IGIHE

Tag: InternationalNews

  • Iran’s Rouhani seeks international dialogue

    {{Iran’s president-elect Hassan Rouhani has promised a more conciliatory tone over the country’s nuclear programme, saying Iran needs a cautious approach in its foreign policy.}}

    In a live address on state TV on Saturday, Rouhani said that Iran was after “dialogue and interaction with others from an equal position, based on mutual respect and interests”.

    He also warned the country would develop relations with others only if Tehran’s interests were respected.

    Media said Rouhani also warned regional countries not to miscalculate Iran’s power, saying some rival nations were now paying the cost.

    “International relations with others are based on respect, mutual interest and equality. We should reduce tensions, increase confidence-building, while keeping our rights and national dignity in consideration.”

    wirestory

  • Russian pro-, anti-gay activists clash

    {{Police detained dozens of people when pro- and anti-gay activists clashed in the Russian city of St Petersburg on Saturday, just two weeks after parliament passed a law banning homosexual “propaganda”.}}

    Critics say the bill – a nationwide version of laws in place in cities including St Petersburg, President Vladimir Putin’s hometown, – effectively bans gay rights rallies and could be used to prosecute anyone voicing support for homosexuals.

    Up to 100 people took part in the march to protest against the law, confronted by an equal number of anti-gay activists, who threw eggs, smoke flares and stones at them.

    Police intervened with batons to stop the violence and detained dozens of people.

    “We staged the rally to support our rights and express our protest against the homophobic law,” Natalya Tsymbalova, a gay activist said by telephone from a police station, adding that the rally did not infringe Russian law.

    The march was organized by the group “Ravnopraviye” (Equal Rights).

    The incident highlights increasing intolerance in Russian society towards gay people and a toughening of laws aimed at stifling any dissent against the rule of Putin in general.

    The bill passed by the lower house on June 11 bans the spreading of “propaganda for non-traditional sexual relations” to minors and sets heavy fines for violations. It has yet to be signed into law by Putin.

    There are no official figures on anti-gay crime in Russia, but in an online poll last year, 15 percent of about 900 gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender respondents said they had been physically attacked at least once in the previous 10 months.

    Putin, who has embraced the Russian Orthodox Church as a moral authority and harnessed its influence as a source of political support, has championed socially conservative values since starting a new, six-year term in May 2012.

    agencies

  • NASA Telescope to Probe Long-standing Solar Mystery

    {{A small NASA telescope was launched into orbit on Thursday on a mission to determine how the sun heats its atmosphere to millions of degrees, sending off rivers of particles that define the boundaries of the solar system.}}

    The study is far from academic. Solar activity directly impacts Earth’s climate and the space environment beyond the planet’s atmosphere. Solar storms can knock out power grids, disrupt radio signals and interfere with communications, navigation and other satellites in orbit.

    “We live in a very complex society and the sun has a role to play in it,” said physicist Alan Title, with Lockheed Martin Space Systems Advanced Technology Center in Palo Alto, California, which designed and built the telescope.

    Scientists have been trying to unravel the mechanisms that drive the sun for decades but one fundamental mystery endures: How it manages to release energy from its relatively cool, 10,000 degree Fahrenheit (5,500 degree Celsius) surface into an atmosphere that can reach up to 5 million degrees Fahrenheit (2.8 million Celsius).

    At its core, the sun is essentially a giant fusion engine that melds hydrogen atoms into helium. As expected, temperatures cool as energy travels outward through the layers. But then in the lower atmosphere, known as the chromosphere, temperatures heat up again.

    Pictures and data relayed by the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph, or IRIS, telescope may finally provide some answers about how that happens.

    The 4-foot (1.2-meter) long, 450-pound (204-kg) observatory will be watching the sun from a vantage point about 400 miles above Earth. It is designed to capture detailed images of light moving from the sun’s surface, known as the photosphere, into the chromosphere. Temperatures peak in the sun’s outer atmosphere, the corona.

    All that energy fuels a continuous release of charged particles from the sun into what is known as the solar wind, a pressure bubble that fills and defines the boundaries of the solar system.

    “Every time we look at the sun in more detail, it opens up a new window for us,” said Jeffrey Newmark, IRIS program scientist at NASA headquarters in Washington, D.C.

    The telescope was launched aboard an Orbital Sciences Corp Pegasus rocket at 10:27 p.m. EDT Thursday (0227 GMT Friday). Pegasus is an air-launched system that is carried aloft by a modified L-1011 aircraft that took off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California about 57 minutes before launch.

    The rocket was released from beneath the belly of the plane at an altitude of about 39,000 feet before it ignited to carry the telescope into orbit.

    IRIS, which cost about $145 million including the launch service, is designed to last for two years.

    {wirestory}

  • Balkan States Hope to Follow Croatia into EU

    {{Croatia becomes the European Union’s 28th member on Monday, the second ex-Yugoslav republic to join the bloc after Slovenia.}}

    Six other countries of the Western Balkans, with a joint population of almost 19 million, are unlikely to join the bloc before the end this decade, as the fallout from Yugoslavia’s violent collapse in the 1990s as well as corruption and sluggish economic growth continue to slow their progress.

    Following are summaries of each country’s prospects:

    ALBANIA

    Hardline communism under dictator Enver Hoxha collapsed in Albania in 1991, and the country of 3 million people joined NATO in 2009.

    Progress towards EU membership has been dogged by concerns over democracy, organized crime and corruption.

    Albania applied for EU candidate status in April 2009 but has twice been turned down, though it was granted visa-free travel to countries in the EU’s so-called Schengen zone in 2010. Brussels has cited shortcomings in the functioning of democratic institutions such as the parliament and judiciary.

    BOSNIA

    Bosnia has yet to apply for EU membership. Since its 1992-95 war, the 3.8 million-strong country has been split into two autonomous regions, overseen by an international envoy and a loose and weak central government.

    Bosnia’s progress remains hamstrung by rivalry between its Serb, Croat and Muslim communities, whose political leaders have failed to implement constitutional reforms mandated by the European Union and the European Court of Human Rights.

    Visa-free travel to the Schengen zone began in 2010 but reforms remain stymied up by the political impasse.

    KOSOVO

    Europe’s youngest country with a population of 1.8 million ultimately hopes to join the EU. It declared independence from Serbia in 2008 and has so far been recognized by 100 countries. However, only 22 of the EU’s 27 members have recognized it.

    It continues to be patrolled by NATO peacekeepers and, since 2008, by an EU police and justice mission, more than a decade after NATO bombed Serbia and took control of Kosovo.

    Organized crime, endemic corruption and continued tensions between the Albanian majority and Serb minority have deterred investors and held back development.

    Kosovo’s parliament this month ratified a landmark EU-brokered agreement in which Serbia ceded de facto control over predominantly Serb-populated northern Kosovo, in exchange for progress towards accession talks. Brussels has recommended opening talks for a stability and association agreement, the first step towards membership.

    MACEDONIA

    Macedonia is a candidate for membership of both NATO and the EU but progress has been hostage to a long-running dispute with its southern neighbor Greece. Athens objects to its use of the name “Macedonia”, saying it implies territorial ambitions towards Greece’s northern province of the same name.

    The Macedonian government meanwhile has begun pursuing an overtly nationalist agenda which diplomats say has further antagonized Greece and the EU.

    MONTENEGRO

    The EU granted the Adriatic country of 700,000 people candidate status in 2010 and opened accession talks last year. Montenegro closed the second negotiating chapter in April but issues such as the judiciary and corruption have yet to be discussed.

    Brussels has stressed Podgorica must do more to clamp down on organized crime and corruption. Montenegro, which dissolved its state union with Serbia in 2006, unilaterally adopted the euro as its official currency in 2002.

    SERBIA

    The biggest market in the Western Balkans with a population of 7.3 million is due to start EU membership talks by January.

    Serbia unblocked its EU integration in April, when its socialist-nationalist government signed an EU-brokered deal with Kosovo, agreeing to cede the control over northern Kosovo that it had retained even after its former province declared independence in 2008.

    Brussels has said recognition of Kosovo is not a precondition for membership but stressed the two countries must normalize relations.

    {reuters}

  • Philippines Rebukes China for ‘militarization’ in South China Sea

    {{The Philippines hit out at China on Sunday over the “increasing militarization” of the South China Sea as tensions between the neighbors flared amid slow-moving regional efforts to forge a compromise over one of Asia’s naval flashpoints.}}

    The rebuke by Philippine Foreign Minister Albert del Rosario at a regional summit in Brunei came a day after China’s state media warned of an inevitable “counterstrike” against the Philippines if it continued to provoke Beijing.

    Friction between China and the Philippines over disputed territories in the oil and gas rich sea has surged since last year due to several naval stand-offs and fraying diplomatic efforts to forge a regional agreement on maritime conduct.

    The 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) hopes to persuade Beijing to join talks on a proposed Code of Conduct (CoC) this year, but China’s naval action has alarmed some nations, particularly the Philippines and Vietnam.

    Most recently, the Philippines accused China of encroaching on its territory after three Chinese ships converged just 5 nautical miles from a small reef where the Philippines maintains a small military force.

    This month the Philippines moved more troops and supplies to the reef, which is within its 200-nautical mile economic exclusion zone. China, which does not recognize the zone, condemned it as an “illegal occupation”.

    Del Rosario said the “massive” presence of Chinese military and paramilitary ships at the Second Thomas shoal and at another reef called the Scarborough Shoal – the site of a tense standoff last year – was a threat to regional peace.

    “The statement on counterstrike is an irresponsible one. We condemn any threats of use of force,” Del Rosario told reporters in Brunei following a meeting of ASEAN foreign ministers.

    He said the ministers had discussed China’s ongoing “illegal” occupation of the Scarborough Shoal, which is just 124 nautical miles of the Philippine coast.

    {wirestory}

  • Guinea Minister Charged with Stadium Massacre

    {{A government minister in Guinea has been charged in connection with a massacre at a stadium in 2009.}}

    Col Claude Pivi is charged with murder, rape and the destruction of property.

    At least 157 people died in the Conakry stadium when troops attacked people protesting against military rule. Scores of women were raped.

    Col Pivi, now in charge of presidential security, is the seventh military figure to be charged over the events. None has so far been tried.

    Rights groups have criticised President Alpha Conde for not moving fast enough to bring those responsible to justice.

    Col Pivi was a leading figure in the CNDD military junta led by Capt Moussa Dadis Camara at the time of the massacre on 28 September 2009.

    Eyewitnesses said people were shot, stabbed, bludgeoned or trampled to death and women raped and tortured.

    Human rights groups and victims’ organisations have welcomed the latest charges but urged the government to speed up the process.

    “Our concern is that this must not just be a situation whereby people are indicted and then are left to go about their business as normal. We want to see some further advancement on this issue,” said Asmaou Diallo, who heads a victims’ support group.

    “We welcome this indictment as it should help us get to the truth. However, we call on this government to make sure that all those indicted persons still in the country should be removed from their posts until they face justice.”

    Moussa Dadis Camara seized power in 2008 when long-time leader Lansana Conte died. But not long after the stadium massacre, he went into exile following an assassination attempt.

    His deputy oversaw the handover to civilian rule, with veteran opposition leader Alpha Conde winning elections in 2010.

  • 8 Soldiers Killed by Roadside Bomb in South Thailand

    {{Eight soldiers have been killed by a roadside bomb in Thailand’s restive south, police say, in one of the deadliest attacks on the security forces in recent years.}}

    The “powerful” bomb targeted military vehicles in Krong Pinang district of Yala province, police said.

    More than 5,000 people have been killed since a separatist insurgency reignited in the Muslim-majority region in 2004.

    Near-daily attacks are continuing despite government talks with rebels.

    “It was a very powerful bomb that completely destroyed the truck,” police spokesman Colonel Pramote Promin told media.

    “Ten soldiers were in the truck. Eight died and two were wounded,” he said, adding that two villagers had also been injured.

    It is the single deadliest attack on Thai security forces in several years.

    The attacks in the south continue despite pledges by the government and negotiators for Muslim separatists to try to curb violence over the Ramadan period, beginning next month, in talks earlier in June.

    Thailand is a Buddhist-majority country, but Muslims are the majority in the three southern provinces of Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat.

    Muslim militants, who are fighting for greater autonomy, are believed to carry out the gun and bomb attacks against security forces and citizens perceived to be government allies or collaborators in the area.

    {agencies}

  • 100th Tour de France Flags off

    {{If the Tour de France founder Henri Desgrange could have magically transported himself forward to the100th edition and discovered that the hot favorite was Kenyan-born Briton Chris Froome, with not a French contender in sight, then he might have abandoned the idea altogether.}}

    Desgrange and his editorial colleagues on the newspaper L’Auto came up with the idea of a cycle race around France to boost its flagging circulation and a non-French winner was the last thing they would have wanted.

    Maurice Garin duly obliged in the 1903 edition, but more importantly the “Grand Boucle” had successfully captured the French public’s imagination and with the exception of two world wars has been raced every year since.

    Despite a raft of doping scandals — this year’s Tour is the first since Lance Armstrong confessed to cheating and was stripped of his seven titles — and the tragic deaths of leading riders such as Tommy Simpson and Fabio Casartelli — its popularity as the greatest free sporting spectacle in the world has endured.

    For a race conceived by a journalist, it has undoubtedly provided rich material to fill countless column inches, not to mention ample opportunities for their photographic colleagues to capture the drama of the moment and France’s stunning scenery.

    Mapping Le Tour, published in conjunction with the centenary race, chronicles the history of the race in images and route maps of each year, plus a stage-by-stage preview of the 2013 edition.

    It reveals that the Tour has visited every region of France apart from Corsica — so fittingly, and to mark the special anniversary, this year’s race will start Saturday with three road stages on the hilly Mediterranean island.

    {Above; In 1903, Riders tackle the stage from Toulouse to Bordeaux in the first ever edition of the Tour de France.}

    {Tour de France 2013 below}

    CNN

  • UK PM visits British troops in Afghanistan

    {{UK Prime Minister David Cameron made an unannounced visit to Afghanistan Saturday, where he met with British troops in Helmand province, according to 10 Downing Street.}}

    His visit coincides with “Armed Forces Day,” a series of events held across Britain Saturday to recognize the contribution of the nation’s servicemen and women, military veterans and their families.

    “I’ve just arrived in Afghanistan — where on this Armed Forces Day I’ll be thanking our troops for all they do to keep us safe,” Cameron tweeted.

    There are currently 8,000 British servicemen and women serving in Afghanistan, alongside 68,000 from the United States, the largest contributor of troops.

    {agencies}

  • Ecuador tells US to explain its spy programme

    Ecuador’s Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino has called on the US to explain itself to the world over its massive spy programme.

    Patino’s comments came days after Edward Snowden, a National Security Agency (NSA) contractor, leaked classified data before fleeing to Russia from where he is seeking asylum in Ecuador.

    The developments have sparked a diplomatic dispute between Washington and Ecuador.

    “The United States should be giving a clear and thorough explanation to the citizens of the world regarding this issue,” Patino said.

    “Instead the entire world is focused on what happens to Edward Snowden and everyone is focused on whether or not the so-called fugitive is captured and that’s not the problem.”

    The US has charged Snowden with espionage for leaking information.

    The whistleblower, currently said to be in transit at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport, is being assisted by the anti-secrecy organisation WikiLeaks to secure asylum in Ecuador.

    Ecuador, whose embassy in London has given WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange asylum as he fights extradition to Sweden where he is wanted on sex assault charges, said earlier this week it was still “analysing” the application.

    Snowden has not been seen since he arrived in Moscow from Hong Kong on Sunday, but Russian officials say he is still in transit.

    agencies