Romania gov't rejects Canadian gold mine project

November 11, 2013

BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — The Romanian government won't allow a Canadian company to develop what would have been Europe's biggest open gold mine, the prime minister said Monday, shortly before a parliamentary commission nixed a bill that would have permitted the project.

The decisions were a boost to environmental advocates and come after 14 years of protest and debate about whether the foreign investment and the jobs that would have been created by the mine outweigh the costs to nature.

Immediate reaction was muted, with just a few dozen anti-mine activists rallying outside Parliament. Analysts say Canada's Gabriel Resources, which has invested hundreds of millions of euros (dollars) in the project, could still devise a new proposal for the mine.

Its original plan proposed using cyanide to extract 314 tons of gold and 1,500 tons of silver in the town of Rosia Montana in northwestern Romania. The plan includes razing four mountains and creating a lake of cyanide.

The project appears to have grown increasingly unpopular over time. The commission of lawmakers rejected the bill sent by the government of Prime Minister Victor Ponta with 17 votes against and 2 abstentions.

Ponta, meanwhile, announced that his government had changed its mind on the project ahead of the commission vote — a statement that followed weeks of protests over environmental concerns and criticism that Romania would earn too little from the deal.

"The ruling coalition intends to reject the project," Ponta said, adding, however, that the government in principle supports foreign investment in its natural resources. He did not directly say the bill the government sent to the commission was flawed, but Ponta and coalition partner Crin Antonescu said the government intended to adopt broader legislation governing the use of Romania's mines and other natural resources.

In its report, the commission also suggested the need for a better legal framework covering such matters. The panel also recommended the Canadian company's 1999 license be declassified and made public. It added that there should be "a correct partnership between the main shareholder and the Romanian state," suggesting that Romania stood to earn too little from the deal.

Jonathan Henry, chief executive of Gabriel Resources, told The Associated Press by telephone that he was waiting to see the commission's report and declined to offer further comment.

Polish marchers try to breach Russian Embassy

November 11, 2013

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Young Poles torched cars, threw stones at police and tried to climb the fence at the Russian Embassy after setting a guard's booth ablaze during a march Monday by nationalists marking Poland's Independence Day.

Police responded with tear gas and stun grenades, while detaining around a dozen people from a group of a few hundred mostly masked men who initially walked in the march. Poland's Foreign Ministry spokesman Marcin Wojciechowski condemned the actions at the Russian Embassy in Warsaw in particular. "There is no justification for hooliganism," Wojciechowski wrote on Twitter.

Police spokesman Mariusz Sokolowski said five police officers and some other people were hospitalized with injuries they sustained during the clashes. Thousands of nationalists marched through downtown Warsaw chanting against the government of Prime Minister Donald Tusk. Their Independence Day march has turned violent before, prompting many residents to call on city officials to ban it.

Warsaw authorities, who initially allowed Monday's march, declared it illegal after the violence, but that did not stop the marchers. Elsewhere in the capital and country, many Poles held peaceful events in memory of the country's regaining sovereignty in 1918 as a result of World War I.

'Apocalyptic' storm floods Sardinia, 18 dead

NICOLE WINFIELD | AP
Tuesday 19 November 2013

ROME: The Mediterranean island of Sardinia, prized by the jet-set for its white sand beaches and crystal-clear seas, was a flood-ravaged mud bath Tuesday after a freak torrential rainstorm killed at least 18 people, downed bridges and swept away cars.

Italian Premier Enrico Letta declared a state of emergency and set aside 20 million euros ($27 million) for emergency relief, saying the priority was reaching remote areas, saving the lives of those still unaccounted for and providing for those left homeless.

The island, which draws royals, entrepreneurs and ordinary tourists alike during the dry, peak summer months, received more than 44 centimeters (17.3 inches) of rain in 24 hours Monday — half the amount it normally receives in a year, officials said.

Italy’s civil protection chief, Franco Gabrielli, said the death toll may still rise as crews reach isolated areas in the countryside where some homes are submerged.

Transport was hampered by rivers of cocoa-colored mud gushing over roads that forced the closure of several major thoroughfares, including a tunnel into the city of Olbia, according to the Anas company which runs Italy’s roads and highways.

Olbia Mayor Gianni Giovannelli said the city had been destroyed by the “apocalyptic” storm, with bridges felled and water levels reaching 3 meters (10 feet) in some places. He described the ferocity of the storm’s rains as a “water bomb.”

Gabrielli defended the civil protection’s alert system, which had signaled an “elevated” risk of the storm on much of Sardinia, the highest level of alert. He warned against day-after finger-pointing, saying evacuation orders had been issued and ignored and that no weather forecast could have predicted the “exceptional” degree of devastation.

Sardinia’s governor, Ugo Cappellacci, said the 17 dead included a family of four, reportedly of Brazilian origin, in Arzachena.

Local newspaper L’Unione Sarda said a policeman helping to escort an ambulance died when the car he was traveling in was submerged in the collapse of a bridge in Dorgali. In hard-hit Gallura, three people died after their car was swept away in the collapse of another bridge, the paper said.

Sardinia is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean and is one of Italy’s autonomous regions. While it’s known to tourists for its pristine Costa Smeralda beaches, the island’s interior is known for its sheep and pastoral life. Sardinians are famed for their exceptional longevity.

Other parts of Italy were also hit by heavy rains Tuesday, including the capital, Rome, and Venice in the north, where residents and tourists donned rubber boots to slosh through a St. Marks’ Square flooded from the “acqua alta” high tides that periodically submerge the lagoon city.

Source: Arab News.
Link: http://www.arabnews.com/news/479866.

Dutch royals pelted with tomatoes in Moscow

November 10, 2013

MOSCOW (AP) — A Russian opposition group says its activists have thrown tomatoes at Dutch King Willem-Alexander and his wife, Queen Maxima, as they arrived for a concert in Moscow.

Eduard Limonov, the leader of the banned National Bolshevik party, said two of its activists hurled tomatoes at the royals on Saturday. Russia's state security agency said they missed their target. Limonov said Sunday the action was intended to attract public attention to what he called the Netherlands' failure to properly investigate the death of the group's member, Alexander Dolmatov, who committed suicide in January at a Dutch deportation center.

The royal visit was aimed to celebrate the two nations' historical ties, but it came amid tensions caused by Russia's seizure of a Dutch-flagged Greenpeace ship and other disputes.

Bulgaria: pro- and anti-government rallies

November 16, 2013

SOFIA, Bulgaria (AP) — Tens of thousands of supporters of the main political parties are gathering in Bulgaria's two biggest cities at pro- and anti-government rallies, which reflect the deep division that has paralyzed the Balkan nation for months.

At Saturday's rally in Sofia, supporters of the governing coalition of the Socialists and an ethnic Turkish party expressed solidarity with the Cabinet. In the second biggest city of Plovdiv, backers of the center-right GERB party accused the incumbents of incompetence and demanded early elections.

The Socialist-backed government took office in May, but ever since has been facing street protests fueled by concerns about corruption. Late last month, students staged full and partial blockades at a number of universities.

Somber US marks 50th anniversary of JFK death

November 23, 2013

DALLAS (AP) — Older Americans remember the day, 50 years ago, as the start of a darker, more cynical time. Many in the U.S. paused Friday to mark half a century since President John F. Kennedy's assassination.

The young, handsome president — who created the Peace Corps, spoke at the Berlin Wall and challenged the country to go to the moon — was shot dead while riding through Dallas, a conservative city that at times has struggled with the unwelcome fame of being forever "linked in tragedy."

"We watched the nightmarish reality in our front yard," Mayor Mike Rawlings told a crowd Friday. It was the first time the city had organized such a large event, issuing 5,000 free tickets. "Our president had been taken from us, taken from his family, taken from the world."

Two generations later, the assassination of a young leader still stirs quiet sadness in the baby boomer generation. Historian David McCullough said Kennedy "spoke to us in that now-distant time past, with a vitality and sense of purpose such as we had never heard before."

Rawlings' comments were followed by a tolling of bells and a moment of silence at the precise time that Kennedy was shot. Drew Carney traveled from Toronto to attend the ceremony. The history teacher said he became intrigued with Kennedy and his ideals as a teenager.

"It filled you with such hope," he said. Elsewhere, flags were lowered to half-staff and wreaths were laid at Kennedy's presidential library and at a waterfront memorial near the family's compound in Massachusetts.

Shortly after sunrise, Attorney General Eric Holder paid his respects at Kennedy's recently refurbished grave at Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, where a British cavalry officer stood guard. A flame burned steadily, as it has since Kennedy was buried.

About an hour later, Jean Kennedy Smith, 85, the last surviving Kennedy sibling, laid a wreath at her brother's grave, joined by about 10 members of the Kennedy family. They clasped hands for a short, silent prayer and left roses as a few hundred onlookers watched.

The tributes extended across the Atlantic to Kennedy's ancestral home in Ireland. In Dublin, a half-dozen Irish soldiers toting guns with brilliantly polished bayonets formed an honor guard outside the U.S. Embassy as the American flag was lowered to half-staff. An Irish army commander at the embassy drew a sword and held it aloft as a lone trumpeter played "The Last Post," the traditional British salute to war dead.

More than a dozen retired Irish army officers who, as teenage cadets, had formed an honor guard at Kennedy's graveside gathered in the front garden of the embassy to remember the first Irish-American to become leader of the free world.

Together with Irish Foreign Minister Eamon Gilmore and embassy staff, they observed a moment of silence and laid wreaths from the Irish and American governments in JFK's memory.

Associated Press writers Bob Salsberg in Boston, Matthew Barakat in Washington and Shawn Pogatchnik in Dublin contributed to this report.

Chile's Bachelet favored to win presidency

November 17, 2013

SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) — Chileans were preparing to return Michelle Bachelet to the presidency on Sunday, hoping she can fulfill promises to reform a dictatorship-era system they blame for keeping the working classes poor and indebted to the privileged few.

Chile is the world's top copper producer and its fast-growing economy, low unemployment and stable democracy are the envy of Latin America. But millions of its citizens have taken to the streets in recent years, venting their frustration over the huge wealth gap between the rich and poor and a chronically underfunded education system.

Many voters blame policies imposed during Gen. Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship for keeping wealth and power in very few hands. His regime privatized natural resources and many government functions and ended the central control and funding of public schools.

Bachelet, 62, is a former political prisoner, pediatrician, defense secretary and Socialist Party stalwart who is a centrist at heart. She left office with sky-high approval ratings after her 2006-2010 presidency despite failing then to bring about major changes in society. But this time, she's taken up the protesters' cause, vowing major changes in taxes and education to reduce the wealth gap.

Bachelet and her closest rival on Sunday, Evelyn Matthei, were childhood friends and daughters of generals who found themselves on opposite sides after Chile's 1973 coup, when Matthei's father ran the military school where Gen. Alberto Bachelet was tortured to death for remaining loyal to ousted President Salvador Allende.

The last survey by Chile's top pollster CEP found 47 percent of declared voters going for Bachelet, suggesting she has a good chance at an outright majority when voters who didn't reveal their preferences to pollsters cast ballots. Matthei got 14 percent in the poll, which had a 3 percentage point error margin. Seven other candidates trailed, although independents Franco Parisi and Marco Enriquez-Ominami were gaining ground on the right and left.

Chileans also will choose 120 members of the lower House of Congress and 20 out of 38 Senate seats on Sunday. Unfortunately for Bachelet, her New Majority coalition won't be able to secure more seats unless it wins at least two-thirds of the votes in each district, under Pinochet's "binomial" electoral system, which was designed to frustrate change.

"You almost feel sorry for her because she's going to be stuck between the future and the past," said Peter Siavelis, a political science professor at Wake Forest University and author of "Democratic Chile: The Politics and Policies of a Historic Coalition".

"There all these demands in the streets for constitutional reform but she's facing a Congress that's going to be elected by the binominal elections system," Siavelis said. "There's not going to be a majority there. So the influence of the dictatorship is going to impact on her reforms."