Jumblatt discusses Damascus visit with Nasrallah

Hezbollah Secretary General Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah has met with Lebanon's Druze leader Walid Jumblatt as the country eyes rapprochement with neighboring Syria.

The talks between Nasrallah and Jumblatt focused on the latter's visit to Syria and assessed his March 31 meeting with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus, said a Friday statement by Hezbollah.

The Lebanese lawmaker and the leader of Lebanon's Progressive Socialists Party (PSP) thanked Nasrallah for his mediating role in making the visit possible.

The visit came in the wake of improvements in ties between Syria and Lebanon.

Jumblatt is known as one of Syria's harshest critics, but in March he said he was ready to bury the hatchet.

During the meeting, both leaders reiterated their commitment to resistance against Israeli threats.

"They also agreed on enhancing the coordination efforts between Hezbollah and the PSP, in order to consolidate coexistence and national unity," the statement added.

Jumblatt also called for cooperation between Hezbollah and the Lebanese army.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=122881§ionid=351020203.

US to retain 90 nukes on Iran border

As Washington and Moscow sign a new arms reduction treaty, skepticism arises in Turkey as to whether those cuts will include US atomic warheads stored in the country.

US President Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev signed a new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) in Prague on Thursday, which requires both sides to reduce their nuclear arsenals to 1,550, or about one-third below current levels.

This is while the Obama administration has revised US policy on atomic weapons, as part of a new Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) that, among other things, is said to be aimed at reducing the US stockpile.

But silence over anticipated US plans to withdraw nuclear bombs deployed in the Incirlik Air Base in southern Anatolia, has left many speculating on whether Washington has any intentions to remove the weapons at all.

When asked about a possible US move to withdraw its nuclear weapons from five European countries, including Turkey, Turkey's Defense Minister Vecdi Gonul said that Ankara had no information about such plans.

“No information has been officially announced,” Gonul told reporters on Wednesday.

The US has positioned a total of 200 B61 thermonuclear gravity bombs in Turkey, Belgium, France, the Netherlands and Germany since the Cold War. Turkey is believed to be hosting 90 bombs at Incirlik Air Base.

On April 2, The Times reported that the United States may remove tactical nuclear weapons deployed in five NATO member European countries, including Turkey.

However, the possibility of the White House seriously considering a decision to withdraw the B61 gravity bombs seems unlikely, as it has not consulted Ankara on the issue so far.

In the latest NPR, while the Obama Administration has reduced the threat of using nuclear weapons against signatories of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), it has excluded NPT signatory Iran from threat reduction.

During the release of the current NPT today, the US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said, "the NPR has a very strong message for both Iran and North Korea, because whether it's in declaratory policy or in other elements of the NPR, we essentially carve out states like Iran and North Korea that are not in compliance with NPT."

"Basically, all options are on the table when it comes to countries in that category," he elaborated.

Washington, which accuses Iran of having the "intention" of developing nuclear weapons, is leading a push for a fourth round of sanctions against Tehran at the United Nations Security Council in a bid to hinder the nation's drive for a nuclear energy program.

Iran, as a signatory of NPT, insists that it neither believes in atomic weapons, nor, as a matter of religious principles, does it intend to acquire nuclear or other weapons of mass-destruction.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=122919§ionid=351020104.

Iran's first bus rally gets under way

Participants in Iran's first city bus rally set off from the Number 2 Sports Complex of the Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company with dozens of vehicles of various makes.

The rally, with 54 buses of different ages, started Friday in the Iranian capital. Each bus has two drivers — chief and assistant. They are accompanied by their wives, who act as navigators.

The rally is scheduled to take 5 days, with the pack covering some 1,500 km (932 miles) while going through the scenic provinces of Qazvin, Gilan, Ardabil, East Azerbaijan, Zanjan, before heading back through Qazvin and pulling in in Tehran on April 14.

The managing director of the municipality-owned Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company Hussein Bizhani said the event has brought together the drivers with good safety records and aims to nurture traffic safety culture among Iranian motorists. The move is a welcome effort, given the country's catastrophic rate of traffic accidents.

He added that the country's police force, plus medical teams from the Red Crescent Society and officials from the five en route provinces are participating with the organizers of the event.

He noted the bus rally will hopefully make its way into neighboring countries in near future.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=122917§ionid=3510212.

In Somalia, al-Shabab takes BBC, VOA off air

Sat Apr 10, 2010

Somali armed group al-Shabab has banned Somali language transmissions by the BBC and VOA inside the country.

In a Friday press release, al-Shabab leaders ordered the local Mogadishu radio and other news organizations transmitting the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) or the Washington-based Voice of America to immediately terminate their contracts.

The group accused the BBC and VOA of negative propaganda against Muslims while supporting the transitional government, a Press TV correspondent reported from Mogadishu late Friday.

Al-Shabab also said that the BBC had been broadcasting the agenda of crusaders and colonialists against Muslims.

In reaction to the ban, VOA issued a statement Friday afternoon, saying that "VOA regrets this decision. We believe broadcasting news and information on FM stations serves the Somali people."

The BBC, in its defense, said it was strictly impartial and spoke to all sides in the conflict.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://edition.presstv.ir/detail/122900.html.

Iranian film competes in Denmark fest

Denmark's new CPH PIX film festival will showcase an Iranian feature film among 12 other movies, which are present in the festival's main competition program.

The film to represent Iran is the 76-minute A Light in the Fog which stars Parivash Nazariyeh and is directed by Panahbarkhoda Rezaei. The 2008 movie recounts the story of a widow, Rana, who lives in a rustic house with her aging father and repairs items such as lanterns for the locals.

Rana's father suggests she consider marrying their distant neighbor Rahmat, and consider she does, as she goes about her everyday tasks of checking fishing nets, lugging coal and caring for her aging dad in the remote, fog-cloaked mountains.

Denmark's CPH PIX international feature film festival will be screened across Copenhagen's cinemas from April 15. The festival is centered at Dagmar Cinema, which will exclusively show festival films during the event, and which will host a number of exciting director Q&A sessions, parties and more.

CPH PIX will go on until April 25 and screen no less than 185 new, original, thought-provoking, funny and controversial films from all over the world. The winner will walk away with 50,000 euros ($67,500).

According to the festival's official website, the 12 films selected for the competition section are:

- 'The Artist', Mariano Cohn, Gaston Duprat, Argentina (2008)
- 'Gigantic', Matt Aselton, USA (2008)
- 'Crush and Blush', Kyoung-mi Lee, South Korea (2008)
- 'A Light in the Fog', Panahbarkhoda Rezaei, Iran (2008)
- 'Katalin Varga', Peter Strickland, Romania (2009)
- 'Be Good', Juliette Garcias, France (2008)
- 'Helen', Christine Molloy, Joe Lawlor, Ireland (2008)
- 'Moon', Duncan Jones, UK (2009)
- 'Without You I'm Nothing', Florian Eichinger, Germany (2008)
- 'Guidance', Johan Jonason, Sweden (2009)
- 'North', Rune Denstad Langlo, Norway (2009)
- 'The Blessing', Heidi Maria Faisst, Denmark (2009)

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=122915§ionid=351020105.

Ahmadinejad opens Zimbabwe trade fair

Sat Apr 10, 2010

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is reportedly to visit Zimbabwe to open the country's International Trade Fair in Bulawayo on April 23.

"This year President Ahmadinejad will open the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair on April 23," Zimbabwean Government spokesman George Charamba said on Friday.

He made the announcement after Iran's new ambassador to Harare, Mohammad Pournajaf, presented his credentials to President Robert Mugabe.

Addressing a press conference after his meeting with Mugabe, Pournajaf said: "Zimbabwe and Iran enjoy strategic co-operation partnerships — the doors and gates of Iran are always open."

"You do not need a visa to visit Iran, so we invite Zimbabweans to come to Iran," AllAfrica news website quoted him as saying.

In March, Ahmadinejad told Zimbabwean Minister of State for Presidential Affairs Didymus Mutasa in Tehran that Iran was ready to help Zimbabwe as much as possible, in view of the sanctions imposed on Harare by the West.

The Islamic Republic will stand by Zimbabwe against "illegal pressure," he added.

Ahmadinejad also called for the implementation of all agreements signed by the two states.

Iran and Zimbabwe have signed several joint cooperation treaties, especially in agriculture, irrigation development, pharmaceuticals and biotechnology.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://edition.presstv.ir/detail/122913.html.

Polish president dies in air crash

A passenger plane carrying Polish President Lech Kaczynski has crashed on approach to Smolensk Airport in southwest Russia, killing all onboard.

Russian news agencies reported 87 people had died in the crash on Saturday, citing the Russia's Emergencies Ministry.

"The plane scraped the tree tops, crashed and caught fire," Polish Foreign Ministry spokesman Piotr Pszkowski told TVN24 channel.

"On board were the president, accompanied by his wife, the army chief of staff and Deputy Foreign Minister Andrzej Kremer," he added.

There were no survivors in the crash, the governor of the Smolensk region Sergei Antufiev said.

Kaczynski was on his way to Katyn where, together with representatives of the Katyn families, MPs and clergy he was to pay tribute to the Poles murdered by the Soviet Stalinist regime. It is estimated that some 22,000 Polish people were massacred by the Soviet People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD) in March 1940.

The agencies also said the plane was a Tupolev Tu-154 and had a capacity of up to 90 people.

The crash occurred about 1.5 km (0.9 miles) from Smolensk Airport in foggy conditions.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=122912§ionid=351020606.