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Syrian refugees in Lebanon face bitter winter

December 15, 2013

BAALBEK, Lebanon (AP) — Shivering in the snow, Syrian Aisha Mohammad looked at the last-minute charity that saved her children from freezing during the smack of a particularly tough Lebanese winter: a wood-burning stove complete with twigs and garbage to ignite in hopes of warming her drafty tent in an icy eastern plain.

Still, her seven children quake from the cold in their donated, bright plastic rain boots, even as they build snowmen resembling their own skinny selves. Since fleeing Syrian government shelling in the northeast province of Raqqa nine months ago, their playground has been here, among the rows of crowded tents they call home.

"We would have frozen to death," without the aid, said the tall, 40-year-old wife of a day laborer who also lives at the camp as she held her runny-nosed four-year-old daughter, Rawan. Like tens of thousands of impoverished refugees living in tents, shacks and unfinished buildings throughout Lebanon, the family faces a miserable winter as aid organizations scramble to meet their needs, constantly overwhelmed by ever-more people fleeing the Syrian conflict, now entering its third year.

Some one-third of Syria's pre-war population of 23 million has been displaced, with 2.3 million now refugees, mostly in neighboring countries. "This is the biggest winterization effort that the U.N. and partners have ever done in the world," said Roberta Russo of the U.N.'s refugee agency. "But still, the scale of the crisis and the number of people coming is so much," she said.

Some 1.4 million Syrians live in Lebanon, including 842,500 officially registered with U.N., charities who are rushing to distribute aid to the most vulnerable — around half a million people. This past week, they handed out blankets, mattresses, kerosene heaters, winter clothes, plastic tarps and fuel coupons, hoping to stave off the worst of a battering storm called Alexa that hit Lebanon, the Palestinian Territories, Turkey, Israel and even the deserts of Egypt with rare snow and rain.

Syrian refugees said the Lebanese army joined the efforts, handing out blankets and mattresses from the back of jeeps. Some kindly neighbors let refugees siphon off electricity and gave them used TV sets and heaters to help pass the time.

On Sunday, the U.N.'s World Food Program said it began airlifting aid into northeastern Syria, trying to reach displaced families with deliveries that had been delayed by the winter storm. The WFP said it hoped to send in enough food for 30,000 people for a month.

In Turkey, foreign ministry official Yunus Bayrak said workers had insulated tents and delivered winter clothing to refugees. But he said conditions in camps just across the border in Syria were likely to be worse.

Charity officials in Lebanon said they planned to distribute more aid, particularly to the 120,000 Syrian refugees living in 430 makeshift encampments scattered throughout the eastern Lebanese mountainous plain of the Bekaa.

Freezing air crept through holes in Mohammad's burlap tent, outside which lay fuel for her Lebanese-donated stove: a tattered shoe, twigs, old clothes and plastic bags. "It's for the fire," she said, acknowledging that the toxic smoke was making her children sick. But she had little choice, particularly when she needed to put them to bed. "I don't know if the children sleep from dizziness or hunger," she said from under a purple headscarf.

Some refugees said municipal officials have seized part of their aid. There was no way of proving the claims, but few appeared to have kerosene, which aid organizations distributed to registered refugees this week in exchangeable coupons.

Nearby, Mariam al-Hamad, 52, burnt an old shoe in her newly donated portable heater as her husband, an amputee, sat nearby. "We ask for heating, that's all," she sighed. The cold has frozen the site's water source, and the men said they were melting snow for drinking water.

Nearby, a boy ran with a plastic bag peeking from the top of his shoes — a cheap waterproofing tool. Other children appeared to have missed out on the winter clothes donations and wore only thin pants and layers of shirts.

In another encampment in the town of Arsal on the Lebanon-Syria border, hundreds gathered around a center run by the Danish Refugee Council, where workers distributed emergency fuel coupons as boys sledded gleefully down a nearby a hill on a plastic sheet.

Residents sat on mattresses in the snow to take advantage of a few hours of scarce sunshine. A group of boys crouched around a pot of cooked wheat, eating sloppily. "Look! I have a hole in my pants!" shouted Abdullah, 12, pointing to his torn clothing.

Some refugees appear to have slid through the cracks. Anwar Abdul-Qader, 40, said he had arrived in Arsal two weeks ago with his 11 children but still hadn't received aid. But friends organized a tent by moving its former inhabitants into other dwellings. For food, Abdul-Qader's children gathered at their better-off neighbor, Abdul-Rahman. He too complained of the cold and thin blankets, but said he had sold part of his fuel ration to buy yerba mate, a popular South American tea-like brew.

Abdul-Qader sighed. "One complains about not having enough blankets. What about those who have none?"

With additional reporting by Yasmine Saker in Beirut and Desmond Butler in Ankara.

Syrian refugees in Jordan in urgent need of humanitarian help

Saturday, 14 December 2013

Chief of moral guidance department in the Jordanian army Colonel Odeh Shdefat affirmed on Friday that Syrian refugees need extra assistance during the current bad weather.

Shdefat said that the Jordanian border forces are now helping refugees facilitate their entrance into Jordan. He said that the violent weather, where heavy snow and rain are falling, meant that the refugees are in urgent need of extra food, clothing and medical aid.

He also said that border forces offer as many primary needs as possible to the refugees along the border, which extends to about 378km. He said that all Jordanian forces are on alert to help Jordanians in need, too.

Since the beginning of the Syrian revolution in March 2011, more than 550,000 Syrian refugees have arrived in Jordan. In addition, more than 600,000 Syrians migrated to Syria before the revolution.

Source: Middle East Monitor.
Link: https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/news/middle-east/8818-syrian-refugees-in-jordan-in-urgent-need-of-humanitarian-help.

Syria's children are freezing to death and Gazans are drowning as Arab billionaires turn a blind eye

Abdel Bari Atwan
Saturday, 14 December 2013

In refugee camps across Jordan and Turkey Syrian children are freezing to death and their peers in the Gaza Strip are drowning while the Arab countries, most notably the wealthy ones, insist on turning a blind eye to their plight.

The Gaza Strip has been suffering without electricity for several months now and life has completely paralyzed because of the Arab-Israeli suffocating siege that has been imposed on nearly two million innocents while this year's winter storms and floods have worsened the situation. The Hamas led government which rules the Strip do not have either the expertise, the necessary funds or the capabilities to deal with this crisis; they had to resort to old fishing boats to rescue homeless Gazans who climbed the rooftops of their flooded homes to cry for help.

There are nearly 150 member States in the Friends of the Syrian People Group, mostly from wealthy European and Arab countries, yet more than four million Syrian refugees are suffering inside and outside of Syria from hunger, disease, fear and lack of any reassuring solution in the near future.

Billions of Arabs' dollars are invested in the "death industry" in Syria to finance the fighting factions who will topple Syria's dictatorial regime and billions are spent to purchase the latest military equipment to arm them. But when the screaming children in the refugee camps freeze to death, the wealthy and their governments are nowhere to be seen.

The funds are allocated only for murder, not for life. Logically those who manage to deliver weapons to the fighters should not fail to deliver medical aid, food and blankets to the children of Aleppo, Homs, Rastan, Ruqqa, Idlib and all the other Syrian cities. Assuming this humanitarian mission is impossible for them to complete they could at least be able to deliver the necessary relief materials and heating equipment to the Syrians in refugee camps in Jordan and Turkey, where there are no military confrontations or explosives.

Yesterday The National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces appealed to the world to "raise the level of emergency aid and food for Syrians in need, whether inside Syria or abroad, in order to protect the children and the elderly from dying in cold" whilst activists have broadcasted online images of a child's corpse with his arms pulled up in the air - "probably frozen," - yet we did not hear a response.

The Syrian people are slaughtered and murdered by all the fighting parties within Syria and they are insulted and humiliated by their Arab brothers in the Arab countries, which reaffirms that the destruction of this country and to humiliate its people has always been the prime goal.

In a statement on Friday Amnesty International criticized the EU failure to play a concrete role to host more Syrian refugees. It also criticized the measures they have taken on their borders to reduce the number of Syrian refugees who try to infiltrate their territories and described them as "shameful." Amnesty International's stance is "honorable" to criticize Western "infidel" countries but what about Arab "Muslim" countries mainly those who want to introduce democracy and human rights to Syria. We ask them, how many Syrian refugees did you host and how do your border guards treat Syrians fleeing death to escape their lives? These are States that accommodate millions of foreign workers from more than 180 non-Arab nationalities.

Gulf countries are donating billions of dollars in oil grants to Egypt to resolve the fuel crisis there which is an honorable humane act that we all acknowledge. Yet how come these States do not demand the Egyptian authorities, from a humanitarian point of view, the passage of some limited gas quantities to operate Gaza's sole power station to illuminate the homes of the two million Muslim Arab "Sunnis" there?

The Gaza Strip has drowned in darkness and floods while Syria's children and elders are freezing to death marking the most disgraceful stain in the history of this nation. Those who do not answer the calls of the deprived while they can, will never be able to free homelands or to respect the minimum human rights in their country or any other.

Source: Middle East Monitor.
Link: https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/articles/middle-east/8816-syrias-children-are-freezing-to-death-and-gazans-are-drowning-as-arab-billionaires-turn-a-blind-eye.

Ships to haul 500 tons of Syrian chemical agents

December 14, 2013

LIMASSOL, Cyprus (AP) — Danish and Norwegian ships can safely ferry up to 500 tons of Syria's most dangerous chemical weapons out of the strife-torn country, a Danish chemical expert said Saturday.

Bjoern Schmidt said sealed containers full of chemical compounds, which when mixed can create lethal Sarin and VX gases, will be loaded at opposite ends of the two cargo ships. The exact quantity of chemicals to be taken out of Syria is unknown, Schmidt said.

Cmdr. Henrik Holck Rasmussen, of Danish frigate HDMS Esbern Snare, said two cargo ships will go to Syria as many times as needed to pick up all chemical weapons. The Danish warship and Norwegian frigate HNOMS Helge Ingstad will act as escorts. Both are docked in Cyprus along with the Danish cargo ship Ark Futura. The second cargo ship, which Norwegian shipper Wilh. Wilhelmsen ASA identified to the Associated Press as the MV Taiko, hasn't arrived yet.

The joint U.N.-Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons team in Syria aims to remove most chemical weapons from Syria by the end of the year for destruction at sea and destroy the entire program by mid-2014. The unprecedented disarmament in the midst of a civil war was launched following an Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack on a Damascus suburb that killed hundreds of civilians.

The U.S. and Western allies accused the Syrian government of being responsible for that attack, while Damascus blames the rebels. Syria has agreed to dismantle its chemical arsenal to ward off possible U.S. military strikes.

Schmidt said according to plan by the OPCW which is in charge of the entire operation, the cargo ships will take the chemicals to the harbor of an as yet unidentified country where the most dangerous chemicals will be transferred onto American ship MV Cape Ray.

The ship is equipped with technology that can largely neutralize the chemicals. The process will take place at sea and the mostly inert chemicals will receive additional treatment at another facility.

Schmidt said the transfer can take place at sea, but that would mean additional risks given weather conditions and rough seas. "I think the safest thing is to go into a harbor," Schmidt said. Croatia has said that it would consider providing one of its ports for the transfer of the chemicals as long as there's no public opposition.

Danish Commodore Torben Mikkelsen, who is commanding the joint Danish-Norwegian operation, said it's unlikely the cargo ships would take any chemical weapons aboard until a harbor is found where they can be transferred onto the American ship.

"If there's no country willing to take the cargo or willing to participate with the transload, we're not going to take the stuff aboard," said Mikkelsen. "We need to know the transload or the disembarkation harbor. Then we're ready to go."

The containers will be inspected and sealed by OPCW officials and Syrian authorities at Latakia port. Each will be equipped with anti-handling and GPS tracking devices. Norwegian and Danish officials will scan the containers once they are aboard the cargo ships using a mobile container scanner, Mikkelsen said.

Mikkelsen said they're still waiting for word on when the operation can begin and the ships can set sail for the trip to Latakia about 166 miles (267 kilometers) from Limassol port. Norwegian frigate commander Per Rostad said there are no plans to put any of the approximately 360 crew members aboard the two warships on the ground at Latakia port. A Finnish team of chemical experts is also aboard the ship to assist the operation.

Schmidt said it's unclear what will happen with other, less dangerous chemicals that the cargo ships will be hauling. He said they'll either be transferred to the American ship or a land-based facility for disposal.

Mikkelsen said crews aboard the Danish and Norwegian warships as well as the cargo ships are now undergoing training to deal with any safety issues that may arise, primarily from rough weather. Schmidt said the biggest safety risk is when the containers and other drums full of the chemicals will be opened aboard the American ship.

Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen, Denmark, contributed to this report.

Palestinian ambassador in Prague killed in blast

January 01, 2014

PRAGUE (AP) — The Palestinian ambassador to the Czech Republic died Wednesday in an explosion that occurred when he opened an old safe that had been left untouched for more than 20 years, officials said.

Ambassador Jamal al-Jamal, 56, was at home with his family at the time of the explosion, according to Palestinian Embassy spokesman Nabil El-Fahel. Al-Jamal was seriously injured and rushed to a hospital where he died, according to police spokeswoman Andrea Zoulova.

Palestinian Foreign Minister Riad Malki said no foul play was suspected, noting that the safe had been left untouched for more than 20 years. It also appeared that the door of the safe had been booby-trapped, according to Zoulova. It was unclear how al-Jamal tried to open it or what type of safe it was.

The safe was recently moved from the old embassy building, but it had come from a building that used to house the Palestinian Liberation Organization's offices in the 1980s, Malki said. "The ambassador decided to open it. After he opened it, apparently something happened inside (the safe) and went off," Malki told The Associated Press.

It was not immediately clear how Malki knew the safe had been untouched for more than 20 years or why and when the safe would have been booby-trapped. During the 1980s — before the fall of the Soviet Union — the PLO had close ties with the Eastern bloc countries. In recent years, relations have been tense and the Czech government was seen as largely taking Israel's side in the Mideast conflict, said Nabil Shaath, a foreign affairs veteran and leading official in Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement.

"The safe was sitting neglected in one of the areas of the old embassy. It was in one of the corners. No one had touched it for 20 to 25 years," Malki said. The embassy recently moved to a new complex.

"The ambassador wanted to know what is in the safe," Malki said. "He opened it and asked his wife to bring a paper and a pen to write down the contents of the safe. She left him to bring (the) pen and paper. During that time, she heard the sound of an explosion."

He said the ambassador had taken some of the contents out of the safe, but it wasn't immediately clear what was inside. It was also unclear how soon the explosion occurred after he opened the safe. The ambassador and his wife were alone in the building at the time because it was a holiday, Malki said. His 52-year-old wife, who called embassy employees to seek help, was treated for shock at the hospital but released. She was not immediately named.

Zoulova said police were searching the apartment but declined further comment. Martin Cervicek, the country's top police officer, told Czech public television that nothing was immediately found to suggest that the diplomat had been a victim of a crime.

Cervicek later said police found one more safe at the embassy complex and were checking it, but that no other explosives were found, Czech public radio and television said. Prague rescue service spokeswoman Jirina Ernestova said al-Jamal was placed in a medically induced coma when he first arrived at Prague Military Hospital. Dr. Daniel Langer, who works there, told public television that al-Jamal had suffered serious abdominal injuries, as well as injuries to his chest and head.

The embassy complex is in Prague's Suchdol neighborhood. The new embassy had not been opened yet and the ambassador, who was appointed in October, spent only two nights in the new residence — also in the new complex.

The explosion occurred in the ambassador's residence. Al-Jamal was born in 1957, in Beirut's Sabra and Shatilla refugee camp. His family is originally from Jaffa in what is now Israel. He joined Fatah in 1975. In 1979, he was appointed deputy ambassador in Bulgaria.

Starting in 1984, he served as a diplomat in Prague, eventually as acting ambassador. From 2005-2013, he served as consul general in Alexandria, Egypt. In October 2013, he was appointed ambassador in Prague.

Mohammed Daraghmeh contributed to this report from Ramallah, West Bank.

Crowds throng Bethlehem for Christmas

December 25, 2013

BETHLEHEM, West Bank (AP) — Thousands of Christian pilgrims from around the world packed the West Bank town of Bethlehem for Christmas Eve celebrations on Tuesday, bringing warm holiday cheer to the biblical birthplace of Jesus on a cool, clear night.

The heavy turnout, its highest in years, helped lift spirits in Bethlehem as leaders expressed hope that the coming year would finally bring the Palestinians an independent state of their own. "The message of Christmas is a message of peace, love and brotherhood. We have to be brothers with each other," said Latin Patriarch Fouad Twal, the top Roman Catholic cleric in the Holy Land, as he arrived in town.

Excited tourists milled about the town's Manger Square, stopping in restaurants and souvenir shops and admiring a large, illuminated Christmas Tree. Marching bands and scout troops performed for the visitors in the streets, and on a stage next to the tree.

Will Green of New York City, along with his wife, Debbie, and their 2-year-old daughter Daphne were among the crowds of people who greeted Twal's motorcade as he entered town from nearby Jerusalem. Green said that being in Bethlehem for Christmas was a dream come true. "All the stories that we grew up with. It's here. It's part of our life. We heard them in the family, school and church. This is the birthplace," he said.

Green slowly pushed a stroller and his wife held their daughter as they followed a crowd toward the Church of the Nativity, built on the site where Christians believe Jesus was born. Palestinian dignitaries greeted Twal at the entrance of Bethlehem. His motorcade crawled through the town's narrow streets as he stopped to shake hands and greet the throngs of visitors. It took him nearly 90 minutes to make the short trip to celebrate Midnight Mass at the Church of the Nativity compound.

Hundreds of people packed the compound for the service. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, the European Union's foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, and Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh were among the dignitaries in attendance.

In his homily, Twal addressed Abbas, telling the president he prays for a "just and equitable solution" for the Palestinians. Twal, himself a Palestinian, also expressed sympathy for the plight of the Palestinians, particularly families with relatives imprisoned by Israel or those who have suffered as a result of the conflict with Israel.

"The world is living through a long night of wars, destruction, fear, hate, racism and, at the present time, cold and snow," he said. Lamenting strife in Africa, Asia and the Middle East, he also urged worshipers "not to forget our own problems here: the prisoners and their families who hope for their release, the poor who have lost their land and their homes demolished, families waiting to be reunited, those out of work and all who suffer from the economic crisis."

Yet Twal called on people not to despair. "We are invited to be optimistic and to renew our faith that this land, home of the three monotheistic religions, will one day become a haven of peace for all people," he said.

"Oh Holy Child, God of goodness and mercy, look with kindness on the Holy Land and on our people who live in Palestine, in Israel, in Jordan and all the Middle East. Grant them the gift of reconciliation so that they may all be brothers — sons of one God," he said.

The number of visitors to Bethlehem remained below the record levels of the late 1990s, when Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts were at their height. Following a Palestinian uprising that began in 2000, the numbers plunged. But thanks to a period of relative calm, they have been steadily climbing in recent years -- and got an extra push this year thanks to the resumption of peace talks.

"Our message is a message of justice and peace," said Palestinian Tourism Minister Rula Maayah. "We Palestinians are seeking peace and we deserve to have peace and our children deserve to live in peace."

Maayah said the number of visitors to Bethlehem was expected to jump by about 14 percent from last year. A spokesman said 10,000 foreign visitors had entered town by the early evening, slightly higher than last year. Israel's Tourism Ministry, which coordinates the visits with the Palestinians, said the number could reach 25,000 during the holiday season.

Despite the Christmas cheer, Mideast politics loomed in the background. In order to enter Bethlehem, Twal's motorcade had to cross through the hulking concrete separation barrier that Israel built during the uprising. Israel says the barrier is needed to keep attackers from entering nearby Jerusalem, but Palestinians say the structure has stifled the town and stolen their land.

Maayah said that the barrier, along with nearby Israeli settlements and Israeli control of archaeological sites in the West Bank, has made it difficult to develop the tourism sector. In addition, few Palestinians seem to think that the current round of peace talks will bear fruit. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry relaunched the talks last summer, but there have been no signs of progress.

Israel carried out a series of airstrikes and other attacks Tuesday in the Gaza Strip in retaliation for the deadly shooting of an Israeli civilian who had been working along the border. The fighting, which left a 3-year-old Palestinian girl dead, was the heaviest in more than a year.

Christmas also serves as a reminder of the dwindling numbers of Christians who live in the Holy Land. Over the decades, tens of thousands of Christians have left, fleeing violence or in search of better opportunities overseas. Christians now make up a tiny percentage of the population.

Bethlehem is now only one-third Christian, with most residents Muslim. In an annual gesture, Israel permitted some 500 members of Gaza's small Christian community to leave the Hamas-ruled territory and cross through Israel to attend the celebrations in Bethlehem.

But for one night at least, residents and visitors brushed aside their troubles to celebrate the holiday. Nick Parker, a student from Georgia Tech University, said he was enjoying the food and making friends with local residents and fellow travelers.

"It's special to be here where Jesus was born," he said. "It's a special opportunity, once in a lifetime."

Car bombing kills pro-Western Lebanese politician

December 27, 2013

BEIRUT (AP) — A powerful car bomb killed a prominent Lebanese politician critical of Syria and its ally Hezbollah, hitting his SUV Friday as it drove through a ritzy business district near Beirut's waterfront, shredding trees and scattering glass and twisted scraps of metal across the pavement.

Allies of the slain politician, former finance minister Mohammed Chatah, indirectly blamed the Shiite Hezbollah group for the bombing, raising tensions between Lebanon's two main political camps at a time when the country's factions are already deeply at odds over the civil war in neighboring Syria.

The morning explosion echoed across Beirut and threw a pillar of black smoke above the city's skyline. The force of the blast punched a nearly 2-meter (yard) wide crater in the street, set at least three cars on fire and shattered windows in office buildings and apartment towers up to a block away.

The 62-year-old Chatah, who was also a former Lebanese ambassador to the United States and a senior aide to ex-Prime Minister Saad Hariri, was killed along with his driver and four others, the National News Agency reported. The Health Ministry said at least 70 people were wounded.

In a statement, the 15 members of the U.N. Security Council strongly condemned the attack and "reiterated their unequivocal condemnation of any attempt to destabilize Lebanon through political assassinations."

The bombing deepened the sense of malaise in Lebanon, which is struggling to cope with the fallout from the civil war in Syria, including the influx of more than 1 million Syrians who have sought refuge from the violence in their homeland.

Lebanon also has had only a weak and ineffectual caretaker government since April, with the two main political blocs unable or unwilling to reach a compromise to form a new Cabinet. Hariri, a Sunni politician, heads the main, Western-backed coalition in Lebanon, known as the March 14 alliance. Hezbollah, which enjoys the support of Syria and Iran and commands a militia stronger than the national military, leads those on the other side of Lebanon's political divide.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Friday's attack, but the bombing was reminiscent of a string of assassinations of around a dozen members of the anti-Syrian Hariri camp that shook Lebanon between 2004 and 2008.

The most dramatic of those was the massive suicide bombing in 2005 in downtown Beirut — some four blocks from the site of the explosion — that killed Hariri's father, Rafik, also a former prime minister. Hariri's allies accused Syria of being behind the killings, a claim Damascus denied.

The opening session in the Hariri assassination trial is due to be held in less than three weeks in The Hague, Netherlands, where the U.N.-backed tribunal investigating his killing is based. Five Hezbollah members have been indicted for their alleged involvement in the assassination. Hezbollah rejects the accusations, and has refused to hand the men over.

Saad Hariri said in a statement that "the ones who are running away from international justice and refusing to appear before the international tribunal" were behind Chatah's assassination. Hariri said those responsible are "the same ones who are opening the doors of evil and chaos into Lebanon" and "brought regional fires to our country," in a clear reference to Hezbollah's armed intervention in support of Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Hezbollah strongly denounced Chatah's assassination, saying it serves "the enemies of Lebanon." The Shiite group's overt role in Syria has inflamed Lebanon's already simmering sectarian tensions. A wave of violence that has washed across the country this year has fueled predictions that Lebanon, which is still recovering from its own 15-year civil war that ended in 1990, is on the brink of slipping back into full-blown sectarian conflict.

In recent months, a series of explosions have struck districts dominated by Hezbollah, apparently in retaliation for the group's decision to dispatch its fighters to Syria, while a deadly twin car bombing hit the northern city of Tripoli, a Sunni stronghold. There have also been repeated clashes between Sunnis — who largely back Syria's rebels — and Shiites and Alawites who back Assad.

The last major assassination in Lebanon took place Oct. 19, 2012, when a car bomb killed Lebanon's top intelligence chief, Wissam al-Hassan. Al-Hassan, a member of Hariri's security circle, was a powerful opponent of Syria's influence in Lebanon and many here blamed his killing on Syria.

Friday's bombing punctured the early morning lull along a quiet street in a posh neighborhood in downtown Beirut that is home to five-star hotels, luxury high-rises and high-end boutiques. "We were having breakfast when the explosion went off, shattering the glass and shaking everyone," said Iman Mohammed, a 36-year-old Egyptian visiting Beirut who was staying at the Ramada Hotel less than 100 meters (yards) from the blast site. "People started running, children were barefoot and some people fled their room in their pajamas."

The army quickly cordoned off the area to prevent people from getting close to the scene, where the twisted wreckage of several cars was still smoldering. Hours later, forensic experts in white hazmat suits were still scouring the site while workers at the neighboring office blocs were sweeping glass into the street from windows several stories up.

Security officials said the car that blew up was rigged with up to 60 kilograms (130 pounds) of explosives, and parked along Chatah's route. The blast struck the former minister's SUV as he was driving to a meeting at Hariri's downtown residence, the officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.

Prosecutor General Samir Hammoud said a preliminary investigation indicated the explosives were packed into a stolen Honda CRV and detonated by remote control. He said investigators will now focus on analyzing footage from security cameras in the area.

Chatah's death marks a serious loss for the pro-Western camp in Lebanon. The 62-year-old was a prominent economist who once worked at the International Monetary Fund in the U.S. and later served as Lebanese ambassador to the U.S. He was one of the closest aides of Rafik Hariri. He later served as finance minister when Saad took over the premiership, and stayed on as his senior adviser after he lost the post in early 2011.

Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati denounced the assassination, "which targeted a political and moderate figure who believed in dialogue, the language of reason and logic and the right to different opinions."

In Washington, Secretary of State John Kerry also condemned Friday's bombing, calling it an "abhorrent terrorist attack" and describing Chatah as "a voice of reason, responsibility and moderation." Hariri's 2005 assassination sparked massive demonstrations that eventually led to the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon, following nearly three decades of military presence and domination of its smaller neighbor.

Chatah was a moderate Sunni politician who opposed Hezbollah and Assad. His last tweet, posted an hour before the explosion, read: "Hezbollah is pressing hard to be granted similar powers in security & foreign policy matters that Syria exercised in Lebanon for 15 yrs."

Associated Press writers Zeina Karam in Beirut and Edith Lederer at the United Nations contributed to this report.

Tensions high in Western Sahara despite new plan

January 01, 2014

LAAYOUNE, Western Sahara (AP) — Helmeted Moroccan riot police waded into the small crowds of women in brightly colored shawls who chanted slogans for independence on the streets of Laayoune, the capital of the disputed territories of the Western Sahara. Every time one group of the mostly women and children protesters was dispersed, another would appear farther down the street, attracting phalanxes of police. The confrontations continued long after dark and degenerated into stone-throwing contests.

The harsh police response against the Sahrawis, as the region's native inhabitants are known, contrasted with the conciliatory gestures the Moroccan government have been extending to the restive desert territory that it annexed 38 years ago. Just weeks before the demonstrations, the government announced a potentially groundbreaking, 10-year economic plan to boost the standard of living and increase respect for human rights — but that has done little to defuse tensions.

The stakes are higher than Morocco's internal problems. The Western Sahara neighbors Mauritania and Algeria are both at the center of the West's fight against terrorism in the deserts of north Africa. The presence of up to 100,000 angry refugees from the Western Sahara in camps in neighboring Algeria has attracted the concern of U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon, who described the refugees as a regional source of instability.

In 1975, Morocco annexed the former Spanish colony of Western Sahara and fought a local independence movement called the Polisario. The U.N. brokered a ceasefire in 1991, pending a referendum over the territory's fate that has never taken place. Now the Moroccan government is presiding over a population with nearly twice the unemployment as the rest of the country, amid growing international unease over the situation.

At dusk in Laayoune's Sahrawi neighborhoods, the tension is palpable, with security trucks on every corner surrounded by riot police in helmets and shields. El-Ghali Djimi, a former political prisoner and a founder of local human rights groups, said she fears her children growing up in this atmosphere may turn to violence, radicalized by the harsh tactics of security forces. Terrorism has been absent from the Sahrawi conflict since the 1991 ceasefire, but concerns are rife that disgruntled youth in the cities or the refugee camps may turn to violence or even become recruits for al-Qaida.

"My generation, the older ones, we have a tolerance, but the youth don't," she said. Djimi's rights groups, like others founded by the Sahrawis, are not recognized by the state, which is very sensitive over who monitors human rights in the territories.

Proposals by the U.S. in April to expand the mandate of the U.N. monitoring mission to include human rights provoked strong protest from Morocco. Instead, the government said, the state-founded National Council for Human Rights performs that function.

Sidi Mohammed Salem Saadoun, the executive director of the council's local branch, said that after a demonstration in October, police broke into some 70 homes of people in retaliation. He noted that this didn't happen after the most recent protests Dec. 10, calling it a step in the right direction.

Saadoun admitted, however, that "much still needs to be done." Out of the 442 complaints the group has submitted to the government on behalf of people since 2011, it has only received seven responses.

The new development plan was publicly backed by King Mohammed VI during a speech in November and calls for overhauling how Morocco manages this desert territory of 500,000 people. "There's just a general consensus that things were not working and I think this plan just laid it out," said Anouar Boukhars, an expert on the region working with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "If the plan is buttressed by judicial and police reforms, which must be done, it has the potential to address the grievances of the local population."

Morocco faces an uphill battle, however, to convince many disaffected Sahrawis of its commitment to human rights and cutting unemployment in half. Years of harsh treatment by security forces has left a legacy of bitterness among many inhabitants, some of whom maintain that self-determination through a U.N.-supervised referendum is the only way to improve their fate.

"If we get self-determination, all the problems can be solved — with another 10 years they are just playing for time," said Dalil Lehcen, an activist studying how Western Sahara's rich phosphate and fishing resources are used for Morocco's benefit. "They haven't done it in the last 37 years — no one in the Western Sahara trusts Morocco."

The new plan, devised at the request of the king, tacitly acknowledges that things aren't going well. It proposes restoring the trust between authorities and the people by "affirming the primacy of human rights, respecting the authority of the law and guaranteeing access to justice."

Yet the powerful governor of the territory, the man who will be leading the implementation of the plan, denied there was any lack of trust between the people and the authorities. He expressed bafflement at the claims that the proposal implies shortcomings in the justice system.

"Everyone has equal access, I really don't know what they are saying with that — there is no problem," said Khalil Dkhil from his office. He also presented a very different vision of the periodic protests that wrack the city of Laayoune. "People have sold their souls to the devil Algeria," he said, describing the protesters as a small minority taking money from regional rival Algeria, which host the pro-independence Polisario movement and supports Western Saharan independence. "They pay children to throw rocks and women to go into the street and provoke police. It's just a question of money."

As seen by the harsh reaction to the Dec. 10 demonstration, which left dozens injured, the authorities fear losing control, said one prominent human rights activist. "They don't really want to open the area to human rights because they know it is like dominos," said Mohammed Salem Lakhal, founder of the CODESA human rights group. "You touch the first piece and all the pieces will fall down."

Two Libya army officers killed in Benghazi

Benghazi, Libya (AFP)
Dec 27, 2013

Two Libyan army officers have been killed in the past 48 hours in the eastern city of Benghazi, cradle of the 2011 revolt against Moamer Kadhafi, officials and medics said.

The restive east has seen frequent attacks on security forces as the weak government in Tripoli has struggled to exert control over former rebels who have refused to disarm or join the security forces.

A security source said Lieutenant Colonel Mohammed al-Zouei, 39, was killed in a drive-by shooting as he headed to a mosque for Friday prayers. A spokesman for Al-Jala hospital confirmed receiving the body.

Another officer, Lieutenant Colonel Ahmed Soueiri, was shot dead on Thursday, the security source said.

In the two years since Kadhafi was overthrown and killed by rebels Benghazi has seen scores of attacks targeting security forces and foreign missions, including a September 2012 assault on the US consulate that killed the ambassador and three other Americans.

The government has struggled to consolidate control in the vast and mostly desert country, which is effectively ruled by a patchwork of local militias and awash in heavy weapons looted from Kadhafi's arsenals.

Source: Energy-Daily.
Link: http://www.energy-daily.com/reports/Two_Libya_army_officers_killed_in_Benghazi_999.html.

Only nominal competition in Turkmenistan's vote

December 15, 2013

ASHGABAT, Turkmenistan (AP) — Energy-rich Turkmenistan held its first multi-party parliamentary elections Sunday, but all the contenders swore loyalty to the Central Asian nation's autocratic leader.

President Gurbanguli Berdymukhamedov has described the elections as a landmark stage in the ex-Soviet country's democratic development, while Amnesty International has called them a sham. Earlier this year, Berdymukhamedov stepped down as leader of the Democratic Party, a move he said should encourage democracy. The pro-business Party of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs created in 2012 also pledges loyalty to Berdymukhamedov, as do three other groups taking part in the vote.

Berdymukhamedov, nicknamed Arkadag (the Protector), has run Turkmenistan with an iron fist since 2006, controlling all aspects of life in the mostly Muslim nation of five million people that borders the Caspian Sea.

On Sunday, state television aired footage of the president visiting a polling station along with his parents. When they got off a minibus, a singer in bright folk costume began performing a song about the president from a stage adorned with Berdymukhamedov's portrait. Members of the local election commission stood up and greeted the leader with words: "Welcome, Arkadag!"

After Berdymukhamedov and his parents cast their ballots, the musicians once again performed the same song "Arkadag" praising the president. Turkmenistan, which boasts rich natural gas reserves estimated to be the fourth largest in the world, has been the subject of intense rivalry for influence between the West, Russia and China.

Berdymukhamedov, a 56-year-old former dentist, came to power after the death of his eccentric predecessor, Saparmurat Niyazov. Niyazov, Turkmenistan's former Communist leader, was celebrated in a bizarre cult of personality that saw cities, streets, months, periodicals and public organizations named after him and his family members. Niyazov also made a two-volume spiritual tome he wrote mandatory reading.

Berdymukhamedov, meanwhile, has maintained the authoritarian leadership style of his predecessor, allowing no dissent or independent media and becoming the subject of adulation that also bears the hallmarks of a personality cult in the mostly desert country the size of California.

During the election campaign, state television broadcast footage of candidates speaking in support of the government's course and meeting with voters in rooms adorned with portraits of the president. In Sunday's election, 283 candidates are running for 125 seats in the national parliament, which has served as a rubber stamp for Berdymukhamedov.

"I'm confident that the elected members of parliament will justify the voters trust and bring an honorable contribution to the country's development," Berdymukhamedov said after casting his ballot. More than 90 percent of eligible voters cast ballots in the vote, the Central Election Commission said.

"We have a big holiday today: for the first time the new Party of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs is taking part in the parliamentary elections," Makhym Annamukhamedova, a textile factory worker said after voting in the Turkmen capital. "I think it is a big step forward for democracy."

Amnesty International described the elections as window dressing. "Holding these elections will not address the atmosphere of total repression, denial of the basic human rights, and the all-permeating fear that has gripped society in Turkmenistan for years, and all pretense of progress on human rights is simply deceitful," John Dalhuisen, the group's Europe and Central Asia program director, said in a statement. "There is still no genuine opposition party, no independent media and not a single independent human rights organization operating freely inside the country."

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the top trans-Atlantic security and rights group, for the first time sent a mission to assess if the vote meets international standards, but it will not conduct a comprehensive observation of the voting, counting and tabulation. It promised to issue a final report in two months.

Japan's Abe should learn from Germany: Xinhua

Beijing (AFP)
Jan 01, 2014

Chinese state media kept up the heat on Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on the first day of 2014, urging him to learn from Germany in dealing with divisive historical issues.

"Abe's conspicuous lack of historical honesty contrasts shamefully with the courage and vision of late West German Chancellor Willy Brandt," the official Xinhua news agency said in a commentary Wednesday.

It highlighted Brandt's 1970 visit to a monument in Poland to victims of the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising -- a revolt by Jews against deportations to Nazi death camps that was brutally crushed by German troops -- when he famously fell to his knees.

What Brandt did was a "spontaneous act of genuine repentance", Xinhua added.

"He said no words, but his silent apology spoke a lot: Germany repents its history, is willing to make up for the past, and stands ready to earn the international trust it needs to move on."

China has intensified criticism of Abe since December 26 when he visited Tokyo's controversial Yasukuni Shrine. It honors several high-level officials executed for war crimes after World War II, and serves as a reminder of Japan's 20th century aggression against China and other Asian nations.

On Monday Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang said Abe "himself closes a door of dialogue with Chinese leaders" and is "not welcome" by the Chinese people.

One Wednesday one of Abe's cabinet ministers paid his own visit to the shrine. Yoshitaka Shindo said he was renewing a wish for peace.

Separately, the Beijing News on Wednesday ran photos of Brandt kneeling in Warsaw and current Chancellor Angela Merkel standing before a wreath with her head bowed during a visit to the site of the Dachau concentration camp in August.

The photos accompanied short articles on reactions -- including by the German government -- to Abe's shrine visit.

"The sincere remorse and in-depth reflection of Brandt and other German leaders paved the way for their nation to be accepted by the international community," Xinhua said. "The moment Brandt knelt down, his nation stood up."

China regularly takes Japan to task over historical interpretations of the war and calls on it to learn "correct" lessons from history.

According to estimates by Chinese government researchers, China lost 20.6 million people directly from the war.

Abe came to power just over a year ago vowing to rejuvenate Japan's long moribund economy and amend its war-renouncing constitution.

His views on history -- he has previously questioned the definition of "invade" in relation to Japan's military adventurism last century -- have raised fears over the direction he wants to take the country.

After his visit to the shrine, he attempted to limit criticism, telling reporters it was not intended to hurt Chinese or South Koreans and should be seen as a pledge that Japan would not go to war again.

Source: Space War.
Link: http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Japans_Abe_should_learn_from_Germany_Xinhua_999.html.

Abe says Japan's pacifist constitution may be revised by 2020

Tokyo (AFP)
Jan 01, 2014

Japan's nationalist Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has said the country's pacifist post-World War II constitution which limits its military to self-defense could be amended by 2020.

In a New Year comment published in the conservative daily Sankei Shimbun on Wednesday, Abe predicted the constitution "will have been revised" by 2020 when Tokyo hosts the Summer Olympics.

His comments come days after he enraged Asian neighbors and disappointed Washington by visiting a Tokyo shrine honoring the country's war dead, including World War II leaders, and been seen abroad as a symbol of Japan's militaristic past.

"(By 2020), I think Japan will have completely restored its status and been making great contributions to peace and stability in the region and the world," he said.

He added that Japan's elevated status could possibly help Asia become a "balanced and stable region".

Abe took power a year ago in an election landslide as Japan faced China's increasingly assertive military posture amid a fierce territorial dispute with Beijing over Tokyo-controlled islands.

He initially focused on improving the economy with stimulus packages, mixing big-spending and easy money policies.

In recent months, he has turned to his more conservative agenda, passing a state secrecy law which critics say is a threat to democracy in Japan.

In a New Year message, Abe reaffirmed his resolve to change the pacifist constitution imposed by the US after Japan's defeat.

"As it has been 68 years since its enactment now, national debate should be further deepened toward a revision (of the constitution) to grasp the changing times," he said.

"Now is the time for Japan to take a big step forward toward a new nation-building effort."

On his security policy, Abe said, "We will resolutely protect to the end Japan's territorial land, sea and air."

The premier has long agitated for the amendment of a key article in the constitution that limits its military to self-defense and bans the use of force in settling international disputes.

The country's well-funded and well-equipped military is referred to as the Self-Defense Forces (SDF).

Abe has said he would like to look into making the SDF a full-fledged military, a plan that sets alarm bells ringing in Asian countries subject to Japan's occupation in the first half of the 20th century.

In his first policy as premier last year, Abe said he would look to change a provision which requires a two-thirds majority in parliament to amend the basic law.

In his New Year message, Abe said the launch of a US-style National Security Council in December would help promote his "proactive pacifism" as a "'signboard of the 21st century' which should be borne by our country."

Source: Space War.
Link: http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Abe_says_Japans_pacifist_constitution_may_be_revised_by_2020_999.html.

China mulls revamping military regions: Japan report

Tokyo (AFP)
Jan 01, 2014

China is considering reorganizing its seven military regions into five in a bid to respond more swiftly to a crisis, the Japanese daily Yomiuri Shimbun reported on Wednesday.

The news comes amid rising tensions over Beijing's territorial claims in the region, with China and Japan squaring off over a chain of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea.

Each of the new military regions will create a joint operations command that controls the army, navy and air force as well as a strategic missile unit, the major daily said citing senior Chinese military officials and other sources.

The planned revamp would mark a shift from the current defense-oriented military that relies mainly on the army to one that ensures more mobile and integrated management of the army, navy, air force and strategic missile units, Yomiuri said.

"It is a proactive measure with eyes on counteracting the Japan-US alliance," the daily quoted one of the officials as saying.

Tokyo and Beijing are locked in a simmering territorial row over Tokyo-controlled Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea which China also claims and calls the Diaoyus.

The United States, while insisting it does not take sides on sovereignty disputes, has said that the islands are under Tokyo's management and so come under a security treaty in which it is required to defend officially pacifist Japan against attack.

Under the proposed military structure China aims to strengthen its attack capability to secure air and naval superiority in the South China Sea and the East China Sea, the daily said.

The newspaper also reported that Japan plans to deploy its first "Global Hawk" unmanned surveillance planes at an airbase in Misawa, on the northern tip of Japan's main Honshu Island, adjacent to a US airbase where the same type of aircraft will be based later this year.

Japan's defense ministry plans to deploy three Global Hawk drones between April 2015 and March 2016, Yomiuri said.

Misawa is located about 2,300 kilometers (1,430 miles) north of the Senkakus which Chinese coastguard ships have frequently approached, sometimes moving into territorial waters, since Tokyo nationalized some of the islands in September 2012.

Equipped with sophisticated sensors and radars, the Global Hawk drone is capable of flying more than 30 hours non-stop and detecting the movements of vessels, aircraft and missiles within a radius of 500 kilometers from an altitude of 18,000 meters.

It does not have attack capability.

The defense ministry and the US air force will jointly maintain the drones to ensure they operate effectively, the report said.

In addition, information collected by the Global Hawk will be shared and jointly analyzed, Yomiuri said.

China, which has been ramping up military spending over its past decade of strong economic growth, has also tussled with the Philippines and Vietnam over maritime territories.

Source: Space War.
Link: http://www.spacewar.com/reports/China_mulls_revamping_military_regions_Japan_report_999.html.

15,000 nationalists march in Kiev

January 01, 2014

KIEV, Ukraine (AP) — About 15,000 people marched through Kiev on Wednesday night to honor Stepan Bandera, glorified by some as a leader of Ukraine's liberation movement and dismissed by others as a Nazi collaborator.

The march was held in Ukraine's capital on what would have been Bandera's 105th birthday, and many of the celebrants carried torches. Some wore the uniform of a Ukrainian division of the German army during World War II. Others chanted "Ukraine above all!" and "Bandera, come and bring order!"

However, many of Bandera's followers sought to play down his collaboration with the Germans in the fight for Ukraine's independence as the leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, Ukraine's foremost nationalist organization in the first half of the 20th century.

Bandera, who died 55 year ago, remains a deeply divisive figure in Ukraine, glorified by many in western Ukraine as a freedom fighter but dismissed by millions in eastern and southeastern Ukraine as a traitor to the Soviet Union's struggle against the occupying German army.

Bandera was a leader of Ukraine's nationalist movement in the 1930s and 1940s, which included an insurgent army that fought alongside Nazi soldiers during part of the Second World War. Bandera's supporters claim they sided with the Nazis against the Soviet army, believing that Adolf Hitler would grant Ukraine independence.

Ihor Mykolaiv, one of Wednesday night's torch bearers, described Bandera as a man "who fought for the country, the faith and the ideals," but insisted that "Bandera never was on the Germans' side." However, Bandera did collaborate with the Nazis and receive German funding for subversive acts in the USSR as German forces advanced across Poland and into the Soviet Union at the start of the war.

He fell out with the Nazis in 1941, after the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists declared Ukraine's independence, and he was sent to a concentration camp. Bandera won back Germany's support in 1944, and he was released. The German army was hoping the Ukrainian insurgents could stop the advance of the Soviet army, which had regained control over much of eastern Ukraine by then. Bandera set up a headquarters in Berlin and oversaw the training of Ukrainian insurgents by the German army.

His group also was involved in the ethnic cleansing that killed tens of thousands of Poles in 1942-44. The Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists portrayed Russians, Poles, Hungarians and Jews — most of the minorities in western Ukraine — as aliens and encouraged locals to "destroy" Poles and Jews.

Bandera was assassinated in 1959 by the KGB in West Germany. In January 2010, less than a month before his term in office was to end, Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko posthumously decorated Bandera with the Hero of Ukraine award. That led to harsh criticism by Jewish and Russian groups. The award was annulled by a court in January 2011 under President Viktor Yanukovych.

Kiev has been the scene of massive pro-European protests for more than a month, triggered by Yanukovych's decision to ditch a key deal with the European Union in favor of building stronger ties with Russia.

The nationalist party Svoboda, which organized Wednesday's rally, was one of the key forces behind the protests, but other opposition factions have said the Bandera rally is unrelated to the ongoing protest encampment in central Kiev.

Thousands sing national anthem at Kiev's Maidan

January 01, 2014

KIEV, Ukraine (AP) — At least 100,000 Ukrainians sang the country's national anthem together at Kiev's main square on New Year's Eve in a sign of support for integration with Europe.

Kiev's Maidan has been the scene of massive pro-European protests for more than a month, triggered by President Viktor Yanukovych's decision to ditch a key deal with the European Union. Opposition leaders had called on Ukrainians to come to the Maidan on the New Year's Eve and sing the national anthem in an act of defiance and what they expected could be the record-breaking live singing of an anthem.

Tens of thousands, who thronged to Maidan and nearby streets, sang "Ukraine Has Not Died Yet" seconds after the New Year's countdown. So far the greatest number of people — 121,653 — singing a national anthem at the same time was recorded in India in May 2013, according to the Guinness World Records.

Ukrainian activists said on Monday they have invited a Guinness official to attend the singing at the Maidan in order to log the attempt at the record. Hundreds of thousands have been rallying at the Maidan since November when Yanukovych decided to ditch a key deal with the European Union. Many in Europe had hoped for closer ties with the EU, favoring Europe's democratic institutions over Russia's authoritarian government led by President Vladimir Putin for nearly 15 years. Pro-European activists have been living in tents on Kiev's barricaded main square for over a month now.

Many Ukrainians at the Maidan said they were expressing their political views by coming to celebrate the New Year there. Serhiy Holota, who was at there with his wife and son, said they came because "it's important to be here with our people" as well as setting an example "for children to live in a free civil society."

Sixty-four-year-old Tamara Tivonenko, who has taken part in protests at the Maidan since they began in November, said for her spending the New Year's there was her sign of support for the opposition. "It's nice to be here on an ordinary day, and it's important to be here together with others on a holiday," she said.

Like in Russia and many other former Soviet republics, the New Year is the most popular holiday of the year, often more widely celebrated than Christmas.

Some 20,000 protest in Ukraine's Kiev

December 29, 2013

KIEV, Ukraine (AP) — About 20,000 people protested in Ukraine's capital on Sunday, maintaining more than a month of rallies opposing the government's decision to shelve a key deal with the European Union.

But the turnout on a clear, cold day was markedly lower than at previous rallies, which had attracted hundreds of thousands of people. As it has before, Sunday's rally opened with speeches by the country's spiritual leaders, including Christian priests, a rabbi and a mufti who called for a national unity and stressed the protesters' right to have the government they want.

Oleh Tyahnybok, head of the opposition national party Svoboda notorious for his racist rhetoric, emphasized that Ukrainians in the west and the east should unite to fight for their rights. "We are all Ukrainians and want our fair demands to be met," he said in his speech.

Most demonstrators in Kiev come from western and central regions, while many people in the mostly Russian-speaking east and the south back closer ties with Moscow. The demonstrations were sparked by President Viktor Yanukovych's decision last month to spike the EU deal in favor of closer ties with Russia. The move angered many Ukrainians, who hoped that closer ties with the EU would help end centuries of Russia's domination.

The protests were galvanized by a brutal police crackdown on Nov. 30, but Yanukovych's government has since limited the use of force in an apparent hope that protests will fizzle out. Yanukovych also has sought to assuage the protesters' anger by releasing some of the jailed opposition activists and suspending several top officials regarding the crackdown, but thousands of demonstrators have maintained their vigil and the crowd has swelled over weekends.

After several attempts to clear the protesters by force drew condemnation from the West, the president now appears set on waiting them out. Kiev's Independence square, or the Maidan, was filled with wood fire smoke on Sunday coming from field kitchens and stoves that protesters installed in the tents they have been living at for weeks. The city's main street, Khreshchatyk, has been barricaded with wooden planks, sacks filled with snow, and car tires since November's crackdown.

At Sunday's rally, many of the demonstrators wore ribbons in the colors of the Ukrainian national flag and remained confident that their campaign will win. Halina Kalymivska, 58, said the turnout could be lower than hoped because of the holiday season but that the underlying problems that sparked the protests have not gone away.

"It can't go on like this any longer. We want a normal life so that we can at least afford basic food," she said. "I don't think that people are disillusioned. Nothing has changed. People will keep on protesting, even after the holidays."

Opposition leaders continued to demand the Cabinet's resignation, but they have toned down demands for Yanukovych's ouster. Arseniy Yatsenyuk of the Batkivshchyna Party said the main three opposition parties that led the protest at the Maidan will work together ahead the next presidential election to build a team "which is capable of making Ukraine a European country."

Oleksandr Turchynov, a lawmaker from the same party, read an opposition manifesto in the square, demanding the government's resignation and the firing of a riot police force blamed for the brutal November crackdown.

Meanwhile, thousands of opposition activists drove and cycled to Yanukovych's country residence of Mezhygirya outside Kiev. The protesters were chanted "Down with Yanukovych!" and urged authorities to find and punish the people who brutally attacked prominent civic activist and journalist Tetyana Chernovil earlier this week.

Riot police blocked the protesters hundreds of meters (yards) from the residence, standing in a chain with their shields raised.

__ Dmytro Vlasov contributed to this report.

Greece: Numbers improve, problems worsen in 2014

January 01, 2014

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece assumes the presidency of the European Union Wednesday, starting 2014 with a promise by the government to pull the country out of a six-year recession, keep a balanced budget, and effectively end a financial crisis that rattled the euro.

"In 2014, Greece will return to the markets and start to become a normal country again," Prime Minister Antonis Samaras said in a televised New Year's address. "After six unending, painful years, 2014 will herald the prospect of growth ... What's important is that we've avoided the worst."

But have they? With most of the 240 billion euros ($330 billion) in bailout loans already paid out, Greece still has an unsustainably high national debt, faces the threat of renewed political instability, and has more than one-in-four jobless and steadily sliding into poverty.

Greeks greeted the New Year after many spent hours lining up in tax offices to pay austerity levies on time. And heavy smog has returned to the country's capital after decades this winter as households left with no heating throw scrap wood and garbage onto the fireplace to try to keep warm.

Here's a look at some of Greece's most pressing problems: NO JOB, NO INSURANCE Greece's financial tailspin wiped out nearly a quarter of its economy and roughly a million jobs. From 7.2 percent before the recession in 2008, unemployment exploded, reaching 27 percent in the third quarter of 2013, giving Greece the worst job rating among the 34 advanced economies in the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

More than 70 percent of the unemployed have been out of work for more than a year, leaving most to rely on charity after losing monthly benefit payments and health insurance. "It's inconceivable that someone with the misfortune of having no work cannot have proper access to state health care," said George Patoulis, head of the Athens Medical Association.

Worst affected, he said, are those with chronic illnesses, unemployed parents seeking vaccinations for their newborn children, and patients in need of expensive drugs including cancer treatment. "We estimate that about 2 million people are without health insurance, out of a total of nearly 8 million who require insurance ... and the problem looks set to continue in 2014," Patoulis said. "It's like planting dynamite under a country's public health."

BARBER'S BUREAUCRACY Pro-bailout governments have tried to stimulate employment by slashing the minimum wage and axing long-standing labor rights and market protection rules — liberalizing everything from truck licenses to permits for neighborhood bakeries.

But unemployment numbers continued to get worse, and critics argue the system remains bogged down in excessive bureaucracy. Unemployed barber Spyros Priftis has been trying to open his own hair salon for nearly three years at a holiday resort on his native island of Corfu, with rules still unclear on the status of his hairdressing diploma obtained from a private college.

"It takes you five years to open up a barber shop in Greece: Two years for a diploma, two years for an apprenticeship, and one year to get your papers sorted out," the 37-year-old said. "Five years! What am I, a heart surgeon? I just want to open a barber shop."

In desperation, Priftis began writing dozens of letters of complaint and faxing them to Greek authorities, as well as European Union finance commissioner Olli Rehn and International Monetary Fund managing director Christine Largarde.

Some of his letters got an answer. And the usually stern EU-IMF negotiators even promised to take up his case with the government during their inspections in Athens. He's still waiting for news.

POLITICAL PERIL

Greece is being run by its third pro-bailout government in two years, as unpopular austerity measures wear out public support for the parties backing them. Conservative Prime Minister Samaras heads the current coalition government and has seen his support in the 300-seat parliament dwindle in the past 18 months from 179 lawmakers to 153.

Samaras recently fell behind in the polls to the left-wing Syriza party that wants to radically renegotiate or even tear up bailout deals, arguing they have failed to deliver recovery and are socially catastrophic.

Syriza has vowed to try to topple the government at twin elections in May for local government and the European Parliament. "In (2014) we will leave behind the decadent political establishment that left the country bankrupt, an establishment of graft and corruption," said Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras, who turns 40 this year. Surveys strongly suggest the two main parties both lack the support to govern outright.

Public sympathy for the far-right Golden Dawn party, meanwhile, remains strong — polling at around 9 percent — despite the jailing of its leadership on charges of criminal activity and recently emerged videotape showing senior party officials greeting newly sworn in members with Nazi salutes.

DEBT MOUNTAIN Despite all the bad news, few people doubt that Greece's fiscal situation is slowly improving, with overspending under control and size of the once-massive public sector reduced. There's more good news: The country's credit rating has begun a long climb out of junk territory. Shares on the Athens Stock Exchange closed at 1,162.68 on the year's last day of trading Tuesday, still well short of pre-recession prices but up an impressive 28 percent on the year. And borrowing rates continued to ease from sky-high crisis levels, the yield on 10-year bonds ending 2013 at 8.42 percent, from nearly 13 percent in late March.

Still, the weakened economy is set to be burdened by a national debt of 176 percent of gross domestic product this year, leaving Athens in vital need of additional debt relief from its emergency creditors. Samaras wants to avoid seeking additional loan money to cover an expected budget shortfall in 2014 and instead hopes to return to bond markets after a four-year absence.

"A critical factor is the whether there can be at least a modest bond issue on the international markets. That would mark the end of the bailout program and could have a significant political effect," said Theodore Krintas, managing director at Attica Wealth Management.

"So I think 2014 will be a year with no middle-ground scenario. Things will either go well, or they will go badly. Either they will develop much more positively than 2013, or it'll be a year of great turbulence. It won't be business as usual, that's for sure."

Latvia becomes 18th country to adopt the euro

January 01, 2014

RIGA, Latvia (AP) — Latvia celebrated the new year as the 18th member of the eurozone, which for all its dents and bruises still represents stability and security to the Baltic country's leaders.

The euro became Latvia's official currency after midnight local time Tuesday (2200 GMT Monday) as New Year's rockets exploded in the skies over the capital, Riga. Acting Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis withdrew the first euro note from a bank machine in a ceremony in Riga after Latvian TV showed pre-recorded greetings from European leaders welcoming his country to the eurozone.

"It's a big opportunity for Latvia's economic development becoming a member of the world's second biggest currency," Dombrovskis said. After joining NATO and the European Union in 2004, entering the eurozone was seen as a natural step for Latvia's political leadership, deepening the Western integration they have sought since Latvia and its Baltic neighbors, Estonia and Lithuania, broke away from the Soviet Union in the early 1990s.

"Joining the euro marks the completion of Latvia's journey back to the political and economic heart of our continent, and that is something for all of us to celebrate," said Olli Rehn, the EU commissioner in charge of economic and monetary affairs.

However, many Latvians are skeptical about the euro. Opinion polls show about half opposed to the currency switch, though support has risen somewhat this year. Some are reluctant to give up Latvia's own currency, the lat, a powerful symbol of independence.

There's also concern about the eurozone's financial woes in recent years and resentment toward the austerity measures imposed by the government partly to fulfill the bloc's stringent membership criteria.

Estonia joined the eurozone in 2011 and Lithuania aims to become a member in 2015. That would complete the Baltic countries' efforts to link up economically, politically and militarily with the West while moving away from Russia's sphere of influence.

European leaders hailed Latvia's entry as a boost for the currency bloc, even though the relatively poor country of only 2 million people is a tiny part of the eurozone economy. Some experts have expressed concern about Latvia's reputation as a haven for suspicious money from the East, just nine months after the eurozone had to rescue Cyprus, a similarly tiny member state that also specialized in attracting huge deposits from Russia.

AP writer Karl Ritter in Stockholm contributed to this report.

New euro member Latvia brings dirty money headache

December 30, 2013

RIGA, Latvia (AP) — When Latvia adopts the euro on Jan. 1, it will bring with it a banking sector that is swelling with suspicious money from Russia and the east — just as the currency bloc is trying to clamp down on such havens.

It was just nine months ago that the eurozone had to rescue Cyprus, a similarly tiny member state that also specialized in attracting huge deposits from Russia. Since then, eurozone leaders have vowed to crack down on financial sanctuaries and improve transparency.

But as the 18th member of the eurozone, Latvia is likely to see a greater — not smaller — influx of dirty money as the country will be viewed as safer than other former Soviet states while financial oversight remains loose.

"Immediately after Latvia joins the eurozone, I imagine we're going to see an actual spike in dubious money flowing in," said Mark Galeotti, a professor at New York University who researches organized crime in the former Soviet Union.

For years, Latvia's political and financial leaders had hoped to create a mini-Switzerland in Eastern Europe — a place where capital in unstable countries such as Russia or Kazakhstan could either park for a while or channel its way further west to banking meccas like Zurich or London.

After a slight dip during Latvia's financial crisis in 2008-2010, the amount of non-resident bank deposits has risen rapidly over the past two years ahead of the country's entry into the eurozone. "The issue with Latvia is that you have a pretty permissible political environment, and you have the massive and quite efficient infrastructure for managing these funds from the East. The question is, why wouldn't you want to go to Latvia?" said Galeotti.

Latvia has 20 domestically registered banks, or one for every 100,000 residents — an extremely high ratio. Of these, about 13 are considered "boutique banks" that rely almost exclusively on foreign funds, mainly from volatile countries of the former Soviet Union. Rather than lend to businesses and consumers, these tiny financial institutions primarily serve as safe havens or money transfer operations. They tend to keep their money in liquid assets so it can quickly be moved.

Some of the money is dirty. This year, Latvia's bank regulator slapped a 100,000-lat ($200,000) fine on a bank for failing to exercise sufficient internal controls with money connected to the so-called Magnitsky case.

Sergei Magnitsky was a Russian lawyer who worked for Hermitage Capital, an investment fund whose chief executive accused Russian police officials of stealing $230 million in tax rebates after illegally seizing Hermitage subsidiaries. In 2008 Magnitsky, at the age of 37, died in prison of pancreatitis, allegedly after being beaten and denied medical treatment.

Hermitage Capital claimed that tens of millions of dollars of the stolen money passed through Latvia. Claiming confidentiality and a risk of destabilizing the industry, Latvia's regulator refused to "name and shame" the bank connected to the case. This refusal, as well as the small size of the fine, triggered criticism and renewed doubts about the regulator's integrity despite imminent eurozone membership.

"The regulators don't have teeth," said Galeotti. They maintain "a kind of culture that emerged in Latvia in the late 1990s...which was ultimately 'Latvia desperately needs business,' and therefore the role of the regulator is not to impede business," he said.

Non-resident bank deposits comprise nearly half of all deposits, which is unusual, and they are on the rise. In the first quarter of 2013, non-resident deposits soared 17.7 percent compared with the same period in 2012 — clear evidence that Latvia's attractiveness as a safe haven is not relenting. The economy has been the fastest-growing in the EU for the past three years and the country displays a remarkable degree of political stability.

"Latvia has historically had a large banking sector, has extremely strict data privacy laws, speaks Russian and 'gets' the post-Soviet mentality," said Tom Wallace, an analyst at C4ADS, a Washington, D.C.-based firm that specializes in data analysis and security.

Wallace, who co-authored a report on the links between Latvian banks and Ukrainian companies involved in the illicit arms trade, added that Latvia "is an EU member and so acts as a conduit to Western financial institutions. If you have money you want to discreetly move out of the former Soviet Union, Latvia has a lot of advantages."

Latvia's banks face scrutiny in a eurozone-wide review by the European Central Bank, which is trying to find weak spots in the financial sector to improve transparency and confidence. The good news for the eurozone is that Latvia's banking system is not too big compared with its economy. That means the country is less likely to need a bailout from its new eurozone partners to save its banks, should they run into trouble, as happened with Cyprus. As of Sept. 30, the banks held nearly 20 billion lats ($30 billion) in assets, or about 120 percent of gross domestic product, far less than the average 320 percent in the eurozone in 2011.

On the flip side, for Latvia, the eurozone is now a safer economic bloc to join than it was 18 months ago, when many investors worried it would break apart. Markets have calmed since the ECB vowed in the summer of 2012 to do whatever it takes to keep the bloc together.

Latvia's regulator says it has introduced a number of controls aimed at anti-money laundering, counter-terrorist financing, and preventing excessively large sums from entering the banking system. Experts agree that the regulator has acknowledged the risks of dirty money and is addressing them, even if slowly.

But Latvian bankers say that pinpointing dirty money is not cut-and-dry. "As anti-laundering regulations become more elaborate across the globe, so are the schemes used by persons who try to avoid them," said Arvids Sipols, who has worked 16 years in Latvian banks and is now on the board of Nord Capital Markets, a Riga-based asset management firm.

"In certain cases, simple filters do work and help to avoid the acceptance of rogue players," said Sipols. "In other cases it will not suffice, and it is not a banker's job to become an international detective."

Historic freeze could break Midwest temp records

January 04, 2014

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) — It has been decades since parts of the Midwest experienced a deep freeze like the one expected to arrive Sunday, with potential record-low temperatures heightening fears of frostbite and hypothermia even in a region where residents are accustomed to bundling up.

This "polar vortex," as one meteorologist calls it, is caused by a counterclockwise-rotating pool of cold, dense air. The frigid air, piled up at the North Pole, will be pushed down to the U.S., funneling it as far south as the Gulf Coast.

Ryan Maue, of Tallahassee, Fla., a meteorologist for Weather Bell, said temperature records will likely be broken during the short yet forceful deep freeze that will begin in many places on Sunday and extend into early next week. That's thanks to a perfect combination of the jet stream, cold surface temperatures and the polar vortex.

"All the ingredients are there for a near-record or historic cold outbreak," he said "If you're under 40 (years old), you've not seen this stuff before." The temperature predictions are startling: 25 below zero in Fargo, N.D., minus 31 in International Falls, Minn., and 15 below in Indianapolis and Chicago. At those temperatures, exposed skin can get frostbitten in minutes and hypothermia can quickly set in because wind chills could hit 50, 60 or even 70 below zero.

Sunday's playoff game in Green Bay could be among one of the coldest NFL games ever played. Temperatures at Lambeau Field are expected to be a frigid minus 2 degrees when the Packers and San Francisco 49ers kickoff, and by the fourth quarter it'll be a bone-chilling minus 7, with wind chills approaching minus 30, according to the National Weather Service. Officials are warning fans to take extra safety measures to stay warm including dressing in layers and sipping warm drinks.

Minnesota called off school for Monday statewide, the first such closing in 17 years, because of projected highs in the minus teens and lows as cold as 30 below. Milwaukee and Madison, Wis., students also won't be in class Monday. North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple urged superintendents to keep children's safety in making the decision after the state forecast called for "life threatening wind chills" through Tuesday morning.

And though this cold spell will last just a few days as warmer air comes behind, it likely will freeze over the Great Lakes and other bodies of water, meaning frigid temperatures will likely last the rest of winter, Maue said.

"It raises the chances for future cold," he said, adding it could include next month's Super Bowl in New York. Snow already on the ground and fresh powder expected in some places ahead of the cold air will reduce the sun's heating effect, so nighttime lows will plummet thanks to strong northwest winds that will deliver the Arctic blast, Maue said. And there's no warming effect from the Gulf to counteract the cold air, he said.

The cold blast will sweep through parts of New England, where residents will have just dug out from a snowstorm and the frigid temperatures that followed. Parts of the central Midwest could also see up to a foot of snow just as the cold sweeps in pulling temperatures to 10 below zero in the St. Louis area.

Even places accustomed to normally mild to warmer winters will see a plunge in temperatures early next week, including Atlanta where the high is expected to hover in the mid-20s on Tuesday. "This one happens to be really big and it's going to dive deep into the continental U.S. And all that cold air is going to come with it," said Sally Johnson, meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service in Sioux Falls.

It's relatively uncommon to have such frigid air blanket so much of the U.S., maybe once a decade or every couple of decades, Maue said. But in the long-run the deep temperature dives are less meaningful for comparison to other storms than daytime highs that are below-zero and long cold spells, he said.

And so far, this winter is proving to be a cold one. "Right now for the winter we will have had two significant shots of major Arctic air and we're only through the first week of January. And we had a pretty cold December," Maue said.

Cambodian police disperse protesters from park

January 04, 2014

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — Cambodian police on Saturday dispersed about 1,000 anti-government demonstrators from a park in the capital, Phnom Penh, a day after four people were killed in a crackdown on a labor protest.

Hundreds of anti-riot police moved in after warning the protesters to leave the area known as Freedom Park, where they have camped since mid-December to demand that Prime Minister Hun Sen step down and call new elections. They claim that a July vote was rigged and the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party robbed of victory.

At least four people were killed Friday when police opened fire to break up a protest by striking garment workers demanding a doubling of the minimum wage. The latest crackdowns indicate a hardening of the government's response to opposition and labor protests, which have been generally peaceful since the elections.

One measure of the seriousness of the situation was an unusual statement issued by the Defense Ministry after Friday's deaths, affirming the military's loyalty to the government. The statement said the army would take whatever action was necessary to defend the government, the king and the constitution. It said that the armed forces regretted learning that some opportunists and politicians insulted the government and incited people to oppose Hun Sen's leadership by bringing about instability.

Rumors were rife in Phnom Penh on Saturday that arrest warrants were issued for opposition and labor leaders, though officials denied that was the case. The park — a venue for political demonstrations — was cleared after Phnom Penh Gov. Pa Socheatvong sent a letter to opposition leader Sam Rainsy banning the use of the park this and next weekend, as well as marches through the city's streets, citing security reasons. The letter said the ban would be lifted once the situation improved.

Major rallies are held at the park on weekends, and the turnout was expected to be larger than usual this time because of anger at Friday's fatal confrontations with workers. While police who cleared Freedom Park were not visibly armed, they acted forcefully and were joined by unidentified plainclothes men carrying iron pipes, who milled around the area afterward in an effort to discourage the protesters from regrouping.

Lang Rith, a 29-year-old demonstrator from southern Takeo province, said he was hit with baton on his back as he tried to run away from the park. "They beat us like they beat animals. I am very scared," Lang Rith said.

The opposition party CNRP issued a statement calling on its followers to maintain a policy of non-violence and appealed to civil society groups and foreign embassies to serve as witnesses to government violence.

The local human rights group LICADHO earlier said in a statement that at least four civilians were shot dead and 21 injured Friday in what it described as "the worst state violence against civilians to hit Cambodia in 15 years."

"The use of live ammunition was prolonged and no efforts appear to have been made to prevent death and serious injury," it said. "Reports suggest that security forces were also injured after being hit with stones."

The U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in Cambodia, Surya Subedi, said Friday's incident was the third time since the disputed elections that authorities have shot into a crowd and caused fatalities. He called for an independent investigation into whether excessive force was used. He also expressed concerned about increasing violence by some demonstrators.

The United States said it deeply regrets the loss of life in the violent clashes between protesters and government security forces. The State Department said that the U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh has been in contact with representatives from all sides to urge the exercise of maximum restraint and respect for the rule of law.

The standoff over wages presents Hun Sen with a dilemma, as increasing violence could drive the workers into a tighter alliance with the opposition, providing a vast pool of people for their increasingly confident street demonstrations. But the government is also close to the factory owners, whose exports fuel the economy and who are generally seen as financial supporters of Hun Sen's ruling Cambodian People's Party.

US sends more embassy personnel out of South Sudan

January 03, 2014

JUBA, South Sudan (AP) — The U.S. Embassy in South Sudan is evacuating more of its personnel because of a deteriorating security situation.

The embassy said Friday that it is organizing another evacuation flight to leave Friday. The embassy has already organized about a dozen flights since fighting broke out Dec. 15. The embassy did not give a specific reason why it is evacuating more personnel. An anti-government force controls a state capital about 120 kilometers (70 miles) north of the country capital, Juba. South Sudan's military spokesman says that force wants to advance on to Juba.

The embassy said it will no longer provide consular services in South Sudan as of Saturday. Even as rebels threaten to march on the capital, representatives for the warring parties are holding preliminary peace talks in Ethiopia.

Historians, environmentalists oppose Calif. solar power plant

Los Angeles (UPI)
Dec 26, 2013

A proposed solar power plant in California has come under fire over concerns it will mar historic elements of a World War II internment camp and harm wildlife.

The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power says that despite the objections is it going ahead with plans to put 1 million photovoltaic panels on 1,200 acres it owns in the Owens Valley north of the city.

The $680-million, 200-megawatt plant would sit within 3-1/2 miles of the historic Manzanar site that was a Japanese American internment camp during World War II, the Los Angeles Times reported Thursday.

Japanese American organizations and National Park Service officials have expressed concerns the solar plant would destroy the isolated character of the site, important to understanding what internees encountered as they were kept there seven decades ago.

Critics of the plant admitted they have little legal or regulatory recourse to try and halt the construction of the solar facility.

"There is no agency that regulates vistas and views," said Bruce Embrey, co-chair of the Manzanar Committee, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving the site. "We have moral authority, an appeal to the city's social conscience. We are urging the DWP to consider alternative sites for its solar farm, perhaps on structures in downtown Los Angeles."

Congress established the 814-acre Manzanar site in 1992 to serve as a reminder of a failure of American civil rights.

In February 1942, two months after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and amid fears along the U.S. west coast of sabotage and espionage, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed an executive order allowing military commanders to relocate and intern "any and all persons" from certain areas.

Thousands of U.S. citizens of Japanese descent were summarily removed to the remote Manzanar site, a harsh landscape hemmed in on the west by the Sierra Nevada Mountains and on the east by the Inyo Mountains.

"For the sake of our visitors' experiences and the memories of our former internees, we must advocate for the area to remain undeveloped," Manzanar Superintendant Les Inafuku told the Times.

Source: Solar Daily.
Link: http://www.solardaily.com/reports/Historians_environmentalists_oppose_Calif_solar_power_plant_999.html.

South Sudan's warring factions meet in Ethiopia

January 03, 2014

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AP) — South Sudan's warring factions held preliminary meetings Friday ahead of the official start of negotiations in neighboring Ethiopia, mediators said.

Dina Mufti, a spokesman for Ethiopia's Foreign Ministry, said the introductory meetings were necessary to bridge the groups' differences ahead of direct talks expected to start Saturday. The meetings are being held at Addis Ababa's Sheraton Hotel.

Meanwhile, both sides continue to fight in the world's newest country and the U.S. Embassy in Juba, the capital, said Friday the Department of State ordered a "further drawdown" of embassy personnel because of the "deteriorating security situation." An evacuation flight was being arranged Friday, the statement said.

South Sudan's government has declared a state of emergency in Unity and Jonglei, two states whose capitals are under rebel control. On Thursday the central government warned that rebels loyal to ousted Vice President Riek Machar were preparing to march to Juba from Bor, the capital of Jonglei state that has been the scene of fierce fighting between government troops and rebels.

South Sudan's military said Thursday it had sent reinforcements to Bor, 120 kilometers (74.57 miles) from Juba. President Salva Kiir insists the fighting was sparked by a coup attempt mounted by soldiers loyal to Machar on Dec. 15. But that account has been disputed by some officials of the ruling party who say the violence began when presidential guards from Kiir's Dinka ethnic group tried to disarm those from the Nuer group of Machar. From there, violence spread across the country, with forces loyal to Machar defecting and seizing territory from loyalist forces.

South Sudan has been plagued by ethnic tension and a power struggle within the ruling party that escalated after Kiir dismissed Machar as his vice president in July. The rebels back Machar, who is now a fugitive sought by the military.

South Sudan peacefully broke away from Sudan in 2011 following a 2005 peace deal. Before that, the south fought decades of war with Sudan.

South Sudan peace talks to open in Ethiopia

January 01, 2014

JUBA, South Sudan (AP) — Negotiators from South Sudan's two warring sides are scheduled to arrive in Ethiopia for peace talks late Wednesday, as the top United Nations official in the country urged both forces to bring the country "back from the brink."

Fighting continued Wednesday in South Sudan's city of Bor — a gateway city to the capital, Juba — a government official said. Bor is just 120 kilometers (75 miles) from Juba. Bor, the capital of Jonglei state, is the current center of ethnically-based violence stemming from the political rivalry between President Salva Kiir and ousted Vice President Riek Machar, the rebel leader accused of mounting a failed coup attempt.

More than 1,000 people have been killed in the violence, says the U.N. Machar said on Tuesday that he would send his forces from Bor on to Juba, but that threat was downplayed by Hilde Johnson, the U.N. representative in South Sudan, who said: "I think we need to take quotations with pinches of salt at this point of time."

Pro-Machar forces in Bor appear to be taking defensive positions, Johnson said. The Bor fighting has newly displaced about 60,000 people, the country's latest humanitarian crisis. "On Jan. 1, the country is at a fork in the road, but it can still be saved from further major escalation of violence," said Johnson, who urged Kiir and Machar to use the new talks to move toward peace. "They can still pull the country back from the brink."

The U.N. is "gravely concerned" about mounting evidence of gross violations of international human rights law, including the extra-judicial killings of civilians and captured soldiers, it said on Tuesday. The U.N.'s estimate of 1,000 dead was given days ago and the number of fatalities is believed to be higher as a result of the new fighting around the country, including in Bor.

South Sudan Foreign Minister Barnaba Marial Benjamin labeled Bor a war zone on Wednesday. Government troops pulled out of parts of Bor because they were concerned about having to kill the "young boys" who fill the ranks of the rebels, said one analyst.

South Sudan's military "was told to withdraw," Edmund Yakani, the executive director of the Juba-based group Community Empowerment for Progress, said, citing the accounts of contacts in Bor. "They communicated that these are young boys and we are killing them like nothing."

Government troops in Bor face renegade forces allied with a pro-Machar tribal militia known as the "White Army," so called because its young members of the Nuer tribe smear their faces with ash to keep insects away.

Johnson said that 240 U.N. police are scheduled to arrive in South Sudan later Wednesday who can help police refugee camps. The U.N. says up to 180,000 people have been internally displaced by the violence, including about 68,000 sheltering at U.N. camps.

"Even with the tremendous efforts made by health partners, sanitation conditions are still inadequate largely due to the large number of people sheltering in United Nations bases which have insufficient space to house these numbers," said Abdi Aden Mohammed, the World Health Organization's representative in South Sudan.

Although Kiir insists the fighting was sparked by a coup attempt mounted by soldiers loyal to Machar, this account has been disputed by some officials of the ruling party who say violence broke out when presidential guards from Kiir's majority Dinka tribe tried to disarm guards from the Nuer ethnic group of Machar.

South Sudan has been plagued by ethnic tension and a power struggle within the ruling party that escalated after Kiir dismissed Machar as his vice president in July. Machar has criticized Kiir as a dictator and says he will contest the 2015 presidential election.

South Sudan's government, the U.N. and other analysts say the dispute is political at its heart, but has since taken on ethnic dimensions. The fighting has displaced up to 180,000 people, according to the U.N.

Muhumuza reported from Kampala, Uganda.