Nepal Maoists threaten blockade
AFP, KATHMANDU
Feb 5 : Nepals new government has vowed to crack down on
corruption and poverty, state media reported Saturday, as Maoist rebels warned they would
bring the country to a halt if King Gyanendra did not reverse his power grab. A cabinet
meeting chaired by the king adopted a 21-point socio-economic programme focused on
creating jobs, ending nepotism and corruption, and spurring economic growth, state-run
radio announced.
"Property amassed through abuse of authority, smuggling, tax
evasion, illegal contract and commission will be seized and nationalised," it said,
announcing the decisions of the cabinet. Gyanendra on Tuesday fired the government led by
Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba for failing to organise elections or quell the
insurgency by Maoists, who want to topple the monarchy and install a communist republic.
He also named a loyalist cabinet under his "chairmanship",
declared a state of emergency and pledged to restore multi-party democracy in three years.
State-run English daily "The Rising Nepal" Saturday outlined
other populist measures the new government planned to take in what analysts say is an
attempt by the king to win support for his actions from Nepalis fed up with greedy and
squabbling politicians.
The government would give more powers to village councils, dole out
property to the landless, modernise farming, create jobs, develop tourism and provide free
education to a percentage of needy students, it said.
A senior minister, meanwhile, said multi-party democracy would only be
restored and elections held once Maoist rebels were defeated.
Foreign Minister Ramesh Nath Pandey told AFP that until the Maoist
insurgency was halted, "multi-party democracy cannot come back on track."
"We have learnt the lessons after paying a heavy price that
without restoring peace and security, we cannot hold elections," he said.
Maoist guerrilla leader Prachanda hit back in a statement received by
AFP in New Delhi Saturday, warning that unless the king reversed his actions, the rebels
would enforce an indefinite countrywide blockade from February 13. Prachanda urged
citizens to stock up with vital provisions and come out "in strong resistance"
to what he said was "Nazi-style repression" by the kings forces.
"Our party challenges Gyanendra .. to withdraw his retrogressive
steps immediately," his statement said. "If he fails to withdraw ... our party
will be compelled to come out for countrywide blockade and traffic strike for uncertain
time, from 13 February," it said.
11 Iraqis, two US troops killed in Iraq violence
AFP, BASRA
Feb 5: Insurgents killed four Iraqi soldiers in a motorcycle bomb in
the southern city of Basra Saturday, as violence elsewhere also left another seven Iraqis
and two US troops dead. "The booby-trapped motorbike exploded as the patrol passed
by. Four soldiers were killed and their vehicle destroyed," captain Farid al-Tamimi
told AFP.
The attack took place behind the general hospital in the Hay al-Rissala
neighbourhood, in the centre of Basra, which is the country's second largest city.
Attacks are seldom in this Shiite-dominated city, but extremist Sunni
Arab organisations have vowed to target the majority Shiite community, which is expected
to obtain a crushing victory in last Sunday's elections. Two children were killed when a
landmine exploded Saturday in the restive Sunni city of Samarra, north of Baghdad,
security and medical sources said. Two Iraqi soldiers were also killed in a roadside bomb
attack in the same city, which US-led troops had raided in October in a bid to clean it of
insurgents ahead of the landmark elections.
In further unrest in Samarra, another soldier and a civilian were
killed during clashes between Iraqi security forces and insurgents in the city centre,
police lieutenant Hussein Abbas said.
In the nearby troublespot of Dhuluiya, a soldier was killed and four
civilians wounded in clashes, police captain Amjad Saad said. The US military also
announced Saturday that two US troops were killed a day earlier in a similar attack near
Baiji, further north. The deaths raise to 1,441 the number of US military personnel whose
lives have been lost in Iraq since Washington invaded in spring 2003.
Meanwhile, US-backed Prime Minister Ayad Allawi was trailing a Shiite
ticket with ties to Iran in Iraq's historic election, according to partial returns
released Saturday. Four US soldiers were killed and nine wounded in the north, and gunmen
seized an Italian journalist in Baghdad.
The United Iraqi Alliance, endorsed by Iraq's top Shiite clerics,
captured more than two-thirds of the 3.3 million votes counted so far, the election
commission said. The ticket headed by Allawi, a secular Shiite, had about 18 percent - or
more than 579,700 votes.
Those latest partial figures from Sunday's contest for 275 National
Assembly seats came from 10 of Iraq's 18 provinces, said Hamdiyah al-Husseini, an election
commission official. All 10 provinces have heavy Shiite populations, and the Alliance had
been expected to do well there. So far, 45 percent of the vote has been counted in
Baghdad, with varying percentages tallied in the other nine provinces.
Nevertheless, the huge lead that the Shiites were rolling up among
their core constituency in the Shiite heartland of southern Iraq pointed to the likelihood
of a tremendous victory. An Alliance win would seal the Shiite majority's bid to claim
power after centuries of domination by Sunni Arabs, including years of oppression by
Saddam Hussein's Sunni-led regime.
No returns have been released from the Kurdish provinces of the north
or mainly Sunni provinces north and west of the capital. Many Sunni Arabs, who comprise an
estimated 20 percent of Iraq's 26 million people, are believed to have stayed away from
the polls - either out of fear of retaliation or anger at a vote held while US troops are
in the country.
The Shiite ticket was also running strong among Iraqis who voted in 14
foreign countries. The International Organization for Migration, which supervised the
expatriate vote, said the Shiite Alliance won about 36 percent of the 263,685 absentee
ballots. The Kurdish Alliance List took nearly 30 percent, and Allawi's ticket was third
with about 9 percent.
Allawi, who lived in exile in Britain during Saddam's rule, had been
expected to draw support from many voters outside Iraq.
Seats in the National Assembly will be apportioned according to each
faction's percentage of the nationwide vote. A two-thirds majority in the assembly -
possibly in a coalition with Kurds and others - would enable the cleric-backed ticket to
wield considerable influence in drafting the new constitution and shaping a democratic
Iraq.
The leader of the Shiite ticket, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, has promised an
inclusive government and a role for the Sunnis and others in drafting the constitution -
the major task of the new assembly.
Al-Hakim and other figures in the Alliance spent years in exile in
mainly Shiite Iran, but they insist they have no intention of transforming Iraq into a
clerical-run state. The ticket was endorsed by Iraq's most revered top Shiite cleric, the
Iranian-born Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.
The signs of a strong Shiite victory have sparked fears that the Sunni
Arab minority will not accept any new government that emerges from the election, fueling
the mainly Sunni insurgency.
The terror group al-Qaida in Iraq vowed new attacks against military
targets in the coming days in an Internet statement posted Saturday. The group promised
"victories, qualitative operations and the killing of the heads of the infidels and
apostates."
The statement alleged to be from al-Qaida in Iraq but the authenticity
of online statements cannot be verified.
In the latest insurgent attacks, two American soldiers were killed
Saturday and four wounded by a roadside bomb outside Beiji, 155 miles north of Baghdad,
the US command said. A second roadside bomb in Beiji killed two other US soldiers and
wounded five, the military said Saturday.
At least 1,445 American military personnel have died in Iraq since the
war began in March 2003.
Meanwhile, gunmen seized Giuliana Sgrena, a journalist for the Italian
newspaper Il Manifesto, in a hail of gunfire after blocking her car near the Baghdad
University compound. She had gone to interview refugees from Fallujah and to attend
Saturday prayers at a nearby mosque, according to Italian radio journalist Barbara
Schiavulli.
Italian Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu said Sgrena may have been
taken by a Sunni gang "who shot at our martyrs of Nasiriyah," referring to the
November 2003 bombing of Italian paramilitary barracks in a southern Shiite city.
The 56-year-old Sgrena is the second Italian journalist kidnapped in
Iraq, and at least the ninth Italian seized here in recent months. Freelance Italian
journalist Enzo Baldoni was abducted and killed in August.
Schiavulli said she received a call from Sgrena's cell phone as the
kidnapping was under way. "I couldn't hear anyone talking. ... I heard people
shooting," Schiavulli said. "I kept saying, 'Giuliana, Giuliana,' and no
answer."
Later, a statement posted on two Islamic militant Web sites in the name
of the little-known Islamic Jihad Organization claimed responsibility for the kidnapping
and gave Italy 72 hours to withdraw its troops from Iraq. It did not say what would happen
after the time passed.
The statement included no picture of the victim or other evidence that
the claim was genuine. An official at the Italian Foreign Ministry said authorities were
looking into the claim but said they were "far from taking it too seriously" at
this stage.
More than 190 foreigners have been abducted in Iraq over the past year.
At least 13 remain missing - including a French woman reporter seized last month. More
than 30 were killed and the rest were freed or escaped.
US military planners hope that building up Iraqi security forces will
help bring stability to the country and allow the Americans to hand over responsibility
for fighting the insurgents.
"Our ticket out of here is not going to be written through
constant combat operations - we'd be here forever doing that," Brig. Gen. Jeffery
Hammond, deputy commander of the US Army's 1st Cavalry Division, told The Associated
Press. "Our ticket out of here is the Iraqi security forces."
Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, the US commander of the training effort,
praised the Iraqi security forces' performance during the election and promised that
"in the months ahead we'll see the addition of a good number of adviser teams that
will work with Iraqi elements" in training programmes.
There are currently 136,000 members of the Iraqi security forces and
military, he told reporters at the Pentagon
Netaji not killed in plane crash: Judge
AFP, KOLKATA
Feb 5: A retired judge inquiring into the mysterious disappearance of a
famed Indian freedom fighter said Saturday there was no evidence to support the theory
that Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose had died in a 1945 plane crash in Taiwan.
Bose, also known as "Netaji" (leader), was president of the
Congress party and founded the Indian National Army (INA) to fight British colonial
forces. He led a failed attack on colonial India from the tiny northeastern state of
Nagaland and later reportedly died in a plane crash at Taihoku airport in Taiwan. But
former Supreme Court judge, Manoj Mukherjee, who was appointed by the government to
conduct an inquiry into Bose's disappearance, said "there is no record" that
Netaji was killed in the plane crash on August 18, 1945. At least two earlier commissions
have held that the freedom fighter died in the accident. The new commission was appointed
a couple of years ago after Bose supporters demanded the case be reopened.
"The Taiwanese government has shown me documents that there was no
record of (a) plane crash in Taiwan between August 14 and September 20, 1945,"
Mukherjee, who recently visited Taiwan, told AFP. "I have verified the documents.
They have promised to send the documents to India within a fortnight," the judge
added.
The plane theory has also been disputed recently by an Indian visiting
professor to Saint Petersburg University, Purabi Roy. Roy, who is also working on Bose's
disappearance, said: "Documents available at Russian archives indicate that Bose was
not killed in the crash." The researcher also disputed that Bose's remains were kept
in a casket at Renkojit temple in Tokyo.
According to recorded history, Bose was arrested by British forces on
July 2, 1940 for his activities and put under house arrest in Calcutta.
However, on January 16, 1941, he escaped and fled to Moscow on an
Italian passport from where he went to Berlin and raised the INA with the support of
Indian prisoners of war.
In October 1943, he left Germany to reach Tokyo before continuing on to
Singapore.
On October 23, 1943, he formed an interim Indian independent government
in Singapore and declared war against the British colonial forces in India. Leading the
newly-formed INA, Bose entered Kohima, capital of Nagaland, on March 19, 1944 and unfurled
the national flag but had to retreat after a British army offensive.
On August 18, 1945, it was reported that Bose had been killed in a
plane crash in Taiwan.
Neither Mukherjee nor Roy have offered alternative theories as to the
circumstances of his death.
Peace in S Asia depends on Kashmir solution: Musharraf
AFP, MUZAFFARABAD
Feb 5: President Pervez Musharraf warned on Saturday that peace in
South Asia would not be possible if Kashmiris were denied a chance to decide their future.
"Establishment of peace in the region is not possible nor can the
confidence-building measures proceed unless the Kashmir issue is resolved in accordance
with the wishes and aspirations of the Kashmiris," he said in a message as Pakistan
observed a day of "solidarity" with the people of Kashmir.
The message was read out by Sardar Siab Khalid, speaker of the
legislature of the Pakistani-administered zone of Kashmir, as bad weather prevented
Musharraf from flying to the state capital, Muzaffarabad. Musharraf, who has initiated a
peace process with India to resolve all issues through dialogue, said Kashmiris would have
to be included in the dialogue process.
Rallies were held here and elsewhere in Pakistan expressing solidarity
with the people of Kashmir fighting Indian rule in the Himalayan state.
"It is the basic right of the Kashmiris to decide their future on
their own. I want to make it clear that Kashmir cause is our vital national interest and
we cannot think of compromising it," Musharraf said. Islamic rebels in Indian-held
Kashmir launched an insurgency in 1989 which has claimed tens of thousands of lives.
Most of the rebels want to join mainly-Muslim Pakistan although some
want independence. Kashmir, which is divided between Pakistan and India, has sparked two
of their three wars since independence in 1947.
The two countries resumed dialogue under international pressure after
coming close to their fourth war in 2002. They have since launched a number of
confidence-building measures but no concrete progress has been made on Kashmir and other
other issues so far. Musharraf said Pakistan would not accept any solution which was not
in line with the wishes of Kashmiris.
"The government of Pakistan has made its position very clear to
the Indian leadership and world leaders." He also assured the Kashmiris that
"the whole Pakistani nation was with them in their struggle for freedom and they
would always enjoy the moral, political and diplomatic support of Pakistan."
The president paid tribute to "more than 80,000 martyrs who had
laid down their lives in Indian-held Kashmir during the ongoing freedom struggle."
"The blood of martyrs will not go in vain. These sacrifices will
soon bear fruit and Kashmiris will achieve their basic rights. "I am sure at long
last the Kashmiris will get peace and freedom," he added.
Meanwhile, authorities in northwestern Pakistan have arrested a
Tunisian man suspected of links with the Al-Qaeda terror network, an official said Friday.
The suspect, who identified himself as Abdul Qayum, was seized on
Wednesday while shopping at a market in Peshawar, near the border with Afghanistan, a
senior intelligence official told AFP requesting anonymity.
"The suspect gave his name as Abdul Qayum and says he is from
Tunisia," the official said, but added that investigators had not yet confirmed his
claims.
The suspect is being questioned about his links with Al-Qaeda, he said.
Pakistan, a key ally in Washington's so-called war on terror since 9/11, has already
captured around 600 alleged Al-Qaeda supporters including some major operatives.
Its forces have also fought pitched battles with militants in the
tribal region of South Waziristan, near Peshawar. Many are thought to have crossed from
Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban regime in late 2001.
The United States placed an advertisement in a Peshawar newspaper
Friday offering rewards of millions of dollars for information leading to the arrest of
Osama bin Laden and other Al-Qaeda kingpins.
Ahead of key summit
Abbas talks peace with Fatah
AFP, GAZA CITY
Feb 5: Mahmud Abbas held talks with the revolutionary council of his
mainstream Fatah faction Saturday, three days before the Palestinian leader meets Israeli
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon for a potentially breakthrough summit.
The summit, to be held in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh on
Tuesday, has fuelled hopes that the Middle East peace process is moving back on track and
coincides with a crucial visit to the region by new US Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice.
It will be the first time top Israeli and Palestinian leaders have met
since 2000, with Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert saying Israel was "strong enough
to take risks" in its negotiations with the Palestinians. Israeli public radio said
top Sharon adviser Dov Weisglass was to travel to Cairo Sunday to establish the common
ground between Israel and the Palestinians ahead of the summit.
Abbas was holding talks with more than 100 members of his own Fatah
party who sit on the revolutionary council, while a top aide said the aim of the summit
was to declare a mutual ceasefire between the two sides. "The revolutionary council
of Fatah is holding an important meeting in the presence of Abu Mazen (Abbas) to discuss
the summit, political and security questions and the results of contacts with
Israel," said Palestinian Authority spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeina. "We intend to
work so that a mutual ceasefire can be declared between the Palestinians and Israelis at
the Sharm el-Sheikh summit," he said. "We are also demanding the liberation of
8,000 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel and hope to be able to sort out the
differences.
King of Nepal's seizure of power a big gamble: Analysts
AFP, KATHMANDU
Feb 5: Nepal's King Gyanendra has taken a huge gamble by seizing power
in a bid to end a bloody and brutal Maoist rebellion that has tortured the Himalayan
kingdom for eight years, analysts say.
If he succeeds, the status of the monarchy will be reinforced to the
detriment of democracy; his failure could lead to the ancient monarchy's collapse, they
say. King Gyanendra fired the government on Tuesday, assumed all powers and declared a
state of emergency, citing the previous administration's failure to bring peace to a
country gripped by civil war since 1996.
The conflict has killed more than 11,000 people and ravaged a
population that has suffered at the hands of rebels and government troops alike.
War-weary, ordinary Nepalis interviewed in the capital Kathmandu said
that if they had to choose between peace and democracy, for which many have been pressing,
they would choose peace. "The population has been victimised, people are less
concerned with politics. They want first peace should prevail," said a pro- monarchy
analyst.
The government that King Gyanendra sacked has come in for much
criticism, like every administration in place since the establishment of a constitutional
monarchy in 1990 when several political parties were allowed to operate. "All the
governments have collapsed, all the parties quarrel, corruption has become
institutionalised," said an official with a human rights group. "Nepalese cannot
believe in democracy," he said. In the king's favour is that the Maoists have for
months been demanding direct negotiations with him, saying he has always been the sole
source of power.
Their demand is ironic since the Maoists, split by hardline and
moderate factions, are fighting for a communist republic to replace the monarchy. But King
Gyanendra's place at the head of the new government that he has appointed could lead the
way to such talks. "If the king can solve the Maoist problem, the Nepalese will like
him and nobody will go for democracy," said an employee of a nongovernment
organisation.
And, said a Western diplomat, in a world focussed on the fight against
terrorism, "the Nepalis, like the international community, are more lenient even if
their rights are suppressed." While the king holds many cards in this gamble, there
are some stacked against him.
He has to tackle not just the Maoists and the opposition, but also the
international community which has been strongly critical of his seizure of power and could
resort to suspending vital aid to press its demand for a return to democracy.
And the king will no longer be able to hide behind successive
governments for the failure to find peace with the Maoists, as he has until now.
Previous governments served as a "fuse" for the king, said a
Nepali journalist. But now, "If he fails, people will blame the king," he said.
The task facing King Gyanendra is tough: find peace, organise elections
and reestablish democracy in three years as he has promised, all the while developing the
economy of the country, one of the poorest in the world. And after all the sacrifices they
have had to make, the people of Nepal will judge him harshly if he cannot succeed.
"If he fails, he will have to find a justification, will be very unpopular, very
weak, he has taken a very big risk," said the NGO employee.
Should peace not be established and the situation in the country
continue to deteriorate, the king will have no choice but to backtrack, said the diplomat.
"He will have to give way and it could mean the end of the
monarchy because he will have to find another solution: it could be putting power in the
hands of the military, a total victory for the Maoists, or democracy."
Bush threatens to turn world into a sea of fire: N
Korea
REUTERS, SEOUL
Feb 5: In its first reaction to US President George W. Bush's State of
the Union address, North Korea said Bush had threatened to turn the world into a "sea
of fire," South Korean media reported on Saturday citing a Pyongyang broadcast.
Attention has been focused on what the North would say about stalled
six- party talks to end its nuclear programme, but the North has yet to make any official
comment on the issue. In a commentary carried by the North's official Radio Pyongyang, the
broadcast cast Bush as saying in his State of the Union address on Wednesday that the fire
of freedom would flare up in every corner of the world, Yonhap News reported, citing a
Saturday broadcast.
"But that means the United States will have the freedom to throw
the world into a sea of battle fires," the North said. Bush, who branded the North
part of an "axis of evil" along with Iran and pre-war Iraq in a previous State
of the Union address three years ago, limited his direct comments on North Korea to a
single sentence on Wednesday.
Indonesia seeks to make public kissing a crime
AFP, JAKARTA
Feb 5: Public kissing and cohabitation may become crimes in Indonesia
in future as the world's largest Muslim nation seeks to overhaul its Dutch-inherited
criminal laws, an official said today.
The drafting of a new criminal code has finally been completed after 25
years and parliament will soon debate it, justice ministry official Abdul Gani Abdullah
told AFP. The proposed draft includes provisions banning public kissing, unmarried couples
from living together and adultery. Offenders caught kissing in the open could be jailed up
to 10 years and fined as much as 300 million rupiah (33,000 dollars) under new penalties.
Some legal experts have criticized the draft, saying the state should
not repress citizens' freedom of expression or interfere in their private lives.
But Abdullah insisted the proposed laws were in line with popular
wishes.
"Kissing in public is a crime if the people around are not happy
and lodge a complain. But if they think it's all right, then no action will be
taken," he said.
Three die in Kashmir local poll violence
AFP, SRINAGAR
Feb 5: Two people were killed and a Muslim candidate in ongoing
municipal elections wounded in a surge of separatist violence in Indian Kashmir, police
said Saturday. A police official said a top-ranking rebel commander of the dominant
militant group Hizbul Mujahedin was shot dead by Indian troops overnight in the southern
Kashmir district of Rajouri.
In the same district, police said suspected militants abducted three
Hindus Saturday.
"One of them was shot dead, while two others managed to give slip
to their captors," a police spokesman said.
In the state summer capital Srinagar, suspected militants overnight
shot and wounded Sheikh Mohammed Amin, police said. Amin had contested the second stage of
the municipal elections held on Tuesday in Srinagar. The latest violence comes on the eve
of Sunday's third phase of the vote, which will be held in the southern districts of
Anantnag and Pulwama. Separatist politicians and rebel groups have called on voters to
shun the elections, the first in more than a quarter of a century, saying the polls are no
substitute for the right to self-determination.
World slowly forgetting tsunami tragedy
AFP, COLOMBO
Feb 5: Hundreds of Sri Lankan youths marched through the capital
Colombo on Saturday, saying the world had already started to forget the tsunami tragedy
six weeks after it struck the region.
Wearing jeans and white T-shirts bearing the words "Let's piece
together the future of Sri Lanka" and holding banners reading "Let's build one
Sri Lanka", they marched from the city's Hyde Park to the Independence Square public
park, collecting funds along the way for tsunami victims.
"We feel that the spirit behind the relief work for the tsunami
victims is dying as Sri Lanka and the world is slowly forgetting the tragedy," said
Aashiq Aminuddin, organiser of the march and a student from the Sri Lankan wing of the
Malaysia-based Asia-Pacific Institute of Information Technology.
"Our march today is an attempt to keep that spirit alive and tell
the world not to forget what we have suffered.
The victims need us for a long time." Nearly 31,000 people died in
the December 26 tsunami tragedy that devastated three quarters of Sri Lanka's coastline
and almost half a million are still homeless.
"Since the tsunami struck, we have collected over 2.5 million
rupees (25,000 dollars) which we have used for relief work," Aminuddin told AFP. On
Saturday, hundreds of tsunami survivors took to streets in southern Matara district to
protest corrupt aid distribution as the government admitted that 70 percent of the victims
had yet to receive any state help. Some 960,000 people are officially listed as being
entitled to tsunami relief after the disaster.
In her Freedom Day address on Saturday, President Chandrika Kumartunga
reiterated that aid was reaching all and urged a unified approach to tackle the tragedy.
After initial cooperation between the government and the rebel Tamil
Tigers over tsunami relief, a row over control of international aid has sparked new
tensions.
US soldier gets six months in Abu Ghraib abuse case
AP, FORT HOOD, TEXAS
Feb 5: Sgt. Javal Davis, who admitted abusing detainees at Abu Ghraib
in late 2003, was sentenced Friday to six months in a military prison and given a
bad-conduct discharge from the Army.
A nine-man military jury deliberated for about 5 1/2 hours before
sentencing Davis, a former Abu Ghraib guard who earlier this week confessed to stepping on
the hands and feet of a group of handcuffed detainees and falling with his full weight on
top of them.
After the verdict was read, Davis' mother sobbed uncontrollably in the
courtroom. Davis gave his father a long hug while a tear rolled down Davis' face.
"All of you who aren't my family can leave now," Davis
snapped at spectators after judge Col. James Pohl and the jury left the courtroom.
Davis will also be reduced in rank to private while serving his
sentence, which could be as short as 4 1/2 months for good conduct in prison and credit
for time served.
The 27-year-old reservist from Roselle, N.J., faced up to 6 1/2 years
in prison for battery, dereliction of duty and lying to Army investigators. A deal with
prosecutors, however, reportedly capped his sentence at 18 months.
Davis said he saw detainees being physically mistreated and sexually
humiliated by other guards, but that he failed to help them or report the abuse, as
required under military law. He also admitted lying to an Army investigator by denying his
misdeeds at the Baghdad prison.
Maj. Michael Holley, one of the prosecutors, had asked the nine jurors
to sentence Davis to 12 to 24 months in prison. Holley said Davis's misdeeds have
tarnished the image of American soldiers in the world's eyes and endangered forces serving
in Iraq.
Holley issued a brief written statement calling the jury's sentence
"appropriate."
Defence lawyer Paul Bergrin implored the jury of four Army officers and
five senior enlisted men to go lightly on Davis, saying he has already been punished
enough for a brief lapse in judgment.
Bergrin blamed the judge for refusing to let him pursue a Defence that
the Army jury pool had been tainted by comments condemning the Abu Ghraib defendants by
President Bush, Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other top military leaders.
The judge ruled that such comments were not prejudicial because they
didn't mention any of the accused by name.
Bergrin also said military intelligence officers at Abu Ghraib should
also face charges for their role in allegedly directing the abuse by prisons guards as a
way to soften up detainees for interrogation.
"They all had their hand in this pie and should have been sitting
in the same seat that Javal Davis was sitting in," Bergrin said. "But I don't
believe we'll ever see them. They've been too insulated."
Nigerian army put on top alert in oil-rich south
AFP, LAGOS
Feb 5: Nigeria's army has been put on top alert in the west African
country's main oil producing region after an outbreak of unrest, this time affecting
ChevronTexaco, the local armed forces chief said Saturday.
"We have stepped up the security arrangement, that means we have
increased our means, and alert level," said General Elias Zamani, in charge of the
army and police in the volatile Niger Delta.
He said a security guard had been killed in clashes, but a spokesman
for the local community said at least two protestors who went Thursday to the oil terminal
of US giant ChevronTexaco on the Escravos river had been killed.
"I don't want to disclose the details. We already have troops
there and we have reinforced them. We are still monitoring the security situation in the
area," where local protesters attack or invade oil installations, Zamani said. The
terminal was invaded on Thursday by hundreds of irate protesters from the Ugborodo, a
mainly Itsekiri ethnic group, who said they want the company out of the region.
"One person died, I don't know how many were wounded," Zamani
said. "The demonstrators mistakenly killed one security guy with a locally made gun,
it was not a military ammunition. My commander on the ground confirms that."
However, Victor Omunu, a member of the Ugborodo community interim
management committee, said: "We have two confirmed dead and three feared dead. The
two were shot dead by soldiers and Mopo (anti-riot policemen). About 13 wounded are in the
hospital, five of them in a very critical condition." "We haven't heard anything
about a dead security agent.
Our boys were not carrying weapons. Our people were defenseless and
armless," he added.
For firms such as ChevronTexaco and Anglo-Dutch giant Shell, the delta
is a profitable but high risk zone, since local residents channel anger at pollution, and
what they regard as minimal benefits for their communities, into unrest which loses the
oil majors hundreds of millions of dollars.
Clashes are frequent between security forces working for the oil
companies and victims of grinding poverty in this southeastern region of Africa's most
populous country of 130 million inhabitants.
"The place is calm right now and normal activities continue,"
Zamani said, while the oil company issued a statement saying that Jay Pryor, "the
Managing Director of Chevron Nigeria Limited... expressed his confidence that the security
authorities will handle the matter promptly."
Military and local officials said that negotiations between community
representatives began on Tuesday and were still under way, while the government said law
enforcement agencies took "prompt action" and "evacuated (villagers) from
the facility".
However, Omunu said: "The meeting is over and nothing concrete
came out of it. The pressure we are putting in will come in different ways."
"Chevron was not even able to put light in the community in 40 years," Omunu
told AFP, meaning a lack of electricity. Oil majors argue that they contribute to
development in the delta by furnishing utilities and helping with education and other
social issues.
A witness said the protesters were about 500 youths who entered the oil
installations "to demand the implementation of a 2002 accord on the development and
employment in the community."
Nigeria, Africa's largest oil producer, also the world's sixth biggest
oil exporter with a daily output of 2.5 million barrels, derives more than 95 percent of
its foreign exchange earnings from oil. Around 20,000 barrels per day were lost in recent
weeks following protests by local communities in the Niger Delta demanding jobs,
amenities, and their "share" of the revenue from oil produced in their region.
Iraq wants money back; Annan promises action on corruption
REUTERS, UNITED NATIONS
Feb 5: Iraq said it wanted its money back from the scandal-tainted UN
oil-for-food program on Friday as Secretary-General Kofi Annan vowed to get to the bottom
of wrongdoing by UN staff.
"Huge sums of money which should have served the needs of the
Iraqi people who were suffering at that time -- a lot of these resources were squandered
and misspent," said Iraq's UN ambassador, Samir Sumaidaie.
Iraq, he said, should at minimum not have to pay for the independent
probe set up by the United Nations from remaining oil-for-food funds. The inquiry panel
has spent $30 million so far, with the approval of the Security Council.
A new report by Paul Volcker, the former US Federal Reserve chairman
appointed by Annan to probe the $67 billion program, found that the director of the plan,
Benon Sevan, helped steer oil contracts to a relative of former UN Secretary-General
Boutros Boutros-Ghali.
The report does not accuse any UN officials of getting bribes. But it
says Sevan received $160,000 from an aunt in Cyrus, who has since died and had few
resources.
"We are as determined as everyone to get to the bottom of this. We
do not want this shadow to hang over the UN," Annan said as he arrived at
headquarters.
Annan said UN officials would be disciplined and diplomatic immunity
would be lifted if criminal acts were committed.
Among other questionable deals in the report was one in which another
UN official, Joseph Stephanides, colluded with a former British UN ambassador so that
Lloyd's Register Inspection Ltd. could get a lucrative contract. Volcker said Stephanides
was anxious to get the program underway.
The report said a more thorough audit of the humanitarian program might
have uncovered cheating by Saddam Hussein's government. A CIA report estimated Saddam
skimmed $1.7 billion from the program and another $8 billion through illegal oil sales
outside it, some permitted by the security council.
Investigators questioned Boutros-Ghali for choosing the Banque
Nationale de Paris, now BNP-Paribas, to handle the program's account. He did so after
council members asked him to select a bank but was criticized for asking Iraq its
preference.
The program began in late 1996 and ended in November 2003, after the
United States overthrew Saddam. Iraq was allowed to sell oil to buyers of its choosing and
contract for food and other necessities to ease hardships caused by UN sanctions.
In Washington, State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said, "One
should not let the corruption and the distortion of the program completely overshadow the
fact that it did, to an important extent, serve the purposes for which it was designed.
"Was it perfect? Was it free of manipulation? No. But did it help?
Yes," he said.
Volcker's 240-page report was a preliminary survey, with a final one to
be produced in June. He said he may have another interim report on the alleged role of
Annan's son, who had worked for a Swiss company that replaced Lloyd's in 1998.
The Iraqi ambassador said the United Nations received $1.14 billion to
administer oil-for-food and wanted to see how much reached its destination or was
squandered by outside contractors working for the world body.
"The question arises whether the secretariat is subject to its own
political culture, which tends to subvert the will of the Security Council," said
Sumaidaie. "This is serious."
He did not blame the council, which approved contracts.
Several investigations are underway in the United States, the most
extensive one in the US Attorney's office in New York and at least eight in the US
Congress.
Sen. Richard G. Lugar, the Republican chairman of the Foreign Relations
Committee, said "part of the blame for the current imbroglio lies with the UN"
but that one had to recognize that council members, including the United States,
"must also answer questions as to why they, too, did not pay greater scrutiny to this
program."
Bush asks Congress for $419.3 billion for defence
AP, WASHINGTON
Feb 5: President Bush will ask Congress for $419.3 billion for the
Pentagon for next year, 4.8 percent more than this year's spending, as the administration
seeks to beef up and reshape the Army and Marine Corps for fighting terrorism.
The request will not include money for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Congress already has appropriated $25 billion for those wars this year, and the White
House is planning to request another $80 billion soon.
The president plans to roll out his military spending proposal Monday
as part of a roughly $2.5 trillion federal budget. But documents obtained by The
Associated Press on Friday show that he will request $19.2 billion more for the Defence
Department than its $400.1 billion budget this year.
However, his request is $3.4 billion below the $422.7 billion the
Pentagon estimated in January that it would need for next year.
The proposal will include restructuring and expanding the Army and
adding combat and support units for the Marine Corps. It reflects Defence Secretary Donald
H. Rumsfeld's efforts to transform the Cold War-style military into one that's more
rapidly deployable to fight terrorist groups.
Under Bush's plan, Defence spending would grow gradually, hitting
$502.3 billion by 2011.
The proposal, according to one of the documents, supports the war on
terrorism by "strengthening US Defence capabilities and keeping US forces combat
ready. It continues to implement lessons learned from ongoing operations in the war."
Those include, according to the proposal, "the need for flexible
and adaptable joint military, strong special operations forces, highly responsive
logistics and the best possible intelligence and communications capabilities."
The plan calls for special operations forces, which the documents
described as "critical to the fight against terrorism," to add 1,200 troops. The
forces would get $50 million to keep people from leaving the services.
The president also wants Congress to let him spend $750 million as he
chooses to help Iraq, Afghanistan and US allies opposing terrorism bolster their military
and security forces. In the past, lawmakers have been reluctant to give Bush unfettered
control of such funds but have generally complied.
On Thursday, Missouri Rep. Ike Skelton - ranking Democrat on the House
Armed Services Committee - said in a statement that he worried that the president's budget
request, which he anticipated would be billions less than the Pentagon had predicted
needing, "may weaken our efforts" in Iraq and Afghanistan "while
undermining our ability to prepare for future conflicts."
Overall, the president's proposal calls for the Navy, Marines and Air
Force to all receive extra funds next year, but the Army's budget would take a $300
million reduction to $100 billion even though it's bearing the brunt of the costs and
fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. However, the $80 billion Bush plans to request in the
coming days for Iraq and Afghanistan is expected to be tilted heavily toward the Army.
Bush plans to propose $1.6 billion to fight chemical and biological
threats next year and $9.9 billion over the next five years. And, he would allocate $9.5
billion for homeland security activities next year and $147.8 billion for training,
maintenance and other "readiness" programs.
Despite the overall military increase, the Pentagon's account for
purchasing new weapons would actually incur a $100 million cut next year to $78 billion.
The proposal underscores how huge federal deficits are affecting even the Defence
Department, long one of Bush's top priorities.
The president, according to the documents, will seek $8.8 billion for
its missile Defence program, compared with $9.9 billion this year. The documents also
showed that he would ask for $695.7 million for the Chinook helicopter for next year,
compared with $869.8 million for this year. And, the B-2 stealth bomber would get $344.3
million, down from $365 million this year.
More than half the total Defence increase - $10.8 billion - would be
for training, maintenance and other costs associated with keeping the military ready for
action. Most of the rest would go for military salaries and construction of bases and
housing.
The proposal calls for increasing military base salaries by 3.1 percent
and civilian salaries by 2.3 percent. It also calls for giving troops more money for
housing and giving reservists better health care coverage and additional education
benefits.
Sudan won't allow Darfur suspects to be tried abroad
AFP, KHARTOUM
Feb 5: Sudan will not allow any citizen to be tried abroad in
connection with suspected crimes against humanity in the war-torn western region of
Darfur, First Vice President Ali Osman Taha was quoted Saturday by the press as saying.
Taha, speaking at a meeting with officials in South Darfur state on
Friday, was referring to an international discussion over whether Sudanese suspected of
such crimes be tried by the International Criminal Court (ICC) or by a special tribunal.
"The government is opposed to trying any Sudanese official or
ordinary citizen involved in the Darfur incidents outside the Sudan," Taha was quoted
as saying.
"The government is capable of doing justice among its people in
Darfur," said Taha, adding that Sudan "is a sovereign state committed to the
international agreements and conventions it has signed." The independent Al-Ayam
daily reported Saturday that 51 Sudanese accused by a UN fact-finding commission of
committing crimes against humanity in Darfur included 10 senior officials in the national
government. Taha, tasked by President Omar el-Beshir with finding a solution to the Darfur
rebellion, set out Friday on a two-day tour of South and North Darfur states. He said he
and John Garang, head of the southern Sudan People's Liberation Movement, would attend
next week's UN Security Council talks on Darfur and on deployment of UN peace support
forces in southern Sudan.
The government signed a peace deal with the SPLM last month, ending two
decades of civil war, and shifting the spotlight more to the Darfur conflict. A UN panel
this week blamed government forces and militia it supports for indiscriminate attacks
there, including the killing of civilians, torture, enforced disappearances, destruction
of villages, rape, pillaging and forced displacement.
However, it stopped short of accusing Khartoum and the militias of
genocide against the Darfur population.
The vast region of Darfur has faced what UN experts call a major
humanitarian crisis, spawned by a February 2003 uprising by black African groups in Darfur
against the Arab government in Khartoum. Around 70,000 people are estimated to have died
in Darfur, many from hunger and disease, while some 1.5 million others have been
displaced, many into squalid and dangerous camps.
Meanwhile, a Sudanese soldier shot an aid worker in the West Kordofan
region, underlining the danger facing those trying to help 1.8 million people displaced by
conflict in neighbouring Darfur, an aid agency said on Saturday. CARE International said
in a statement its clearly marked vehicle was fired on without warning on Thursday morning
during a visit to a water and sanitation project in West Kordofan, which borders the
troubled Darfur area.
"The bullet, fired by a Sudanese soldier, struck and wounded a
CARE staff member who received medical treatment and is in good condition," the
statement said.
"Sudanese military authorities subsequently apologised to CARE for
the incident."
Darfur rebels who took up arms two years ago have been known to operate
in Kordofan and a new rebel movement has claimed attacks in the region since December.
At least 5 aid workers have been killed in Darfur since humanitarian
aid began to flow in earnest in April 2004, when a shaky ceasefire was signed between the
two main rebel groups and the government.
Tobacco billions beyond US reach: Court
REUTERS. WASHINGTON
Feb 5: A US appeals court on Friday rejected the government's bid to
force cigarette makers to pay $280 billion in past profits, striking the toughest sanction
from the racketeering case and lifting tobacco stocks.
The three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals for the District of
Columbia ruled 2-1 that federal law does not allow the monetary "disgorgement"
penalty the government sought in the civil case that has been tried since September.
"We hold that the language of (the racketeering law) and the
comprehensive remedial scheme of (the racketeering law) preclude disgorgement as a
possible remedy in this case," Appeals Court Judge David Sentelle wrote in the
majority opinion.
Tobacco stocks rose after the ruling, with the S&P Tobacco Index
closing up 4.92 percent.
The decision reverses a lower court ruling from last May and strips the
government of its most powerful weapon in the case. Analysts believe it could prompt the
government to seek a settlement. R.J. Reynolds General Counsel Charles Blixt said in a
statement the ruling "dramatically transforms the DOJ suit."
In addition to the monetary penalty, the government is seeking to
impose tougher rules on marketing, advertising and warnings on tobacco products.
Targeted in the government's lawsuit, filed in 1999, are Altria Group
Inc. (MO.N: and its Philip Morris USA unit; Loews Corp.'s Lorillard Tobacco unit, which
has a tracking stock, Carolina Group; Vector Group Ltd.'s Liggett Group; Reynolds American
Inc.'s R.J. Reynolds Tobacco unit and British American Tobacco Plc unit British American
Tobacco Investments Ltd.
Shares of Altria Group closed up $3.26, or 5.11 percent, at $67.00, on
the New York Stock Exchange. The stock reached as high as $68.50, its highest level in at
least 10 years, after the ruling.
Reynolds American shares closed up $3.69, or 4.5 percent, at $85.60,
Carolina Group finished up $1.52 at $33.50. Loews shares rose $1.80 to $70.80. Vector
shares were up 47 cents at $16.53.
"We believe today's ruling substantially reduces the risk
associated with the DOJ lawsuit, and should alleviate investor concerns about that
case," Rob Campagnino, an analyst at Prudential Equity Group, said in a research
note.
Anti-smoking groups urged the government to fight on.
William Corr, executive director of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids,
said the judge presiding over the trial can still order changes that would further protect
the public and require the industry to pay billions of dollars to fund tobacco prevention
and cessation programs.
"The tobacco industry and its allies may view today's ruling as an
opportunity to seek a weak settlement of the case. The White House and the Department of
Justice should resist such efforts and aggressively pursue the case ... "
A spokeswoman for the Justice Department said its attorneys were
reviewing the ruling and had no further comment.
The government charges cigarette makers deceived the public about the
dangers of smoking as part of a 50-year industry conspiracy.
The tobacco companies deny they illegally conspired to promote smoking
and say the government has no grounds to pursue them after they drastically overhauled
marketing practices as part of the 1998 settlement with state attorneys general.
Judge Sentelle, a Ronald Reagan appointee from the tobacco-producing
state of North Carolina, wrote that the civil racketeering statute used to bring the case
was aimed at putting an end to the illegal conduct going forward.
"Disgorgement is a very different type of remedy aimed at
separating the criminal from his prior ill-gotten gains and thus may not be properly
inferred from (the statute)," Sentelle said.
Sentelle was joined by another Reagan appointee Judge Stephen Williams.
Dissenting was Judge David Tatel, who was appointed by former President Bill Clinton,
whose administration brought the case.
Clowns offer to raise ailing Pope's spirits
REUTERS, ROME
Pope John Paul may have the best medical care at Rome's Gemelli
hospital, but there are some who think a red nose or two may cheer up the ailing Pontiff.
Hospital clowns Dr Little Cake and Dr White Cabbage told reporters they
wanted to take some time out from their usual work on the children's wards and try their
jokes on the Pope.
"We want to go and see him, if he'll have us," said one of
the clowns, wearing a plastic red nose and a white laboratory coat decorated in colorful
cartoon characters.
"After all it's our job to bring a smile wherever there is
suffering," she added. The two clowns were on their morning rounds in the Gemelli
Friday when they were mobbed by journalists camped out at the hospital awaiting word of
the Pontiff's health.
British ministry won't rule out alien life
AFP, LONDON
Undaunted by the lack of evidence, officials at the British defence
ministry are reportedly refusing to rule out the existence of alien life forms visiting
Earth.
The Financial Times quoted from a hitherto confidential letter by an
official acknowledging the ministry recorded accounts of people claiming to have seen
alien life in Britain.
According to the letter, obtained under recent legislation on freedom
of information, such reports are collected "solely to establish whether what was seen
might have some defence significance."
While admitting that "only a handful of reports in recent years
have warranted further investigation and none revealed an evidence of a threat," it
went on say the ministry was "totally open-minded" about the hypothesis of alien
life.
Two weeks ago an anonymous caller reported seeing "strange
lights" above Kent, southeast England, while another claimed to have seen a flying
saucer sailing above Stoke, central England.
Dark forces behind Harry Potter e-book hoax
AFP, WASHINGTON
Evil forces are probably behind a website offering a purported
electronic version of the upcoming Harry Potter book, author JK Rowling warned this week.
Rowling said in a message on her website that the since-closed site,
www.harrybooks.info, had been offering what it alleged to be an e-book version of
"Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince," due for release in July.
The offer, she said, was a scam.
"You should NEVER trust any Harry Potter e-books offered for
download from the Internet or on P2P (Peer-to-Peer)/file-trading networks," Rowling
said.
Two girls fined for causing distress to neighbour
REUTERS, DURANGO, COLORADO
A Colorado judge ordered two teen-age girls to pay about $900 (480
pounds) for the distress a neighbour said they caused by giving her home-made cookies
adorned with paper hearts.
The pair were ordered to pay $871.70 plus $39 in court costs after
neighbour Wanita Renea Young, 49, filed a lawsuit complaining that the unsolicited
cookies, left at her house after the girls knocked on her door, had triggered an anxiety
attack that sent her to the hospital the next day.
Taylor Ostergaard, then 17, and Lindsey Jo Zellitte, 18, paid the
judgment on Thursday after a small claims court ruling by La Plata County Court Judge Doug
Walker, a court clerk said on Friday.
The girls baked cookies as a surprise for several of their rural
Colorado neighbours on July 31 and dropped off small batches on their porches, accompanied
by red or pink paper hearts and the message: "Have a great night".
The Denver Post newspaper reported on Friday that the girls had decided
to stay home and bake the cookies rather than go to a dance where there might be cursing
and drinking.
It reported that six neighbours wrote letters entered as evidence in
the case thanking the girls for the cookies.
But Young said she was frightened because the two had knocked on her
door at about 10:30 p.m. and run off after leaving the cookies.
She went to a hospital emergency room the next day, fearing that she
had suffered a heart attack, court records said.
The judge awarded Young her medical costs, but did not award punitive
damages. He said he did not think the girls had acted maliciously but that 10:30 was
fairly late at night for them to be out.
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