Showing posts with label World News. Show all posts

Monday, September 9, 2013

Syria Welcomes The Russian Proposal To Handover Chem. Weapons

Moscow: Syria has "welcomed" Russia's proposal for President Bashar al-Assad's regime to put chemical weapons under international control, CNN reported on Monday.

Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov had told reporters that Russia will urge Syria to put its chemical weapons supply under international control if it doing so would avert U.S. military action.

Lavrov had called for international talks in Moscow to avert a military strike and end Syria's two-year-old conflict.

Speaking in Moscow alongside his Syrian counterpart, Lavrov blamed US-backed rebels in Syria for preventing a peace conference in Geneva.

Reports also said that Russia had pressed upon the UN atomic agency to report on the nuclear risk of air strikes on Syria in efforts to stave off possible US attack.

Two diplomats said Russian envoy Grigory Berdennikov urged action on an earlier request in comments today to the International Atomic Energy Agency's 35-nation board.

A confidential letter from the Russian foreign ministry to IAEA chief Yukiya Amano obtained by The Associated Press today warns of the "catastrophic" consequences of a strike on a research reactor near Damascus.

The diplomats, who were inside the closed meeting, demanded anonymity because they were not authorised to report on the discussion.

The IAEA has said it is assessing Russia's request.

With agency inputs

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- Unknown Updated at: Monday, September 09, 2013

14 Hurt As Thai Flight Skids Off Runway

A Thai Airways plane skidded off the runway in Bangkok after the landing gear malfunctioned, slightly injuring more than a dozen passengers as they evacuated the jet, the airline said on Monday. The incident late on Sunday at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport involved an Airbus 330-300
carrying 288 passengers and 14 crew members on a flight from Guangzhou in southern China, the carrier said.

The plane was seen resting on grass on Monday morning next to the runway with its evacuation slides still deployed and the Thai Airways name and logo hastily covered up.

"Sparks were noticed from the vicinity of the right landing gear near the engine; the matter is under investigation," the airline said in a statement.

"The captain took control of the aircraft until it came to a complete stop and passengers were evacuated from the aircraft emergency exits. The operation was conducted by the captain and cabin crew strictly according to emergency procedures."

About 14 people were slightly injured when they escaped down the emergency slides, Thai Airways president Sorajak Kasemsuvan told local television.

"They were sent to hospital but most of them received treatment and were discharged," he added.

The carrier said it would take about 24 hours to remove the aircraft, which could cause flight delays.

The incident comes just over a week after dozens of passengers and crew were injured when a Thai Airways A380 superjumbo hit severe turbulence during a flight from Bangkok to Hong Kong.

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- Unknown Updated at: Monday, September 09, 2013

Wednesday, September 4, 2013

No Attack On Syria means US Risks Loosing Allies

The United States risks not only losing its international allies and friends, but also its credibility at the world stage if no military action is taken against the Bashar al-Assad regime for alleged use of chemical weapons, the Obama Administration has told American lawmakers.

"If we fail to act, we're going to have fewer allies. We are going to have fewer people that count on us, certainly in the region," Secretary of State John Kerry told the US Senate. Kerry, who has spent hours talking to world leaders over phone after the alleged chemical

attack in Syria on August 21 that killed more than 1,400 people, said on Tuesday that the credibility of US is at stake.

"It's fair to say that our interests would be seriously set back in many respects if we are viewed as not capable, or willing to follow through on the things that we say matter to us," the Secretary of State said.

Describing the use of chemical weapons a violation of the world's "red line", Kerry said that no action by the US would set a dangerous precedent.

"We would be opening Pandora's box with respect to a whole set of dangerous consequences as a result of the United States not keeping its word. And it would make our life very, very difficult with respect to North Korea and Iran," he said.

Congressional debate on President Barack Obama's request for authorisation to strike Syria intensified as Kerry, Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel and General Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff, briefed the lawmakers on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

"A refusal to act would undermine the credibility of America's other security commitments, including the president's commitment to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. The word of the United States must mean something. It is vital currency in foreign relations and international and allied commitments," Hagel told lawmakers at a Senate hearing on Syria.

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- Unknown Updated at: Wednesday, September 04, 2013

Thursday, July 4, 2013

World: Army takes over Egyptian Governance

CAIRO: Egypt's first democratically elected president was overthrown by the military on Wednesday, ousted after just one year in office by the same kind of Arab Spring uprising that brought the Islamist leader to power.

The armed forces announced they would install a temporary civilian government to replace Islamist President Mohamed Morsi, who denounced the action as a "full coup" by the generals. They also suspended the Islamist-drafted constitution and called for new elections.

Millions of anti-Morsi protesters around the country erupted in celebrations after the televised announcement by the army chief. Fireworks burst over crowds in Cairo's Tahrir Square, where men and women danced, shouting, "God is great" and "Long live Egypt."

Fearing a violent reaction by Morsi's Islamist supporters, troops and armored vehicles deployed in the streets of Cairo and elsewhere, surrounding Islamist rallies. Clashes erupted in several provincial cities when Islamists opened fire on police, with at least nine people killed, security officials said.

Gehad el-Haddad, a spokesman for the Muslim Brotherhood party, said Morsi was under house arrest at a Presidential Guard facility where he had been residing, and 12 presidential aides also were under house arrest.

The army took control of state media and blacked out TV stations operated by the Muslim Brotherhood. The head of the Brotherhood's political wing was arrested.

The ouster of Morsi throws Egypt on an uncertain course, with a danger of further confrontation. It came after four days of mass demonstrations even larger than those of the 2011 Arab Spring that toppled longtime autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

Egyptians were angered that Morsi was giving too much power to his Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamists and had failed to tackle the country's mounting economic woes.

Beyond the fears over violence, some protesters are concerned whether an army-installed administration can lead to real democracy.

President Barack Obama urged the military to hand back control to a democratic, civilian government as soon as possible but stopped short of calling it a coup d'etat.

He said he was "deeply concerned" by the military's move to topple Morsi's government and suspend Egypt's constitution. He said he was ordering the US government to assess what the military's actions meant for US foreign aid to Egypt — $1.5 billion a year in military and economic assistance.

The US wasn't taking sides in the conflict, committing itself only to democracy and respect for the rule of law, Obama said.

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- Unknown Updated at: Thursday, July 04, 2013

Tuesday, July 2, 2013

World : Snowden seeking asylum in 19 countries including India

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden released a statement Monday night from Moscow saying he is “impressed at the efforts taken by so many” to help him, with WikiLeaks hours later releasing a list of countries to be sent applications for asylum.

Sarah Harrison, WikiLeaks' legal advisor to Edward Snowden, has made requests for asylum from a long list of nations, according to a news release posted to that organization’s website early Tuesday morning.

Requests were made following the initial bids submitted to Ecuador and Iceland, with the list now including countries throughout Europe, Latin and Central America, and several others. The complete list is below:

"The requests were made to a number of countries including the Republic of Austria, the Plurinational State of Bolivia, the Federative Republic of Brazil, the People’s Republic of China, the Republic of Cuba, the Republic of Finland, the French Republic, the Federal Republic of Germany, the Republic of India, the Italian Republic, the Republic of Ireland, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the Republic of Nicaragua, the Kingdom of Norway, the Republic of Poland, the Russian Federation, the Kingdom of Spain, the Swiss Confederation and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela," the statement reads.

The former National Security Agency contractor who leaked documents detailing widespread domestic and foreign surveillance said he is disturbed by what he sees as the Obama administration’s use of international intimidation tactics.

“On Thursday, President Obama declared before the world that he would not permit any diplomatic ‘wheeling and dealing’ over my case,” Snowden wrote. “Yet now it is being reported that after promising not to do so, the President ordered his Vice President to pressure the leaders of nations from which I have requested protection to deny my asylum petitions.”

“This kind of deception from a world leader is not justice, and neither is the extralegal penalty of exile. These are the old, bad tools of political aggression. Their purpose is to frighten, not me, but those who would come after me.”

Snowden highlighted how Washington's effort to bring him home for prosecution seemed to reflect a new ideology that portrays citizenship as a kind of extrajudicial blunt weapon.

“For decades the United States of America [has] been one of the strongest defenders of the human right to seek asylum,” Snowden wrote. “Sadly, this right laid out and voted for by the US in Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, is now being rejected by the current government of my country. The Obama administration has now adopted the strategy of using citizenship as a weapon. Although I am convicted of nothing, it has unilaterally revoked my passport, leaving me in a stateless person. Without any judicial order, the administration now seeks to stop me [from] exercising a basic right. A right that belongs to everybody. The right to seek asylum.”

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- Unknown Updated at: Tuesday, July 02, 2013

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

World : New hope for Syria as Putin and Obama Agrees to push peace talks

Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Barack Obama say their “opinions do not coincide” on the bloody Syrian civil war but they’ve agreed to “push” the Assad regime and opposition forces back to the negotiation table for peace talks.

Putin and Obama emerged late Monday from a two-hour bilateral meeting at the G8 summit in Northern Ireland to announce they still don’t see eye-to-eye on the Syrian conflict, but they’re both committed to reducing escalating violence and use of chemical weapons.

“Of course, our opinions do not coincide, but all of us have the intention to stop the violence in Syria and to stop the growth of victims and to solve the situation peacefully, including by bringing the parties to the negotiating table in Geneva. We agreed to push the parties to the negotiating table,” Putin said through a translator following his bilateral meeting with Obama.

“We do have different perspectives on the problem, but we share an interest in reducing the violence, securing chemical weapons and ensuring they are neither used nor are they subject to proliferation, and that we want to try to resolve the issue through political means, if possible,” Obama said.

“And so we have instructed our teams to continue to work on the potential of a Geneva followup to the first meeting.”

The two leaders also released a joint statement saying they have agreed to hold a U.S.-Russia summit in Moscow on Sept. 3-4, 2013, to “discuss in greater detail the full range of bilateral and international issues.”

Both sides have reached an understanding on a “positive agenda for relations between our countries” that includes arms control, non-proliferation, international security, trade, responding to global threats, countering terrorism and militant extremism, says the statement.