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Friday, March 27, 2009

(ZaViews Editorial *****every friday*****) Sarkozy or Putin? By Ayesha Siddiqa

President Zardari is a hard man to pin down

Why couldn’t we see our president, like Nicolas Sarkozy, as someone who was well-meaning, despite his scandalous behaviour, he asked. More recently, a Russian friend asked me why Mr Zardari could not be like Vladimir Putin — using an authoritative style of governance to control the ‘mafia’. So who is our president like — Sarkozy or Putin?If Sarkozy is to be judged based on his propensity to raise eyebrows on account of his social behaviour, then, yes, Mr Zardari is someone with a similar style. He had warmed up to the then vice-presidential nominee in a style that most Pakistanis objected to, but perhaps that was his manner. However, the French president has other serious matters on his agenda as well.So, what about Vladimir Putin who is considered authoritarian, eager to silence all other voices around him and keen to remain in power against all democratic norms. Given his long association with KGB, the Soviet spy agency, the Russian prime minister’s style does not come as a surprise. He was trained as a member of a coercive organisation in the communist Soviet Union. Nonetheless, there is a major difference between the two men. While using authority, which makes him popular with the rest of the world, Putin does not seem too keen to destroy the Russian bureaucracy that was the linchpin of communist power. In fact, the concern to save some state institutions is one of the reasons behind attempts to bring powerful segments of the mafia under control. This is considered critical to the survival of the Russian state.Is Pakistan’s head of state honouring the integrity of institutions? There are times when one gets glimpses of a plan to build a new political system not dominated by forces traditionally powerful in Pakistan. This is not a bad idea. However, the approach adopted has so far not proved supportive of the aspiration to break old power centres. In fact, there is a risk that these may be strengthened. For instance, the military more than any other institution benefited from the president’s recent conflict with segments of civil society and the lawyers’ movement.Unlike Putin or Sarkozy, who do not weaken themselves or their institutional support base, Mr Zardari’s primary dependence has been on external powers. His calculation seems to be that as long as he delivers on some counts, such as issues relating to military security, he can continue to have the support of outside players. Since the world will not tolerate a military takeover, they have an interest in strengthening a civilian regime in Pakistan even at the cost of tolerating its political inadequacies. Sources also say there was hope at the top of receiving approximately $40bn in foreign aid that would help improve the presidential image and be a strong antidote to all arguments condemning Mr Zardari as a failed leader.One wonders if there is any realisation in Pakistan that the US will not be able to offer anything more than $7bn spread over five years and that too attached to certain conditions. In addition, there is also a possibility that weary of the political turmoil inPakistan the international community feels too dejected with the present government and is, thus, less inclined to support it.Considering the fact that the US and UK (as disclosed by a former British diplomat) were keen to support the PPP government over other opposition parties, especially the PML-N, before the 2008 elections, the possibility of the aforementioned thinking within the present government is not surprising. Since a lot of people in Pakistan including my milkman, hairdresser, maid and chowkidar also believe that Pakistan’s policies are made inWashington, the political and military leadership cannot be blamed for getting excited by promises of cooperation from western capitals.After all, even western powers don’t understand that stability in Third World countries does not grow on trees or cannot be brought about through tactical political manoeuvres. Like its predecessors, the present PPP government cannot survive, at least not in the form it started out with, unless it shows an interest in building and strengthening national institutions.However, the American emphasis is always on finding short-term solutions to complex problems by routing US regional policies through individuals who can carry out one-window operations. So, when Gen Musharraf, who was perceived as a staunch ally for a long time, couldn’t deliver, others were allowed to throw him away. The general’s predecessor, Gen Zia, was also a US favourite until Washington and Rawalpindi parted ways.The fondness for the current Pakistani leadership may not be any different. There is also no guarantee that the US will continue to look down on the PML-N leadership. The situation is bound to get trickier with changes in the larger geo-political environment. Once the cash-strapped West finds greater challenges to its existence in Afghanistan and the South Asian region, the probability of encouraging other local partners increases. At that time if Mr Zardari’s behaviour appears as frustrating as it is now, it won’t take long forWashington to reconsider its options.The patronage system, be it local or international, is highly destabilising for players that don’t fully appreciate the rules of the game. Under the circumstances, Asif Zardari’s survival depends on building institutions rather than killing them. Even if he loves authority, the rules of the game would build his strength as much through institutions as cronies. Perhaps, if he really seriously thought about becoming Putin he could survive.

Beckham will play minder for fiery Rooney

David Beckham is ready to act as Wayne Rooney's minder to keep the fiery England forward out of trouble.England coach Fabio Capello called Rooney a "crazy man" following the Manchester United star's petulant red card for throwing the ball at the referee against Fulham last weekend.Capello's joke hid concern that a lack of individual discipline could damage England's hopes of a successful World Cup campaign in South Africa next year.Rooney has often struggled to control his temper with England and was sent off for stamping on Ricardo Carvalho in the 2006 quarter-final defeat against Portugal. He was also substituted by Sven Goran Eriksson after losing his rag in a friendly against Spain in 2004.Beckham knows from personal experience how the red mist can descend quickly on the pitch following his costly red card for kicking Diego Simeone in the 2002 World Cup defeat to Argentina.The on-loan AC Milan midfielder is a more mature figure now but he knows it is essential that Rooney retains his fire or he will become a less dynamic player.Beckham believes it is impossible to completely tame Rooney but he is keen to keep an eye on Rooney so he can avoid the kind of explosions that could lead to more disciplinary problems."If you take that side of him out of his game he becomes a different player and a different animal," Beckham said.

Google triumvirate take only $1 each in pay for 2008

Google CEO Eric Schmidt and co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin received only $1 each in pay for the entire year of 2008. But with their shares in the internet giant, they are billionaires.Google's co-founders and the California Internet titan's chief executive Eric Schmidt each took only a dollar in pay last year, a filing Tuesday with US regulators indicates.Larry Page, Sergey Brin, and Schmidt stuck with their usual one-dollar annual paychecks despite tough economic times that have eroded billions of dollars in value from their Google stock holdings."Eric, Larry and Sergey have voluntarily elected to receive only nominal cash compensation," Google said in a proxy statement filed Tuesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission."Their primary compensation continues to come from returns on their ownership stakes in Google."The trio at the top of Google's command structure received no bonuses either.Page owns about 29.2 million shares of Google stock while Brin holds 28.6 million shares, making them the firm's biggest stock holders and giving the duo controlling interest, according to the filing.Brin, 35, and Page, 36, started Google while students at Stanford University. The pair incorporated Google in 1998 and have taken a dollar each in annual pay since the company went public with a stock offering in 2004.Schmidt has the third largest stake in the company; owning just shy of 9.4 million shares.

WB OKs $500 mln interest-free loan to Pakistan

WASHINGTON The World Bank said Thursday it approved a 500 million dollar, interest-free credit to support Pakistan's program on economic stability. "Pakistan has experienced severe external and internal shocks in the past year and is confronting a very difficult macroeconomic situation," the Washington-based World Bank said in a statement. "The rise in international oil and food prices sharply inflated the country's import bill and the subsequent slowdown in the global economy dampened external demand for Pakistan's exports." It noted that "political turmoil and uncertainties affected investor confidence," leading to capital outflows. The Poverty Reduction and Economic Support credit is designed to support measures that promote macroeconomic stability, the Bank said. It also seeks to improve Pakistan's competitiveness by bolstering the financial sector and cutting barriers to business.

Google to trim jobs in marketing and sales

Internet search giant Google has announced plans to cut nearly 200 marketing and sales jobs from its international operations as the global downturn takes a toll on its lucrative online advertising business.Internet search giant Google said Thursday that it plans to cut nearly 200 marketing and sales jobs from its international operations."We did look at a number of different options but ultimately concluded that we had to restructure our organizations in order to improve our effectiveness and efficiency as a business," Google senior vice president of sales and business development Omid Kordestani said in a message at the firm's website.Google's rapid growth resulted in some job duplications and the company "over-invested" in some areas, according to Kordestani."When companies grow that quickly it's almost impossible to get everything right and we certainly didn't," Kordestani wrote."In some areas we've created overlapping organizations which not only duplicate effort but also complicate the decision-making process."The cuts come a month after Google announced it was getting out of the broadcast radio advertising business in a move that was expected to result in the Internet powerhouse shedding about 40 workers.Google said it would sell or terminate services it launched in 2006 to target broadcast radio advertising and automate programming.Google also recently abandoned a two-year-old Print Ads program that put the California firm's online expertise to work auctioning off space on newspaper pages to bargain-seeking advertisers.Google has been cutting costs in the face of a struggling economy that has slowed even the online advertising king's money-making machine.

Allied Irish Banks hit by $81M loans scam

LONDON, England  Britain's Serious Fraud Office and London police are investigating an alleged $81 million (£56 million) fraud on the corporate banking department of Allied Irish Banks (AIB).The SFO said it had searched a business and two residential addresses in London and believed AIB was not the only financial institution deceived by the suspects.It said that between 2003 and 2007 AIB, Ireland's largest bank by market value, loaned money for the purchase of UK investment properties to companies controlled by an individual who was now the main suspect.The SFO said the main suspect operated with the assistance of others.However, in 2008 AIB identified problems with one element of its security interests over the investment properties."Following an internal review it became apparent that the guarantees of certain lease payments on these properties by an investment grade counterparty (a blue chip property company) were fraudulent," the SFO said.AIB referred the matter to the authorities and also took control of and sold the relevant properties, which resulted in a write down of the outstanding loan balances by £56m, the SFO said.

Japan Issues Order to 'Destroy' N. Korea Rocket

TOKYO Japan's defense minister ordered the military to prepare to shoot down any debris that could fall on Japanese territory if a North Korean rocket launch fails, mobilizing interceptor missiles and sending two warships to the Sea of Japan.North Korea has said it will launch a communications satellite April 4-8, and has warned that fragments from the launch could fall into waters off Akita and Iwate prefectures (states) in northern Japan. In response, Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada told reporters he ordered the deployment of land-to-air and sea-to-air missile interceptors to the area at risk."We issued a destruction order," Hamada told reporters at parliament. "We will make sure to eliminate anything that may cause us any damage."North Korea has mounted a rocket on a launch pad on its northeast coast, American intelligence officials say, putting Pyongyang well on track for a launch the U.S. and South Korea warned Thursday would be a major provocation with serious consequences.

U.S. destroyers on move as N. Korea prepares rocket launch

U.S. Navy ships capable of shooting down ballistic missiles are being moved to the Sea of Japan, a Navy spokesman said.The move came as North Korea was preparing for an expected rocket launch next month.Later Thursday, Japan announced it was ready to fire on the rocket if any part of it enters Japanese airspace.Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada's order was to destroy debris from the North Korean rocket if its launch fails and fragments fall in Japanese territory, said defense ministry spokesman Yuichi Akiyoshi.The U.S. ships, with powerful Aegis radar that can track ballistic missile launches, were on regularly planned deployments but were, "prepared to track a launch or more, if afforded," according to a U.S. Navy official who could not be named due to the sensitivity of the information.The United States generally has a number of Aegis-capable ships in the Sea of Japan because of the threat posed by North Korea to launch missiles. The ships monitor the region and are designed to track and, if need be, shoot down ballistic missiles. 

Blast injures Somali minister

Somalia's interior minister has been wounded after a roadside bomb exploded next to his car in the capital Mogadishu, officials and witnesses say.Abdel-Qader Ali Omar's bodyguard and two passers-by were killed in the blast in the Bakara neighbourhood on Thursday, witnesses said."He was targeted in a roadside bomb explosion. He sustained injuries but they are not too serious. One of his bodyguards died," a government official told the AFP news agency on condition of anonymity.There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack."We heard a big explosion, which seemed to be a landmine targeting the car," Abdirahman Ali, a witness, said. "I was standing opposite. Bodyguards opened fire."Omar spoke to the media shortly after being treated for shoulder injuries at a Mogadishu hospital."I have no problem and I escaped the attack," he said."I'm not going to say who is behind the attack just now but we all know each other in the capital Mogadishu and we will take steps to enforce peace."

Guantanamo inmates may be released on US soil

US National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair said that some inmates of the controversial Guantanamo Bay prison camp may be released on US soil and receive 'some sort of assistance to start a new life'.President Barack Obama's intelligence chief confirmed Thursday that some Guantanamo inmates may be released on US soil and receive assistance to return to society."If we are to release them in the United States, we need some sort of assistance for them to start a new life," said National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair at his first press conference."You can't just put them on the street," he added. "All that is work in progress."Obama has vowed to close the controversial prison camp by next January and has ordered individual reviews for cases against each of the over 240 remaining prisoners.Blair told reporters that the review of Guantanamo cases was still underway, and that the government was "building dossiers on each of the detainees." The Obama administration is currently evaluating what could be done with the prisoners, he said, but pledged that if they are sent to another country, "we have to be sure that that country will treat them in a humane fashion."Twenty men detained at the remote US naval base at Guantanamo Bay in southern Cuba have been cleared of terrorism charges, including 17 Chinese Uighurs ordered released by a US court in June, seven years after their arrest. But the US says they may face persecution if returned to China.

Iran, India may join US war in Afghanistan

Sen. John Kerry and the Sen. Richard Lugar preside over the
 hearing on the Iranian situation on Capitol Hill in Washington.

WASHINGTON A key US senator said on Thursday that the United States and Iran might begin their cooperation for stabilising Afghanistan after a meeting between officials of the two countries in The Hague next week.‘We also need to reach out to Afghanistan’s other neighbours, including India, China, and Iran,’ Senator John Kerry told the confirmation hearing for the new US ambassador to Afghanistan.The former Democratic presidential candidate, who now heads the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, noted that in 2001 and 2002, Iran helped to stabilise Afghanistan. ‘And the Obama administration is right to explore how our interests might coincide again on this issue, beginning at the Hague Conference next week,’ he added.Earlier on Thursday, Hasan Qashqavi, a spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, told reporters in Tehran that Iran would join the United States at two international conferences on Afghanistan, including the one at The Hague which begins on March 31.‘The level of participation is yet to be determined,’ he added. Last week, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton officially invited Iran to the Hague conference.The US move is seen in Tehran as a moral victory for the Iranian government, which was castigated by the Bush administration as part of an ‘Axis of Evil’.Although the US still plays a leading role in the campaign against Iran’s nuclear programme, the US decision to involve it in its efforts to stabilise Afghanistan enhances the stature of the Iranian government.Both the Afghan President Hamid Karzai and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon are expected to attend. Other attendees will include foreign ministers from countries in the region, countries that are part of the International Security Assistance Force and other countries and organisations that are contributing to reconstruction in Afghanistan.

Obama Seeks 'Strategy' Not 'Straightjacket' in Afghanistan

President Obama will announce the deployment of 4,000 additional U.S. Army troops to Afghanistan on Friday, part of strategy senior officials say will merge increased military efforts with a massive diplomatic push there and in neighboring Pakistan."Our focus is first and foremost on those who threaten the United States of America," a senior official said, referring to Al Qaeda and Taliban forces that now reside in unknown locations in Pakistan."That strategy is to disrupt, dismantle and defeat Al Qaeda, its associates and destroy their safe havens," another senior official said during a White House briefing in advance of the president's speech. "This strategy is a strategy, it's not a straightjacket. It's designed to be flexible. We will re-asses as we go along."The 4,000 Army trainers are in additional to the contingent of 17,000 Marines and Army personnel Obama already announced he would send into combat operations in Afghanistan. Those deployments will start this spring and continue through the summer. The Army trainers will focus their efforts on expanding the ranks and professionalism of the Afghanistan National Army (ANA).Separately, the administration has won an as-yet-unannounced commitment of forces from France to increase training of Afghan police forces.

32 dead after Indonesia dam bursts: official

A dam burst its walls near the Indonesian capital Jakarta early Friday, killing 32 people and leaving hundreds of homes underwater, a health ministry official said."Thirty-two people were killed, four of them children. All of them drowned," official Danang Susanto told AFP."The dam burst happened at 2:00 am (1900 GMT Thursday) but before that there was heavy rain and wind, many trees were uprooted. People were still sleeping and couldn't do anything."

VIDEO #2 of FedEx Cargo Jet Crashing in Tokyo, Japan

UK Scientists Grow A Living Human 'Brain'

Scientists in Birmingham have grown a living human 'brain' The team at Aston University created tiny bundles of cells which act like a mini nervous system.They believe it could help find a cure for degenerative conditions like Alzheimer's, motor neurone or Parkinson's disease.Professor Michael Coleman is leading the research.He explained: "We are aiming to be able to study the human brain at the most basic level, using an actual living human cellular system. "Cells have to be alive and operating efficiently to enable us to really understand how the brain works."The experiment involves altering cells from a cancer tumour and making them behave like brain cells.Although far from finished, scientists hope the fake brain cells will give them a greater understanding of how real brains work.This, in turn, could significantly further research into conditions which affect the brain.Neil Hunt, chief executive of the Alzheimer's Society, said: "It is still very early days, but in the future this interesting research could lead to a useful tool for investigating dementia."The technique could also provide an alternative to animal testing and is being supported and funded by the Humane Research Trust.Over the next ten years a million people will develop dementia, but campaigners say research into the disease is hugely under-funded.Current treatments cause unpleasant side-effects and do not halt the progression of conditions.Professor Coleman believes his findings could change this. He said: "We hope our technique will provide scientists with a new and highly relevant human experimental model to help us understand the brain better and develop new drugs and treatments to tackle neurodegenerative disease."

Former top seed Kim Clijsters announces comeback

Former top seed Kim Clijsters announced in an interview she will be back on tennis courts after two years of retirement. After training for charity events, the 23-year-old Belgian, now also a mother, declared her desire was back. Former world No.1 Kim Clijsters of Belgium on Thursday announced her return to competitive tennis almost two years after retiring from the sport at just 23 years old."I intend to play in the US Open and almost certainly in the tournaments at Cincinnati (early August)- my first official tournament back - and Tornoto," she told a press conference in her hometown."I have been practicing on a regular basis with my training partner Wim Fissette and by physical coach Sam Verslegers, sometimes as much as six hours a day."The desire is back!." The right-hander, famous for her trademark splits defensive play, won 34 WTA tournaments and 11 doubles' crowns, including the 2005 US Open title when she defeated French player Mary Pierce 6-3, 6-1 at Flushing Meadows.She also won the 2002 and 2003 women's season-ending tour championship title.

Taylor, Ryder keep NZ in contention

Ross Taylor and Jesse Ryder batted a record 271-run partnership to help New Zealand recover from a poor start in the second Test against India in Napier.NZ reached 351 for four at the end of the first day after the hosts had won the toss and opted to bat on a good wicket at McLean Park.Taylor (151) and Ryder (137 not out) stepped up to the wicket at 23-3 within the first hour after Zaheer Khan and Ishant Sharma destroyed New Zealand's top order.The pair rescued the hosts with their partnership, surpassing the record for any New Zealand wicket against India after tea.The previous record was between Mark Richardson and Lou Vincent who scored 231 for the first wicket in Mohali in October 2003.
New Zealand first innings
T McIntosh c Karthik b Sharma 12
M Guptill c Sehwag b Khan 8
J How b Khan 1
R Taylor c Y Singh b H Singh 151
J Ryder not out 137
J Franklin not out 26
Extras 16

Total (for four wickets, 90 overs) 351
Fall of wickets 1-21 2-22 3-23 4-294

To bat: Brendon McCullum, Daniel Vettori, Iain O'Brien, Jeetan Patel, Chris Martin.

IBM to shift roughly 5,000 US jobs to India

Computer giant IBM is to announce it will cut around 5,000 jobs in the United States, according to the Wall Street Journal. The company, which has until now resisted the effects of the financial crisis, is expected to transfer these jobs to India.Computer giant IBM plans to cut a "large number" of US employees in its business services unit and transfer their duties to India, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.The newspaper, citing "people familiar with the situation," said that IBM generally avoids public disclosure of layoffs and the number of US jobs being eliminated could not be determined.It said that earlier this year, IBM sent notices of layoffs to around 4,600 employees in its software, sales, semiconductor and finance groups.The Journal, citing an internal document, said the global business services group targeted for layoffs is the largest at IBM in terms of revenue and employment, with 180,000 employees worldwide.The newspaper said IBM had 398,500 workers worldwide at the end of 2008 and 115,000 in the United States, down from 121,000 at the end of 2007.IBM is one of the few major corporations to have weathered the global economic showdown and ended 2008 with 12.9 billion dollars in cash and marketable securities in hand.The Journal reported last week that IBM was in talks to buy computer server company Sun Microsystems Inc. and the Indian press has reported that IBM may be interested in fraud-hit software services exporter Satyam Computer Services.

Report: Pakistan Aiding Taliban Attacks in Afghanistan

The Taliban offensive in Afghanistan is aided partly by support from operatives in Pakistan's military intelligence agency, The New York Times reported on Wednesday.Pakistan’s support for the Taliban, coordinated by operatives inside Pakistan’s Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, reportedly includes military supplies, money and guidance for the militant group’s leaders.U.S. government officials said informants and surveillance provided key evidence to prove the ties between the Taliban and Pakistani spies.Pakistani officials told the Times they had firsthand knowledge of the ties, which they denied were strengthening the insurgency.Evidence shows ISI operatives meet regularly with Taliban commanders to discuss whether to intensify or reduce violence before the Afghan elections.Pakistani leaders deny government ties to militant groups and the Times quoted U.S. officials as saying it was unlikely top government officials were coordinating the efforts. The middle-ranking intelligence operatives sometimes cultivate relationships without the approval of senior officials, the paper said.

Obama phones Zardari to discuss key issues

President Barack Obama discussed bilateral
 issues with President Zardari during their telephone conversation.

ISLAMABAD US President Barack Obama on Thursday called President Asif Ali Zardari and discussed bilateral relations, situation in the region as well as other matters of mutual interest.During the telephone conversation, President Obama and President Zardari discussed the 'Friends of Democratic Pakistan' (FODP) forum initiative, aimed at promoting and strengthening democracy in Pakistan.President Asif Ali Zardari, who launched the initiative of the FODP in New York in September 2008, will chair the Friends' Ministerial meeting being held in Tokyo on April 17.The two leaders also discussed matters relating to the fight against militancy, with particular reference to peace in the region.The new US Administration under President Obama is working on a new strategy to deal with terrorism and extremism, with focus on a stable, economically strong and democratic Pakistan.

US report on Chinese military a 'gross distortion'

Beijing has responded furiously to the Pentagon’s annual global military assessment, which warns of China’s growing military power and its effects on the region, accusing the report of “making groundless accusations”.China said Thursday that a Pentagon report warning of Beijing's growing military power distorted the truth and urged the United States to stop issuing the annual assessment or risk harming relations."This report issued by the US side continues to play up the fallacy of the so-called China military threat," foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told journalists in Beijing."This is a gross distortion of the facts... and China resolutely opposes it." Qin also said the United States should stop issuing the annual report and cease "making groundless accusations against China so as not to further damage the two sides' military relations."The Pentagon said in its yearly report to Congress on China's military that its pursuit of sophisticated weaponry was altering Asia's military balance and could be used to enforce Beijing's claims over disputed territories.China has kept up major investment in its armed forces and made advances in high-tech weaponry that outpace other countries in the region, the defence department said in the report issued Wednesday.It said China was developing technologies for nuclear, space and cyber warfare that were "changing regional military balances and that have implications beyond the Asia-Pacific region."The build-up could allow China to "project power to ensure access to resources or enforce claims to disputed territories," the report said.Apart from its traditional focus on deterring Taiwan's independence, China was raising its capacity to carry out extended air operations in the South China Sea, it said.

Poverty 'worsening' in Asia-Pacific

A United Nations reports says poverty is worsening in the Asia-Pacific region due to the global economic crisis.Unstable food prices and climate change are contributory factors, the report by the UN Economic Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (Espac) says.The report, entitled Addressing Triple Threats to Development, was released on Thursday in over 20 cities across the region.Among other things, Espac said that food and fuel prices rose dramatically in 2008.It also said that record high oil prices last year contributed to an increase in the price of rice up by 150 per cent.Rice is the region's staple, so price increases have hit the poor the hardest.That triggered an increase in the number of undernourished people to 583 million.

Obama answers seven of 104,000 Web questions

In an appeal to the tech-savvy public, the White House's Web site opened itself to questions for President Obama's online town hall meeting Thursday.The virtual meeting Thursday morning was a new take on President Franklin Roosevelt's fireside chats. The question-and-answer session reached out to online followers as Obama tries to rally an anxious country in support of his solutions to the economic crisis.Obama began his address by trying to draw a clear line between what he sees as the political games of Washington and the actual needs of the American people."What matters to you and your families and what people here in Washington are focused on are not always" the same, he said, criticizing the winner-loser mindset of the politicians in the nation's capitol."This isn't about me, it's about you," he said. "It's about the families whose letters I read every single day, and, for the American people, what's going on is not a game."After the call for questions closed at 9:30 a.m., more than 90,000 people had submitted more than 104,000 questions for the president. The questions largely focused on the economy but spread across several categories. Online users ranked the questions more than 3.6 million times, according to WhiteHouse.gov.

Iran, NATO hold first talks in 30 years: official

An Iranian diplomat and a NATO official have held "informal talks" at alliance headquarters in Brussels in the first such meeting in 30 years, NATO officials confirmed Thursday."There were exploratory contacts recently. Nothing of substance was discussed. It was a first informal contact between an Iranian diplomat and a representative of the secretary general," one official said.A second NATO official said the visit last week by the diplomat, who was not identified, was the first "since the regime of the Shah" of Iran, which collapsed in 1979.

North Korea Threatens to Restart Nuke Program Over Rocket Launch Sanctions

North Korea said on Thursday it would restart its weapons-grade nuclear program if the United Nations takes any action to punish it for firing a rocket that Pyongyang claims is a satellite, Reuters reported.North Korea mounted a rocket on a launchpad on its northeast coast, American officials said, putting the country well on track for a launch the U.S. and South Korea warned Thursday would be a major provocation with serious consequences.Pyongyang says the rocket will carry a satellite, but regional powers suspect the North will use the launch to test the delivery technology for a long-range missile capable of striking Alaska. They have said the launch — banned by the U.N. Security Council in 2006 — would trigger sanctions.

Jets 'bombed convoy in Sudan'

A Sudanese minister has told that the US launched two air raids in the country earlier this year.Mabrouk Mubarak Salim, the state minister for highways, said on Thursday that Sudanese, Somalis, Ethiopians, and Eritreans were killed in the attacks in January and February.The attacks targeted a number of cars in the desert near the eastern city of Port Sudan, Salim said.Photos released by a Sudanese intelligence source to Al Jazeera show what is said to be the aftermath of the attacks.More than 50 people received treatment at a hospital in the town of Kassala after the raids, which were launched from the US fleet in the Red Sea, he said.However, Deng Alor, the Sudanese foreign minister, said in Egypt on Wednesday that he had no knowledge of any such air raid."We have no information about such an attack," he said.

Pakistan, US coordinating drone attacks: WSJ

The Wall Street Journal reported that Pakistani 
officials want to broaden the drone attacks to target 
militants that have attacked Pakistani citizens, in order
 to win domestic support. 

NEW YORK US and Pakistani intelligence officials are drawing up a fresh list of terrorist targets for Predator drone strikes along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, part of a US review of the drone program, the Wall Street Journal said Thursday.Citing official sources the newspaper said Pakistani officials are seeking to broaden the scope of the program to target extremists who have carried out attacks against Pakistanis, a move they say could win domestic support.The Obama administration is weighing the effectiveness of the program against the risk that its unpopularity weakens an important ally.Underlining the fragility of the situation, the US believes Pakistan's top intelligence agency is directly supporting the Taliban and other militants in Afghanistan, even as the US targets those groups, says a person close to the deliberations.In a separate but similar report the New York Times quoting US government officials said 'the Taliban's widening campaign in southern Afghanistan is made possible in part by direct support from operatives in Pakistan s military intelligence agency, despite Pakistani government promises to sever ties to militant groups fighting in Afghanistan'.The support consists of money, military supplies and strategic planning guidance to Taliban commanders who are gearing up to confront the international force in Afghanistan that will soon include some 17,000 American reinforcements.The Times said 'support for the Taliban, as well as other militant groups, is coordinated by operatives inside the shadowy S Wing of Pakistan’s spy service, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence  the officials said. There is even evidence that ISI operatives meet regularly with Taliban commanders to discuss whether to intensify or scale back violence before the Afghan elections.'The Wall Street Journal in its report pointed out the Central Intelligence Agency's drone program is important to Washington because areas of Pakistan remain a haven for Taliban and al Qaeda militants operating in Afghanistan.