Iran accepts fresh nuclear plan - BBC
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| The UN nuclear watchdog says Iran has agreed to a plan aimed at clearing up questions about its controversial nuclear activities. |
The IAEA says the development is "significant", but adds that for the plan to work, it is essential to get full and active co-operation from Iran.
It also says Iran is continuing its enrichment programme, but at a slower pace than before, despite UN sanctions.
Western powers fear Iran could try to make nuclear arms, which Tehran denies.
They have warned Iran is playing for time and should halt its programme immediately to avoid further UN sanctions.
The UN Security Council has already imposed two rounds of sanctions against Iran over the nuclear row. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Sharif names Pakistan return date - BBC
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| Pakistan's exiled former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will return home on 10 September to challenge President General Pervez Musharraf, he says. |
Mr Sharif, deposed by Gen Musharraf in 1999, was speaking in London a week after Pakistan's top court defied the government to rule his return legal.
His announcement comes as former PM Benazir Bhutto claims she is nearing a deal to share power with Gen Musharraf.
Correspondents have said Mr Sharif could still face jail if he goes home.
Mr Sharif said he planned to "start a decisive struggle against dictatorship", adding that Gen Musharraf should step down from the presidency and from his army post.
The former prime minister, who served two terms between 1990 and 1993 and from 1997 to 1999, said it would be "unfortunate" if Ms Bhutto made a deal with Gen Musharraf.
"I disagree with Ms Bhutto's current policy of shaking hands with a dictator," he said. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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One million told to leave Iraqi city as gunfights rage - Intl. Herald Tribune
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| More than one million pilgrims were ordered to leave the Shiite holy city of Karbala on Tuesday as the police imposed a curfew after two days of violence that included raging gun battles between what appeared to be rival Shiite militias. |
At least 35 people have been killed during a religious festival there, with nearly 200 wounded, security officials said. The government sent reinforcements from Baghdad to quell growing unrest and help clear Karbala.
Security officials said gunmen from the Mahdi militia, which is nominally loyal to the Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr, had attacked guards around the two Karbala shrines that were under the protection of the Badr Brigade, the armed wing of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, a major Shiite party.
In telephone calls to reporters in Karbala, gunfire and exploding mortar shells could be heard.
The security officials, who requested anonymity for security reasons, said at least 180 people had been wounded, including women and children. |
Published: Aug. 28, 2007
Posted: Aug. 29, 2007 |
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Abu Ghraib officer spared prison - BBC
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| The only US army officer to be charged over the Iraq jail abuse scandal has been reprimanded for disobeying an order not to discuss the inquiry. |
Lt-Col Steven Jordan had faced up to five years in jail for e-mailing soldiers about the investigation.
He had been in charge of the prison's interrogation unit when pictures of US soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners were taken in 2003.
He was cleared on Tuesday of three charges of mistreatment of detainees.
Lt-Col Jordan, who did not appear in any of the photographs, had pleaded not guilty to all charges at his court martial. |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 29, 2007 |
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Climate flooding risk 'misjudged' - BBC
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| Climate change may carry a higher risk of flooding than was previously thought, the journal Nature reports. |
Researchers say efforts to calculate flooding risk from climate change do not take into account the effect carbon dioxide (CO2) has on vegetation.
Higher atmospheric levels of this greenhouse gas reduce the ability of plants to suck water out of the ground and "breathe" out the excess.
Plants expel excess water through tiny pores, or stomata, in their leaves.
Their reduced ability to release water back into the atmosphere will result in the ground becoming saturated.
Areas with higher predicted rainfall have a greater risk of flooding. But this effect also reduces the severity of droughts.
The findings suggest computer models of future climate change may need to be revised in order to plan for coming decades. |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 29, 2007 |
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JustHillary asked, "How did poor family donate $45,000 [to Clinton camp]?" but facts reported by WSJ tell different story - Media Matters
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| An August 28 headline on the political website JustHillary.com read, "Wall St. Journal on Hillary campaign mystery: How did poor family donate $45,000?" However, the August 28 article to which JustHillary linked described the family in the following way: "Records show they own a gift shop and live in a 1,280-square-foot house that they recently refinanced for $270,000. William Paw, the 64-year-old head of the household, is a mail carrier with the U.S. Postal Service who earns about $49,000 a year, according to a union representative. Alice Paw, also 64, is a homemaker. The couple's grown children have jobs ranging from account manager at a software company to 'attendance liaison' at a local public high school. One is listed on campaign records as an executive at a mutual fund." |
Published: Aug. 28, 2007
Posted: Aug. 29, 2007 |
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CNN's Henry uncritically aired Bush's claim that "violence has sharply decreased in Baghdad" - Media Matters
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| Summary: In airing President Bush's assertion that "[s]ectarian violence has sharply decreased in Baghdad. The momentum is now on our side," CNN's Ed Henry gave no indication that he attempted to verify Bush's assertion. By contrast, recent articles by the Associated Press and McClatchy Newspapers have challenged claims about decreases in violence in Iraq. |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 29, 2007 |
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Blitzer omitted context of Clinton remarks to ask: "Why not give the military a chance to see if they can finish the job?" - Media Matters
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| Summary: In an interview with Sen. Chuck Schumer, CNN's Wolf Blitzer omitted the context from Sen. Hillary Clinton's remarks that "[w]e've begun to change tactics in Iraq, and in some areas -- particularly in Al Anbar province -- it's working," to assert that "even some Democrats are now suggesting that maybe the military part of the troop buildup, the so-called surge, is making some progress." But Clinton was attributing successes in Al Anbar to a change in tactics, not President Bush's so-called "surge" strategy. |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 29, 2007 |
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Re-airing Abrams/Carlson segment, MSNBC left out part where Carlson admitted assault - Media Matters
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| On August 29, MSNBC twice re-aired a segment from the August 28 edition of Live with Dan Abrams, in which MSNBC host Tucker Carlson asserted, "Having sex in a public men's room is outrageous. It's also really common. I've been bothered in men's rooms." Carlson continued, "I got bothered in Georgetown Park," in Washington, D.C., "when I was in high school." As Media Matters for America noted, when Abrams asked how Carlson responded to being "bothered," Carlson said: "I went back with someone I knew and grabbed the guy by the -- you know, and grabbed him, and ... hit him against the stall with his head, actually." However, while both August 29 re-airings did include Carlson's claim that he had been "bothered in men's rooms," neither broadcast aired the portion in which Carlson claimed that he "went back with someone" and "hit him against the stall with his head." Both re-airings did include a portion of the segment in which Carlson asserted, "I'm not anti-gay in the slightest." |
| During the 9 a.m. ET hour of MSNBC Live, anchor Amy Robach introduced the Abrams/Carlson clip -- which did not include Carlson's claim to have assaulted the person who "bothered" him -- as follows: "Prominent Republicans have been quick to distance themselves from Idaho Senator Larry Craig following his arrest for lewd behavior in a men's bathroom. ... More than ever, the party of traditional values has to worry about hypocrisy. Dan Abrams talked about it with Tucker Carlson and [MSNBC's Morning Joe host] Joe Scarborough last night on MSNBC." After the clip ended, Robach plugged Abrams' show: "Well, you can catch Live with Dan Abrams weeknights at 9 p.m. Eastern here on MSNBC." |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 29, 2007 |
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Feeney sinks further into ethics swamp - St. Petersburg Times
Editorial |
| If U.S. Rep. Tom Feeney, R-Oviedo, has failed to burnish an image as a congressional influence peddler, it is not for lack of trying. Apparently not content with the outrage over his lavish 2003 Scotland golf trip on the dime of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, Feeney is now paying for his legal defense with $5,000 from a businessman seeking a NASA contract.
Call it shameless symmetry. |
Feeney created his legal defense fund in June, at the same time he was denying that the Justice Department considers him a suspect in its ongoing investigation of bribery in Congress. He told the Orlando Sentinel then that the fund was going to be used to provide necessary records to investigators and to "demonstrate conclusively that I always have acted with honesty and integrity."
Toward that quest to demonstrate his integrity, Feeney has now taken a $5,000 contribution from a company owned by his longtime political benefactor, Tyng-Lin Yang. Yang, as the Sentinel reports, is also president of Yang Enterprises, which is seeking a "logistics operations" contract at NASA's Johnson Space Center. Feeney is the senior Republican on the House Science space subcommittee. Feel cozy? |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 29, 2007 |
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Census Shows a Modest Rise in U.S. Income - NY Times
ABBY GOODNOUGH |
| The nation’s median household income grew modestly in 2006, the Census Bureau reported yesterday, even as the percentage of people without health insurance hit a high.
Experts said the rise in income was mainly a reflection of an increase in the number of family members entering the workplace or working longer hours. Average wages for men and women actually declined for the third consecutive year. |
"There’s lots of evidence that more people are working," said Jared Bernstein, a senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal policy group in Washington. "The important theme going on here is a labor market that’s definitely offering people more work and more hours, but at lower wages."
The slight improvements in household income and a drop in the poverty rate came during a period of job growth, particularly toward the end of 2006, and declining inflation as a result of falling oil prices. But in 2007, the economy has begun weakening because of the national housing slump, and inflation has jumped. The average wage peaked at $17.52 an hour in February and has since fallen, according to Labor Department data. |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 29, 2007 |
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Bush Wants $50 Billion More for Iraq War - Washington Post
Thomas E. Ricks |
| President Bush plans to ask Congress next month for up to $50 billion in additional funding for the war in Iraq, a White House official said yesterday, a move that appears to reflect increasing administration confidence that it can fend off congressional calls for a rapid drawdown of U.S. forces.
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The request -- which would come on top of about $460 billion in the fiscal 2008 defense budget and $147 billion in a pending supplemental bill to fund the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq -- is expected to be announced after congressional hearings scheduled for mid-September featuring the two top U.S. officials in Iraq. Army Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker will assess the state of the war and the effect of the new strategy the U.S. military has pursued this year.
The request is being prepared now in the belief that Congress will be unlikely to balk so soon after hearing the two officials argue that there are promising developments in Iraq but that they need more time to solidify the progress they have made, a congressional aide said.
Most of the additional funding in a revised supplemental bill would pay for the current counteroffensive in Iraq, which has expanded the U.S. force there by about 28,000 troops, to about 160,000. The cost of the buildup was not included in the proposed 2008 budget because Pentagon officials said they did not know how long the troop increase would last. The decision to seek about $50 billion more appears to reflect the view in the administration that the counteroffensive will last into the spring of 2008 and will not be shortened by Congress. |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 29, 2007 |
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The Great Iraq Swindle - Rolling Stone
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| How Bush Allowed an Army of For-Profit Contractors to Invade the U.S. Treasury |
How is it done? How do you screw the taxpayer for millions, get away with it and then ride off into the sunset with one middle finger extended, the other wrapped around a chilled martini? Ask Earnest O. Robbins -- he knows all about being a successful contractor in Iraq.
You start off as a well-connected bureaucrat: in this case, as an Air Force civil engineer, a post from which Robbins was responsible for overseeing 70,000 servicemen and contractors, with an annual budget of $8 billion. You serve with distinction for thirty-four years, becoming such a military all-star that the Air Force frequently sends you to the Hill to testify before Congress -- until one day in the summer of 2003, when you retire to take a job as an executive for Parsons, a private construction company looking to do work in Iraq.
Now you can finally move out of your dull government housing on Bolling Air Force Base and get your wife that dream home you've been promising her all these years. The place on Park Street in Dunn Loring, Virginia, looks pretty good -- four bedrooms, fireplace, garage, 2,900 square feet, a nice starter home in a high-end neighborhood full of spooks, think-tankers and ex-apparatchiks moved on to the nest-egg phase of their faceless careers. On October 20th, 2003, you close the deal for $775,000 and start living that private-sector good life.
A few months later, in March 2004, your company magically wins a contract from the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq to design and build the Baghdad Police College, a facility that's supposed to house and train at least 4,000 police recruits. But two years and $72 million later, you deliver not a functioning police academy but one of the great engineering clusterfucks of all time, a practically useless pile of rubble so badly constructed that its walls and ceilings are literally caked in shit and piss, a result of subpar plumbing in the upper floors.
You've done such a terrible job, in fact, that when auditors from the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction visit the college in the summer of 2006, their report sounds like something out of one of the Saw movies: "We witnessed a light fixture so full of diluted urine and feces that it would not operate," they write, adding that "the urine was so pervasive that it had permanently stained the ceiling tiles" and that "during our visit, a substance dripped from the ceiling onto an assessment team member's shirt." The final report helpfully includes a photo of a sloppy brown splotch on the outstretched arm of the unlucky auditor.
When Congress gets wind of the fiasÂco, a few members on the House Oversight Committee demand a hearing. To placate them, your company decides to send you to the Hill -- after all, you're a former Air Force major general who used to oversee this kind of contracting operation for the government. So you take your twenty-minute ride in from the suburbs, sit down before the learned gentlemen of the committee and promptly get asked by an irritatingly eager Maryland congressman named Chris Van Hollen how you managed to spend $72 million on a pile of shit.
You blink. Fuck if you know. "I have some conjecture, but that's all it would be" is your deadpan answer.
The room twitters in amazement. It's hard not to applaud the balls of a man who walks into Congress short $72 million in taxpayer money and offers to guess where it all might have gone. |
Published: Aug. 23, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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Iraq Weapons Are a Focus of Criminal Investigations - NY Times
JAMES GLANZ & ERIC SCHMITT |
| Several federal agencies are investigating a widening network of criminal cases involving the purchase and delivery of billions of dollars of weapons, supplies and other matériel to Iraqi and American forces, according to American officials. The officials said it amounted to the largest ring of fraud and kickbacks uncovered in the conflict here. |
The inquiry has already led to several indictments of Americans, with more expected, the officials said. One of the investigations involves a senior American officer who worked closely with Gen. David H. Petraeus in setting up the logistics operation to supply the Iraqi forces when General Petraeus was in charge of training and equipping those forces in 2004 and 2005, American officials said Monday.
There is no indication that investigators have uncovered any wrongdoing by General Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq, who through a spokesman declined comment on any legal proceedings.
This article is based on interviews with more than a dozen federal investigators, Congressional, law enforcement and military officials, and specialists in contracting and logistics, in Iraq and Washington, who have direct knowledge of the inquiries. Many spoke on condition of anonymity because there are continuing criminal investigations.
The inquiries are being pursued by the Army Criminal Investigation Command, the Department of Justice, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, among other agencies.
Over the past year, inquiries by federal oversight agencies have found serious discrepancies in military records of where thousands of weapons intended for Iraqi security forces actually ended up. None of those agencies concluded that weapons found their way to insurgents or militias.
In their public reports, those agencies did not raise the possibility of criminal wrongdoing, and General Petraeus has said that the imperative to provide weapons to Iraqi security forces was more important than maintaining impeccable records. |
Published: Aug. 28, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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A Defender of Bush’s Power, Gonzales Resigns - NY Times
PHILIP SHENON & DAVID JOHNSTON |
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Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales announced his resignation on Monday, ending a stormy tenure at the Justice Department that was marked by repeated battles with Congress over whether he had allowed his intense personal loyalty to President Bush to overwhelm his responsibilities to the law.
Mr. Gonzales, the nation’s first Hispanic attorney general, offered no clear explanation of the reasons for his departure or its timing. The announcement caught his top aides at the Justice Department by surprise, leading to speculation among lawmakers and department officials that Mr. Gonzales may have felt pressure from within the administration to step down. |
Published: Aug. 28, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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WSJ omitted key information in article about Clinton donations from "unlikely address" - Media Matters
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| Summary: In an article on campaign donations to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton from "an unlikely address," The Wall Street Journal suggested that "wealthy New York businessman" and "top fundraiser[]" Norman Hsu may have funneled illegal campaign contributions to Clinton by reimbursing members of the Paw family for contributions made to Clinton under their names. However, the Journal gave no indication it actually tried to get financial information indicating "how the Paw family is able to afford such political largess." |
Published: Aug. 28, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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Wealthy Get Extra Shield for Wildfires - NY Times
WILLIAM YARDLEY |
| The wind shifted, and suddenly the wildfire that has been raging just west of these exclusive high desert hills appeared closer than ever to Al LaPeter’s 7,000 square feet of the sweet life.
"Oh, God," Mr. LaPeter said.
Then he exhaled, and relaxed. After all, he has insurance. His big house on the Big Wood River? The Ferrari 430 Spider in the garage? The immaculate Model A Ford? Covered. Literally. |
Right then and there, Tom Futral, a guy from Montana with a spray gun and a truckload of the magical goop that has quickly become the envy of the second-home set in this pricey part of the parched West, was applying fire retardant to Mr. LaPeter’s shake roof and wood house, courtesy of his insurer, the AIG Private Client Group.
"They called me," Mr. LaPeter, 62, said. "I didn’t even know that they did this."
That may be because this is the first time in memory that a wildfire has so closely threatened the A-list redoubts of Hailey, Ketchum and Sun Valley (there are $3.7 billion in assets to protect, according to the incident commander leading the fire fight), and it is the first time AIG has deployed a crew to Idaho as part of its Wildfire Protection Unit for high-end clients who are willing to pay what the company says is an average of $10,000 annually for homeowner’s insurance.
The company, which insurance industry experts say is the only major insurer applying emergency fire retardant as part of some policies, has offered the service since 2005 in parts of California and Colorado. But increasing development at the fringes of national forests, recent drought and higher temperatures are combining to expand the risk of property damage and expand the AIG client list. Last year, the insurer sent crews to fires in Montana and Texas. Federal firefighters largely welcome the help. |
Published: Aug. 28, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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Hannity refused to disavow Ted Nugent's slurs against Obama and Clinton - Media Matters
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| On the August 24 edition of Fox News' Hannity & Colmes, co-host Sean Hannity aired video footage of musician and right-wing activist Ted Nugent at an August 21 concert calling Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) a "piece of shit" and referring to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) as a "worthless bitch." In the video clip, Nugent holds up what appear to be two assault rifles and says he told Obama "to suck on my machine gun" and says he told Clinton "you might want to ride one of these into the sunset." |
| After airing the clip, Hannity referred to Nugent as a "friend and frequent guest on the program," and then compared Nugent's comments to recent statements by Obama, which Hannity again distorted by claiming Obama "accus[ed] our troops of killing civilians." Hannity then asked Democratic strategist Bob Beckel: "What's more offensive to you? Is it Barack Obama's statement about our troops or Ted Nugent?" Beckel responded by asking Hannity if he was "prepared to disavow this lowlife," to which Hannity responded: "No, I like Ted Nugent. He's a friend of mine." When Beckel said that Nugent "ought to never come on your show again, and if you have him on, you ought to be ashamed of yourself," Hannity responded: "Not at all. We have you on." |
Published: Aug. 27, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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U.S. Military Funds Iraqi Insurgents - Post Chronicle
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| Iraqi contractors revealed that they pay off insurgent groups with money from the U.S. government in order to work in certain areas, a report said. |
The accusations would mean that the deadly insurgents have partly financed their war against U.S. troops with U.S. dollars, McClatchy Newspapers reported Monday.
The payments, which allow supplies to move and construction work to begin in the Anbar region, have been allegedly taking place since the projects began in 2003, said Iraqi contractors, politicians and interpreters involved with reconstruction efforts.
Contractors and politicians have also warned that the most recent rebuilding efforts launched by the U.S. military in Iraq could be another opportunity for militant groups to siphon off more money, the report said.
"Now, we're back to the same old story in Anbar. The Americans are handing out contracts and jobs to terrorists, bandits and gangsters," Sheik Ali Hatem Ali Suleiman, the deputy leader of the largest and most powerful tribe in Anbar, told McClatchy Newspapers. |
Published: Aug. 27, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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Senator Craig withdraws from Romney campaign role - Boston Globe
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| US Senator Larry Craig resigned tonight as Senate co-chairman for Mitt Romney's presidential campaign, within hours after news broke of Craig's guilty plea to disorderly conduct after an incident in a men's bathroom. |
"Senator Craig has stepped down from his role with the campaign. He did not want to be a distraction and we accept his decision," Romney's campaign said in a statement.
The Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call reported today that Craig pleaded guilty earlier this month to a charge of disorderly conduct after he was arrested in June at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport by a plainclothes police officer investigating lewd conduct complaints in a men's public bathroom.
Craig denied any "inappropriate conduct" and said his actions had been misconstrued.
In February, Romney announced that Craig of Idaho and Robert Bennett of Utah would serve as co-Senate liaisons.
"Both men have a unique perspective of the new generation of challenges confronting our nation," Romney said in the statement announcing their roles. "I look forward to working with them to find the solutions needed to ensure that our country remains a strong world leader."
In May, Romney's campaign announced that Craig would be co-chairman of the Romney for President Idaho Leadership Team. |
Published: Aug. 27, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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The housing market slump has hit US shares - BBC
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| Concern that US house prices could fall sharply has returned after a key survey showed that sales fell to a near five-year low in the year to July. |
Sales of existing homes fell 0.2% to 5.75 million units in the year, the lowest since November 2002, said the National Association of Realtors (NAR).
It marks the first time that the US's main estate agent body had reported a decline in 12 consecutive months.
The figures caused the main US share indexes to end lower on Monday.
While the Dow Jones lost 58 points to 13,321, the Nasdaq slipped 15 points to 2,561.
Meanwhile, the Standard & Poor's 500 index shed 12 points to 1,467.
Last week a separate study said sales of new homes surprisingly rose in July, giving Wall Street a major boost on Friday. |
Published: Aug. 27, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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Chinese Seek to Buy a U.S. Maker of Disk Drives - NY Times
JOHN MARKOFF |
| William D. Watkins of Seagate Technology disclosed the move by a Chinese company to buy a U.S. drive maker. |
A Chinese technology company has expressed interest in buying a maker of computer disk drives in the United States, raising concerns among American government officials about the risks to national security in transferring high technology to China.
The overture, which was disclosed by the chief executive of one of the two remaining drive makers in the United States, William D. Watkins of Seagate Technology, has resurrected the issues of economic competitiveness and national security raised three years ago when Lenovo, a Chinese computer maker, bought I.B.M.’s personal computer business.
Tensions have been increasing lately between the countries over China’s ambitions in developing its military abilities and advanced technologies for industrial and consumer uses.
Although disk drives do not fall under a list of export-controlled technologies, the attempted purchase of an American disk drive company would require a security review by the federal government, according to several government officials.
In recent years, modern disk drives, used to store vast quantities of digital information securely, have become complex computing systems, complete with hundreds of thousands of lines of software that are used to ensure the integrity of data and to offer data encryption.
That could raise the prospect of secret tampering with hardware or software to make it possible to pilfer information via computer networks, intelligence officials have warned.
Seagate has recently begun selling drives with hardware encryption abilities.
Mr. Watkins did not identify the Chinese company. But he said that the possibility of an acquisition had sent alarm bells ringing at some government agencies.
"The U.S. government is freaking out," Mr. Watkins said during an interview on Thursday.
Reached Friday night, Treasury officials declined to comment on possible Chinese overtures for an American maker.
While Mr. Watkins said that Seagate, which is the largest drive maker in the United States, was not for sale, he also said that if a high enough premium was offered to shareholders it would be difficult to stop.
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Published: Aug. 25, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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French president cautions against attacking Iran in standoff over Tehran's nuclear program - SignOnSanDiego
Angela Doland |
| French President Nicolas Sarkozy warned Monday that it would be "catastrophic" to resort to military force in confronting Iran over its suspect nuclear program. |
"For me, Iran having a nuclear weapon is unacceptable," Sarkozy said in his first major address on foreign policy, but he stressed that he opposed an attack on the Islamic regime and urged that the West rely on diplomacy.
He said Iran can choose between dialogue with the international community or more U.N. sanctions. "This tactic is the only one that allows us to escape from a catastrophic alternative: an Iranian bomb, or the bombing of Iran," he said.
Sarkozy also said Iran is entitled to use nuclear power for civilian needs, such as generating electricity.
If countries like Iran run out of fossil fuels, and "if they don't have the right to the energy of the future, then we will create conditions of misery and underdevelopment, and therefore an explosion of terrorism," Sarkozy said.
In other areas, the new president signaled a shift in tone from his predecessor, Jacques Chirac, casting himself as a "friend of Israel" and taking a tougher line on Russia and China.
But despite his admiration for the United States, Sarkozy said Chirac was right to oppose the war in Iraq, which he called a mistake. |
Published: Aug. 27, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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As China Roars, Pollution Reaches Deadly Extremes - NY Times
JOSEPH KAHN & JIM YARDLEY |
| No country in history has emerged as a major industrial power without creating a legacy of environmental damage that can take decades and big dollops of public wealth to undo. |
But just as the speed and scale of China’s rise as an economic power have no clear parallel in history, so its pollution problem has shattered all precedents. Environmental degradation is now so severe, with such stark domestic and international repercussions, that pollution poses not only a major long-term burden on the Chinese public but also an acute political challenge to the ruling Communist Party. And it is not clear that China can rein in its own economic juggernaut.
Public health is reeling. Pollution has made cancer China’s leading cause of death, the Ministry of Health says. Ambient air pollution alone is blamed for hundreds of thousands of deaths each year. Nearly 500 million people lack access to safe drinking water.
Chinese cities often seem wrapped in a toxic gray shroud. Only 1 percent of the country’s 560 million city dwellers breathe air considered safe by the European Union. Beijing is frantically searching for a magic formula, a meteorological deus ex machina, to clear its skies for the 2008 Olympics.
Environmental woes that might be considered catastrophic in some countries can seem commonplace in China: industrial cities where people rarely see the sun; children killed or sickened by lead poisoning or other types of local pollution; a coastline so swamped by algal red tides that large sections of the ocean no longer sustain marine life.
China is choking on its own success. The economy is on a historic run, posting a succession of double-digit growth rates. But the growth derives, now more than at any time in the recent past, from a staggering expansion of heavy industry and urbanization that requires colossal inputs of energy, almost all from coal, the most readily available, and dirtiest, source.
"It is a very awkward situation for the country because our greatest achievement is also our biggest burden," says Wang Jinnan, one of China’s leading environmental researchers. "There is pressure for change, but many people refuse to accept that we need a new approach so soon."
China’s problem has become the world’s problem. Sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides spewed by China’s coal-fired power plants fall as acid rain on Seoul, South Korea, and Tokyo. Much of the particulate pollution over Los Angeles originates in China, according to the Journal of Geophysical Research.
More pressing still, China has entered the most robust stage of its industrial revolution, even as much of the outside world has become preoccupied with global warming. |
Published: Aug. 28, 2007
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007 |
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Lawmakers Describe 'Being Slimed in the Green Zone' - Washington Post
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| The sheets of paper seemed to be everywhere the lawmakers went in the Green Zone, distributed to Iraqi officials, U.S. officials and uniformed military of no particular rank. So when Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.) asked a soldier last weekend just what he was holding, the congressman was taken aback to find out. |
In the soldier's hand was a thumbnail biography, distributed before each of the congressmen's meetings in Baghdad, which let meeting participants such as that soldier know where each of the lawmakers stands on the war. "Moran on Iraq policy," read one section, going on to cite some the congressman's most incendiary statements, such as, "This has been the worst foreign policy fiasco in American history."
The bio of Rep. Ellen O. Tauscher (D-Calif.) -- "TAU (rhymes with 'now')-sher," the bio helpfully relates -- was no less pointed, even if she once supported the war and has taken heat from liberal Bay Area constituents who remain wary of her position. "Our forces are caught in the middle of an escalating sectarian conflict in Iraq, with no end in sight," the bio quotes.
"This is beyond parsing. This is being slimed in the Green Zone," Tauscher said of her bio.
More than two dozen House members and senators have used the August recess to travel to Iraq in the hope of getting a firsthand view of the war ahead of commanding Gen. David H. Petraeus's progress report in two weeks on Capitol Hill. But it appears that the trips have been as much about Iraqi and U.S. officials sizing up Congress as the members of Congress sizing up the war. |
Published: Aug. 31, 2007
Posted: Aug. 31, 2007 |
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Mystery DR Congo fever kills 100 - BBC
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| More than 100 people have died because of a fever epidemic in the centre of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, health officials say. |
Many of the victims are people who have been in contact with the deceased, including medical staff, and who lack equipment to deal with the illness.
The latest victim was a nurse at a local hospital. She died on Thursday after taking care of infected patients.
Health officials say the medical staff had no masks and this put them at risk.
Speaking from Kananga, the capital of West Kasai region, Dr Jean-Constantin Kanow said the illness had first started three months ago, when chickens and pigs started dying - but now people were also affected.
The epidemic was affecting four villages: Kampungu, Makonono, Kaluamba and Mombo. |
Published: Aug. 31, 2007
Posted: Aug. 31, 2007 |
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G Bissau 'to shoot drug planes' - BBC
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| Suspected drug planes that enter Guinea-Bissau's airspace will be shot down in a bid to reduce rampant cocaine trafficking, the government says. |
Prime Minister Martinho N'Dafa Cabi said he had personally issued the uncompromising order.
This follows the army's seizure of a truckload of jet fuel in a forest outside the city of Buba on Thursday.
International drugs experts fear the poor, unstable country with numerous islands could become a "narco-state". |
Published: Sep. 01, 2007
Posted: Aug. 31, 2007 |
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World facing 'arsenic timebomb' - BBC
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| About 140 million people, mainly in developing countries, are being poisoned by arsenic in their drinking water, researchers believe. |
Speaking at the Royal Geographical Society (RGS) annual meeting in London, scientists said this will lead to higher rates of cancer in the future.
South and East Asia account for more than half of the known cases globally.
Eating large amounts of rice grown in affected areas could also be a health risk, scientists said.
"It's a global problem, present in 70 countries, probably more," said Peter Ravenscroft, a research associate in geography with Cambridge University.
"If you work on drinking water standards used in Europe and North America, then you see that about 140 million people around the world are above those levels and at risk." |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Deadly cholera outbreak in Iraq - BBC
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| An outbreak of cholera in two northern Iraqi provinces has killed eight people and infected 80 others, the Kurdistan Regional Government has said. |
Kurdish Health Minister Zeryan Othman said local health authorities were also treating 4,250 suspected cases of the disease in Sulaimaniya and Tamim.
Specialist teams and emergency aid have been sent to the affected regions.
Serious problems with water quality and sewage treatment, worsened by crumbling local infrastructure, are being blamed.
A report by the UK-based charity, Oxfam, and the NGO Co-ordination Committee in Iraq (NCCI) last month warned that 70% of Iraq's population did not have adequate water supplies and that only 20% had access to effective sanitation. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Typhoid making a comeback in UK - BBC
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| People holidaying in exotic places without being vaccinated is causing a rise in dangerous diseases like typhoid, warn doctors. |
And low air fares could be fuelling the problem, they claim.
Figures from the Health Protection Agency show there has been a 69% increase in typhoid cases in recent years, with most acquired abroad.
Health experts are launching a campaign Valuing Vaccines to spread the message about the importance of immunisation.
Dr Jane Zuckerman, director of the Centre for Travel Medicine at the Royal Free Hospital in north London, who is backing the campaign, said: "The level of public ignorance exposed by these results is extremely worrying.
"We have seen vaccine-preventable diseases like typhoid on the increase because people travel abroad to endemic areas without being vaccinated and return sick to the UK."
Typhoid kills 600,000 people worldwide each year.
In 2002, 147 typhoid cases were reported in England and Wales, with 101 of those acquired abroad.
In 2006, this had leapt to 248 cases, of which 122 were acquired abroad.
A milder strain of the disease, called paratyphoid and which cannot be vaccinated against, increased by 78% over the last five years.
A survey of more than 1,000 reveals more than 1 in 3 people in the UK are not aware of the diseases which can be prevented by vaccination.
Nearly two-thirds did not know that typhoid could be prevented by vaccination, while two out of five incorrectly believed there was a vaccine for malaria. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Texas to execute getaway driver - BBC
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| Human rights groups are urging clemency for a Texas death row inmate due to be executed on Thursday for a 1996 murder although he was not the gunman.
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Kenneth Foster, now 30, was convicted under a Texas law that allows accomplices to a crime that results in murder to face capital punishment.
He was driving the getaway car in a botched robbery that led to a shooting.
Prosecutors successfully argued during his trial that Foster displayed "reckless disregard for human life".
The Texas "law of parties" abolishes the distinction between the main perpetrator of a crime and an accomplice, allowing both to be held equally culpable. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Turk With Islamic Ties Is Elected President - NY Times
SABRINA TAVERNISE & SEBNEM ARSU |
| An observant Muslim with a background in Islamic politics was voted in on Tuesday as president, breaking an 84-year grip on power by the secular establishment and ushering a new religious middle class from Turkey’s heartland into the center of the staunchly secular state. |
Lawmakers approved Abdullah Gul, a 56-year-old economist, with 339 votes, far above the simple majority required in the 550-member Parliament. Two candidates shared another 83 votes. The main party of the secular establishment boycotted the balloting.
The selection of Mr. Gul ended four months of political standoff that began when Turkey’s secular establishment and military, vehemently opposed to his candidacy, blocked it in May, forcing a national election last month.
But Mr. Gul’s party, Justice and Development, refused to back down, and his success was a rare occasion in Turkish history in which a party prevailed against the military.
There was no immediate statement from the military, which has ousted four elected governments since 1960. But its unspoken reaction was frosty: No military commander attended Mr. Gul’s inaugural ceremony, a highly unusual departure from protocol, considering that he is now the commander in chief. |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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A Sobering Census Report: Americans’ Meager Income Gains - NY Times
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| The economic party is winding down and most working Americans never even got near the punch bowl. |
The Census Bureau reported yesterday that median household income rose 0.7 percent last year — its second annual increase in a row — to $48,201. The share of households living in poverty fell to 12.3 percent from 12.6 percent in 2005. This seems like welcome news, but a deeper look at the belated improvement in these numbers — more than five years after the end of the last recession — underscores how the gains from economic growth have failed to benefit most of the population.
The median household income last year was still about $1,000 less than in 2000, before the onset of the last recession. In 2006, 36.5 million Americans were living in poverty — 5 million more than six years before, when the poverty rate fell to 11.3 percent.
And what is perhaps most disturbing is that it appears this is as good as it’s going to get. |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Wyoming GOP moves vote to Jan. 5 - Yahoo! News
MEAD GRUVER |
| Wyoming Republicans have jumped to the head of the pack in the nominating process, moving their delegate-selection conventions to Jan. 5 before even Iowa or New Hampshire vote. |
While the move puts Wyoming first in the accelerated primary process, it is not expected to stay there as states continue to jockey for position. At stake for Wyoming Republicans on Jan. 5 will be 12 delegates to the national convention.
"We're first in the nation," said Tom Sansonetti, the state party's 2008 county convention coordinator. "At least for the next couple, three weeks until New Hampshire and Iowa move, which I expect they will."
Wyoming Republicans made the decision Saturday and announced it late Tuesday.
The ever-changing contest schedule — and the earlier start to the balloting — has created an enormous level of discomfort for national parties trying to impose discipline on the states as well as presidential campaigns trying to figure out strategies when voting could begin in just four months.
As a deterrence, the Republican National Committee insists they will penalize states that schedule nominating contests before Feb. 5 by withholding delegates to the conventions next summer.
"The rules are very clear. Any state that holds its primary outside the window will be penalized delegates," said Republican National Committee spokesman Paul Lindsay, adding delegates would be allocated to states at the end of the year.
Sansonetti said Wyoming stood to lose half its delegates. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Call to regulate the net rejected - BBC
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| The internet should not be used as a scapegoat for society's ills, said Vint Cerf, Google's net evangelist and a founding father of the network. |
Speaking on the BBC Radio 4's Today programme he rejected calls for strict control of what is put online.
He said the net was just a reflection of the society in which we live.
Anyone regulating beyond what was clearly illegal put themselves on a "slippery slope" that could limit freedom of expression, he said.
"If it's not illegal, it raises a rather interesting question about where you do draw the line," he said. |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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China finance minister steps down - BBC
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| The Chinese Finance Minister, Jin Renqing, has resigned for personal reasons, the government has announced. |
Mr Jin will be transferred to a Communist Party think-tank where he will be deputy chief, a government statement said.
The 63-year-old has been in the post since 2003. There has been no formal announcement yet as to his successor.
The move comes amid rising concerns over accelerating inflation in China and a surging stock market.
"Due to personal reasons, comrade Jin Renqing has tendered his resignation and the central government has accepted his request," a State Council official said. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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UN warns of 'armed' Darfur camps - BBC
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| The UN's emergency relief co-ordinator, John Holmes, has described the refugee camps in Darfur as militarised. |
Mr Holmes told the BBC that some of the 1.2 million refugees are impatient, politicised, and armed.
He said having thousands of disaffected men cooped up in camps in which weapons were available, was dangerous.
He believes the situation in the camps is bound to lead to clashes, and reflects the fact that there is no peace settlement in place for Darfur.
With Sudanese forces circling the camps the situation is potentially explosive. |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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ICRC highlights world's 'missing' - BBC
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| There are at least 375,000 missing people in Iraq, officials say.
The international community has been criticised for not doing enough to locate those missing worldwide as a result of conflicts and other violence. |
The report by the International Committee of the Red Cross highlighted what it called a hidden tragedy.
It called on those responsible for detaining civilians to allow families to obtain information about their loved ones' condition and whereabouts.
The ICRC report coincides with the International Day of the Disappeared.
There is no exact figure for the number of missing worldwide. In Iraq, official estimates put the number of missing in conflicts since 1980 at between 375,000 and one million.
There are still more than 17,000 people missing from the wars that tore apart the former Yugoslavia more than 10 years ago, the ICRC said in a statement.
Tens of thousands of people are also unaccounted for across Africa. The ICRC said about 22,000 people have been declared missing in Angola alone. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Bo Diddley suffers heart attack - BBC
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| Diddley (sic) was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987
Musician Bo Diddley is in a stable condition in a US hospital after suffering a heart attack. |
The 78-year-old singer-guitarist complained of dizziness and nausea during a routine medical check-up on Friday, his publicist Susan Clary said.
He was taken to hospital where he had a stent implanted to improve the blood flow to his heart. Ms Clary said his situation was "very serious". |
Published: Aug. 29, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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How Did News Outlets Miss Senator's Arrest for Nearly Three Months? - Editor and Publisher
Joe Strupp |
| The revelation late Monday that Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho) was arrested nearly three months ago for allegedly making sexual advances in a men's room raises the issue of how such an action could occur without the press reporting it. |
Even Roll Call reporter John McArdle, who broke the story late Monday, admits he only received word of the arrest and subsequent guilty plea via a tip last week.
"You would think in the 24-hour news cycle, something like this would slip through," said McArdle, a four-year veteran of the Capitol Hill daily. "He wanted to keep it quiet, and he almost got away with it." |
Published: Aug. 28, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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GMA casts Gonzales scandals as partisan: "For Democrats, it's another scalp to hang on the wall" - Media Matters
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| Summary: On Good Morning America, correspondent David Wright asserted that "[w]ere it not for the scandals, [President] Bush had hoped to make" outgoing Attorney General Alberto Gonzales "the first Hispanic justice on the U.S. Supreme Court." Wright also reported that Gonzales' resignation "is being welcomed on both sides of the aisle" because "[f]or Democrats, it's another scalp to hang on the wall; and for Republicans, it's a huge distraction that now goes away." In fact, several Republicans have joined Democrats in calling for Gonzales to resign. |
Published: Aug. 28, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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NY Times' Stolberg, MNSBC's Matthews cited Tony Perkins, GOP conservatives as espousing "ethics" and "values" - Media Matters
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| Summary: New York Times reporter Sheryl Gay Stolberg repeated a common media practice of suggesting that the GOP's "social conservative wing" cares more about "ethics and family values" than others, and quoted Tony Perkins, the president of the Family Research Council, in support. Similarly, MSNBC's Chris Matthews asked Perkins about "conservative people like yourself, who are not politicians, but are men of the church, who believe in values, rather than election results." Neither noted Perkins' reported ties to both the white-supremacist Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC) and former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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History Will Not Absolve Us - Village Voice
Nat Hentoff |
| If and when there's the equivalent of an international Nuremberg trial for the American perpetrators of crimes against humanity in Guantánamo, Iraq, Afghanistan, and the CIA's secret prisons, there will be mounds of evidence available from documented international reports by human-rights organizations, including an arm of the European parliament—as well as such deeply footnoted books as Stephen Grey's Ghost Plane: The True Story of the CIA Torture Program (St. Martin's Press) and Charlie Savage's just-published Takeover: The Return of the Imperial Presidency and the Subversion of American Democracy (Little, Brown). |
While the Democratic Congress has yet to begin a serious investigation into what many European legislators already know about American war crimes, a particularly telling report by the International Committee of the Red Cross has been leaked that would surely figure prominently in such a potential Nuremberg trial. The Red Cross itself is bound to public silence concerning the results of its human-rights probes of prisons around the world—or else governments wouldn't let them in.
But The New Yorker's Jane Mayer has sources who have seen accounts of the Red Cross interviews with inmates formerly held in CIA secret prisons. In "The Black Sites" (August 13, The New Yorker), Mayer also reveals the effect on our torturers of what they do—on the orders of the president—to "protect American values."
She quotes a former CIA officer: "When you cross over that line of darkness, it's hard to come back. You lose your soul. You can do your best to justify it, but . . . you can't go back to that dark a place without it changing you."
Few average Americans have been changed, however, by what the CIA does in our name. Blame that on the tight official secrecy that continues over how the CIA extracts information. On July 20, the Bush administration issued a new executive order authorizing the CIA to continue using these techniques—without disclosing anything about them.
If we, the people, are ultimately condemned by a world court for our complicity and silence in these war crimes, we can always try to echo those Germans who claimed not to know what Hitler and his enforcers were doing. But in Nazi Germany, people had no way of insisting on finding out what happened to their disappeared neighbors.
We, however, have the right and the power to insist that Congress discover and reveal the details of the torture and other brutalities that the CIA has been inflicting in our name on terrorism suspects. |
Published: Aug. 28, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Post-quake Peru runs out of tents - BBC
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| Peruvian officials say they have run out of tents and urgently need at least 40,000 more to house victims of the devastating earthquake two weeks ago. |
Aid agencies said many survivors in the Ica region were living on the streets in unhygienic conditions, and were desperately in need of basic supplies.
French agency Medecins San Frontieres said it was as if the earthquake had struck just a day before.
More than 500 people were killed and 1,300 injured in the earthquake.
The worst damage was in the coastal cities of Ica and Pisco, south of Lima. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Nigeria scraps state oil company - BBC
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| Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua is to scrap the state-owned oil corporation and restructure the industry. |
A national energy council will instead be established to oversee the notoriously corrupt oil sector.
The council, headed by the president, has six months to create five new organisations out of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
Nigeria is the world's eighth-largest exporter of crude oil but relies on imports for its fuel needs.
There are often fuel scarcities and the subsidised price of fuel is regularly flouted.
The country loses millions of dollars of oil through illegal sell-offs, and reform of the oil sector is one of the newly-elected government's key aims. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Sarkozy 'loosening' 35-hour week - BBC
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| France's President Nicolas Sarkozy says he wants to go "much further in loosening up the 35-hour" working week. |
Mr Sarkozy also said he wanted to tighten up competition between firms to make consumer prices fall.
In a speech to the employers' organisation Medaf, he said he was not planning to sit around waiting for international growth to improve.
Mr Sarkozy said a global economic slowdown would only encourage him to do more to make the economy competitive. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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UN issues Pakistan refugee appeal - BBC
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| The UN refugee agency has appealed to the government of Pakistan to postpone Friday's planned closure of one of the country's largest Afghan refugee camps. |
It says that it is "deeply concerned" over the closure of Jalozai camp in North West Frontier Province (NWFP).
The UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) has warned that "tens of thousands" of Afghans are being pressured into leaving by Friday.
It says their exodus could lead to a humanitarian crisis this winter. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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Bloggers battered by viral storm - BBC
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| Google's Blogger site is being used by malicious hackers who are posting fake entries to some blogs.
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The fake entries contain weblinks that lead to booby-trapped downloads that could infect a Windows PC.
Infected computers are being hijacked by the gang behind the attacks and either mined for saleable data or used for other attacks.
The Blogger attack is the latest in a series by a gang that has managed to hijack hundreds of thousands of PCs. |
Published: Aug. 30, 2007
Posted: Aug. 30, 2007 |
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