Tag: InternationalNews

{{UN Ambassador Susan Rice will be on Capitol Hill this week to meet with individual members of Congress to discuss the Benghazi attacks, aides on Capitol Hill confirm.}}

She will come face-to-face with many Senators who have opposed her possible nomination to be the next Secretary of State.

She is scheduled for a Tuesday morning meeting with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who, though he has backed off recently, has been perhaps most vocal in saying he would oppose Rice if nominated by President Obama to succeed Hillary Clinton.

McCain had said in the past he’d be willing to filibuster Rice’s nomination and do “whatever is necessary to block the nomination” of Rice if it came to that because of how she handled the aftermath of the Libya attack.

This weekend McCain notably backed off on his threat, saying he’d “give everyone the benefit of explaining their position and the actions that they took.”

Rice will also meet with Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., who has also been critical of the administration’s handling of the immediate fallout the Benghazi attack.

Aides on Capitol Hill say that Rice is expected to meet with many other members of Congress this week.

Remains of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat have been exhumed in Ramallah, in the West Bank, to help determine the cause of his death.

Witness said Tuesday that the remains were moved out of Arafat’s mausoleum and taken to a mosque, where Palestinian doctors collected samples for handing over to international teams from France, Russia and Switzerland.

Three doctors, three forensic scientists, the health minister, the justice minister, and heads of the lawyers and doctors syndicates are present during the exhumation, the sources said.

The Palestian attorney general, with the help of French prosecutors, had started interviewing dozens of Palestinian officials close to Arafat about the conditions the leader was living under before his death in 2004.

Three teams of international investigators travelled on Monday to the muqataa, the Palestinian Authority (PA) headquarters, where Arafat is buried.

They could be seen bringing equipment to the site throughout the day.

A nine-month investigation by Al Jazeera found elevated levels of the substance in Arafat’s final personal effects.

The findings, which were broadcast in July, suggest that there was also a high level of polonium in Arafat’s body when he died, raising fresh questions about what killed the longtime Palestinian leader.

The cause of Arafat’s death has long remained a mystery.

Some reports speculated that he died from AIDS, cirrhosis of the liver, or other diseases, but medical experts who studied his final medical records told Al Jazeera that he was in good health until he suddenly fell ill in October of 2004.

Many Palestinians have long believed that Arafat was poisoned by Israel, a charge Tirawi repeated on Saturday.

French legal experts have also begun to gather evidence on the case in preparation for a possible trial, including testimony from people in the West Bank, according to Palestinian officials.

The teams are operating under a near-media blackout imposed by the PA, which had promised a transparent and open investigation.

None of the investigators contacted over the past few days was willing to speak on the record.

And late on Monday, the PA said it would not allow lawyers representing Arafat’s widow, Suha, to attend the exhumation, without offering any reason for its decision.

On Monday night, workers with hand tools drilled through more than four metres of concrete over Arafat’s body. Investigators have collected several samples on the way down to look at polonium levels.

The whole process was to take about 10 hours.

{{Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak announced his resignation Monday, saying he will quit politics in January to spend more time with his family.}}

His resignation comes at a highly delicate time for Israel, which is observing a fragile cease-fire with the militant Palestinian group Hamas after an eight-day conflict that killed more than 160 people — the overwhelming majority of them Palestinians in Gaza.

He said Monday at a news conference in Tel Aviv that he will continue as defense minister for the next three months, as elections are due in January. He said he won’t contest the elections.

Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s executive committee, weighed in on the announcement.

“I hope this signals recognition of the futility of the military approach in the adoption of violence as means of dealing with the Palestinians,” she said.

“If it is for personal reasons, we cannot comment, but if it’s recognition that his whole career was based on the military approach to political life, then this demonstrates the recognition of the futility of militarism and violence.”

Some Israeli political commentators had speculated ahead of the announcement that Barak was planning to quit the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to form a new center-left party.

{Wirestory}

{{The body of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat is to be exhumed on Tuesday, Palestinian officials say.}}

His body is to undergo tests to find out whether his death in Paris in 2004 was caused by poisoning.

Arafat’s medical records say he had a stroke resulting from a blood disorder.

But France began a murder inquiry in August after Swiss experts hired by a documentary crew found radioactive polonium-210 on Arafat’s personal effects.
Continue reading the main story
Analysis
image of Richard Galpin Richard Galpin BBC News, Ramallah

The chief investigator Taufik al Tirawi said they had recently asked the Russians to take part in this investigation because they had “an historical relationship” with Moscow.

It seems the Palestinians do not fully trust France and Switzerland when it comes to proving or disproving that their former leader was murdered.

It is not known how long it will take the three countries to complete their tests. But it will be a key moment – and it is possible they will reach different conclusions.

While most Palestinians are certain their leader was murdered, there are serious questions about the validity of testing for polonium poisoning eight years after Mr Arafat’s death. The half-life of polonium is less than five months.

His tomb, in Ramallah in the West Bank, was sealed off earlier this month.

Once the body is removed from the tomb inside the stone-clad tomb mausoleum, scientists from France, Switzerland and Russia will each take samples, former Palestinian intelligence chief Tawfik Tirawi told reporters.

The experts will then take these samples to their respective countries to be tested for Polonium 210 and possibly other lethal substances.

Arafat’s body will be reburied the same day with military honours.

Arafat, who led the Palestine Liberation Organisation for 35 years and became the first president of the Palestinian Authority in 1996, fell violently ill in October 2004 at his compound.

Two weeks later he was flown to a French military hospital in Paris, where he died on 11 November 2004, aged 75.

His widow, Suha, objected to a post-mortem examination at the time, but later appealed to the Palestinian Authority to permit the exhumation “to reveal the truth”.

Many Palestinians continue to believe that Israel poisoned him. Israel has denied any involvement. Others allege that he had Aids.

In 2005, the New York Times obtained a copy of Arafat’s medical records, which it said showed he died of a massive haemorrhagic stroke that resulted from a bleeding disorder caused by an unknown infection.

Independent experts who reviewed the records told the paper that it was highly unlikely that he had died of Aids or had been poisoned.

A murder inquiry was launched by French prosecutors in August after an investigation by al-Jazeera TV, working with scientists at the Institute of Radiation Physics (IRA) at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland, found “significant” traces of polonium-210 present in samples taken from Arafat’s personal effects, including his trademark keffiyeh headdress.

In some cases, the elevated levels were 10 times higher than those on control subjects, and most of the polonium could not have come from natural sources, the scientists said.

But the institute also said Arafat’s symptoms – as described in medical reports – were not consistent with polonium poisoning.

{Wire Story}

{{The 18th United Nations climate change conference (COP18) has opened in Doha, the Qatari capital.}}

For the next fortnight, up to 17,000 people will attend the conference. Delegates will be negotiating a new global deal on climate, but there are ongoing tensions between rich and poor countries.

A central issue at the summit is the the problem of “hot air” carbon permits.

The term refers to attempts by some wealthy countries to carry over unused carbon permits so they can be offset against future cuts.

Developing nations say this is unfair and reduces the value of any commitment to reduce carbon dioxide.

South African foreign minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane officially handed over the COP presidency to Qatar’s Abdullah Al-Attiyah here at the Qatar National Convention Centre.

After brief speeches by both, UNFCCC executive secretary Christiana Figueres pointed out the “unique” location of this year’s COP.

“Each COP is unique – and this is no exception,” she said.

“This is the first time the COP is being held in the Gulf region. On this historic occasion, the Gulf region has an unequaled world stage to showcase the contributions being made to reduce the Gulf’s food and water vulnerabilities, to put regional energy growth on a more sustainable path and to build a safer, stronger and more resilient energy future for all countries.”

As Qatar welcomes world leaders to the conference, its own environmental record has come under criticism as a major contributor to greenhouse gases.

The climate talks have placed a spotlight on the Gulf Arab state, which produces nearly 50 tonnes a year of carbon dioxide for each of its 1.6 million residents.

Environmentalists question whether Qatar has the diplomatic muscle – and, more importantly, the political will to play a positive role in the critical two-week negotiations.

{{The leader of Lebanon’s Hezbollah says the militant group would fire thousands of rockets into Israel and hit cities in the country’s heartland in any future war.}}

Sheik Hassan Nasrallah’s comments came days after an eight-day Israeli offensive against Gaza ended with a truce.

Israeli aircraft launched some 1,500 strikes on targets linked to the Palestinian territory’s Hamas rulers and other groups, while Gaza militants fired roughly the same number of rockets into Israel.

Some Iranian-made Fajr-5 rockets targeted the cities of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem for the first time.

Nasrallah said in a speech in Beirut Sunday that Israel will face “thousands of rockets that will fall on Tel Aviv and other areas if it launches an aggression against Lebanon.”

Israel and Hezbollah fought a 34-day war in 2006.

{{Barely 24 hours after over ten people were slaughtered in Maiduguri, twenty ladies in mini skirts and trousers were yesterday slaughtered in their separate homes in the metropolis by yet to be identified terrorists.}}

Also the Joint Task Force, Operation ‘Restore Order’, Friday, placed a bounty on suspected terrorists and members of Boko Haram.

This ugly development in Maiduguri is one of its kind, as many believed that most of the daily killings in Borno are only targeted at men and security agencies.

The slaughtering of about twenty different ladies, our correspondent gathered, took place in the early hours of yesterday precisely at about 1 to 2am when most of residents were still asleep in their houses due to the curfew imposed by state government.

A source told our correspondent that the most hit areas were Mary wards, few meters away from the University of Maiduguri, one of the places accommodating students of the institution living off-Campus due to accommodation shortage.

Also affected according to investigation, were ladies living close to the black spots areas of Gwange, London Chiki, Abbagaram, Kaleri areas where series of killings and bomb blasts had occurred in the past, killing JTF officers.

When contacted on phone, both the JTF spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Sagir Musa and the Police Commissioner, Mr. Yuguda Abdullahi said that they are not in Maiduguri, the state capital to confirm the incident.

But a top JTF Commander said, he had directed his men to the affected areas yesterday morning to evacuate the remains of over twenty girls slaughtered within the Maiduguri metropolis.

N50m bounty placed on Boko Haram leaders

Meanwhile, the Joint Task Force, Operation ‘Restore Order’, Maiduguri, have declared the suspected terrorists wanted and placed a reward on each of them.

They are wanted in connection with terrorist activities particularly in the region that led to the killings, bombings and assassinations of some civilians, religious leaders, traditional rulers, businessmen, politicians, civil servants and security personnel amongst others.

They are also wanted for arson and destruction of properties worth several millions of Naira.

A statement listed 19 alleged senior members of the extremist group blamed for hundreds of deaths in connection with its insurgency in northern and central Nigeria as suspects.

The rewards ranged from N50million for the suspected leader of the group, Abubakar Shekau, to N10 million for various Boko Haram “commanders”.

Lieutenant Colonel Sagir Musa, who issued the statement on behalf of the Military Task Force operating in the region did not respond to phone calls. Violence linked to Boko Haram’s insurgency is believed to have left over 3,000 people dead since 2009, including killings of security forces.

{{Hundreds of gay rights activists marched through New Delhi on Sunday to demand that they be allowed to lead lives of dignity in India’s deeply conservative society.}}

Dozens of demonstrators carried a nearly 15-meter- (50-foot-) long, rainbow-colored banner and waved placards demanding that the government extend the scope of anti-discrimination laws to schools, workplaces and public and private spaces.

Activists said that three years after the Delhi High Court made changes in India’s colonial-era law that made gay sex a crime, homosexuals are still not socially accepted in India.

In 2009, the court had decriminalized gay sex, which until then had been an offense punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

Conservative groups have asked India’s top court to overturn the lower court’s order, and Supreme Court judges are currently hearing opinions from a range of people — including conservative groups and gay rights activists. It’s unclear when the court will make its ruling.

“If only the Supreme Court comes out on our side, and if gay marriage became legal, what could be better” said Zorian Cross, a New Delhi-based theater actor and playwright at the parade.

“Queer and loving it” and “Give us your support” read some of the placards carried by the activists as they marched to the rhythmic beat of traditional drums and music. Other supporters distributed badges and rainbow-colored flags and scarves.

The march ended in a public meeting at Jantar Mantar, the main area for protests located in the heart of the capital, New Delhi. Many gay rights group members and their families danced and sang as drummers and musicians performed.

Vimal Kumar, an activist with a rights group called the National Alliance of Peoples’ Movements, said the government had to ensure that all forms of discrimination against gays, lesbians and transgenders was ended.

“The government has to listen. Our struggle has gone on for very long, and we are hopeful the government will listen and act on our demands,” Kumar said.

Gay rights activists are demanding that the government allow people to record the gender category of their choice in the national census, voter identity cards and all other government documents.

“We are demanding that all people be allowed to exercise their right to live their lives with dignity and freedom, regardless of their gender or sexual orientation,” said a statement issued by rights groups at the parade.

Kumar said peoples’ attitudes were gradually beginning to change and there was greater understanding among the families in urban areas as television campaigns and gay parade marches caught on. But the pace of change was slow, he said.

In some big cities, homosexuality is slowly gaining acceptance, and a few high-profile Bollywood films have dealt with gay issues.

Still, many marchers Sunday covered their faces with scarves or wore masks because they have not told their friends and families about their sexuality.

{{Iran is accusing the U.S. Navy of carrying out “illegal and provocative acts” in the Persian Gulf and Sea of Oman.}}

In identical letters to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the Security Council, Iran’s U.N.Ambassador Mohammad Khazaee said the Navy repeatedly violated the country’s airspace.

He cited flights over the coastal areas of Bushehr on seven occasions in October and most recently a U.S. drone flight on Nov. 1 which disregarded all radio warnings and penetrated Iranian airspace.

The letters, circulated Friday, urged Ban to warn the U.S. “against the continuation of acts in violation of international law and of the adverse consequences of any provocative and dangerous actsfor which the United States government would be held responsible.”

{{A Norwegian mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik accused prison officers of trying to drive him to suicide in conditions he describes as “a mini Abu Ghraib.”}}

Breivik wrote a 27-page letter addressed to prison officials,”If it wasn’t for the fact that I am an exceptionally patient person, I would most likely have lost my mind in pure frustration,” Breivik said in the letter dated Oct. 15 that was updated on Oct. 26 and Oct. 30.

“Anyway, there are limits to what a person can take.”

Breivik wrote that he is frustrated that guards do not cooperate with his carefully planned daily schedule, where he times his various activities down to the minute.

“One cannot exclude that Ila Prison’s leadership has assured itself that ‘loyal social democrats’ dominate the ward to prevent possibly benevolent people gaining access,” Breivik said.

He also alleges that the prison director keeps the security regime tight out of personal vengefulness against Breivik.

The 33-year-old right-wing fanatic killed 77 people in twin attacks last year in Norway’s worst peacetime massacre.

He detonated a car bomb outside government offices in Oslo killing eight people and then drove to the island of Utoya where he massacred 69 in a shooting spree at the summer camp of the governing Labor Party’s youth wing.