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01/04/2013 - 00:05
Taiwan, Germany seek potentially vast new energy source
TAIPEI (AFP)
A research vessel carrying German and Taiwanese scientists set sail for waters off the island's southwestern coast on Sunday in search of methane hydrate, a potentially vast new energy source.
The substance, a fossil fuel that consists of very densely-packed methane trapped in ice, is found beneath the seafloor on continental shelves and in the Arctic's permafrost.
Earlier this month, Japan announced it had successfully extracted the hydrate, known as "fire ice", from its seabed, a move it called a world first and a major breakthrough for the energy-starved nation.
The 4700-tonne German ship, called the "Sonne" will undertake a 50-day expedition at a cost of around $3.98 million, three-quarters of which will be funded by Germany and the remainder by Taiwan.
"This will be the first time we may be able to physically explore for the substance," Wayne Wang of Taiwan's National Science Council told AFP. Past studies have indicated reserves in the area could supply the island for up to 50 years.This file picture, taken on March 19, 2005 shows the "burning ice," methane hydrate, a potential future source of energy during a press preview for the 2005 World Exposition in Nagakute, Aichi prefecture, central Japan. A research vessel carrying German and Taiwanese scientists set sail for waters off the island's southwestern coast on Sunday in search of methane hydrate.
Nuclear energy currently accounts for around 20 percent of the island's energy mix but has become increasingly controversial in recent years following Japan's atomic crisis.
Taiwan is heavily dependent on costly oil imports mainly from the Middle East and Africa.
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Taiwan, Germany seek potentially vast new energy source
Arctic 'greening' seen through global warming
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31/03/2013 - 19:13
Arctic 'greening' seen through global warming
PARIS (AFP)Land within the Arctic circle is likely to experience explosive "greening" in the next few decades as grass, shrubs and trees thrive in soil stripped of ice and permafrost by global warming, a study said on Sunday.
Wooded areas in the Arctic could increase by as much as 52 percent by the 2050s as the so-called tree line -- the maximum latitude at which trees can grow -- shifts hundreds of kilometres (miles) north, according to computer simulations published in the journal Nature Climate Change.
"Such widespread redistribution of Arctic vegetation would have impacts that reverberate through the global ecosystem," said Richard Pearson of the American Museum of Natural History's Center for Biodiversity and Conservation.
The Arctic has become one of the world's 'hotspots' for global warming. Over the past quarter-century, temperatures there have been rising roughly twice as fast as in the rest of the world.
"These impacts would extend far beyond the Arctic region," Pearson said in a statement. "For example, some species of birds seasonally migrate from lower latitudes and rely on finding particular polar habitats, such as open space for ground-nesting."
In a separate study also published on Sunday, Dutch scientists said that iceshelves in Antarctica -- another source of worry in the climate equation -- have in fact been growing thanks to global warming.
Meltwater that runs off the Antarctic mainland provides a cold, protective "cap" for iceshelves because it comes from freshwater, which is denser than seawater, the team from the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute said.
Iceshelves are the floating blankets of ice that extend from the coast. They are fed by glaciers that move ice down from the icesheet and towards the sea.
The freshwater acts as a cold coating for the underside of the iceshelf, cocooning it from warmer seas, according to their study, appearing in the journal Nature Geoscience.
This would explain an apparent anomaly: why sea ice around Antarctica has been growing, reaching the greatest-ever recorded extent in 2010, it suggested.
Other scientists, asked to comment on the work, concurred that the phenomenon was one of several unexpected impacts from global warming, a hugely complex interplay of land, sea and air.
If confirmed, it does not detract from the broader trend -- and source of concern -- from warming, they said.
"This is a major, new piece of work with wide implications for assessing Antarctica's ice mass in the coming decades," said palaeo-climatologist Valerie Masson-Delmotte of France's Laboratory for Climate and Environmental Science (LCSE).
She pointed to a worrying rise in sea levels in 2011 and 2012, due partly to expansion of the ocean through warming and through glacier runoff, coming from mountains and also from Greenland and Antarctica, the two biggest sources of land ice on the planet.
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Acordo entre Jordânia e palestinos para 'defender' Jerusalém Jovens palestinos são feridos em ataque de colonos (segurança palestina)
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31/03/2013 - 22:15
Acordo entre Jordânia e palestinos para 'defender' Jerusalém
31 Mar 2013AMÅ (AFP)O rei de Jordânia, Abdullah II e o presidente da Autoridade Palestina, Mahmud Abbas, assinaram neste domingo um acordo manifestando seu "objetivo comum de defender" Jerusalém e seus lugares sagrados muçulmanos contra qualquer "tentativa de judaização", indicou o Palácio Real.
"Neste acordo histórico, Abbas lembrou que o rei é o guardião dos lugares sagrados de Jerusalém, e que tem o direito de realizar todos os esforços legais para protegê-los, em particular a mesquita Al-Aqsa", escreveu o palácio em um comunicado.
O acordo "ressalta igualmente os princípios históricos sobre os quais Jordânia e Palestina chegaram a um acordo para manter seus esforços conjuntos para proteger a cidade e seus lugares sagrados das tentativas de judaização israelense", continuou o comunicado.
No texto é reafirmado também "o objetivo comum" de ambos os países "de defender toda Jerusalém, sobretudo em um momento crítico em que a cidade enfrenta (...) mudanças ilegais diariamente" que ameaçam "sua autenticidade e sua identidade original", segundo o texto.
"Jerusalém enfrenta atualmente desafios maiores e tentativas de alterar sua identidade árabe, muçulmana e cristã", insiste o Palácio Real.
Em Jerusalém fica localizado o terceiro lugar sagrado do Islã, a Esplanada das Mesquitas, onde estão as mesquitas Cúpula da Rocha e Al-Aqsa.
Este lugar, que os muçulmanos chamam de "Nobre Santuário" (Haram al-Sharif); e os judeus, de "Monte do Templo", em referência ao antigo Templo de Jerusalém destruído pelos romanos no ano 70, é um lugar sagrado para o Islã, assim como para o judaísmo, e fonte de tensão entre as duas comunidades.
Durante a guerra dos Seis Dias, de 1967, Israel tomou o controle de Jerusalém Oriental para depois anexá-la, uma decisão que a comunidade internacional nunca reconheceu.
Os palestinos consideram Jerusalém Oriental como a capital de seu futuro Estado.
Desde a guerra de 1967, a Jordânia, que assinou em 1994 um tratado de paz com Israel, é a guardiã dos lugares sagrados muçulmanos de Jerusalém.
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31/03/2013 - 23:28
Jovens palestinos são feridos em ataque de colonos (segurança palestina)
31 Mar 2013NABLUS, Territórios Palestinos (AFP)Oito estudantes palestinos foram feridos a pedradas por colonos israelenses neste domingo à noite, perto de Nablus, Cisjordânia, indicaram membros dos serviços de segurança palestinos.
Os estudantes em excursão estavam em um ônibus que foi atacado perto do assentamento de Yitzar por colonos, acrescentaram as mesmas fontes.
Yitzhar, reduto de nacionalistas religiosos, é considerada uma das colônias mais extremistas da Cisjordânia ocupada.
Localizada perto da cidade de Nablus, essa área é frequentemente cenário de confrontos entre palestinos e colonos ou forças de segurança israelenses.
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Coreia do Norte promete reforçar poderio nuclear
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31/03/2013 - 21:31
Coreia do Norte promete reforçar poderio nuclear
SEUL (AFP)A Coreia do Norte prometeu reforçar o poderio de seus armamentos nucleares um dia depois de ter anunciado "estado de guerra" com a Coreia do Sul, e indicou que nunca vai negociar sua dissuasão atômica em troca de ajuda.
As tensões aumentaram consideravelmente desde que os Estados Unidos apertaram as sanções em resposta aos testes nucleares e com mísseis da Coreia do Norte, e desde que americanos e sul-coreanos realizaram exercícios militares na fronteira.
Em um encontro realizado neste domingo, o comitê central do Partido dos Trabalhadores, liderado por Kim Jong-Un, decidiu que a posse de armas nucleares "deve ser fixada por lei", indicou a agência de notícias oficial KCNA.
As forças armadas nucleares "devem ser expandidas e fortalecidas com qualidade e quantidade até que a desnuclearização do mundo seja alcançada", acrescentou.
Os membros também decidiram desenvolver um reator de água leve como parte de um plano de abastecimento energético ligado a sua indústria nuclear civil, indicou a KCNA.
O Norte revelou em 2010 a existência de uma instalação de enriquecimento de urânio e de um reator de água leve, supostamente para gerar energia.
Especialistas consideram que essas instalações poderiam ser facilmente reconfiguradas para produzir combustível para armas nucleares, com o fortalecimento do programa de armas de plutônio existente.
Em abril de 2009, o Norte abandonou formalmente as negociações entre seis partes relacionadas a uma oferta de ajuda econômica em troca de uma desnuclearização.
Neste domingo o país reiterou que suas armas atômicas não são moeda de troca.
"Elas são um tesouro de um país reunificado que nunca poderá ser trocado por bilhões de dólares," indicaram os membros do comitê central, de acordo com a KCNA.
O encontro teve como objetivo abordar o desenvolvimento econômico e nuclear, discutindo esforços para desenvolver a agricultura e a indústria leve e melhorar o nível de vida da população.
"A economia do país deve ser transformada em uma economia baseada no conhecimento e o comércio exterior deve ser feito de forma multilateral e diversificada, assim como os investimentos devem ser amplamente possibilitados," indicou a agência de notícias.
O comitê também defendeu esforços nos campos da ciência espacial, incluindo o lançamento de mais satélites avançados.
Pyongyang considera que seus lançamentos de mísseis de longo alcance têm por objetivo colocar satélites em órbita para projetos pacíficos. Os Estados Unidos e outras nações indicam que o verdadeiro objetivo é testar a tecnologia de mísseis balísticos daquele país.
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EUA: acidente em central nuclear deixa um morto
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31/03/2013 - 20:55
EUA: acidente em central nuclear deixa um morto
WASHINGTON (AFP)Um acidente numa central nuclear do Arkansas (sul dos EUA), em que não houve fuga de material radioativo, deixou um morto e três feridos, anunciou a operadora Entergy, afirmando que não existe perigo para a população.
"O acidente aconteceu quando caiu o 'stator' (parte fixa) de um gerador, no momento em que ele estava sendo retirado da turbina", explicou a empresa.
O primeiro reator da central estava desligado para receber combustível, e o segundo parou automaticamente.
O grupo afirmou que "este acidente industrial" foi classificado pelo órgão estatal que fiscaliza as atividades nucleares de "acontecimento incomum", a menos grave das situações de emergência.
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U.S. F-22 stealth jets join South Korea drills amid saber-rattling
WASHINGTON |
(Reuters) - The United States sent F-22 stealth fighter jets to South Korea
on Sunday to join military drills aimed at underscoring the U.S.
commitment to defend Seoul in the face of an intensifying campaign of
threats from North Korea.The advanced, radar-evading F-22 Raptors were deployed to Osan Air Base, the main U.S. Air Force base in South Korea, from Japan to support ongoing bilateral exercises, the U.S. military command in South Korea said in a statement that urged North Korea to restrain itself.
Saber-rattling on the Korean peninsula drew a plea for peace from Pope Francis, who in his first Easter Sunday address called for a diplomatic solution to the crisis on the Korean peninsula.
"Peace in Asia, above all on the Korean peninsula: may disagreements be overcome and a renewed spirit of reconciliation grow," he said, speaking in Italian.
Tensions have been high since the North's young new leader, Kim Jong-un, ordered a nuclear weapons test in February, breaching U.N. sanctions and ignoring warnings from North Korea's closest ally, China, not to do so.
That test, North Korea's third since 2006, drew further U.N. and bilateral sanctions designed to pressure the impoverished North to stop its nuclear weapons program. Pyongyang responded to the new steps by ratcheting up warnings and threats of war.
North Korea said on Saturday it was entering a "state of war" with South Korea, but Seoul and its ally the United States played down the statement from the official KCNA news agency as the latest in a stream of tough talk from Pyongyang.
In a rare U.S. show of force aimed at North Korea, the United States on Thursday flew two radar-evading B-2 Spirit bombers on practice runs over South Korea.
On Friday, Kim signed an order putting the North's missile units on standby to attack U.S. military bases in South Korea and the Pacific, after the stealth bomber flights.
The F-22 jets will take part in the annual U.S.-South Korea Foal Eagle military drills, which are designed to sharpen the allies' readiness to defend the South from an attack by North Korea, the U.S. military said.
The U.S. military did not say how many of the planes were flown to South Korea from Kadena Air Base in Okinawa. The statement described Sunday's deployment as part of routine shifts of air power among bases in the Western Pacific that U.S. forces have been conducting since 2004.
Japan's Kyodo news agency quoted the top Japanese government spokesman, Yoshihide Suga, as condemning Pyongyang for "aggressive provocation" after Kim's ruling party newspaper, the Rodong Sinmun, identified U.S. military bases in Japan as targets for attack.
The two Koreas have been technically in a state of war since a truce that ended their 1950-53 conflict. Despite its threats, few people see any indication Pyongyang will risk a near-certain defeat by re-starting full-scale war.
(Reporting by Paul Eckert; Editing by Eric Beech) COPY http://www.reuters.com/
Central African Republic leader takes defense ministry in caretaker government - Fighting erupts after car bombing in Mali | Video Syria says rebels set fire to three eastern oil wells | Video
- Central African Republic leader takes defense ministry in caretaker government
- Fighting erupts after car bombing in Mali
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- Syria says rebels set fire to three eastern oil wells
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Central African Republic leader takes defense ministry in caretaker government
BANGUI |(Reuters) - Central African Republic's new leader Michel Djotodia announced a caretaker government on Sunday in which he is defense minister, according to a statement issued by his spokesman.
The new government, which is due to hold elections in the mineral-rich former French colony within three years, will retain civilian opposition representative Nicolas Tiangaye as prime minister.
Djotodia toppled President Francois Bozize on March 24 after leading thousands of his Seleka rebel fighters into the riverside capital Bangui, triggering days of looting and drawing international condemnation.
The African Union suspended Central African Republic and imposed sanctions on Seleka leaders, including Djotodia, last week. France and the United States say the rebels should adhere to a power-sharing deal signed in Gabon's capital Libreville in January that mapped out a transition to elections in 2016 in which Bozize was forbidden from running.
Djotodia has pledged to act in the spirit of the agreement and said on Friday he would step down in 2016. But Washington on Saturday said Tiangaye, named premier under the Libreville agreement, was now the only legal head of government.
Bozize seized power in a 2003 coup, but his failure to keep promises of power-sharing after winning disputed 2011 polls led to the offensive by five rebel groups known as Seleka, which means "alliance" in the Sango language.
(Reporting by Ange Aboa; Writing by Richard Valdmanis; Editing by Jon Hemming and Stephen Powell)COPY http://www.reuters.com
Iran sanctions spur boom for Pakistani diesel smugglers
Iran Sanctions Spur Boom for Pakistani Diesel Smugglers
JOGAR, Pakistan |
(Reuters) - Some of the contraband is spirited across the mountains in
Pepsi bottles carried by child smugglers. Yet more is loaded into
pick-up trucks or siphoned into barrels and strapped onto mules.So lucrative are the returns that even seasoned opium traffickers are abandoning their traditional cargo to grab a share of Pakistan's closest thing to an oil boom: a roaring trade in illicit Iranian diesel.
"Why smuggle opium when you can earn as much money by smuggling diesel? It's much safer," said a former opium trader from the Pakistani town of Mand, a smuggling hub near the Iranian border.
"Besides, I'm now called a successful businessman -- not a drug dealer," said the man, who gave his name as Hamid.
Diesel smuggling has long been a part of the illicit trade in Baluchistan, where a thriving commerce in goods from guns and narcotics to duty free cigarettes and second hand Toyotas constitutes one the arteries of the globalised criminal economy.
But a Reuters inquiry into the fuel trade, based on interviews with participants across the province and a visit to remote parts of the frontier, has revealed that sanctions on Iran has made diesel smuggling extremely remunerative.
The findings also raise questions about the possible degree of complicity in fuel smuggling among Pakistani security forces stationed in Baluchistan, a vast province sandwiched between Iran and Afghanistan.
Covering almost half of Pakistan's land area but extremely sparsely populated, Baluchistan is home to both insurgents campaigning for an independent Baluch homeland, and drug cartels shipping Afghan opium and heroin to world markets.
In Nushki, a small town on one of the roads cutting through Baluchistan's arid moonscape, diesel traders preparing to drive to the Iran border had little to fear from the law.
"Bringing in fuel this way is so much cheaper and makes great profits," said one of the transporters, a burly man wearing a gold watch who had the demeanor of a wealthy businessman. "Even though there are security check points at all these border towns inside Pakistan, no one ever stops me. Why wouldn't I do this?"
TWICE AS MUCH
For years, diesel smuggled from Iran has supplemented the 2.7 million to 3 million tons (20 million to 22 million barrels) of diesel that Pakistan's state oil company buys from the Kuwait Petroleum Corp each year.
The illegal trade cooled in late 2010 when Iran cut fuel subsidies, narrowing profit margins for importers. But smugglers have gone into overdrive since late September, when growing pressure from Western sanctions caused the Iranian rial to lose forty per cent of its value against the dollar in a week, making diesel even cheaper for Pakistani buyers.
Iran sets its diesel price at 4,500 Iranian rials a liter, (about 15 U.S. cents at the open market rate) - less than the price of mineral water. In Pakistan, a liter of smuggled diesel can sell for 104 rupees a liter ($1.06) -- cheaper than the official price of 112 rupees a liter.
In Baluchistan, diesel dealers are making so much cash that some passenger transporters are trading in buses to buy pick-up trucks sturdy enough to make the journey to the frontier across river fords and forbidding escarpments.
"I sold my mini-bus to buy a pick-up. It earns me twice as much as the passenger van," said a man called Altaf, who has started ferrying Iranian diesel to the town of Turbat in Baluchistan.
At Jogar, a border pass in granite mountains, children trek across the hills bearing Iranian diesel in Pepsi bottles. Some is transported on donkeys. On the Baluchistan coast, smuggling proceeds on an industrial scale as diesel arrives at ports via vessels plying the Gulf of Oman.
Like tributaries feeding a river, individual smugglers bring their barrels to depots, where the cargo is aggregated into tanker trucks.
There is no way to reliably measure the amount of fuel involved, but traders believe that 100-130 tankers -- each capable of carrying 25,000-40,000 liters -- are filled with illicit Iranian diesel in Baluchistan each day.
The tankers then deliver the fuel to markets across Pakistan, or into Afghanistan, whose reliance on Iranian refined products poses a particular dilemma for Washington.
In January, the U.S. Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction warned that fuel purchases made for Afghan security forces using U.S. government funds may have included Iranian petroleum products, which would be a violation of Washington's own sanctions on Tehran.
Iran's attempts to boost formal energy ties with Pakistan are also a concern for the U.S. government. Washington has voiced opposition to plans to build a pipeline through Baluchistan to tap Iranian natural gas, which Pakistan sees as a possible answer to its chronic electricity shortages.
"ARMED HENCHMEN"
The ease with which diesel smuggling has blossomed anew underscores the tenuous writ of the authorities in Baluchistan, a region with a long history of independence that has felt marginalized ever since it was merged into Pakistan in 1948.
So large are the sums involved that many suspect elements in the paramilitary Frontier Corps, which has primary security responsibility in Baluchistan, and other agencies are involved.
"The Frontier Corps, coast guards and police provide the smugglers with protection in return for their share," said a senior government official in Makran, a southern coastal strip in Baluchistan and smuggling hotspot.
The Frontier Corps declined comment, but has in the past denied involvement in illegal trade, saying it has repeatedly confronted heavily armed heroin traffickers.
Fuel importers and marketers said, however, that Pakistan's over-stretched security forces turn a blind eye.
"Vehicles loaded with Iranian diesel and petrol provide us with fuel as a routine matter -- there are no hindrances to its transportation," said Ghulam Ali, who sells the smuggled products openly in Quetta, the main city in Baluchistan.
Akbar Baloch, who runs an import and export business from a village near the Iran border, said influential figures on both sides of the frontier were involved. "Their armed henchmen escort the vehicles used for smuggling," he added.
Iran's government, already battling Western moves to restrict supplies of gasoline and other refined products, has sought to stem smuggling by introducing a system of smart cards to ration subsidized fuel.
In Pakistan, authorities admit they are overwhelmed. Ibrahim Vighio, a senior customs official in Quetta, said the government plans to form a new 1,000-strong anti-smuggling unit. "We have lack of forces, proper weapons and equipment to stop the smuggling," he said.
(Additional reporting by Gul Yousufzai In QUETTA and; Jessica Jaganathan in SINGAPORE, Writing by Matthew Green; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
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A Wary Easter Weekend for Christians in Syria
A Wary Easter Weekend for Christians in Syria
By ANNE BARNARD
Andrea Bruce for The New York Times
Syrian Christians at Zaytoun Church in Damascus on Good Friday.
The holiday is infused with uncertainty for Syria’s Christians, with
many saying they fear not only the country’s general chaos, but also the
rise of religious intolerance.
- : Christians in Syria Celebrate Good Friday With Hope and FearAndrea Bruce for The New York TimesSyrian Christians at Zaytoun Church in Damascus on Good Friday. More Photos »
By ANNE BARNARD
Published: March 30, 2013
DAMASCUS, Syria — Torches flickered outside the church. Little girls wore their sparkly Easter best. Children bearing lanterns filed out through the heavy gilt doors, as worshipers carried an icon of Jesus and a cross covered with carnations.Multimedia
But the Good Friday procession at St. Kyrillos Church here in Syria’s capital did not follow the route it had taken for generations. No drums or trumpets announced its presence. The marchers made a tight circle inside the iron-gated courtyard, then headed back into the church, a hedge against the mortar shells like the one that hit a hospital across the street recently. At pauses in their singing, gunfire rattled, not more than a few blocks away.Easter weekend is usually the year’s most festive for Syria’s Christians, but this year, it is infused with grave uncertainty. Christians here say they primarily fear the general chaos enveloping the country as the war enters its third year. But like members of Syria’s other religious minorities, many Christians also fear what they see as the rise of extremists among the mainly Sunni Muslim rebels fighting the government of President Bashar al-Assad.As they gathered in small knots in the church courtyard — which on a normal Good Friday would have been packed — many parishioners wondered aloud where they would be next Easter.“Either everything will be O.K. in one year, or there will be no Christians here,” said Ilias, 20, a man who, like some other Christians quoted in this article, was willing to give only a first name.At the church on Friday night, many parishioners said the coexistence of Christians and Muslims was deeply ingrained in Syrian society, and they did not believe that the rebels were targeting them because of their religion. Their main fear was that Christians, perceived as wealthy, were targets for financially motivated kidnappers.But they worried that the equilibrium had changed. They have heard stories of churches being burned. They are hosting Christians who have fled Damascus suburbs as fighting encroached, some of them saying they were pushed out by hostile Sunni fighters.Although the nominal rebel leadership outside the country has vowed that all sects will be treated equally if Mr. Assad falls, some rebel groups inside Syria have called for an Islamic state. That means different things to different people, but some fighters have alarmed Christians by calling for archaic practices from the days of the caliphates, like taxing religious minorities.“There are strangers who are against the way we used to live together,” said Nancy, 16, who was heading home for her family’s usual Easter feast, a classically Syrian meal of kibbe — bulgur wheat stuffed with meat — and tabbouleh.“The only way to split Syria was through sectarianism,” she said. “They want to split the Christians from the other sects.”The government and rebels blame each other for introducing sectarianism into the conflict. The government has long portrayed the uprising, which began as a peaceful protest movement, as fueled by foreign-driven Muslim extremism. The rebels say the government, dominated by Mr. Assad’s Shiite Alawite sect, stoked fear among minorities to keep them loyal. There are some Christians among the opposition, but not a critical mass.Syria has one of the oldest Christian communities in the world and one of the largest in the Middle East — about 10 percent of the population. (Most Syrian Christians are Eastern Orthodox and will celebrate Easter on May 5.) Christians have long been prominent among the country’s elite, and before the Baath Party coup that led to Assad family rule, a Christian, Fares al-Khoury, served as prime minister.“The Christians in Syria are the only ones left in the region,” said Bashar Ilias, a theological student and social worker who distributes church donations to people displaced by the fighting. “If they leave, Christianity will lose its roots.”Unlike some Christian factions in Lebanon, which claim to be descended from the ancient Phoenicians, Syria’s Christians generally pride themselves on their Arab heritage and see themselves an integral part of the region.Most church services are in Arabic; Arabic inscriptions are carved on the marble walls of ornate churches. At St. Kyrillos Church in the Qassaa neighborhood on Friday, a haunting melody seemed to meld with the sweet, waxy smell of votive candles: the song “Ya Habibi,” Mary’s lament for Jesus, beloved throughout the Arab world as a classic in the repertory of the Lebanese diva Fairouz.Most Christians interviewed emphasized that Syrian Muslims were largely tolerant, and blamed the influence of Saudi Arabia and foreign fighters for sectarianism.But amid the atmosphere of fear, many have begun to speak of the conflict in religious terms.“The Christians in Syria are being crucified in Syria for the church,” Mr. Ilias said as he visited an elderly friend, Janette Shaheen, after services.“Jesus was oppressed once, but we are being oppressed every day,” added Mrs. Shaheen, who lives near a church that has been shelled several times.Mr. Ilias added: “If someone is born a Muslim, I can’t say he’s the devil. His action is an evil action, but he’s human.” But Syrian Muslims, he said, “acknowledge the existence of others.”The thud of a distant mortar shell could be felt faintly through the floor. Just a few blocks to the east is Jobar, a rebel-held neighborhood.Mrs. Shaheen served coffee to Fouad Anouf, 51, who fled Jobar recently. He and his wife and three small children were the only Christians in their apartment building, but they stayed there for nearly a year after rebels entered the neighborhood.The rebels were Syrians, he said, and did not threaten him, even after a new wave of Islamist fighters arrived. They let him cross the battle lines every day to get to work. He left, he said, when his building became a battleground between government tanks and rebel snipers. Now it has been burned, leaving him penniless.“Both sides are using the same methods to destroy the country,” he said.Christians are far from unanimous on the conflict. Mr. Ilias, the social worker, said Mr. Assad — “May God prolong his life” — was the protector of minorities.Yet Mr. Anouf assigned equal blame for the conflict to Russia and Iran, which back the government, and the United States and its allies, which back the opposition. He referred to the fighters not as terrorists, as the government does, but as “the free army,” which he distinguished from “the regular army.”Another displaced Christian, Marzouk, said he had fled the suburb of Harasta after Saudi fighters arrived and his Sunni neighbors told him that he was not safe. “The compromise should be crushing those people with the military boot,” he said. “The government should have no mercy upon them.”
Islamist Fighters Repelled in Assault on Timbuktu
Islamist Fighters Repelled in Assault on Timbuktu
By SCOTT SAYARE
A small band of radical Islamist fighters battled French and Malian
soldiers for hours in a firefight in Timbuktu on Sunday after
infiltrating the Malian city overnight, Malian officials said.
By SCOTT SAYARE
Published: March 31, 2013
PARIS – A small band of radical Islamist fighters battled French and
Malian soldiers for hours in a firefight in Timbuktu on Sunday after
infiltrating the Malian city overnight, Malian officials and witnesses
said.
The fighting, which was preceded by a suicide attack at a military
checkpoint on Saturday night, was the first such violence to reach
downtown Timbuktu since January, when French forces arrived and forced
out the jihadists who had seized the city in 2012. No one claimed
responsibility for the attack.
“It started after a suicide car bombing” about 10 p.m. on Saturday,
Capt. Modibo Naman Traoré of the Malian Army told Reuters. That attack,
he said, “served to distract the military and allow a group of jihadists
to infiltrate the city by night.”
The attackers appeared to number perhaps 10 or 15, said the French
military spokesman, Col. Thierry Burkhard, of whom “a half-dozen” were
confirmed killed. One French soldier was wounded and evacuated by
helicopter for medical treatment, Colonel Burkhard said. A handful of
Malian soldiers were wounded, according to news media reports.
After the suicide attack, fighters arriving on foot were able to “skirt”
the checkpoint, said the mayor, Ousmane Hallé. By Sunday, the fighters
had reached the city center, Mr. Hallé said by telephone.
“They had said Timbuktu was secured,” the mayor lamented. The fighting
had ceased by about 3 p.m. on Sunday, he said, though military aircraft,
presumably French, continued to circle in the skies above Timbuktu.Two
patrols of French fighter aircraft had been sent to Timbuktu, according
to Colonel Burkhard, the military spokesman, but they did not fire any
munitions.
Since jihadist fighters were driven out of Timbuktu in January, French
and Malian forces have clashed regularly with Islamist fighters a few
hundred miles east, in and around Gao, the other major population center
of the Malian north. Timbuktu, by contrast, has largely been spared
violence.
Fighters mounted similar attack on the city 10 days ago, however, in
which several Islamist fighters and a Malian soldier were killed, Malian
and French officials said. That attack began with a suicide bombing and
reportedly involved as many as 30 Islamist fighters. It was put down by
French and Malian soldiers, supported by French combat aircraft, and
the attackers did not reach the city center.
The jihadist group that maintained control of Gao until earlier this
year, The Movement For Oneness and Jihad in West Africa, claimed
responsibility for that attack, Agence France-Presse reported. France
reinforced its military presence in Timbuktu in response to that attack.
France intervened militarily in Mali in January after Islamist fighters
began a southward offensive, prompting an urgent plea for assistance by
the interim president, Dioncounda Traoré. About 4,000 French troops are
deployed there, along with 4,800 Malian soldiers and 6,300 troops from
several other African nations. French military operations have been
concentrated mostly in the craggy desert mountains of the Adrar des
Ifoghas, in the far north, a redoubt for Al Qaeda in the Islamic
Maghreb.
Joined by Chadian forces, the French have reportedly killed several
hundred jihadist fighters in the area, including a top Qaeda commander
known as Abu Zeid, whose death has been confirmed by French and Chadian
authorities. French officials have said that combat operations in the
Adrar des Ifoghas are largely complete.
“We have reached our objectives,” President François Hollande of France
said in a television interview last week, pledging that a withdrawal of
French troops will begin at the end of April.
French forces are to number 2,000 by July, when presidential and
legislative elections are scheduled in Mali, and about 1,000 by the end
of the year, Mr. Hollande said.
But the elections will be contingent upon the security conditions in the
country, and many analysts and diplomats are doubtful that they will be
held as scheduled.
On Saturday, Mr. Traoré announced the formation of a government
commission for “dialogue and reconciliation,” whose task is to ease
tensions between the military and the government and between the
government and the populations of the north, which have long complained
of neglect by Bamako.
It is also charged with easing tensions between the government and
ethnic Tuareg separatist fighters, who drove the Malian Army out of
northern Mali last year, before Islamist fighters overran the territory
and seized control.
Tuareg militias still operate alongside French and African forces in the
north, despite strained relations with the Malian Army and the
government in Bamako. The National Movement for the Liberation of
Azawad, or M.N.L.A.– the name used by Tuareg separatists to designate
the Malian north – has accused Malian soldiers of widespread abuse of
Tuareg civilians and in recent days dismissively called the leadership
in Bamako a “putschist government,” a reference to the military coup
that toppled the elected president last year.
The group has reportedly named its own governor for the town of Kidal,
in the far north, to the displeasure of the government.
COPY http://www.nytimes.com/
Who Can Bring the E.U. To Its Senses?
Sunday Review »
Observer: Who Can Bring the E.U. to Its Senses?
Until there are leaders who will push for the interests of Europe as a whole, expect more near-disasters.
ditorial | Sunday Observer
By DAVID C. UNGER
Published: March 30, 2013
Cyprus finally got a revised bailout plan last week. It taxes big, uninsured bank depositors to pay part of the cost of restructuring the country’s two biggest banks while leaving the savings of smaller, insured depositors untouched. But just days before, Cyprus, with the blessings of the smartest bankers and smartest finance ministers in Europe, came within a whisker of adopting a truly reckless plan that would have taxed small savers, undermined deposit insurance and risked sparking disastrous bank runs elsewhere, notably Italy and Spain, the euro zone’s third- and fourth-largest economies.
Jean Jullien
Today's Editorials
-
Editorial: Social Security, Present and Future (March 31, 2013)
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Editorial: Resurrecting California’s Public Universities (March 31, 2013)
How could sophisticated European finance ministers — along with senior
officials of the European Central Bank and the International Monetary
Fund — have signed off on such a counterproductive rescue plan? And if
they could agree to that, what other damaging schemes might they grab
for in some future crisis?
Europe urgently needs to ask itself these questions. This month’s close
call was hardly its first brush with self-inflicted disaster in the
three-year-old euro crisis; in 2010, loose and premature talk by French
and German leaders about involuntary loan write-downs of private-sector
loans needlessly scared off potential lenders. And unless some drastic,
though politically difficult, changes are made in Europe’s outdated
decision-making machinery, it probably won’t be the last.
The basic problem is that the E.U. is not a true union but more a
collection of states that have not in any real sense ceded
decision-making power to a central authority. The result is chaos fed by
conflicting national objectives. In the Cyprus case, German politicians
wanted to minimize bailout costs to German taxpayers in an election
year. Cyprus’s president hoped to keep the island an attractive haven
for foreign depositors. The I.M.F. insisted that Cyprus not be lent more
than it could pay back. And the new leader of Europe’s finance
ministers, a tough-talking, austerity-preaching Dutch finance minister,
wanted to make a point about debtors paying for their own bailouts. All
of them somehow initially settled on the lowest common denominator: a
bizarre scheme pinning much of the responsibility and most of the pain
on small, insured depositors in Cyprus’s banks.
Wiser heads would have squelched any such plan before it was announced.
Even though the proposal was later dropped, the public — justifiably
worried that its leaders could make the same dumb mistake again —
quickly lost confidence in the deposit insurance every E.U. country has
been required to have since 2010 as a safeguard against bank runs. That
confidence will take years to rebuild.
None of these European leaders would sign off on such high-wire
financial policy experiments in their home countries. Why do they do it
on the wider European stage?
Part of the answer lies in the way the E.U. was put together
in the 1950s and ’60s as a loose union of jealously sovereign states —
somewhat like the United States under the original Articles of
Confederation. That posed no insuperable problems for the six-nation
coal-and-steel community and free-trade zone that the European Common
Market was at the time.
But as the E.U. has grown larger (Croatia will become the 28th member
state later this year) and more ambitious (17 countries now use the
euro), that loose and decentralized structure has begun audibly
creaking. Instead of preserving sovereignty and nurturing democracy, it
has created a situation where paymaster nations like Germany seek to
impose the policy preferences of German voters on other states without
regard to economic circumstances. It makes no sense to raise taxes and
slash jobs when economies are already in free fall. But that is what the
E.U. is now demanding be done across Southern Europe, with disastrous
economic and political consequences. A better governed E.U. would put
more emphasis on reviving growth in the south and stimulating consumer
demand in the north.
But there is not much European vision among today’s top national
leaders. No Helmut Kohl or François Mitterrand sits among them to bring
fellow leaders to their senses before local political motives lead them
into continentwide blunders. There are plenty of smart politicians
attending E.U. summit meetings and plenty of capable European
commissioners keeping the Brussels bureaucracy whirring. But there are
no Alexander Hamiltons or James Madisons pushing for the interests of
Europe as a whole, not just the interests of Germany, France, Finland,
the Netherlands or Cyprus — even as ambitious projects like the euro
have increased the need for coherent and consistent rules and policies.
The European Central Bank president, Mario Draghi, has occasionally
tried to step into the leadership gap but is constantly reminded that he
can be only as “European” as Germany, the bank’s most important
shareholder, will permit.
So while the euro will likely survive Europe’s recent stumbles on
Cyprus, it will survive unnecessarily weakened by avoidable mistakes.
Someday Europe may produce leaders willing to grapple with the task of
building sustainable European economic institutions. Until then, the
union seems doomed to lurch from one mismanaged crisis to the next.
戴耀廷：“占领中环”已走对第一步棋
更新时间 2013年3月31日, 格林尼治标准时间11:55
戴耀廷联同朱耀明（左）和陈健民（右）发起“占领中环”运动。
香港“占领中环”运动发起人之一，香港大学法律学系副教授戴耀廷对BBC中文网说，他认为这场争取普选运动已走对了第一步。
包括国务院港澳事务办公室主任王光亚在内的北京涉港高官，以至于中共喉舌《人民日报》旗下的《环球时报》均先后对“占领”行动提出警告。此前，戴耀廷与香港基督教浸信会牧师朱耀明和香港中文大学社会学系副教授陈健民提出了这项运动的“信念书”，声明要以“爱与和平”占领香港心脏地带。
戴耀廷对BBC中文网说：“我们只是三个人发表了一个‘信念书’，还有就是我走到不同的团体去跟他们谈‘和平占中’的问题，但是已经看到你的对手，他要很慎重的回应你每一步。”
“我就说，这也表示你走的这步棋已经是走对了，因为你已经对你的对手产生了一定的压力。”
对于新任中国全国人大法律委员会主委乔晓阳一周前评论出任香港行政长官条件时曾说“对抗是互为对手，你死我活”，戴耀廷并不认同。
他认为，“对手”只是代表彼此有不同意见，而现在大家正处于一个商讨的过程当中。
“流血机会不大”
王光亚一周前在广东深圳会见香港立法会亲北京阵营议员时被香港记者追问对“占领中环”运动的看法，他当时说香港是法治社会，港人不希望看到“搞乱香港”的行为。
戴耀廷多次强调走上街头是最后手段。
“如果他们认为香港居民会比内地人更能承受他们制造的混乱，而且他们的追随者会越来越多，长期跟着他们干，以香港的‘经济自杀’做政治赌博，那就请他们试试好了。”
同日下午， 按键 中国中央电视台新闻频道播出解放军驻港部队星期四（24日）在香港维多利亚港内进行海空联合巡逻演练的片段。
这是继 按键 21至22日驻港部队航空兵团首次在香港境内进行实弹演练后的又一次演练，片段中所见，一些海军士兵在巡逻艇进入维多利亚港后，持枪指向中环金融区作戒备状。
戴耀廷重申，占领中环街头是行动的最后一步，如果北京届时能接纳他们提出的香港普选方案，他们不会采取堵路等策略。
他说：“我们真正希望的就是透过这个和平理性的民主程序让中央政府看到，在香港讲民主其实没有什么可怕，也不会造成‘暴民政治’。”
戴耀廷还认为，即便他们最终采取堵路等行动，演变成流血冲突的机会也不大。
“如果真的出现军队在香港的时候，单是因为一群人，只是站在路中心的这种非暴力行为的时候，我想‘一国两制’是不是也没有了？”
“那么对整个香港——不单是我们这群争取民主的人——还有香港的商界，怎办？世界的投资者怎样看这个事情呢？”
近年香港年青一辈的社会运动人士开始倾向于不接受泛民主派指挥，当中一些立场左倾者近日发文质疑这场“占领中环”运动与民生剥离，并表明不会支持。
戴耀廷认为，自运动酝酿至今只有两个多业，但已经能促使“北京要员”对其行动表态，他有信心透过参与者之间的口耳相传，能达成号召至少1万人参与“占领中环”运动的目标。
COPY http://www.bbc.co.uk/
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