Tag: InternationalNews

The body of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat is to be exhumed on Tuesday, Palestinian officials say.

His body is to undergo tests to find out whether his death in Paris in 2004 was caused by poisoning.

Arafat’s medical records say he had a stroke resulting from a blood disorder.

But France began a murder inquiry in August after Swiss experts hired by a documentary crew found radioactive polonium-210 on Arafat’s personal effects.
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Analysis
image of Richard Galpin Richard Galpin BBC News, Ramallah

The chief investigator Taufik al Tirawi said they had recently asked the Russians to take part in this investigation because they had “an historical relationship” with Moscow.

It seems the Palestinians do not fully trust France and Switzerland when it comes to proving or disproving that their former leader was murdered.

It is not known how long it will take the three countries to complete their tests. But it will be a key moment – and it is possible they will reach different conclusions.

While most Palestinians are certain their leader was murdered, there are serious questions about the validity of testing for polonium poisoning eight years after Mr Arafat’s death. The half-life of polonium is less than five months.

His tomb, in Ramallah in the West Bank, was sealed off earlier this month.

Once the body is removed from the tomb inside the stone-clad tomb mausoleum, scientists from France, Switzerland and Russia will each take samples, former Palestinian intelligence chief Tawfik Tirawi told reporters.

The experts will then take these samples to their respective countries to be tested for Polonium 210 and possibly other lethal substances.

Arafat’s body will be reburied the same day with military honours.

Arafat, who led the Palestine Liberation Organisation for 35 years and became the first president of the Palestinian Authority in 1996, fell violently ill in October 2004 at his compound.

Two weeks later he was flown to a French military hospital in Paris, where he died on 11 November 2004, aged 75.

His widow, Suha, objected to a post-mortem examination at the time, but later appealed to the Palestinian Authority to permit the exhumation “to reveal the truth”.

Many Palestinians continue to believe that Israel poisoned him. Israel has denied any involvement. Others allege that he had Aids.

In 2005, the New York Times obtained a copy of Arafat’s medical records, which it said showed he died of a massive haemorrhagic stroke that resulted from a bleeding disorder caused by an unknown infection.

Independent experts who reviewed the records told the paper that it was highly unlikely that he had died of Aids or had been poisoned.

A murder inquiry was launched by French prosecutors in August after an investigation by al-Jazeera TV, working with scientists at the Institute of Radiation Physics (IRA) at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland, found “significant” traces of polonium-210 present in samples taken from Arafat’s personal effects, including his trademark keffiyeh headdress.

In some cases, the elevated levels were 10 times higher than those on control subjects, and most of the polonium could not have come from natural sources, the scientists said.

But the institute also said Arafat’s symptoms – as described in medical reports – were not consistent with polonium poisoning.

Wire Story

The 18th United Nations climate change conference (COP18) has opened in Doha, the Qatari capital.

For the next fortnight, up to 17,000 people will attend the conference. Delegates will be negotiating a new global deal on climate, but there are ongoing tensions between rich and poor countries.

A central issue at the summit is the the problem of “hot air” carbon permits.

The term refers to attempts by some wealthy countries to carry over unused carbon permits so they can be offset against future cuts.

Developing nations say this is unfair and reduces the value of any commitment to reduce carbon dioxide.

South African foreign minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane officially handed over the COP presidency to Qatar’s Abdullah Al-Attiyah here at the Qatar National Convention Centre.

After brief speeches by both, UNFCCC executive secretary Christiana Figueres pointed out the “unique” location of this year’s COP.

“Each COP is unique – and this is no exception,” she said.

“This is the first time the COP is being held in the Gulf region. On this historic occasion, the Gulf region has an unequaled world stage to showcase the contributions being made to reduce the Gulf’s food and water vulnerabilities, to put regional energy growth on a more sustainable path and to build a safer, stronger and more resilient energy future for all countries.”

As Qatar welcomes world leaders to the conference, its own environmental record has come under criticism as a major contributor to greenhouse gases.

The climate talks have placed a spotlight on the Gulf Arab state, which produces nearly 50 tonnes a year of carbon dioxide for each of its 1.6 million residents.

Environmentalists question whether Qatar has the diplomatic muscle – and, more importantly, the political will to play a positive role in the critical two-week negotiations.

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A Russian scientist freed on Saturday after nearly a decade in jail for selling secrets to China accused Vladimir Putin’s “court” of turning the Kremlin leader into a tsar and of using the legal system to punish opponents.

Valentin Danilov, 66, looked pale and thin as he was released on parole from a prison colony on the edge of the industrial Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk after serving eight years of a 14-year sentence.

But he was defiant over a case which human rights activists say was politically motivated and part of an attempt by Putin to intimidate academics with ties to other countries during his first term as president.

“I would really appreciate it if somebody finally told me what state secret I sold,” Danilov told reporters after he emerged from the prison colony’s high corrugated walls and travelled by car through the snow-dusted streets of Krasnoyarsk to his daughter’s apartment.

He declined to comment directly on President Putin but criticized Russia’s political and judicial system nearly 13 years after the former KGB spy first rose to power and more than two decades after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

“As for President Putin, I guess everybody would be the same as him in his place. The court makes the tsar. In many cases it’s the people around him that are guilty rather than him himself,” said Danilov.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon has sent a bill to congress to change the official name of the country.

The current name, the United States of Mexico, was adopted in 1824 and was intended to emulate its northern neighbour.

President Calderon wants to change it to just Mexico, as the country is known the world over.

Mr Calderon, who leaves office on 1 December, said Mexico no longer needed to copy any foreign power.

“The name of our country no longer needs to emulate that of other nations,” Mr Calderon told a news conference.

“Forgive me for the expression, but Mexico’s name is Mexico.”

The name United States of Mexico (Estados Unidos Mexicanos) was brought in after independence from Spain.

It is used mostly on official documents, money and other government material.

Mr Calderon first suggested the name change as a congressman in 2003, but the bill did not make it to a vote.

The constitutional reform Mr Calderon proposes needs to be approved by both houses of Congress and a majority of Mexico’s 31 state legislatures.

Coming with just a week to go before Mr Calderon leaves office, the president’s critics see this as a symbolic gesture.

Mr Calderon will hand over to president-elect Enrique Pena Nieto of the Institutional Revolutionary Party.

In Korea, the chief of a Seoul district prosecution office offered to resign Friday over a sex sandal involving a junior prosecutor, the latest in a series of incidents which have tarnished the elite law enforcement agency.

The Supreme Prosecutors’ Office launched an investigation into allegations that a trainee prosecutor performed sexual acts with a female suspect in his office during an interrogation after promising to clear her of charges.

The incident comes as the prosecution office falls under growing criticism after prosecutors were ensnared in a series of incidents involving bribery, sexual harassment and verbal abuse of police officers.

“We are conducting an inspection into the law school graduate who is currently working as a trainee prosecutor at the Seoul Eastern District Prosecutors‘ Office,” said Lee Jun-ho, chief of the inspection team Thursday.

Seok Dong-hyeon, chief of the Seoul Eastern District Prosecutors’ Office, said Friday that he will step down from his post to take responsibility.

The accused prosecutor, 30, whose name is withheld, was interrogating the 43-year-old woman without the presence of an inspector, which is against the law.

The prosecutor also had sex with the woman at a nearby motel several days later, the inspectors said.

The misconduct was revealed when the woman tipped off her lawyer, who then asked the prosecutor in charge of supervising him.

“The two involved in the incident made a written agreement not to mention their inappropriate acts to anyone,” said the lawyer.

The trainee prosecutor was interrogating the woman on a Saturday because she said that was the only day she had available. According to a prosecution source, the acts happened by accident when he was placating her.

The official also said the woman called the trainee several days later and they went to the motel together. She allegedly asked the trainee for 50 million won ($46,000) for a settlement.

The inspection team plans to call in the prosecutor to question if he forcefully requested the sexual relations in exchange for favors.

The sex scandal came after chief prosecutor Kim Kwang-jun who received around 900 million won from conman Cho Hee-pal and Eugene Group, a construction-based conglomerate, was arrested last week.

Other prosecutors reportedly involved are being investigated by a special counsel team.

Prosecutor-General Han Sang-dae apologized Thursday for the strings of immoral acts of his employees who are supposed to represent justice and protect the public.

He convened a meeting on the same day with the heads of prosecutors’ offices nationwide and discussed how to strengthen the self inspection and achieve the reform.

The announcement for prosecutorial reform is expected to be unveiled before Dec. 7, earlier than previously thought, due to the latest sex scandal.

However, the public cast doubt on the authority’s promise for reform which has been pledged every time such scandals happened. Previous incidents include the “Benz prosecutor” case in 2011 in which a prosecutor was bribed with a Mercedec-Benz and a brand-name purse; the “sponsored prosecutors” in 2010 in which a dozen prosecutors received sexual favors from a construction firm; and the “Grandeur prosecutor” who received a car and money in return for favors to a suspect in 2008.