NEW YORK (Reuters) – Americans are on track to give more for Haiti than the 2004 Asian tsunami despite a struggling economy, but the earthquake has left some companies wondering how they can do more than write checks, experts said on Wednesday.

Two weeks after a magnitude 7 earthquake devastated Haiti’s capital of Port-au-Prince, killing as many as 200,000 people, Americans have donated some $519 million, The Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University said.

Patrick Rooney, the center’s executive director, said Americans were on track to beat the $1.92 billion raised in 2005 after a tsunami killed 226,000 people, mainly in Indonesia, India, Thailand, Sri Lanka and the Maldives.

“It seems like the economy is not having a big impact on giving,” Rooney told Reuters. “It’s a fairly remarkable philanthropic response.”

NEW YORK, Jan 27 (Reuters) – Americans are on track to give more for Haiti than the 2004 Asian tsunami despite a struggling economy, but the earthquake has left some companies wondering how they can do more than write checks, experts said on Wednesday. Two weeks after a magnitude 7 earthquake devastated Haiti’s capital of Port-au-Prince, killing as many as 200,000 people, Americans have donated some $519 million, The Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University said. Patrick Rooney, the center’s executive director, said Americans were on track to beat the $1.92 billion raised in 2005 after a tsunami killed 226,000 people, mainly in Indonesia, India, Thailand, Sri Lanka and the Maldives. "It seems like the economy is not having a big impact on giving," Rooney told Reuters. "It’s a fairly remarkable philanthropic response." But he said the Haiti fund-raising was unlikely to match the $2.8 billion given following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States or the $6.47 billion donated after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit the U.S. Gulf Coast in 2005. Rooney said the median gift given after the Asian tsunami, the Gulf Coast hurricanes and the Sept. 11 attacks was $50. "We don’t think people are doing a massive reallocation of their consumption or their philanthropy," he said. "Rather they are digging in a little bit deeper and they might be giving up going out for dinner or drinks one night instead." Of the money donated so far for Haiti, $122 million has come from U.S. companies, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Business Civic Leadership Center. It is currently the third largest U.S. business disaster response, said the center, behind the $566 million raised for the tsunami and the $1.08 billion given after the hurricanes. COMPANIES SEEK NEW WAYS TO HELP Stephen Jordan, senior vice president and executive director of the Business Civic Leadership Center, said that much of the business response to Haiti was employee-driven. "Because there isn’t really a customer presence in Haiti, a lot of this is employee motivated, the employees just expect companies to be a part of the response," Jordan told Reuters. "Compared to (the 2008 earthquake in) China, where you had every company and its brother with an interest in China, some years the American Chamber (of Commerce) in Haiti doesn’t have enough members to even keep operating," he said. Jordan said companies were eager to find ways of responding beyond just giving money. "What we are really seeing here is a renewed determination to improve the disaster response process because it can’t continue to be about throwing money out the door," he said. Companies are frustrated at seeing problems in areas such as telecommunications or delivery of aid that they could help with if a better coordination system were in place, Jordan said. Edith Falk, chairwoman of the Giving USA Foundation, which promotes philanthropy, said it appeared that Americans were donating to a wider range of groups than during previous disasters and that text messaging could extend fund-raising by keeping mobile phone users aware of the disaster. Some $30 million has already been raised for Haiti through donations by mobile phone users made by text messages. "Disasters like this really bring out the best in people," she said. "Wouldn’t it be great if people would give at this level on a regular basis because the needs are so great in so many different parts of the world?" (Editing by Mark Egan and Xavier Briand)

NEW YORK, Jan 27 (Reuters) – Americans are on track to give more for Haiti than the 2004 Asian tsunami despite a struggling economy, but the earthquake has left some companies wondering how they can do more than write checks, experts said on Wednesday. Two weeks after a magnitude 7 earthquake devastated Haiti’s capital of Port-au-Prince, killing as many as 200,000 people, Americans have donated some $519 million, The Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University said. Patrick Rooney, the center’s executive director, said Americans were on track to beat the $1.92 billion raised in 2005 after a tsunami killed 226,000 people, mainly in Indonesia, India, Thailand, Sri Lanka and the Maldives. "It seems like the economy is not having a big impact on giving," Rooney told Reuters. "It’s a fairly remarkable philanthropic response." But he said the Haiti fund-raising was unlikely to match the $2.8 billion given following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States or the $6.47 billion donated after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit the U.S. Gulf Coast in 2005. Rooney said the median gift given after the Asian tsunami, the Gulf Coast hurricanes and the Sept. 11 attacks was $50. "We don’t think people are doing a massive reallocation of their consumption or their philanthropy," he said. "Rather they are digging in a little bit deeper and they might be giving up going out for dinner or drinks one night instead." Of the money donated so far for Haiti, $122 million has come from U.S. companies, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Business Civic Leadership Center. It is currently the third largest U.S. business disaster response, said the center, behind the $566 million raised for the tsunami and the $1.08 billion given after the hurricanes. COMPANIES SEEK NEW WAYS TO HELP Stephen Jordan, senior vice president and executive director of the Business Civic Leadership Center, said that much of the business response to Haiti was employee-driven. "Because there isn’t really a customer presence in Haiti, a lot of this is employee motivated, the employees just expect companies to be a part of the response," Jordan told Reuters. "Compared to (the 2008 earthquake in) China, where you had every company and its brother with an interest in China, some years the American Chamber (of Commerce) in Haiti doesn’t have enough members to even keep operating," he said. Jordan said companies were eager to find ways of responding beyond just giving money. "What we are really seeing here is a renewed determination to improve the disaster response process because it can’t continue to be about throwing money out the door," he said. Companies are frustrated at seeing problems in areas such as telecommunications or delivery of aid that they could help with if a better coordination system were in place, Jordan said. Edith Falk, chairwoman of the Giving USA Foundation, which promotes philanthropy, said it appeared that Americans were donating to a wider range of groups than during previous disasters and that text messaging could extend fund-raising by keeping mobile phone users aware of the disaster. Some $30 million has already been raised for Haiti through donations by mobile phone users made by text messages. "Disasters like this really bring out the best in people," she said. "Wouldn’t it be great if people would give at this level on a regular basis because the needs are so great in so many different parts of the world?" (Editing by Mark Egan and Xavier Briand)

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Former U.S. President Bill Clinton’s philanthropic summit was the most popular venue for chief executives in 2009, with the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, tumbling to No. 4 from the top spot, a survey found on Monday.

Davos, due to start on Wednesday, suffered as executives at some of the world’s most admired multinational companies chose to speak at U.S. forums during last year’s recession, the study by public relations firm Weber Shandwick found.

The fifth Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), held every September in New York, narrowly edged out the Chief Executives Club of Boston in the “Five-Star Conference” study with the Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council coming in at No. 3.

Experts said Clinton had an unrivaled mix of power and celebrity that pushed his annual summit, which coincides with the United Nations General Assembly in New York, to the top of chief executives’ speaking agendas.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Former U.S. President Bill Clinton’s philanthropic summit was the most popular venue for chief executives in 2009, with the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, tumbling to No. 4 from the top spot, a survey found on Monday.

Davos, due to start on Wednesday, suffered as executives at some of the world’s most admired multinational companies chose to speak at U.S. forums during last year’s recession, the study by public relations firm Weber Shandwick found.

The fifth Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), held every September in New York, narrowly edged out the Chief Executives Club of Boston in the “Five-Star Conference” study with the Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council coming in at No. 3.

Experts said Clinton had an unrivaled mix of power and celebrity that pushed his annual summit, which coincides with the United Nations General Assembly in New York, to the top of chief executives’ speaking agendas.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Former U.S. President Bill Clinton’s philanthropic summit was the most popular venue for chief executives in 2009, with the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, tumbling to No. 4 from the top spot, a survey found on Monday.

Davos, due to start on Wednesday, suffered as executives at some of the world’s most admired multinational companies chose to speak at U.S. forums during last year’s recession, the study by public relations firm Weber Shandwick found.

The fifth Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), held every September in New York, narrowly edged out the Chief Executives Club of Boston in the “Five-Star Conference” study with the Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council coming in at No. 3.

Experts said Clinton had an unrivaled mix of power and celebrity that pushed his annual summit, which coincides with the United Nations General Assembly in New York, to the top of chief executives’ speaking agendas.

NEW YORK, Jan 22 (Reuters) – Mining companies are urging resource-rich Australia to quickly consider any industry tax changes, Resources and Energy Minister Martin Ferguson said on Friday after speculation sparked a fall in mining stocks.

Treasury chief Ken Henry has recommended scrapping state royalty taxes on mining projects and replacing them with a national resource rent tax, injecting billions of extra dollars into government coffers, a newspaper reported on Thursday.

The speculation saw Australian mining stocks slide faster than the wider market on Thursday as investors fled on fears the new tax would cut profits, compounded by a drop in metals prices.

During a visit to New York to promote Australia, Ferguson told Reuters that resources, mining and financial companies were telling him to “just get these matters resolved, we cannot have this ongoing speculation.”

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The United States has won convictions in 89 percent of cases involving terrorism charges brought since the September 11, 2001 attacks, a study by New York University’s Center on Law and Security found on Wednesday.

With the self-professed September 11 mastermind and four accused accomplices due to be tried in New York, the report found the federal courts provided a “a strong and effective system of justice for alleged crimes of terrorism.”

The Center on Law and Security reviewed 828 prosecutions that made up 337 cases against 804 people for its “Terrorist Trial Report Card: September 11, 2001 – September 11, 2009.”

“While we can only assess the cases that have been brought, federal prosecution has demonstrably become a powerful tool in many hundreds of cases, not only for incapacitating terrorists but also for intelligence gathering,” wrote the Center’s Executive Director Karen Greenberg.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Communities devastated by the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami have “built back better” and lessons were learned for future disaster recovery, said Bill Clinton, who served as U.N. special envoy for tsunami rebuilding.

The former U.S. president told Reuters that quickly rebuilding permanent homes was the biggest challenge after the December 26, 2004 tsunami that killed around 226,000 people, mainly in Indonesia, India, Thailand, Sri Lanka and the Maldives.

He recalled visiting an Indonesian camp housing survivors well after the magnitude 9.15 undersea earthquake struck off the coast and triggered the huge tsunami that killed 166,000 people alone in the country’s Aceh province.

“People were still living in tents and they were very hot and very uncomfortable, several months after we thought they would be in permanent housing,” he said. “That’s the thing that I felt worst about.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration is creating impunity for senior officials of former President George W. Bush accused of authorizing torture, the American Civil Liberties Union said on Thursday.

As Obama accepted the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, the ACLU, which has pursued nearly a dozen cases against the U.S. government since 2003 related to prisoner abuse, accused him of failing to provide accountability on torture.

“We’re increasingly disappointed and alarmed by the current administration’s stance on accountability for torture,” said ACLU National Security Project Director Jameel Jaffer. “The administration is actively obstructing accountability.”

Obama said in April that CIA interrogators who had used waterboarding — a form of simulated drowning — on suspected militants will not face prosecution and he released Bush-era memos specifying that the practice did not constitute torture.