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Tag: InternationalNews

  • Nicolas Sarkozy officially being investigated

    {{A judge on Thursday filed preliminary charges against former President Nicolas Sarkozy in a campaign finance case, formally placing him under investigation over allegations that he illegally took donations from France’s richest woman on way to his 2007 election victory.}}

    The preliminary charges were issued against Sarkozy, 58, after he went through hours of questioning in a Bordeaux courthouse, according to the prosecutor’s office.

    The ex-president is accused of “abuse of someone in an impaired state” in the case involving L’Oreal cosmetics fortune heiress Liliane Bettencourt, who is now 90.

    Under French law, preliminary charges mean the investigating magistrate has reason to believe wrongdoing was committed, but allows more time to investigate. The charges may later be dropped or could lead to a trial.

    Sarkozy potentially could join his predecessor and former mentor, former President Jacques Chirac, who was convicted after office. In a political financing scandal of his own, Chirac in late 2011 became the only former French leader since World War II-era Nazi collaborator Marshal Philippe Petain to be charged or convicted of a crime.

    The charges were unlikely to have any immediate political impact. The conservative Sarkozy said his political career was over and assumed a low profile after losing his re-election bid to Socialist Francois Hollande in May. While some polls suggest Sarkozy is the mainstream right’s favored candidate in the next presidential race, it’s not until 2017.

    Still, Sarkozy’s travails were likely to take the media spotlight off political scandal that hit Hollande’s government this week, with the resignation of Budget Minister Jerome Cahuzac over allegations that he squirreled away cash abroad to avoid paying French taxes.

    The investigation in Bordeaux that has caught up Sarkozy centers on the finances of Bettencourt, who was once the focus of a long-running family feud over her fortune. Bettencourt, who was reported to suffer from Alzheimer’s disease, has since been placed under legal protection.

    Sarkozy lost his legal immunity from prosecution when he failed to win re-election. In November, he was given the status of a so-called “assisting witness,” with the possibility of facing charges later on allegations of abusing someone in an impaired state, swindling and abuse of confidence.

    After Thursday’s questioning, a three-judge panel opted only to retain the first of those counts related to activity in February 2007 and throughout that year, according to the prosecutor’s office. It emphasized that the former president is still presumed innocent of any wrongdoing.

    Investigating judge Jean-Michel Gentil was looking into conflicting accounts about how many times Sarkozy — a darling of the mainstream political right — visited the home of Bettencourt in the run-up to his winning 2007 campaign for president, according to one lawyer.

    Earlier in the probe, Bettencourt’s ex-accountant told police she gave 150,000 euros ($192,000) to the manager of Bettencourt’s fortune that was to be passed on to Sarkozy’s campaign treasurer.

    “If Mr. Gentil placed Mr. Sarkozy under investigation this evening it’s because he had a reason to do so,” said Antoine Gillot, a lawyer for Bettencourt’s former butler, who was also questioned Thursday along with Sarkozy, on French TV i-Tele. “It was a semi surprise … it means the judge has a certain number of facts.”

    Sarkozy’s lawyer and spokeswoman didn’t return calls, e-mails or text messages from The Associated Press seeking comment about the decision Thursday.

    But Thierry Mariani, a lawmaker and ally in Sarkozy’s conservative party, suggested the charges were politically motivated and part of an effort to discredit Sarkozy just as polls suggest he is still widely liked and show big disappointment in Hollande — whose popularity has tanked just 10 months into his five-year term.

    AP

  • Obama Says, Peace possible In Middle East

    {{Insisting “peace is possible,” President Barack Obama on Thursday prodded both Israelis and Palestinians to return to long-stalled negotiations with few, if any, pre-conditions, softening his earlier demands that Israel stop building settlements in disputed territory.}}

    The president made his appeal just hours after rockets fired from Hamas-controlled Gaza landed in a southern Israeli border town, a fresh reminder of the severe security risks and tensions that have stymied peace efforts for decades.

    Obama, on his second day in the Middle East, shuttled between Jerusalem and Ramallah, reaching out to the public as well as political leaders. He offered no new policies or plans for reopening peace talks but urged both sides to “think anew” about the intractable conflict and break out of the “formulas and habits that have blocked progress for so long.”

    “Peace is possible,” Obama declared during an impassioned speech to young people in Jerusalem. “I’m not saying it’s guaranteed. I can’t even say that it is more likely than not. But it is possible.”

    The deep disputes dividing the Israelis and Palestinians have remained much the same over the years, and include deciding the status of Jerusalem, defining borders and resolving refugee issues.

    Palestinians have been particularly incensed over Israeli settlements in disputed territories, and the Israelis’ continued construction has also drawn the condemnation of the United States and other nations.

    Further settlement activity is “counterproductive to the cause of peace,” Obama said. But in a notable shift, he did not repeat his administration’s previous demands that Israel halt construction.

    Instead he urged the Palestinians to stop using the disagreement as an “excuse” to avoid talks.

    “If the expectation is that we can only have direct negotiations when everything is settled ahead of time, then there is no point for negotiations,” Obama said during a joint news conference with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah.

    “I think it is important to work through this process even if there are irritants on both sides.”

    Abbas said Palestinians remain committed to seeking peace with Israelis, but he made clear that settlement construction had made his people distrustful of Israel’s intentions.

    “This is very dangerous that people and the new generation reaches the conviction that it’s no more possible to believe in the two-state solution,” he said.

    Obama has sided with the Palestinians on the settlement issue during his first four years in office. However, when Israel reluctantly declared a 10-month moratorium on construction, the Palestinians balked at returning to negotiations until shortly before the suspension expired and talks foundered shortly thereafter.

    The Palestinians want a state in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem — territories Israel captured in the 1967 war — but indicate they are ready for minor adjustments to accommodate some settlements closest to Israel.

    Since 1967, Israel has built dozens of settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem that are now home to 560,000 Israelis — an increase of 60,000 since Obama became president four years ago.

    AP

  • North Korea Issues Fresh Threat to U.S.

    {{North Korea said it would attack U.S. military bases on Japan and the Pacific island of Guam if provoked, a day after leader Kim Jong-un oversaw a mock drone strike on South Korea.}}

    The North also held an air raid drill on Thursday after accusing the United States of preparing a military strike using bombers that have overflown the Korean peninsula as part of drills between South Korean and U.S. forces.

    North Korea has stepped up its rhetoric in response to what it calls “hostile” drills between South Korea and the United States. It has also been angered by the imposition of fresh U.N. sanctions that followed its February 12 nuclear test.

    Separately, South Korea said a hacking attack on the servers of local broadcasters and banks on Wednesday originated from an IP address in China, raising suspicions the intrusion came from North Korea.

    “The United States is advised not to forget that our precision target tools have within their range the Anderson Air Force base on Guam where the B-52 takes off, as well as the Japanese mainland where nuclear powered submarines are deployed and the navy bases on Okinawa,” the North’s supreme military command spokesman was quoted as saying by the KCNA news agency.

    Japan and U.S. Pacific bases are in range of Pyongyang’s medium-range missiles.

    It is not known if North Korea possesses drones, although a report on South Korea’s Yonhap news agency last year said it had obtained 1970s-era U.S. target drones from Syria to develop into attack drones.

    {Reuters}

  • India court upholds actor Sanjay Dutt’s conviction

    {{India’s Supreme Court upheld the weapons conviction of Bollywood leading man Sanjay Dutt and ordered him to report to prison within four weeks in a case linked to the deadliest terror attack in Indian history.}}

    Dutt’s failed appeal of his conviction was part of a broader ruling by the Supreme Court on cases stemming from the 1993 bombings that killed 257 people in the financial hub of Mumbai. A total of 100 people were convicted of involvement in the blasts.

    The court also Thursday upheld the death sentence given to Yakub Memon, who is a brother of Ibrahim ‘Tiger’ Memon, a suspected mastermind of the bombings who remains at large.

    However, the court commuted to life in prison the death sentences given to 10 other men convicted of carrying out the blasts. Some of the men have been in prison for nearly two decades.

    Dutt, 53, originally had been sentenced to serve six years in prison on the charge of possessing an automatic rifle and a pistol that were supplied to him by men subsequently convicted in the bombings. He served 18 months in jail before he was released on bail in November 2007 pending an appeal to the top court.

    The Supreme Court shaved one year off his sentence and ordered him imprisoned within a month to finish out the remaining 3 1/2 years of his sentence. Dutt had earlier been acquitted of the more serious charges of terrorism and conspiracy.

    In a statement released to the Indian media, Dutt said he was “heart-broken” and “shattered and in emotional distress.”

    “If they want me to suffer more I have to be strong,” he said.
    Dutt told reporters that he was consulting experts to explore his legal options.

    The actor’s case is part of a sprawling Mumbai bombings trial that has lasted 18 years. Dutt maintains he knew nothing about the bombing plot and that he asked for the guns to protect his family — his mother was Muslim and his father Hindu — after receiving threats during sectarian riots in Mumbai.

    AP

  • Philippine Court Halts Contraceptives Law

    {{The Philippine Supreme Court temporarily halted the implementation of a law that provides state funding for contraceptives, legislation opposed by the dominant Roman Catholic Church but supported by reproductive health activists}}.

    The Responsible Parenthood Law was passed by lawmakers late last year despite the church’s opposition but petitioners questioned its legality on several grounds, saying it offends religious beliefs and fosters abortion, which remains illegal in the country.

    Voting 15-5 in favor of 10 separate petitions Tuesday, the justices stopped the implementation of the law until June 18, when both sides will argue their cases before the court, said Theodore Te, spokesman for the Supreme Court.

    Catholic leaders consider the law an attack on the church’s core values and say it promotes promiscuity and destroys life. The government says it helps the poor manage the number of children they have and provides for maternal health care.

    Nearly half of all pregnancies in the Philippines are unwanted, according to the U.N. Population Fund, and a third of those end up aborted in back-alley clinics.

    The Philippines has a population of 94 million and one of Asia’s highest birth rates.

    Edwin Lacierda, spokesman for President Benigno Aquino III, said that the government was confident it will be able to defend the merits of the law.

    Aquino risked the clash with the church and church-backed politicians to sponsor the law and lobby for its passage.

    Aquino signed the law in December, and the Department of Health last week drafted and approved its implementing rules, setting it into motion.

    The law mandates government health centers to provide universal and free access to nearly all contraceptives to everyone, particularly the country’s poorest, who make up a third of the population.

    So far, such access has been patchy, expensive, and hinged on the political will of local governments.

    In the past, for instance, some mayors banned free distribution of condoms in their areas.

    The law also makes sexual education compulsory in public schools.
    The government made some concessions in deference to the church, according to Mellisa Upreti, regional director for Asia at the U.S.-based Center for Reproductive Rights.

    It failed to legalize all contraceptives, including emergency contraception, and the law contains a measure that allows private and religious-affiliated hospitals to deny reproductive health services based on their moral and theological objections, Upreti wrote in Tuesday’s Guardian newspaper.

    Private-run Catholic hospitals are among the leading providers of health care in the Philippines.

    {Associated Press}

  • Malala Shot by Taliban Returns to School

    {{Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani teenager shot in the head by the Taliban, has returned to school for the first time since she was targeted.}}

    The 15-year-old joined other girls at Edgbaston High School for Girls in Birmingham for her first day back at school on Tuesday, said Edelman, the public relations agency handling her media relations.

    Malala was airlifted to Britain for treatment after Taliban gunman shot her on Oct. 9, while on her way home from school in northwestern Pakistan.

    The militant group said it targeted her because she promoted “Western thinking” and criticized the group’s behavior when it took over the scenic Swat Valley where she lived.

    The shooting sparked outrage in Pakistan and many other countries, and her story has captured global attention for the struggle for women’s rights in her homeland.

    Malala was released in February from the hospital that was treating her for her injuries. Doctors said she was recovering well after receiving skull reconstruction and cochlear implant surgeries.

    In a statement, Malala said she was excited to return to school and that she wanted “all girls in the world to have this basic opportunity.”

    “I miss my classmates from Pakistan very much, but I am looking forward to meeting my teachers and making new friends here in Birmingham,” she added.

    The teenager is expected to remain in the U.K. for some time as her father, Ziauddin, has secured a post with the Pakistani Consulate in the English city of Birmingham.

    {AP}

  • Hungarian Journalist Asked to Return State Award

    {{Hungary’s Minister of Human Resources has asked a journalist to return a state award he received Friday after Israel and the United States complained about disparaging remarks he had made earlier about Gypsies and Jews.}}

    Minister Zoltan Balog has said he made a mistake by giving the Mihaly Tancsis prize to Ferenc Szaniszlo, a former foreign correspondent who now has a show on right-wing Echo TV.

    In 2011, Hungary’s media authorities fined the station 500,000 forints ($2,200) because of Szanilo’s comments which, for example, said Gypsies — or Roma — were monkeys and social parasites.

    In a letter to Szaniszlo released on his website late Tuesday, Balog asked Szaniszlo to “kindly” return the award.

    The ambassadors of Israel and the United States have issued letters criticizing Balog’s original decision.

    Associated Press

  • Obama Heads to Israel

    {{U.S. President Barack Obama arrives in Israel on Wednesday without any new peace initiative to offer disillusioned Palestinians and facing deep Israeli doubts over his pledge to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran.}}

    Making his first official visit here as president, Obama hopes to reset his often fraught relations with both the Israelis and Palestinians in a carefully choreographed three-day stay that is high on symbolism but low on expectations.

    He will meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, hold separate talks in the occupied West Bank with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and address a skeptical Israeli public with a speech to students.

    U.S. officials say he will try to coax the Palestinians and Israelis back to peace talks.

    He will also seek to reassure Netanyahu he is committed to preventing Iran from getting a nuclear bomb and discuss ways of containing Syria’s civil war.

    However, the White House has deliberately minimized hopes of any major breakthroughs, a reversal from Obama’s first four years in office when aides said he would only visit the Jewish state if he had something concrete to accomplish.

    Workers have hung hundreds of U.S. and Israel flags on lamp posts across Jerusalem, as well as banners that boast of “an unbreakable alliance,” but the apparent lack of any substantial policy push has bemused many diplomats and analysts.

    {wirestory}

  • Russian Navy to Be Permanently Present in Mediterranean

    {{The Russian Navy will keep a permanent squadron of five to six ships in the Mediterranean Sea in order to protect its interests in the area, Russian Navy Chief Admiral Viktor Chirkov told the Zvezda television channel.}}

    The squadron will be comprised of frigates, cruisers and support vehicles and will be subordinate to the Black Sea Fleet command.

    It will be armed with advanced ships built as part of the ambitious state armaments program, which provides for a complete overhaul of the Russian military by 2020.

    The decision to deploy a permanent task force in the Mediterranean was announced by Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu on March 11.

    Senator Viktor Ozerov confirmed the plans on March 15, telling a group of more than 60 military attaches from 48 countries, including key NATO members the United States and Britain, that the naval force would “solve tasks for our state, of course, following all international laws.”

    Chirkov also said that Russia is ready to re-establish its Navy presence in the Pacific and Indian oceans.

    Russia closed its naval base at Cam Ranh Bay in Vietnam in 2002. On March 4, Shoigu visited Vietnam to discuss military-technical cooperation.

    Earlier in July, Vietnamese President Truong Tan Sang announced that Vietnam would allow Russia to re-establish its presence at the base.

  • Orthodox Activists Storm Darwin Museum, Plant ‘God Created World’ Flag

    {{Orthodox activists have stormed Moscow’s Darwin Museum, tossing leaflets with creationist slogans into the lobby and planting a “God Created the World!” flag on the roof.}}

    The event, organized by the God’s Will movement, was held on Sunday to mark the passing of 7,522 years since the creation of the world.

    According to the group’s official website, the movement seeks “to fulfill the commandments of Christ through civil activism.”

    One participant, Dmitry Tsorionov, said of the event on Twitter: “Checkmate, atheists! 7,522 summers from the creation of the world, creationists have seized the Darwin Museum!”

    In a video posted on YouTube, activists can be seen in large groups singing hymns, wearing T-shirts denouncing the theory of evolution and proclaiming creationism, and throwing papers with religious slogans into the lobby — one of which read, “God created cats.”

    Witnesses later reported that the activists picked up all the leaflets after themselves and even snatched them back from museum workers who had gathered them.

    None of the activists were detained. A police spokesman on Monday declined to comment.

    This is not the first such occupation-style protest by Orthodox activists. They have made a name for themselves in recent months by raiding various venues that they consider blasphemous.

    Last August, the director of Moscow’s Museum of Erotic Art reported that “Orthodox militants” barged into the museum holding a brick and a Bible.

    Just days before that, an event in support of Pussy Riot at Teatr.doc was disrupted by Orthodox activists who stormed in with a television crew filming as they denounced the theater event.

    {Moscow Times}