Tag: InternationalNews

{{The US National Security Agency spied on civil rights leader Martin Luther King and boxer Muhammad Ali during the height of the Vietnam War protests, declassified documents reveal}}.

The documents show the NSA also tracked journalists from the New York Times and the Washington Post and two senators.

Some NSA officials later described the programme as “disreputable if not outright illegal”, the documents show.

The operation, dubbed “Minaret”, was originally exposed in the 1970s.

However, the names of those on the phone-tapping “watch list” had been kept secret until now.

The secret papers were published after a government panel ruled in favour of researchers at George Washington University.

The university’s National Security Archive – a research institute that seeks to check government secrecy – described the names on the NSA’s watch-list as “eye-popping”.

The agency eavesdropped on civil rights leaders Martin Luther King and Whitney Young as well as boxing champion Muhammad Ali, New York Times journalist Tom Wicker and Washington Post columnist Art Buchwald.

Protest fears
The NSA also monitored the overseas phone calls of two prominent US senators – Democrat Frank Church and Republican Howard Baker.

Many of those targeted were considered to be critics of US involvement in the Vietnam War.

In 1967 the strength of the anti-war campaign led President Lyndon Johnson to ask US intelligence agencies to find out if some protests were being stoked by foreign governments.

The NSA worked with other spy agencies to draw up the “watch lists” of anti-war critics, tapping their phone calls.

The programme continued after Richard Nixon entered the White House in 1969. US Attorney General Elliot Richardson shut down the NSA programme in 1973, just as the Nixon administration was engulfed in the Watergate scandal.

The latest revelations come as the NSA is embroiled in fresh controversy over its surveillance programmes.

US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden recently exposed far-reaching electronic surveillance of phone records and internet traffic by the agency.

Researchers Matthew Aid and William Burr, who published the documents on Wednesday, said the spying abuses during the Vietnam War era far surpassed any excesses of the current programme.

“As shocking as the recent revelations about the NSA’s domestic eavesdropping have been, there has been no evidence so far of today’s signal intelligence corps taking a step like this, to monitor the White House’s political enemies,” they wrote.

BBC

{{A court in China has convicted the son of a high-profile army general and sentenced him to 10 years in jail for rape, state media say.}}

The court said Li Tianyi, 17, and four others raped the woman at a Beijing hotel in February after having drinks.

He had denied any sexual relations with the woman, whom he alleged was working as a prostitute, previous reports say.

Li Tianyi is the son of army Gen Li Shuangjiang, known for his renditions of patriotic songs on television.

Li Tianyi’s mother Meng Ge is also a well-known singer in China’s People’s Liberation Army.

The case was heard at the Haidian Court in north-west Beijing. The other defendants also received jail terms ranging from three to 12 years.

This was not the first time that Li Tianyi, also known as Li Guanfeng, was involved in an incident that sparked public outcry. In 2011, he was sentenced to detention for a year over a road rage incident.

He was behind the wheel of a BMW car with no licence plates in Beijing when he confronted a middle-aged couple in another vehicle blocking his way.

He assaulted the couple and shouted at shocked bystanders, telling them not to “dare to call the police”.

His father apologised to the couple over the incident.

The case of Li Tianyi inflamed public anger at the children of the political elite, who are often seen as spoilt and above the law, correspondents say.

{{Greek police clashed with protesters in Athens late Wednesday at the end of a huge march sparked by the murder of an anti-fascist musician, allegedly at the hands of a self-confessed neo-Nazi.}}

Protesters were seen hurling petrol bombs at anti-riot police, who responded with tear gas a few hundred metres (yards) from the headquarters of the neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn.

Some also attacked shops including a bank after police parked trucks in the road to block the protesters’ access to the party offices.

Around 10,000 left-wing activists staged a peaceful protest earlier Wednesday in Athens against the fatal September 18 stabbing of 34-year-old musician Pavlos Fyssas by unemployed truck driver George Roupakias.

Roupakias, a Golden Dawn member, admitted stabbing Fyssas but said he was acting in self-defence.

The killing sparked a wave of sometimes violent protests and prompted an unprecedented crackdown on Golden Dawn after months of inaction by the authorities.

In recent months, Golden Dawn has been accused of instigating beatings of migrants and political opponents, and several of its lawmakers have been implicated in assaults, but police failed to pursue most of the cases.

This changed after Fyssas’ murder, with the government this week suspending several senior police officers for failing to investigate suspected illegal activity by Golden Dawn.

Police raids on Golden Dawn offices in search of hidden weapons were also ordered this week, amid reports that the party organised military-style training activities for its members.

In the wake of Fyssas’ murder, government officials and police unionists have confirmed long-running fears that Golden Dawn has broad support among Greek police.

“Over the last three years there are many incidents in which fellow officers tolerated violence by Golden Dawn members,” Christos Fotopoulos, head of the Greek association of police staff, told Skai radio.

Two police generals quit their posts on Monday and several other officers on the island of Evia were suspended after failing to investigate a Golden Dawn office near a local police station where weapons were allegedly kept.

On Tuesday, a police officer assigned to a Golden Dawn lawmaker prosecuted for anti-migrant aggression was arrested in the central town of Agrinio.

Golden Dawn has vehemently denied links to the singer’s killer — despite pictures emerging of Roupakias participating in party activities — and says it is the victim of a smear campaign.

“I cannot possibly be Al Capone, ordering paid criminals to every corner of Greece,” party leader Nikos Michaloliakos told his party website TV this week, dismissing the allegations as “laughable.”

“We have dozens of offices operating legally around the country,” he said, as the party on Wednesday threatened to sue all its main political rivals.

A few days prior to Fyssas’ murder, members of the Communist party had been assaulted by alleged Golden Dawn supporters whilst putting up posters.

agencies

A small group of male high school students wore skirts in protest at a ban on girls wearing skirts yesterday at a high school in the southern province of Antalya.

Several male students, members of “Dev-Lis” (Revolutionary High Schoolers), turned out for the protest against a ban placed on girls wearing skirts late yesterday, after the Gazi Anatolian High School in Antalya prohibited its female students from wearing skirts as part of the school uniform.

wirestory

{{Foreign ministers from the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany (P5 + 1) are set to sit down with their Iranian counterpart on Thursday for what could be the start of earnest talks about Tehran’s controversial nuclear programme, in the wake of Iran’s President Hassan Rohani stating that he wanted to reach a deal within three to six months.}}

“The only way forward is for a timeline to be inserted into the negotiations that is short. The shorter it is, the more beneficial it is to everyone,” Rohani said in an interview with the Washington Post newspaper published on Wednesday.

The comments come a day after he told the UN General Assembly that Iran presented no threat to world peace and was ready to engage with the United States.

Rohani told the newspaper on the sidelines of the UN gathering in New York that, “If it’s three months that would be Iran’s choice, if it’s six months that’s still good. It’s a question of months not years.”

There was a real optimism at the UN over the possibility of a breakthrough in the stalled nuclear negotiations, according to FRANCE 24’s correspondent at the UN in New York Emmanuel Saint-Martin.

“It is a cautious optimism,” Saint-Martin noted. “One Western diplomat told me today that while we have seen a lot of gestures and a lot of good signals have been sent, so far there is nothing concrete. So people are very eager for this meeting.”

Rohani, described as a moderate cleric, won the presidential election in June on a platform of more openness with the West and progress on the nuclear issue.

US President Barack Obama and French President François Hollande welcomed Rohani’s encouraging address in New York this week, but demanded more than rhetoric.

{{Key Syrian Islamist rebel groups say they do not recognise any foreign-based opposition group, including the Syrian National Coalition.}}

“The National Coalition and the proposed government under [recently chosen] Ahmad Tomeh does not represent us, nor do we recognise it,” 13 of Syria’s most powerful rebel groups said in a joint statement late on Tuesday.

The groups include members of the main rebel Free Syrian Army, as well as Liwa al-Tawhid, the main rebel force in the northern province of Aleppo, and Jabhat al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda-linked group.

The UN Security Council blacklisted al-Nusra Front as an alias of al-Qaeda in Iraq in May, while the US State Department had designated the group as a terrorist organisation in December last year.

Ahrar al-Sham also signed on, as did the 19th Division, a significant but relatively new addition to the mainstream FSA.

In their statement, they also called for Islamic law to be applied.

“These forces call on all military and civilian groups to unite in a clear Islamic context that… is based on sharia [Islamic] law, making it the sole source of legislation,” it said.

They called for “unity” and “to reject division… putting the interest of the [Islamic] nation over the interest of each group”.

wirestory

A Russian parents’ committee has asked President Vladimir Putin to cancel a planned concert by gay musician Elton John, saying he intended to violate a ban on “homosexual propaganda”.

In an open letter to Putin, the local parents’ group in central Ural region was reported by media as saying: “The singer intends to come out in support of local sodomites and break the current Russian law, directed at protecting children.”

Critics say the law banning gay “propaganda” among minors – which has prompted calls for a boycott of Russia’s hosting of the 2014 Winter Olympics – is discriminatory, barring people from being open about their sexual orientation.

The law is part of a broader attempt by Putin to win over Russians in the mostly conservative country following protests against his rule among urban and often middle class voters over his return to the Kremlin last May.

The parents’ committee was unavailable for comment despite repeated phone calls.

Sir Elton John, who reminisced in an interview earlier this month with the Guardian newspaper of having sex on a Moscow rooftop with a translator during his 1979 Soviet Union tour, said he wanted to perform in Russia to support the gay community.

“As a gay man, I can’t leave those people on their own without going over there and supporting them. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I’ve got to go,” he said in the interview.

John will perform on December 6 in Moscow and December 7 in Kazan.

One of the world’s most prominent gay celebrities, he lives with his partner David Furnish, with whom he is in a civil union, and is bringing up two children.

He has campaigned for gay rights in Britain and in Ukraine where he was denied the right in 2009 to adopt a child because of his age and marital status.

Reuters received no comment from John despite an email request.

Performers Madonna and Lady Gaga criticized the law in concerts in St Petersburg last year, leading Moscow to implement a harsher visa regimes for performers coming to Russia.

U.S. singer Cher turned down an invitation to perform at the Winter Games in Russia’s Black Sea resort of Sochi because of the anti-gay propaganda, saying the decision was a “no brainer”.

Human rights groups say the new law has fueled hate crimes against homosexuals.

Homosexuality was decriminalized after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, but polls by the independent Levada Center show a majority of Russians approve of the new legislation and nearly 40 percent believe gay people need treatment.

agencies

Iran’s new president, Hassan Rouhani, expressed hope on Tuesday that U.S. President Barack Obama would not be swayed by “warmongering pressure groups” at home in dealing with the Iranian nuclear dispute and called for a consistent voice from Washington on the issue.

Speaking to the United Nations General Assembly hours after Obama addressed the annual gathering of world leaders, Rouhani said he was prepared to engage in “time-bound and results-oriented” nuclear talks and did not seek to increase tensions with the United States.

“I listened carefully to the statement made by President Obama today at the General Assembly,” he said. “Commensurate with the political will of the leadership in the United States and hoping that they will refrain from following the short-sighted interest of warmongering pressure groups, we can arrive at a framework to manage our differences.”

“To this end, equal footing, mutual respect and the recognized principles of international law should govern the interactions,” he said. “Of course, we expect to hear a consistent voice from Washington.”

A potential encounter at the United Nations between Obama and Rouhani failed to take place on Tuesday as the Iranians indicated it was too complicated, senior Obama administration officials said.

U.S. Deputy U.N. Ambassador Rosemary DiCarlo was seated at the U.S. table while Rouhani spoke. Earlier, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif was present for Obama’s speech.

While his speech lacked the strident anti-Western rhetoric of predecessor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s U.N. speeches, Rouhani offered no concessions. He repeated Tehran’s position that Iran is not interested in atomic weapons.

“Nuclear weapon and other weapons of mass destruction have no place in Iran’s security and defense doctrine, and contradict our fundamental religious and ethical convictions,” he said in his first U.N. speech since taking office in August.

While he avoided any suggestion that Israel had no right to exist, he sharply criticized the treatment of the Palestinians – albeit without naming Israel directly.

reuters