Australia rapped for violating aborigine rights

Amnesty International has slammed the Australian government's inability to tackle the poverty the country's aborigines are facing.

The London-based organization's visiting Secretary-General Irene Khan said on Wednesday that the conditions aboriginals are facing are deeply disturbing and require a new approach.

"In the heart of the First World, I saw scenes more reminiscent of the Third World - of countries torn by war, dominated by repressive regimes or racked by corruption," AP quoted Khan, a Bangladesh-born lawyer, as saying.

She underlined that the aborigines are suffering from the violation of their basic human rights.

"... This violation occurs on a continent of such privilege that it is not merely disheartening, it is deeply disturbing."

The Amnesty boss said she was surprised to witness first hand the extent of their poverty.

"They feel disempowered, robbed of their dignity, threatened with the loss of their identity and attacked on their own ancestral lands."

The UN had also criticized the Australian government's policies towards aboriginal communities earlier this year.

The life expectancy of indigenous Australians is 17 years lower than that of other Australians.

Iran summons Argentinean envoy over cultural plunder

Iranian Foreign Ministry has summoned the Argentinean chargé d'affairs to protest an attempt by the country's former diplomat for "plundering Persian treasures."

Argentina's former counselor to Iran Sebastian Zavala was stopped by Iranian customs officials as he was about to leave the country upon the termination of his post.

An array of antiquities weighing about 4 tones, including gold and silver coins dating to the time ancient Persian dynasties, battle shields, manuscripts, engraved stones and a 200-year-old framed marriage certificate were discovered in what he claimed was his "personal effects," ready to be shipped out of the country.

Iranian authorities delivered a formal letter of complaint to Argentinean chargé d'affairs Mario Enrique Quinteros on Wednesday, criticizing the former envoy's "undignified act carried out against diplomatic, cultural commitments".

The Iranian Foreign Ministry explained in its letter that Iran's Cultural Heritage Organization and the Judiciary were pursuing the antique items' smuggling case.

The Argentinean chargé d'affairs, for his part, said he would relay Iran's message to authorities in his country.

Kabul boosts security ahead of Karzai inauguration

Wed Nov 18, 2009

Afghan forces have boosted security in and around Kabul to deter Taliban attacks during President Hamid Karzai's second inauguration ceremony.

The Afghan Defense Ministry said on Wednesday that several roads leading to Karzai's fortified presidential palace will be closed to traffic.

The ministry has declared a public holiday for government offices in the capital. Kabul residents have been asked to avoid unnecessary journeys.

Kabul's only international airport is to be closed to commercial flights on Thursday.

Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has arrived in the capital ahead of the inauguration. Moreover, Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband and French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner will be among foreign dignitaries to attend the ceremony.

Karzai will take his oath of office on Thursday, three months after an election marred by allegations of widespread fraud and vote rigging failed to produce a winner with the majority of the ballot.

A run-off to the vote was never held, since Abdullah Abdullah, Karzai's main rival, decided to withdraw his bid for presidency.

Taliban militants carried out numerous attacks during the August 20 election.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://edition.presstv.ir/detail/111610.html.

Houthis release photos of Saudi phosphorous bombs

Houthi fighters in Yemen say Saudi forces have used unconventional weapons in their fight against Shias in northern country.

The fighters said many civilians were killed or injured after Saudi warplanes dropped phosphorous bombs on villages in north.

They have also released pictures of phosphorus bomb attacks by Saudi warplanes.

In a move to protect the civilian population from the raging war in north Yemen, Amnesty International wrote a letter to Saudi Arabia's Defense Minister, Crown Prince Sultan bin 'Abdul 'Aziz Al-Saud last week asking whether phosphorus bombs were used in the attacks.

The London-based rights group demanded Riyadh's explanation about the manner in which the bombs were used and what precautions were taken to ensure that civilians were not put at risk.

The organization however has received no response from Saudi officials yet.

Saudi Arabia launched earlier in November an offensive against Shia fighters, who accuse the kingdom of supporting the Yemeni government in its crackdown.

The Yemeni government launched Operation Scorched Earth in August in an effort to crush the Houthis, whom it accuses of seeking to restore an imamate that was overthrown in 1962.

The Houthis, however, dismiss the accusations, saying they are only seeking to put an end to the government's discriminatory policies against them.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=111524§ionid=351020206.

Bushehr plant 'to come on stream in coming months'

After Moscow said that a Russian-built nuclear power plant in Iran would not go online by the end of 2009 as planned, a top Iranian nuclear official says the plant will be completed within months.

Earlier on Monday, Russia announced that due to technical problems its engineers are not able to start up the reactor at the Bushehr plant, Iran's first nuclear power station, by the year's end.

"We expect major results by the end of the year, but the launch will not take place," Interfax quoted Russian Energy Minister Sergei Shmatko as saying.

Moscow had previously announced that the power plant, located in Iran's southern city of Bushehr, would be up and running by the end of 2009.

Meanwhile, Kazem Jalali, the spokesman for Iran's Foreign Policy and National Security Commission in Majlis quoted the head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization (AEO) as saying that the final steps for the launch of the plant are underway.

"In line with an agreement with the Russians, this plant will be launched in the coming months and it is currently on the final stages," AEO chief Ali Akbar Salehi was quoted as saying on Wednesday.

Salehi said the injection of fuel into the plant's reactor is among the first measures to be carried out at the Bushehr power plant.

Meanwhile Jalali said that no definite timeline can be set for the inauguration of Bushehr power plant, explaining the reason as being the time difference between the Iranian and Christian calendars.

The delay in the launch of Bushehr plant comes as Tehran and Moscow signed a deal on the construction of the facility in 1995.

Under the deal, the plant was originally scheduled to be completed in 1999.

Referring to the long overdue construction of the site, Jalali urged the AEO chief to pursue the matter more actively.

"As this plant has turned into a symbol of cooperation between Russia and Iran we hope that it comes on stream soon as possible," Jalali added.

Georgia sends first peacekeepers to Afghanistan

Moscow, Nov 17 (New Kerala): Former Soviet Republic of Georgia will dispatch 173 peacekeepers to Afghanistan as part of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).

The personnel are Georgia's first peacekeeping contribution to the ISAF.

''Tonight, a company of the 23rd Battalion, 2nd Brigade will fly to Afghanistan. In all, 173 people will go to Afghanistan, including one representative of the Georgian clergy,'' RIA Novosti news agency quoted a Georgian Defense Ministry spokesman yesterday.

The company would be placed under French command, the spokesman said.

The Georgian parliament in August approved President Mikheil Saakashvili's initiative to send an infantry company and an infantry battalion to Afghanistan.

The Defense Ministry said the battalion, comprised of 500 peacekeepers, would go to Afghanistan in the spring of 2010 and serve together with the Americans.

A Great Wall: Obama tours China's iconic site

By CHARLES HUTZLER, Associated Press Writer

BEIJING – President Barack Obama absorbed history's expanse Wednesday from atop the Great Wall of China, a manmade wonder of such enormity that Obama found himself putting daily life in perspective.

"It's magical," Obama said, walking down a ramp alone, his hands in his pockets. "It reminds you of the sweep of history and our time here on earth is not that long. We better make the best of it."

A must-see for presidents from President Richard Nixon on, the Great Wall was one of Obama's major sightseeing stops during his diplomatic tour of Asia. He later traveled to Seoul, South Korea, the final stop of his eight-day trip.

Dressed in a winter jacket against a biting wind at the Great Wall, Obama led a knot of people for a half-hour jaunt up the crenelated wall toward a watchtower, a restored section originally built 500 years ago.

Obama walked down the last ramp by himself in a choreographed moment for photographers. White House aides were exultant afterward that "the shot" they had planned turned out perfectly.

The earliest sections of the wall were built more than 2,000 years ago. From the portion where Obama stood, the mountainside vistas were majestic.

Obama's tourism breaks at the Great Wall and the Forbidden City's former imperial palaces on Tuesday were the only diversions on an eight-day Asia trip meant to show U.S. reengagement with the region.

Obama sought to reassure allies in Japan and Southeast Asia — a mission he would continue in South Korea later Wednesday. In China, he tried to lend positive momentum to relations with the new world power and potential rival.

Stops at landmark tourist sites used to be — and often still are — compulsory for foreign dignitaries visiting China. Nixon's foreign affairs strategist Henry Kissinger suspected his Chinese hosts scheduled sightseeing to drag out his time — and perhaps drag out concessions.

History matters to the Chinese, who take pride in being heirs to a civilization of 4,000-plus years and believe the past offers insights into their present.

The head of China's legislature, Wu Bangguo, told Obama on Monday, "In China, there is a saying that if you want to appreciate the history of China in the past 100 years, go to Shanghai; in the past 1,000 years, come to Beijing; and for the past 2,000 years, go to Xi'an" — the imperial capital of China's first emperor and later dynasties.

Obama replied that he was impressed with the dynamism of Shanghai, where he held a town hall-style meeting with Chinese youth Monday and which, he said, is "a sign of China's emergence as a great economic power." His rapid 30-minute run through the vast Forbidden City on Tuesday was "a reminder of the incredible traditions and heritage of the Chinese people."

After the Wall, Obama headed for South Korea, his first visit to the country. How to coax nuclear-armed North Korea to return to disarmament talks is the top issue for Obama's meetings Thursday with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak in the capital, Seoul.

A longtime U.S. ally whose president is strongly pro-U.S., South Korea looks in many ways like the easiest part of Obama's Asia's swing.

Obama and Lee have taken a skeptical view of North Korea's recent conciliatory rhetoric to resume negotiations over its nuclear program, only weeks after it exploded a nuclear test-device and test-fired missiles. Last week, the North and South Korean navies skirmished in disputed waters for the first time in seven years, sending a North Korean patrol boat retreating in flames.

The clash was a reminder that the Korean Peninsula remains a volatile flash-point for the United States, which fought North Korean and Chinese forces to a standstill in the 1950-53 Korean War.

US army 'dramatically' underreporting suicides

US soldiers returning from Iraq, Afghanistan frequently beat own wives, attempt suicide.

By Dahr Jamail - ANCHORAGE, Alaska

According to a soldiers' advocacy group at Fort Hood, the US base where an army psychiatrist has been charged with killing 13 people and wounding 30 in a Nov. 5 rampage, the official suicide figures provided by the Army are "definitely" too low.

Chuck Luther served 12 years in the military and is a veteran of two deployments to Iraq, where he was a reconnaissance scout in the 1st Cavalry Division. The former sergeant was based at Fort Hood, where he lives today.

"I see the ugly," Luther told IPS. "I see soldiers beating their wives and trying to kill themselves all the time, and most folks don't want to look at this, including the military."

Luther, who in 2007 became the founder and director of the Soldier's Advocacy Group of Disposable Warriors, knows about these types of internal problems in the military because he has been through many of them himself.

Luther told IPS that he believes the real number of soldiers at Fort Hood committing suicide is being dramatically underreported by the military.

"There are suicides of active-duty troops occurring regularly both on and off base," Luther said. "One of them I knew personally since I served with him in Iraq and he was one of my soldiers, and they still have him listed as under investigation for suicide."

"From what I know right now, there are at least three suicides they are not reporting at all. Most notably, there is a soldier who committed suicide that the Army confirmed through a press conference, and this is not being reported, and I'm working with the Pentagon to try to find out why that is not being reported," he said. "The Army won't even release his name."

Yet Luther believes the situation is even worse.

"I definitely believe there are more than these. If this is what they've hidden from us that we know of, we can rest assured there are many, many more than this. We filed a FOIA [Freedom of Information Act] to get information from them [Army], but they bog you down in red tape," he said.

Due to the military's continued attempts to mask the true number of suicides in the ranks, along with an ongoing refusal to make the radical policy changes necessary to properly treat soldiers and psychiatric care providers exposed to secondary post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), Luther fears the worst for the future.

"There will be more 5 November [referencing the recent Fort Hood tragedy] attacks on fellow soldiers, and they will likely be even more drastic," he said.

"Everybody has to outdo someone, so the next are likely to be worse. Violence breeds violence. I was trained to be very violent in combat as a scout...we killed or detained Iraqis before anyone else got there. Two months ago I warned the Army's Chain of Command that before we had an attack by a soldier on other troops when they come home, we needed to make some dramatic changes."

At the time of the interview, one week after army psychiatrist Major Nidal Hasan's shooting rampage left 13 dead and over 30 wounded at Fort Hood, Luther informed IPS that in the previous three days at Fort Hood, "I've heard commanders tell soldiers requesting psychological help that they are full of crap and don't have PTSD...so if we can't implement these needed changes quickly and rapidly we are going to have more loss of life on US soil by soldiers killing other soldiers."

While not on the scale of the recent shooting incident, several other killings by soldiers have been reported at Fort Hood over the last two years.

According to official military statistics, Fort Hood already suffers the highest number of suicides among Army installations since the invasion of Iraq in 2003. While Luther believes the number is far higher, Army officials at Fort Hood admit to at least 10 suicides on the base from January to July of this year, and at least 75 "confirmed" suicides since 2003.

Several years of repeated war-zone deployments are taking their toll, as Army personnel are experiencing record rates of PTSD, depression, other mental health problems, alcohol and drug abuse, and suicides.

According to the Army Suicide Event Report, a total of 99 soldiers killed themselves in 2006, the highest rate of military suicides in the 26 years the military has been keeping statistics on suicides. More than a quarter of them were by troops in combat postings in Iraq and Afghanistan. The figure does not include post-discharge suicides by military personnel.

In 2007, at least 115 suicides were reported by the Army, another record. Last year set another record, with at least 133 reported suicides, in addition to there being a record number of suicides in the Marine Corps that year.

The suicide rate for the Army for 2008 was calculated roughly at 20.2 per 100,000 soldiers, which for the first time since the Vietnam War is higher than the adjusted civilian rate.

Thus far, 2009 is on pace to set another record for the number of suicides in the Army.

Private Michael Kern, an active-duty Iraq war veteran who is based at Fort Hood, served in Iraq from March 2007 to March 2008.

On Nov. 9, four days after the shooting spree at Fort Hood, Kern told IPS, "The 20th Engineering Battalion was hit hard in this rampage. They are scheduled to deploy in January to Afghanistan, and lost a lot of good folks on Thursday [Nov. 5]. I personally know a soldier in that Battalion who attempted suicide last night."

Mental health problems and suicide appear to now be systemic in the military.

By October 2007, data within the Army's fifth Mental Health Advisory Team report indicated that approximately 12 percent of combat troops in Iraq and 17 percent of those in Afghanistan were coping by taking prescription antidepressants and/or sleeping pills to cope.

In 2008, the Daily Telegraph of London reported that two out of five suicide victims among troops in Iraq and Afghanistan have been found to be on antidepressants.

In April 2008, the RAND Corporation released a stunning report revealing, "Nearly 20 percent of military service members who have returned from Iraq and Afghanistan - 300,000 in all - report symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder or major depression, yet only slightly more than half have sought treatment."

A 2008 court case in California revealed a Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) email that revealed 1,000 veterans who are receiving care from the VA are attempting suicide every single month, and 18 veterans kill themselves daily.

Israeli army warns rabbis on soldiers' revolt

Israel faces protest from radicalized soldiers acting on orders from extremist settler rabbis.

TEL AVIV - The Israeli army has warned a group of radical rabbis that anti-government protests by their students while serving in the military would not be tolerated, the army said on Wednesday.

The warning follows two incidents involving soldiers who publicly held up banners vowing to refuse to participate in any future evacuation of illegal Jewish settlements in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian West Bank.

The soldiers came from Jewish seminaries, or yeshivas, where students combine military service with religious study.

In a meeting with the rabbis running the seminaries, Major General Avi Zamir, who heads the army's human resources directorate, said such protests "could cause a serious rift and undermine the standing of the IDF as the army of the people," an army statement said.

Zamir asked the rabbis to come up with a "real, clear and determined plan to deal with the issue," the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) statement said.

In the past right-wing rabbis have been accused of urging their students to refuse orders to evacuate illegal settlements on religious grounds.

Many radical Jews claim that their God gave all of historic Palestine to the Jewish people alone, with no room to Palestinians, the original inhabitants of the land.

An umbrella organization for yeshivas whose students serve in the army said in a statement on Wednesday that it was "opposed to political demonstrations in the heart of the army that put in peril the army's foundations and the social unity at the core of the army."

It also called "for a debate within Israeli society on the use of soldiers for police missions."

Within the past month, six soldiers have been sentenced to prison and two to other punitive measures for publicly vowing not to evacuate settlements if ordered to do so.

The issue of illegal Jewish settlements is one of the thorniest in the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the main stumbling block in stalled US efforts to restart peace negotiations.

Settlement outposts built without government authorization are considered illegal under Israeli law. The international community considers all Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian land illegal.

Israel illegally occupied Palestinian East Jerusalem and the West Bank in 1967.

Around 200,000 illegal Jewish settlers are estimated to have moved into the dozen or so Israeli settlements in Palestinian East Jerusalem.

There are about 300,000 more illegal Jewish settlers currently living in settlements the Palestinian West Bank.

The settlers adhere to radical ideologies and are extremely violent to almost-defenseless Palestinians.

Hardline Netanyahu in new anti-Iran war threats

Israeli PM tours German-made submarine that can launch missiles carrying nuclear warheads.

ON BOARD THE INS EILAT - Hardline Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu toured a naval vessel on Tuesday, using the backdrop of his country's military power to make fresh threats against Iran.

"The threat that Iran poses is very grave for the state of Israel," Netanyahu said aboard the INS Eilat, a missile ship.

Netanyahu also toured one of Israel's three German-made, Dolphin-class submarines, the country's most expensive weapons platform.

According to specialist newsletter Jane's Defence Weekly, the submarines, known as U212s, are designed for a crew of 35, have a range of 4,500 kilometres (2,810 miles) and can launch cruise missiles carrying nuclear warheads.

However, when it confirmed the sale in 2006, the German government said the two vessels were not equipped to carry nuclear weapons.

Israeli media have reported that the Dolphin submarine could be key to any attack on Iran.

An Israeli submarine passed through the Suez Canal for the first time in June, escorted by Egyptian navy vessels, in what Israeli media said was intended as a message to Iran.

Iran insists it has the right to develop nuclear technology, which it says is aimed at generating energy for its growing population.

Although Iran has oil, it is still dependent on petrol imports to meet about 40 percent of domestic consumption.

Israel is the only country in the Middle Ease that actually has nuclear weapons.

Observers say due the strong Jewish and pro-Israel lobbies in the US and some European countries, these countries have taken a hypocritical stance in relation to nuclear issues in the region.

Tehran had repeatedly protested against Israeli and US war threats, warning them that it would retaliate in the event of any strike against Iran.

Tehran is not liked in Tel Aviv because of its strong criticism of the long and brutal Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories.

Tehran also accuses Israel of having a role in training the notorious former Iranian secret police during the era of the ruthless US-backed dictator, the shah, who were involved in torturing Iranians before the 1979 revolution.

Tehran Intl. Short Film Festival names winners

The 2009 edition of the Tehran International Short Film Festival has announced its winners during a ceremony held at Tehran's Art Bureau.

Finland's Shadows by Hanna Bergholm and Slovenia's Every Day is Not the Same by Martin Turk won the In Search of Truth Awards of the International Section.

The Best Film award of the ECO Member Section went to Ayan by Kyrgyz filmmaker Sadyk Sher-Niyaz.

The Best Feature Film Award of the International Section was granted to Scotland's Simon Hipkins for The Last Regal King Size, while Norway's Jens Lien was honored for Every Day is a Fish Day.

The Best Documentary Award of the International Section went to Georges Salameh's Maesmak from Italy.

Winners of the festival's national section were Houman Seyyedi, who won the Best Feature Film Award for his All My Paraphernalia is Dislocated and Mahin Javaherian, whose It's Raining Cats and Dogs won her the Jury Special Award.

Organized by the Iranian Young Cinema Society (IYCS), a member of the International Short Film Conference (ISFC), the 2009 TISFF was held from Nov. 11 to 16, screening films from more than 100 countries.

Low-enriched uranium stays in Iran: Mottaki

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki says the Islamic Republic is considering to exchange its enriched uranium with nuclear fuel inside the country.

"Iran will not send its 3.5-percent-enriched uranium out of the country," ISNA quoted Mottaki as saying on Wednesday. "That means we are considering to exchange the enriched uranium inside Iran," he went on to explain.

Under a mid-October proposal discussed in Vienna, Iran is asked to send most of its domestically produced low-enriched uranium (LEU) abroad to be converted into more highly enriched fuel rods for the Tehran reactor, which produces medical isotopes.

Following the Vienna meeting western media launched a campaign saying that Iran had failed to respond to the proposal in a timely manner.

"The notion that Iran has not yet responded to the proposal [put forth by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)] is mere propaganda," The Iranian minister said, adding that the country had already responded to the agency.

"In fact, they want our response to be whatever they dictate to us!" he said.

Iran prefers to domestically enrich uranium to 20 percent, or buy the 20-percent-enriched uranium that it needs rather than exchanging its LEU with fuel rods, Mottaki said.

"However, since they were insisting on the exchange, we decided to open a window of opportunity and study different aspects of this possibility... But since their estimate about the amount of fuel to be exchanged runs counter to that of our experts, technical examinations are still ongoing," Mottaki added.

"We have called for the Vienna technical commission to be established again so that we can present our viewpoints. The commission has yet to be established," he noted.

The IAEA-proposed draft was first floated by the Obama administration. Tehran, however, says its 'technical and economic' concerns must be taken into account first.

Iran, a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), says its activities are aimed at non-military civilian applications of the technology.

Tehran to exhibit modern Japanese paintings

The Imam Ali Religious Arts Museum is to mount an exhibition of modern Japanese paintings of the 1990s, in the Iranian capital of Tehran.

Painting for Joy will display some 30 works by young Japanese artists, who were in their 30s during the 1990s.

The exhibition, to be held from Nov. 19 to Dec. 2, 2009, will present paintings by highly acclaimed artists such as Makoto Aida, Yoshitaka Echizenya, Takanobu Kobayashi, Chiezo Taro, Yoshitomo Nara, Nobuhiko Nukata, Miran Fukuda, Naofumi Maruyama and Takashi Murakami.

Painting for Joy has also toured various cities in the Netherlands, Macedonia, Greece, the US, Canada and New Zealand.

Painting is one of the oldest and most highly refined Japanese art forms, encompassing a wide range of genre and styles.

Painting for Joy shows how young Japanese artists tried to further develop artistic expression in the final decade of the twentieth century, when information networks and communications technology witnessed rapid development.

Obama vows to end Afghan occupation

US President Barack Obama says his administration will soon announce "very clear benchmarks" for Afghanistan that would bring the eight-year long occupation there to an end.

In an interview on Wednesday, Obama said that he will bring the Afghan war to an end before he leaves office.

"My preference would be not to hand off anything to the next president. One of the things I'd like is the next president to be able to come in and say I've got a clean slate," CNN quoted Obama as saying.

The president emphasized that "a multi-year occupation won't serve the interests of the United States."

"The American people will have a lot of clarity about what we're doing, how we're going to succeed, how much this thing is going to cost, what kind of burden does this place on our young men and women in uniform and most importantly, what's the end game on this thing."

The remarks come as differences emerge among the US officials on the handling of the controversial war in Afghanistan.

General Stanley McChrystal, the commander of US and NATO forces in Afghanistan, has been warning that the war could be lost unless 40,000 more troops are deployed in the country.

Meanwhile, the US ambassador to Kabul, Karl Eikenberry, recently expressed serious reservations about a troop surge, saying that Afghan President Hamid Karzai should root out the country's corruption problem first.

However, Obama is not expected to announce a final decision on the matter for several weeks.

Although more than 100,000 foreign troops are currently fighting Taliban militants in Afghanistan, there has been no sign of stability in the war-torn country.

Thousands of civilians have lost their lives in Afghanistan since the 2001 US-led invasion.

Musharraf 'questioned' over Bhutto case

Wed Nov 18, 2009

A team of UN investigators looking into the assassination of Pakistan's former prime minister Benazir Bhutto in 2007 has questioned former military ruler, Pervez Musharraf.

According to the United Nations, the team arrived in Pakistan in July and questioned dozens of individuals over the circumstances surrounding Bhutto's assassination.

"The Commission of Inquiry had a frank, open and cordial conversation with former president Musharraf, having been able to pose to him many queries on issues central to its mandate," a statement from the UN said on Wednesday.

Bhutto, the two time prime minister of Pakistan, was targeted in a suicide gun-and-bomb attack in December 2007 as she was leaving an election rally in the garrison city of Rawalpindi.

Her assassination threw the country into a crisis and left questions unresolved for Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and many of her supporters.

London's Scotland Yard also conducted an inquiry into the assassination and ruled that Bhutto died from the force of a suicide bomb and not by gunfire.

The panel, led by the Chilean ambassador to the UN, Heraldo Munoz, will submit a report to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon at the end of the year, which will be shared with the Pakistani government and the UN Security Council.

The UN team has stressed that its mandate is limited to fact-finding and does not include a criminal investigation.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://edition.presstv.ir/detail/111594.html.

Iran to assemble 16,000 cars in Venezuela

The Iranian minister of industries and mines says Iran plans to produce 16,000 vehicles at its Venezuelan car plant in the coming year.

Ali-Akbar Mehrabian made the remarks after a meeting with Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicholas Maduro, and Science Minister Jesse Chacon, in Tehran.

The two allies opened a joint car plant in central Venezuela in 2006.

The Iran Khodro Company already exports the country's first all domestic vehicle, Samand, to several countries such as Venezuela, Turkey, Belarus, Russia, Syria and Tajikistan.

The Venezuelan delegation arrived in Tehran on Monday to work on the details in preparation for Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's upcoming visit to Venezuela.

Mehrabian also said that his talks with the Venezuelan officials focused on cooperation in the fields of food industry, gas and oil sectors, agriculture, science and technology, as well as generating electricity.

Jammu and Kashmir ideal for golf tourism: Jora

Jammu, Nov 18 (PTI) Stressing on diversification of tourism related activities in the state, Jammu and Kashmir government said that the state is blessed with natural lush green plains and meadows, making it an ideal destination for golf tourism.

"Golf tourism has taken a flight in our state due to its wonderful locations and we need to develop proper infrastructure to attract foreign as well as domestic tourists," state minister for tourism and culture, Nawang Rigzin Jora said here today.

The 18-hole golf course, spread over 1400 kanals of land, is being developed at an estimated cost of Rs 44 crore, in the first phase and will become operational in December this year, he said.

China plans newest fighters export to Azerbaijan

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ China is now able to produce its analogue of the Su-27/30 and MiG -29. The country has three new aircrafts of its own: the J-10, J-11 and the FC-1. In near future China plans to sell about 1200 fighters’ modifications, izvestia.ru reported.

In the early 1990s, the Chinese aerospace industry seemed stalled. Efforts to design and build their own fighters had produced little success, which culminated in the Chinese decision to purchase Sukhoi Su-27SK and Su-30MKK fighters, plus a license to assemble the Su-27s at Shenyang under their Chinese designator, J-11, which turned out to be a qualitative leap for China’s airway industry and Armed Forces.

Clearly, within the next decade Chinese industry will be building products competitive with the rest of the world and will be a player on the fighter aircraft export market.

Today, Beijing plans to supply aircrafts to Azerbaijan, as well as establish series manufacturing in Pakistan. Bangladesh, Myanmar, Lebanon, Iran, Malaysia, Morocco, Nigeria, Sri Lanka and Algeria have already shown interest to China-manufactures aircrafts. According to China and Pakistan-given appraisal, the number of fighters to be exported may reach 800.

Old mining town elects Muslim mayor

GRANITE FALLS, Wash.—Granite Falls residents are suspicious of any newcomers, let alone a Muslim native of Pakistan who moved to this rugged, blue-collar mining town to open his own bar.

But 54-year-old Haroon Saleem has thrived, winning over the town with hard work and an easy smile. He has become so popular that, on Nov. 3, he won the mayor’s job in a landslide, getting 61 percent of the more than 800 votes cast—a result that residents say would have been inconceivable not long ago.

“In the old Granite Falls, there were no minorities. It was a rough, rough, logging town. Any outsider, whether a minority or somebody from Everett, was the same. It was very difficult to be accepted in this town,” said Sharon Ashton, a close confidant of Saleem.

Saleem said he was nervous about being accepted, and hired a white assistant manager to ease local concerns when he opened his bar in 2000.

But he was embraced virtually from the start.

“That tells you how good and great of a community Granite Falls is,” he says with a slight accent. “They didn’t care ... I am who I am, and people love me for that, and I just love people. People know that I am smart, I am a businessman. In the big scheme of things, all these qualities have made me, got me to where I am today.”

After the Sept. 11 attacks, Saleem said community members reached out, letting him know he was one of them. No one seems to notice that his wife, Bushra, attends social events in a traditional shalwar dress.

Perhaps it helps that he owns one of the local watering holes, Saleem laughs. He admits that running the Timberline Cafe, with beer ads plastered everywhere, is not exactly a pious following of Islam, which forbids alcohol consumption. But Saleem’s story isn’t typical.

He emigrated from Rawalpindi, a city next to Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital—where his father’s business tanked and family feuds were a constant worry—to work in Iran as a seaman and then to the U.S. in 1979 on a visitor visa. When the visa expired, he decided to risk staying in the country.

Bears get satellite collars in Indian Kashmir

SRINAGAR (AFP) - Wildlife experts in Indian-controlled Kashmir have fitted black bears with satellite-tracking collars to study their behavior and help conserve the endangered animals, officials said Wednesday.

"This is the first time in India that Himalayan black bears have been fitted with a GPS collar," wildlife warden Rashid Naqash told AFP, adding that there just 300 of the animals in the region.

These collars will help in studying the behavior and habitat of the Himalayan black bear, he said, adding the "step will go a long way in conserving the endangered species."

A team of wildlife experts have put collars on three black bears -- a male, a female and a cub -- in the Dachigam national park on the outskirts of state's summer capital Srinagar.

Three more are likely to receive them soon, said Naqash, who is in charge of the park which sprawls over an area of 140 square kilometres (54 square miles).

Once the bears are caught, their age, weight and sex are recorded and the tracking system is fitted before they are released back into the wild.

A transmitter in the collar sends a signal to a satellite which relays the location of the animal to ground stations.

Naqash says the collars could also help prevent bear attacks in the region. Wild bears have killed more than two dozen people in the past four years and left 150 injured.

"We can always monitor their movements and sound an alert once they start moving towards the human habitations," said Naqash.

Egypt, Turkey Launch Naval Exercise

ANKARA [MENL] -- Egypt and Turkey have launched their first naval exercise.

Officials said the naval exercise began on Nov. 16 and would last through Nov. 21. They said the exercise was taking place along the Turkish coast and focused on interoperability and firepower.

Doctors say most Britons reject swine flu vaccine

By Kate Kelland

LONDON (Reuters) - More than half of Britons being offered vaccination against pandemic H1N1 flu are turning it down because they fear side-effects or think the virus is too mild to bother, a survey of doctors showed on Wednesday.

Many of the 107 family doctors polled by Britain's Pulse magazine said there was widespread resistance from patients and on average only 46 percent of those offered the vaccination agree to have it.

Doctors reported particular difficulties in persuading pregnant women to be vaccinated against the virus, according to Pulse, a trade newspaper for doctors.

"In all the pregnant women we've offered it to, I think only about one in 20 has agreed," Dr Chris Udenze, a family doctor based in Nottingham, central England, said in the survey.

Skepticism has been growing in Britain and other European countries about health authorities' handling of the H1N1 pandemic because the number of people infected has been lower than originally feared.

Britain began a vaccination program on October 21 for high-risk hospital patients, front-line healthcare workers, children in seasonal flu risk groups, pregnant women and people with compromised immune systems.

British health authorities have twice revised down their worst-case scenarios for H1N1 flu, which was declared a pandemic in June and has killed more than 7,000 people worldwide, according to latest data from the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control.

Original estimates that as many as 65,000 could die from H1N1 in Britain have now been cut to a prediction of around 1,000 deaths -- way below the average annual toll of 4,000 to 8,000 deaths from seasonal winter flu.

Richard Hoey, Pulse's editor, said his survey showed that many patients, and a substantial number of doctors were "unconvinced there is sufficient evidence that swine flu vaccination is safe and necessary."

A spokesman for the government's health department said it was "too early to speculate on uptake rates" for H1N1 vaccines but that doctors were working hard to reach as many patients as possible with their initial supplies.

"We recommend that people in the at risk groups accept the offer of vaccination," he said. "People in the risk groups are more likely to be severely ill if they catch swine flu, and the vaccine provides the best protection against the disease."

Suzanne Somers speaks out against the conventional cancer industry: mammograms, chemotherapy vs. alternative cures

(NaturalNews) As the author of the New York Times bestseller, "Knockout: Interviews with doctors who are curing cancer," Suzanne Somers is making waves across the cancer industry. Her powerful, inspired message of informed hope is reaching millions of readers who are learning about the many safe, effective options for treating cancer that exist outside the realm of the conventional cancer industry (chemotherapy, surgery and radiation).

Recently, Suzanne Somers spoke with NaturalNews editor Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, to share the inspiration for her new book Knockout. "People are just starving for some new information... for other options, for hope in [treating] cancer," she explained.

The full interview with Suzanne Somers is available as a downloadable MP3 file from NaturalNews.com: http://naturalnews.com/Index-Podcas...

In it, Somers explains why she's so concerned about the current course of the cancer industry:

"In 2010, cancer will be the biggest killer in the world. I fear for everybody walking into the present cancer protocol. It's going to make billions and billions of dollars for the industry, which is already a $200 billion-a-year business. It's going to bankrupt families. It causes expensive deaths. It emaciates people and they die anyway. Why not look into the options that are offered in Knockout? Why not look into Dr. Burzynski out of Houston? Why not look into Dr. Gonzalez in New York or Dr. Forsythe out of Nevada? [They] have a different protocol that doesn't require harsh chemicals or degrading the body."

In the interview, Suzanne also explains the limitations of chemotherapy and why the cancer industry has failed the people:

"There are only three kinds of cancer that respond to chemotherapy: Testicular cancer, childhood leukemia, some lymphomas including Non-Hodgkin's," she says. "For all of us who have raised money marching, going to black-tie fundraisers, we've thrown billions and billions of dollars at pharmaceutical companies and the FDA to find a cure, and it has failed. They do not have a cure."

Mammograms causing more harm than good
In the NaturalNews interview, Somers also discusses the problems with mammograms. When asked for her thoughts on the US government's sudden change in position that now says women under 50 should never receive mammograms, Somers explained:

"I have information so shocking in Knockout about mammograms that I have been reluctant on television to even bring it up, because to say anything negative about mammograms is going against the gold standard. So I was thrilled when I saw this report yesterday. Nobody's saying the real truth [about the harm caused by mammograms]. They don't want to open Pandora's Box ...you mean a lot of the women who faithfully had mammograms got their cancer from mammograms?"

What's in the "Knockout" book
Suzanne Somers' book presents a collection of interviews from leading doctors who have developed and now apply natural cancer therapies to patients, producing outstanding results. To gather information for her book, Somers explains, "I called doctors, I interviewed their patients, I talked to hundreds of people, I interviewed science writers, PhDs, neuroscientists, nutritionists... even the scientific advisory board of Life Extension."

And rather than preaching to people about what they should or shouldn't do, Somers' book simply provides new information and new options to men and women who want to know more before making a potentially deadly decision about chemotherapy. "You've got to get smart and connect the dots and ask yourself, with all the money going into [conventional] cancer, do they have an answer? The answer is no. We're on our own, so let's look at these independent doctors who are having success," Somers says.

The information presented in Somers' book, not surprisingly, has raised the ire of the conventional cancer industry and all their powerful allies (including more than a few organizations in the mainstream media). That's why Somers' message has been viciously attacked by conventional cancer and chemotherapy pushers who see the information presented in Knockout as a threat to their authority (and repeat business). "My message interferes with Big Business's bottom line," explains Somers. "But until what Big Business is doing is good for us, and for the betterment of our health and mankind, then I think people have to speak out about it."

And she's speaking out with a powerful, inspired voice. Listen to the full interview with NaturalNews editor Mike Adams here: http://naturalnews.com/Index-Podcas...

After hearing the interview, pick up the book yourself at your local book retailer or online. Here's the Amazon.com link: http://astore.amazon.com/wsdm-20/de...

"The war on cancer is a dismal failure," says Somers. "If this were a military project, the people in charge would be fired. It's not working."

But there are real solutions for cancer, and there are doctors delivering "alternative" cancer treatments right now that are producing astonishing results (putting conventional chemotherapy to shame). Suzanne's book lists a wealth of resources where you can find more information about natural cancer treatments and the clinics that offer them.

Here's a short list of some of the health experts she mentions (many more are listed in her book):

Dr. Julian Whitaker
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.whitakerwellness.com

Dr. Burzynski
Houston, TX
http://www.burzynskiclinic.com

Dr. Gonzalez
New York, NY
http://www.dr-gonzalez.com/index.htm

Ralph Moss
http://www.CancerDecisions.com

Dr. Russell Blaylock
http://www.RussellBlaylockMD.com

Dr. Forsythe
Nevada
http://www.DRforsythe.com

Do you know someone just diagnosed with cancer?
If so, send them the link to this article. Make sure they listen to this interview with Suzanne Somers. Information is power, and by providing your family members, friends or coworkers with more information and more options, you are empowering them with precisely the kind of information that might very well save their lives.

Chemotherapy is extremely toxic to the human body. It causes permanent damage to the brain, heart and kidneys. Mammograms harm ten times as many women as they help. Don't your loved ones deserve to know about the options available right now that can treat and reverse cancer without destroying their health?

That's what you'll learn in this interview and in Suzanne Somers' "Knockout" book. Inform yourself, and help empower others with knowledge -- the kind of knowledge the cancer industry would prefer people never had access to.

Somalia: Ahlu-Sunnah Wal-Jama Slams President's Remarks

17 November 2009

Somalia's Ahlu Sunnah Wal-Jama has condemned remarks made by Somali president Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, terming it as insult to the group.

In an interview with BBC Somali Service, President Ahmed describe the group as any another armed militia fighting in his war-torn country.

Sheikh Omar Sheikh Mohammed Farah, Ahlu-Sunnah's chairman slammed the remarks as an insult to his group.

"President Sheikh Sharif has openly ignored our existence, describing us as guerrillas just like Al-Shabaab and Hizbul Islam," he said in a press conference.

Sheikh Farah called on the president to apologize within 48-hours or else his group will take unspecified action against the Somali government.

In the interview, President Sharif stated that there are on-going talks with pro-government group in joining his administration, a statement which the group's leader rejected and termed it as lies.

The group's leader said they will formally lodged their complains and agreement with TFG to the parliament, urging parliamentarians to respond about the president's remarks.

It is the first time the group, which declared its support to the fragile UN-backed transition government, to strongly criticize the government.

Source: allAfrica.
Link: http://allafrica.com/stories/200911180043.html.

Czechs and Slovakians Celebrate 20th Anniversary of the Velvet Revolution

By Peter Sedik

BRATISLAVA, Slovakia—Thousands of people in both the Czech Republic and Slovakia went to the streets in recent days to commemorate the so-called "Velvet Revolution”: the non-violent movement that 20 years ago caused the fall of the communist regime in then Czechoslovakia.

The revolution was labeled as "velvet" by a Czech journalist and the term quickly spread in foreign media. It was called as such due to its non-violent nature, since no one was killed during the overthrow of the communist rule.

In Prague, tens of thousands gathered on Nov. 17 to commemorate the Velvet Revolution. A concert called "20 Years Without Curtain" launched the career of former dissident and the first post-communist President Vaclav Havel.

Concerts, rallies, and re-enactments of the communist state were organized to recall the events in 1989, when student demonstrations in Prague, suppressed by the riot police, sparked other mass protests on the streets, ultimately leading to the collapse of the Communist Party's power.

In February 1948 the Communist Party seized power in the former Czechoslovakia with the help of a state coup. In the 1950s, the communists intimidated Czech society using Stalinist practices, where critics of the communist regime were put into forced labor camps in Uranium mines or jailed.

The first attempt by reformist members of the Communist Party to improve the regime was called "Socialism with a human face," and it was violently suppressed in 1968 by the armed forces of the Soviet-led Warsaw pact.

Purges followed in the Communist Party and in a period called "normalization," the regime maintained its power for another 20 years. During this time, the opposition in the Czech Republic was formed under the informal lead of Vaclav Havel, playwright and essayist. In Slovakia, most dissidents were members of the Catholic Church or environmentalists.

After the Velvet Revolution in November 1989, Czechoslovakia began its bumpy path toward democracy. On 1993, by a decision of the then political leaders, the Czechoslovak Federation was peacefully divided into two independent countries, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Both countries are currently members of the European Union and NATO.

During the 40 long years of Communist rule in then Czechoslovakia, more than 205,000 people were put in jail and around 20,000 were held in forced labor camps for political reasons. More than 170,000 people escaped Czechoslovakia during this period. During this period 248 people were sentenced as the enemies of the state, around 4,500 people died in jails as political prisoners, and at least 282 were killed during their attempts to escape the "Iron Curtain."

Academics cease support for Holocaust center

A group of academics have withdrawn their support for an Austrian Holocaust Studies center due to the limited access to the center's archive.

According to a letter sent to the Associated Press, the university professors and researchers are provided with limited access and in some cases with no access to the archive of Vienna's Jewish community.

The Vienna Wiesenthal Institute for Holocaust Studies began provisional operations in January. Its purpose is to give researchers access to roughly 8,000 files of the late Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal and to parts of a vast archive belonging to Jewish Community Vienna, which represents the city's Jewish Community.

Earlier this month, former officials at the institute — including Anton Pelinka, the former chairman of the executive committee; and business manager Ingo Zechner — announced they were quitting, saying scholars would not be able to do independent research due to the archive restrictions.

In a copy of the letter obtained by the AP, 12 of the institute's 15-member international academic advisory board said they, too, were dropping out.

"The International Advisory Board of the Vienna Wiesenthal Institute has noted with increasing concern that the conditions under which the institute could carry out its work with the necessary degree of scholarly independence can no longer be met," the academics wrote in the letter dated Monday.

"On the basis of the information available to us and in view of the resignations...we conclude that the board no longer serves a useful purpose."

The letter was co-signed by, among others, Yehuda Bauer, professor of Holocaust Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem; David Bankier, head of the International Institute for Holocaust Research at Yad Vashem; and Tom Segev, an Israeli historian, journalist and Wiesenthal biographer.

Iraqi Kurds renew vote boycott threats

Iraqi Kurd leaders threaten to boycott the key national elections scheduled for January unless Kurdish areas receive more seats in the parliament.

The office of Kurdistan Regional President Massoud Barzani said the way seats were allocated to Kurds under the new election law was unfair.

"Unless this seat allocation formula is reconsidered in a just manner, the people of (the) Kurdistan Region will be compelled to boycott the election," said a statement posted on Barzani's website.

The statement came as Iraq's Sunni Arab Vice President Tareq al-Hashimi vetoed on Wednesday part of an election law over its failure to allocate any seats to the Iraqis living abroad.

Three northern provinces, represented by their own parliament as well as president, make up the autonomous Kurdish region, which borders Turkey.

Barzani's statement condemned the current division of seats as "an attempt to reduce the number of Kurdistan Region representatives in the next Iraqi parliament and diminish their achievements."

Kurdish lawmaker Mahmoud Othman echoed Barzani's demands and the threat of boycott and said, "If no changes are made on this matter, then we will not participate in the elections."

Al-Hashimi said he objected to Article One of the law approved by the parliament earlier this month because it did not give a voice to Iraqis living outside the country.

The Iraqi vice president's decision comes on the heels of the long-delayed passage of an electoral law for the January polls on November 8.

Any delay in the vote could in turn procrastinate US withdrawal from the country, a process scheduled to speed up following the election.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=111592§ionid=351020201.

Iraqi VP vetoes new election law

Iraq's Sunni Arab Vice President Tareq al-Hashimi has vetoed part of an election law over its failure to allocate any seats to Iraqis living abroad.

Al-Hashimi said he objected to Article One of the law approved by the parliament earlier this month because it did not give a voice to Iraqis living outside the country.

"On November 15, I sent a letter to parliament asking for the law to be amended. Parliament said I could veto the contested first article (of the law), which is what I have done today," AFP quoted al-Hashimi as saying.

He had given the parliament until Tuesday noon to amend the election bill and ensure greater representation for the mostly Sunni expatriates living in Jordan and Syria, throwing the January vote into question.

Parliament is now expected to reopen debate on the proposed law, which will result in a likely delay of the polling date.

In a letter to parliament on Monday, al-Hashimi said the election bill ratified a week ago did not take into consideration the estimated two million Sunnis who fled the sectarian violence in the aftermath of the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Any delay in the voting could derail a US plan to withdraw combat troops from Iraq, a process scheduled to ramp up following the election.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=111587§ionid=351020201.

Israel new settlement plans under fire

Israel's decision to erect hundreds of new housing units in the West Bank have dismayed in the United States and the United Nations.

On Tuesday, Tel Aviv announced plans to build 900 new homes in Gilo, one of a dozen Israeli settlements in the illegally annexed East Jerusalem (Al-Quds), seized by the Israeli army along with the rest of the occupied West Bank during the six-day war in 1967.

The latest announcement drew sharp criticism from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who 'deplored' the construction as an 'illegal' action that would stunt peace efforts and cast doubt on the possibility of a two-state solution.

The US also voiced dismay at the approval of new Israeli housing on the occupied Palestinian land, accusing Israel of undermining US-backed efforts to relaunch peace negotiations.

Britain also criticized the continuous expansion of Israeli settlements for making it harder to secure an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal, while France also regretted Tel Aviv's persistence in going ahead with its construction activity.

But Israeli Interior Minister Eli Yishai fended off the criticism on Wednesday, saying freezing construction in Gilo was just like freezing construction in any other neighborhood in the West Bank.

"Construction in Jerusalem (Al-Quds) cannot be halted and Gilo is in Jerusalem," he said.

The decision to expand the Israeli settlements sparked outrage among Palestinians, who have repeatedly called for a complete freeze on new building before any new round of talks.

The Fatah-led Palestinian Authority, deeply disappointed with the failure of peace efforts, has launched a unilateral bid to seek statehood from the United Nations, despite divisions with the Gaza-based Hamas movement.

Europe and the United States discouraged the move on Tuesday, urging reconsideration of the recognition move and calling for a return to talks.

"I would hope that we would be in a position to recognize a Palestinian state but there has to be one first, so I think it is somewhat premature," said Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, whose country holds the EU presidency.

Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank remain divided over political differences between Hamas resistance movement and the Western-backed Fatah.

The standoff between the rival factions hiked to a breaking point in June 2007 after Fatah staged a coup against the democratically elected Hamas government almost a year after its sweeping victory in the 2006 elections, forcing Hamas to limit its rule to the Gaza Strip.

'Israel using Palestinians as guinea pigs'

The Sawasya Center for Human Rights has stated that the Israel is using Palestinians held in its detention centers as guinea pigs to test the effectiveness of new drugs manufactured by its health industry.

According to the Palestinian Information Center, the Cairo-based rights center cited evidence that Israeli interrogators gave prisoner Zuhair al-Iskafi and several other Palestinian inmates an injection which resulted in complete loss of their hair on the head and body -- a medical condition referred to as alopecia universalis.

The Sawasya Center called on human rights organizations and the World Health Organization to dispatch a delegation of medical experts to Israel to examine Palestinian detainees allegedly subjected to these tests.

The issue of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails is routinely glossed over by the international community. Thousands of Palestinians are still held in flagrant breach of international law and their basic human rights.

A report prepared by the Palestinian Ministry for Prisoner Affairs states that 700,000 Palestinians have been arrested since 1967 and almost 50,000 since the second uprising of 2000.

Today, 9,850 are being held in about 30 prisons and detention centers in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. Of these, 105 are women and 359 are children.

All are held either by the military or in Israeli prisons, and many are in administrative detention without trial or a judicial decree.

Iran Khodro unveils national diesel engine

The Middle East's largest automaker, Iran Khodro Company (IKCO), has unveiled a new national diesel engine on Tuesday.

Iran Khodro unveiled the national diesel engine in a ceremony attended by the Minister of Industries and Mines Ali-Akbar Mehrabian.

The new lightweight 1.5-liter turbo-diesel uses advanced technology to deliver strong power and torque of 256Nm while improving on fuel economy.

Fuel consumption on the engine will be 5 liters per 100 kilometers in combined cycle.

“Iran has successfully produced light duty diesel engines to complete its fuel basket,” Mehrabian said.

“Iranian designer had previously designed and manufactured diesel engine for power plants with 1,000 steam horsepower and today they successfully made it for cars,” he added.

Iran spent 20 million dollars for the design and manufacturing of the engine and it's estimated to cost less than 1,000 dollars in mass production.

The striking engine has achieved emission standard of Euro 5, featuring a Diesel Particulate Filters (DPF) as well as a new Exhaust Gas Recirculation (EGR).

Diesel Particulate Filters (DPF) eliminates the diesel particulate matter or soot from the exhaust gas of a diesel engine. The Exhaust Gas Recirculation (EGR) is a nitrogen oxide emissions reduction technique to lower exhaust emissions.

Jordan's king rejects pro-Israeli's anti-Iran plans

Jordan's King Abdullah II has expressed his country's “rejection” of any anti-Iran measure, speaking to a visiting group of a major pro-Israeli lobby group in the US.

The rare pro-Iran expression by the King of Jordan, which has formal diplomatic relations with Israel, unlike Iran which considers the entity as illegitimate, came during a meeting Monday with a delegation representing the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a powerful pro-Israeli pressure group in the US that widely influences American foreign policy in the Middle East.

In the meeting, King Abdullah called for "dialogue" as the only channel for resolving the dispute over Iran's nuclear case.

His comment came after Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon rejected speculations that the warnings of any military attack on Iran are just a bluff, insisting that they are very real.

According to anti-lobbyist groups in the US such as 'Common Cause,' AIPAC gives money to over 90 percent of US Members of Congress and has virtual control over every congressional committees and subcommittees that is responsible for making foreign policy in the Middle East.

Although some members of AIPAC have been charged and convicted of spying for Israel, the lobby group continues to function and influence policy decisions in the US unhindered.

Meanwhile, the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton again made the provocative statement last week that Washington will keep every option on the table when it comes to halting Iran's nuclear program, hoping that it would serve as a 'warning' to Tehran.

"We've always said that every option is on the table. Our goal is to prevent or dissuade Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons," Clinton claimed.

Iran has reiterated that its activities are conducted in line with its obligations to the nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT), to which it is a signatory, and that it only seeks the civilian applications of the technology.

Western nuclear powers, namely Britain, France, Germany and the United States continue to claim, under heavy pressure from Tel Aviv, that the Iranian government is after nuclear weaponry.

This is while Israel is widely known to possess over 200 nuclear warheads and refuses to sign any international atomic regulatory and non-proliferation treaty.

Forbidden City has President Obama as guest

With snow-covered roofs and patches of ice in the courtyards, the Forbidden City was given a little more sense of timelessness with the remaining snows brought by a blizzard last week.

Visiting U.S. President Barack Obama played tourist Tuesday on his first visit ever to China, spending up to an hour touring the Forbidden City and its maze of red buildings and cobblestone courtyards.

Built in the 1400s, the Forbidden City once was home to 24 Chinese emperors who ruled the country for nearly 500 years, between 1420 and 1911. The former imperial palace is now known as the Palace Museum, and is open to visitors all around the world.

President Obama changed from his business suit and tie to a sweater and brown shearling jacket, toured one of the world's greatest landmarks. The City is on the list of Unesco's World Heritage treasures.

"It's beautiful. It's a magnificent place to visit. I will come back with my girls and my wife," Obama told reporters. "It's a testament to the greatness of Chinese history," said Obama.

Accompanied by museum curator Zheng Xinmiao, Obama entered the museum from its main entrance in the south, the Meridian Gate and walked along the museum's central axis, also the axial line of Beijing, from south to north.
Before concluding his tour, Obama reportedly received a "mysterious" gift from the museum. He sat down and wrote at length in the VIP visitors' book, without disclosing the content.

Obama's visit did not go unnoticed by the Chinese people, as the museum was closed yesterday to public, who usually average more than 20,000 a daily. Part of Chang'an Avenue nearby had also been closed Tuesday morning.

As Obama is scheduled to visit the Great Wall in Badaling in northern Beijing Wednesday morning, notices reminding citizens to avoid traveling on the Badaling highway were posted by the transportation department in recent days.

Tight safety inspections were imposed outside the St. Regis Hotel, where Obama stayed in Beijing. Traffic controls were also seen in the surrounding area. A gas station nearby was temporally closed and will resume service on November 19, according to Beijing Times.

"It is understandable for such an arrangement," a Beijing citizen surnamed Zhang, who was waiting by a security cordon on Chang'an Avenue Tuesday. "I hope he can under-stand more about Chinese culture through his sightseeing, and further understand the people here."

NASA, Microsoft launch Web site on Mars

NASA and Microsoft Corp. have collaborated to create a Web site to allow earthlings to become Martians, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) announced on Tuesday.

By surfing the "Be a Martian" Web site, internet users can have fun while advancing their knowledge of Mars, the JPL said in a press release.

The public will be able to participate as citizen scientists to improve Martian maps, take part in research tasks, and assist Mars science teams studying data about the Red Planet.

The Web site will also enable the public to explore details of the solar system's grandest canyon, which resides on Mars, call up images in the Valles Marineris canyon before moving on to chart the entire Red Planet.

The collaboration of thousands of participants could assist scientists in producing far better maps, enabling smoother zoom-in views and easier interpretation of Martian surface changes.

By counting craters, the public also may help scientists determine the relative ages of small regions on Mars, according to the release.

In the past, counting Martian craters has posed a challenge because of the vast numbers involved. By contributing, Web site users will win game points assigned to a robotic animal avatar they select.

"Mars exploration inspires people of all ages, and we are especially eager to encourage young people to explore Mars for themselves," said Charles Elachi, director of JPL in Pasadena, California. "We are delighted to be involved in providing the creative opportunity for future explorers to contribute to our understanding of Mars."

"The beauty of this type of experience is that it not only teaches people about Mars and the work NASA is doing there, but it also engages large groups of people to help solve real challenges that computers cannot solve by themselves," said Marc Mercuri, director of business innovation in the Developer and Platform Evangelism Group at Microsoft.

With a common goal of inspiring digital-age workforce development and life-long learning in science, technology, engineering and mathematics, NASA and Microsoft unveiled the Web site at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles this week, according to the release.

Afghan capital readies for Karzai inauguration

By HEIDI VOGT and AMIR SHAH, Associated Press Writer

KABUL – Security forces increased patrols and helicopter flyovers in the Afghan capital Wednesday, bracing for possible militant attacks during the ceremony that will cement President Hamid Karzai's tumultuous re-election victory.

Karzai will be sworn in for his second five-year term Thursday, with many in the international community hoping he will introduce solid reforms and pave the way for a Cabinet house-cleaning to rid the administration of corrupt officials.

The inauguration comes amid repeated calls and threats from the international community that he reform his government following an election so spoiled by fraud that it took two and half months to resolve.

The U.S. has said that is will not provide any civilian aid to the Afghan government unless it can ensure accountability for the money. Both the U.S. and other NATO countries have also said they are weighing the rampant government corruption and mismanagement in decisions over committing more troops.

Even the ceremony itself is fraught with potential danger. Dignitaries from 42 countries are scheduled to attend, and the event could be a target for militants eager to attack the president and his allies.

There will be no large public ceremony. Instead, the inauguration will be held inside the presidential palace with tight restrictions on who is allowed in. Since an assassination attempt on Karzai at a public parade in 2008, he has stayed away from large public appearances.

The government has declared Thursday a national holiday and has asked the public to stay home to minimize traffic on the capital's clogged roads, while regular flights to and from Kabul airport will be canceled for the day.

Col. Sanam Gul, commander of the 4th Battalion of the Afghan National Army, the key Afghan combat unit in Logar province south of the capital, said his troops along with U.S. forces were increasing patrols and checkpoints leading into Kabul and stopping suspicious vehicles headed in that direction.

"The enemy is now trying to penetrate into Kabul to disrupt the inauguration," Gul said.

Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman Mohammad Zahir Azimi said patrols have been stepped up throughout Kabul, and that roads leading to embassies have been blocked.

"We have very tight security inside Kabul, around Kabul, outside Kabul," he said.

The inauguration comes as the reputation of the Karzai government has sunk to new lows. Though dogged by corruption for years, the government was seen as particularly tainted by the August presidential vote and the rampant ballot-box stuffing that took place.

Western diplomats leaned on the Afghan president for weeks before he accepted results that didn't give him the 50 percent needed to win outright. Karzai was eventually declared the winner after his only remaining opponent dropped out because he said there was no way a runoff vote could be fair.

Even before the election, Afghans tended to worry more about the lack of help from their government than attacks from Taliban militants, according to a survey released Wednesday by aid agency Oxfam International.

About 70 percent of the Afghans surveyed between January and April blamed poverty and unemployment for the fighting in their country. Survey respondents were not limited to one choice, and 48 percent of those polled also picked corruption and government ineffectiveness as a major cause of violence. But only 36 percent said that the Taliban were significant cause of fighting.

The survey of about 700 Afghans across fewer than half of the country's provinces is not a scientific representation, but it gives a taste of people's concerns as they prepare for another five years with Karzai.

"This survey shows they're incredibly concerned about the ability of the government to deliver services and the transparency of the government," said Ashley Jackson, a researcher with the British-based charity.

Meanwhile, security and Taliban forces continue to clash in the volatile regions. In the latest violence, a U.S. service member was killed when his vehicle hit a bomb in the south of the country, NATO forces said.

Surprise over U.S.-China joint statement

Special Correspondent

It talks of India-Pakistan ties

NEW DELHI: Strategic analysts have expressed surprise over the summit-level joint statement by U.S. and China mentioning India and Pakistan but cautioned against “over-excitement” on the issue. India has refused to react saying there is “no point in doing so.”

The statement by U.S. President Barack Obama and his Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao, issued on Tuesday in Beijing, supports the “improvement and growth of relations between India and Pakistan.”

It says “the two sides are ready to strengthen communication, dialogue and cooperation on issues related to South Asia and work together to promote peace, stability and development in that region.”

“In the present circumstances, I hope Mr. Obama and Mr. Hu Jintao are not confusing hope with facts,” observed the former External Affairs Minister, Natwar Singh. “India has consistently extended its hand of friendship to Pakistan but the response has been wholly unsatisfactory. The government and the people of India want warm and cordial relations with Pakistan so do the people of Pakistan. Regrettably the establishment of Pakistan is not in favor,” he added.

The former Foreign Secretary, Salman Haider, was surprised that such observations had been made because the U.S. knows it would be regarded as some sort of provocation to India. “But India should not get overexcited, for, it is a confident country which has done well and is in command of its processes. The statement should not give a message to Pakistan that it could start attempting the involvement of others in our bilateral affairs. We have repeatedly told our friends not to interfere. This is not a good formulation and is not at all helpful,” he said.
Not first time

However, this is not the first time that a U.S.-China summit-level joint statement has mentioned India. Meeting soon after the Pokhran tests in 1998, the then U.S. President Bill Clinton and the former Chinese President, Jiang Zemin, had issued a statement that was more specific on Kashmir, the main irritant in India-Pakistan relations. The statement expressed the “commitment” of the U.S. and China to help peacefully resolve “the difficult and long-standing differences between them [India and Pakistan], including the pending issue of Kashmir.”

As joint statements go, the recent as well as the earlier ones also dwell on the international situation in other parts of the world such as the Six-Party Talks on a nuclear-free Korean peninsula, the Iranian nuclear issue and the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan among others.

California Governor Schwarzenegger visits US troops in Iraq

Sacramento, California - California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger visited US troops Monday in Iraq. The former Hollywood action star was previously in Iraq in 2003.

He met with hundreds of troops at Camp Victory in Baghdad, signing autographs and handing out cigars, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/295026,california-governor-schwarzenegger-visits-us-troops-in-iraq.html.

Vietnam protests China move in South China Sea

Hanoi - Vietnam has protested new moves by China to assert sovereignty over the disputed Spratly and Paracel Islands in the South China Sea, local media reported Tuesday. China announced November 8 it had decided to establish local governing bodies known as hamlet committees on Woody Island, the largest of the Paracels.

"This act seriously infringes upon Vietnam's territorial sovereignty," said government spokeswoman Nguyen Phuong Nga said. It would harm the prospects for peaceful negotiations to determine the islands' permanent status.

China has occupied the Paracel Islands since 1974, when its troops overwhelmed a South Vietnamese garrison occupying the islands.

On Monday, Vietnamese Defense Minister Phung Quang Thanh told local media that South-east Asia should pool efforts to achieve a better bargaining position in maritime territorial negotiations.

"Let's stop allowing the bloc [the Association of South East-Asian Nations] to be separated and divided, in order to better protect the sovereignty and territory of each country," Thanh said.

Thanh was understood to be talking about negotiations with China, which has pressed the region's countries to negotiate bilateral treaties with it, rather than as a bloc.

Both Vietnam and China are signatories to the 2002 Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea. The declaration commits the parties to resolving the islands' status through negotiations, and provides for freedom of navigation.

Vietnam and China generally enjoy close relations, but the conflict over maritime resources is a persistent source of tension. Each country submitted maritime territorial claims to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea in early May, and rejected the other's claims shortly afterward.

The South China Sea is believed to contain substantial undersea oil reserves.

Hong Kong shivers through coldest November in a decade

Hong Kong - As heavy snow fell in parts of China, Hong Kong temperatures fell below 10 degrees Celsius Tuesday as the sub-tropical city shivered through its coldest November in 10 years. More than 30 elderly people were taken to hospital with cold-related illnesses as a winter monsoon sent temperatures plunging.

Tuesday was the coldest day of the year so far with an average temperature of 12 degrees Celsius and temperatures two to three degrees lower in the New Territories bordering China.

Weathermen warned the cold conditions would last at least until the end of the week.

Hong Kong is located in a sub-tropical belt at the southern tip of China where it never snows and only occasionally traces of frost can be seen.

As well as the coldest November temperatures for a decade, 2009 saw Hong Kong's hottest August for more than 30 years with average daily temperatures hitting 33 degrees on at least 10 days.

Indonesia checking reports asylum standoff resolved

Jakarta - Indonesia said Tuesday it was checking reports that Sri Lankan asylum seekers aboard an Australian customs ship moored off Indonesia's Bintan island had agreed to disembark after weeks of standoff. The 78 Sri Lankans were picked up by the Australian ship Oceanic Viking in international waters one month ago, while on their way to Australia, claiming persecution in their homeland.

They were taken to port on Bintan but had refused to disembark, prompting weeks of standoff.

Last week, 22 of them agreed to go ashore and enter at an Australian-funded refugee center on Bintan, after being promised speedy processing for their refugee claims by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

Australian media reported Tuesday that the standoff with the remaining migrants had ended.

The website of Australian broadcaster ABC said Australian officials had informed their Indonesian counterparts that the 56 Sri Lankans still aboard had agreed to disembark.

"We are still unable to confirm the reports but if there's such information it's only natural for our officials on the ground to be prepared," Indonesian Foreign Ministry spokesman Teuku Faizasyah said.

Most Australia-bound emigrants, mainly from Sri Lanka and Afghanistan, arrive on small boats from Indonesia, where they have paid smugglers to arrange their passage.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/295042,indonesia-checking-reports-asylum-standoff-resolved.html.

China jails Tibetan website founder for 15 years - Summary

Beijing - A Chinese court has sentenced the founder of a Tibetan-language website to 15 years in prison for "disclosing state secrets," and a Tibetan blogger was sentenced to five years in prison, officials and rights groups said on Tuesday. Kunchok Tsephel, 39, was given the longer sentence by the Intermediate People's Court in the Gannan Tibetan prefecture of the north-western province of Gansu, apparently for charges linked to postings on his website and for passing on information about protests by Tibetans last year.

A court official confirmed the 15-year sentence against Kunchok Tsephel to the German Press Agency

Turkey ends prison isolation of jailed PKK leader Ocalan

Istanbul - The Turkish government has ended the isolation of jailed Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan, media reports said Tuesday. Ocalan has been held in solitary confinement on the island prison of Imrali, off the coast from the city of Bursa, since his capture in 1999.

Despite his isolation, Ocalan maintains a high level of control over the PKK and remains a popular figure in Turkey's predominantly Kurdish south-east.

According to media reports, authorities Tuesday brought five more inmates to the island prison.

The move is being seen as another part of the government's new "democratization" initiative, aimed at boosting the cultural and political rights of Turkey's Kurdish minority.

The PKK, classified as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union, has been fighting Turkish forces since 1982, in a struggle that has cost an estimated 40,000 lives.

Although the group originally sought the creation of a separate Kurdish state, it now calls for improved rights for Turkey's Kurds, believed to number between 12 to 15 million.

Cook with Garlic to Fight the Flu

by Michelle Schoffro Cook Nov 12, 2009

It’s flu season again. Every year those nasty little viruses take hold of our bodies (probably to get a bit of warmth) and rule just about everything we say, do, feel, or think–at least for a few days. This year’s swine flu has people particularly nervous. If you’re trying to survive flu season unscathed or to beat the flu you already have, make sure you eat plenty of garlic. Your friends won’t like you, but neither will the flu bugs and other viruses you want to keep at bay.

Not only does garlic beat off flu viruses, that small clove helps lower high blood pressure, prevents hardening of the arteries and lessens cholesterol buildup in the heart. Thanks to many studies on garlic’s medicinal properties, we also know it is antibacterial and antifungal. Research even implicates garlic in the prevention of stomach cancer and in giving the immune system an overall boost. Just what the doctor ordered at this time of year.

While garlic contains potassium and germanium, two minerals that are critical to health, it is best known for its sulfur compounds, particularly allicin. These are the main phytochemicals (natural plant chemicals) you’ll want in your diet.

Unfortunately, many manufacturers of garlic supplements haven’t captured enough of the active ingredient to make the pills worth popping. However, some of the aged garlic extracts are effective. Forget garlic powder you can purchase in most grocery stores. It is the lazy person’s garlic and doesn’t offer many rewards in exchange for the saved time. Pill or powder, neither compares to the real thing.

So, heat up your oven and start chopping. It’s time to throw some fresh garlic into your favorite soup, stew, chili, stir-fry, meat, or veggie dish. For those of you scared to offend the significant other in your life, try roasting garlic by cutting off the stem, exposing the top of each clove and drizzling a bit of olive oil over it. Wrap it in foil or place in a garlic roaster and bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for about an hour. This greatly minimizes its powerful aroma but creates a spread that tastes fabulous and has the consistency of butter. For even more potent health benefits, add raw garlic to your meal after it has been cooked. Or, top your favorite toasted bread with minced garlic, some sea salt, chopped tomatoes and a dash of olive oil for a fast and delicious bruschetta.

There are three main types of garlic: Creole, Italian or Mexican, and Tahitian. Most of the garlic on our grocery store shelves comes from California and is likely of the Creole variety. Italian or Mexican garlic is a bit smaller than its Creole counterpart and has a slightly purplish-colored skin. Tahitian garlic is also known as elephant garlic largely because of its size. It is several times larger than its Creole, Italian or Mexican sisters. But, don’t let the size fool you. When it comes to garlic, good things come in small packages; the Italian or Mexican variety is the most potent.

Look for garlic that is firm and free of black mildew on the skin. Store it at room temperature in a well-ventilated spot such as a garlic keeper. Most experts suggest trying to get at least one clove a day to reap the maximum health benefits. But, if your taste buds shout for more, let them have it.

So, if your flu hasn’t already abandoned ship at all this talk of garlic, whip up a garlic-laden dinner and it will be running scared.

So will your friends, you say? Find some friendship among fellow garlic eaters. And consider that Roman centurions marched side-by-side into battle and across the European countryside sporting their finest military garb and cloves of garlic between their toes (to ward off fungal infections).

How’s that for friendship among the ranks?

Dark Chocolate Definitely Eases Emotional Stress

by Melissa Breyer Nov 14, 2009

OK, honestly? It doesn’t take a scientist to tell me that chocolate makes me feel better. But they’re saying it anyway–new evidence that dark chocolate helps ease emotional stress was just published in “Metabolic Effects of Dark Chocolate Consumption on Energy, Gut Microbiota, and Stress-Related Metabolism in Free-Living Subjects.” I don’t know how my gut microbiota feel about it, but it’s doing wonders for my mood.

The study found that eating about an ounce and a half of dark chocolate a day for two weeks reduced levels of stress hormones in the bodies of people feeling highly stressed.The daily dose also partially corrected other stress-related biochemical imbalances. And that’s not all…Sunil Kochhar and colleagues note growing scientific evidence that antioxidants and other beneficial substances in dark chocolate may reduce risk factors for heart disease and other physical conditions. Although studies in the past have suggested that chocolate may ease emotional stress, there was little evidence until now from research in humans on exactly how chocolate might have those stress-busting effects.

In the study, scientists identified reductions in stress hormones and other stress-related biochemical changes in volunteers who rated themselves as highly stressed and ate dark chocolate for two weeks. “The study provides strong evidence that a daily consumption of 40 grams [1.4 ounces] during a period of 2 weeks is sufficient to modify the metabolism of healthy human volunteers,” the scientists say. Sign me up…

MIDEAST: U.S. Takes Aim Over Jordan's Shoulder

By Jon Elmer

MUWAQQAR, Jordan, Nov 17 (IPS) - In the bleak and seemingly endless desert expanse that unfolds east of Jordan's capital city, Amman, lies a crucial cog in the ambitious regional designs of the U.S. and its allies in the Middle East.

Commonly known by its acronym JIPTC, the Jordan International Police Training Centre is ground-zero for the transformation of U.S.-allied security forces not only for the Kingdom of Jordan, but also for Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinian Territories.

Under the regime of King Abdullah II, this country of six million strategically located at the heart of the Middle East and bordered by Iraq, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Syria and the West Bank, has developed itself as something of a "Green Zone" in a tumultuous region.

As Gen. Craig McKinley, chief of the National Guard Bureau in the U.S. said during a joint training mission and tour of Jordan late last month, the country has become "the lynchpin" in the efforts to create a "peaceful central command region."

JIPTC is staffed mostly by Jordanians, but the trainers are military and police officers from more than a dozen countries - primarily Canada, the United Kingdom and the U.S. - as well as private contractors, such as DynCorp.

The relatively unassuming base, surrounded by blast walls and concertina wire, is comprised predominantly of temporary portable buildings spread out across a five square kilometre facility. The sprawling desert environment is well suited for its multiple shooting ranges for a programme that planners say is three-quarters hands-on training, and only one-quarter classroom instruction.

Since graduating its first class in November 2003, JIPTC has trained more than 50,000 police officers bound for Iraq. More recently, the academy has trained four battalions of the Palestinian security forces, deployed under the auspices of United States security coordinator, Gen. Keith Dayton, to back the "caretaker" government of Mahmoud Abbas and Salam Fayyad in the West Bank.

With little fanfare, JIPTC has Jordan's regime playing a frontline role in the U.S. project to transform the Middle East.

"Jordan continues to be a key partner and to play a positive role in the region," Gen. David Petraeus, the U.S. commander responsible for the region told a Senate Armed Service Committee meeting in April. "Jordan participates in many regional security initiatives and has placed itself at the forefront of police and military training for regional security forces."

Mouin Rabbani, an Amman-based analyst told IPS that such a link is also problematic. "Jordan is one of the leading U.S. allies in the region, and it suffers the consequences of U.S. policy, perhaps more than others, because it's situated literally between the two biggest American failures in the region: Iraq and Palestine."

Gen. Petraeus has explicitly linked JITPC to attempts to legitimize the failed peace process in the Israel-Palestine conflict. "These efforts will likely prove critical in the continued development of legitimate security forces in Lebanon and the Palestinian Territories and, as a consequence, in the long-term viability of the peace process," he told the Senate committee.

According to Rabbani, Jordan's support for U.S. efforts in the failed peace process "raises questions about a strategy which is, for all intents and purposes, wholly and exclusively aligned with one external would-be mediator that's seen increasingly as irretrievably hostile to Palestinian and more general Arab national aspirations, and completely wedded to Israeli interests."

In Gen. Dayton's first substantial interview with an Israeli newspaper regarding his role in training the Palestinian forces, he was clear about his objectives. "I'm here to advance America's interests, but I'm also here because of the relationship between your country (Israel) and mine," he told Ha'aretz.

The Palestinian forces have an open agenda to target Hamas and other Palestinian factions. In May, six people were killed when Dayton's forces attacked Hamas activists in the West Bank town of Qalqilya, sparking a gun battle that lasted several hours and took place without Israel's interference. Hamas characterized the attack as "an awful crime" committed by "collaborators"; while Abbas declared that his forces would continue to strike opposition groups "with an iron fist."

Gen. Dayton, in his only major policy speech to date, told the stridently pro- Israel think tank, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), that JIPTC-trained Palestinian security forces had engaged in a series of violent raids that were "surprisingly well coordinated" with Israel. Dayton characterized the results as "electric."

"They have caught the attention of the Israeli defense establishment for their dedication, discipline, motivation, and results." Dayton added, "the Jordanian-trained guys are the key."

Staging security training in Jordan cuts to the heart of the problem with the credibility of these indigenous forces among their people. It is presumed that they cannot be trained in their local milieu because they lack political legitimacy.

To this end, Dayton told the WINEP audience: "You might ask, why Jordan? The answer is pretty simple. The Palestinians wanted to train in the region, but they wanted to be away from clan, family and political influences. The Israelis trust the Jordanians, and the Jordanians were anxious to help."

The JIPTC-trained forces find themselves at the centre of a bitter factional divide. Hamas won a decisive electoral victory in 2006, but has been forced underground in the West Bank since sweeping Israeli arrests of many of its elected members, and the subsequent takeover by Fayyad's regime in Ramallah.

The West Bank elected 52 of Hamas' 74 members of the 132-seat Palestinian Legislative Council, while Fayyad's party, The Third Way, received less than three per cent of the popular vote, which translated into two seats. Abbas' Fatah party tallied 45 seats. However, since assuming power, Abbas and Fayyad's West Bank regime has been the beneficiary of more than 1.8-billion dollars in U.S.-encouraged international aid for a population of 2.5 million, while Hamas and the Palestinians in Gaza have been subjected to a crippling boycott.

Upwards of 1,000 Palestinians have been arrested by Dayton's security forces, mostly Hamas members. Many of those arrested face dubious charges, if any, and the judicial process has been the source of significant criticism by Palestinian human rights groups.

All this has served to cast doubt on the legitimacy of Dayton's security project, while the Hamas-Fatah division has all but stricken the feasibility of holding presidential elections in the Palestinian Territories, now a year overdue.

Meanwhile, U.S President Barack Obama announced in June a 150 million dollar military aid increase to Jordan, bringing the annual total to more than 513 million dollars. The increase came on top of the Bush Administration's 2007, ten-year, 50 billion dollar military aid package to the region's allied regimes, including Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the pliant Gulf states. The deal included a 30 billion dollars weapons package to Israel through 2017.

Spain will not 'force' new EU relation with Cuba

Madrid - Spain will upgrade the European Union's relations with Cuba only if such a "consensus" is reached during Madrid's EU presidency in the first half of 2010, a senior official said Tuesday. Some EU countries are critical of Spain's plans to modify the union's 1996 common position on Cuba, which links relations to human rights and freedoms on the Caribbean island.

"Nothing will be done without the consensus of the 27" EU member countries, Spain's Ibero-America Secretary of State Juan Pablo de Laiglesia told a senate Ibero-American affairs committee.

However, he attributed the reservations of some countries partly to their lack of knowledge about the changes that had occurred in Cuba since 1996.

Cuba could not be an exception to Spain's plans of improving EU relations with all of Latin America, the secretary of state said.

Kurdish, Sunni threats put Iraqi elections in peril

Baghdad - Threats from Kurdish and Sunni Arab politicians to withdraw support for the country's new election law have once again thrown into question whether a vote will take place on time. After weeks of tense debate on voting in the disputed northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, lawmakers last week reached an 11th-hour compromise to allow voting to take place on January 18, ahead of the constitutionally mandated deadline of the end of January.

But Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, a Sunni Muslim, on Tuesday again threatened to veto the law if more seats are not reserved for expatriate Iraqis, most of whom are believed to be Sunnis.

The Kurdish Regional Government on Tuesday also said it would boycott the polls if the number of seats from its two provinces was not increased.

"The presidency of the Kurdish Regional Government has decided to boycott the coming parliamentary elections because of the mechanism for distributing the number of seats in the parliament across the country's provinces," Kamal Kirkuki, speaker of the parliament for the semi-autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq, told reporters Tuesday.

"It is impossible to accept a seat-allocation mechanism based on data from (food) ration cards," he said.

Absent a census, which has been stalled out of fears it would bring to a head an old dispute over areas claimed by Kurdish and Arab Iraqis, population data was taken from food-ration cards all Iraqis hold under a system started by former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein.

Kurdish politicians have objected to an overall reduction in the number of seats at stake from the two provinces that make up the semi-autonomous region based on that data.

The Kurdish threats to boycott the polls came as al-Hashemi gave parliament until Tuesday night to raise the number of seats reserved for refugees and expatriate Iraqis.

He has asked that 15 per cent, not 5 per cent, of seats in parliament be reserved as compensatory seats to insure a higher representation for refugees.

If parliament did not respond to his requests by Tuesday night, al-Hashemi said, he would oppose the law and try to prevent its passage.

"There are several gaps in the elections law. To avoid opening many political files, I focused only on the main issue that concerns Iraqis inside and outside Iraq, (the one) ... concerned with the displaced and refugees outside Iraq," he said in a statement on the Iraqi presidency's website.

Under the Iraqi constitution, there should be a member of parliament for every 100,000 Iraqi citizens. With at least 4 million Iraqi refugees, al-Hashemi argued, parliament should raise the number of seats allocated for them.

Iraqi politicians greeted parliament's last-minute passage of an elections law on November 8 with relief, after debate over the sensitive issue of voting in the disputed city of Kirkuk and surrounding al-Tamim province threatened a political and constitutional crisis.

US President Barack Obama likewise praised the compromise. The US military has said it would begin decreasing the number of its troops in Iraq roughly two months after the polls, provided the country appeared stable.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/295134,kurdish-sunni-threats-put-iraqi-elections-in-peril.html.