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US, France return envoys to Syria to press Assad

Posted by: on: December 7, 2011


Clinton held talks with seven opponents of Assad (AFP/Pool, J. Scott Applewhite)

The United States and France sent their ambassadors back to Syria to champion protesters, demanding that the regime protect the envoys who had been pulled out due to safety fears.

US Ambassador Robert Ford and French Ambassador Eric Chevallier had faced harassment and threats as they shone a light on President Bashar al-Assad’s nine-month crackdown, in which more than 4,000 people are said to have died.

“We believe his presence in the country is among the most effective ways to send the message that the United States stands with the people of Syria,” US State Department spokesman Mark Toner said as the two envoys flew back in.

Ford will seek to provide “reliable reporting on the situation on the ground” and engage “with the full spectrum of Syrian society on how to end the bloodshed and achieve a peaceful political transition,” Toner said.

White House spokesman Jay Carney demanded that Syria uphold international obligations to protect foreign diplomats and allow US officers “to conduct their work free of intimidation or obstacles.”

In Paris, deputy foreign ministry spokesman Romain Nadal said that the concerns that led to Chevallier’s recall have not gone away but that “his work on the ground in Syria is important.”

“France is more than ever at the side of the Syrian people,” Nadal told AFP.

The US and French ambassadors had both traveled in Syria to document protests and show their support, amid official attempts to prevent international media and observers from witnessing the crackdown firsthand.

The United States announced on October 24 that Ford had been brought back to Washington because of “credible threats.” Assad supporters had pelted Ford and the embassy staff with tomatoes and damaged US vehicles as they visited an opposition leader in Damascus.

The French ambassador was recalled on November 16 after mobs loyal to Assad attacked France’s honorary consulate in the northern city of Latakia and the detached chancery in Aleppo.

Toner said the United States “felt there was a sense of urgency” in sending Ford back to Damascus but said that Washington would “keep a close eye” on what it viewed as threats to him, including articles in the state-run press.

In further pressure on Syria, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Tuesday held talks in Geneva with seven opponents of Assad. She called for the protection of women and minorities, a key concern for a future without Assad, as he comes from the minority Alawite sect.

read more -AFP

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Former Israel president Moshe Katsav begins jail term for rape

Posted by: on: December 7, 2011


Former Israel president Moshe Katsav speaks to journalists as he leaves his house in Kiryat Malachi. He accused Israel of "executing" an innocent man. Photograph: AP

The former Israeli president Moshe Katsav has entered a minimum security prison to begin a seven-year sentence for rape.

Katsav, 66, was convicted last December of assaulting a female former employee when he was a cabinet minister and sexually harassing two other women while president, from 2000 to 2007.

The Iranian-born politician, who has repeatedly declared his innocence, remained free while he appealed against his case, but the supreme court upheld the conviction last month and sent him to prison.

TV footage showed him entering the Maasiyahu jail in central Israel, where he became the highest-ranking Israeli official to be imprisoned.

Katsav looked agitated and overwhelmed as he addressed journalists before beginning his sentence. He accused authorities of ignoring evidence that could clear him and claimed “the truth will come to light”.

“The state of Israel is executing a man today on the basis of impressions, without real time testimony, without evidence,” Katsav said. “One day, consciences will prick and you will see that you buried a man alive.”

In the absence of forensic evidence, prosecutors built their case almost entirely on witness testimony. Legal experts said the similarities in the accounts of victims, who did not know one another, prompted the conviction.

Prison officials say Katsav has been placed in a section of the jail reserved for observant Jews and will share a cell with Shlomo Benizri, a former cabinet minister convicted of accepting bribes.

Security around the former president will be heightened – as part of a suicide watch placed on new prisoners and to prevent inmates from harming him. Katsav’s lawyers have expressed concern that the politician might try to injure himself.

The claims against Katsav came to light in 2006 after he told police one of his accusers was trying to extort money from him.

The twists and turns of the case have riveted and appalled the country. Shortly after the accusations came to light, Katsav held a news conference to accuse prosecutors and the media of plotting his demise because he did not belong to the country’s European-descended elite.

Katsav resigned from office two weeks before his term was due to expire under a plea bargain that would have allowed him to escape jail. Instead he rejected the plea bargain and vowed to prove his innocence in court.

He later said he did not regret that decision because it would have meant he confessed to a crime he did not commit.

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Eurozone crisis: Clarke rejects EU power grab call

Posted by: on: December 7, 2011


Mr Clarke warned against "distractions" in the EU talks - BBC

Ken Clarke has warned Tory eurosceptics not to expect powers to be returned from the EU at this week’s summit.

The justice secretary said the prime minister should focus on resolving the eurozone crisis and talk of “wider structures” would be a distraction.

David Cameron has said he will not agree to any EU treaty change “that fails to protect our interests”.

Germany and France are pushing for treaty changes enshrining new budget rules for eurozone members by March.

Mr Clarke, the most pro-European Conservative cabinet minister said in an interview with the Financial Times it would be a distraction to open up discussions about the “wider structures of the union”.

“We’re not going to renegotiate any transfers of powers, in my opinion,” he said.

He said Britain should be prepared to accept “proper” financial regulation from Brussels but he rejected the idea of an EU “Tobin tax” on financial transactions.

“It’s the devil’s own job to collect,” he said, and added that New York and Hong Kong would not follow suit.

read more at BBC

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Russian communists win support as Putin party fades

Posted by: on: December 5, 2011


Just 20 years ago, they seemed consigned to the dustbin of history. At Sunday’s parliamentary polls, Russia’s communists drew students, intellectuals, even some businessmen in forging an opposition to Vladimir Putin’s wounded United Russia party.

The Communist Party (CPRF) for most Russians evokes images of bemedalled war veterans and the elderly poor deprived of pensions and left behind in a “New Russia” of glitzy indulgence. Large swathes of society have appeared beyond the reach of the red flag and hammer and sickle.

Until Sunday.

Not that the Communist Party’s doubling of its vote to about 20 percent presages any imminent assault on power. The memories of repression in the old communist Soviet Union, the labor camps and the regimentation are still too fresh for many. But vote for the Party they did, if perhaps with gritted teeth.

“With sadness I remember how I passionately vowed to my grandfather I would never vote for the Communists,” Yulia Serpikova, 27, a freelance location manager in the film industry, told Reuters. “It’s sad that with the ballot in hand I had to tick the box for them to vote against it all.”

For many Russians disillusioned by rampant corruption and a widening gap between rich and poor, the communists represented the only credible opposition to Putin’s United Russia.

Through all the turmoil of the early 1990s when the Soviet Union collapsed, the party kept a strong national organization based on regions and workplace. With access to official media limited for the opposition, this has been a huge advantage.

Also the communists, ironically, benefited from the votes of some pro-Western liberals who saw little or no hope of kindred parties such as economist Grigory Yavlinsky’s Yabloko clearing the seven percent threshold to enter parliament. Yabloko doubled their vote to 3.3 percent.

The vote for the communists, commanding a support base that guaranteed seats, would reliably count against United Russia. Votes cast for Yabloko, failing at the threshold, would be redistributed to the successful parties, most gallingly United Russia.

“Many people (40 percent) didn’t vote, simply saying there’s no-one to vote for and it’s all decided ahead of time,” said veteran commentator Vladimir Pozner said. “That’s a shame because if more had voted, Yabloko might have got in.”

In the end though Yabloko is too closely associated in the minds of many with the economic and social chaos of the 1990s.

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Assange on mass surveillance: ‘You are all screwed!’

Posted by: on: December 3, 2011


The whistle-blowing website Wikileaks has begun releasing sensational information on the multi billion dollar global spying industry. The database contains hundreds of documents shining a light on the methods being used by secret services all over the world. Here’s the video of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange speaking to journalists and students at a press conference at City University London in central London on December 1, 2011. Along with a number of other guest speakers, Mr Assange spoke of the Wikileaks ongoing investigation of surveillance software companies and their alleged use by governments around the world.

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U.S. jobless rate drops to 2-1/2 year low

Posted by: on: December 3, 2011


The U.S. unemployment rate fell to a 2-1/2 year low in November, even though the pace of hiring remained too slow to suggest a significant quickening of the recovery.

Nonfarm payrolls increased by 120,000 jobs last month, the Labor Department said on Friday, and the jobless rate dropped to 8.6 percent, the lowest since March 2009, from 9.0 percent in October.

It was the biggest monthly decline since January. While part of the decrease was due to people leaving the labor force, the household survey from which the department calculates the unemployment rate also showed solid gains in employment.

“The economy is continuing to head in the right direction,” said Millan Mulraine, senior macro strategist at TD Securities in New York. “However, the ultimate test of the sustainability of the recovery is for the economy to create a sufficient number of jobs to sustain a consumer-led rebound in activity.”

“On this measure, this report falls short,” he said.

Although the gain in the number of jobs created as measured by the survey of employers was relatively modest, it marked a pickup from October’s upwardly revised 100,000 increase.

In all, 72,000 more jobs were created in October and September than previously reported.

The retail sector accounted for more than a third all new private sector jobs in November as shops geared up for a busy holiday season, but average earnings fell two cents.

Data ranging from manufacturing to retail sales suggest the U.S. economy’s growth pace could top 3 percent in the fourth quarter, an acceleration from the third quarter. In contrast, much of the rest of the world is slowing and the euro zone appears to have already fallen into recession.

Stocks on Wall Street opened higher on both the employment report and growing optimism of a solution to the European debt crisis, while prices for U.S. government debt fell. The dollar was little changed against a basket of currencies.

The report could temper the appetite among some Federal Reserve officials to ease monetary policy further.

In forecasts released earlier this month, the Fed said the jobless rate would likely average 9 percent to 9.1 percent in the fourth quarter. It did not expect it to drop to an 8.5 percent to 8.7 percent range until late next year.

via reuters

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Myanmar’s Suu Kyi embraces U.S., with a nod to China

Posted by: on: December 3, 2011


U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton embraces Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi after their meeting at Suu Kyi's residence in Yangon. (Associated Press, Saul Loeb / December 2, 2011)

Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi welcomes U.S. support, but she also underscores the importance of China to her country’s future.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi pledged on Friday to work together to bring democracy in the country.

Wrapping up a historic three-day visit to Myanmar, Ms. Clinton held hands with Ms. Suu Kyi on the porch of the Nobel Peace Prize laureate’s lakeside home where she spent much of the past two decades under house arrest and thanked her for her “steadfast and very clear leadership.” The meeting was the second in as many days for the pair, after a private one-on-one dinner in Yangon on Thursday.

“You have been an inspiration but I know that you feel you are standing for all the people of your country who deserve the same rights and freedoms as people everywhere,” Ms. Clinton told Ms. Suu Kyi. “The people have been courageous and strong in the face of great difficulty over too many years. We want to see this country take its rightful place in the world.”

Ms. Suu Kyi has welcomed Ms. Clinton’s visit and tentatively embraced reforms enacted by Myanmar’s new civilian government. She thanked the secretary and U.S. President Barack Obama for their “careful and calibrated” engagement that has seen the U.S. take some modest steps to improve ties.

“We are happy with the way in which the United States is engaging with us,” she said. “It is through engagement that we hope to promote the process of democratization. Because of this engagement, I think our way ahead will be clearer and we will be able to trust that the process of democratization will go forward.”

As she did in the capital of Naypyidaw on Thursday, Clinton said more significant incentives will be offered but only if the government releases all political prisoners, ends brutal campaigns against ethnic minorities, respects the rule of law and improves human rights conditions.

Ms. Suu Kyi, whose National League for Democracy party won 1990 elections that were ignored by the then-military junta but now plans to run in upcoming parliamentary elections, endorsed that approach and called for the immediate release of all political prisoners and cease-fires to end the ethnic conflicts.

“If we move forward together I am confident there will be no turning back on the road to democracy,” Ms. Suu Kyi said, referring to her party, the government, the United States and other countries. “We are not on that road yet, but we hope to get there as soon as possible with the help and understanding of our friends.”

Ms. Suu Kyi, a heroine for pro-democracy advocates around the world, said Ms. Clinton’s visit, the first by a U.S. secretary of state to Myanmar in more than half a century, represented “a historical moment for both our countries.”

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Pakistanis told to fire back at US

Posted by: on: December 3, 2011


Pakistani protesters burn a U.S. flag during an anti-Nato rally in Peshawar, Pakistan Photo: AP Photo/Mohammad Sajjad

Pakistan’s top military commander has ordered the country’s troops to return fire should they come under attack again from U.S.-led coalition forces, a move that’s likely to increase tensions after an American-led air raid on two border outposts last week killed 24 Pakistani soldiers.

Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, Pakistan’s army chief, issued the order in a letter Thursday that set out the rules of engagement against any “aggressor.”

The new orders came as Pakistan and U.S. officials continued to trade conflicting accounts of what happened in the incident, which American officials say came after a joint U.S.-Afghan unit took fire from the Pakistani side of the border but which Pakistani officials say was unprovoked. No American or Afghan casualties were reported in the incident, which now is thought to have occurred shortly after midnight Nov. 26.

The Pentagon said Pakistan has refused to participate in the U.S. investigation of the bombing. Defense Department spokesman George Little said the U.S. has asked Pakistan to be part of the investigation, but that the Pakistanis have “elected to date” to not participate.

Little refers to the bombing as a “bump in the road” for U.S.-Pakistani counterterrorism cooperation.

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Wikileaks reveals mass surveillance of mobile devices

Posted by: on: December 2, 2011


Wikileaks Founder Julian Assange has warned, “You’re all screwed,” when it comes to smartphone and gadget monitoring and surveillance.

Users of the Iphone, Blackberry and Gmail are among those who are supposedly ‘screwed’ because more than 150 organisations can monitor data on mobile devices. Assange made the statement at a press conference while unveiling the Wikileaks ‘Spy Files’ project.

Wikileaks said, “Mass interception of entire populations is not only a reality, it is a secret new industry spanning 25 countries.”

“It sounds like something out of Hollywood, but as of today, mass interception systems, built by Western intelligence contractors, including for ‘political opponents’ are a reality.”

Assange said, “Who here has an iPhone? Who here has a BlackBerry? Who here uses Gmail? Well, you’re all screwed.”

“The reality is, intelligence contractors are selling right now to countries across the world mass surveillance systems for all those products.”

The organisations apparently have the ability to track devices, intercept messages and listen to phone calls, according to The Press Association.

It might sound like a complete invasion of privacy but the goings on are legal according to Assange and are leading to a “totalitarian surveillance state”.

He said the US, UK, Australia, South Africa and Canada are all developing “spying systems”, and the data is collected and sold on to “dictators and democracies alike”.

The publication of the ‘Spy Files’ consisting of 287 documents in collaboration with the web site spyfiles.org is a “mass attack on this mass surveillance industry,” added Assange. µ

Source: The Inquirer

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The war against Iran’s nuclear program

Posted by: on: December 2, 2011


The war is under way, though no one declared it and no one will confirm it. This is the secret war against Iran’s nuclear project. It did not start this week or last month. It has been under way for years, but only faint echoes have reached the public.

In June 2010, the press reported that the computer system operating the uranium enrichment centrifuges at Natanz had been infected with a virus. A deadly worm, known as Stuxnet, had infiltrated the controllers, manufactured by Siemens.

Two weeks ago, a huge blast ripped through a Revolutionary Guards military base 40 kilometers west of Tehran. The explosion could be heard as far away as the capital. Dozens of people were killed, including the head of Iran’s missile development project, General Hassan Tehrani Moqaddam. This week, there was a powerful explosion in Isfahan, Iran’s third-largest city, which has a uranium conversion plant on its outskirts. It is not yet clear what was damaged in the blast.

These incidents involved three key elements of Iran’s nuclear program. The first is uranium conversion (which comes after the mineral has been mined ), the second is enrichment, and the third is the delivery means.

Coupled with other incidents, including the assassination of several Iranian nuclear scientists, these events have worried the ayatollahs’ regime, causing reactions ranging from embarrassment to anger. The public response usually follows a pattern: first a sweeping denial, then a limp and stuttering admission that “something happened,” and finally the claim that it was an “accident.” This shows that the regime does not know exactly what to say, and that its voice is not uniform. It also reflects the fierce dispute within the regime’s top ranks. The leadership is divided, and the reactions come from a range of ministries, rival organizations and competing media outlets.

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Spy Files: WikiLeaks exposes dark secrets of surveillance

Posted by: on: December 2, 2011


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Europe Stocks Slip After ECB Draghi’s Cautious Comments – WSJ

Posted by: on: December 1, 2011


European Central Bank President - Mario Draghi

European stocks fell and the euro slipped against the dollar after comments by European Central Bank President Mario Draghi were laced with caution, tempering the positive sentiment following Wednesday’s coordinated liquidity moves by central banks.

Draghi, speaking to the European parliament on the joint measures by banks, warned that downside risks to the economic outlook have increased and he also cautioned that dysfunctional government bond markets in several euro-area countries are hampering single monetary policy. In addition, the ECB’s president said the central bank’s bond purchases can only be limited.

Newedge economist Annalisa Piazza said, “The ECB stands ready to act to face the current challenges, both with standard and non-standard measures. However, Draghi said the importance of the creation of a commonly shared fiscal consolidation. In a nutshell, we see the ECB to continue to provide support in the direction of reducing the current imbalances. However, its independence is re-affirmed.”

By 0910 GMT, the Stoxx Europe 600 index was down 0.7% at 238.40. This follows a gain of 3.6% on Wednesday, the biggest percentage gain since Aug. 12. London’s FTSE 100 fell 0.3% to 5489.11, Frankfurt’s DAX declined 0.8% to 6041.70 and Paris’s CAC-40 was 0.9% lower at 3125.85.

Cyclical stocks were leading the declines, with investors taking advantage of the strong gains in the previous session and taking profits. The Stoxx Europe 600 construction and materials sector was down 1.6%, the basic resources index was 1.4% lower and the insurance index was down 1.3%. Cyclical sectors, which are sensitive to the economy, all rose strongly on Wednesday after the Federal Reserve, the Bank of Canada, the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank and the Swiss National Bank agreed to lower the pricing on existing temporary U.S. dollar liquidity swap arrangements by 50 basis points.

However, despite the action, the underlying issues affecting the European sovereign debt crisis remain unsolved. Indeed, Goldman Sachs said in the near term, it expects European equity markets to fall further as recession is priced in and earnings downgrades accelerate. The investment bank announced a more defensive stance in its portfolio, downgrading the banking, industrial goods and services, basic resources, food and beverages, and autos sectors. It upgraded technology and health care.

Meanwhile, euro-zone purchasing managers index manufacturing data were in line with expectations, confirmed at 46.4 in November. The index is at its lowest level since June 2009 but still 13 points higher than its record low. The data had little bearing on markets.

Earlier, Asian stock markets surged Thursday following the moves by major central banks Wednesday to lower dollar funding costs for European banks and after the People’s Bank of China cut its reserve requirement ratio for the first time in over three years.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index advanced 5.6%, while China’s Shanghai Composite advanced 2.3%. Japan’s Nikkei Stock Average rose 1.9%, Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 climbed 1.9%, and South Korea’s Kospi Composite jumped 2.3%.

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Obama Refrains From a Formal ‘I’m Sorry’ to Pakistan

Posted by: on: December 1, 2011


Pakistanis in Karachi on Wednesday protested the NATO airstrikes that killed two dozen Pakistani soldiers last week. Asif Hassan/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

The White House has decided that President Obama will not offer formal condolences — at least for now — to Pakistan for the deaths of two dozen soldiers in NATOairstrikes last week, overruling State Department officials who argued for such a show of remorse to help salvage America’s relationship with Pakistan, administration officials said.

On Monday, Cameron Munter, the United States ambassador to Pakistan, told a group of White House officials that a formal video statement from Mr. Obama was needed to help prevent the rapidly deteriorating relations between Islamabad and Washington from cratering, administration officials said. The ambassador, speaking by videoconference from Islamabad, said that anger in Pakistan had reached a fever pitch, and that the United States needed to move to defuse it as quickly as possible, the officials recounted.

Defense Department officials balked. While they did not deny some American culpability in the episode, they said expressions of remorse offered by senior department officials and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton were enough, at least until the completion of a United States military investigation establishing what went wrong.

Some administration aides also worried that if Mr. Obama were to overrule the military and apologize to Pakistan, such a step could become fodder for his Republican opponents in the presidential campaign, according to several officials who declined to be named because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

On Wednesday, White House officials said Mr. Obama was unlikely to say anything further on the matter in the coming days. via NY times

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Hillary Clinton lands in Myanmar espousing hope for change

Posted by: on: December 1, 2011


U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton shakes hands with Myanmar's President Thein Sein during a meeting at the president's office in Naypyitaw on Dec. 1, 2011. Damir Sagolj/Reuters

Saying she hopes to support “a movement for change,” U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived Wednesday in Myanmar on a landmark visit that will see her meet leaders of the current military-backed pariah government, as well as opposition icon Aung San Suu Kyi.

Though the trip marks the first visit by a U.S. secretary of state since John Foster Dulles in 1955, the fanfare upon Ms. Clinton’s arrival was minimal. She was greeted at the airport in Naypyidaw by a deputy foreign minister – and two large signs welcoming the capital’s next visitor, the Prime Minister of fellow international outcast Belarus.

A year ago, the United States led a chorus dismissing the first elections in the former Burma since 1990 as a sham aimed to perpetuate military control over the country. The results of the heavily manipulated vote seemed to support that conclusion – a parliament dominated by military officers, and a new “civilian” President who was one of the top figures in the outgoing junta.

But that general-turned-president, Thein Sein, has moulded cynicism into hope with a series of rapid reforms that have stunned the country after five decades of direct military rule. Now, even Ms. Suu Kyi – who was under house arrest while her party boycotted the November, 2010, election – seems to be among the converts. After a private meeting in August with Mr. Thein Sein, she agreed to rejoin the political process and is expected to run as a candidate in parliamentary by-elections scheduled for early next year.

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Britain evacuates embassy staff from Iran

Posted by: on: November 30, 2011


Britain set in motion the withdrawal of some diplomatic staff and families from Tehran on Wednesday as Iran’s parliament speaker blamed Britain’s “domination-seeking” policies for the storming of British compounds by hard-line Iranian protesters the day before.

Norway, meanwhile, closed its embassy in Tehran due to security concerns after Tuesday’s assault on the British Embassy and a residential complex. Mobs hauled down British flags and ransacked offices in retaliation for Britain’s support of tighter sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program.

Protestors remove the flag of the British embassy in Tehran on November 29, 2011. Iranian protesters stormed two British Embassy compounds in Tehran on Tuesday, smashing windows, hurling petrol bombs and burning the British flag in a protest against sanctions imposed by Britain, live Iranian television showed.   Reuters

In London, the Foreign Office said some diplomatic staff and dependents would leave Iran. But it declined to say how many people were being removed or give other details.

“Ensuring the safety of our staff and their families is our immediate priority,” said the statement. It noted some diplomatic work is ongoing, though the embassy is officially closed.

The Iranian government has expressed regret about “unacceptable behavior” of protesters, whose attacks began after anti-British demonstrations apparently authorized by authorities.

But Iran’s Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani said that the “wrath of (students) resulted from several decades of domination-seeking behavior of Britain.”

Larijani — addressing an open session of parliament Wednesday — also called the U.N. Security Council’s condemnation of the embassy attack a “hasty move.”

Larijani’s comments reflect the deepening diplomatic crisis between Iran and Britain, whose relations have in the past gone through periods of upheavals. On Sunday, Iran’s parliament approved a bill to downgrade relations with Britain, one of America’s closest allies with diplomatic envoys in the Islamic Republic.

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North Korea claims progress in uranium enrichment

Posted by: on: November 30, 2011


North Korean leader Kim Jong-il Photo:AP

An unidentified spokesman at Pyongyang’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the construction of an experimental light-water reactor and low enriched uranium are “progressing apace”.

The statement, carried by the official Korean Central News Agency, said that North Korea has a sovereign right to the peaceful use of nuclear energy and that “neither concession nor compromise should be allowed”.

Concerns about North Korea’s atomic capability took on renewed urgency in November 2010 when the country disclosed a uranium enrichment facility that could give it a second route to manufacture nuclear weapons, in addition to its existing plutonium-based programme.

North Korea has been building a light-water reactor at its main Yongbyon nuclear complex since last year. Such a reactor is ostensibly for civilian energy purposes, but it would give the North a reason to enrich uranium. At low levels, uranium can be used in power reactors, but at higher levels it can be used in nuclear bombs.

Earlier this month, North Korean state media said “the day is near at hand” when the reactor will come into operation. Washington worries about reported progress on the reactor construction, saying it would violate U.N. Security Council resolutions.

via the telegraph

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Euro in danger, Europe races for debt solution

Posted by: on: November 29, 2011


A man checks stock indexes on a screen of a bank in Milan, Italy, Monday, Nov. 28, Photo By Luca Bruno, 16 hrs ago. AP

European leaders rushed Monday to stop a rampaging debt crisis that threatened to shatter their 12-year-old experiment in a common currency and devastate the world economy as a result.

One proposal gaining prominence would have countries cede some control over their budgets to a central European authority. In a measure of how rapidly the peril has grown, that idea would have been unthinkable even three months ago.

World stock markets, glimpsing hope that Europe might finally be shocked into stronger action, staged a big rally. The Dow Jones industrial average in New York rose almost 300 points. In France, stocks rose 5 percent, the most in a month.

More relevant to the crisis, borrowing costs for European nations stabilized. They had risen alarmingly in recent weeks — in Greece, then in Italy and Spain, then across the continent, including in Germany, the strongest economy in Europe.

The yields on benchmark bonds issued by Italy and Germany rose, but only by hundredths of a percentage point. The yield fell 0.1 percentage point on bonds of France, 0.14 points for those of Spain and 0.22 points for Belgium.

Allowing a central European authority to have some control over the budgets of sovereign nations would create a fiscal union in Europe in addition to the monetary union of the 17 countries that share the euro currency.

Some analysts have said that would be a leap toward creating a United States of Europe. More delicately, it would force the nations of Europe to swallow their national pride, cede some sovereignty and agree to strengthen ties with their neighbors rather than fleeing the euro union during the crisis.

The common currency has the problem that the monetary policy is joint, but the fiscal policy is not,” Germany’s finance minister, Wolfgang Schaeuble, said in a meeting with foreign reporters in Berlin.

The monetary union has existed since the euro was created in 1999, but the European Union, which includes the 17 euro nations and 10 others that use their own currencies, has no central authority over taxing and spending.

Countries like Ireland, Portugal, Spain, Greece and Italy overspent wildly for years and racked up annual budget deficits that have left them with monstrous debt. Italy holds €1.9 trillion in debt, or 120 percent of the size of its economy.

via AP.

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WikiLeaks Julian Assage wins Australian journalism award

Posted by: on: November 28, 2011


WikiLeaks has been recognised in Australia for its “outstanding contribution to journalism”, with founder Julian Assange lashing out at “cowardly” Prime Minister Julia Gillard in an acceptance speech.

The anti-secrecy website was lauded at the annual Walkley Awards, where winners are chosen by an independent panel of journalists and photographers, for its courageous reporting of secret US cables.

“WikiLeaks applied new technology to penetrate the inner workings of government to reveal an avalanche of inconvenient truths in a global publishing coup,” the Walkley trustees said in bestowing the award Sunday evening.

“Its revelations, from the way the war on terror was being waged, to diplomatic bastardry, high-level horse-trading and the interference in the domestic affairs of nations, have had an undeniable impact.”

The whistleblowing website has published thousands of cables in which US diplomats give their often candid views on world leaders, to Washington’s acute embarrassment.

Assange, an Australian citizen who has previously blasted Canberra for not doing enough to protect him in the fallout from the leaks, was scathing of the government in accepting the accolade in a pre-recorded video message.

“The Gillard government has shown its true colours in relation to how it?s handled US pressure on WikiLeaks,” he said in footage shown on SBS television which broadcast the awards.

via AFP.

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Barack Obama hosts EU leaders

Posted by: on: November 28, 2011


President Barack Obama is hosting European Union leaders for a summit Monday that is likely to focus on the European debt crisis.

Obama will meet at the White House with European Council President Herman Van Rompuy, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton.

The Obama administration is watching warily as European countries struggle to bolster confidence in the euro currency. The crisis has seen smaller eurozone nations Greece, Portugal and Ireland bailed out and is now threatening much bigger economies, such as Italy and Spain.

The Obama administration has expressed concerns that the crisis could damage the U.S. economy.

via AP.

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Vladmir Putin tells stop meddling to West

Posted by: on: November 28, 2011


Vladimir Putin yesterday issued a blunt warning to the West not to interfere in Russia’s forthcoming elections.

Mr Putin accused Western countries, including Britain, of meddling by giving financial grants to Russian democracy and human rights groups, and by sending observers to monitor elections.

He branded Russians who accept such grants as “Judases”, adding: “It would be better if [Western countries] used this money to pay off their national debt and stop conducting an ineffective and costly foreign policy.”

Mr Putin, 59, made the remarks at a rally in which he accepted the nomination to represent his United Russia party as its presidential candidate in March. Dmitry Medvedev, the current president, is expected to swap jobs with him as prime minister.

Mr Putin’s enemies insist his party is full of corrupt bureaucrats, and claim ballot-rigging has already begun for the parliamentary elections next Sunday. – Daily Mail

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Gaddafi son needs surgery on gangrenous fingers – doctor

Posted by: on: November 25, 2011


By Christian Lowe and Ayman al-Sahli - Reuters

Saif al-Islam has been nursing injuries to his right hand which he says were sustained during a NATO airstrike weeks ago. No further details have been available on the state of his heavily bandaged thumb, index and middle fingers.

“This wound is not in good condition and requires amputation,” Andrei Murakhovsky, a Ukraine-born doctor working in Zintan, the town where Saif al-Islam is being held, and who treated him three days ago told Reuters.

“The wound is covered with gangrenous tissue and necrotic tissue,” Murakhovsky added.

Fighters from Libya’s Western Mountains captured Saif al-Islam in the southern desert on Saturday and flew him to their stronghold town of Zintan, where he is being held pending a handover to the country’s provisional government.

Saif al-Islam’s middle finger did not require surgery but the two other bandaged digits had been severed and were weeping pus, said Murakhovsky, who was interviewed by Reuters television in English and later by telephone in Russian.

“His index finger has been ripped off at the level of the middle phalange (finger bone), the bones are all shattered … It’s the same thing with the thumb of that hand,” he said.

When a picture of Saif al-Islam’s bandaged hand was aired, many Libyans thought his captors had cut off his fingers in retribution for televised remarks in which he threatened anti-Gaddafi rebels, pointing and making other hand gestures.

read more at reuters

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Obama joins Google+

Posted by: on: November 25, 2011


Click here to go to Obama for America on Google+

Google+, the Internet search giant’s rival to Facebook, has a high-profile new member: US President Barack Obama.
“Obama for America,” the president’s 2012 reelection campaign, created an official Barack Obama page on Google+ on Wednesday.
We’re still kicking the tires and figuring this out, so let us know what you’d like to see here and your ideas for how we can use this space to help you stay connected to the campaign,” it said in its first message. Last month, Obama added popular microblogging platform Tumblr to the Internet arsenal for his White House campaign. During his 2008 presidential run, Obama relied heavily on the Internet for organising, fundraising and communicating and he is expected to do so again during his reelection bid. The White House is an active user of Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Foursquare and other online services.

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Malaysia to set up 4,000 WiFi villages by 2012

Posted by: on: November 23, 2011


Information, Communications and Culture Minister, Datuk Seri Dr. Rais Yatim

By the end of 2012, about 4000 WiFi villages will be set up nationwide as part of the Government’s initiative to bring the benefits of broadband to the citizens.

According to Information, Communications and Culture Minister, Datuk Seri Dr. Rais Yatim, at present there are only about 1,400 WiFi villages in the country and are mostly found in Perlis, Sabah, and Sarawak.

“We are in the process of building electronic towers in Sabah and Sarawak, therefore our big enrolment drive to create Malaysia as an internet community is there now,” he said.

The average cost of the project for each village is about RM25,000 (USD 7,800) to RM 32,000 (USD 10,000). The villages would be provided with the normal computerising system with broadband facility which will be free of charge for the first three months, while a minimum of RM10 (USD 3) per month would be charged subsequently.

The WiFi village project is an important component in helping the Government realise its objective of becoming a high-income and high skilled nation driven by innovation and a knowledgeable society.

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Obama keeps pressure on Congress for deficit deal

Posted by: on: November 22, 2011


Targeting Republicans in Congress and on the presidential campaign trail, President Barack Obama is in New Hampshire, a political battleground, to begin a year-end push to extend payroll tax cuts.

U.S. President Barack Obama says he will veto any effort to undo automatic spending cuts that would kick in in 2013. (Evan Vucci/Associated Press)

During a speech Tuesday at a high school, the president was to argue that a failure to extend the tax breaks would hurt middle-class families already struggling amid a shaky economy, effectively daring congressional Republicans to block a measure and thus increase taxes.

“If we don’t act, taxes will go up for every single American, starting next year. And I’m not about to let that happen,” Obama said Monday, previewing the message he was expected to deliver.

The White House says a middle-class family making $50,000 a year would see its taxes rise by $1,000 if the payroll tax cuts are not extended.

Earlier, supercommittee co-chairs Patty Murray, a Democratic senator from Washington, and Jeb Hensarling, a Republican House representative from Texas, said despite “intense deliberations” the members of the panel had been unable “to bridge the committee’s significant differences.

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India Starts Key Session

Posted by: on: November 22, 2011


Raveendran/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images Parliament House in New Delhi.

India’s Parliament meets for four weeks starting Tuesday in what could be the most important legislative session of the government’s five-year term.

Having struggled for more than a year against widespread allegations of corruption and criticism that its policy machine has developed paralysis even as economic growth slows sharply, the Congress party-led government is looking to counter both critiques: Its agenda for Parliament’s “winter session,” to end Dec. 21, includes a bill creating an anticorruption ombudsman’s office to oversee senior bureaucrats and politicians, a national food-security bill and a bill that could allow foreign participation in managing India’s old-age pensions.

The government’s credibility has been weakening; it is imperative for the government to assert its image,” said Mridula Mukherjee, professor at New Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University. “The winter session will test whether the Congress party-led alliance can recover ground and move forward.

read more at WSJ

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Vladimir Putin booed at Moscow martial arts fight

Posted by: on: November 22, 2011


The boos and whistles that greeted the Russian prime minister when he stepped into the ring and took the microphone at a martial arts event in Moscow on Sunday may have given him a shock.

They come amid a sense of fatigue with Putin in the run-up to the March presidential election which is almost certain to give him at least six more years as Kremlin leader.

In video footage posted on the Internet, fans can be heard shouting and whistling as Putin is handed the microphone in the ring of Olympiysky Stadium. Allowing just a blink of bewilderment as he peers around the stadium, Putin presses on to congratulate fighter Fyodor Yemelyanenko’s victory over an American rival. One fan screams “leave” as Putin speaks.

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