Brazil chooses Swedish fighter jet in $4.5B deal

December 18, 2013

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazil's government said Wednesday that Sweden's Saab won a long-delayed fighter jet contract initially worth $4.5 billion that will supply at least 36 planes to Latin America's biggest nation.

The decision to buy the Saab jet over Boeing's F-18 Super Hornet or France's Dassault Rafale came as a surprise to many. Some analysts said Boeing's bid was hurt by reports that the U.S. conducted extensive spying in Brazil, including a direct targeting of President Dilma Rousseff's own communications.

Brazil wants the jets to ramp up its defense capabilities to patrol a porous land border that's more than 9,300 miles (15,000 kilometers) long, much of it covered by jungle, over which arms and drugs easily flow. Brazil also seeks better protection for offshore oil fields it has discovered in recent years.

Defense Minister Celso Amorim said the choice after some 15 years of debate was made following "careful study and consideration, taking into account performance, transfer of technology and cost, not just of acquisition but of maintenance."

Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt went on Twitter to call the decision "a tribute to Swedish technology and competitiveness." Many had expected the choice to be between the Boeing and French planes. Former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva had favored the Dassault Rafale, while Rousseff was said to favor the F-18.

Revelations six months ago that the U.S. National Security Agency's mammoth espionage program included widespread spying on Brazil was likely a factor in Saab being chosen, some analysts said. Brazilian anger over the spying led Rousseff to cancel a planned state visit to Washington in October.

"Dilma had been favoring the Boeing plane and a lot of people thought she would announce her decision during her state visit to Washington," said David Fleischer, a political scientist at the University of Brasilia. "Boeing was very close, but then the NSA booted them out of the air."

Carl Meacham, director of the Americas program at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the NSA stories made it politically impossible for Rousseff to go with Boeing and the decision will be another blow to U.S-Brazilian relations that already "are at a significant low."

Alexandre Barros, a political risk consultant with the Brasilia-based firm Early Warning, disagreed the NSA was a big factor. The Swedish jet was favored by Brazil's air force, according to an internal assessment leaked to the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo in 2010, and Barros said it was always going to win the competition.

He said many in the government long opposed Boeing because the company's bid was less flexible in terms of technology transfers than the two European plane makers and also because they were wary of becoming indebted to Washington.

"The Americans tend to think that if you buy arms from them you are automatically their allies," Barros said. "Brazil doesn't want that kind of link." He said that as South America's main power, Brazil doesn't want to be in the position of being perceived as having to support American policies on the continent. Part of the draw of Saab's bid was that Sweden doesn't have any political clout in the region.

Brazil's military hopes the purchase decision after years of debate will lead to advances in its defense capabilities. The country had the largest defense industry in the developing world in the mid-1980s. It was the world's eighth-largest arms exporter with strong demand for its armored personnel carriers, reconnaissance and anti-aircraft vehicles, troop carriers and rocket launchers.

However, the industry went into a tailspin when the Cold War ended and demand for weapons declined. In 1990, Brazil's two largest arms manufacturers, Engesa and Avibras, sought protection from creditors for debts of about $200 million.

Associated Press writers Jenny Barchfield in Rio de Janeiro, Karl Ritter in Stockholm and Stan Lehman in Sao Paulo contributed to this report.

Rebels said to control some S. Sudan oil fields

December 20, 2013

JUBA, South Sudan (AP) — Armed rebels were said to be in control of some of South Sudan's oil fields Friday, raising questions of how long the country's oil will flow and whether Sudan could enter the conflict.

President Salva Kiir implored his country to turn away from ethnic violence and met Friday with foreign ministers from neighboring states, including Kenya and Ethiopia, who flew into Juba, the capital, to help calm tensions after a week of ethnic strife that is estimated to have killed hundreds.

Kiir did not speak publicly, but the government's Twitter feed attributed this quote to him: "Those who may want to take the law into their hands, the long arm of the government will get them." The United Nations expressed alarm at an attack by "approximately 2,000 armed elements" on a U.N. base in Jonglei state that killed two peacekeepers from India. A statement from the secretary-general's office said a number of civilians seeking refuge there Thursday were killed.

Fighting continued to spread on Friday in Jonglei and Unity state, an oil area, as armed groups opposed to the nation's military emerged, said a South Sudan expert communicating with combatants and U.N. officials in strife-torn regions outside the capital.

"We've seen the conflict expand quite rapidly and quite dramatically in recent days. We've seen the emergence of different armed groups under different commands, and we've seen the former vice president say he's not interested in talks that don't end in Salva Kiir stepping down," said Casie Copeland, South Sudan analyst for the International Crisis Group. She added that the arrival of regional foreign ministers in Juba "is genuinely a good thing."

Armed opposition groups appeared to be in control of some oil fields in Unity state, she said. South Sudan's oil fields have historically been a target for rebel movements. "The potential for oil wealth to exacerbate the current power struggle should not be underestimated," said Emma Vickers of Global Witness, a London-based group that investigates and campaigns to prevent natural resource related conflict. "If rebel forces were to capture the oil fields, they could effectively hold the government to ransom."

The United Nations said Friday that 35,000 people continue to seek refuge at U.N. bases in three locations across the country, including 20,000 at two bases in the capital. The U.S. Embassy had a fifth emergency evacuation flight on Friday to move Americans out of the country. British, German and Dutch planes were also scheduled to fly out. Hundreds of foreigners, including aid workers, have hurriedly left South Sudan this week at the urging of foreign embassies concerned about the possibility of out-of-control violence.

Forty-five U.S. troops were dispatched to Juba earlier this week to protect U.S. citizens and property. A top U.N. official in the country, Toby Lanzer, said Friday that "difficulties" continued in Jonglei state, including the province capital, Bor, where a top military commander loyal to Machar defected from the army this week, taking his troops with him.

South Sudan gets nearly 99 percent of its government budget from oil revenues. The country reportedly earned $1.3 billion in oil sales in just five months this year, Global Witness said. South Sudan, the world's newest country, peacefully broke away from Sudan in 2011 after decades of war and years of negotiations that former U.S. President George W. Bush invested heavily in. The south's oil flows north through Sudan's pipelines, and a rebel takeover of southern oil fields could invite Sudan into the conflict. .

Ethnic violence broke out among South Sudan's presidential guard late Sunday night, and fighting spread across the country over the next several days, leading to fears of a civil war between ethnic groups.

Kiir, an ethnic Dinka, earlier this week said an attempted coup had triggered the violence, and the blame was placed on fired Vice President Riek Machar, an ethnic Nuer. But officials have since said a fight between Dinka and Nuer members of the presidential guard triggered the violence. Machar's ouster from the country's No. 2 political position earlier this year had stoked ethnic tensions.

After meeting with Kiir, Ethiopia's Foreign Minister Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the ministers from a regional bloc known as IGAD were in the country to "understand the situation first hand." He called the meeting with Kiir productive but did not provide details.

The U.N.'s humanitarian arm said 14,000 people are seeking shelter in Bor, the capital of Jonglei state, the scene of heavy violence this week. Several hundred people are also seeking shelter in Bentiu, the capital of Unity state.

The U.N. sent four helicopters to Akobo, in Jonglei state, on Friday and said on Twitter that it "has received assurances from forces in charge" that the helicopters will be permitted to land. On Thursday armed youths breached the U.N. compound in Akobo, and two U.N. peacekeepers were killed. The U.N. mission also estimates that at least 11 of the civilians who sought refuge there were killed during the attack.

Straziuso reported from Nairobi, Kenya. Rodney Muhumuza contributed from Kampala, Uganda. Associated Press writer Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed.

Tribal war fears in South Sudan as rival army units clash

Dec. 19, 2013

JUBA, South Sudan, Dec. 19 (UPI) -- Fighting between rival army units has spread to towns around the capital South Sudan's capital, with reports of 500 dead since Sunday, underlining the fragility of the world's youngest state and fears the violence will ignite a potentially disastrous tribal conflict.

The fighting is primarily between followers of President Salva Kiir Mayardit and his longtime main political rival, Riek Machar, whom he sacked as vice president in July and who is now on the run.

Juba was reported largely calm Wednesday, with some streets in ruins, as fighting broke out at military bases in nearby towns such as Bor, north of the capital, and Torit to the east. Some reports said Machar's forces were in control there.

The violence that erupted Sunday at two military bases in Juba between two wings of the Presidential Guard, manned by rival tribes, highlighted how the new state, despite the triumph of the Christian and animist south in gaining independence from the Arab Muslim north in July 2011, has inherited a legacy of deep ethnic divisions that could lead to a new conflict.

Kiir claimed Monday the violence was triggered by an attempted coup by Machar's forces.

But diplomats and officials of relief agencies suggested it was more likely Kiir had mounted a pre-emptive strike against Machar, his most acerbic critic who had announced his plans to run for president in elections set for 2015.

Diplomats who knew Kiir during his days as a guerrilla commander fighting the military might of the Khartoum regime say since the southern region achieved statehood through a peace deal that ended Sudan's devastating 1983-2005 civil war, Kiir has become "increasingly authoritarian."

Machar, a popular hero of the Sudanese people's Liberation Army headed by Kiir, has accused him of becoming a dictator as the fledgling southern state, one of the world's most impoverished countries despite its oil production, struggles to establish itself.

But underlying their enmity is the deep division between the south's two main ethnic tribal groupings, the Dinka, the largest, to which Kiir belongs, and the Nuer from which Machar comes.

Analysts say although events have focused on the dispute with Sudan to the north concerning the oilfields that lie mainly along the border and on the struggle to build state institutions, the central issue is the unresolved grievances between South Sudan's two main communities.

This is exemplified in the decades-old rivalry between Kiir and Machar within the SPLA and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement that's now the ruling party.

Kiir's peremptory dismissal of Machar as his vice president in July, along with his entire Cabinet, indicates suggestions Kiir has dictatorial leanings, if not ambitions, and that it was he, not Machar, who made the first military move Sunday, may have some validity.

"The fact that the fighting began because of paranoia and ethnic divisions in the Presidential Guard is a further sign of the deteriorating situation in the country where some of the smaller communities resent what they see as Dinka domination, or a 'Dinkocracy,'" analyst Daniel Howden said.

"The Presidential Guard, which until recently was hailed as a big step in integration, has come apart at the seams. Were similar grievances to come violently to the surface in the rest of the country, then mayhem would follow."

Analysts say that would plunge the landlocked south into an economic black hole. Although it sits on most of the region's oil, its only export route is through pipelines across Sudan.

Renewed conflict will block long-awaited exploration and could spill over into neighboring states like Kenya and Ethiopia, which are on the cusp of major energy booms.

The storm will likely engulf the north, which also has severe economic problems, including a growing budget deficit that has swollen since the south broke away in 2009, slashing Khartoum's revenues.

Sudan, largely desert, is heavily dependent on food imports, and spends about $800 million a month bringing in foodstuffs.

Eighty percent of its wheat is imported and prices have soared amid a sharp currency devaluation since separation.

In September, security forces killed about 200 people protesting fuel subsidy cuts. Unrest and political pressure on Khartoum is mounting.

Major dam-building on the Nile River in Ethiopia, where the mighty river rises, is likely to reduce the water supply and aggravate these tensions.

Source: United Press International (UPI).
Link: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/Special/2013/12/19/Tribal-war-fears-in-South-Sudan-as-rival-army-units-clash/UPI-34931387458523/.

India: 3 UN peacekeepers dead in South Sudan

December 20, 2013

JUBA, South Sudan (AP) — Less than three years after its creation, the world's newest country is beginning to fracture along ethnic lines in violence that has killed hundreds of people, including three U.N. peacekeepers. What could come next, some warn, is ethnic cleansing.

South Sudan's numerous ethnic groups have battled each other for decades, but for years their animosity was united in hatred of the government in Khartoum, Sudan, the country's former capital. When the south gained independence in 2011, the groups' common enemy receded, exposing the fault lines — this week, even among the presidential guard.

On Thursday, armed youths breached a U.N. compound in Jonglei state, causing an unknown number of casualties. "Unfortunately, just this very morning such militia groups have targeted and killed three soldiers from India in South Sudan," India's U.N. Ambassador Asoke Mukerji told a U.N. meeting on peacekeeping Thursday evening.

It was the first announcement of U.N. personnel killed in this week's upsurge of violence. Pakistan's U.N. Ambassador Masood Khan asked for a minute of silence, and diplomats rose to pay tribute to the fallen soldiers.

The Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting for 10 a.m. Friday. In the capital, Juba, emergency evacuation flights took away American and British citizens, aid workers and United Nations personnel to escape the violence.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon again urged political dialogue. "The future of this young nation requires its current leadership to do everything possible to prevent South Sudan descending into the chaos that would be such a betrayal of the ideals behind its long struggle for independence," a statement from his office said late Thursday.

South Sudan's government declared that its security forces "are in absolute control of the situation," but admitted later Thursday that the central government had lost control of Bor, the capital of the country's largest and most populous state, where barrages of gunfire were reported.

"The situation in South Sudan can be best described as tense and fragile. If it is not contained, it could lead to ethnic cleansing," said Choul Laam, a top official with the ruling Sudan People's Liberation Movement, who spoke in Nairobi, Kenya.

Violence broke out late Sunday when the presidential guard splintered along ethnic lines. Guards from the president's majority Dinka tribe tried to disarm guards from the Nuer ethnic group, said Laam. Violence in Juba spiraled from there, and then extended out into the country.

"The awful accounts of killings in Juba may only be the tip of the iceberg," said Daniel Bekele of Human Rights Watch. "Government officials — whatever their politics — need to take urgent steps to prevent further abuses against civilians and quickly deescalate rising ethnic tensions."

President Salva Kiir earlier said an attempted coup had triggered the violence, and the blame was placed on ousted Vice President Riek Machar, an ethnic Nuer. Machar disputed Kiir's allegations that he had attempted a coup, but said he wants Kiir out of power.

"We want him to leave. We want him to leave. That's it," Machar told Radio France Internationale. "He can't unite the people and he kills them like flies." Machar, an influential politician who is a hero of the brutal war of independence against Sudan, is Kiir's rival for top leadership of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement party. Tensions had been mounting since Kiir fired Machar as his deputy in July. Machar later said he would contest the presidency in 2015.

Regardless of the cause, the South Sudan government said the violence has already killed up to 500 people. Armed ethnic Nuer youths breached a U.N. compound in the tiny Jonglei village of Akobo, near the Ethiopian border, to reach civilians believed to be Dinkas seeking shelter there, said U.N. spokesman Farhan Haq in New York. "We fear there may have been some fatalities but can't confirm who and how many at this stage," Haq said.

At the time, 43 Indian peacekeepers, six U.N. police advisers and two U.N. civilian employees were present at the base, as were about 30 South Sudanese who had sought shelter, according to the U.N. mission in South Sudan. The mission said it would dispatch aircraft early Friday to evacuate U.N. personnel who remain at the base.

South Sudan's capital was mostly peaceful Thursday, and the government tried to assure the U.N. and foreign embassies "that civil tranquility has been fully restored." U.S. President Barack Obama said in a letter to Congress that 45 military personnel were dispatched to South Sudan on Wednesday to protect U.S. citizens and property.

Countries such as the U.S., Britain, Italy and Germany continued to evacuate residents. A plane with a mechanical malfunction blocked the runway during the day, jamming up inbound and outbound flights.

The U.S. evacuation plane — the fourth group of Americans flown out in two days — was eventually able to take off heading for Kenya. "Runway clear. Wheels up," the embassy said on Twitter. Two military flights and a charter took off on Wednesday. Britain's evacuation plane landed in Uganda late Thursday.

The government said it lost control of Bor, the capital of Jonglei state, to forces loyal to Machar. Gunfire was reported early and late in the day, and the U.N. used four helicopters to transport 75 people — a mix of aid workers and U.N. staff — to Juba, said Challiss McDonough, a spokeswoman for the U.N.'s World Food Program.

"We lost control of Bor to the rebellion," said Philip Aguer, the South Sudanese military spokesman. Aguer said renegade officers wrested control of the town from loyalist forces. At least 19 civilians had been killed in Bor, said Martin Nesirky, a spokesman for the U.N. secretary-general's office, citing figures from the South Sudan Red Cross.

In oil-rich Unity state, fighting broke out in oil fields on Wednesday and Thursday, said Mabek Lang De Mading, the state's deputy governor. He said five people died Wednesday and 11 on Thursday. Foreign ministers from neighboring countries Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda and Djibouti traveled to South Sudan to try and diffuse the crisis.

Human Rights Watch said Thursday that South Sudanese soldiers fired indiscriminately in highly populated areas of Juba earlier in the week and targeted people for their ethnicity. Citing witnesses and victims, the group reported that "soldiers specifically targeted people from the Nuer ethnic group." In some cases, the group added, the Dinka may have been targeted by Nuer soldiers.

An estimated 20,000 people have sought refuge at two U.N. compounds in Juba and another 14,000 in Bor. U.N. officials warned of a humanitarian crisis. Deputy secretary-general Jan Eliasson said in New York on Thursday that the U.N. will do its best to protect those who have sought refuge. "Clearly, civilians are in danger," said Eliasson.

Associated Press reporters Tom Odula in Nairobi, Kenya; Rodney Muhumuza in Kampala, Uganda; Cassandra Vinograd in London; Cara Anna and Edith M. Lederer in New York and Elaine Ganley in Paris contributed to this report. Straziuso reported from Nairobi.

UN: Hundreds estimated killed in South Sudan

December 18, 2013

JUBA, South Sudan (AP) — Fighting in South Sudan has killed up to 500 people, U.N. diplomats said Tuesday, and the United Nations fears the violence in the oil-rich East African country is "largely along ethnic lines."

The United States ordered its citizens to leave South Sudan immediately. The president of South Sudan, which is also the world's newest country, has blamed the violence on a coup attempt Sunday by soldiers loyal to his former deputy, who belongs to a different ethnic group.

As many as 20,000 people have taken refuge with the U.N. mission in the capital, Juba, the president of the Security Council, French Ambassador Gerard Araud, told reporters. Araud said the council received only "patchy information" in a special briefing Tuesday evening by the U.N. peacekeeping chief, with the cause of the violence yet unknown.

"We are extremely concerned," Araud said. "There is a heavy toll, that's obvious," he added. U.N. diplomats said they were told that local sources in Juba put the death toll at 400 to 500 and estimated the number of injured at around 800, but these figures could not be verified.

Araud said that for the moment, civilians are not being targeted, and he described the violence as "infighting between soldiers." Sporadic but heavy gunfire has been heard across Juba since Sunday as factions of the armed forces repeatedly clashed.

The office of U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon issued a statement saying the secretary-general is "deeply concerned" about "the risk of targeted violence against certain communities." He urged everyone to immediately cease their hostilities.

The Security Council also expressed its concern and called "for the government of South Sudan to engage in dialogue with its opponents and to resolve differences peacefully in order to prevent any spread of the current violence."

The U.S. Embassy said in an advisory that Americans who choose to stay in South Sudan "should review their personal security situation and seriously reconsider their plans." The embassy suspended its normal operations.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, speaking to reporters in Manila, the Philippines, urged all parties in South Sudan to "refrain from any action that can further escalate the tensions." "Political differences need to be resolved by peaceful and democratic means. The government should respect the rule of law and the people of South Sudan should be able to realize their full potential," Kerry said.

South Sudan President Salva Kiir told the nation on Monday that a group of soldiers loyal to former Vice President Riek Machar, whom he fired in July amid a power struggle, tried to take power by force but were defeated. Kiir then ordered a dusk-to-dawn curfew in the capital.

The alleged coup attempt took place Sunday when some soldiers raided the main army barracks' weapons store in Juba but were repelled by loyalists, sparking gunfights across the city, Foreign Minister Barnaba Marial Benjamin told The Associated Press.

Some officials had previously estimated the casualties could be in the hundreds. There are "disturbing reports of ethnically-targeted killings," with most of the fighting pitting soldiers from Kiir's majority Dinka tribe against those from Machar's Nuer tribe, said Casie Copeland, the South Sudan analyst for the International Crisis Group.

"The fighting has been fierce and parts of Juba have been reduced to rubble," she said. The South Sudanese military has arrested five political leaders with suspected links to the coup attempt, and many more are still being sought, Benjamin said. The government later said in a statement that 10 people have been arrested in connection with the alleged coup plot, and five remain at large, including Machar.

The U.S. Embassy in Juba and the U.N. Mission in South Sudan have denied they are harboring Machar, Benjamin added. The hunt for Machar, an influential politician who is one of the heroes of a brutal war for independence waged against Sudan, threatens to send the country into further political upheaval.

Machar, the deputy leader of the ruling party, said he would contest the presidency in 2015. He has openly criticized Kiir, saying if South Sudan is to be united it cannot tolerate "one man's rule or it cannot tolerate dictatorship."

The international community has repeatedly urged South Sudan's leaders to exercise restraint amid fears the violence could spark wider ethnic violence. The U.N. chief told Kiir in a telephone call Tuesday that he expected him "to exercise real leadership at this critical moment, and to instill discipline in the ranks of the (Sudanese military) to stop this fighting among them," according to U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky.

South Sudan has been plagued by ethnic tension since it broke away from Sudan in 2011. In the rural Jonglei state, where the government is trying to put down a rebellion, the military itself faces charges of widespread abuses against the Murle ethnic group.

Muhumuza reported from Kampala, Uganda. AP writers Cara Anna and Edith M. Lederer at the U.N. contributed to this report.

South Sudan on edge as army hunts coup plotters

December 17, 2013

KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — Sporadic gunfire continued to ring out in South Sudan's capital, Juba, as the military "cleared out remnants" of a faction of soldiers accused of mounting a coup attempt, the foreign minister said Tuesday amid growing tension over the likely fate of the former deputy president who is accused of leading the failed plot.

Barnaba Marial Benjamin told The Associated Press that the military had arrested five political leaders with suspected links to the coup attempt and that many more were yet to be traced. Chief among the wanted is former Vice President Riek Machar, he said, who is now believed to be in hiding after he was identified by President Salva Kiir as the political leader favored by a faction of soldiers who tried to seize power earlier this week.

"They are still looking for more ... who are suspected of being behind the coup," Benjamin said, referring to the military. Machar, he said, "is wanted by the government." The United States Embassy in Juba and the United Nations Mission in South Sudan denied they are harboring Machar, he said.

The hunt for Machar, an influential politician who is one of the heroes of a brutal war of independence waged against Sudan, threatens to send the world's youngest country into further political upheaval following months of a power struggle between Kiir and his former deputy. The international community continued to urge South Sudan's leaders to exercise restraint amid fears the military's actions in the aftermath of the attempted coup could spark wider ethnic violence.

Hilde Johnson, special representative of the United Nations Secretary-General for South Sudan, warned against "hate speech" that could spark violence against certain ethnic groups. "At a time when unity among South Sudanese is more needed than ever, I call on the leaders of this new country and all political factions and parties, as well as community leaders to refrain from any action that fuels ethnic tensions and exacerbates violence," the statement said.

Kiir fired Machar as his deputy in July, sparking fears of political upheaval. Machar, the deputy leader of the ruling Sudan People's Liberation Movement, has said he will contest the presidency in 2015. He has openly criticized Kiir, saying that if the country is to be united it cannot tolerate a "one man's rule or it cannot tolerate dictatorship." At the time of Machar's ouster, part of a wider dismissal of the entire Cabinet by Kiir, the U.S. and the European Union urged calm amid fears the dismissals could destabilize the country.

Kiir addressed the nation Monday in combat fatigues and vowed the plotters would face justice and announced a dusk-to dawn curfew in the capital city. It remains unclear how many people —civilians or soldiers — have been killed or wounded in the latest violence, in which mortar and heavy machinegun fire has been heard.

Emma Jane Drew, South Sudan director for the aid group Oxfam, said she "strongly condemns the use of violent force against civilians, particularly women and children," urging all armed groups to respect human rights.

The latest violence has forced up to 13,000 people to seek shelter inside or in the immediate outskirts of two U.N. facilities in Juba, Toby Lanzer, the U.N.'s humanitarian coordinator in South Sudan, said in Twitter post Tuesday.

South Sudan's government has given little details about how the coup was planned, saying an investigation is under way. But Benjamin said Monday that a group of renegade soldiers attempted to steal weapons from an army barracks in Juba but were then repulsed, sparking gunfights Sunday night and early Monday. Benjamin described the alleged coup plotters as "disgruntled."

The local Sudan Tribune newspaper reported on its website that military clashes erupted late Sunday between members of the presidential guard in fighting that seemed to pit soldiers from Kiir's majority Dinka tribe against those from the Nuer tribe of Machar.

United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon said in a statement that he was "deeply concerned about reports of fighting between members of the (Sudanese military) in Juba and about the risk of targeted violence against certain communities." He urged the country's military leaders to "impose discipline on their forces and to exercise maximum restraint in the use of force."

The oil-rich East African nation has been plagued by ethnic tension since it broke away from Sudan in 2011. In the rural Jonglei state, where the government is trying to put down a rebellion by a former colonel in the country's armed forces, the military itself faces charges of widespread abuses against the Murle ethnic group of rebel leader David Yau Yau. Thousands have been displaced from their homes, many seeking refuge across the border.

South Sudan president says coup has been repulsed

By CHARLTON DOKI and RODNEY MUHUMUZA
16th of December 2013, Monday

JUBA, South Sudan (AP) — South Sudan's president on Monday ordered a dusk-to-dawn curfew in the capital after soldiers loyal to the former deputy attempted to seize power by force, leading to clashes between military factions that highlight the growing instability of the world's youngest nation.

Flanked by government officials, President Salva Kiir —who put on fatigues with an army general's epaulets inside of his usual gentleman's suit — said Monday in a televised address to the nation that the military had foiled a coup orchestrated by "a group of soldiers allied with the former vice president." The soldiers had attacked the South Sudanese military headquarters near Juba University late Sunday, sparking sporadic bursts of gunfire that continued Monday, he said.

"The attackers went and (the) armed forces are pursuing them," Kiir said Monday. "I promise you today that justice will prevail."

The government is now "in full control of the military situation" in Juba, he said, insisting his government could only be removed though elections.

Details of the attempted coup remained sketchy, but South Sudanese Foreign Minister Barnaba Marial Benjamin told The Associated Press Monday that troops within the main army base in Juba raided the weapons store but were repulsed. Some politicians had since been arrested, he said, but could not confirm if former Vice President Riek Machar —the alleged coup leader— was among those in detention. Benjamin said the coup was plotted by "disgruntled" soldiers and politicians led by Machar, who fell out with Kiir before being fired earlier this year as the country's deputy president.

An Associated Press reporter saw heavily armed soldiers and police patrolling the streets of Juba, but gunfire could no longer be heard later on Monday. The streets were largely empty of civilians. EgyptAir reported that it had cancelled its flight to Juba on Monday, saying the airport there was closed.

The United Nations Mission in South Sudan on Monday reported the sound of mortar and heavy machine-gun fire, saying hundreds of civilians had sought refuge inside U.N. facilities.

"We hope the security situation in Juba will quickly normalize to enable the civilians to return very soon to their residential areas," the mission said in a statement. There were no "key political or military figures" among those given shelter inside U.N. facilities, it said.

Tension had been mounting in South Sudan since Kiir fired Machar as his deputy in July, sparking concerns about possible tribal clashes. Machar, who has expressed a willingness to contest the presidency in 2015, said after he was fired that if the country is to be united it cannot tolerate a "one man's rule or it cannot tolerate dictatorship." His ouster, part of a wider dismissal of the entire Cabinet by Kiir, had followed reports of a power struggle within the ruling party. At the time, the United States and the European Union urged calm amid fears the dismissals could spark political upheaval in the country.

While Kiir is leader of the ruling Sudan People's Liberation Movement party, many of the dismissed ministers, including Machar, were key figures in the rebel movement that fought a decades-long war against Sudan that led to South Sudan's independence in 2011. Machar, a deputy chairman of the ruling party, is one of the country's most influential politicians.

The local Sudan Tribune newspaper reported on its website that military clashes erupted late Sunday between members of the presidential guard in fighting that seemed to pit soldiers from Kiir's Dinka tribe against those from the Nuer tribe of Machar.

In a message to American citizens Monday, the U.S. Embassy in Juba said it had received "reports from multiple reliable sources of ongoing security incidents and sporadic gunfire in multiple locations" across Juba.

"The U.S. Embassy has not been able to confirm that gunfire and insecurity have fully ceased," the message said. "The embassy recommends that all U.S. citizens exercise extra caution at all times. The U.S. Embassy will continue to closely monitor the security environment in South Sudan, with particular attention to Juba city and its immediate surroundings, and will advise U.S. citizens further if the security situation changes."

Hilde Johnson, special representative of the United Nations secretary-general for South Sudan, said in a statement that the U.N. mission in Juba was "deeply concerned" over the fighting that broke out late Sunday and which continued Monday.

"As the Special Representative of the Secretary General I urge all parties in the fighting to cease hostilities immediately and exercise restraint," the statement sad. "I have been in touch regularly with the key leaders, including at the highest levels to call for calm."

South Sudan has experienced bouts of ethnic violence, especially in rural Jonglei state, since the country peacefully broke away from Sudan after a brutal civil war.

___

Muhumuza contributed from Kampala, Uganda. Associated Press reporters Tom Odula in Nairobi, Kenya, and Maamoun Youssef in Cairo contributed to this report.

Mandela buried in rolling hills of South Africa

December 15, 2013

QUNU, South Africa (AP) — His flag-draped casket resting on a carpet of animal skins, Nelson Mandela was laid to rest Sunday in the green, rolling hills of the eastern hamlet where he began his extraordinary journey — one that led him from prison to the presidency, a global symbol of endurance and reconciliation in the fight against South Africa's racist rule.

Artillery boomed and military aircraft roared through a cloud-studded sky, as the simple and the celebrated gathered to pay their final respects in Mandela's native village of Qunu at a state funeral that blended ancient tribal rituals with a display of the might of the new, integrated South Africa.

"Yours was truly a long walk to freedom and now you have achieved the ultimate freedom in the bosom of your maker," Brig. Gen. Monwabisi Jamangile, chaplain-general of the South African military, said as Mandela's casket was lowered into the ground at the family gravesite. "Rest in peace."

"I realized that the old man is no more, no more with us," said Bayanda Nyengule, head of a local museum about Mandela, his voice cracking as he described the burial attended by several hundred mourners after a larger funeral ceremony during which some 4,500 people, including heads of state, royalty and celebrities, paid their last respects.

The burial ended a 10-day mourning period that began with Mandela's death on Dec. 5 at 95, and included a Johannesburg memorial attended by nearly 100 world leaders and three days during which tens of thousands of South Africans of all races and backgrounds filed past Mandela's casket in the capital, Pretoria.

For South Africans, it was also a time for reflection about the racial integration they achieved when Mandela presided over the end of apartheid, and the economic inequality and other challenges that have yet to be overcome and seem certain to test his legacy's endurance.

The burial site marked a return to Mandela's humble roots, but the funeral trappings were elaborate. South African honor guards from the army, navy and air force, including both black and white officers, marched in formation along a winding dirt road.

In contrast to the military pomp, some speakers evoked the traditions of the Xhosa tribe, to which Mandela's Thembu clan belongs. "A great tree has fallen, he is now going home to rest with his forefathers," said Chief Ngangomhlaba Matanzima, a representative of Mandela's family who wore an animal skin. "We thank them for lending us such an icon."

Another speaker, Zolani Mkiva, served for many years as Mandela's praise singer, a traditional role in which he shouted out the leader's attributes to audiences, prefacing Mandela's many stations in life with the words "very important:" person, prince, patriot, politician, prisoner, philosopher, president, pensioner, patient, papa.

"The bones of our ancestors are vibrating. The waves of African oceans are reverberating," Mkiva said. In keeping with Xhosa traditions, Mandela's casket was brought to Qunu Saturday draped in a lion skin, an honor bestowed on those of a high rank like Mandela, who is the son of a traditional clan chief. His body lay for the night in his family home before burial, a time when tradition dictates that family elders "talk" to the body to explain to his spirit what is happening.

South African television showed Mandela's casket at the family gravesite, but the broadcast was stopped just before the coffin was lowered into the ground at the request of the Mandela family, which often talked of how it had to share its patriarch with the nation and the world.

His body was buried around noon, "when the sun is at its highest and the shadow at its shortest," said Cyril Ramaphosa, deputy leader of the country's ruling party, the African National Congress. Mandela spent 27 years as a prisoner of apartheid, then emerged to lead a delicate transition to democracy when many South Africans feared the country would sink into all-out racial conflict. He became president in the first all-race elections in 1994 and served one five-year term.

At the funeral ceremony, Mandela's portrait looked over the assembly from behind a bank of 95 candles representing each year of his life. His casket, transported to the tent on a gun carriage and draped in the national flag, rested on a carpet of cow skins.

Mandela's widow, Graca Machel, and his ex-wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, were dressed in black Xhosa head wraps and dresses. Guests included veterans of the military wing of the ANC, as well as U.S. Ambassador Patrick Gaspard and other foreign envoys.

Britain's Prince Charles, Monaco's Prince Albert II, Oprah Winfrey, billionaire businessman Richard Branson and former Zimbabwean Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai also were there. At one spot overlooking Mandela's compound, several hundred people gathered to watch the televised ceremony. A group of Zulu traditional dancers with spears and shields gathered nearby to pay their last respects to Mandela.

"He's a first class guy in the world," dancer Musa Ngunbane said. Ahmed Kathrada, an anti-apartheid activist who was jailed on Robben Island with Mandela, remembered his old friend's "abundant reserves" of love, patience and tolerance. He said it was painful when he saw Mandela for the last time, months ago in his hospital bed.

"He tightly held my hand, it was profoundly heartbreaking," Kathrada said, his voice breaking at times. "How I wish I never had to confront what I saw. I first met him 67 years ago and I recall the tall, healthy strong man, the boxer, the prisoner who easily wielded the pick and shovel when we couldn't do so."

Recalling her grandfather's simple roots, Nandi Mandela said he went barefoot to school as a boy in Qunu, where he herded cattle before eventually became president and a figure of global renown. "It is to each of us to achieve anything you want in life," she said.

In the Xhosa language, she referred to her grandfather by his clan name: "Go well, Madiba. Go well to the land of our ancestors, you have run your race."

Associated Press writers Gregory Katz and Alan Clendenning in Johannesburg contributed to this report.

Mandela makes final journey home in SAfrica

December 15, 2013

QUNU, South Africa (AP) — Nelson Mandela came home Saturday.

A hearse carrying Mandela's body drove into his hometown in rural South Africa ahead of burial Sunday, returning the country's peacemaker to the place where he had always wanted to die. It was here in Qunu that Mandela roamed the hills and tended livestock as a youth, absorbing lessons about discipline and consensus from traditional chiefs. From here he embarked on a journey — the "long walk to freedom" as he put it — that thrust him to the forefront of black South Africans' struggle for equal rights that resonated around the world.

As motorcyclists in uniform and armored personnel carriers escorted the vehicle carrying Mandela's casket to the family compound, people lining the route sang, applauded and, in some cases, wept. "When I saw the hearse passing, I couldn't hold my excitement. I felt like I was holding him by the hand," said Norma Khobo. "It was very exciting, I saw him!"

The vehicle carrying Mandela's casket, covered with a national flag, arrived at the family compound under cloudy skies at 4 p.m. It was accompanied by an enormous convoy of police, military and other vehicles, and a military helicopter hovered overhead.

According to Xhosa tribal tradition, Mandela was honored as a leader by placing a skin on the coffin, replacing the flag. Mandela's journey started Saturday with pomp and ceremony at an air base in the capital before being flown aboard a military plane to this simple village in the wide-open spaces of eastern South Africa.

At the Mthatha airport Mandela's casket was welcomed by a military guard and placed in a convoy for the 32 kilometer (20 mile) voyage toward Qunu. Residents and people who had traveled for hours thronged a road leading to Qunu, singing and dancing as Mandela T-shirts were handed out.

"We got up this morning at 2 a.m. and drove from Port Elizabeth — it's about seven hours — and we got here now. We're waiting on to show our last respects to Madiba," said Ebrahim Jeftha, using Mandela's clan name.

Mandela's widow, Graca Machel, and his former wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, tearfully embraced at Mthatha airport when the casket arrived. Mandela had been imprisoned for 27 years for opposing racist apartheid and emerged in 1990 to forge a new democratic South Africa by promoting forgiveness and reconciliation. He became president in 1994 after South Africa's first all-race democratic elections.

The late president died in his Johannesburg home Dec. 5 at age 95. His body lay in state for three days this week, drawing huge crowds of South Africans who mourned his death and celebrated his successful struggle against apartheid.

When Mandela's body arrived at Mthatha airport soldiers in full dress regalia, male and female, were stationed on foot on either side of the road as cows grazed nearby. Local residents lined the route, shielding themselves from the sun with umbrellas.

Mandela had longed to spend his final months in his beloved rural village but instead he had spent them in a hospital in Pretoria and then in his home in Johannesburg where he had remained in critical condition, suffering from lung problems and other ailments, until his death.

A problem that threatened to mar the funeral appeared to be resolved late Saturday night when Archbishop Desmond Tutu's spokesman said the Nobel prize-winning cleric would attend Sunday's funeral in Mandela's home village of Qunu. Earlier Tutu said that he would not attend because he had not been invited or accredited as a clergyman. Spokesman Roger Friedman did not say what brought about the change in Tutu's plans.

Earlier, Mac Maharaj, a spokesman for the presidency, said Tutu was on the guest list. "He's an important person and I hope ways can be found for him to be there," Maharaj said. In Qunu, residents expressed deep affection for Mandela, their beloved native son.

"Long live the spirit of Nelson Mandela," chanted a crowd on a highway near Mandela's compound. "My president," they sang. There were also old songs of the anti-apartheid struggle. "Release Mandela from prison," went the chorus of one.

Many people carried small national flags or banners with a smiling image of Mandela. Periodically, police and other official vehicles passed by, heading to the compound. Khanyisa Qatolo, 28, was born in Qunu and attended children's Christmas parties hosted by Mandela at his home when she was a child in the 1990s.

"I remember his smile," she said. "I miss his smile." Qatolo said she was disappointed that local residents would be unable to go to Mandela's funeral, in line with local custom, and had instead been asked by officials to view the final rites on big video screens in the area.

"The people of the community, they should be there, supporting the family," she said. "I feel bad not to go there." Milly Viljoen, 43, drove 12 hours through the night with a friend to stand on the roadside overlooking Mandela's compound in Qunu.

"'It's befitting to see him to his final resting place," she said. Viljoen, a student activist during apartheid, first saw Mandela when he appeared before an enthralled crowd in Cape Town after he was released in 1990. She met him later when he visited the township school where she was teaching. She said: "You couldn't help but love the man and be touched and hang onto his every word."

Gregory Katz in Johannesburg contributed to this report.

C. Africa violence fans flames of sectarian hatred

December 20, 2013

BANGUI, Central African Republic (AP) — After days of relative calm, sectarian violence once more exploded Friday in Central African Republic claiming at least 30 lives.

Despite international efforts to contain the crisis, the cleavages in the impoverished country remain wide, threatening to tear it apart. A mob of young men wearing crucifixes attacked a mosque Friday, pounding holes into its cinderblock walls and methodically stripping apart the corrugated iron roof and tossing the pieces on the ground.

"We don't want mosques in our country," shouted Clavert Bettare, a machete strapped to his back over the din of the destruction. "We don't need them (Muslims)," because he said they make up what he thinks is a small percentage of the population.

The sweet smell of marijuana permeated the scene as young men pulled on joints and cheered on the dismantling of the mosque and ripped up the Arab language books and pamphlets they found inside. The night before, this neighborhood of Gobango had witnessed clashes between rival Muslim and Christian militias that spiraled into a firefight when Chadian troops from the African Union peacekeeping force rolled up and began shooting at the civilians, residents said.

A government statement Friday said the Chadian troops responded after being attacked by a grenade hurled by Christian militias, whom they accused of kidnapping people and terrorizing the population. In Gobango, however, residents' anger at the Chadians, whom they see as allied to the Muslim president, Michel Djotodia, had spilled over into rage against all Muslims.

"Theirs is a culture of hate. We aren't like that. All the mosques must go," Bettare said as the crowd of angry young men and women shouted in agreement. Muslims make up about 15 percent of Central African Republic's population and have largely lived in harmony with the country's Christian majority. The takeover by mainly Muslim rebels this spring, however, has inflamed sectarian tensions, sparking attacks by Christian militias against Muslim neighborhoods, while the president's forces are accused of revenge attacks.

Fears of mass atrocities and possibly genocide has spurred an international response spearheaded by 1,600 French troops backed by African forces from Chad, Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Burundi and Gabon. The U.S. has pledged $100 million to help equip and train these forces.

U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Samantha Power, a reputed scholar on genocide, visited Central African Republic on Thursday and prophetically warned the president that only by holding those accountable for atrocities could the cycle of revenge attacks be halted.

"Absent particular individuals being held accountable for the crimes being committed, there is a real risk that whole groups will be held responsible," she told reporters prior to her departure. "People will start to resent all members of a religious community."

On Friday, at least 40 injured crammed the Bangui community hospital, many from a daybreak attack on a Muslim neighborhood by anti-government Christian militias. At least three people died from their wounds.

Red Cross estimates that the toll since the fighting started Thursday evening was more than 30 dead, bringing the number killed since the Dec. 5 uprising by Christian militias and former regime soldiers to 583.

Angry Muslims from the neighborhood, known as Kilometer 5, later attacked a car full of French journalists after the violence, blaming France for only disarming Muslim militias. Just days before in a meeting with a local imam near the mosque, residents castigated him for adopting a reconciliatory attitude toward Christians when their community was under attack.

"There has been discrimination against Muslims for the last 50 years, and for the last 50 years we've had a Christian president and then for the first time we have a Muslim president it is a problem," businessmen Mahamet Abdel Rahim said.

Next to him, Ahmed Namarwa, a student, maintained that Muslims have always been a part of Central African Republic society, but feared that there was an attempt to wipe them out. "They came here to exterminate the Muslims," he said, describing how his sister and her husband were killed by Christian militias. "Reconciliation could happen, but a lot of work has to be done to bring together Muslims and Christians."

The international community is hoping that the African and French troops can stop the violence, disarm the warring groups and buy time for the two sides to come together and work out their differences peacefully. The U.S., for its part, pledged $7 million to aid the process of reconciliation.

For several days, it had appeared calm had returned to the city with people thronging to marketplaces, and shops and gas stations reopening, but with the renewed shootings Friday, the capital, Bangui, again seemed largely deserted as people stayed home or fled into the hills.

The conflict has shattered the already poor country, sending 700,000 people, almost 20 percent of the population fleeing their homes. According to Adrian Edwards of the U.N. refugee agency, 210,000 people in the capital alone have been displaced — mostly Christians fearing revenge attacks by government forces.

Djotodia has pledged to hold elections by the end of 2014 and then step down, but for many people, stability and reconciliation can only happen with his immediate resignation. A few hundred young men and women danced through the city in the morning, chanting for him to step down and take the Chadian peacekeepers with them, whom they describe as his allies. Some called for the return of Francois Bozize, the deposed president.

The demonstration scattered, however, when several sand-colored Chadian military vehicles drove by, underscoring the fear many feel for these troops. "It's complicated today," a French soldier said at a checkpoint in the city not far from where the mosque was destroyed.

Philippines, leftist rebels to observe Christmas truce

Manila (AFP)
Dec 18, 2013

The Philippine military and one of Asia's last communist guerrilla groups said Wednesday they are to call an informal truce over Christmas, bringing some peace to a nation reeling from disasters.

The Communist Party of the Philippines said its New People's Army guerrillas would observe a 48-hour unilateral ceasefire in the mainly Catholic Asian nation from December 24, and another 48-hour truce from New Year's Eve.

The Philippine military chief, General Emmanuel Bautista, said the government would observe its own "suspension of offensive military operations" against the Maoist rebels over the Christmas period, as it had done in previous years.

"We deserve a break during Christmas. This is a very significant, very important holiday for our people especially now after these major disasters," Bautista told reporters. He did not give specific dates for the effective truce.

Super Typhoon Haiyan left nearly 8,000 people dead or missing when it struck the Philippines' central islands on November 8, inflicting $12.9 billion worth of damage and leaving 4.4 million people homeless, the government said Wednesday.

The economic planning ministry said the government would need $8.17 billion over four years to help the survivors get back on their feet, rebuild hundreds of communities and make both more resilient to future disasters.

The typhoon struck less than four weeks after a 7.1-magnitude earthquake hit the central islands of Bohol and Leyte, killing more than 220 people.

The guerrillas announced their unilateral holiday truce in a statement sent to AFP.

"This ceasefire declaration is being issued in solidarity with the Filipino people's traditional observance of Christmas and New Year's holidays," its central committee said.

It added the communist New People's Army forces in the typhoon-devastated islands of Samar and Leyte would not attack government forces until mid-January so both groups could help people displaced by Haiyan.

President Benigno Aquino had been aiming to end the rebellion before his six-year term expires in 2016, but the government said in April that peace talks had collapsed.

"It doesn't matter that peace prospects are dim. This is for the Filipino people," General Bautista said.

The Maoist insurgency has claimed 30,000 lives since 1969 according to government estimates, though its armed force is down to about 4,000 guerrillas from more than 26,000 in the late 1980s.

Source: Space War.
Link: http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Philippines_leftist_rebels_to_observe_Christmas_truce_999.html.

Thai opposition party to boycott general election

December 22, 2013

BANGKOK (AP) — Thailand's main opposition Democrat Party said it would boycott February's general election, deepening a political crisis as protesters called for another major rally Sunday to step up efforts to oust the government and force political reforms.

The party's leader, former Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, announced the boycott Saturday after a meeting of party executives, saying the decision was made in order to ensure that Thailand's government will "represent the people once again."

A spokesman for the ruling party said the Democrats were guided by the knowledge that they knew they would lose the election. The Democrats' position reflects the stand taken by street protesters demanding that Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra step down ahead of the elections. The demonstrators want an appointed interim government to institute reforms before any new polls are held. They called for a big rally Sunday on the heels of similar protests that have drawn crowds as large as 150,000-200,000 people since Oct. 31.

Yingluck dissolved the lower house of Parliament earlier this month to try to end the crisis, and on Saturday proposed a plan for making political reforms following the election. It included having election candidates take an oath to support the creation of a reform council immediately after taking office; having the council's representatives come from all walks of life at local and national levels; and mandating that the council finish its work within two years.

The Democrats, who are closely allied with the protest movement, also led an election boycott in 2006 that helped destabilize the government and paved the way for a military coup that ousted then-Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, Yingluck's older brother.

Abhisit said he had "to accept the truth that the people believe that even if the Democrat Party runs in this election, they believe they will be not be able to reform the country." "We are choosing the harder path, making the long-term decision to represent the people once again," he said.

The Democrat Party has not won a national election since 1992, while Thaksin and his allies have won each one held since 2001. The protest movement, led by a former senior member of the Democrat Party, Suthep Thaugsuban, demands that the Feb. 2 polls not be held if Yingluck stays on as caretaker prime minister. The protesters say Thai politics are hopelessly corrupt under Thaksin's continuing influence, and that he buys his electoral support from the country's urban and rural poor. They believe that traditional one-man, one-vote democracy doesn't work because the poor are not educated enough to choose responsible leaders.

Abhisit, however, distanced his party from the position of the so-called People's Democratic Reform Committee, saying the Democrats respected the concept of elections. Promphong Nopparit, a spokesman for Yingluck's ruling Pheu Thai Party, said that the Democrats' action was not unexpected, and that it was taken because they knew they would lose.

"It is a political game," Promphong said. "In the end, they have the same objective, which is to overthrow Yingluck's government and overthrow the democratic system." In 2006, Thaksin called early elections to try to defuse calls for his resignation on grounds of alleged corruption and abuse of power. His party won, but the three parliamentary opposition parties boycotted the polls and millions of voters marked an abstention box on their ballots as a protest against the prime minister.

The boycott and abstentions meant that in some constituencies, winners could not be certified because they failed to attain a legal minimum share of the registered vote. The inconclusive results left Parliament unable to convene.

After King Bhumibol Adulyadej publicly lectured judges that they had a responsibility to end the deadlock, the nation's top courts annulled the polls, compounding Thaksin's troubles. Circumstances now are changed. An amendment to the election law apparently makes it less likely that Parliament could not be convened. Due to poor health, the 86-year-old monarch is also less likely to play an active role. And while the courts, bastions of conservatism, remain hostile to Thaksin, Thaksin's supporters are a now a huge and better organized force, and have shown they are capable of causing chaos of their own.

Will the Moon be carved-up?

by Boris Pavlischev
Moscow (Voice of Russia)
Dec 20, 2013

Experts forecast that the Moon will become sort of the seventh continent of Earth by the middle of the 21st century. People will reclaim the polar regions and build residential areas there. In this context it may happen that many countries' interests will clash on the Moon.

Part of the scientific community draws a parallel between the Arctic shelf and the Moon, believing that competitive struggle is likely to start in both places. Many countries will be eager to get hold of the polar regions of the Moon that are the best places to live in. The largest amount of ice has been discovered around the poles. Ice is a source of oxygen for astronauts, drinking water and hydrogen that is a rocket fuel.

In addition, the Moon is rich in natural resources, including rare metals that can be mined around the residential areas. At present, it would be extremely expensive to extract metals from the moon soil and deliver them to Earth. But later, when their resources on Earth peter out, lunar resources will come in handy. These are the arguments of those who see no alternative to competition.

Most probably, the distribution of the poles and resources will be done in a civilized way, Vladislav Shevchenko, head of the Department of Lunar and Planetary Studies of the Sternberg Astronomical Institute at Moscow State University believes.

"I would not like this to be interpreted as a struggle. When there was a Moon race between the USSR and the US, Americans did not complete their Apollo program. They left the USSR behind and lost interest. I talked to American colleagues and they said the exploration should certainly have been continued, maybe together with the Soviet Union if we had managed to come to an agreement. This means that in the future as well cooperation is better than a race."

According to the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, the Moon is the province of all mankind. One could stake a claim there but this would carry no legal weight. Planting flags on the Moon by astronauts or interplanetary stations is purely symbolic, so it is not quite correct to draw parallels between the Moon and the Arctic. The Moon is first of all a gold-mine of scientific information and it should be jointly explored, Deputy Director of the Space Research Institute at the Russian Academy of Sciences Vyacheslav Rodin is convinced.

"International cooperation will certainly rule supreme while there are no economic interests, while it is not clear where commercial profits lie. Scientists can't help communicating with each other and sharing ideas. You can rest assured that Earth has a joint team for exploring the Moon."

As for businessmen, experts admit that they could be allowed to explore lunar resources. There is enough space for everyone at the Moon poles. However, chances are that we will have to adopt international legal standards to regulate commercial activity on the Moon.

As for the Outer Space Treaty, there is no need to update it. It was ratified by most members of the international community. At the same time, some countries did not sign the document or acceded without signing or ratifying it, like China or North Korea. It is difficult to forecast if those countries will behave aggressively on the Moon.

Source: Moon Daily.
Link: http://www.moondaily.com/reports/Will_the_Moon_be_carved_up_999.html.

Europe launches billion-dollar Milky Way telescope

Paris (AFP)
Dec 19, 2013

The European Space Agency on Thursday launched an advanced telescope designed to detect a billion stars and provide the most detailed map yet of the Milky Way and our place in it.

The Gaia telescope was successfully hoisted by a Soyuz-STB-Fregat rocket from ESA's space base in Kourou, French Guiana, the agency reported in a webcast.

The star-hunter separated from the last of the rocket's four stages 42 minutes after launch, and mission controllers said everything was fine.

The 740-million-euro ($1.02-billion) device, the most sophisticated space telescope ever built by Europe, aims at building an "astronomical census" of a billion stars, or around one percent of all the stars in the Milky Way.

By repeating the observations as many as 70 times throughout its mission, Gaia can help astronomers calculate the distance, speed, direction and motion of these stars and build a 3-D map of our section of the galaxy.

The stellar haul will be 50 times greater than the bounty provided by Hipparcos, a telescope of the early 1990s whose work provided a gold-standard reference guide still widely used by professional astronomers today.

"Gaia is the culmination of nine years of intensive work which will enable exceptional advances in our understanding of the Universe, its history and laws," said Jean-Yves Le Gall, head of France National Centre of Space Studies (CNES), which is taking a lead role in the mission.

"We are at the dawn of revolutionizing our understanding of the history of the Milky Way," said Stephane Israel, boss of Arianespace, which launched the satellite.

A Soviet-era workhorse of space with an excellent record of reliability, Soyuz is deployed at Kourou under a deal to widen Arianespace's options for the world's satellite launch market.

Gaia will also help in the search for planets beyond our Solar System -- as many as 50,000 so-called extrasolar planets could be spotted during the satellite's five-year life, astronomers hope.

It will do this by measuring the "wobble" in light that occurs when a planet passes in front of a star. The tug of its gravity causes a minute deflection in the stellar light reaching the telescope.

Gaia will also observe the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter to help the search for any rocks that may one day threaten Earth, and keep a watch for distant exploding stars, called supernovae, which are rarely observed in real time.

The 2.03-tonne telescope "is so sensitive that it can measure the equivalent of the diameter of a hair at a distance of 1,000 kilometers", or 600 miles, CNES says on its website.

"If Hipparcos could measure the angle that corresponds to the height of an astronaut on the Moon, Gaia will be able to measure his thumbnail," according to ESA.

Gaia will start its star survey in May after taking up position at the so-called Lagrange point L2, located 1.5 million kilometers (937,000 miles) from the Earth, which offers year-round observation of the cosmos without the view being disturbed by the Sun, Earth or Moon.

To stay at L2, the spacecraft will have to perform tiny maneuvers each month, scrutinized by a network of telescopes on Earth to ensure a hoped-for accuracy of 100 meters (yards).

ESA members have set up a network of 30 centers, manned by 450 people, to crunch the raw data, including a supercomputer at CNES's base in Toulouse, southwestern France, capable of carrying out six thousand billion operations a second.

Even so, it will take years to transform the million billion bytes of input into usable maps and catalogs.

Source: Space Daily.
Link: http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Europe_launches_billion-dollar_Milky_Way_telescope_999.html.

Russian oligarch Khodorkovsky reunited with family

December 21, 2013

BERLIN (AP) — The former oil baron Mikhail Khodorkovsky was reunited with his family in Berlin on Saturday, a day after being released from a decade-long imprisonment in Russia.

Khodorkovsky, a prominent critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was meeting with his eldest son Pavel and his parents, Marina and Boris, who had flown separately to the German capital to meet him, said Christian Hanne, Khodorkovsky's spokesman.

"Today is family day," Hanne told The Associated Press. Khodorkovsky also spoke to the editor of the Russian weekly New Times in what is believed to be his first interview since his release. In its video recording released by the magazine, Khodorkovsky, wearing a black pullover, looked tired but composed as he recalled tough prison conditions. He said the only break from a tough prison regime came when his wife and other family members were allowed to see him for a few days.

"During these years I had an opportunity — three days per quarter during four years out of 10 — to spend the nights in a visiting room, when I had visitors," he said. His son, Pavel Khodorkovsky also spoke briefly to reporters waiting outside Berlin's luxury Adlon Hotel.

"I'm thrilled to be here in Berlin today because my father is free," he said. "My family is finally united and we are very, very happy to be together." "As you can imagine my father is going through a lot right now and he cannot possibly be with all of you today," the son said, adding that a news conference was planned for Sunday. "But he really appreciates all the support that he has received through these years."

Khodorkovsky was released from prison Friday, hours after being pardoned by Putin, and immediately flown to Berlin on a private jet organized by former German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher. The 86-year-old veteran diplomat had spent years working behind the scenes to lobby Putin for Khodorkovsky's release.

Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters Friday that he didn't know why Khodorkovsky chose to fly to Germany. "That was his own decision. No one has dictated him anything," said Peskov, adding that Khodorkovsky was free to return to Russia whenever he wanted.

"He is the citizen of the Russian federation, no one can prevent a citizen of the Russian federation from returning to Russia," Peskov said. Peskov said that Khodorkovsky had submitted a formal appeal for pardon and a longer personal letter to Putin. He wouldn't comment on what the longer letter contained.

One reason why Khodorkovsky's chose to make his first destination Berlin could be that his mother has received medical treatment there in the past. The news conference Sunday, at which the 50-year-old is expected to speak about his future plans, is scheduled to be held at Checkpoint Charlie — a crossing point between East Berlin and West Berlin during the Cold War that has now become a popular tourist destination.

Once Russia's richest man, the billionaire boss of the country's largest oil company, Yukos, was arrested in 2003 and charged with tax evasion. His current net worth is unknown.

Volkmar Kienoel in Berlin and Vladimir Isachenkov in Moscow contributed to this report.

Russian oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky a free man

December 20, 2013

BERLIN (AP) — After spending 10 years in Russian jails for what many in the West believe were trumped-up offenses, Mikhail Khodorkovsky left prison a free man Friday and immediately flew to Germany.

Russian President Vladimir Putin pardoned his long-time rival Friday morning and the country's Federal Penitentiary Service said Khodorkovsky quickly left the IK-7 prison in the remote northwestern village of Segezha.

Khodorkovsky had petitioned to be allowed to travel to Germany to meet his mother who is undergoing medical treatment, the Penitentiary Service said in a statement. Germany's Foreign Ministry confirmed that Khodorkovsky arrived at Berlin's Schoenefeld Airport in the afternoon.

In a statement released on the website of his lawyers and supporters, Khodorkovsky said his application for a pardon, which he made Nov. 12, was not an admission of guilt. "I am very much waiting for the minute when I can embrace my nearest and personally shake the hands of all my friends and colleagues," he said in the statement.

He also thanked former German foreign minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher, who met him at the Berlin airport, for his "personal participation in my fate." A statement from Genscher's office said he had met Khodorkovsky while head of the German Council on Foreign Relations and agreed to a request from Khodorkovsky's lawyers to try to help secure his release.

OBO Bettermann, a German energy company that provided the plane for Khodorkovsky, said it offered it on Genscher's request. During his time in prison on politically tinged charges of tax evasion and embezzlement, the 50-year-old Khodorkovsky has shifted his image from a powerfully wealthy, often arrogant oligarch into a respected dissident. The former oil tycoon became a political thinker and editorial writer who argued for social justice and placed the blame for Russia's stagnating economy squarely on its longtime leader Putin.

It wasn't clear whether Khodorkovsky would continue his opposition to the Kremlin or even choose to return to Russia. Putin's announcement less than 24 hours before the release that Khodorkovsky would be pardoned appeared to catch both the public and Khodorkovsky's lawyers by surprise. His release was equally shrouded in mystery. Several hours before he was allowed to go, Khodorkovsky's lawyers and family said they still had no idea when he would be let out.

Khodorkovsky's father, Boris, told The Associated Press that he and his wife Marina are in Moscow and will fly to Germany on Saturday. Khodorkovsky's second wife and three children live in the Moscow region. Pavel, his eldest son from his first marriage, has been campaigning on his father's behalf and lives with his family in New York City.

Putin told reporters on Thursday that Khodorkovsky applied for the pardon because his mother's health is deteriorating. The Kremlin's website published a decree Friday morning saying that Putin was "guided by the principles of humanity" when he decided to pardon Khodorkovsky.

The pardon appeared to be a sudden turnaround for the Kremlin, which has vigorously prosecuted Khodorkovsky since his arrest in 2003, in what was widely seen as Putin's retribution for the tycoon's political ambitions.

Freeing Russia's most famous prisoner — along with an amnesty this for two jailed members of the Pussy Riot punk band and the 30-member crew of a Greenpeace protest ship — appears aimed at easing international criticism of Russia's human rights record ahead of February's Winter Olympics in Sochi, Putin's pet project.

It also appears to reflect Putin's confidence in his hold on power and his belief that Khodorkovsky now presents little threat to his rule. Khodorkovsky was Russia's richest man, worth billions of dollars, and the CEO of the country's largest oil company when he was arrested in 2003 on the tarmac of a Siberian airport and charged with tax evasion.

During Putin's first term as president, the oil tycoon angered the Kremlin by funding opposition parties and also was believed to harbor personal political ambitions. His actions defied an unwritten pact between Putin and a narrow circle of billionaire tycoons, dubbed "oligarchs," under which the government refrained from reviewing privatization deals that made the group enormously rich.

Khodorkovsky's oil company Yukos was effectively crushed under the weight of a $28 billion back-tax bill. Yukos was sold off. Most of it went to state oil company Rosneft, allowing the Kremlin to reassert control of the country's oil business as well as stifle an inconvenient voice.

Khodorkovsky's current net worth is unknown, but it's likely, at most, a mere shadow of his onetime fortune.

Vasilyeva reported from Moscow. Jim Heintz, Laura Mills and Leonid Chizhov in Moscow and David Rising in Berlin contributed to this report.

After 10 years in jail, Khodorkovsky eyes freedom

December 19, 2013

MOSCOW (AP) — It was arguably Russian President Vladimir Putin's biggest political decision of the year — the announcement that imprisoned tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky will be pardoned. Here's a look at Khodorkovsky, the implications of his imprisonment and his impending release:

WHO IS KHODORKOVSKY? At the time of his arrest in October 2003, when special forces stormed his private jet at a Siberian airport, Khodorkovsky was the head of Russia's largest oil producer. He was believed to be the country's richest man, with a fortune estimated at $15 billion.

He was also a constant thorn in Putin's side. Putin had set out to tame the "oligarchs," the hugely wealthy businessmen who wielded strong political power. He made it clear they could keep their wealth if they agreed to stay out of politics.

Most complied, but Khodorkovsky didn't. He funded opposition parties in parliament, which still had the power to block Kremlin legislation. He also supported independent media as the Kremlin was taking over the last national television network outside its control.

HIS QUESTIONABLE CRIMINAL CASES Khodorkovsky was convicted of tax evasion and sentenced to nine years in prison in May 2005. His Yukos oil company was effectively crushed under the weight of a $28 billion back-tax bill. The court also ruled that Khodorkovsky and partner Platon Lebedev had to pay $600 million in back taxes. Yukos was sold off, mostly to state oil company Rosneft, allowing the Kremlin to reassert control of the country's oil business as well as stifle an inconvenient voice.

In 2011, Khodorkovsky was convicted again, this time on charges of stealing the oil that his company produced and reselling it abroad at higher prices. He was due to be released from prison in August 2014.

Many trial witnesses said the charges were bogus, even absurd. Critics saw both trials as a nakedly political move to eliminate Putin's biggest rival. REPENTING IN PRISON Before his arrest, Khodorkovsky was not a sympathetic figure to most Russians, who resented how the oligarchs had enriched themselves in the post-Soviet privatization era, when state assets were sold in murky deals for shockingly low amounts. Although he was admired for making Yukos the first major Russian company with Western-style bookkeeping, he was also said to be a ruthless boss.

But behind bars, the tycoon swiftly turned into an articulate political thinker and a much sought-after columnist. He wrote for leading Russian media and corresponded with prominent Russian authors. Khodorkovsky's prison writing has showed the evolution of his political views. In 2005, he penned a column headlined "The Left Turn" where he virtually repented for the sins of privatization and called on Russian authorities to come up with a leftist, more socially oriented agenda. He also proposed that oligarchs pay a tax for the companies they had bought up.

In an October opinion piece for The New York Times, Khodorkovsky said Putin was the main reason that Russia's economy was stagnating and its social fabric deteriorating. "Today the system for running the country is called "Vladimir V. Putin." Can he change? I don't want to give a categorical answer: A human being is too complicated a creature for that," he wrote.

A BETTER IMAGE As a tycoon, Khodorkovsky avoided the ostentation of his other oligarchs. In prison, he became downright frugal. Igor Gnezdilov, Khodorkovsky's Siberian prison cellmate in 2007, told the Kommersant newspaper how he once chided Khodorkovsky for wearing a cheap track suit. Gnezdilov suggested that the former oligarch get himself "decent" clothes.

"Why would I?" Khodorkovsky replied, according to Gnezdilov. Reflecting how public perception of him has changed, a poll by the Levada Center published in June showed that 33 percent of Russians would favor his early release as opposed to 19 percent in 2007. A mere 16 percent said they would oppose his release, compared to 44 percent six years ago.

WHY NOW? With the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi just 50 days away, the Kremlin has been anxious to soothe Western criticism of its human rights record. The Russian parliament on Wednesday passed an amnesty law that would drop charges against thousands of Russians and release thousands more.

Under the amnesty bill, Greenpeace activists arrested in the Arctic are likely to be allowed to go home and jailed members of the punk band Pussy Riot be released. Khodorkovsky would have remained the most prominent politically tainted prisoner.

Chris Weafer, a senior partner at Moscow's Macro Advisory consulting firm, said it appears that Russia is getting sensitive to improving its image as Sochi approaches and "is on a campaign to kind of defuse the long-time issues."

WHAT NOW? Khodorkovsky's current net worth is unknown, but likely it's at most a mere shadow of his onetime fortune. The political weight he has acquired over the past decade would make him an attractive figure for Russia's nascent opposition. But he may not have the stomach for Russian politics after a decade in the country's notoriously harsh prisons.

The toll it took on him was clear in an interview earlier this year. Khodorkovsky was asked what he would have done if he had known before his arrest that he would be spending the next 10 years in prison.

"I'm afraid I would have shot myself," he answered.

Jim Heintz and Laura Mills contributed to this report.

Putin to pardon jailed tycoon Khodorkovsky

December 19, 2013

MOSCOW (AP) — In a surprise decision, President Vladimir Putin announced Thursday that jailed former oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky will be pardoned, a move that will see his top foe and Russia's onetime richest man freed after more than a decade in prison.

The development, along with an amnesty for two jailed members of the Pussy Riot punk band and the 30-member crew of a Greenpeace protest ship, appeared aimed at easing international criticism of Russia's human rights record ahead of February's Winter Olympics in Sochi, Putin's pet project.

Putin waited until just after his tightly choreographed annual news conference to make the announcement, dropping the biggest news of the day after journalists had already peppered him with questions in a four-hour marathon.

Putin said the 50-year-old Khodorkovsky, who was set to be released next August, had submitted an appeal for pardon, something he had refused to do before. "He has spent more than 10 years behind bars. It's a tough punishment," Putin said. "He's citing humanitarian aspects — his mother is ill. A decree to pardon him will be signed shortly."

The head of the Kremlin's United Russia faction said he expects Khodorkovsky to celebrate the New Year at home with his family. Khodorkovsky's son, Pavel, tweeted: "Very happy news. Waiting to speak with my father to learn more."

Putin's announcement "came as a big surprise for me, totally out of the blue," Khodorkovsky's mother, Maria, told RT television. "We are old people, and we are waiting, hoping to live to the moment when we can embrace him," his father, Boris, said in remarks posted on the Slon.ru online newspaper.

Analysts viewed the decision as a clever step ahead of the Sochi Olympics. "At first blush, the pardon for Khodorkovsky appears to be a rather canny move that will throw Putin's critics off-balance in the run-up to Sochi, while sending a clear message of self-confidence to his domestic political opponents," Andrew Weiss of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said in a written commentary.

In October 2003, masked commandos stormed into Khodorkovsky's jet on the tarmac of a Siberian airport and arrested him at gunpoint. He was found guilty of tax evasion in 2005 and convicted of embezzlement in a second case in 2010.

Critics have dismissed the charges against Khodorkovsky as a Kremlin vendetta for challenging Putin's power. During Putin's first term as president, the oil tycoon angered the Kremlin by funding opposition parties and also was believed to harbor personal political ambitions.

His actions defied an unwritten pact between Putin and a narrow circle of billionaire tycoons, dubbed "oligarchs," under which the government refrained from reviewing privatization deals that made them enormously rich in the years after the Soviet collapse on condition that they didn't meddle in politics.

Putin didn't say a word Thursday about the fate of Khodorkovsky's business partner, Platon Lebedev, who was convicted and sentenced in the same trials. Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he hadn't asked for a pardon.

During the news conference, Putin was asked if Khodorkovsky could face yet another criminal case that would keep him behind bars longer. He gave a vague answer, saying he doesn't see grounds for that, but prosecutors must investigate alleged offenses.

Gleb Pavlovsky, a former political consultant for the Kremlin, said on Ekho Moskvy radio that Khodorkovsky might have submitted his pardon request after being threatened with yet another trial. At the time of his arrest, Khodorkovsky was estimated to have a fortune of around $15 billion but it's not clear what is left. Khodorkovsky's oil company, Yukos, was once Russia's largest but it was dismantled after his arrest, its most lucrative assets ending up in the hands of the state-owned company Rosneft.

Russia's deputy minister of economic development, Andrei Klepach, voiced hope that Khodorkovsky's release would help improve Russia's image among investors. German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier voiced hope for Khodorkovsky's quick release.

"The pardoning of Mikhail Khodorkovsky is a good decision," he said in a statement. At his news conference, Putin also confirmed that an amnesty approved Wednesday by the Kremlin-controlled parliament will apply to the two members of Pussy Riot still in jail and to the Greenpeace crew facing hooliganism charges for their protest at a Russian oil rig in the Arctic.

Putin still stood by his strong criticism of Pussy Riot's irreverent 2010 protest at Moscow's main cathedral, describing it as a publicity stunt that "crossed all barriers." He also alleged that the Greenpeace activists, who spent two months in jail after their Arctic protest before being granted bail, were trying to hurt Russia's economic interests.

Despite strains in Russia-U.S. ties, the Russian president offered support to President Barack Obama, saying that surveillance by the U.S. National Security Agency is necessary to fight terrorism. The U.S. government should "limit the appetite" of the agency, however, with a clear set of ground rules, he said.

Putin, a 16-year KGB veteran and the former chief of Russia's main espionage agency, said while the NSA program "isn't a cause for joy, it's not a cause for sorrow either" because it's necessary to monitor large numbers of people to expose terrorist contacts.

Asked about former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, whom Russia has granted asylum, Putin insisted that Moscow isn't controlling him and hasn't tried to learn his secrets. He argued that any revelations published by Snowden must have come from materials he provided to journalists before landing in Russia. He reaffirmed that Moscow made providing refuge to Snowden conditional on halting what Putin called his anti-American activities.

Putin said he hasn't met with Snowden and insisted that Russian security agencies haven't worked with him or questioned him about NSA activities against Russia. Putin's annual news conference is seen by the Kremlin as a key way to burnish Putin's father-of-the nation image.

Journalists waved handwritten posters with names of their cities to attract Putin's eye. One succeeded by holding up a Yeti doll in a T-shirt with the name of her region, while another invited Putin to attend a party at her newspaper.

Associated Press writers Laura Mills in Moscow and Frank Jordans in Berlin contributed to this report.

Russia rebuilding lost radar coverage

Moscow (Voice of Russia)
Dec 19, 2013

The commissioning of a Konteyner radar station in the Russian region of Mordovia east-southeast of Moscow has marked the completion of the latest part of Russia's program to patch up its radar surveillance coverage, which developed huge gaps after many of the Soviet radar stations were taken over by new states and many others fell into post-Soviet disrepair.

Adding to this misery is the fact that many of the Soviet Union's former allies are now in NATO. This means the holes in Russia's air and space defense system have to be closed, and closed immediately. Hence the deployment of several Voronezh missile-detecting radars and now of the Konteyner radar.

A classical radar utilizes ultra-short radio waves or microwaves and therefore cannot see beyond the horizon.

Long-wave radars, which can, are impractical because of their huge antennas and immense power appetites.

In the 1980s, the Soviet Union developed its Duga shortwave radars, which can see beyond the horizon due to the multiple reflection of short waves from the ground and the ionosphere.

It positioned radars of this type near Komsomolsk-on-Amur in the Far East and near Chernobyl and Nikolayev in Ukraine. Unfortunately, the Chernobyl nuclear accident and the break-up of the Soviet Union put paid to the Duga program.

In the 1990s and the 2000s, the NIIDAR institute developed its Teletz, Volna, Podsolnukh and Laguna radars, which utilize the ability of short radio waves to travel beyond the horizon due to diffraction amid surface relief elements. These radars have proved to be quite useful in controlling Russia's 200-mile coastal economic zone.

And now comes the Konteyner, capable of detecting aircraft and missiles, both ballistic and cruise, popping up at 3,000 kilometers away at altitudes of up to 100 kilometers.

Moreover, its angular coverage is close to 180 degrees, allowing Russia to make do with a mere handful of such radars. Importantly, the Konteyner features a modular set-up, making it easy to assemble and easy to service.

The Konteyner complex built in Mordovia consists of several towers supporting big receiving antennas. The transmitter is located in the neighboring region of Nizhny Novgorod.

The next Konteyner station is to be built in the Russian Far East. In total, there should be as many as six by 2020. Together with the Voronezh stations, they will forever close the radar surveillance gaps around the country's borders.

Source: Space Mart.
Link: http://www.spacemart.com/reports/Russia_rebuilding_lost_radar_coverage_999.html.

Russia passes amnesty bill, questions remain

December 18, 2013

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia's parliament on Wednesday passed an amnesty bill that will likely apply to the 30-member crew of a Greenpeace ship detained after an Arctic protest, but it wasn't immediately clear if and when the activists would be allowed to leave the country.

The amnesty, which also would likely free the two jailed members of the Pussy Riot punk band, has been largely viewed as the Kremlin's attempt to soothe criticism of Russia's human rights records ahead of the Winter Olympics in Sochi in February. But opposition lawmakers argued it doesn't go nearly far enough and the complicated legislation appeared to leave many questions open.

The State Duma on Wednesday voted 446-0 in favor of the carefully tailored bill, which mostly applies to those who haven't committed violent crimes, first-time offenders, minors and women with small children. Lawmakers said they expect about 2,000 people to be released from jail.

The Duma adopted last-minute amendments to the bill to include suspects of hooliganism who are still awaiting trial, a provision that could apply to the crew of a Greenpeace ship facing those charges after their September protest in the Arctic.

The activists, who spent two months in jail before they were granted bail, were initially accused of piracy but authorities later changed that charge to hooliganism. The nation's top investigative agency has said, however, that the probe into the incident isn't over yet and that some of the crew members could face additional charges, such as assaulting a law enforcement official, so it has remained unclear whether the Greenpeace crew would be pardoned.

Greenpeace said it hopes that the amnesty bill will allow foreign crew members of the Arctic ship to get exit visas and leave Russia. "The Arctic 30 now hope they can spend Christmas at home," said Greenpeace spokesman Aaron Gray-Block. "But it is too early to say."

The crew members insist the charges against them were bogus. "I might soon be going home to my family, but I should never have been charged and jailed in the first place," the ship's captain, Peter Willcox, said in a statement.

The bill is also expected to release Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alekhina, the jailed members of the Pussy Riot punk band who are serving two years in prison on charges of hooliganism for an irreverent anti-Kremlin protest at Moscow's main cathedral. They both have small children.

However, the legislation doesn't contain names, and there has been no official confirmation that Tolokonnikova and Alekhina could be released. The amnesty does not cover former oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who has been widely described as Russia's top political prisoner, and only eight out of 26 defendants who took part in a 2012 protest rally on the Bolotnaya square in Moscow that ended in scuffles between protesters and riot police.

Opposition lawmaker Dmitry Gudkov said the amnesty bill "has buried all hopes of human rights activists and families of political prisoners that their children and family members will be set free." The amnesty will go into effect as soon as the bill is published in the government newspaper, which is expected to happen on Thursday. But it allows authorities a six-month period to carry it out, meaning some of the prisoners could in theory wait weeks or months before getting released. Prisoners would apply to prison administration for amnesty, and officials would decide whether they were eligible. Those of them who committed disciplinary offenses behind bars could be denied amnesty.

Lawyers and families of the Pussy Riot members insist that everyone eligible for the release ought to be allowed to walk free as soon as the bill is published. Their prison terms end in March. Pyotr Verzilov, Tolokonnikova's husband, told The Associated Press he believes there is nothing to stop his wife from being released if the bill is published on Thursday.

Victoria Buravchenko and Vladimir Isachenkov contributed to this report.

Iran unveils new radar able to detect small drone aircraft

Dec. 18, 2013

TEHRAN, Dec. 18 (UPI) -- Iran unveiled a new advanced long range radar system capable of detecting small drone aircraft, head of the country's air defense said.

The radar system called Arash operates on UHF, VHF and HF frequencies and will improve the country's ability to engage in electronic warfare, Iran's semi-official Fars News Agency quoted Brig. Gen. Farzad Esmayeeli, head of the country's air defense saying Tuesday.

"The powerful Arash radar is one of the most important achievements of Khatam al-Anabia Air Defense Base," he said. The radar will be stationed in an undisclosed location in the country in the coming days.

The new radar does not emit radar waves and cannot be detected by the enemy, Fars said adding the radar is also known as the Silent Radar System.

Source: United Press International (UPI).
Link: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2013/12/18/Iran-unveils-new-radar-able-to-detect-small-drone-aircraft/UPI-48971387365909/.