Ship movements signal possible North Korea missile test

By Jon Herskovitz

SEOUL (Reuters) – Chinese fishing vessels have moved out of waters near a disputed sea border between the two Koreas, a South Korean military official said on Wednesday, which could signal a North Korean missile test is imminent.

North Korea usually orders its vessels to stay out of Yellow Sea waters off its west coast when it conducts short-range missile tests. China is the closest thing the North can claim as a major ally and is the impoverished state's biggest benefactor.

"The (Chinese) fishing boats have disappeared, but no other unusual moves have yet been detected," said an official with South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff who asked not to be named. The official would not comment on a possible missile test.

During its last test launch of short-range missiles in that area in October 2008, the North issued a no-sail order to its ships a few days before firing off missiles, South Korean government officials have said.

Impoverished North Korea, angry at the hard-line policies of the South's government, in recent weeks has stepped up tension by threatening to reduce its wealthy neighbor to ashes and making moves to test fire its longest-range missile.

Analysts said the steps were aimed at putting pressure on the South and at attracting the notice of new U.S. President Barack Obama, who is sending Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to the region next week to discuss regional security concerns.

"We are hopeful that some of the behavior that we have seen coming from North Korea in the last few weeks is not a precursor of any action that would up the ante or threaten the stability and peace and security of the neighbors in the region," Clinton said at a new conference in Washington on Tuesday.

It takes weeks for North Korea to prepare a launch of its Taepodong-2 missile, which has never successfully flown but is eventually supposed to be able to hit U.S. territory. It was last fired in 2006, fizzling less than a minute after launch.

The U.S. military stepped up its monitoring of North Korea this week amid concerns of possible missile launches, a U.S. military official said.

The North can easily test-fire short-range missiles, with South Korean government officials telling a leading local daily they suspect such a test may take place soon near the disputed naval border called the Northern Limit Line (NLL).

The NLL was set unilaterally by U.N.-led forces at the end of the 1950-53 Korean War and the North has said it is illegal. The area was the site of deadly naval clashes between the two Koreas in 1999 and 2002.

The foreign ministers of South Korea and Japan issued a statement after meeting in Seoul calling on North Korea to stop its provocations.

"The two shared the perception that it is undesirable for North Korea to create tension with hard-line comments and urged the North to act in a manner that would contribute to regional stability," their joint statement said.

Talabani congratulates election victors

BAGHDAD, Feb. 9 (UPI) -- Iraqi officials offered praise for the winners in the January provincial elections but called for solidarity among party leaders to move the country forward.

Iraq held provincial elections in 14 of the 18 provinces Jan. 31. Though the State of Law list backed by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki scored well in many parts of the country, the margin of victory suggested several blocs may need to form coalitions at the provincial level.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said the elections marked a major milestone in Iraq's path toward democracy. He also praised Iraqi security forces, international monitors, election officials and the Iraqi people for a successful voting experience, Iraqi satellite channel al-Sumaria reported Monday.

Meanwhile, Maliki met with his top military commanders in a weekend session, commending the ability of the national security forces to set aside sectarian and ethnic divisions for the sake of the country.

Iraqi Defense Minister Abdul Qadir Obeidi told the prime minister during the meeting that his forces were preparing themselves for their larger role in Iraq as U.S. and international forces pull back to their bases.

Source: United Press International (UPI).
Link: http://www.upi.com/Emerging_Threats/2009/02/09/Talabani_congratulates_election_victors/UPI-37081234220673/.

Wild otter crashes zoo exhibit

JACKSONVILLE, Fla., Feb. 10 (UPI) -- A curator at Florida's Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens said a wild North American river otter somehow found its way into the zoo's otter exhibit.

Craig Miller, curator of mammals at the zoo, said only one otter was left in the exhibit when the attraction closed Sunday night but keepers arrived Monday morning to find the otter had been joined by a wild cousin from outside, the (Jacksonville) Florida Times-Union reported Tuesday.

Miller said the incident was a first for the zoo.

"We get birds or squirrels coming in, of course," he said. "And we may find possum remains in the lion yard. But never this."

He said the wild otter was freed Monday afternoon at the Trout River. Florida regulations bar zoos from keeping wild animals unless they are injured or declared a nuisance animal.

"He's a first-time offender," Miller said. "So we let him go."

The curator said officials will likely tighten the fence surrounding the exhibit to keep wild animals out of the otter area.

Turkey approves naval mission in Somalia

Ankara - The Turkish parliament on Tuesday passed a memorandum that will allow Turkey to send naval forces to fight piracy off the coast of Somalia.

Last week the government sent to parliament the memorandum to allow Turkish ships to join the international operation. The navy immediately started preparations in anticipation of Tuesday's parliamentary vote.

General Metin Durak of the Turkish General Staff told reporters on Friday that the vessel would be ready to embark within a month.

More than a dozen ships with links to Turkey have been hijacked off the Somali coast during the recent spate of piracy. Last month two Turkish ships and their crew were released after a ransom was paid. - Sapa-dpa

Netanyahu, Livni declare win in Israeli election

By STEVEN GUTKIN, Associated Press Writer

JERUSALEM – Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and hard-line rival Benjamin Netanyahu both claimed victory Tuesday in Israel's parliamentary election, but official results showed a race so close it could be decided by a third candidate — a rising power among the hawks.

Right-wing parties — including Netanyahu's Likud Party — appear to have won a clear majority of 65 seats in the 120-seat parliament, which would give Netanyahu the upper hand in forming the next government.

However, with 99 percent of the votes counted, Livni's centrist Kadima Party had 28 seats, while Likud had 27. Those results could change by a seat or two — enough to alter the outcome — when soldiers' votes are tallied Thursday evening.

The winner of the election wasn't clear in part because Livni could try to form a coalition with hawkish parties. It appeared ultranationalist Avigdor Lieberman, who based his campaign on denying citizenship to Israeli Arabs he considers disloyal, could single-handedly determine the country's next leader with his decision of whom to join.

He declared after the vote that he spoken to both Livni and Netanyahu and told them he could be persuaded to join either one, but he added that he wanted a "nationalist right-wing government."

Whoever comes out on top, the political wrangling was likely to drag on for weeks, and with it the fate of international Mideast peace efforts.

A win by Livni, who favors giving up land to make room for a Palestinian state, would boost President Barack Obama's goal of pursuing an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal.

A government led by Netanyahu, who opposes concessions to the Palestinians, could put Israel and the U.S. on a collision course. Netanyahu says he would allow West Bank settlements to expand and is seen as likely to contemplate military action against Iran.

"With God's help, I will lead the next government," Netanyahu told a raucous crowd of cheering supporters chanting his nickname, Bibi. "The national camp, led by the Likud, has won a clear advantage."

Soon after, Livni took the stage before a crowd of flag-waving supporters and flashed a V for victory sign. "Today the people chose Kadima. ... We will form the next government led by Kadima."

Even if Livni could overcome the formidable obstacles and become Israel's second female prime minister after Golda Meir, she would almost certainly be hindered by right-wing coalition partners opposed to her vision of giving up land in exchange for a peace deal with the Palestinians.

The election was called after she failed to put together a ruling coalition when scandal-plagued Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced he was stepping down last fall.

Nevertheless, applause, cheers and whistling erupted at Kadima headquarters in Tel Aviv as television stations began reporting their exit polls, with supporters jumping up and down and giving each other high-fives and hugs.

In his speech, Netanyahu told his supporters that he was proud of the gains by his hard-line party. He called for a broad-based coalition, but said he would first turn to his "natural partners in the national camp," a reference to other hard-liners opposed to peace concessions.

The partial results marked a dramatic slide for Netanyahu, who had held a solid lead in opinion polls heading into the election.

Israelis vote for parties, not individuals. Since no party won a parliamentary majority, the leader of one of the major parties must try to put together a coalition with other factions — a process that can take up to six weeks.

In coming days, President Shimon Peres will ask a candidate to try to put together a government. Peres, who hails from Kadima and served for decades in the dovish Labor Party, could lean toward Livni as opposed to Netanyahu — who once defeated Peres in the 1996 election — as the candidate most capable of forming a government. But if a parliamentary majority tells him it favors Netanyahu, he will have to pick the Likud leader.

If Livni's projected victory holds, it is likely due to a strong showing by Lieberman, who appears to have taken a sizable chunk of votes that would have otherwise gone to Netanyahu.

The partial results gave Lieberman's Yisrael Beitenu Party 16 seats, placing it in third place behind Kadima and Likud — and ahead of Labor, the party that ruled Israel for decades. That gives Lieberman a key role in coalition building.

Lieberman said his party's strong showing means he holds the key to forming the new Israeli government. Lieberman could serve in a Livni government because he is not a classic hawk who rejects any compromise with the Palestinians. Like Livni, he favors giving up parts of the West Bank. Lieberman and Livni converge on other issues that could for a basis for cooperation.

"It is up to Lieberman who will form the next coalition," said Menachem Hofnung, a professor of political science at Hebrew University. "Lieberman has emerged as the kingmaker. He is the winner of these elections, and it depends on who he sides with over the next few weeks as to who will be prime minister."

Netanyahu, who was prime minister a decade ago, portrayed himself as the candidate best equipped to deal with the threats Israel faces — Hamas militants in Gaza, Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon and behind them an Iranian regime that Israel believes is developing nuclear weapons.

He has derided the outgoing government's peace talks as a waste of time, and said relations with the Palestinians should be limited to developing their battered economy.

Livni, who has led Israel's peace talks the past year, has pledged to continue the negotiations with the moderate Palestinian government in the West Bank. At the same time, she advocates a tough line against the Hamas regime in the Gaza Strip, and was one of the architects against a bruising Israeli military offensive in Gaza last month.

At Likud headquarters, activists dismissed Kadima's edge and predicted Netanyahu would be tapped to form the next government.

"I am certain that Netanyahu will be the next prime minister," said Likud lawmaker Gilad Erdan. "Netanyahu has a clear advantage because the right-wing parties have a larger bloc. The test is not which party gets the most votes, but which candidate has the best chance to form a coalition, and that person is Benjamin Netanyahu."

Kadima lawmaker Haim Ramon predicted the party would lead the next government.

"We are the only party that can approach both the right wing and the left," he told Channel 2 TV. But he acknowledged the results would make it difficult for anyone to govern.

Israel's Palestinian peace partners in the West Bank said the next Israeli government would have to stop building settlements in the West Bank before talks could resume.

"We now have clear conditions for whoever heads the Israeli government," said Rafiq Husseini, a senior aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. "The conditions for negotiations to resume begin with the immediate halt of settlement activities."

Peace talks have not included the Gaza Strip's Hamas rulers, who do not recognize Israel's right to exist and recently were the target of a devastating Israeli military offensive.

In Gaza, Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said the election results don't make a difference in the lives of Palestinians because Israel "is still working to eliminate the Palestinian existence.

"Anyone who thinks that new faces might bring change is mistaken," Barhoum said, before the exit polls were released.

Australia bushfire toll 181 and rising, arson probe

By Michael Perry

SYDNEY (Reuters) - Cooler weather helped thousands of firefighters begin to get a grip on Australia's deadliest bushfires on Wednesday but 181 people were confirmed dead in parts of the southeast devastated by the infernos.

Forensic police sifted through ash to identify bodies and the Sydney Morning Herald said the death toll could reach 300 as many burned-out areas had not yet been searched.

Victoria state Premier John Brumby said there may be 50 to 100 dead in Marysville, a town of some 500 residents which had been sealed off to the public because of the horrific scenes. "There are still many deceased people in their homes," said Brumby.

"The toll is going to be massive," said firefighter John Munday, who was in Marysville 10 minutes before the firefront swept through the town on Saturday night.

"We had people banging on the sides of our tanker begging us to go back to houses where they knew there were people trapped, but we couldn't because if we had, we'd all be dead too," Munday told The Australian.

The fires tore through rural towns north of Melbourne on Saturday night, fanned by strong winds and heatwave temperatures. Melbourne's temperature on Saturday hit a city record of 46.4 Celsius (115.5 Fahrenheit).

The disaster area, more than twice the size of London and encompassing more than 20 towns north of Melbourne, has been declared a crime zone. More than 750 homes have been destroyed.

Victoria state police have launched the nation's biggest arson investigation, dubbed "Operation Phoenix." The bushfires were suspicious because there were no natural events such as lightning to start the blazes, police said.

Bushfire arsonists could face manslaughter or murder charges.

FIREFIGHTERS BATTLING BLAZES

More than 4,000 firefighters are battling some 33 fires in Victoria state, 23 of them still out of control.

The firefighters were backburning to starve fires of fuel and extending control lines on Wednesday and warmer weather was forecast for the coming weekend.

"We've still got several significant fires burning across the state but the weather conditions at the moment have stilled a little bit, which is allowing some good active work," said emergency official Nina Cullen.

The bushfires are the worst natural disaster in Australia in 110 years. The previous worst bushfire was the Ash Wednesday fires of 1983 which killed 75 people.

The blazes have increased pressure on Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to take firm action on climate change as scientists blamed global warming for the conditions that fueled the disaster.

Australia is particularly vulnerable to climate change because of its hot, dry environment. But it is dependent on coal-fired power and Rudd has set a target for cuts in overall greenhouse gas emissions of only 5 percent by 2020.

Australia is the most fire-prone country on earth, say scientists, and most of its bushfires are ignited by lightning. Fire officials monitor lightning strikes and any fire that does not correspond with a strike is assumed to be started by people, either accidentally or deliberately.

Victoria has ordered a Royal Commission of Inquiry to probe all aspects of the bushfires, including safety guidelines.

Officials say the golden rule of surviving forest fires is to evacuate early or stay and defend one's home, but experts say many victims in Victoria appear to have panicked and fled at the worst time.

Some were incinerated in their cars as they tried to outrun the flames.

Fountain of Mysterious Space Dust Found

SPACE.com Staff
space.com – Tue Feb 10, 5:16 pm ET

The universe is not empty. The space between stars and between galaxies is permeated by gas and dust.

In fact our solar system is currently experiencing a cosmic dust storm with at least three times as much dust passing through compared to just a few years ago, owing to a periodic weakening of the sun's magnetic field. And sometime in the next 10,000 years, we'll plow through the G-cloud, a region of dust more dense than the one we're in now.

Astronomers have struggled for a conclusive answer as to where all this dust comes from.

"We not only do not know what the stuff is, but we do not know where it is made or how it gets into space," said Donald York, a professor of astronomy and astrophysics at the University of Chicago.

York and his colleagues have now identified a fountain of dust that appears to be just the sort of culprit they have been looking for.

The dust factory is a double star system, designated HD 44179, that sits within the strikingly beautiful Red Rectangle, an oddly geometric cloud of gas and dust located 2,300 light-years away.

Old and dusty

One of the double stars in the Red Rectangle is a type astronomers figure produces dust. It has burned all the hydrogen in its core, so it can no longer support the primary form of thermonuclear fusion that powers other stars like our middle-aged sun.

These post-AGB (post-asymptotic giant branch) stars, as they are called, collapse and then generate enough heat to burn a new fuel: helium. During the transition, which takes place over tens of thousands of years, a star like this loses an outer layer of its atmosphere, York and his colleagues explain. Dust is thought to form in this cooling layer, which is pushed outward by the star's radiation pressure.

In double-star systems, material is often shared, or pulled from one star to the other. A disk of material from the post-AGB star can form around the second smaller, more slowly evolving star.

"When disks form in astronomy, they often form jets that blow part of the material out of the original system, distributing the material in space," York explained. This is what the researchers think they observed in the Red Rectangle.

The discovery, to be detailed next month in the Astrophysical Journal, has wide-ranging implications, the researchers say, because dust is critical to scientific theories about how stars form.

"If a cloud of gas and dust collapses under its own gravity, it immediately gets hotter and starts to evaporate," York said. Something, possibly dust, must immediately cool the cloud to prevent it from reheating.

The giant star sitting in the Red Rectangle is among those that are far too hot to allow dust condensation within their atmospheres. And yet a giant ring of dusty gas encircles it.

Years of watching

Witt's team made approximately 15 hours of observations on the double star over a seven-year period with the 3.5-meter telescope at Apache Point Observatory in New Mexico.

"Our observations have shown that it is most likely the gravitational or tidal interaction between our Red Rectangle giant star and a close sun-like companion star that causes material to leave the envelope of the giant," Witt said.

Some of this material ends up in a disk of accumulating dust that surrounds that smaller companion star. Gradually, over a period of some 500 years, the material spirals into the smaller star. Just before this happens, the smaller star ejects a small fraction of the accumulated matter in opposite directions via two gaseous jets, called "bipolar jets."

Other quantities of the matter pulled from the envelope of the giant end up in a disk that skirts both stars, where it cools.

"The heavy elements like iron, nickel, silicon, calcium and carbon condense out into solid grains, which we see as interstellar dust, once they leave the system," Witt explained.

Cosmic dust production has eluded telescopic detection because it only lasts for perhaps 10,000 years â€" a brief period in the lifetime of a star. Study hundreds of stars, and the odds are long you'll find one in this phase.

Astronomers have observed other objects similar to the Red Rectangle in Earth's neighborhood of the Milky Way. This suggests that the process Witt's team has observed is quite common when viewed over the lifetime of the galaxy, which is several billion years.

"Processes very similar to what we are observing in the Red Rectangle nebula have happened maybe hundreds of millions of times since the formation of the Milky Way," Witt said.

Tsvangirai set to become Zimbabwe's PM

HARARE (AFP) – Zimbabwe's opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai is set to become prime minister Wednesday, joining President Robert Mugabe in a unity government after a decade of struggling to push him from power.

Tsvangirai's decision to bring his Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) into the unity government has raised doubts overseas and sparked fierce debate within his own party.

Now he is set to take office at 11:00 am (0900 GMT) and then head to a stadium to address his supporters, a speech that will celebrate but also need to reassure.

The former union leader is all too aware of the concerns that he, like earlier Mugabe rivals, could be swallowed into the long-ruling ZANU-PF party without changing the course of a nation that is by any measure disintegrating.

"The skeptics must understand why we have done this and what is the best course of action to address the questions and challenges of transition in this political environment," Tsvangirai said on the eve of his swearing-in.

"We have made this decision and we made it without being forced. We want our colleagues in the country and outside the country to approach it from that perspective. It is our decision. Let history be the judge of this decision," he said.

His swearing-in will cap nearly a year of turmoil that began last March, when Tsvangirai won a first-round presidential vote that was greeted with nationwide political violence, mostly against his supporters.

Hoping to end the unrest that left at least 180 dead, Tsvangirai pulled out of the run-off and left Mugabe to claim a one-sided victory denounced as a sham overseas.

South Africa brokered the unity deal, which was signed on September 15 but stalled amid protracted talks on how to divide cabinet posts and share control of the security forces.

Those concerns were finally addressed when the parties agreed to name co-ministers to home affairs, which oversees the police, and to create a new National Security Council that will allow all parties control of the security forces.

But analysts question how such an arrangement can work with the 84-year-old Mugabe, who has ruled since independence in 1980 and who just recently declared that "Zimbabwe is mine."

"Tsvangirai's swearing in symbolizes a new era for the people of Zimbabwe," said Daniel Makina, a political analyst at the University of South Africa.

"Whether the inclusive government will be a success or not is another matter," he added.

The challenges facing Zimbabwe would daunt even the best administration.

More than half the population needs emergency food aid. Unemployment is at 94 percent. Only 20 percent of children go to school because teachers haven't been paid and exams not graded.

Public hospitals are closed, with doctors and nurses unpaid, exacerbating a health crisis in a nation where 1.3 million people have HIV and cholera has hit nearly 70,000 people since August, killing about 3,400.

"We only hope that his appointment will stem the tide of economic and humanitarian decline. But the lingering question is how effective are his powers going to be," Makina said of Tsvangirai.

An independent political analyst in South Africa, Daniel Silke, described Tsvangirai's taking office as an important step towards normalizing Zimbabwe.

"However, it will take some time to impress the international community. This is just the beginning of a long and arduous road for Zimbabwe to achieve international legitimacy," said Silke.