IGIHE

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  • North Korea Fires 2 Missiles off Eastern Coast

    North Korea Fires 2 Missiles off Eastern Coast

    {{North Korea fired two short-range missiles off its eastern coast on Monday, the second such launch in less than a week, according to the South Korean Defense Ministry.}}

    The defense ministry said it is on high alert and monitoring the situation. It called on the North to stop the missile launches.

    The weapons launched were Scud missiles with a range capability of 500 kilometers, according to the defense ministry, twice that of those launched last week.

    On Thursday, four Scud missiles were fired into the sea off North Korea’s eastern coast just days after the start of annual joint military exercises between South Korea and the United States.

    North Korea opposes such exercises, which routinely spark tension among the three countries.

    Last year’s exercises triggered weeks of heightened tensions between the nations and North Korean threats of nuclear war.

    Thursday’s launch was the first time North Korea had fired Scud missiles, which have a range that covers the whole of the Korean Peninsula, since 2009, South Korea said.

    Foreign policy experts say the North Korean missile firings may not herald a repeat of last year’s saber rattling from Pyongyang, which included threats of preemptive nuclear strikes against the United States and South Korea and the declaration that the armistice that stopped the Korean War in 1953 is null and void.

    CNN

  • Winnie Mandela Disowns Movie About her Life

    Winnie Mandela Disowns Movie About her Life

    {{Late South African President Nelson Mandela’s ex-wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela Monday dissociated herself from an upcoming movie about her life, Xinhua reported.}}

    The movie “Winnie Mandela”, which portrays the personal and political life of the activist, Winnie Mandela, is scheduled to be released in South Africa’s theaters, according to the country’s National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF).

    Mandela said that she had approached the movie producers to voice her concern but it fell on deaf ears.

    “In my life’s struggle I have seen and heard many things said about me. I understand that my story, alongside that of my people is one that will continue to be told for many generations,” read a statement that Mandela issued Monday.

    “In an attempt to ensure that my truth was reflected, I reached out to the film makers of ‘Winnie Mandela’ — my advances were rejected. I imagine the basis was to allow the creative process to occur organically– a concept I try to understand.

    “I respect all creative efforts to make this story one that would appeal to a global audience as well as yield commercial gains for all those who invested in it,” she added her statement.

    She further said that she would like her story to be told truthfully and correctly, denying some media reports that she is against the cast of the movie about her because it’s done by international artists.

    “Unlike ‘Long Walk To Freedom’, this film is based on an unauthorised biography whose producers did not deem it fit to consult me or my family. My family and I are therefore not associated with this production,” she said.

    Starring Academy Award winner US Actor Jennifer Hudson in the title role and Terrence Howard as Nelson Mandela, the film tells the story of Winnie Madikizela-Mandela’s experiences during the turbulent decades of her husband’s imprisonment.

    It was directed by South African award-winning filmmaker Darrell Roodt. The screenplay was co-written by Roodt and Andre Pieterse. It is based on the book, “Winnie Mandela: A Life”, by Anne Marie du Preez Bezdrob, a former journalist.

    The film was shot over 13 weeks on locations in Johannesburg, Cape Town, the Transkei (Winnie’s place of birth), and Robben Island, where Nelson Mandela spent 18 of his 27 years in incarceration, before he became South Africa’s first democratically elected president, said the NFVF.

    {winniemandela.co.za}

  • Catholic Church prevents March 7 Opening Pleasure Hospital’ in Burkina Faso

    Catholic Church prevents March 7 Opening Pleasure Hospital’ in Burkina Faso

    {{According to a statement released Tuesday by the nonprofit organisation Clitoraid, pressure from the Catholic Church and other detractors has caused Burkina Faso’s government to block the scheduled March 7 opening of the clitoral repair hospital, known as the Kamkaso Hospital, in Bobo-Dioulasso, Burkina Faso.}}

    Nicknamed “the Pleasure Hospital”, the Kamkaso facility is the first of its kind in the world.

    “Although the government has suddenly withdrawn its approval for surgeries to be performed there, this facility, once open, will provide free surgery for victims of female genital mutilation,” said Dr. Brigitte Boisselier, president of Clitoraid.

    “The procedure repairs the physical damage they endured. But this wonderful mission has now been stymied by the Catholic Church and its cronies, who are conducting a smear campaign against it for their own selfish motives.”

    Boisselier said Clitoraid will seek immediate legal redress through the courts.

    “In the meantime, the surgeries we had scheduled will still take place over the next few weeks, at another hospital in Bobo-Dioulasso,” she said. “We’re going ahead as planned.”

    She went on to describe why the Kamkaso Hospital will not open on March 7.

    “Although the request for licensure of the new hospital was submitted in 2011 and we received repeated assurances from regional and national officials that the hospital could open on March 7, the health minister of Burkina Faso has explained to a representative of AVFE, our local Clitoraid partner, that the license will not be approved for our scheduled inauguration date of March 7,” Boisselier explained.

    “Nevertheless, we will go ahead with our inauguration ceremony as planned. And our surgical team will still operate on the patients scheduled for the procedure, but that will take place at another hospital.”

    She said that an official source who requested anonymity told her that strong pressure from IRM detractors, especially the Catholic Church, was responsible for both the license refusal and the cancellation of the First Lady of Burkina Faso’s participation in the opening ceremony.

    “By seeking to prevent our opening, the Catholic Church has become an accomplice of the criminals who mutilate the genitals of African women,” Boisselier declared.

    “Along with its mission of restoring mutilated clitorises for FGM victims, Clitoraid’s Pleasure Hospital will be a strong deterrent to those who still practice this barbaric custom. They would stop making the excisions since it’s foolish to destroy something that can be readily restored.”

    Boisselier said this stance taken by the Catholic Church against Clitoraid is hardly a surprise, given the Vatican’s record.

    “Those blocking our opening are the same criminals who support pedophile priests and money laundering by Vatican banks,” she said. “And their directives against using condoms are responsible for thousands of unnecessary AIDS deaths in Africa.

    Boisselier said Clitoraid will take prompt legal action to open the hospital.

    “This pressure to close us down will only delay the opening,” she said. “Our attorneys are already looking into various legal options and there will also be worldwide protests in front of Burkina Faso’s embassies.”

    As evidence of the pressures brought by the Catholic Church, Boisselier cited the following declaration made against the Kamkaso Hospital by Professor R. Marie Charlemagne Ouedraogo, a Knight of the French Legion of Honor and Commander of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, a well-known branch of the Catholic Church.

    “This is a big campaign of fraud organized by the sect of Rael with the complicity of certain doctors of Burkina Faso! The health ministry and the governor are beseeched to stop this poisonous campaign! Also, the complicit doctors will have to appear before the medical board very soon!”

    “How can a doctor who performs these surgeries himself at very high cost to his patients accuse us of a fraudulent campaign when his rates are way too high for the poor women who planned to come to the Kamkaso hospital?” Boisselier asked. “What is the real fraud here?

    Clitoraid offers free surgeries performed by competent volunteer doctors, and they follow a procedure that has been published officially by its originator, Dr. Pierre Foldes of France. It has already been performed on thousands of women.”

    Boisselier went on to elaborate about what she considers the real reason for the smear campaign against Clitoraid and the Kamkaso hospital.

    “The real reason for this delay in the hospital opening is clearly linked to the fact that this purely humanitarian project was initiated by Rael, spiritual leader of the Raelian Movement,” she said.

    “The people putting pressure against this hospital prefer to pursue a pseudo-philosophical vendetta for their own profit instead of thinking of the 80 women who will be in Bobo-Dioulasso to have their free surgery between March 3 and March 14.”

    According to Boisselier, the surgeries will be done at the hospital of a doctor friend who will host Clitoraid’s medical team.

    “Our surgeons are licensed to perform surgeries in Burkina Faso,” she pointed out. “The people responsible for these pressures against us should be ashamed.

    The Kamkaso hospital is the collective effort of thousands of people of various philosophical backgrounds.

    They have all contributed to restore the pleasure of life to thousands of women who experienced deep trauma. To prevent them from receiving this voluntary and free help simply because the people offering it don’t believe in their god is outrageous.

    But this campaign against us is perfectly aligned with other misdeeds of the Catholic Church, which teaches that suffering is a source of awakening and ultimate spirituality.”

    Boisselier explained that for Raelians, pleasure is the most beautiful source of fulfillment.

    “We will continue doing our best to help FGM victims get their dignity back as women and enjoy their right to enjoy physical pleasure and fulfillment,” she said.

    The building inauguration ceremony will be held at Clitoraid’s Kamkaso Hospital on March 7 starting at 10 a.m. A press conference will follow.

    {myjoyonline}

  • Expert Proposes to Ghana 16 years as Consent Age to Sex

    Expert Proposes to Ghana 16 years as Consent Age to Sex

    {{Population and sexual health expert, Professor F.T. Sai is advocating that Parliament harmonizes the existing law on the Children’s Act that puts the minimum marriage age in Ghana at 18 years but allows girls to engage in consented sex at age 16.}}

    According to him, consent to sex should be fixed at age 18 and marriage should be fixed at 18 years and above.

    The amendment to the law, Prof. Sai told Joynews, Monday, is key to preventing forced marriage within the country.

    Prof Sai noted that due to the Ghanaian custom of permitting parents to give away their children in marriage, there is the need for vigorous education in homes and communities in order to overcome forced marriage in the country.

    The Population and sexual health expert is supporting campaigners against forced marriage with his proposal to amend the Children Act of 1998.

    If the proposed amendment to the Act is successful, then having consented sex with a-16-year-old girl may land one into jail.

    Campaigners against the current age of consent are convinced that changing to 18 years will be a positive start to tackle forced marriage, a common practice in parts of rural Ghana.

    Speaking on the issue, Member of Parliament (MP) for Tarkwa Nsuaem, Eugenia Kusi, indicated that expressed consent of young girls, who find themselves in such forced marriages are usually not sought.

    To her, teenagers lacked the mental capacity to make informed decision about their marriage partners.

    Available statistics indicate that over 277,000 women in Ghana were forced into marriage in 2010 and the number is expected to hit almost 500,000 by 2030 if measures are not implemented to address the menace.

  • Girl Costs dad $80K With Facebook Post

    Girl Costs dad $80K With Facebook Post

    {{The former head of a private preparatory school in Miami, Florida is out an $80,000 discrimination settlement after his daughter boasted about it on Facebook.}}

    Patrick Snay, 69 — the former head of Guillver Preparatory School — filed an age discrimination complaint when his 2010-11 contract wasn’t renewed.

    In November 2011, the school and Snay came to an agreement in which Snay would be paid $10,000 in back pay, and an $80,000 settlement. Gulliver Schools also agreed to cut Snay’s attorneys a check for $60,000.

    But before the ink could dry on the deal, Snay’s daughter took to Facebook, boasting, “Mama and Papa Snay won the case against Gulliver. Gulliver is now officially paying for my vacation to Europe this summer. SUCK IT.”

    Snay’s daughter blasted the message to her 1,200 Facebook followers, which included many current and former Gulliver students. Word of the post spread like wildfire back to school officials.

    Within a few days, Gulliver Schools sent a letter to Snay’s attorneys stating that Snay had broken a confidentiality agreement and that he would not be receiving the $80,000 settlement.

    The agreement stated that neither Snay nor his wife could speak about the settlement to anyone except for his attorneys and other professional advisers.
    Snay filed a motion to enforce the settlement and won in a Circuit Court ruling. The school appealed.

    A hearing was held to determine if his daughter’s knowledge of the settlement and her Facebook post had violated the confidentiality agreement.

    “What happened is that after settlement, my wife and I went in the parking lot, and we had to make some decisions on what we were going to tell my daughter. Because it’s very important to understand that she was an intricate part of what was happening.

    “She was retaliated against at Gulliver. So she knew we were going to some sort of mediation. She was very concerned about it. Because of what happened at Gulliver, she had quite a few psychological scars which forced me to put her into therapy.

    “So there was a period of time that there was an unresolved enclosure for my wife and me. It was very important with her. We understood the confidentiality. So we knew what the restrictions were, yet we needed to tell her something,” Snay explained in court documents.

    Last week, the Third District Court of Appeal for the State of Florida agreed that Snay had, in fact, violated confidentiality and reversed the Circuit Court ruling.

    It wrote: “Snay violated the agreement by doing exactly what he had promised not to do.

    His daughter then did precisely what the confidentiality agreement was designed to prevent, advertising to the Gulliver community that Snay had been successful in his age discrimination and retaliation case against the school.

    “Based on the clear and unambiguous language of the parties’ agreement and Snay’s testimony confirming his breach of its terms, we reverse the order entered below granting the Snays’ motion to enforce the agreement.”

    Snay is now the headmaster at Riviera Preparatory School in Coral Gables, Florida.

    CNN

  • Why Maduro is not Chávez & Venezuela is not Ukraine

    Why Maduro is not Chávez & Venezuela is not Ukraine

    {{The president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, was young once too. He played guitar and worked as a roadie for a rock band, Enigma, leaving his hair long in the back, mullet-style.}}

    The skinny, rebellious young man looked not too different from the student protesters and angry teens now challenging his government in the streets.

    For these youths, who grew up during the 14-year rule of his predecessor, Hugo Chávez, it is Maduro who has become the face of a rotten establishment.

    “Maduro, resign now!” they roar.

    After more than two weeks of daily protests that have left at least 14 dead and 150 injured, Maduro is stumbling toward Wednesday’s anniversary of ­Chávez’s death, saddled by doubts about his ability to keep his mentor’s “Bolivarian” revolution running.

    The problems Chávez passed along when he died last year, including rampant crime and a cratering economy, have gotten worse.

    But the man who calls himself “a son of Chávez” has also inherited a silver spoon of immense, centralized state power. Maduro and the United Socialist Party founded by Chávez control 20 of Venezuela’s 23 state governments, as well as the Supreme Court, parliament and, the most important, the military and the national oil company.

    In the poor and working-class barrios where Chávez provided new schools, medical clinics and subsidized housing, loyalty to the government remains strong.

    Venezuela is not Ukraine, analysts say, where a weak president wobbled, then fled.

    “There is no reason to believe Maduro is in an unstable situation,” said Gregory Weeks, a Latin America scholar at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

    “The military has declared itself behind him and has not wavered in that regard.
    Unless they were called in for intense repressive measures, it is hard to imagine any scenario where military leaders would revolt.”

  • President Yanukovych’s ouster Faces Terrorism Charges

    President Yanukovych’s ouster Faces Terrorism Charges

    {{Russia’s Investigative Committee has opened a criminal case on terrorism-related charges against the leader of a Ukrainian nationalist group widely seen as the driving force behind former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych’s ouster.}}

    Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin on Monday said Dmitry Yarosh, the leader of the ultranationalist group Right Sector, was wanted for “public appeals to commit acts of terrorism” on Russian soil and acts of extremism, charges that carry up to seven and five years in prison, respectively.

    Investigators say Yarosh posted a statement on the group’s Vkontakte page urging the Islamist insurgent leader Doku Umarov — often referred to as Russia’s equivalent of Bin Laden — to join Ukraine in fighting the Kremlin.

    The Right Sector has denied the charges, however, saying that people hired by the Kremlin had hacked the group’s official Vkontakte page and written a fake appeal to Umarov that was falsely attributed to Yarosh.

    The Right Sector was widely seen as the driving force behind the protests in Kiev that led to a violent uprising against the government and heightened tensions with Russia.

    The group gained prominence when the protests became more radical in January and February, after the mainstream opposition and Svoboda, a more moderate nationalist party, began to lose their appeal.

    Yarosh rose in popularity for his role in the protests and was appointed a deputy chairman of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council last month.

    It is for this reason that the group believes Yarosh has been accused of colluding with a terrorist — to villainize him and eliminate any influence he may have had among Ukrainians.

    In the Vkontakte message that prompted criminal charges by Russian investigators, the author said that many Ukrainians had participated in the same “liberation war” being waged by Chechens and other North Caucasus peoples.

    Members of UNA-UNSO, one of the groups constituting the Right Sector, reportedly fought against Russians in the Georgian-Abkhazian conflict and first Chechen War in the 1990s.

    “As the leader of the Right Sector, I am calling on you to step up your struggle,” the message read. “Russia is not as strong as it seems. You have a unique opportunity to win. Use this opportunity!”

    Artyom Skoropadsky, the Right Sector’s spokesman, dismissed the message and the criminal case as a ploy by the Kremlin to smear the group.

    “I think this was organized by the Kremlin to paint us as terrorists,” he said by phone.

    Russia’s telecommunications watchdog has also recently banned the Right Sector’s page and several other pages related to the Ukrainian revolution on Vkontakte.

    The Right Sector, set up last year, is an umbrella organization that unites the Patriots of Ukraine, Trizub, SNA, UNA-UNSO and White Hammer nationalist groups.

    The organization has often been portrayed as more radical and militant than any other nationalist groups in Ukraine, with a a more negative attitude toward the Kremlin and a reputation for dressing in full military gear during the Maidan protests, complete with ski masks that rarely came off.

    The group has made it clear that it sees itself as a well-organized military organization.

    {Right Sector’s Dmitry Yarosh addressing a rally in central Kiev in February.}

  • David Cameroon Aide Held over Child Abuse

    David Cameroon Aide Held over Child Abuse

    {{One of David Cameron’s aides has been arrested on suspicion of an offence “relating to child abuse imagery”, Downing Street has said.}}

    Patrick Rock, 62, resigned as the deputy head of the policy unit on 12 February.

    Number 10 said it had been made aware of a potential offence and referred the matter to the National Crime Agency, which arrested Mr Rock at his home a few hours later on 13 February.

    The NCA has not confirmed the arrest.

    A Downing Street spokesman said that following Mr Rock’s arrest, it “arranged for officers to come into Number 10 [to] have access to all IT systems and offices they considered relevant”.

    The prime minister was immediately informed and kept updated throughout, he said.

    ‘Party’s upper echelons’
    He added: “This is an ongoing investigation so it would not be appropriate to comment further, but the prime minister believes that child abuse imagery is abhorrent and that anyone involved with it should be properly dealt with under the law.”

    BBC political correspondent Iain Watson said Mr Rock had been a fixture in the upper echelons of the Conservative Party for three decades, initially working for Margaret Thatcher, and was brought back into Downing Street by David Cameron in 2011.

    As deputy head of the policy unit, he was one of a number of officials who had been working on policies to rid the internet of child abuse, our correspondent said.

    Mr Rock was involved in preparations for a summit last year, working with the NCA, at which leading companies agreed to make it as difficult as possible to find images of abuse on their search engines.

    Downing Street said ministers and not advisers determined the policy.

    {wirestory}

  • Mauritania Anger after ‘Koran Torn’

    Mauritania Anger after ‘Koran Torn’

    {{Hundreds of Muslims have protested in Mauritania’s capital, Nouakchott, after news spread that the Koran had allegedly been desecrated at a mosque.}}

    An imam reported that four men with their faces covered by turbans entered the mosque, tearing copies of the Koran and throwing them into a toilet.

    Police fired tear gas to disperse angry crowds, and one person was killed, a hospital source said.

    Mauritania is a Muslim country with a tiny Christian population.

    It has been a key ally of the West in the campaign against al-Qaeda and other militant groups operating in the region.

    Journalist Hamdi Mohamed El Hacen in Nouakchott says protesters burnt barricades and many shops and markets remained closed on Monday.

    {{‘Psychiatric evaluation’}}

    Hundreds of protesters gathered in the city centre and outside various mosques, chanting “God is Great” and demanding that the men be arrested and given the death sentence for allegedly blaspheming Islam, he says.

    A hospital source told Reuters news agency that one person was killed after apparently being hit by an exploding tear gas canister.

    It is unclear who allegedly desecrated the Koran or what their motive was.

    The imam, Mohamedoun Ould Mohamed Salem, said the men took four copies of the Koran, which they then shredded and threw into the mosque’s toilet.

    Public anger has been compounded by two recent incidents of alleged blasphemy, Mr El Hacen says.

    In February, a man was arrested and sent for psychiatric evaluation after urinating on a Koran in northern Mauritania.

    {agencies}

  • Mugabe Backs Uganda’s Anti-gay Law

    Mugabe Backs Uganda’s Anti-gay Law

    {{Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has thrown his weight behind Uganda’s draconian anti-gay laws and hinted at a crackdown on gays in his own country, state media reported Monday.}}

    He castigated the West for punishing Kampala with aid cuts after President Yoweri Museveni signed into law a bill that banned homosexuality in the east African country.

    “They (the West) want to tell us… that it’s a violation of human rights, that is what they are doing to Museveni right now,” Mugabe said.

    “The human right you have as a man is to marry another woman not to get another man to marry, we refuse that,” said Mugabe at a weekend wedding reception of his only daughter Bona.

    Mugabe has previously said homosexuality is un-African and described gays and lesbians as worse than pigs and dogs.

    “It’s a terrible world we are in, a terrible world where people want to do things that they feel will enhance their own interests.”

    He said until recently he was not aware of the existence of an association of homosexuals in Zimbabwe, and warned he would want to know who belongs to the group.

    “I understand we have a group of homosexuals in this country. I didn’t know until I was told the day before yesterday. So we want to check on who is in that group,” Mugabe said.

    The Gays and Lesbians Association of Zimbabwe (GALZ) has long operated in the country despite Mugabe’s ranting against homosexuality.

    Police have on several occasions raided the GALZ offices and prosecutors had laid charges against the association accusing it of operating an unregistered organisation. However, a magistrate dismissed the case last week.

    Same sex marriages are outlawed in Zimbabwe.

    {sowetan}