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A03591

Articles : International

Bilal Husein to be released - Press TV

By Isaac Oommen

Mugabe withholds election results; journalist to be freed from U.S.; Israel snubs Carter; and more.

9 killed in latest attacks in Somalia
Two British teachers and two Kenyans were among the victims of the attack by Islamic al-Shahab militia on Belet Wayne town. Al-Shahad insists the deaths were unintentional. (International Herald Tribune, 04/14/08)

Recount in Zimbabwe
President Robert Mugabe has insisted on an election recount (The Observer, 04/14/08), refusing to disclose any results until this has ended (Al Jazeera, 04/14/08). Opposition groups have accused Mugabe of using the recount as a cover for intimidation and even cheating. Government forces are already cracking down on opposition protests (AFP, 04/15/08), and militias have burnt huts as a warning to those who voted the wrong way (The Standard, 04/12/08). Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has fled the country for Botswana, fearing for his safety (Daily Nation, 04/15/08).

Lebanon marks civil war amid new danger
Crowds marched along the Green Line that once separated Christians and Muslims during the civil war of 1975-1990. They made it clear that they wanted an end to the sectarianism that was keeping the country from having a president. (Al Arabiya, 04/13/08)

Delayed responses in Iraq
Gun battles between Iraqi governmental forces backed by the U.S., and Shiite militiamen have caused around 200 deaths and 1,000 injuries so far (Then Times, 04/13/08). Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, even as the gun-battles rage on, is calling for the reinstatement of 1,300 Iraqi soldiers and policemen who were dismissed for handing their weapons to and joining the side of the Mahdi army last week (Al Arabiya, 04/14/08). Al-Sadr insists that those policemen and soldiers were only doing as their religious leaders asked. Handing away weapons is something the Iraqi army cannot afford at present – a quiet $236 million arms deal with Serbia recently netted for the army equipment that was mostly unusable (The New York Times, 04/14/08). Officials are upset that Iraqi army brass went behind the backs of the U.S. to procure the deal, and then messed up the entire thing. The question also still rages on five years after the invasion as to what happened to so many of Iraq’s ancient treasures that were looted from its museums during the invasion (The Times, 04/13/08). The Ministry of Defense is only now paying a boy who was accidentally shot in Basra by a British soldier (The Guardian, 04/15/08). In turn, the U.S. is finally releasing AP photographer Bilal Husein after imprisoning him without having his case heard for over two years (Yahoo! News, 04/14/08). Forces also found another one of many mass graves north of Baghdad (Reuters, 04/14/08).

Headscarved Turkish women prepare for long struggle
t was only in February that the ruling Muslim AK Party managed to un-ban headscarves in places like universities. With the country’s supreme court readying itself to shut down the AK Party itself for anti-secular activities, the future of the headscarf and the women who wear it is being brought into question once again. (Yahoo! News, 04/14/08)

Israel under a lens
Israel may be offering Palestinians a temporary cease-fire (UPI, 04/14/08), but is not giving up the use of psychological torture against Palestinian suspects it currently has in custody (Al Jazeera, 04/13/08). Israel is also refusing security to visiting former U.S. President Jimmy Carter (Al Arabiya, 04/14/08), even after showing strong feelings against the rocket attacks on on Sderot by Palestinians (BBC News, 04/14/08). His plans to meet with Hamas leaders are what soured the Israeli against him. Israel is also taking part in some highly suspicious military drills (Asia Times Online, 04/12/08), as the U.S. gets increasingly hostile towards Iran.

Putin offered key party position
The United Russia Party will be offering departing President/Prime Minister-elect Vladmir Putin the position of chairman, according to party sources. Such a seat would solidify Putin’s position and intentions to keep his influence on the Kremlin. (Al Jzaeera, 04/14/08)

Pakistan parliament calls for UN probe into Bhutto murder
With Pakistan’s parliament finally formed, things are getting done finally. The ruling coalition, so far with no protest from the opposition, has called for the UN to probe the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who died last December after a gun-bomb attack hit her convoy before the general elections. With peace restored in the capital, the Pakistani military is also coordinating better with the Afghan side (Reuters, 04/14/08), squeezing Taliban and Al Qaeda forces holed up in the border region of the two countries. (The Times of India, 04/14/08)

Nepal’s Maoists surge ahead in vote count
All polls say that the Maoists will be leading the government from this summer onwards. With grand plans such as that to boot out the king, they might still find some resistance from opposition parties. (AFP, 04/15/08)

U.N. rights expert calls Myanmar vote plan ‘surreal’
The government is detaining and repressing anyone who is campaigning against the May 10 constitutional referendum the government has set up. Forced referendums are hardly indicators of a changing government. (Reuters, 04/14/08)

Taiwan’s Ma: Meeting advances China ties
President-elect Ma Ying-jeou may be proceeding with caution, but he is nevertheless elated with the recent chat between his prime-minister-elect Vincent Stew and Chinese President Hu Jintao. The talk was meant to have begun the delicate process of unfreezing relations between the country and it’s powerful and oftentimes bully of a neighbor. (Yahoo! News, 04/14/08)

China to execute hundreds during Olympics: Amnesty
China may be planning to green up the Olympics this year (International Herald Tribune, 04/14/08), but they definitely will keep the streets running red with the blood of the executed. Amnesty International calculates that since China executes about 22 prisoners a day, it will have killed 374 people for the duration of the Olympics. (The Times of India, 04/15/08)

Housing woes in U.S. spread around the globe
Markets from Dublin to New Delhi and Hong Kong are slowing down, and even falling back. As with everything else, that which affects the U.S. affects the world. When mortgage providers tightened their rules in the U.S., their counterparts around the world did the same thing. Now people all over the world are feeling the sub-prime fallout. (The New York Times, 04/14/08)

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For more articles from GNN’s exclusive contributors, read Nathan Coe’s Labor News Roundup and mwm’s If you knew…

Posted by mercenary
I've been a media student, an English Literature undergrad, a radio host and a few other things to pass the time. I've been properly around the third world, as well as a bit of the first. At the end of all this, I've found that there's more to learn than ever before. ...

Disclaimer: Statements and opinions expressed in articles published on this site are those of the authors and not of the staff or editors of GNN, unless otherwise stated.

RECENT COMMENTS

Always good to stay hot off the press . . .

Zimbabwe court rejects MDC demand

Zimbabwe strike gets muted response

Putin accepts key party position

microdot @ 04/15/08 11:04:49

China bunkers down behind its great wall

By the time the “sacred” flame reaches Beijing for the opening ceremony of the Games on August 8, where the protests will no doubt continue with 30,000 foreign reporters looking on, every group with an ax to grind against China will have had an opportunity to air its grievances to a worldwide audience.

And while these criticisms may be based on legitimate concerns about the repressive Chinese presence in Tibet and the ugly human-rights record of China in general, their expression has led to a surge of nationalism among Chinese that has strengthened, not weakened, authoritarian Communist Party rule.

Two heroic stories perhaps best illustrate the great divide between Chinese and Western sensibilities over the rough passage of the flame. On the Chinese side, we have Jin Jing, a 28-year-old amputee now widely revered as the “wheelchair angel”. After losing a leg to cancer, she has become a national hero for her defense of the flame during its perilous Parisian sojourn. According to state media, Jin, formerly a member of Shanghai’s wheelchair fencing team, fought off waves of deranged demonstrators to keep the flame alight during the Paris leg of the relay. Photographs and video footage of her successful battle with one assailant lit up Internet chat rooms with nationalistic fervor and outrage.

microdot @ 04/15/08 11:12:14

Reuters pictures – 4 days ago: Jin Jing, a 27 year-old amputee and Paralympic fencer, displays a torch for Beijing Olympic Games during an interview with Reuters in Beijing April 11, 2008. The wheelchair-bound Chinese torch bearer has rocketed to national fame after fending off Tibet protesters in Paris, with a torrent of Internet messages feting her as a patriotic symbol of revulsion at the relay mayhem.

microdot @ 04/15/08 11:15:39

the circumstances were not for the faint hearted

Jin was the third torchbearer during the Paris leg. On the early morning of April 7, she received a text message from a friend, who told her to be extra careful, because in London, some attackers tried to grab the torch.

So she prepared for the worst and insisted on holding the torch with her own two hands instead of following the original plan and placing it on a special support device connected to her wheelchair.

After she received the torch from the second bearer and before the torch was lit, several attackers rushed to her and tried to grab it.

She held onto the torch tightly and guarded it with her body. During the struggle her chin and shoulder were scratched.

Police, her guards and surrounding Chinese students helped her and the torch never left her hands during the scuffle. Despite the anger and the hurt, Jin says she tried her best to hold back the tears.

“I think if you know they will grab your national flag and insult it, everyone would do the same thing I did.”

Jin sent a text message to her mom after the incident.

“You can be proud of me”.

At 9, Jin lost part of her right leg due to a malignant tumor in her ankle. She survived the ordeal and worked as a telephone operator in a local hotel.

Her colleagues recalled that she took the bus to work by herself, saved her money to buy fashion magazines, and liked shopping with other girls. She was always cheerful and upbeat, despite her disability.

During a speech contest in 2001, Jin met a coach who invited her to join in the local wheelchair fencing team.

A big fan of fictional swordsman Zorro, Jin agreed, thinking fencing was something symbolizing justice and integrity. She picked it up quickly and won silver and bronze in the 2002 Busan Far East and South Pacific Games.

Although she did not win the chance to compete in this year’s Paralympics, her optimism and cheerful personality won her a coveted place as torchbearer.

microdot @ 04/15/08 11:21:26

People are calling for a boycott of French Goods. But. It gets funnier . . .

OPEN QUOTE

On another side of the world meet Majora Carter, 41, an Olympic torch-bearer in San Francisco who used her moment in the limelight to unfurl a small Tibetan flag that she had hidden in her sleeve.

While the ordeal of the wheelchair angel went on for a reported 15 minutes, Carter and her Tibetan flag were quickly muscled out of the relay and into the hands of the San Francisco police by the Olympic torch’s now notorious paramilitary phalanx of Chinese escorts.

A spokesman for Coca-Cola, which sponsored Carter in the only North American stop for the relay and obviously wants to sell a lot more cola in China, expressed the company’s disappointment.

microdot @ 04/15/08 11:31:36

Has anyone calculated how many innocent civilians in Occupied Iraq and Afghanistan will die a violent death while the Olympics are going strong?

microdot @ 04/15/08 11:38:18

Mind you, 374 is a LOT of executions. I’m not saying it ain’t.

microdot @ 04/15/08 11:40:56

According to Iraq Body Count, in 2007, we’re talking about

14 Deaths per day from vehicle bombs

plus

39 Deaths per day from gunfire / executions.

Just in Iraq. So 22 vs 53. A day. Times 17 days . . .

While the Olympics are transpiring in Beijing, the US Occupation in Iraq will have killed

901 people

most of them innocent men, women and children

microdot @ 04/15/08 11:47:36

More from the Zimbabwe Dis-Disinfo Campaign

Zimbabwe and the Power of Propaganda — Ousting a President via Civil Society

OPEN QUOTE

“Zimbabwe is a strategic country for the United States because events in Zimbabwe have a significant impact on the entire southern Africa region.” (US Agency for International Development, 2005)

microdot @ 04/16/08 10:56:01

“And while these criticisms may be based on legitimate concerns about the repressive Chinese presence in Tibet and the ugly human-rights record of China in general, their expression has led to a surge of nationalism among Chinese that has strengthened, not weakened, authoritarian Communist Party rule.”

Oh Christ, has it ever… Just had a debate about just how useful boycotting carefour (French supermarket) really is. They are such an insecure people… 5000 years of history (as they love to continually say) and they still play the “so really though… what do you think of me?!?” game..

Not_Uberche @ 04/16/08 11:19:09

Although, I did get an applause in class when I told my students that the Tibet “issue” is really none of the USA, France, or anyones business except Tibet and the Beijing govt.

I did leave out my usual, and its none of your business either part that I usually add for the local Nanjing people.

But I was teaching a class of university girls. So that kinda affected me a little..

Uber, next class, give the ‘no ones business’ speech, end with “So the USA and France should mind their own DAMN business!! FREE TIBET!” and see how they react, because they will be all excited and emotional because they are nationalist idiots, and I bet they wont even notice the free Tibet part at the end. I am going to try it next class…

Memnoch07 @ 04/16/08 18:41:58