Tag: InternationalNews

{{NATO said Saturday that The first of six Patriot missile batteries intended to protect Turkey from Syrian threats is operational along the countries’ shared border.}}

The other five batteries, which NATO says are to be for defensive purposes only, are expected to be in place in coming days.

NATO foreign ministers decided in December to deploy the batteries after Syria launched Scud missiles near the Turkish border. In October, errant Syrian artillery shells hit the Turkish border town of Akcakale.

The operational missile battery is in the city of Adana. Patriot systems will also be deployed to help protect the Turkish cities of Kahramanmaras and Gaziantep, NATO said.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said this month that the missile batteries will stay only as long as there is a threat.

Their arrival came on yet another day of bloodshed in Syria, where the United Nations said recently that more than 60,000 have been killed since the conflict began nearly two years ago.

At least 129 people were killed across the country Saturday, according to the Local Coordination Committees of Syria, a network of opposition activists.

{agencies}

{{“Troubling and counterproductive” rhetoric from North Korea is inflaming tensions on the Korean peninsula, but ultimately, “we will judge North Korea by its actions, not its words,” the U.S. envoy to North Korea said Friday.}}

In its latest bout of saber-rattling, North Korea on Friday warned of the possibility of “strong physical counter-measures” against South Korea after the United Nations imposed tougher sanctions against the North earlier this week.

The threat against South Korea came a day after the North said it would carry out a new nuclear test and more long-range rocket launches as part of a new phase of confrontation with the United States.

The statement Friday from North Korea’s Committee for Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland said it would take action against South Korea if it “takes a direct part” in the U.N. sanctions.

The South Korean Unification Ministry declined to comment specifically on the new threats from Pyongyang. It reiterated its stance that North Korea should refrain from further provocations.

Agencies

{{French-led forces in Mali are advancing on the key northern city of Timbuktu, as they press on with their offensive against Islamist rebels.}}

On Saturday Malian and French forces seized Gao, another key northern city.

The advance comes as African Union leaders are meeting to discuss sending more troops to Mali.

Islamists seized the north of the country last year, but have been losing ground since French forces launched an operation earlier this month.

Late on Saturday French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said Malian and French troops would arrive “near Timbuktu soon”.

Overnight they secured Gao – northern Mali’s most populous city- after special forces captured the airport and a strategic bridge to the south.

{{The Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi praised Benito Mussolini for “having done good” despite the Fascist dictator’s anti-Jewish laws, immediately sparking expressions of outrage as Europe on Sunday held Holocaust remembrances}}.

Berlusconi also defended Mussolini for allying himself with Hitler, saying he likely reasoned that it would be better to be on the winning side.

The media mogul, whose conservative forces are polling second in voter surveys ahead of next month’s election, spoke to reporters on the sidelines of a ceremony in Milan to commemorate the Holocaust.

In 1938, before the outbreak of World War II, Mussolini’s regime passed the so-called “racial laws,” barring Jews from Italy’s universities and many professions, among other bans.

When Germany’s Nazi regime occupied Italy during the war, thousands from the tiny Italian Jewish community were deported to death camps.

“It is difficult now to put oneself in the shoes of who was making decisions back then,” Berlusconi said of Mussolini’s support for Hitler.

“Certainly the (Italian) government then, fearing that German power would turn into a general victory, preferred to be allied with Hitler’s Germany rather that oppose it.”

AP

{{Holocaust survivors, politicians, religious leaders and others marked International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Sunday with solemn prayers and the now oft-repeated warnings to never let such horrors happen again.}}

Events took place at sites including Auschwitz-Birkenau, the former death camp where Hitler’s Germany killed at least 1.1 million people, mostly Jews, in southern Poland.

In Warsaw, prayers were also held at a monument to the fighters of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943.

Pope Benedict XVI, speaking from his window at St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican, warned that humanity must always be on guard against a repeat of murderous racism.

“The memory of this immense tragedy, which above all struck so harshly the Jewish people, must represent for everyone a constant warning so that the horrors of the past are not repeated, so that every form of hatred and racism is overcome, and that respect for, and dignity of, every human person is encouraged,” the German-born pontiff said.

Not all words spoken by dignitaries struck the right tone, however.

On the sidelines of a ceremony in Milan, former Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi sparked outrage when he praised Benito Mussolini for “having done good” despite the Fascist dictator’s anti-Jewish laws.

Berlusconi also defended Mussolini for allying himself with Hitler, saying he likely reasoned that it would be better to be on the winning side.

The United Nations in 2005 designated Jan. 27 as a yearly memorial day for the victims of the Holocaust — 6 million Jews and millions of other victims of Nazi Germany during World War II.

The day was chosen because it falls on the anniversary of the liberation in 1945 of Auschwitz, the Nazis’ most notorious death camp and a symbol of the evil inflicted across the continent.

{Associated Press}

{{Thousands of people have rallied in Washington DC calling for stricter gun controls as they marched from the Capitol to the Washington Monument.}}

The crowd included residents of Newtown, Connecticut, where a primary school shooting last month revived a debate over security and gun safety.

They carried banners carrying the names of gun violence victims and daubed with messages like “Gun Control Now”.

Speakers urged them to lobby politicians to back gun control reform.

BBC

{{Hackers claiming to be from the activist group Anonymous have hacked a US government website in response to the death of Aaron Swartz.}}

Activists embedded a video statement on the homepage of the United States Sentencing Commission, an agency of the US government.

The statement referred to the death of Mr Swartz, an internet activist who apparently killed himself in January.

“Two weeks ago today, a line was crossed,” the statement said.

“Two weeks ago today, Aaron Swartz was killed. Killed because he faced an impossible choice. Killed because he was forced into playing a game he could not win.”

Mr Swartz, who was 26, was facing hacking charges and is believed to have taken his own life.

His federal trial was due to be held next month. If found guilty, he could have faced up to 35 years in prison.

Following his death, Mr Swartz’s family released a statement blaming “intimidation” and “prosecutorial overreach” from the criminal justice system.

BBC

{{Top international financial officials have wrapped up the World Economic Forum in the Swiss resort of Davos warning that much needs to be done to stabilise the world economy.}}

Christine Lagarde, International Monetary Fund’s managing director on Saturday told world leaders to “not relax”, despite relief that the euro has remained intact and the US has so far managed to get through a crucial budget hurdle.

Lagarde said that the 17 European Union countries that use the euro have to follow through on steps to keep the troubles at banks from burdening governments.

She said US officials have to “indicate very promptly” how they’re going to deal with their ongoing budget dispute between President Barack Obama and Republicans in Congress.

Among the is global issues raised at the conference was “concern” about Tokyo’s economic policies.

‘Not without concern’

During the conference, concern had been raised about Tokyo’s new economic policies. The new government in Tokyo, led by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, has pushed the Bank of Japan (BOJ) to be more aggressive in its actions to battle nearly two decades of deflation and sluggish growth.

The BOJ on Tuesday unveiled a new inflation target of two percent and a massive programme of asset purchases to pump money into the economy, sparking accusations that central bank independence had been compromised.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel told the meeting on Thursday that she was “not without concern” about Japan’s actions.

But on Saturday Japan’s economy minister hit back, saying they did not call into question the independence of its central bank.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Akira Amari said the Bank of Japan had “voluntarily” decided with the government to introduce a new inflation target in a bid to boost the world’s third-largest economy.

“As regards the new proposal, you might say that it might undermine the independence of the BOJ. In the case of Japan so far, there has not been any undertaking to share the inflationary targets with the central bank,” Amari said.

The policy has also led to a steady decline in the value of the yen against other currencies, boosting exports, but other countries have expressed concern that Tokyo is pursuing a beggar-thy-neighbour approach.

{{Topless protest}}

The conference is also routinely marked by protest. Earlier in the Saturday, a trio of topless feminist activists set off pink flares and staged a noisy protest in the bitter cold outside the Davos forum.

The women, from the Ukrainian group Femen tried to break through a security fence before police guarding the World Economic Forum bundled them away.

The groups which has been staging protests at the Swiss meeting since 2010 say that the interests of women are not presented at the conference.

“Today Femen activists came to scream SOS in Davos, SOS from all women from all over the world … all the time when they discuss women in economics it’s a discussion about one thing, how to earn money more using women, because women are always treated as slaves,” Inna Shevchenko, a protester said.

Czechs have chosen the outspoken Milos Zeman, an ex-premier, as their new president in runoff of the EU republic’s first direct election.

Zemen on Saturday beat opposition candidate, Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, with a 54,8 percent win with almost all the votes counted.

“Milos Zeman has won, I acknowledge this, and I hope he will manage to be the president of all Czech people,” Schwarzenberg, who garnered 45,17 percent, of the votes, conceded as the final results rolled in Saturday.

His victory ends a decade under strident eurosceptic outgoing 71-year-old President Vaclav Klaus, with 68-year-old Zeman, having a decidedly Europe-friendly approach.

In 1998-2002, Zeman’s leftist government helped negotiate his country’s 2004 EU accession and Zeman is now a self-described “euro-federalist”.

“I promise that as a president elected in a direct vote by citizens, I will do my best to be the voice of all citizens,” Zeman said in his victory speech at a Prague hotel, as overjoyed supporters chanted “Long live Zeman”.