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Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Sri Lanka opens consulate in SW China

The consulate of Sri Lanka opened in Chengdu, capital of southwest China's Sichuan Province, on Tuesday.

"Chengdu is the hub of western China," said Karunatilaka Amunugama, the Sri Lanka Ambassador to China. "Opening consulate here is important to deepen cooperation between Sri Lanka and the western areas of China."

Sichuan saw a rise of trade with Sri Lanka over the years. In 2008, export of Sichuan to Sri Lanka hit 14.27 million U.S. dollars. The exported goods included television, textile, engine and parts of automobile, while Sichuan bought minerals and steel from Sri Lanka.

Covering 65,610 square kilometers with its population of 19.9 million, Sri Lanka is famous for its precious stones and tea.

After Shanghai and Guangzhou, Sichuan has the third most foreign consulates in China, including the consulates of United States, Germany, France, Thailand, South Korea, Singapore, Pakistan, Philippines and Sri Lanka.

China strives to contribute more to global fight against climate change

As challenging as it is serious, climate change is not only clamoring for global attention, but also for global action.

Despite its tremendous need for development, China, the world's largest developing country, has taken unprecedented efforts in recent years to address the global issue.

From the closure of "Five Kinds of Small Plants" producing steel, iron and cement, to underlining "ecological civilization" in the 17th CPC Congress Report and publishing "China's National Climate Change Program," these concrete actions demonstrate the determination of the Chinese government to do something to about climate change.

CONSTRUCTING ECOLOGICAL CIVILIZATION

In October 2007, Chinese President Hu Jintao, also CPC general secretary, declared in his report to the 17th CPC congress that China will work to construct "ecological civilization," signifying a new beginning for China's environmental protection.

Henri Proglio, chairman and CEO of the Veolia Environment, commented that it is quite encouraging for China to raise the concept of "ecological civilization," and through this declaration, China has raised the importance of environmental protection to an unprecedented level.

Published in June 2007, "China's National Climate Change Program," the country's first policy document and first national proposal among all developing nations, comprehensively lists the initiatives to combat climate change before 2010.

Additionally, October 2008 saw the publication of "China's Policies and Actions for Addressing Climate Change," which addresses the impact of climate change on China, China's policies and actions, as well as its efforts to cope with global warming.

These efforts indicate great determination on China's part, while the country is facing the dual task of promoting economic growth on the one hand while transforming its growth mode on the other -- all this amidst the global financial crisis.

As stipulated in the "11th Five-Year Plan," China's unit GDP energy consumption will be reduced by 20 percent till 2010. According to statistics from the State Development and Reform Commission, out of the entire 4,000 billion yuan (585.7 billion U.S. dollars) investment, 210 billion yuan (30.7 billion U.S. dollars) will be allocated to energy conservation and ecological construction, while 370 billion yuan (54.18 billion U.S. dollars) will be allocated to independent innovation and industrial structure adjustment. Meanwhile, proposed and approved by the state council, related instructions are also detailed in the stimulus package for 10 sectors.

China is demonstrating its commitment to sustainable development with an even stronger heart to the world.

HARD-EARNED ACCOMPLISHMENT

According to the official data issued by the National Leading Group Office for Climate Change and Energy Conservation of the State Council on June 5, China's unit GDP energy consumption has been reduced by 10.1 percent from 2005 to 2007, the first three years of the "11th Five-Year Plan," which equals 750 million tons reduction of carbon dioxide emissions.

The road towards these accomplishments has been bumpy, fraught with various of difficulties during the past thirty years of rapid economic growth.

During the "11th Five-Year Plan," over 1,000 billion yuan will be added to increase investment in energy conservation and emission reduction. Small thermal plants have been shut down. Furthermore, backward production facilities producing about 250 million tons of cement and 150 tons of steel and iron have been closed.

On Nov. 26, China announced that it was going to reduce the intensity of carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP in 2020 by 40 to 45 percent compared with the level of 2005.

Realizing these targets requires not only willingness but also courage to face China's harsh realities. China still has 150 million poor and an economy that is waiting to be developed to improve people's living standard and promote industrialization.

However, realizing the urgency and significance to contain climate change, these difficulties will not hinder China's pursuit to be a responsible member of the international community.

CLIMATE CHANGE, ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION

To seek low carbon and green economy, we need to develop new energy and advocate new spending patterns.

According to research by the Ministry of Environmental Protection, reducing one ton of sulfuric dioxide will lead to 38 tons reduction of carbon dioxide. Thus, about 250 million tons of carbon dioxide will be cut with the completion of the task in the "11th Five-Year Plan," which requires a 10-percent decrease in sulfuric dioxide, roughly 6.7 million tons.

Reductions of two major pollutants have been steadfast. In 2008, the discharged chemical oxygen demand (COD) and sulfuric dioxide have been reduced by 6.61 percent and 8.95 percent respectively, compared to that of 2005. While in the first six months of 2009, the two indexes fell by 2.46 percent and 5.4 percent against that of the same period in 2008.

Apart from this, China has been committed to tree-planting, ecological industrial park establishment, raising public awareness of environmental protection, as well as national park and wetland construction.

Environmental degradation is endangering China's domestic development. For sustainable development to be achieved, great emphasis should be played on protecting the environment and combating climate change to fulfill the responsibility to both China and the world at large.

Red Cross in first visit to Taliban-held detainees

By ELIANE ENGELER, Associated Press Writer

GENEVA – The international Red Cross has made its first visit to Afghan prisoners held by the Taliban in the northwest of the country, the organization said Tuesday.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said it visited three members of the Afghan security forces detained by the Taliban in Badghis province. The two visits took place last month, it said.

"This is the first time since the beginning of the current conflict that the ICRC has visited people detained by the armed opposition," said Reto Stocker, the head of the ICRC's delegation in Kabul. He called the visits a breakthrough.

ICRC spokeswoman Carla Haddad Mardini declined to comment on the conditions of the three prisoners visited by the agency.

"We did assess the conditions of detention and treatment and made recommendations when we felt necessary," she told reporters.

The neutral agency does not publish the findings of its visits, but issues confidential reports to the detaining authorities or groups.

Haddad Mardini said she was unable to say how many other people were being held by the Taliban in Afghanistan. The access to the three prisoners has been the result of years of work, she said. "We hope we will be able to repeat that visit and to extend such visits to other regions in the country."

The ICRC, which is the guardian of the Geneva Conventions on the conduct of warfare, regularly visits prisoners of war around the world to check how they are being held and treated. It also helps prisoners keep in touch with their families.

The agency said it has visited 136 places of detention in Afghanistan and has registered more than 16,000 prisoners since the U.S. invasion in 2001.

Stocker said he hopes the ICRC will also be able to visit people held by "other armed opposition groups," in Afghanistan.

Barak Ousts Rabbi Melamed's Yeshiva from 'Hesder' Program

by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu

(IsraelNN.com) Defense Minister Ehud Barak announced Sunday night he is throwing out the Har Bracha yeshiva, headed by Rabbi Eliezer Melamed, from the Hesder yeshiva program. Barak charged the rabbi with “undermining democratic principles” and “inciting” students to refuse IDF orders to expel Jews from their homes.

The Hesder yeshiva program allows young men to service in the IDF for up to two years, instead of the usual three, and to learn at yeshiva for at least three years. The organization of the Hesder yeshivas has not commented on the historic decision by the Defense Minister, who also is chairman of the Labor party.

The Defense Minister said that the IDF should be kept out of political arguments, exactly the same claim made by many leading national religious rabbis concerning the decision by Barak and IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi to use soldiers to help expel Jews from their homes. Police normally undertook the expulsions until the massive forced evacuation of Jews from Gaza and northern Samaria four years ago.

Defense Minister Barak said he decided to ban Rabbi Melamed’s yeshiva from the Hesder program after consulting with IDF Chief of Staff Ashkenazi. Barak's spokesmen said he also spoke with other rabbis of Hesder yeshivas.

The organization of Hesder yeshivas said they made it clear last week to Defense Minister Barak that they opposed excluding Har Bracha from the Hesder program.

Barak said the order will not go into effect immediately in order to allow Har Bracha students to join another Hesder yeshiva.

Former High Court Justice Yaakov Turkel said on Voice of Israel government radio Sunday night said that Barak is wrong in punishing yeshiva students for the rabbi’s statements.

Taliban can be admired for their faith and loyalty, says bishop

(WARNING): Article contains propaganda!

* * * * *

13 Dec 2009

The Taliban can be admired for their conviction to their faith and their sense of loyalty to one another, the new bishop for the Armed Forces has claimed.

By Jonathan Wynne-Jones and Duncan Gardham

The Rt Rev Stephen Venner called for a more sympathetic approach to the Islamic fundamentalists that recognizes their humanity.

The Church of England’s Bishop to the Forces warned that it will be harder to reach a peaceful solution to the war if the Afghan insurgents are portrayed too negatively.

His comments came as the Prime Minister visited Afghanistan and warned that the Taliban was fighting a "guerrilla war" aimed at causing "maximum damage". Gordon Brown said soldiers were discovering improvised explosive devices every two hours.

Mr Brown stayed overnight in the Allied base in the southern city of Kandahar, the first British Prime Minister to spend the night in a war zone since Winston Churchill. His visit came days after the death of Lance Corporal Adam Drane, the 100th member of the British forces to die in Afghanistan this year. His death brought the total number of British service personnel who have died since the start of operations in 2001 to 237.

Bishop Venner stressed his admiration for the sacrifices made by the British forces fighting in Afghanistan but also urged the need for a reassessment of how the Taliban are viewed.

“We’ve been too simplistic in our attitude towards the Taliban,” said Bishop Venner, who was recently commissioned in his new role by Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury.

“There’s a large number of things that the Taliban say and stand for which none of us in the west could approve, but simply to say therefore that everything they do is bad is not helping the situation because it’s not honest really.

“The Taliban can perhaps be admired for their conviction to their faith and their sense of loyalty to each other.”

Besides their attacks on the armed forces, the Taliban have also been responsible for public beatings, amputations and executions and have launched bomb attacks on the civilian population in Afghanistan.

They often refer to foreign forces as “Crusaders” in an echo of the religious wars of the Middle Ages.

The bishop said that some of their methods of combat are not honorable or acceptable, but argued that it was unhelpful to demonize them.

“We must remember that there are a lot of people who are under their influence for a whole range of reasons, and we simply can’t lump all of those together.

“To blanket them all as evil and paint them as black is not helpful in a very complex situation.”

Bishop Venner said that everyone in Afghanistan, including the Taliban, would have to be included in discussions to find a solution to the conflict.

“Afghanistan is going we hope in the end to find a way to live together with justice and prosperity for all. In order to do that we have to involve all the people of Afghanistan to find it.

“It is that lasting and just peace that will in the end justify the sacrifices our servicemen and women have made."

In the meantime, he said, the Government has “a moral duty” to ensure that the army is properly equipped.

Colonel Richard Kemp, a former commander in Afghanistan who has written about the insurgency, said the bishop was being naïve.

“We clearly need to understand our enemy but that is more of a military issue rather than a religious one," he said.

“There are elements in the Taliban who do not act from a religious perspective and it is important to understand and turn them around.

“But there are many others who will not be persuaded. Their central creed and ethos is about violent oppression which comes from a politics of extreme religion that has very little to commend it in terms that we would recognize or appreciate.

“In many ways it is a mistake to compare their faith of extreme holy war with the kind of religion of peace and understanding that the bishop follows. They certainly wouldn’t show understanding of his faith.”

Earlier this year, Peter Davies, the mayor of Doncaster, claimed that British society could learn from Taliban family values. He said that under the Taliban, Afghanistan had an “ordered system of family life”.

Last month David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, offered parts of the Taliban "an alternative to fighting'' and said men now fighting against British forces should be encouraged to sit in the Afghan parliament.

His comments came a day after a new military strategy was unveiled that talked of the need to negotiate with the Taliban, offering them money or immunity from prosecution in order to secure peace.

Source: The Telegraph.
Link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/6804155/Taliban-can-be-admired-for-their-faith-and-loyalty-says-bishop.html.

France's Louvre museum returns five frescoes to Egypt

France has handed over to Egypt five disputed, frescoed fragments that were held by the Louvre museum in Paris.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy presented one of the slabs, or steles, to his Egyptian counterpart Hosni Mubarak, who was on a visit to Paris.

The Egyptians had demanded the return of the Pharaonic fragments and had broken off ties with the Louvre.

They are believed to be from a 3,200-year-old tomb of the cleric, Tetaki, in the Valley of the Kings, near Luxor.

Conferences suspended

The steles, which are each only 15cm (5.9in) wide and 30cm (11.8in) high, were part of the Louvre's reserve collection.

French officials have maintained that the Louvre acquired the steles in good faith.

But Egypt's antiquities department had said the Louvre bought the fragments despite knowing they were stolen in the 1980s.

It broke off ties with the Louvre in October, saying they would only be restored once the fragments were returned.

Several conferences were suspended, as well as archaeological work being carried out by the Louvre south of the Egyptian capital, Cairo.

Mr Sarkozy said on Monday that doubts about the fragments only emerged in November.

"France is particularly committed to fighting the illegal trafficking of works of art," he said in a statement.

Four of the fragments were purchased from the Maspero gallery in France in 2000, while the fifth was acquired at auction in Paris in 2003.

Ancient Egyptian artworks and relics are displayed in many of the world's top museums, but in recent years the Egyptian government has stepped up pressure to repatriate some of them.

Iraq Finance Ministry to resume work following blast - Summary

Sun, 13 Dec 2009

Baghdad - Iraq's Finance Ministry will resume its work in the coming days, according to a statement Sunday, following last week's series of deadly car bombs, which killed 132 people and damaged ministry offices. The announcement came as a session in parliament was underway in which security officials and ministers were present to discuss the coordinated attacks, which also left 500 people injured.

Legislators have been calling for a sweeping overhaul of the security services. Prime Minister Nuri al-Malaki has been the target of criticism from various factions for the security breaches.

As the debate went on, attacks continued in various areas of the country.

Two people were killed when a car bomb targeted a senior military official Sunday in Fallujah, some 60 kilometers west of the Iraqi capital Baghdad, security officials said.

Officials said a child was believed to be among the dead. Eleven people were injured in the blast, including Colonel Asaad al-Shamri.

Meanwhile, a civilian was killed and four were injured when unknown gunmen triggered an explosion in the home of a policeman, officials said.

Earlier, two soldiers were killed and 21 injured when a car bomb exploded near an Iraqi army facility in the northern city of Mosul, police said.

The bomb had been placed in a parked car at a military recruitment center.

Mosul, some 400 kilometers north of the capital Baghdad, is among the most dangerous areas in Iraq, where insurgents carrying out near- daily attacks.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/299119,iraq-finance-ministry-to-resume-work-following-blast--summary.html.

First polls close in Chile's tight presidential election - Summary

Sun, 13 Dec 2009

Santiago - The first polling stations closed Sunday in Chile's presidential election, which was poised to be historic as the center-left alliance that has ruled since the restoration of democracy in 1990 could lose power. With about 8 million Chileans registered to vote, the first polling stations closed at 2000 GMT, with all voting over two hours later. There is no prescribed closing time for voting in Chile, with polling stations required to remain open for at least nine hours.

The first preliminary official results were to be made public later Sunday.

According to opinion polls, the ruling Concertacion - a coalition of Socialists and Christian-Democrats with two smaller parties - is facing a second-place finish and an uncertain fate in a potential run-off, despite the huge popularity of outgoing President Michelle Bachelet.

Conservative multimillionaire Sebastian Pinera, 60, was widely regarded as the favorite to win the first round of voting, with forecasts predicting an estimated 35-40 per cent of the vote.

"A message of hope for all Chileans: Better times are coming for Chile and for Chileans," Pinera said as he cast his ballot.

Centre-left Senator Eduardo Frei, 67, who previously governed Chile from 1994-2000, was predicted to get 25-30 per cent, with minority leftist candidate Marco Enriquez-Ominani, 36, polling around 20 per cent, according to surveys ahead of the vote.

It seemed unlikely that any of the candidates would obtain an absolute majority, and with it the presidency, in the first round of voting. If no candidate wins outright, the top two will contest a second round on January 17, followed by the inauguration of a new president for a four-year term on March 11.

Bachelet, the first Chilean woman ever to hold the presidency, has an approval rating of almost 80 per cent as she approaches the end of her four-year mandate. Chilean law forbids immediate re-election, but observers think Bachelet will target a return in 2014.

"Chile will as always show the world that it is a country that respects democracy, that respects peace," Bachelet said as she cast her ballot.

Indonesian president begins state tour to Europe

Sun, 13 Dec 2009

Jakarta - Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono left for a week-long tour to Europe Sunday that will include attendance at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Denmark. Yudhoyono will visit Belgium, France and Germany to discussing efforts bilateral ties and to promote the climate change talks, presidential spokesman Dino Pati Djalal said.

Accompanied by his wife and several cabinet ministers, Yudhoyono is scheduled to visit Brussels on December 14, Paris the following day and Germany on December 16, state-run Antara news agency said.

"The visit (to Europe) is long-awaited. In the past five years the president has several times planned to visit Europe but to no avail because he had to adjust his time," Djalal said.

In Brussels, the Indonesian leader will also hold talks with European Union President Jose Manuel Barroso on how to enhance relations between the 27-nation bloc and Indonesia.

In Copenhagen, Yudhoyono is scheduled to deliver a speech to the first session of the climate change conference, Djalal said.

He explained the presence of seven provincial governors in the entourage as designed to show the world that Indonesia is "serious in the field of forest conservation to reduce the level of global warming."

India tests nuclear-capable Dhanush missile

Sun, 13 Dec 2009

New Delhi - India on Sunday test-fired its indigenously developed nuclear-capable Dhanush ballistic missile from a naval ship in the Bay of Bengal, news reports said. The Dhanush, which means archer's bow in Sanskrit, is a naval variant of the short-range Prithvi surface-to-surface missile.

The missile was launched from INS Subhadra, about 35 nautical miles offshore from the test range of Chandipur in India's eastern state of Orissa, IANS news agency reported citing defense sources.

The Dhanush is capable of carrying both conventional and nuclear warheads and can carry a payload of up to 500 kilograms.

It is a single stage missile with liquid propellant and can hit both sea and land targets within a range of 350 kilometers.

The Dhanush is part of a series of weapons being developed by India's state-run Defense Research and Development Organization under an integrated missile project launched in the early 1980s.

Second Afghan official arrested over corruption charges

Sun, 13 Dec 2009

Kabul - Police in Afghanistan have arrested the deputy mayor of the capital Kabul on charges of corruption, just days after his boss was sentenced to four years in prison on similar charges, a senior prosecutor said Sunday. Wahabuddin Sadaat was arrested at Kabul airport on his arrival from Saudi Arabia, Deputy Attorney General Fazil Ahmad Faqiryar told German Press Agency dpa.

"He was arrested at 11 am yesterday by police and now he is in our custody," he said.

His arrest came nearly a week after a court convicted Kabul mayor Mir Abdul Ahad Sahebi of awarding a contract without proper competition, and ruled that he be dismissed from office. Sahebi who was sentenced in absentia, was later arrested, and then released on bail pending an appeal.

Faqiryar said that Sadaat, Sahebi and the deputy mayor's secretary allegedly mislead authorities by awarding the contract for the annual lease of a government building to a private sector company for 16,000 dollars less than it is worth.

"The court sentenced Sahebi to four years in prison and the other official to two years, but since Mr Sadaat was not inside the country, his case was not completed," Faqiryar said.

The latest arrest is seen as another step in the first major anti- corruption move by newly-inaugurated President Hamid Karzai, who has vowed to fight endemic corruption in his administration.

Despite the court ruling Sahebi was reportedly back in his office and has described the case against him and his colleagues as "a conspiracy".

On Sunday, Faqiryar said that the court's decisions were valid. "If we freed Mr Sahebi on bail, it was because we were concerned about his poor health condition, not any other reason."

"For us he is found guilty by the primary court, so he should not be running municipality until the appeal court's decision is issued," he said, but could not explain that why the ruling was not enforced yet.

Karzai, who won re-elected in fraud-tainted elections last month, is under massive pressure from Western leaders to crack down on graft.

Last month, the Afghan government launched an anti-corruption unit and assigned a task force to target senior government officials suspected of involvement in rampant corruption.

Karzai was expected to unveil the list of his new cabinet ministers on Wednesday or Thursday.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/299075,second-afghan-official-arrested-over-corruption-charges.html.

Polls open in Chile's tight presidential election

Sun, 13 Dec 2009

Buenos Aires/Santiago - Polls opened Sunday in a Chilean presidential election that was expected to be very tight and could turn out to be historic as the center-left alliance that has ruled Chile since the restoration of democracy in 1990 faces a possible loss of power. With about 8 million Chileans registered to vote, polling stations were set to close at 2000 GMT. Exit poll results were expected to be available shortly afterward, with the first preliminary official results to be made public later Sunday.

According to opinion polls, the ruling Concertacion - a coalition of Socialists and Christian-Democrats with two smaller parties - is facing a second-place finish and an uncertain fate in a potential run-off, despite the huge popularity of outgoing President Michelle Bachelet.

Conservative multimillionaire Sebastian Pinera, 60, was widely regarded as the favorite to win the first round of voting, with forecasts predicting an estimated 35-40 per cent of the vote.

Center-left Senator Eduardo Frei, 67, who previously governed Chile from 1994-2000, was predicted to get 25-30 per cent, with minority leftist candidate Marco Enriquez-Ominani, 36, polling around 20 per cent, according to opinion surveys ahead of the vote.

It seemed unlikely that any of the candidates would obtain an absolute majority, and with it the presidency, in the first round of voting. If no candidate wins outright, the top two finishers will contest a second round on January 17, followed by the inauguration of a new president for a four-year term on March 11.

Bachelet, the first Chilean woman ever to hold the presidency, has an approval rating of almost 80 per cent as she approaches the end of her four-year mandate. Chilean law forbids immediate re-election, but observers think Bachelet will target a return in 2014.

Catalan villages vote on independence from Spain

Sun, 13 Dec 2009

Barcelona - Voting opened Sunday in localities around the north-eastern Spanish region of Catalonia in unofficial "referendums" on whether the region should become independent. About 165 villages and towns were staging votes with no legal value to explore the extent of separatism in the wealthy region of 7 million residents.

Separatism is seen as being on the rise of Catalonia, where opinion polls show about 20 per cent of the population as supporting its independence from Spain.

Since the Spanish government does not authorize official referendums on independence, the Catalan votes were being organized privately by volunteers, with the backing of some political parties.

About 700,000 people including foreign residents were eligible to vote in the referendums held at schools, trade union offices and some municipal premises.

The votes followed the example of the village of Arenys de Munt, where 96 per cent of voters endorsed an independent Catalonia in September. Voter turnout, however, was only about 40 per cent.

The localities where Sunday's polls were due to be held ranged from small villages to Sant Cugat del Valles, which has 75,000 residents. The bigger city of Girona and the regional capital Barcelona were expected to follow suit in 2010.

Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said Saturday that the Catalan votes on independence were "not going anywhere," while his deputy Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega stressed that the "illegal" votes would have no practical consequences.

The Spanish government already faces a heterogeneous separatist movement in the Basque region.

Catalonia has one of the strongest self-governments among Spain's 17 regions, with a muscular policy to promote its language alongside Spanish and its own police force. But some Catalans find that insufficient.

Organizers of the Catalan referendums said they were not campaigning for independence, but only wanted Catalans to express their opinion on a question which Spain did not want to be brought out into the open.

Mayon volcano in Philippines oozes lava; alert up

By JIM GOMEZ, Associated Press Writer

MANILA, Philippines – Authorities moved thousands of villagers from harm's way near the Philippines' most active volcano Tuesday after it oozed lava and shot plumes of ash, and said they probably would spend a bleak Christmas in an evacuation center.

State volcanologists raised the alert level on the cone-shaped, 8,070-foot (2,460-meter) Mayon volcano overnight to two steps below a major eruption after ash explosions and dark orange lava fragments glowing in the dark trickled down the mountain slope.

Nearly 50,000 people live in a five-mile (eight-kilometer) radius around the mountain, and authorities began moving thousands of them in case it erupts, Albay provincial Gov. Joey Salceda said.

"Whatever the volcano does, our target is zero casualty," Salceda told The Associated Press.

Salceda said he had decided to cancel a trip to Copenhagen, where he was to attend the U.N. climate conference to discuss his central Albay province's experience with typhoons and other natural disasters.

He said he would appeal for foreign aid to deal with the expected influx of displaced villagers to emergency shelters.

The first of 20 vehicles, including army trucks, were sent to villages to take residents to schools and other temporary housing, provincial emergency management official Jukes Nunez said.

"It's 10 days before Christmas. Most likely people will be in evacuation centers, and if Mayon's activity won't ease down we will not allow them to return to their homes," Nunez said. "It's difficult and sad, especially for children."

Although the alarm has been sounded, life throbbed normally in many laid-back farming villages near the restive volcano. Throngs of farmers flocked at the town hall in Guinobatan, which lies near the danger zone, for a Christmas party, then headed home bearing gifts.

Village leader Romeo Opiana said the 249 residents in his farming community of Maninila, near the volcano, readied packs of clothes but no one had left. An army truck was parked nearby, ready to haul people if the threat grows.

"We're ready, but we're not really alarmed," said Opiana, 66. He could not remember how many times he had seen Mayon's eruptions since childhood.

Magma had been rising at the volcano over the past two weeks and began to ooze out of its crater Monday night, but it could get worse in coming days, said Renato Solidum, head of the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology.

"It's already erupting," Solidum told the AP. He said the volcano had so far only gently coughed out red-hot lava, which had flowed half a mile (half a kilometer) down from the crater.

Some classes were suspended indefinitely near the danger zone. Officials will find a way to squeeze in classes in school buildings to be used as shelters, Salceda said.

Residents in Albay are used to moving away from Mayon, which spewed ash last month and prompted the evacuation of some villages.

About 30,000 people were moved when it last erupted in 2006. Typhoon-triggered mudslides near the mountain later that year buried entire villages, killing more than 1,000 people.

Mayon's most violent eruption, in 1814, killed more than 1,200 people and buried a town in mud. A 1993 eruption killed 79 people.

The Philippines lies along the Pacific "Ring of Fire," where volcanic activity and earthquakes are common. About 22 out of 37 volcanoes in the archipelago are active.

Mozilla's Firefox - the big challenger in the browser wars

Sun, 13 Dec 2009

Hamburg - There wasn't much in the way of choice in web browsers in the late 1990s, after Microsoft's Internet Explorer edged out Netscape Navigator and got itself pre-installed on almost every PC. Microsoft's strategy left competitors few options. But, after the dust settled, Netscape made its source code open, allowing a community of developers to create an open source browser, presented to the world in 2004 as Firefox.

Since then, Firefox - with its logo of a fox circling the globe - has captured the hearts of surfers around the world. It has surged globally, even becoming the market leader in Germany, where 44 per cent of computer users prefer it, according to a recent poll by Fittkau & Maass. That compares to 37 per cent for Microsoft's Explorer.

Guided by the Mozilla Foundation since 2003, the program grew almost under cover. Like a phoenix, it returned to life on a very few computers as early as 2002 under the name of Firebird. Only on November 1, 2004, was Firefox 1.0 released.

From the start, it included options that made Explorer look old-fashioned, like a pop-up blocker and dynamic bookmarks for newsfeeds.

And those were just the start. Firefox also introduced practical features like managing multiple sites with tabs and the option to install add-ons. Its universal language allowed Mozilla's collaborators to make those add-ons themselves - for example, features that block banner ads or access Twitter functions.

The addition of Weave Sync allows Firefox users to upload their personal settings - bookmarks, cookies, passwords, user history and open tabs - up to Mozilla servers, allowing them to access the data via Firefox browsers on other computers. Encryption ensures security for that sensitive data.

People who prefer to carry their personal Firefox around with them on a USB stick can also do so thanks to a portable version of the browser.

"In hindsight, taking on Microsoft with a small, non-profit community could naturally be seen as a crazy undertaking," said Tristan Nitot, European president of the Mozilla Foundation, on the five-year anniversary of Firefox in November.

But the group considers itself lucky to have already attained two of its goals: "Choice and promoting innovation on the web."

The next version, Firefox 3.6, should make add-on personas a set part of the software, allowing users to customize their browser's appearance and individualize it. Boring monocolor backgrounds will soon be replaced by autumn forests, movie scenes, abstract patterns, or even the body of an electric guitar. There will be 35,000 of these skins from which to choose. The truly creative will be able to tailor their own.

Rights group sees small improvements in Libya

Sat, 12 Dec 2009

Tripoli - Human Rights Watch has noticed "pockets of improvements" in Libya but they are taking place in a still "repressive atmosphere," the group said Saturday. Among the changes the rights watchdog spotted were "expanded freedom of expression." However, laws continued to stifle speech and abuses by security forces were the "norm," it added.

As part of the opening up, the rights group said it was able to hold a press conference in the Libyan capital for the first time.

"A public assessment of Libya's human rights record in Tripoli would have been unthinkable a few years ago and reflects the expanded space for public discussion in Libya," Sarah Leah Whitson, the Middle East program director at the watchdog, said in a statement.

The group was releasing a 78-page report entitled Libya: Truth and Justice Can't Wait, which was based on monitoring conducted outside the country.

On the issue of unlawful detention, the report noted apparent conflicts between the Justice Ministry and the security forces, which were said to operate with "impunity," capable of arresting people without warrants.

"Efforts by the Justice Ministry to address cases of unjustly imprisoned detainees are an important step in the right direction, but every Libyan knows that true reform in the country will not be possible so long as the Internal Security Agency remains above the law," according to Whitson.

The report also noted the cases of two Swiss men who have not been allowed to leave Libya since June 2008 on what are officially visa violations, but appears to be the result of a diplomatic war between Tripoli and Bern.

Human Rights Watch called for a reform of the legal system and penal code to allow for greater freedoms.

After Turkish ban on party, US urges support for political freedom

Sat, 12 Dec 2009

Washington - The United States Friday urged Turkey to "advance political freedoms" for all of its citizens after Turkey's Constitutional Court banned the country's largest Kurdish political party. The court ruled earlier in the day that the Democratic Society Party (DTP) supported terrorism.

The US State Department said it would not comment on the specifics of the ruling, as it was an internal matter for Turkey.

"However, we believe that Turkey's democratic system should continue to advance political freedoms for all its citizens," the state department spokesman said in a statement.

The US urged "extreme caution" in limiting freedoms, and encouraged the Turkish government "to continue its efforts to ensure that all Turkish citizens fully exercise the rights and responsibilities of citizenship."

The ruling means the party is immediately dissolved, with its 37 parliamentarians facing a five-year ban on political activity - including party chief Ahmet Turk.

The decision was seen as a major blow to Turkish-Kurdish relations, which had recently thawed after decades of bloodshed and near civil-war in the east of the country.

Turkish politicians have repeatedly claimed the DTP is the political wing of the banned Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan had recently promised a "democratic opening" towards the Kurdish minority, who number around 15 million - or 20 per cent of the population.

The Kurds have long demanded more autonomy, especially greater respect for their own language.

The conflict, mainly between the outlawed PKK and the Turkish army, has left at least 35,000 people dead.

On Monday, US President Barack Obama met with Erdogan in Washington, praising his overtures to Turkey's minority Kurdish community.

Real Christmas trees greener than the plastic variety

Sat, 12 Dec 2009

Sydney - People who buy plastic Christmas trees rather than authentic fir ones often say they are helping save the planet. But only if they use the artificial tree for every festive season for almost two decades, researchers in Australia said Saturday.

They said that 3 kilograms of carbon dioxide is produced in the growing, transportation and disposal of a real tree compared with the 48 kilograms produced in the manufacture of the average artificial tree.

"You would need to keep a plastic tree for nearly 20 years to be on the same carbon footprint as a natural tree," Victoria state Environment Minister Gavin Jennings told public broadcaster ABC.

Jennings, who commissioned the research, said the ideal would be for householders to use a potted fir tree and replant it after Christmas is over.

In Britain, some growers are providing a rent-a-tree service, with customers having the same tree each year. Off-season, the replanted tree soaks up carbon dioxide and gives the renter a pleasant green feeling that can last the rest of the year.

Chinese president en route to Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan

Sat, 12 Dec 2009

Beijing - Chinese President Hu Jintao left Beijing Saturday for a three-day official visit to Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan, state media reported. Hu is scheduled to attend the inauguration of a Central Asian gas pipeline, and hold formal talks with Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev and Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

The 1,833-kilometer gas project, which began construction in 2007, is the country's first transnational pipeline. It runs from the border between Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, passing through Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan before reaching China, the agency said.

"The pipeline will be commissioned on December 14. Starting from that, Turkmenistan will annually supply China with 40 billion cubic meters of natural gas for the next 30 years," Berdimuhamedov was quoted as saying by Interfax news agency.

Saudi Arabia celebrates crown prince's return

Sat, 12 Dec 2009

Riyadh - Saudi Arabia on Saturday began celebrations to mark the return to the country of Crown Prince Sultan, after a year-long absence for medical treatment. The prince, King Abdullah's octogenarian half-brother, left the country in November 2008 for medical treatment in the United States and recovery in Morocco.

He returned Friday, appearing healthy in televised broadcasts in which he spoke briefly about the recent floods in Jeddah, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and Afghanistan.

Streets have been festooned with Sultan's photograph, and the Interior Ministry has announced a royal pardon for "some" prisoners to celebrate the crown prince's return.

The Saudi daily Arab News said Sultan's resumption of duties as deputy premier and defense minister would "add his wise counsel" to issues as the conflict in Yemen and the response to the Jeddah floods.

A rally at the Olympic stadium in Riyadh is scheduled for Sunday evening as part of the celebrations, Interior Ministry spokesman Major General Saleh al-Malik announced.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/298983,saudi-arabia-celebrates-crown-princes-return.html.

Russian-Norwegian consortium to develop huge Iraqi oil field

Sat, 12 Dec 2009

Baghdad - A consortium led by Russian energy giant Lukoil and Norway's Statoil on Saturday won the rights to develop Iraq's massive West Qurna-Phase II oil field, the Oil Ministry confirmed. The field, with some 12.9 billion barrels of proven reserves, was the most important field still up for grabs on the final day of the second round of bidding in an auction that began Friday.

The Russian-Norwegian consortium said it would boost the field's production to 1.8 million barrels of oil per day (bpd).

Of the 10 oil and gas fields opened to foreign investment in the latest round of bidding, only the Majnoon, with 12.8 billion barrels of proven reserves, was as large.

A consortium led by Royal Dutch Shell and Malaysia's Petronas energy companies on Friday won rights to develop that field, promising to boost production from 46,000 bpd to 1.8 million bpd, in exchange for 1.39 dollars to the barrel.

Petronas was also part of a consortium led by China's CNPC that on Friday won the rights to develop the Halfaya oil field, which has proven reserves of 4.1 billion barrels.

CNPC, which has a 50-per-cent stake in the consortium, with Petronas and France's Total each holding 25-per cent, plan to raise Halfaya's production to 535,000 bpd, from the 3,000 bpd it currently produces.

The consortium requested 1.40 dollars per barrel for the investment.

Shell and US giant ExxonMobil in November signed a deal to develop the West Qurna-Phase I field.

The auction is taking place in the shadow of a series of bombings that on Tuesday killed as many as 127 people and injured more than 500 in central Baghdad.

Some of the fields still on offer, such as the Nijm field in northern Iraq's conflict-riven Nineveh province, or the East Baghdad field, whose 8.1 billion barrels of oil lie almost exactly beneath the Shiite slum of Sadr City, are in areas with tenuous security.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/298986,russian-norwegian-consortium-to-develop-huge-iraqi-oil-field.html.

Iran dismisses further sanctions as 'unjust and political' - Summary

Sat, 12 Dec 2009

Tehran - Iran said Saturday that any further United Nations sanctions over its controversial nuclear programs were "unjust and political," ISNA news agency reported. The European Union and the US announced on Friday that they were prepared to push for more UN sanctions against Iran should the Islamic Republic refuse to cooperate with foreign demands on its nuclear projects.

"The countries (planning the sanctions) know very well that their plan is totally unjust and political," foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast told ISNA.

"World public opinion should know that this plan is outside any internationally acknowledged legal framework and especially outside the framework of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)," the spokesman said.

The government said Iran has the right to pursue peaceful nuclear development, including uranium enrichment, as signatory of the Non- Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and member of the IAEA.

Tehran also rejects Western charges that it is working on a secret nuclear program to make an atomic bomb.

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, currently in Bahrain at a security conference, criticized the world powers' plans of renewed sanction against Iran and said such measures would have the reverse effect.

"The use of force, threats and sanctions for confronting Iran's peaceful nuclear projects and making instrumental and political use of the IAEA would not only have reverse effects but also undermine the NPT," Mottaki was quoted by Mehr news agency as saying.

The Iranian foreign minister called on the world powers "to stop discrimination", instead of focusing on Iran, but to also look at Israel.

The nuclear row has reached another deadlock after Iran admitted to the construction of a new enrichment site south of Tehran, and rejected a plan brokered by the IAEA for Iran's low enriched uranium (LEU) being exported to Russia and France for further enrichment and eventually fuel for the Tehran medical reactor.

"The deal is still on, just our proposal was the deal should be made inside Iran: bring the fuel and get the LEU instead," Mehmanparast said, reiterating that Iran needed guarantees that the deal would be correctly implemented.

"The deal can fully be under IAEA supervision and even the fuel can even be delivered inside Iran first to the IAEA (and then to us)," the spokesman added.

Both the IAEA and the world powers have so far rejected the Iranian proposal and gave Iran time until the end of the year to accept the initial IAEA plan or face renewed sanctions.

Following another IAEA resolution last month against the Islamic state, Iran warned it would reduce cooperation with the UN nuclear guardian to a minimum and would even increase the enrichment level of its uranium from around 5 per cent now to 20 per cent by itself.

Tehran however later revised its stance and, as repeated Saturday by Mottaki in Bahrain, vowed to continue cooperation.

Tehran also proclaimed that for covering its electricity needs, the country needed between 15 to 20 new uranium enrichment sites of which ten have already been ordered by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to be built.

Morocco says hunger strike is an 'Algerian plot'

RABAT — Morocco on Monday charged that Aminatou Haidar, a Sahrawi activist on hunger strike in Spain's Canary Islands, is part of a "systematic, methodical plot devised by Algeria."

Haidar, 42, has been on hunger strike for almost a month on Lanzarote, after being refused entry to the Western Sahara, which is territory occupied by and claimed by Morocco.

Algeria has long been an ally of the Polisario Front independence movement, which emerged in the Western Sahara as Spanish settlers withdrew in 1975 and Morocco annexed the territory.

Haidar, 42, is claiming her right to return to Western Sahara's main town of Laayoune and accuses the Moroccan authorities of taking away her Moroccan passport. But the Rabat government says she refused "to carry out the usual police formalities (in Laayoune) and denied her Moroccan nationality."

"This lady is at the orders of her masters," Communications Minister Khalid Naciri said Sunday on a public television channel, adding that she was being manipulated in a "plan to divide and destabilize the region."

Asked Monday to explain his remarks, Naciri -- who is also Morocco's government spokesman -- launched into an attack on Algeria.

Algiers "is in a position of weakness in relation to the plan for autonomy drawn up by Morocco for the Western Sahara and which is welcomed by the international community," he told AFP by telephone.

Haidar's case was an "odious instrumentalisation" aimed at "attracting the sympathy of international public opinion," Naciri said, accusing Algeria of "a Cold War discourse. The Berlin Wall has fallen in Europe and another is being built by Algeria."

"We can't take the responsibility for a systematic, methodical plot devised by Algeria. Too much is too much," Naciri added when asked what Morocco planned to do about the Haidar affair.

Haidar was expelled from the Western Sahara on November 14 and began her hunger strike two days later, demanding her right to be able to return to the territory.

She has consumed only sugared water since.

Naciri described Morocco and Spain as "victims of a Machiavellian plan".

Kashmiri Diaspora urged to highlight the abuse of human rights in IOK

LONDON, Dec 14 (APP): The UK Kashmiri Diaspora has been urged to highlight the abuse of human rights in the Indian Occupied Kashmir.A leading Muslim member of the British Parliament, Lord Nazir Ahmed, recently elected as Chairman, All Parties Parliamentary Group on Kashmir, speaking at a seminar organized by the UK chapter of Jammu Kashmir Liberation League to commemorate the 61st UN Human Rights, said it is an important day for the people of Jammu Kashmir and awareness raising activities and campaigns regarding the situation of the human rights in Jammu Kashmir.

He advocated the need for bringing the cause of Kashmir to the notice of the representatives of the people in both houses of parliament in the UK.

Lord Ahmed was of the opinion that political activists and representatives of the Diaspora in the UK and all over the world should take an approach that revolves around the basic rights of the people of J&K rather than being critical of either countries party to the conflict.

Welcoming the participants at the House of Commons and specially Lord Ahmed in his new role as the chair of the APPG,Dr Misfar Hasan, the organizer of the seminar and the senior leader of JKLL, said that recent discovery of more than 2700 unnamed graves in the Indian Held Kashmir is another indication how much people of Kashmir have suffered at the hands of the Indian armed forces.

Talking about the recent attack on a senior political activist of APHC, he said that the incident is an indication that forces with vested interests want to sabotage the dialogue process as ever.

Speaking on the occasion, member of Parliament from Aylesbury and the Shadow foreign minister for the Conservative Party, David Liddington describing discovery of mass graves in the Held Kashmir as unfortunate was of the opinion that organizations like Amnesty International, International red Cross and other Human Rights organizations must have an unfettered access to investigate such unfortunate cases of crimes against humanity.

He further said that his party would accept a settlement of J&K that is acceptable to the people of Jammu Kashmir.

Another Conservative MP Paul Goodman while describing his visits to the refugee camps in the AJK said he has the firsthand account of the torture and use of force by the Indian authorities against the people of Held Kashmir.

He further said that people in different regions may be of different opinions regarding the final settlement of the issue.

Goodman said that they need to keep a focus on human rights violations in Held Kashmir. A resolution that takes into account wishes of the people of J&K would be lasting solution of the problem.

Prof. Nazir Shawl, Executive Director, Kashmir Center, London, presented a report on human rights violation to Lord Ahmed and reiterated that while the Indian government is giving an impression to the International community of talks and peace in the state yet the discovery of another unnamed mass graves in the Held Kashmir valley presents to the civilized world the possibility of mass genocide of many innocent civilian Kashmiris.

Muhammad Khan, a senior leader from Muslim Conference, UK, asked for a unified action to support the cause of the right of Self Determination and hoped that Lord Ahmed would use his good office to evolve some joint strategy in helping towards a political resolution of the issue through mediation.

Dr. Hassan in his closing remarks said that Kashmir is a political issue that must not be taken in context of religions as people of Kashmir with a very diverse culture and religions have lived peacefully side by side for centuries.

He said JKLL as a political party condemns all acts of terrorism anywhere on the globe and advocates a peaceful political settlement of the issue.

The participants agreed to a proposal by Lord Ahmed for an all parties moot in January to develop a consensus on the role of Kashmiri Diaspora to achieve the right of self-determination.

Castro says US on offensive in LatAm despite Obama

By WILL WEISSERT, Associated Press Writer

HAVANA – Fidel Castro says President Barack Obama's "friendly smile and African-American face" are hiding Washington's sinister intentions for Latin America — more evidence of a new cooling in U.S.-Cuba relations after a thaw had seemed possible just months ago.

In a letter to Hugo Chavez that the Venezuelan president read at the close of a summit of leftist Latin American nations Monday, Castro said the U.S. "empire is on the offensive again" in the region.

He blamed Washington for a military coup that toppled leftist President Manuel Zelaya of Honduras in June and criticized a U.S. agreement with Colombia that allows U.S. troops greater access to seven of that country's military bases.

"They are obviously the real intentions of the empire, this time under the friendly smile and African-American face of Barack Obama," Castro said.

The 83-year-old former Cuban president heaped praise on Obama when he first took office, calling him intelligent, sincere, serene, courageous, honest and well-meaning. He later endorsed Obama's winning of the Nobel Peace Prize.

But Castro has turned on Obama, saying in an opinion piece in state media last week that the U.S. president's acceptance of the Nobel prize after deciding to send 30,000 more soldiers to Afghanistan was "a cynical act."

His letter to Chavez is the latest sign that reconciliation between the U.S. and the communist-governed island isn't likely soon. That had seemed a possibility as recently as the spring, when the White House eased restrictions on Cuban-Americans who want to travel and send money to this country and Obama spoke of a possible new beginning in relations.

On Saturday, the U.S. State Department said Cuba detained an American citizen Dec. 5 who had been working in Cuba as a subcontractor for a Maryland-based economic development organization.

Cuba's government has not commented, but word of the arrest came after both sides blamed each other for the postponement of meetings scheduled for this month to discuss immigration issues.

In November, the State Department denounced an assault — allegedly by plainclothes Cuban state security agents — on the island's top dissident blogger, Yoani Sanchez. Obama later sent a lengthy message praising Sanchez and answering a series of questions from her.

Prominent American blacks recently denounced racism in Cuba, which is a touchy subject for this nation, and the Cuban military conducted war games against a U.S. invasion, which authorities here still insist is a real possibility.

The idea that Washington is turning up the heat on the leftist governments in Latin America dominated the two-day meeting of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas, a regional trade group known as ALBA that was founded by Chavez as an alternative to U.S.-backed, free-trade consortiums.

Bolivian President Evo Morales said that if the U.S. threatened Latin America militarily, the region would rise up and create "a second Vietnam." Chavez quipped that Obama was the winner of the "Nobel Prize of War."

The Venezuelan leader also responded to recent comments by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who warned Latin American governments to "think twice" about building ties with Iran.

"It's ridiculous, the threat of the secretary of state, and we aren't afraid of her," Chavez said.

Taliban kill 7 policemen in S Afghanistan

KABUL, Dec. 14 (Xinhua) -- Taliban militants killed seven policemen in the militancy-hit Helmand province in south Afghanistan early Monday, spokesman for provincial administration Daud Ahmadi said.

"Three Taliban men influenced a police checkpoint outside provincial capital Lashkar Gah opened fire on policemen inside the checkpoint at 03:30 a.m. local time killing seven on the spot and made their good escape with 10 AK-47 and a police vehicle," Ahmadi told Xinhua.

He also added that police later on launched a siege and search operation and so far arrested two of the culprits while the third one reached to Taliban base in the mountains around.

This is the second attack on police checkpoint over the past 24 hours in Afghanistan.

The previous attack against police checkpoint in the northern Baghlan province also left seven police constables dead late Sunday night.

Source: Xinhua.
Link: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-12/14/content_12646041.htm.

Turkish PM's visit to Italy postponed

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s visit to Italy scheduled December 16, 2009 was postponed due to Dec. 13 attack on Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi, Turkish Haberler website reports referring to Erdogan’s Dec. 14 statement.

As NEWS.am reported previously, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi stood an assault at the Sunday rally organized by the ruling “The people of Freedom” party in central Duomo’s square, Milan.

After the speech, a man approached Berlusconi and stroke him in the face with a cathedral statuette, France-Presse agency reports.

As a result, a 73-year-old Premier suffered a fractured nose, two broken teeth and cuts to his lips, Reuters informs. Presently, he is under medical supervision in one of Milan hospitals.

The police arrested the attacker — a 42-year-old Italian Massimo Tartaglia, who was undergoing treatment for mental problems within 10 years, the source says. However, according to consulting doctor, Tartaglia was not a danger to society, Italian media reports.

Turkey's Erdogan criticizes ban on Kurdish party

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey (Reuters) - Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan spoke out on Monday against a court ban on a Kurdish party that caused angry protests and plunged the country into political uncertainty.

The court ruling drew criticism from the European Union, dealing a new blow to Turkey's faltering hopes of EU membership.

"Our position against the closure of the DTP is clear ... We are against the closure of parties. We think individuals should be punished, not a (party) identity," Erdogan told parliament.

The leader of the banned Democratic Society Party (DTP), closed after being found guilty of links to the separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), said former party members would resign from parliament in protest.

This could open the way for by-elections, increasing political uncertainty ahead of national polls due in 2011.

In Diyarbakir, the largest city in the primarily Kurdish southeast, thousands of Kurds took to the streets, watched by riot police, for the fourth day of protests since the court disbanded the only Kurdish party in parliament.

In the town of Dogubeyazit, angry protesters threw petrol bombs and stones at police, who fired back with tear gas and water cannon.

Clashes have erupted mainly in villages in the southeast, but also in the heart of Istanbul's shopping and entertainment district on Sunday, raising ethnic tensions.

The European Commission warned Turkey on Monday that the court verdict could deprive a substantial number of voters of representation, which it said was essential to Ankara fulfilling its democratic mandate.

The ruling AK Party wants to push reforms aimed at ending decades of conflict with Kurdish separatists by increasing the rights of Turkey's roughly 12 million Kurds.

Investors who are hardened to the emerging market's domestic turmoil were relatively untroubled by the events.

The Turkish lira and bonds weakened moderately on Monday but shares were in positive territory, boosted by news of Abu Dhabi's surprise $10 billion bail-out of debt-stricken Dubai.

HERO'S WELCOME

DTP deputies, riding an open-top bus, received a heroes' welcome when they arrived at Diyarbakir on Monday after a flight from Ankara, as around 5,000 people flooded the streets in a largely peaceful protest against the party's closure.

The chairman of the former party, speaking in the predominantly Kurdish city, said there was no longer any reason to remain in parliament.

"As you know, we have said before there is no reason to stay in parliament if our struggle for democracy is not taken into consideration ... We will submit our resignations to the speaker of the parliament in the shortest possible time," said DTP chairman Ahmet Turk.

Other MPs speculated that they could join an alternative pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party.

Earlier in the day police fired water cannon when a group of youths pelted them with rocks and ripped up street signs. Protesters also stoned a local office of the AK Party and several people were arrested.

Some protesters carried portraits of Abdullah Ocalan, the imprisoned leader of the PKK.

The Constitutional Court ordered the closure of the DTP after finding it guilty of cooperating with the PKK, branded a terrorist organization by Washington, Brussels and Ankara.

The PKK has fought for 25 years for a Kurdish homeland in southeast Turkey. Some 40,000 people have died in the violence since 1984.

The Kurds, who make up around 20 percent of the population, were for decades forbidden to use the Kurdish language, and have long complained of discrimination.

Land mine kills 6 Somali children in same family

MOGADISHU, Somalia — A community leader in Somalia says an explosion of an old land mine has killed six children from the same family near the border with Ethiopia.

Hareri Hassan Barre says six children between the ages of 3 and 11 were killed by the blast as their mother prepared a meal nearby. He says only the mother, father and a small baby survived in the family of nine.

Barre says the area is full of land mines because of conflict between Somalia and Ethiopia in the late 1970s.

The U.N. Mine Action Center says that 357 communities in Somalia are affected by land mines, which were first laid in the country in 1964. Mines appear along the Ethiopian border and around strategic facilities, camps and towns.

UN chief, Moroccan officials discuss Western Sahara issues

2009-12-13

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon met with Moroccan Foreign Minister Taieb Fassi-Fihri and intelligence agency (DGED) chief Mohamed Yassine Mansouri in New York on Friday (December 11th). "We discussed several issues, notably the situation in the Maghreb and the development of the Sahara issue," MAP quoted Fassi-Fihri as saying after the meeting. To keep "all doors closed and without contact between governments at a moment when we face real challenges, not only at the level of the Maghreb but also in Europe, is against the interests of the people of the region", the minister added.

According to Reuters, Ban Ki-moon broached the issue of Western Sahara activist Aminatou Haidar's hunger strike. The 42-year-old has been at the Spanish Canary Islands airport of Lanzarote since Moroccan authorities deported her on November 14th.

The Media Response to the Growing Influence of the 9 /11 Truth Movement

Reflections on a Recent Evaluation of Dr. David Ray Griffin

by Elizabeth Woodworth

Global Research, December 12, 2009

The cover story of the September 24, 2009, issue of The New Statesman, the venerable left-leaning British magazine, was entitled “The 50 People who Matter Today.” Any such list, necessarily reflecting the bias and limited awareness of the editors, would surely contain choices that readers would find surprising.

That is true of this list – which includes families as well as individuals. A good number of names are, to be sure, ones that would be contained in most such lists created by British, Canadian, or American political commentators, such as the Obamas, the Murdochs, Vladimir Putin, Osama bin Laden, Angela Merkel, Bill and Melinda Gates, Warren Buffett, Pope Benedict XVI, and Gordon Brown. But about half of the names reflected choices that I, and probably most other readers, found surprising. One of these choices, however, is beyond surprising - it is astounding.

I refer to the person in the 41st position: David Ray Griffin, a retired professor of philosophy of religion and theology who, in 2003, started writing and lecturing about 9/11, pointing out problems in the official account of the events of that day. By the time the New Statesman article appeared, he had published 8 books, 50 articles, and several DVDs. Because of both the quantity and quality of his work, he became widely regarded as the chief spokesperson of what came to be called “the 9/11 Truth Movement.” It was because of this role that the New Statesman included him in its list, calling him the “top truther” (the “conspiracy theorist” title went to Dan Brown, who was placed in the 50th slot).

In saying Griffin “matters”, however, the New Statesman was not praising him. Here is how the magazine explained its choice:

“Conspiracy theories are everywhere, and they always have been. In recent years, one of the most pernicious global myths has been that the US government carried out, or at least colluded in, the 11 September 2001 attacks as a pretext for going to war. David Ray Griffin, a retired professor of religion, is the high priest of the ‘truther’ movement. His books on the subject have lent a sheen of respectability that appeals to people at the highest levels of government - from Michael Meacher MP to Anthony ‘Van’ Jones, who was recently forced to resign as Barack Obama's ‘green jobs’ adviser after it emerged that he had signed a 9/11 truth petition in 2004.”

I wish to raise two questions about the New Statesman’s treatment of Griffin. First, is its evaluation of him as one of the most important people in the world today simply absurd, as it certainly seems at first glance, or is there a perspective from which it makes sense? Second on what basis could the editors justify their claim that the 9/11 truth movement is promoting a “myth” – and a “pernicious” one at that?

The Inclusion of Griffin in the List: Does It Make Sense?

Why would Griffin’s role as “top truther” – as the intellectual leader of the 9/11 truth movement - lead the magazine’s editors to consider him one of the “50 people who matter today”? Unlike a president, a prime minister, or a pope, he has no political clout; unlike a billionaire, he has no financial clout; and his book sales do not begin to rival those of Dan Brown. Indeed, his books do not even get reviewed in the press. The idea that he is one of the 50 people who matter most in the world today is, as he himself has said, absurd – at least from most angles.

There is, however, one angle from which it does make sense: Given the enormity of the 9/11 attacks and of the policies, both foreign and domestic, that have been justified as responses to those attacks, a movement challenging the official story of the attacks certainly could, in principle, become so influential that its intellectual leader would be a person of consequence.

And the movement has, in fact, grown enormously in both size and credibility since 2004 and 2005, when Griffin published his first two books on the subject – “The New Pearl Harbor” and “The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions” – and began working, with colleague Peter Dale Scott, on an edited volume that was published in 2006 as “9/11 and the American Empire: Intellectuals Speak Out.”

Due in large part to these volumes - plus the national exposure Griffin received when his 2005 lecture at the University of Wisconsin in Madison was carried by C-SPAN - a small group of academics formed Scholars for 9/11 Truth, which led in turn to the formation of Scholars for 9/11 Truth and Justice, the leaders of which launched the Journal of 9/11 Studies in 2006.

The existence of these scholarly organizations stimulated the creation of three professional organizations: Veterans for 9/11 Truth, Pilots for 9/11 Truth, and the destined giant of the movement, Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth, which was formed after architect Richard Gage, a conservative Republican, heard an interview with Professor Griffin on his car radio that would change his life. In it, Griffin was describing the newly released oral testimonies from the dozens of New York firefighters a who had heard booming explosions in the Twin Towers. After looking into the evidence for himself and concluding that the destruction of the World Trade Center buildings could not have resulted from anything other than explosives, Gage formed his organization of architects and engineers, which now has almost 1000 licensed members.

While these developments were occurring, translations were made of some of Griffin’s books, beginning with “The New Pearl Harbor,” which was published in Italian, Chinese, Danish, Czech, French, Dutch, Japanese, and Arabic. Thanks in part to these translations, a worldwide movement is now calling for 9/11 truth.

Also, this movement, which at one time was discounted as crazy conspiracy theorists playing around on the Internet, has now become widely professionalized, with Griffin again a critical influence in his consultant role to the emerging organizations of journalists, lawyers, medical professionals, religious leaders, and political leaders.

One of those organizations, Political Leaders for 9/11 Truth, includes in its membership British MP Michael Meacher, who has, according to the New Statesman, succumbed to the “sheen of respectability” given to “the ‘truther’ movement” by Griffin’s books. The New Statesman would presumably look equally askance at other members of this organization, including Senator Yukihisa Fujita, one of the leading members of the new ruling party of Japan, who made a nationally televised presentation questioning the official account or 9/11, and Ferdinando Imposimato, a former Italian senator and judge who presided over the trial of the assassination of President Aldo Moro and the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II.

If political leaders are so easily taken in by a “pernicious global myth” about 9/11 because of the “sheen of respectability” lent to it by Griffin’s books, one could hopefully look to firefighters, who are generally practical, sensible people, for reassurance about the truth of the official account of 9/11. This hope is dashed, however, by the testimonies about explosions in the Twin Towers by dozens of firefighters, some of whom Richard Gage heard Griffin discussing on that interview in 2006. New York firefighters lost 343 of their own on September 11. The members of Firefighters for 9/11 Truth are demanding the investigation and prosecution of those involved in arranging explosions, destroying evidence, and orchestrating a cover-up.

One thing bringing Griffin to the attention of the editors of the New Statesman may have been the selection of his seventh book about 9/11, “The New Pearl Harbor Revisited,” by America’s foremost book trade reviewer, Publishers Weekly, as its “Pick of the Week” on November 24, 2008. This honor, which is bestowed on only 51 books a year, perhaps increased the sheen of respectability these editors attribute to Griffin’s books.

And, if the New Statesman did its homework in researching its #41 position, it would have found that Griffin was nominated in both 2008 and 2009 for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Whatever the case, there can be no doubt that the 9/11 truth movement, which Griffin has done more than any other single person to bring to its present level of professionalism and credibility, now poses a significant threat to the public narrative about 9/11, which has been accepted as a basis for policy by virtually all governments and news organizations around the world.

The decision of the New Statesman to include Griffin on the list of people who matter today does make sense, therefore, insofar as it was saying that the movement he represents is important. This way of understanding it was, in fact, Griffin’s own, as soon as he learned about the article. In a letter to fellow members of the 9/11 truth community, he said: “We should take this [New Statesman] article as a reluctant tribute to the effectiveness of our movement.”

Does the 9/11 Truth Movement Promote a Pernicious Myth?

My second questions is: On what basis could the New Statesman editors justify their claim that this 9/11 truth movement promotes a “myth” - a “pernicious” one at that?

To call it a “myth” implies that it is not true. But why is it “pernicious”?

If the New Statesman were a right-wing magazine, we could assume that it would regard the 9/11 truth movement’s central claim – “that the US government carried out, or at least colluded in, the 11 September 2001 attacks as a pretext for going to war” – as pernicious because it seeks to undermine the imperialist wars justified by 9/11. But surely the left-leaning New Statesman does not share that view.

The word “pernicious” might simply mean that the myth “that the US government carried out, or at least colluded in, the 11 September 2001 attacks as a pretext for going to war,” is too morally repugnant to accept. But that gut reaction does not bear on the truth or falsity of the possibility, especially in light of all the morally repugnant things carried out by the Bush-Cheney administration that have already been publicly documented.

More likely, the New Statesman shares the view of left-leaning intellectuals, such as Alexander Cockburn and George Monbiot, that the 9/11 movement is distracting many left-leaning people from dealing with truly important issues.

However, would many people who regard 9/11 as a false-flag operation – in which forces within the US government orchestrated the attacks to have a pretext for, among other things, going to war against oil-rich Muslim countries - consider the attempt to reveal this truth a distraction from important issues? Surely not.

For the Statesman to call the central claim of the 9/11 truth movement “pernicious,” therefore, seems to be simply another way of calling it a “myth” – of saying that it is false.

If so, the question becomes: On what basis would the editors of the New Statesman argue that the position of the 9/11 truth movement, as articulated in Griffin’s writings, is false?

I will suggest a possible way they could do this: They could use the pages of their magazine to explain why the cumulative case Griffin has constructed against the official story is unconvincing. To assist them in this task, I have provided below a summary of some of the main points in Griffin’s case, with page references to his most comprehensive work, “The New Pearl Harbor Revisited” (2008), and his most recent book, “The Mysterious Collapse of World Trade Center 7.”

Elements in Griffin’s Cumulative Case Against the Official Account of 9/11

Evidence that the attacks were carried out by Arab Muslims belonging to al-Qaeda

The FBI, which does not list 9/11 as one of the terrorist acts for which Osama bin Laden is wanted, has explicitly admitted that it “has no hard evidence connecting Bin Laden to 9/11” (NPHR 206-11).

Mohamed Atta and the other alleged hijackers, far from being devout Muslims ready to die as martyrs, regularly drank heavily, went to strip clubs, and paid for sex (NPHR 153-55).

The main evidence for hijackers on the planes was provided by phone calls, purportedly from passengers or crew members on the airlines, reporting that the planes had been taken over by Middle-Eastern men. About 15 of these calls were specifically identified as cell phone calls, with Deena Burnett, for example, reporting that she had recognized her husband’s cell phone number on her Caller ID. But after the 9/11 truth movement pointed out that cell phone calls from high-altitude airliners would have been impossible, given the cell phone technology available in 2001, the FBI changed its story, saying that all the calls, except two made from a very low altitude, had been made using onboard phones.

Although US Solicitor General Ted Olson claimed that his wife, Barbara Olson, phoned him twice from AA 77, describing hijackers with knives and box-cutters, his widely reported story was contradicted by FBI evidence presented to the Moussaoui Trial in 2006, which said that the only call attempted by her was “unconnected” and (therefore) lasted “0 seconds” (NPRH 60-62).

Although the decisive evidence proving that Al-Qaeda was responsible for the attacks was originally said to have been found in a rented Mitsubishi that Mohamed Atta had left in the airport parking lot in Boston, the present story says that it was found in luggage that did not get loaded onto American Flight 11 from the commuter flight that Atta took that morning from Portland, Maine. This story changed after it emerged that Adnan and Ameer Bukhari, originally said to have been the hijackers who boarded American 11 after taking that commuter flight from Portland, had not died on 9/11.

The other types of reputed evidence for Muslim hijackers, such as security videos at airports, passports discovered at the crash sites, and a headband discovered at the crash site of United 93, show clear signs of having been fabricated (NPHR 170-73).

In addition to the absence of evidence for hijackers on the planes, there is also evidence of their absence: Although the pilots could have easily “squawked” the universal hijack code in two or three few seconds, not one of the eight pilots on the four airliners did this (NPHR 175-79).

The Secret Service, after being informed that a second World Trade Center building had been attacked---which would have meant that unknown terrorists were going after high-value targets---and that still other planes had apparently been hijacked, allowed President Bush to remain at the unprotected school in Sarasota, Florida, for another 30 minutes. The Secret Service thereby betrayed its knowledge that the airliners were not under the control of hostile hijackers.

Evidence of a “stand-down” order preventing interception of the four planes

Given standard operating procedures between the FAA and the military, according to which planes showing signs of an in-flight emergency are normally intercepted within about 10 minutes, the military’s failure to intercept any of the flights implies that something, such as a stand-down order, prevented standard procedures from being carried out (NPHR 1-10, 81-84).

Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta reported an episode in which Vice President Cheney, while in the bunker under the White House, apparently confirmed a stand-down order at about 9:25 AM, which was prior to the strike on the Pentagon. (NPHR 94-96).

The 9/11 Commission did not include this testimony from Mineta in its report and claimed that Cheney did not enter the bunker until almost 10:00, which was at least 40 minutes later than Mineta and several other witnesses reported his being there (NPHR 91-94).

The 9/11 Commission’s timeline for Cheney that morning even contradicted what Cheney himself had told Tim Russert on “Meet the Press” five days after 9/11 (NPHR 93).

Evidence that the official story about the Pentagon cannot be true

Hani Hanjour, who according to his flight instructors could not safely fly a single-engine airplane, could not have possibly executed the extraordinary trajectory reportedly taken by American Flight 77 in order to hit Wedge 1 of the Pentagon (NPHR 78-80).

Wedge 1 would have been the least likely part of the Pentagon to be targeted by foreign terrorists: It was remote from the offices of the top brass; it was the only part of the Pentagon that had been reinforced; and it was still being renovated and hence was only sparsely occupied (NPHR 76-78).

Evidence that the official story about the destruction of the World Trade Center cannot be true

Because the Twin Towers were supported by 287 steel columns, including 47 massive core columns, they could not have come straight down, largely into their own footprints, unless these columns had been severed by explosives. Therefore, the official theory - according to which the buildings were brought down solely by fire plus, in the case of the Twin Towers, the impact of the planes – is scientifically impossible (NPHR 12-25).

Many other things that occurred during the destruction of the Twin Towers, such as the horizontal ejections of steel beams from the top floors and the liquefying of steel and other metals with melting points far above any temperature that could have produced by fire, can only be explained by powerful explosives (NPHR 30-36).

The almost perfectly symmetrical collapse of WTC 7, which was supported by 82 steel columns, could only have occurred if all 82 of those columns had been sliced simultaneously (MC Ch. 10).

In its final report on WTC 7, issued in November 2008, NIST admitted that this building had come down in absolute free fall for over two seconds. NIST, however, was still affirming a theory of progressive collapse caused by fire, which, as NIST had explained the previous August, could not possibly result in absolute free fall, because the lower floors would offer resistance. NIST was able to avoid admitting that explosives had brought the building down, in other words, only by continuing to affirm its fire theory after admitting that it could not explain one of the empirical facts it had come to acknowledge (MC Ch. 10).

Journalists, city officials, WTC employees, and over 100 members of the Fire Department of New York testified to having witnessed massive explosions in the World Trade Center buildings (NPHR 27-30, 45-48, 51).

A scientist who had formerly worked for the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), which produced the official reports on the world Trade Center, reported in 2007 that it had been “fully hijacked from the scientific to the political realm,” so that its scientists had become little more than “hired guns” (NPHR 11, 238-51).

The fact that NIST in writing its reports functioned as a political rather than a scientific agency is illustrated with special clarity by its report on WTC 7, in which it not only omitted all the evidence pointing to the occurrence of explosives (MC Chs. 3-5), but also falsified and even fabricated evidence to support its claim that the building was brought down by fire (Chs. 7-10).

Until the editors of the New Statesman are able to refute Griffin’s cumulative argument, we can agree with their view that Griffin, by virtue of his role in the 9/11 truth movement, has become a person of global importance, while rejecting as groundless their charge that the growing importance of this movement is pernicious.

Innocent Guantánamo Torture Victim Fouad al-Rabiah Is Released in Kuwait

by Andy Worthington

Global Research, December 11, 2009
Truthout - 2009-12-10

The long ordeal of Fouad al-Rabiah, an innocent man and a 50-year-old father of four, who had been in US custody for almost exactly eight years, finally came to an end today, when he was flown back to his homeland of Kuwait from Guantánamo, where he had spent the majority of those lost years, after several brutal months in US custody in Afghanistan.

Until the moment of his release, everything about his treatment at the hands of the US government was shameful.Twelve weeks ago, when District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly granted his habeas corpus petition, and ordered his release, she revealed the most extraordinary - and extraordinarily depressing - story. This shone the most unflinching light on Guantánamo as a place where men, who were rounded up for bounty payments by the US military's allies in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and were never adequately screened on capture, were then sent to Guantánamo. Once there, in the absence of any information to back up the administration's claims that they were "the worst of the worst," they became the victims of false allegations made by other prisoners (who were either coerced to do so, or were bribed with the promise of improved living conditions), and were then tortured and abused to make false confessions.

During the prisoners' habeas corpus petitions over the last 14 months, numerous examples of dubious allegations made by unreliable witnesses have been exposed by the judges, as well as other examples of cases that "defie[d] common sense" or exposed the use of torture, but until al-Rabiah's case was examined, the existence of a clear chain of torture and threats inflicted to produce false confessions at Guantánamo had never been revealed with such alarming clarity.

Al-Rabiah's story began when he traveled to Afghanistan in 2001 to provide humanitarian aid, but was caught up in the chaos following the US-led invasion, and ended up in the hands of the US military. What followed was truly shameful. In Guantánamo, unreliable witnesses - whose unreliability was acknowledged by the authorities - claimed that he had met Osama bin Laden and had provided him with a suitcase of money, and also claimed that he had played a supporting role to al-Qaeda in the battle of Tora Bora, the showdown between al-Qaeda and US-supported Afghan forces in December 2001, when bin Laden escaped into Pakistan.

Under torture, which included, but was not limited to prolonged sleep deprivation - being moved from cell to cell every few hours over a period lasting for several weeks at least, in a program that was euphemistically known as the "frequent flier program" - al-Rabiah finally broke down, inventing a story to please his captors, and dutifully repeating it in 2004 during his Combatant Status Review tribunal, a military review board designed to establish that he had been correctly designated as an "enemy combatant," who could continue to be held without charge or trial.

Although the authorities knew that the witnesses were unreliable, and interrogators and other personnel cast serious doubts on al-Rabiah's story, he was, nevertheless, put forward for a trial by military commission at Guantánamo in November 2008, based on the credible-sounding story he had parroted at his tribunal, and it was only when Judge Kollar-Kotelly was able to review his case that the whole sordid story emerged.

As she noted in her ruling, in one of several passages loaded with controlled disdain for the Bush administration (and for the Obama administration for pursuing the case):

Not only did al-Rabiah's interrogators repeatedly conclude that [his] confessions were not believable - which al-Rabiah's counsel attributes to abuse and coercion, some of which is supported by the record - but it is also undisputed that al-Rabiah confessed to information that his interrogators obtained from either alleged eyewitnesses who are not credible and as to whom the Government has now largely withdrawn any reliance, or from sources that never even existed ... If there exists a basis for al-Rabiah's indefinite detention, it most certainly has not been presented to this Court.

What makes this story even more shocking is that al-Rabiah's innocence was established in the summer of 2002, when a CIA analyst and an Arabic expert interviewed him as part of a fact-finding mission to Guantánamo, which revealed that a large number of the men held "had no connection to terrorism whatsoever." As Jane Mayer described his findings about al-Rabiah in her book, "The Dark Side":

One man was a rich Kuwaiti businessman who took a trip to a different part of the world every year to do charity work. In 2001, the country he chose was Afghanistan. "He wasn't a jihadi, but I told him he should have been arrested for stupidity," the CIA officer recalled. The man was furious with the United States for rounding him up. He mentioned that every year up until then, he had bought himself a new Cadillac, but when he was released, he said, he would never buy another American car. He was switching to Mercedes.

What followed was even more disturbing and demonstrates, succinctly, how the "enemy combatant" program developed by the Bush administration was fueled by the most damaging arrogance. As Mayer explained, when John Bellinger, the legal adviser to the National Security Council (NSC), and Gen. John Gordon, the NSC's senior terrorism expert, learned of the agent's report and tried to reveal the information to President Bush to ask him to urgently review the cases of the men held at Guantánamo, a meeting with Alberto Gonzales, who was then the White House counsel, was hijacked by David Addington, Vice President Dick Cheney's legal counsel, who dismissed their concerns by declaring, imperiously, "No, there will be no review. The President has determined that they are ALL enemy combatants. We are not going to revisit it!"

As Fouad al-Rabiah prepares to greet his family for the first time in over eight years, having spent the last 12 weeks detained at Guantánamo for no reason whatsoever (beyond the two weeks' notice demanded by Congress before any prisoner is released), David Cynamon, one of his attorneys, provided me by email with the following statement on behalf of the legal team that worked so hard to secure his release:

"We are pleased that the US Government has at long last complied with the court order to return Mr. al-Rabiah to Kuwait. The court's opinion in his case is proof that his release is long overdue. Mr. al-Rabiah is an innocent man. His complete innocence is clearly demonstrated in the trial court's decision, which the U.S. Government did not attempt to appeal. In fact, at the very outset of Mr. al- Rabiah's confinement, the United States' own expert intelligence analyst concluded Mr. al-Rabiah was an innocent man in the wrong place at the wrong time. Nonetheless, this innocent citizen of one of the United States' best allies was wrongfully imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay for almost eight years, during which he was tortured, abused, and coerced into making false confessions. We call upon President Obama to provide both a formal apology on behalf of the United States and appropriate compensation for Mr. al-Rabiah's ordeal. Mr. al- Rabiah can never reclaim the eight years he lost at Guantánamo Bay - and the United States must not simply turn and forget."

Source: Global Research.
Link: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=16506.