Indonesian smoker loses six teeth to exploding cigarette

Jakarta - An Indonesian man has lost six teeth and received 51 stitches to his mouth after a cigarette he was smoking exploded, media reports said Tuesday. Andi Susanto, a resident of Bekasi near Jakarta, was riding a motorcycle when the cigarette exploded in his mouth on Thursday, The Jakarta Post newspaper reported.

Susanto, who admitted he had been a smoker since he was in elementary school, told the Post he was traumatized by the incident and would try to quit smoking.

"It had been always fine," the 31-year-old was quoted as saying by the Post. "The incident was all so unexpected."

Susanto's family is seeking compensation from the company that produced the cigarette, Nojorono Tobacco Indonesia.

The cigarette maker said its products did not contain any explosive materials.

Police are investigating the incident and had not yet established the cause of the explosion.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/307052,indonesian-smoker-loses-six-teeth-to-exploding-cigarette.html.

Malaysia's Anwar to call premier as witness in sodomy trial - Update

Kuala Lumpur - Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim on Tuesday claimed that Prime Minister Najib Razak and his wife were involved in bringing the current sodomy charges against him. After months of delays, the trial began at the High Court in the capital Kuala Lumpur, the second time Anwar has faced charges of sodomy.

Anwar, 62, is accused of sodomizing a 24-year-old male aide, a charge he denies.

Scores of supporters and reporters greeted Anwar, who arrived with his wife, daughters and lawyers.

The former deputy prime minister, dressed in a grey suit, smiled and waved at supporters, many of whom had been gathered for hours, before entering the court.

Less than an hour later, as the court adjourned for lunch, Anwar told reporters he was seeking to subpoena Najib and his wife Rosmah Mansor as witnesses.

Anwar claimed that he had proof that his accuser, Saiful Bukhari Azlan, had gone to meet Najib at the premier's residence days before the allegations were made public, and charged that the premier had a role in the accusations.

Najib had earlier admitted to meeting Saiful, but said the young man had only come to reveal that he had been sodomized by Anwar.

Najib claimed he did not know Saiful prior to the meeting, and that he had agreed to meet him in his "capacity as a leader and he as an ordinary citizen who wants to tell me something."

Anwar said the new sodomy charges were part of a political plot to undermine his three-party opposition alliance, which made major gains in the country's 2008 general elections.

In a previous case, Anwar was sentenced to prison for corruption and sodomizing his family's former driver in 1998. He was then released in 2004 after the Federal Court overturned the sodomy conviction.

Anwar has maintained that the charges at that time were designed to prevent him from challenging then Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.

Officials have denied claims of a conspiracy.

Sodomy is a crime in mainly Muslim Malaysia, punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/307058,malaysias-anwar-to-call-premier-as-witness-in-sodomy-trial.html.

Southern Israeli coast closed off after floating bombs discovered

Tel Aviv - Israel's southern coastline was closed Tuesday, and police were on high alert, following the discovery of two barrels packed with explosives which washed ashore Monday. The two barrels were found near the resort city of Ashkelon, about 12 kilometers north of the Gaza Strip, and the port city of Ashdod, which lies approximately 30 kilometers north of the salient.

Security officials said the barrels were part of a carefully planned, coordinated attack originating from the Gaza Strip and targeting Israeli ships, ports and naval bases.

Police spokesman Mickey Rosenfeld said the coast south of Ashdod was closed off and police and security forces were on the lookout for further floating bombs.

The two barrels discovered Monday, which were filled with 15 kilograms of explosives, were made safe by police.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/307062,southern-israeli-coast-closed-off-after-floating-bombs-discovered.html.

Germany, India discuss economic and security cooperation

New Delhi - German President Horst Koehler held talks with Indian leaders in New Delhi Tuesday to deepen the partnership between the two countries, including economic and security cooperation. Accompanied by a high-level business delegation, Koehler, 66, arrived in the Indian capital Monday to begin a week-long tour.

Koehler was welcomed with a ceremonial reception on the forecourt of the presidential palace where he was received by his Indian counterpart Pratibha Patil and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

The German president later laid a wreath at the memorial to Mahatma Gandhi, pacifist leader of India's independence movement.

After a brief meeting with India's Foreign Minister SM Krishna, Koehler held key talks with Singh at the Hyderabad House.

The Indian External Affairs Ministry said the agenda included global challenges such as international terrorism, the financial crisis, climate change and poverty reduction.

Four pacts between India and Germany are under discussion including one on security and counter-terrorism measures and another on economic and technological cooperation.

"The key objective of President Köhler's visit is to open up new avenues for Germany and India to work together in developing a 21st-century world policy based on mutual cooperation," the German embassy in Delhi said.

"His first official visit to India underlines the increasing importance of the strategic partnership between Germany and India," it added.

The legislative power of the German president is limited - national government is headed by the chancellor - but the role carries symbolic weight, especially in diplomatic relations.

Koehler's schedule includes a meeting with top business leaders later Tuesday and a visit to the Indian Institute of Technology in Delhi on Wednesday.

On Thursday he is to travel to the western state of Maharashtra, to visit the plants of German carmaker Volkswagen and Indian energy company Thermax in the town of Pune, before traveling to Mumbai to meet with Indian industrialists.

On Sunday, Koehler and the German delegation are scheduled to fly on to South Korea, the current chair of the G-20.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/307065,germany-india-discuss-economic-and-security-cooperation.html.

American detainees say US, Pakistan trying to set them up

Islamabad - Five American nationals arrested in Pakistan on suspicion of conspiring to carry out terrorist attacks accused US and Pakistani authorities of trying to frame them Tuesday. The detainees, believed to be in their 20s, made the allegation in a letter thrown to reporters from inside a prison van which took them to a special court in Pakistan's eastern town of Sargodha.

"Since our arrest the USA and the FBI and Pakistani police have tortured us," the men said in the letter written on tissue paper. "They are trying to set us up."

The suspects said they were innocent, and ended their letter with the phrase "help us."

Their counsel, Khalid Khwaja, told reporters that he was being prevented from meeting his clients and did not have access to the police reports.

Pakistani police and prison authorities rejected the torture charge, which was also made when the Americans were being driven away from the court on January 18.

Investigation officer Amir Abbas Shirazi said on Monday that the court had ordered the detainees to be medically examined.

The suspects were remanded in custody until February 16, the date set for the next hearing.

The media and public are not allowed to witness the trial, but two officials from the US embassy in Islamabad were present in court.

The American students were reported missing from the US state of Virginia in November, and arrested in a raid on a house in Sargodha in December.

Pakistani police claimed the five men were plotting terrorist attacks and tried to link up with Islamist extremist groups associated with al-Qaeda over the internet.

Two of the suspects are of Pakistani origin and the three others of Egyptian, Yemeni and Eritrean descent.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/307071,american-detainees-say-us-pakistan-trying-to-set-them-up.html.

Egypt's steel wall along border with Gaza 'near completion'

Cairo (Earth Times) - Egypt has almost finished building an underground steel wall along its border with the Gaza Strip to curtail smuggling through tunnels, a leading Egyptian newspaper reported Tuesday. The barrier is "near completion" and is "in its final stages of construction," eyewitnesses told Cairo's al-Masry al-Youm daily.

They said there had been heightened construction activity in recent weeks, with as many as 45 shipments of steel arriving in the past two days alone.

Egypt has never explicitly confirmed it is building such a barrier, but President Hosny Mubarak last week defended "increased fortifications" along the border as a matter of "national sovereignty" that were "not up for debate."

His remarks were a response to rising domestic and regional criticism of Egypt and Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip since Hamas took control of the territory's security forces in 2007.

Smugglers have used cross-border tunnels to bring basic commodities, drugs and weapons into the Gaza Strip since the imposition of the blockade.

Egyptian security forces on Monday said they had discovered five tunnels which had been used to smuggle car and motorcycle parts, as well as paint, into the Gaza Strip.

Smugglers have dismissed the reported barrier as ineffective, saying they will simply tunnel deeper, and that many of the tunnels are, in any case, already deeper than the new wall's reported depth of 20 meters.

Moussavi condemns violent methods used against Iranian protesters

Tehran - The leader of Iran's opposition Green Movement, Mir-Hossein Moussavi, on Tuesday condemned the violent methods used against Iranian protesters. "This method of provoking people in using violence against others (protesters) recalls the methods used during the monarchy era," Moussavi said an interview with opposition website Kalameh.

"As before the 1979 revolution, also today the roots of dictatorship can be witnessed," the former Iranian premier said on the occasion of the 31st anniversary of the revolution.

He deplored the characterization of protesters exercising their constitutional rights as "weeds and goats," as President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had reportedly said.

The opposition has staged large protests against the president and accused him of fraud in last June's presidential election which gave Ahmadinejad a second term.

Ahmadinejad had also compared the demonstrators to football hooligans whose favorite team has lost in an important match.

Together with ex-presidents Mohammad Khatami and Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and former parliament speaker Mehdi Karroubi, Moussavi forms the opposition leadership quartet against Ahmadinejad.

According to opposition websites, Khatami also accused the government of perpetrating what he called "blind violence."

"This kind of blind violence will have unclear consequences," Khatami warned in a meeting Monday with reformist officials.

He was referring to two protesters, allegedly from monarchist groups, who were hanged last week and nine others sentenced to death for their involvement in the protests and alleged plans to topple the Islamic establishment.

"The correct reply to protests should not be suppression, jail and executions but allowing the people the legal right to say what they want," he was quoted as saying.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/307079,moussavi-condemns-violent-methods-used-against-iranian-protestors.html.