Tag: InternationalNews

India and Canada have finalised the terms for their nuclear deal, paving the way for Canadian firms to export uranium to India.

Once implemented, the deal is likely to provide a boost to India’s plans to increase its nuclear capacity to meet growing energy demands.

The deal was agreed in 2010, but there had been differences over supervision of the use of uranium in India.

Canada has banned the trade of nuclear materials with India since 1976.

“Canada with its large and high quality reserves of uranium could become an important supplier to the Indian nuclear power programme,” India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his Canadian counterpart Stephen Harper said in a joint statement.

Seven Syrian army generals defected to Turkey on Tuesday, Turkish media reported.

The generals were allowed to enter Turkey through the southern Hatay province under tight security measures, the Anadolu Agency said.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has lost a stream of high-level government and military officials in recent months as his forces continue battling rebels seeking an end to four decades of al-Assad family rule.

Manaf Tlass, a brigadier general and a former close friend of the president, left Syria’s Republican Guard in July. Prime Minister Riyad Hijab has also defected.

At least 10 people drowned in the Mediterranean when a ship sank between Libya and the Italian island of Lampedusa Sunday, according to Italy’s official news agency.

Seventy people, including 62 men and eight women, were rescued, ANSA reported. One of the women is pregnant, it said.

The search by Italy’s Navy and Coast Guard is underway for any other survivors, but the report did not say how many people were still missing.
The report referred to the ship’s passengers as migrants, suggesting they are from North Africa.

A boat carrying about 100 migrants from Tunisia ran into trouble in the same area two months ago, triggering a rescue effort by the Italians and NATO ships.

Lampedusa, the closest Italian island to Africa, has become a destination for tens of thousands of refugees seeking to enter European Union countries.

South Korea’s elderly suicide rate is the highest among member nations of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

Data showed Tuesday, prompted the country to come up with measures to counter the rise of suicides among economically strapped senior citizens.

According to the data compiled by the OECD, 81.8 per 100,000 South Korean elderly citizens under 74 years of age committed suicide in 2010, while 160 out of 100,000 people took their own lives among those aged 75 and above, the highest among the 34 member countries of the OECD.

The number is five to six times higher than that of the United States and even Japan, known to have one of the highest suicide rates in the world.

In 2005, South Korea’s elderly suicide rate also ranked first among OECD members.

“Those who were unable to prepare for a financially stable life after retirement seem to be turning to extreme measures after suffering from physical and mental problems without any support from others,” said Choi Bong-seon, who works at a specialized institution for the elderly in North Chungcheong Province.

With the number of those living alone while suffering from economic hardships or illnesses on the rise, elderly people committing suicide has emerged as a major social issue in the country in recent years.

According to Statistics Korea, almost one in five senior citizens in the country were living alone in 2010, and the protracted global economic slump has left more and more of them struggling without any means of support.

In October, a 65-year-old man living on his own was found dead in his home in Cheongju, 137 kilometers south of Seoul, according to the police. He had supposedly taken his own life after trying to make ends meet as a day laborer.

In order to reduce the significantly high rate of elderly suicides, local governments are drawing up preventive measures such as providing services including treatment and counseling to those suffering from depression.

“It is urgent for the government as well as the regional communities to pay more attention to help and protect the elderly,” Choi said.

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Argentinian lawmakers passed a new measure Wednesday lowering the nation’s voting age to 16.

Representatives in the South American country’s lower house overwhelmingly voted in favor of the law Wednesday. A majority of senators approved it last week.

The move to lower the voting age from 18 to 16 comes a year before a key mid-term election in Argentina, and some critics have said it’s an attempt by President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner and her party to garner more votes.

But supporters of the measure say it will give young people more opportunities to participate in politics.

“I think it’s important that the law reflects reality,” said Rep. Hector Recalde of the Victory Front party.

“Reality indicates that the participation of young people is increasing in our country. It’s good that it’s this way.”

Rep. Eduardo Amadeo of the Peronist Front party offered a more cynical take on the nation’s youth.

“If you ask me what is the worst social problem in Argentina, it is the youth. Education is worse. The consumption of drugs is worse.

Employment is worse. Things like teen pregnancy, they are much worse than they were at the beginning of this government, and now the government has discovered them and they say, we are going to vote,” he said.

Nahuel Armando, a student in Buenos Aires, said lowering the voting age would be a positive move.

Syrian rebels firing mortars and rocket-propelled grenades captured an oilfield in the country’s east on Sunday after three days of fierce fighting with government troops protecting the facility, activists said.

The head of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdul-Rahman, said rebels overran the Al-Ward oilfield in the province of Deir el-Zour near the border with Iraq early Sunday.

About 40 soldiers were guarding the facility that the rebels had been pounding for the past three days, he said, adding that opposition fighters also captured several regime troops.

Oil was a major source of revenue for the cash-strapped regime of President Bashar Assad before the European Union and the United States imposed an embargo on Syria’s crude exports last year to punish the government for its brutal crackdown on protesters early on in the uprising.

“This field used to supply the regime with fuel for its tanks and our aim was to stop these supplies,” Omar Abu Leila, an activist in Deir el-Zour, told The Associated Press by telephone. He said there was heavy fighting recently near the oil facility that is located just east of the city of Mayadin.

Both activists said the rebels shot down a fighter jet near the oil field Sunday. It was not clear if the warplane was taking part in fighting in the area.

An Israeli news program claims that Israel’s premier told his military to prepare for a strike on Iranian nuclear sites in 2010, but it was not ready.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak says in excerpts aired Sunday that “at the moment of truth, the answer given was that the ability didn’t exist.”

It quotes former Mossad chief Meir Dagan as telling Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the order was illegal, as it needed Cabinet approval.

The full program is scheduled for broadcast Monday.

Israel views Iran as an existential threat due to its nuclear program, frequent calls for Israel’s destruction and support of anti-Israel militants.

The West suspects Iran might try to build nuclear weapons. Iran denies that. Israel has hinted at a military strike if economic sanctions fail.