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JJackson
04-30-2008, 07:28 PM
There is a rather nasty diplomatic problem developing (well developed really) in Indonesia regarding the renewal of the memorandum of understanding (MoU) between the US Navy and the Indonesian government concerning the operation of the Naval Medical Research Unit in Jakarta. I have been trying to find a copy of the existing MoU or any information regarding the rather odd diplomatic and financial arrangements these labs operate under.
If anyone has any thoughts ...
Thanks JJ

davidbfpo
04-30-2008, 08:18 PM
Intrigued by this story, nineteen staff working in Jakarta, been there thirty eight years and currently working on bird flu. So a quick Google found news reports aplenty and for others read on: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2008/04/29/house-calls-inquiry-us-lab.html

Even more puzzling is on thiswebsite blog: http://www.zonegrippeaviaire.com/showthread.php?t=75&page=14

All very odd and sorry does not fully answer why the row started.

davidbfpo

JJackson
04-30-2008, 08:50 PM
David thanks for the quick comeback. I am a moderator on another site, like this one, but its focus is bird flu. The distrust of the US's motives and its generally poor standing in the Muslim world led to accusations of spying and even NAMRU-2 being a biological weapons lab. This is becoming quite nasty with US Sec Levitt, the Indonesian President and Health minister all now pouring fuel on the fire. We are lucky to have a team of posters who scan and machine translate press from around the world, on health issues, and now have an Indonesian member explaining how it is playing out on the ground. There are other NAMRUs and AFRIMS and I fear the resentment may spread to NAMRU-3 in Egypt once they become aware of NAMRU-2's expulsion. What I can not find is this MoU around which the immediate argument revolves. The larger disagreement involves Big-Pharma, Intellectual property rights, Material Transfer Agreements, US reciprocity and much else.
There are hundreds of post on the subject some of which can be found in this thread.
http://www.flutrackers.com/forum/showthread.php?t=66225&page=2