Dalai Lama begins visit to India's disputed Arunachal Pradesh

New Delhi - Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama arrived Sunday to a resounding welcome at the monastery town of Tawang in India's eastern state of Arunachal Pradesh, which China considers a disputed region. Thousands of maroon-robed monks and local people clad in traditional costumes crowded the Dalai Lama's route from the helipad to the Tawang monastery, the IANS news agency reported.

At the Tawang monastery, the Dalai Lama was greeted by more than 800 monks, including scores of child novitiates, who chanted hymns and rang giant gongs.

Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Dorjee Khandu was also present to greet the Dalai Lama.

China had repeatedly protested the Dalai Lama's plan to visit the region, which it considers to be southern Tibet.

China views the Dalai Lama as a separatist, conspiring for Tibetan independence. The Tibetan leader has said that he wants greater autonomy for Tibet within China.

China also claims 90,000 square kilometres of territory in Arunachal Pradesh while India says it is an integral part of the country.

India, in turn, accuses China of occupying 38,000 square kilometres in Jammu and Kashmir.

Several rounds of talk since 2005 have led to little progress on resolving issues over the undemarcated border shared by the two countries along the Himalayan range.

In the face of China's protests over the Dalai Lama's visit, the Indian government had responded by saying the spiritual leader was free to travel where he wished in India as long as it was for religious purposes.

An aide to the Dalai Lama said on the eve of his visit that the leader was going to Tawang to give religious discourses and would not be interacting with the media.

"It was a lifetime experience to have seen the Dalai Lama from so close," Sherbu, an excited child monk was quoted as saying. "He waved back at us, and I consider this to be a blessing for me and the people here."

The Arunachal Pradesh government invited the Dalai Lama to visit Tawang, which was the birthplace of the sixth Dalai Lama. It was also one of the first stops for the 14th and current Dalai Lama when he fled from Tibet in 1959 after the Chinese occupation of the region.

The Dalai Lama and his government-in-exile, which is not recognized by any nation, are based at the northern Indian hill town of Dharamsala.

Along with the Dalai Lama, an estimated 100,000 Tibetans live in India.

China pledges 10 billion dollars in aid to Africa - Summary

Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt (Earth Times - dpa) - Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on Sunday pledged 10 billion dollars in new loans to African nations for the development of infrastructure and social programs. He made the announcement at the start of the fourth ministerial meeting of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.

"We will help Africa build up financing capacity. We will provide 10 billion dollars in concessional loans to African countries," Wen told the gathering of leaders from some 50 countries across Africa.

The loans are to be distributed over the next three years.

"I came to Sharm el-Sheikh to boost friendship between our country and the African continent," Wen said. "Whatever change may take place in the world ... our policy of supporting Africa's economic and social development will not change."

The two-day FOCAC meeting, opened by Egyptian President Hosny Mubarak, is to follow up on the implementation of recommendations from the last summit in Beijing in 2006.

China's 10-billion-dollar loan is double that offered at the Beijing summit and in line with an earlier promise to the African continent.

These included commitments by China to double its 2006 assistance to Africa by 2009, to provide 3 billion dollars in preferential loans and 2 billion dollars in preferential buyer credits to Africa, to establish a special fund of 5 billion dollars to encourage Chinese investment in Africa, and to cancel some debts.

Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi, who is accompanying Wen, earlier told the official Xinhua news agency that steps agreed to at the Beijing summit had been implemented smoothly.

En route to Cairo, Wen responded to claims that China is exploiting African nations in order to fulfill its own needs for energy and resources.

"Energy is never the main part of our cooperation with Africa. What China expects is comprehensive cooperation of mutual benefits," the China Daily quoted Wen as saying.

China would also set up environmental and scientific programs in the continent, Wen said.

China is to set up 100 clean energy projects as well as science and technology partnership, under which China would carry out 100 joint demonstration projects with Africa on scientific and technological research and receive 100 African postdoctoral fellows to conduct scientific research in China.

Wen also promised that China would build 50 schools and train 1,500 school principals and teachers for African countries.

China will also help in the medical care and health African sectors providing medical equipment and anti-malaria materials worth 500 million yuan (73.2 million US dollars) to the 30 hospitals and 30 malaria prevention and treatment centers built by China and train 3,000 doctors and nurses for Africa.

On Saturday, Wen held talks with Mubarak and the two signed a number of economic and cultural agreements.

He also visited the 22-member Cairo-based Arab League, and noted that under the current international political and economic circumstances, "it is in the interests of both China and the Arab countries to enhance cooperation."

Arab League Secretary General Amr Mussa meanwhile expressed gratitude to China for its support for Arab causes.

Thousands rally against US base in Japan

Tokyo - Thousands of people rallied on the island of Okinawa in southern Japan on Sunday to demand the relocation of a US military base which they say has been a burden on the island. The protests, which organizers say drew about 21,000 people, occurred just days ahead of a scheduled visit by US President Barack Obama to Japan.

According to a 2006 agreement between Tokyo and Washington, the Futenma base is to be moved from the city centre of Ginowan to reclaimed land near Henoko on the island's coastal region.

The row over the base could overshadow Obama's visit as newly- elected Japanese Premier Yukio Hatoyama, who has campaigned for a more equal relationship with the US, has said the base could be moved off the island or even out of the country entirely.

The US demands that Japan honor the 2006 deal, under which Tokyo would also have to finance the relocation of the base by 2014.

Meanwhile, Hatoyama has come under pressure in his own country as his approval ratings have dropped following his landslide election in August after decades of conservative governments.

Ginowan residents complain the base has increased noise levels, pollution and crime in the city.

"I urge Prime Minister Hatoyama to tell President Obama that Okinawa needs no more US bases," Ginowan mayor Yoichi Iha was quoted as saying at the rally in a report by the British Broadcasting Corporation.

Even the suggested new location of the base is controversial as environmentalists fear damage to local coral reefs, the BBC reported.

In total 47,000 US military personnel are currently based in Japan.

Iraq parliament approves long delayed elections law

Baghdad- Iraqi lawmakers voted on a long delayed new election bill that will pave the way for national elections in January. A debate over the conduct of elections in the oil-rich disputed city of Kirkuk has forestalled a vote several times in recent weeks.

Many Iraqi Kurds hope to make Kirkuk, and its nearby oil fields, the capital of a future independent state, calling it their "Jerusalem." Arab and Turkmen politicians view the city and surrounding al-Tamim province as integral parts of Iraq.

Parliamentary deadlock on the issue has thrown into question whether the elections will take place on January 16, as scheduled.

According to the Iraqi constitution, the elections must take place by the end of January. A law must be passed 90 days before voting begins.

Iyad al-Samarrai, the speaker of the Iraqi parliament has been meeting with representatives of the various parliamentary blocs in a new effort to strike a compromise.

The election law's appearance on the parliament's agenda followed an apparent softening of each side's position.

Kurdish lawmakers Tuesday said they would accept a compromise that would grant Kirkuk a "special status" in January's polls - a retreat from the Kurds' previous insistence that voting in Kirkuk and the surrounding al-Tamim province must take place together with the rest of the country, using the most recent voter registration rolls.

Massoud Barzani, president of northern Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region, had previously said that the Kurds would not accept any solution giving Kirkuk "a special status" in the 2010 polls.

Kirkuk was left out of previous elections after lawmakers failed to come to a formula for counting the region's votes.

Kurdish lawmakers back a UN proposal that would see Kirkuk vote with the rest of the country, using 2009 voter registration rolls that show a marked rise in the number of Kurdish voters.

Meanwhile, Arab and Turkmen politicians look with suspicion at the rise in Kurdish voters and want 2004 rolls used instead.

A more recent UN proposal suggested using the most recent voter rolls, but instituting a quota system to make sure that Arabs and Turkmens were represented.

This proposal also suggested making the results of the election provisional, subject to an examination of the voter rolls.

Kurds initially rejected that proposal, with the head of the Kurdish parliamentary bloc, calling it "curious backpedaling on the (UN) mission's stance on Iraq."

Iraqi lawmakers have been seeking a consensus solution to the issue for fear that Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, himself an ethnic Kurd, might veto an election law passed over Kurdish objections.

Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, an Arab Sunni Muslim, said he would intervene if one side sought a solution at the expense of all groups in the city.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/293769,iraq-parliament-approves-long-delayed-elections-law.html.

Ants Save Mates Trapped in Sand

Helpful acts, such as grooming or foster parenting, are common throughout the animal kingdom, but accounts of animals rescuing one another from danger are exceedingly rare, having been reported in the scientific literature only for dolphins, capuchin monkeys, and ants. New research shows that in the ant Cataglyphis cursor, the behavior is surprisingly sophisticated.

Elise Nowbahari of the University of Paris North, Karen L. Hollis of Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Massachusetts, and two colleagues mimicked a natural situation—an ant restrained by collapsing sand and debris.

But hidden beneath the sand was a nylon snare holding the ant firmly in place. The ant’s nestmates consistently responded by digging around the victim and tugging at its limbs until they found the trap, then biting at the nylon strand. Potential rescuers did not, however, do the same for unrelated ants or insects of other species.

The ants’ ability to discern and then tackle the unfamiliar nylon snare demonstrates cognitive and behavioral complexity, unlike such simple actions as digging or limb pulling, which could arguably be elicited by a chemical distress signal. Nowbahari and Hollis distinguish rescue behavior from other cooperative acts in that both participants risk physical harm (rescuing ants could themselves be trapped under falling sand), with no possibility of reward for the rescuer aside from the benefits of kin selection.

UNICEF says famine closing in on S. Sudan

Mon Nov 9, 2009

The United Nations children's agency UNICEF has warned of potential famine in southern Sudan, following low rainfalls and a surge in ethnic violence.

The world body says if action is not taken soon, the situation could have a serious impact on the lives of local people, especially children.

"Here the crisis is going to hit very hard. We can expect significant levels (of hunger) which can border on red flag emergency which becomes a famine," UNICEF's deputy executive director Hilde Johnson said on Sunday.

Poor rainfalls at the end of the rainy season along with a surge in tribal conflicts are the main reasons behind the current situation, added Johnson who is visiting south Sudan's oil-producing Jonglei state.

According to recent UN figures, about 1.2 million people are already suffering from serious food insecurity in the underdeveloped region.

The situation is expected to worsen in the coming months as a second dry season sets in and the few remaining food reserves are used up.

Officials say this could lead to conflicts between rival ethnic groups in the south.

This year alone, about 2,000 people in the region are thought to have lost their lives in tribal clashes.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://edition.presstv.ir/detail/110804.html.

Ahmadinejad to help open project in Venezuela

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez says his Iranian counterpart will visit Caracas before the end of the year to help inaugurate a joint housing project.

"I want him (Mahmoud Ahmadinejad) to accompany me to inaugurate some houses," Chavez told Iran's Ambassador to Venezuela, Ahmad Sobhani, in a Sunday TV-radio show.

The houses to be inaugurated are 240 homes built as part of a housing development program between the two countries.

During the Venezuelan president's last visit to Iran, which was in September, the two governments signed over 200 cooperation agreements in various fields such as health, oil, trade, housing, food and finance.

Iranian engineers have already constructed a dairy production plant and a flour factory in Venezuela.

According to comments by the Venezuelan mining minister and Chavez himself, Iranian experts are also helping the Latin American state locate uranium reserves.

The project involves conducting geophysical tests and aerial surveys to find uranium deposits in the mineral-rich states of Bolivar and Tachira.