Translate

Search This Blog

Saturday, December 31, 2011

Cyclone Thane crosses Tamil Nadu coast, 26 killed


It left a trail of destruction and throwing life out of gear in Cuddalore district and neighbouring Union Territory of Puducherry. Cuddalore, about 170 km from here on the east coast, bore the brunt of the cyclonic fury, accounting for nine deaths, Puducherry seven and Chennai two in rain-related incidents such as wall collapse and electrocution, officials said. Thane crossed the coast between Cuddalore and Puducherry bringing in its wake torrential rains accompanied by gale that uprooted hundreds of trees and electric poles, snapping power supply in several areas. The tiny Puducherry was cut off from neighbouring districts in Tamil Nadu with the uprooted trees blocking road traffic. After the landfall, Thane moved further westward and weakened rapidly into a deep depression and lay centered at about 100 km west of Cuddalore, the regional weather office here said. "The system is likely to move westwards and weaken further," it said forecasting heavy rainfall for the next 12-24 hours in different parts of the state and Puducherry and advised fishermen against venturing into sea due to rough conditions. Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa sanctioned a sum of Rs 150 crore towards immediate relief works including putting back in shape the infrastructure which has taken a hit and directing four of her cabinet colleagues to visit affected districts to oversee relief work. Train services from southern Tamil Nadu were hit as many of them ran late or were stopped in the nearby station while flights to international destinations by private carriers including to Kuwait and Malaysia from Chennai were cancelled. Puduchery District Collector S B Deepak Kumar said that rescue operations were in full swing in the union territory. Uprooted trees were being removed from the roads. The regional weather office here said, "The very severe cyclonic storm  THANE  over southwest Bay of Bengal moved further westward and crossed north Tamil Nadu coast between Cuddalore and Puducherry between 6.30 and 7.30 AM on Friday." It had now weakened into a severe cyclonic storm and lay about 30 km west of Cuddalore and 35 km southwest of Puduchery, it said, adding wind speeds of upto 140 kph was recorded during this period. "Under the influence of this system, rainfall at most places with heavy to very heavy falls at a few places would occur over north coastal Tamil Nadu and Puducherry during next 12 hours and over north interior Tamil Nadu during next 24 hours," a weather bulletin said. Further, isolated heavy to very heavy rainfall would occur over south coastal Andhra Pradesh during next 12 hours and over Rayalseema, north Kerala and south Karnataka during the next 24 hours. Cuddalore district in Tamil Nadu was the most affected, with damaged roads rendering it difficult for rescue teams including those from National Disaster Response Force and Fire and Rescue Services to reach the cyclone hit fishing hamlets. District Collector Amuthavalli said even as communication lines remained affected, over 5000 houses of fishermen had been damaged.

Syrian forces kill 25 protesters


Tens of thousands of protesters rallied near Damascus on Thursday as Syrian security forces killed at least 25 civilians nationwide and peace monitors spread out to areas hit by unrelenting violence. Some 30,000 people gathered in a square outside the Grand Mosque in Douma just north of the capital, prompting security forces to pull back from previously held positions, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. Earlier, as Arab League observers arrived at Douma city hall, security forces opened fire on protesters outside the mosque, killing at least four and wounding several others, the rights group said. The observers, on the third day of a mission aimed at halting the bloodshed in Syria, also visited the central city of Hama, Idlib in the northwest, and Daraa in the south, according to Syrian television. SANA, the official news agency, said observers visited the Baba Amro neighbourhood of Homs, Harasta city, Daraa and Hama provinces "and met a number of citizens." Daraa is the cradle of the unprecedented nine-month protest movement against President Bashar al-Assad s regime, which has ruled Syria with an iron fist for 11 years. The United States said Thursday the presence of Arab monitors in Syria had offered some benefit to protesters even if it had failed to halt the regime s deadly crackdown. According to UN estimates announced in early December, more than 5,000 people have been killed in the Syrian government crackdown on dissent since mid-March. Activists say that more than 70 civilians have been killed by security forces since a first group of monitors arrived on Monday in Syria on a month-long renewable mission to implement an Arab League peace plan. France, the United States and Human Rights Watch have warned the Syrian regime against trying to hide the facts from the monitors, and Paris charged that the team was not being allowed to see what was happening in Homs. The League mission is part of an Arab plan endorsed by Syria after weeks of stalling. It calls for the withdrawal of armed forces from towns and residential districts, a halt to violence and the release of detainees.

Car Bomb kills 12, injures 30 in Quetta, Pakistan


At least 12 people were killed and 30 were injured in a suspected car bomb attack near the house of former federal minister Naseer Mengal s son Shafiq Mengal on Arbab Karam Khan Road, Quetta Pakistan. Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) has taken the responsibility of the deadly blast. Many houses caught fire after the blast. The shockwave of the blast was felt in long distances and nearby shops were also damaged. The fire also broke out after the blast which swathed many nearby houses and shops. Firefighters reached the site and were busy trying to extinguish it. Ambulances and paramedic staff were busy shifting injured to hospitals. Police said the majority of the dead were passers-by making it even harder to piece together what happened. "We are facing difficulties to know about the nature of the blast because many of the witnesses who were present at the scene have been killed," police said. Soon after the blast, private guards hired by the former minister s son, Shafiq-Ur-Rehman, opened fire and gunshots rang out at the scene for up to half an hour. A photo journalist for a local news agency was wounded by the firing in the chaotic aftermath of the blast.

Friday, December 30, 2011

Youngest MCP Aarifa hospitalized


The youngest Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) Aarifa Karim is hospitalised and in critical condition. Aarifa become the world’s youngest MCP when she completed her certification at the age of nine in 2004. Aarifa’s father said that she had an epileptic attack last week which caused damage to her brain and heart.

Myanmar: 17 killed in blasts, fire


A fire followed by several explosions engulfed state warehouses and neighboring homes in Myanmar s main city of Yangon on Thursday, killing at least 17 people and injuring 108. The blasts occurred as firefighters were putting out the fire that had started in a state-owned warehouse before spreading to other warehouses and nearby homes and buildings before dawn. Six of the dead were firefighters, a home ministry source said. He did not want to be identified because he is not authorized to speak to the media. He added the fire and blasts destroyed 16 warehouses, a Buddhist monastery and 76 homes in Mingalar Taung Nyunt township in eastern Yangon. A total of 108 injured people were brought to Yangon General Hospital, said a senior nurse. The nurse did not want to be identified because she is not authorized to speak to the media. "Many of the dead were hit by flying debris of broken walls and stone slabs that were flung on to the streets due to the explosions," Maung Win, a 45-year-old resident, told the Associated Press. The explosions rocked the entire city, jolting residents from sleep. A 20-foot (6-meter) -wide and 15-foot (4.5-meter) -deep crater was visible at the site. Black smoke was seen billowing from the rubble Thursday morning. Firefighters were searching for bodies from among the debris. It was not immediately clear what caused the fire, but the home ministry official said the explosions were due to chemicals, including ammonia and potassium nitrate, stored in one of the warehouses. Residents said the fire started in a warehouse that stored electronic goods then spread to other warehouses and houses.

Thursday, December 29, 2011

Pakistan rejects Pentagon's report on NATO attack


Pakistan has rejected the US report pertaining to NATO s attack on Pakistani check post on November 26 that killed 24 soldiers, saying that with Brigadier General Stephen Clark as head, the investigation can never bring out unbiased findings, our sources reported Wednesday. According to sources, Pakistan has dismissed the report on NATO attack as the head of investigating team Brigadier General Stephen Clark has been linked to the strategic team involved in the attack. And that is why he is believed to be an inappropriate choice to carry out investigation as a neutral party. A report by military investigators was delivered to General Ashfaq Kayani on Sunday by a US officer based in Islamabad, who explained the findings to the general, Pentagon spokesman Captain John Kirby told reporters. The full report from the joint US-NATO investigative team was not released publicly until Monday to allow time for the Pakistani leadership to read the findings first, Kirby said. "We wanted General Kayani to be able to see the entire thing," he said. The approach represented "an appropriate professional courtesy" to Kayani, he added. A summary of the report was released Thursday and the officer who led the investigation, Brigadier General Stephen Clark, briefed reporters by phone the same day.

Pakistan Government corruption has broken all records


The Transparency International Pakistan (TIP) says corruption touched its limits in the country in the outgoing year. Addressing a news conference, TIP Chairman Sohail Muzaffar said that delay in action against corrupt elements dented the process of accountability badly. He said the list of scandals is endless -- Steel Mills, NICL, Punjab Bank, Rental Power Plants (RPPs), Haj operations, KESC, PIA, Railways and WAPDA to name a few. He also said that the Supreme Court’s decisions are openly being violated, while institutions seem least interested in implementing court verdicts. The TIP has declared Land Administration and Police the most corrupt departments in its 2011 survey, while Education and Military remained least corrupt. The TIP survey report puts taxation at third place in corruption; judiciary at fourth; energy sector at fifth; tendering and contracting at sixth; customs at seventh while health sector was allotted eighth slot.

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Lokpal bill okayed, CBI can't grill Indian Army


Only two MPs didn’t attend the session, according to an Indian TV. Under the approved bill, the armed forces of India cannot be held accountable by government-controlled Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). Opposition parties boycotted the vosting session, while there were 247 votes for and 178 against the bill. India s prime minister earlier warned opponents of the key anti-graft bill that they risked unleashing "chaos and anarchy" as he sought to push the divisive legislation through parliament on Tuesday. Premier Manmohan Singh spoke during a heated debate on the draft law, which was branded too weak by opposition parties and veteran activist Anna Hazare who launched a hunger strike Tuesday to demand the bill be redrafted. Parliament was convened for a special three-day session devoted to the new legislation which would create an independent "Lokpal" or ombudsman to probe corruption among senior politicians and civil servants. The main points of contention focus on the ambit of the ombudsman s office and its powers of investigation. The government bill offers only limited jurisdiction over the prime minister and requires the ombudsman to put any criminal probes in the hands of the government-controlled Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). Hazare and a number of opposition parties want the ombudsman s office to have its own, independent investigative team. But Singh insisted that such a move would be tantamount to creating a separate, unelected executive that was unaccountable to parliament or the Indian people.

Iran warns oil blockade if sanctions imposed


The warning came from Iranian Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi on Tuesday. The threat was reported by the state news agency IRNA as Iran conducted navy wargames near the Strait of Hormuz, at the entrance of the oil-rich Gulf. "If sanctions are adopted against Iranian oil, not a drop of oil will pass through the Strait of Hormuz," Rahimi was quoted as saying. "We have no desire for hostilities or violence... but the West doesn t want to go back on its plan" to impose sanctions, he said. "The enemies will only drop their plots when we put them back in their place," he said. The threat underlined Iran s readiness to target the narrow stretch of water along its Gulf coast if it is attacked or economically strangled by Western sanctions. More than a third of the world s tanker-borne oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz. The United States maintains a navy presence in the Gulf in large part to ensure that passage remains free. Iran is currently carrying out navy exercises in international waters to the east of the Strait of Hormuz. Ships and aircraft dropped mines in the sea Tuesday as part of the drill, according to a navy spokesman. Although Iranian wargames occur periodically, the timing of these is seen as a show of strength as the United States and Europe prepare to impose further sanctions on Iran s oil and financial sectors. The last round of sanctions, announced in November, triggered a pro-regime protest in front of the British embassy in Tehran during which Basij militia members overran the mission, ransacking it. London closed the embassy as a result and ordered Iran s mission in Britain shut as well. Tehran in September rejected a Washington call for a military hotline between the capitals to defuse any "miscalculations" that could occur between their militaries in the Gulf. An Iranian lawmaker s comments last week that the navy exercises would block the Strait of Hormuz briefly sent oil prices soaring before that was denied by the government. While the foreign ministry said such drastic action was "not on the agenda," it reiterated Iran s threat of "reactions" if the current tensions with the West spilled over into open confrontation.

The G show (Day 13)


Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Monday, December 26, 2011

Friday, December 23, 2011

Pentagon terms NATO attack on Pakistan a mistake


The Pentagon s top spokesman said US forces had "misunderstandings" in connection with a NATO attack last month that killed two-dozen Pakistani troops and further strained relations between Washington and Islamabad. Brig. Gen. Stephen Clark, an Air Force special operations officer who led the investigation, said the US. force actually "uncovered a considerable cache" of weapons in connection with the ill-fated operation. "The investigating officer found that U.S. forces, given what information they had available to them at the time, acted in self defense and with appropriate force after being fired upon," the Pentagon said in a statement. "He also found that there was no intentional effort to target persons or places known to be part of the Pakistani military, or to deliberately provide inaccurate location information to Pakistani officials." Twenty-four Pakistani soldiers were killed and 13 others injured Nov. 26 when NATO fighter jets and helicopters bombed two border outposts in the Mohmand tribal region near the Afghanistan border. The episode further deteriorated the relationship between Washington and Islamabad, which began to strain after an American raid inside Pakistan that killed Al-Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden on May 2. Following the outpost airstrikes, the Pakistani government immediately closed two border check points for NATO supplies into Afghanistan through Pakistan and threw the U.S. out of its Shamsi air base in southwestern Balluchistan province. The Pentagon statement faulted "inadequate coordination" by U.S. and Pakistani military officers for the airstrikes, including their reliance on incorrect mapping information shared with the Pakistani liaison officer. The poor coordination "resulted in a misunderstanding about the true location of Pakistani military units. This, coupled with other gaps in information about the activities and placement of units from both sides, contributed to the tragic result," the statement said. The findings of the investigation have been shared with the Pakistani and Afghan governments, as well as key NATO leadership, the Pentagon said.

Thursday, December 22, 2011

US warns of new int'l pressure on Syria


The White House said if Damascus did not fully implement an Arab League plan to contain the violence, "the international community will take additional steps to pressure the Assad regime to stop its crackdown." The Arab peace plan, endorsed by Syria on November 2, calls for a halt to violence, the withdrawal of security forces from urban areas, the release of detainees, and the entry of 500 Arab monitors. But the opposition Syrian National Council said Wednesday that forces loyal to Assad had "massacred" more than 200 people in two days. The White House said in its statement that Assad s regime had "flagrantly violated their commitment to end violence and withdraw security forces from residential areas. "The United States is deeply disturbed by credible reports that the Assad regime continues to indiscriminately kill scores of civilians and army defectors, while destroying homes and shops and arresting protesters without due process," it said. "Time and again, the Assad regime has demonstrated that it does not deserve to rule Syria. It s time for this suffering and killing to stop." The White House went on to call for the "immediate and full implementation of the Arab League agreement" and urged Syria s remaining allies to urge Damascus to comply with it. "Bashar al-Assad should have no doubt that the world is watching, and neither the international community nor the Syrian people accept his legitimacy," it said. The United Nations estimates that more than 5,000 people, mainly opposition protesters, have been killed since mid-March, when Syrians began taking to the streets to demand the end of the Assad family s 40-year reign. The protests were inspired by uprisings across the region that have led to the overthrow of long-ruling dictators in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. The United States and the European Union have imposed sanctions on Assad s regime and the 22-member Arab League approved similar measures last month over Damascus s refusal to admit the observers.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

US troops may stay past 2014 in Afghanistan

It was said in an interview published Wednesday that American troops could stay in Afghanistan beyond 2014, the latest signal of a possible open-ended US military role in the country. General John Allen told the New York Times that negotiations with Afghan officials on a strategic partnership would "almost certainly" feature "a discussion with Afghanistan of what a post-2014 force will look like." Afghan President Hamid Karzai had "in fact, just the other day talked about his desire to have conversations with the US about a post-2014 force," Allen was quoted as saying. "We would probably see some number of advisers, trainers, intelligence specialists here for some period of time beyond 2014," the commander said. Allen, who oversees the NATO-led force in the 10-year-old war, is the highest-ranking military officer to openly suggest the possibility of American forces remaining beyond 2014. President Barack Obama s administration has suggested combat troops would depart by the end of 2014 but left the door open to a residual force remaining on the ground. The US ambassador to Afghanistan, Ryan Crocker, said earlier this month that Washington would be ready to keep forces in Afghanistan if the Kabul government requested it. With the United States now engaged in a gradual troop drawdown, Karzai said Sunday his government is negotiating the terms of a long-term US presence in the country that could involve American troops. US-led troops, which toppled the Taliban in a 2001 invasion, have been battling the hardline Islamist insurgency for ten years and are due to hand over security duties to Afghan government forces by 2015. The United States is withdrawing 10,000 troops this year, leaving 91,000 on the ground into next year. Another 23,000 are due to leave by the end of September. Former Afghan officials and analysts have warned the country likely will slide into a civil war, with rivals India and Pakistan clashing through proxies, if US and allied forces withdraw at the end of 2014. In Iraq, US and Iraqi leaders could not agree on the terms for a future US force and the withdrawal of American troops has been accompanied by sectarian political turmoil.

Violence across Syria


Government forces surrounded residents of a restive Syrian village in a valley and killed all those trapped inside, more than 100 people, in a barrage of rockets, tank shells, bombs and gunfire that lasted for hours, a witness and two activist groups said Wednesday. The attack on Tuesday pushed the death toll for two days of violence across Syria to more than 200, and was one of the deadliest single events of the entire nine-month uprising against President Bashar Assad’s authoritarian rule. The White House reacted by renewing its call for Assad to step down, saying his regime does not deserve to rule. The offensive targeted the village of Kfar Owaid, about 30 miles from the northern border with Turkey. It is part of the rugged mountainous region of Jabal al-Zawiyah, which has been the scene of clashes between troops and army defectors and intense anti-government protests for weeks. Syrian troops began attacking the region on Saturday, residents said. ”It was an organized massacre,” said Rami Abdul-Rahman, head of the British-based activist group Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. ”The troops surrounded people then killed them.” Syrian officials have not commented on the allegations. The White House said Assad’s regime has no credibility and has ”flagrantly violated” its commitment to end violence. The statement said the Obama administration is deeply disturbed by continued reports of government-backed violence against the Syrian people. One villager who is an anti-government activist told The Associated Press by telephone that scores of residents and activists fled Tuesday morning to the nearby Budnaya Valley, where they were completely surrounded by troops. The forces bombarded them with tank shells, rockets and heavy machine gun fire. The man, who identified himself only as Abu Rabih for fear of government reprisal, said troops also used bombs filled with nails to increase the number of casualties. ”What happened yesterday was a crime against humanity,” Abu Rabih said. He said 110 people were killed in the attack and 56 of the dead were buried in Kfar Owaid on Wednesday. Others were buried in villages nearby. According to activists, all of those in the valley were unarmed civilians and activists, there were no armed military defectors among them. Abu Rabih said the Jabal al-Zawiyah region has been under intense attack by government forces since Saturday. Assad agreed Monday to allow foreign monitors under an Arab League plan aimed at stopping the bloodshed. But the huge toll from the crackdown on Monday and Tuesday has reinforced opposition suspicions that Assad is just playing for time to stall a new round of international condemnation and sanctions. The crackdown has already left Assad internationally isolated and under tremendous pressure from the Arab world as well as the west.

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Kim Jong Il


North Korea displayed the body of ruler Kim Jong Il in a glass coffin surrounded by red flowers Tuesday, and his young heir was one of the first to pay respects, a strong indication that a smooth leadership transition was under way. As the country mourned for a second day with high-level visits to Kim’s body at a memorial palace and public gatherings of weeping citizens, state media fed a budding personality cult around his youngest known son and anointed heir, Kim Jong Un, hailing him as a ”lighthouse of hope.” AP video footage shot in the capital, Pyongyang, showed the glass coffin holding Kim’s body, wrapped in red cloth and surrounded by blossoms of his namesake flowers, red ”kimjongilia.” As solemn music played, Kim Jong Un. believed to be in his late 20s, entered the hall to view his father’s bier, surrounded by military honor guards. He observed a moment of solemn silence, then circled the bier, followed by other officials. Outside one of the capital’s main performance centers, mourners carried wreaths and flowers toward a portrait of Kim Jong Il. Groups were allowed to grieve in front of the portrait for a few minutes at a time. ”We will change today’s sorrow into strength and courage and work harder for a powerful and prosperous nation, as our general wanted, under the leadership of the new General Kim Jong Un,” U Son Hui, a Pyongyang resident, told The Associated Press. The announcement Monday of Kim’s death over the weekend raised acute concerns in the region over the possibility of a power struggle between the untested son and rivals, in a country pursuing nuclear weapons and known for its unpredictability and secrecy. But there have been no signs of unrest or discord in Pyongyang’s somber streets. With the country in an 11-day period of official mourning, flags were flown at half-staff at all military units, factories, businesses, farms and public buildings. The streets of Pyongyang were quiet, but throngs of people gathered at landmarks honoring Kim. The AP footage showed Kim’s bier decorated by a wreath from Kim Jong Un along with various medals and orders. The body was laid out in the Kumsusan Memorial Palace, a mausoleum where the embalmed body of Kim’s father, national founder Kim Il Sung, has been on display in a glass sarcophagus since his death in 1994. Kim Jong Il died of a massive heart attack on Saturday caused by overwork and stress, according to the North’s media. He was 69, though some experts question the official accounts of his birth date and location. The two-day state funeral is to begin at the Kamsusan Memorial Palace on Dec. 28. North Korean officials say they will not invite foreign delegations and will allow no entertainment during the mourning period. Since Kim’s death the media have stepped up their lavish praise of the son, indicating an effort to strengthen a cult of personality around him similar to that of his father and, much more strongly, of Kim Il Sung. The Korean Central News Agency on Tuesday described Kim Jong Un as ”a great person born of heaven,” a propaganda term previously used only for his father and grandfather. The Rodong Sinmun, the newspaper of the ruling Workers’ Party, added in an editorial that Kim Jong Un is ”the spiritual pillar and the lighthouse of hope” for the military and the people.It described the twenty-something Kim as ”born of Mount Paektu,” one of Korea’s most cherished sites and Kim Jong Il’s official birthplace. On Monday, the North said in a dispatch that the people and the military ”have pledged to uphold the leadership of comrade Kim Jong Un” and called him a ”great successor” of the country’s revolutionary philosophy of juche, or self reliance. Kim’s death could set back efforts by the United States and others to get Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions. Concerns are also high that Kim Jong Un, being young and largely untested, may feel he needs to prove himself by precipitating a crisis or displaying his swagger on the international stage.

Baiden says Taliban not US enemy


The United States has said that Taliban are not enemy of the U.S, a move seen as the latest effort of the Obama administration to send an olive branch to the terrorist outfit that ruled Afghanistan before 9/11, media reported on Tuesday. "Look, the Taliban per se is not our enemy. That s critical," US Vice-President Joe Biden said in an interview to the Newsweek magazine. "There is not a single statement that the (US) President has ever made in any of our policy assertions that the Taliban is our enemy because it threatens US interests," he said. If, in fact, the Taliban is able to collapse the existing government, which is cooperating with us in keeping the bad guys from being able to do damage to us, then that becomes a problem for us. So there s a dual track here, Biden added. "One, continue to keep the pressure on al-Qaida and continue to diminish them. Two, put the government in a position where they can be strong enough that they can negotiate with and not be overthrown by the Taliban," he said. "And at the same time try to get the Taliban to move in the direction to see to it that they, through reconciliation, commit not to be engaged with al-Qaida or any other organization that they would harbor to do damage to us and our allies," Biden said. White House press secretary Jay Carney, supporting Biden s statement, said the Vice-President does not regret having said this. "We didn t invade Afghanistan. We did not send US military personnel into Afghanistan because the Taliban were in power. They had been in power. We went into Afghanistan because al-Qaida had launched an attack against the US from Afghanistan," he said.

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Iran says it’s almost done decoding US drone


Iran claims its experts are in the final stages of recovering data from the US surveillance drone captured by Iranian armed forces. Lawmaker Parviz Sorouri, from the parliament’s national security and foreign policy committee, says the extracted information will be used to file a lawsuit against the US for the ‘‘invasion’’ by the unmanned aircraft. Sorouri also says Iran has the capability to reproduce the drone through reverse engineering. He didn’t elaborate. His remarks were carried by state TV on Monday. The TV broadcast a video on Thursday of Iranian military officials inspecting what it identified as the RQ-170 Sentinel drone. Iranian state media have said the unmanned spy aircraft was detected and brought down over the country’s east.

Obama asks Iran to return downed US drone


President Barack Obama on Monday said the US government had requested the return of a spy drone downed over Iran but declined to discuss if its loss could compromise US national security. “We have asked for it back. We’ll see how the Iranians respond,” Obama said during a joint news conference with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki after the two met at the White House. Obama acknowledged differences between Washington and Baghdad on how to deal with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government’s crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators but said Maliki was acting in Iraq’s best interests. Maliki raised concerns about the risk of sectarian violence in Syria spilling into neighboring Iraq and said he wanted the Syrian situation resolved peacefully.

Israel & Arab democracy


Israel’s vice premier declared Monday that many Arab countries aren’t ready for democracy, a comment sure to rankle many in the Middle East, where thousands have died and thousands more have risked their lives in uprisings against brutal dictators. Vice Prime Minister Moshe Yaalon said Israel learned a bitter lesson about democracy in the Middle East when Islamist Hamas militants came to power in free elections in Palestinian territories in 2006. The following year, the group violently overran the Gaza Strip, ousting forces loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas. Democratic elections, Yaalon said, don’t necessarily make for democratic practices. ”We are not sure, to say the least, what we witness now is real democratization,” he told a group of foreign journalists. ”Hamas exploited the democratic rules of the game … to impose a non-democratic regime.” ”We believe that you can’t reach democracy by elections,” he added. ”We believe in a long process. It should start by education.” Tunisia, which does not border Israel, might be ripe for democracy, he said. But Palestinians, he said, are not. ”We believe the Palestinian society is not mature (enough) to exercise civil society,” he said. Immediately after Hamas’ election victory, the militant group ”began to kill the opposition and to throw the (rival) Fatah activists from the 18th floor of a skyscraper,” Yaalon said, referring to an event during the 2007 takeover. Palestinians argue that Israel and the West applied double standards, by preaching democracy but then refusing to recognize the results of the 2006 election, widely perceived as fair and free. Palestinian spokesman Ghassan Khatib said Yaalon harbors a ”racist attitude” that is ”unacceptable from an official in the state that is occupying Palestine and is contributing daily to its suffering and problems.” ”Israel is the last country in the world that is allowed to speak about human rights because Israel was, throughout the occupation period, violating the rights of the Palestinians through unjustified killing, including of children, demolishing of houses, (and) confiscating of land,” he said. Yaalon, a former Israeli military chief, is a member of the governing Likud party and reflects mainstream thinking in the party. Palestinians plan elections for May 2012, part of their declared program to reconcile the dueling governments in Hamas-run Gaza and the West Bank, which is controlled by Abbas. The strong showing by Islamist parties in Egypt’s recent elections has fueled fears in Israel about future ties between the countries. Israel’s 1979 peace treaty with Egypt, a landmark first with an Arab nation, has been the cornerstone of regional stability since. Egyptians plan to hold two more rounds of elections through January and president elections later next year. Asked if Egypt was ready for democracy, Yaalon replied: ”For Europe, it took hundreds of years, centuries, to bring about real democracy. In the Middle East, we are at the beginning of the first century of democratization.” In another observation, Yaalon said Iran should be faced with the choice of ”whether to have a bomb or to survive.” ”A nuclear Iran would be a nightmare, not just for Israel, but for Western interests and for the free world,” Yaalon said. In line with official Israeli policy, he called for stiffer economic sanctions on Tehran, and said a military strike should be a ”last resort.” Israel, like the West, disbelieves Iran’s claims that its nuclear program is designed to produce energy, not weapons.

Monday, December 12, 2011

US troops may stay in Afghanistan after 2014 says Envoy


The ambassador, Ryan C Crocker, speaking at a roundtable event with a small group of journalists, said that if the Afghan government wanted American troops to stay longer, the withdrawal could be slowed. “They would have to ask for it,” he said. “I could certainly see us saying, ‘Yeah, makes sense.” He emphasised, however, that no such decision had been made. White House officials said that Mr. Crocker’s comments were consistent with its previously stated position. “The president never excluded the possibility that there would be some U.S. forces here, but he stressed that security would be under Afghan lead by 2014,” said the embassy spokeswoman, Eileen O’Connor. “The president has always spoken of a responsible winding down of the efforts here, so talk of the possibility of some troops still being here post-2014 is not a change in policy.” “We are on a timeline, as you know,” Mr. Crocker said. “Ten thousand out by the end of the year, that is being met.” With the additional 23,000 by September 2012, he added, “that basically recovers the surge” — the reinforcements Mr. Obama ordered two years ago. “Beyond that, there are no decisions,” he said, adding, “And as far as I’m aware, there are no formal recommendations yet.” He said that there is no chance of turmoil or chaos in Afghanistan after bomb blasts. He said that the planners of blasts have no assistance of Afghan people. We have not had such clues which could prove that Haqqani network was involved in these attacks, he concluded.