[Libya Herald] The remains of an ancient cemetery dating back to Roman times has been found on a Misrata farm.
When the owner of the farm unearthed what he believed to be an ancient tomb, he called in experts to examine the remains. They discovered that the find was one of a number of graves in a cemetery, according to Libyan news agency LANA.
Samples from the graves have been taken to the Department of Tourism and Antiquities at Misrata University for further examination.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/08/2013 00:00 ||
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[Pak Daily Times] The leftist Libre party in Honduras on late Friday formally asked election officials to overturn the results of the November 24 presidential election, which their candidate claims to have won.
A document formally requesting the annulment was delivered by ex-president Manuel Zelaya, accompanied by his wife, Libre candidate Xiomara Castro. Officials earlier declared conservative Juan Orlando Hernandez the election winner.
Zelaya told AFP that the document he submitted included proof of "clear" voter fraud.
"It was a well-done fraud," said Zelaya, who claimed that officials at 2,800 voting stations conspired to throw the election for Hernandez.
He insisted that votes were also bought, "because at the other voting stations, all 12,000 of them ... Xiomara won."
Zelaya was deposed at gunpoint in a June 2009 coup after he aligned Honduras with the leftist governments of Cuba and Venezuela.
This led to 100 days of unrest that included massive street protests and a crackdown on leftist activists.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/08/2013 00:00 ||
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#2
any guesses on which side Obama and Kerry will support?
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/08/2013 9:46 Comments ||
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Last go-round Obama ordered sanctions and attempted to unite the OAS against the formal Honduran government, but that had Hillary! involved. With Kerry on the reigns, we should be concerned if McCain starts talking about Zelaya being one of his heroes for not giving up.
[Al Ahram] Eight people were killed Saturday in a bombing in Colombia which was immediately blamed on leftist FARC rebels who are currently engaged in peace talks with the government.
The victims comprised two civilians and six members of the military and police, who died when a vehicle loaded with explosives blew up in the small town of Inza as locals prepared for a farmer's market, authorities said.
Seven soldiers were maimed in the early morning blast but their conditions were not immediately disclosed.
The army said in an official statement that the incident "clearly shows that the FARC continue to systematically commit acts of terrorism against civilians."
Police Commissioner Rodolfo Polomino told news hounds that the attack was "further evidence of indiscriminate FARC terrorism."
As well as the two civilians, those killed included an army major, two lieutenants, a sergeant, a soldier and a police sergeant, the statement said.
The blast occurred as Bogota and the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia FARC or FARC-EP, is either a Marxist-Leninist revolutionary guerrilla organization or a drug cartel based in Colombia. It claims to represent the rural poor in a struggle against Colombia's wealthier classes, and opposes United States influence in Colombia, neo-imperialism, monopolization of natural resources by multinational corporations, and the usual raft of complaints. It funds itself principally through ransom kidnappings, taxation of the drug trade, extortion, shakedowns, and donations. It has lately begun calling itself Bolivarian and is greatly admired by Venezuela's President-for-Life Chavez, who seemingly fantasizes about living in the woods and kidnapping people himself. He provides FARC with safe areas along the border. (FARC), established in 1964, attempt to negotiate an agreement to end their near 50-year-old conflict.
Considered Latin America's longest-running insurgency, it has left hundreds of thousands of dead and displaced more than 4.5 million people.
The peace talks began more than a year ago in the Cuban capital Havana and so far the two sides have reached agreement on two of five subjects.
Inza is a small and secluded rural village located in the troubled department of Cauca, where the FARC has a strong presence.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/08/2013 00:00 ||
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[Pak Daily Times] Troops rubbed out four municipal workers returning from a shooting range in southwestern Mexico on Friday, apparently after mistaking them for criminals, a state official and residents said.
The incident took place in the town of Arcelia and the victims included the director and deputy director of municipal transport as well as two culture department workers, said a Guerrero state interior department official. Residents said the four were driving back from a shooting club where they practiced and hunted with low-caliber guns. "There was confusion because one of the four subjects who died was wearing military-style clothes, so the soldiers fired," the official said on condition of anonymity.
The soldiers were taken to the Arcelia prosecutor's office.
Some 200 people blocked the town's main road to protest the shooting. It was the second time that residents block the highway this year to demand that soldiers leave the town. The military has been deployed across Mexico since 2006 to combat narco mobs. More than 77,000 people have died in drug related violence since then.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/08/2013 00:00 ||
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[Al Ahram] Ukraine's opposition, preparing for what it hopes will be a gigantic protest rally on Sunday, says it will negotiate with President Viktor Yanukovych only if he fires the government and appoints a new one committed to deepening European integration.
Around 20,000 demonstrators crowded into Kiev's Independence Square on a windy and snowy night Saturday, but organizers of the protests, which are now in their third week, are calling for a massive turnout Sunday. A throng estimated at 300,000 or more showed up for a similar rally a week ago.
That turnout reflected wide anger over police violence against demonstrators the previous two days, and there are no signs that anger has dissipated. The square holds an extensive tent camp for protesters, including field kitchens, and demonstrators are occupying two nearby buildings, one of them functioning as an improvised opposition headquarters and media center.
The protests started after Yanukovych backed away from signing an association agreement with the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... that would have deepened economic ties, thereby diminishing neighboring Russia's influence.
Arseniy Yatsenyuk, head of the largest opposition faction in parliament, told reports Saturday that Yanukovych must dismiss the government, and "we are ready to start the dialogue only if the president makes the first step."
Opposition politicians tried on Tuesday to fire the government in a no-confidence vote in parliament, but fell well short of the needed majority.
That government must be replaced by one "that clearly sets the target to sign an association agreement and resume negotiations with the IMF." The opposition sees aid from the International Monetary Fund as key to helping Ukraine through economic troubles that have made Yanukovych lean toward Russia.
Russia wants Ukraine to join a customs union also including Belarus and Kazakhstan that would be a counterweight to the EU and put pressure on Yanukovych to shelve the EU agreement.
Yatsenyuk called the customs union "a new version of the Soviet Union."
Distress over the customs was high after Yanukovych and Russian President Vladimir Putin ...Second and fourth President of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead... met on Friday. The leaders' offices on Saturday said the presidents didn't discuss the customs union, but suspicions persisted.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/08/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
Might be an option worth considering closer to home....
[Pak Daily Times] EU Commission head Jose Manuel Barroso has made an impassioned plea for Europeans to resist mounting populism and extremism ahead of bloc-wide elections in May. So he's not talking about turbans, he's talking about the guys who want to get rid of the turbans.
Europe is struggling to recover from a devastating economic crisis that has helped fuel anti-immigration and anti-EU sentiment, with far-right political parties gaining traction in several countries, including La Belle France.
And with elections to the European Parliament due in May, the migration of workers from poorer to richer member states has become a hot political issue.
"We must have the courage to fight these very negative forces," Barroso told AFP in an interview during a visit to Gay Paree for a major summit focused on security in Africa.
"I am vehemently calling on Europeans to step out of the comfort zone, to quit their silence, to not always let extremes make their move, to have -- in La Belle France too -- the courage to defend Europe.
"I would like it not to be the anti-Europeans who take the initiative by manipulating emotions and anxieties" linked to the crisis and unemployment, Barroso said, less than six months ahead of elections to the European parliament in which Death Eater parties look well placed.
Last month, Marine Le Pen, head of La Belle France's far-right National Front party, and Dutch anti-Islamic leader Geert Wilders announced a "historic" alliance aimed at creating a group at the European parliament after the elections.
This could also include Belgium's Vlaams Belang, Italia's Lega Nord and Austria's Freedom Party. Other countries have strong populist parties, such as Britannia's UKIP.
"I would like to see pro-European forces from the centre-left, centre-right and centre have the courage to come and defend Europe, to show that there are things that must be done at a national level too," said Barroso, who in 2014 ends his second five-year mandate at the helm of the Commission.
The former Portuguese prime minister said it was important to "explain that Europe is not the cause of problems but is also part of the solution."
Posted by: Fred ||
12/08/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
Can't let the people express themselves. Look what it did to America!
Posted by: Bobby ||
12/08/2013 12:46 Comments ||
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What happened was the Icelandic people were more than happy to stiff foreign depositors for billions when things went bad. The UK and Holland objected and played hard ball to get the money back for their mostly mom and pop depositors.
#3
During the run up to the economic crash, there were guys off fishing boats who decided they were hedge fund genuises. It was largely driven by Iceland and Ireland's tax laws, and people like Lehman Bros helping these twits set up shop as money managers (so they could charge tranaction fees). When the bottom fell out, it was of course not their fault(sarc off) and they went back to fishing. This literally happened.
Posted by: ed in texas ||
12/08/2013 8:36 Comments ||
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I seem to recall that the Icelandic government was heavily invested in subprime loan derivatives. When things tanked, they went broke. I had not heard of anything in the media since.
[Al Ahram] Turkish police on Saturday used tear gas and water cannon to break up a protest on the sidelines of the funeral of two Kurds rubbed out during festivities a day earlier, an AFP photographer reported.
Hundreds of protesters set up barricades of burning tyres on a road in the Yuksekova district of Kurdish-dominated southeastern Turkey and pelted officers with stones.
The festivities come after two protesters, aged 34 and 32, were rubbed out Friday in a violent confrontation with police, sparked by claims that Kurdish rebel cemeteries had been destroyed.
The local governor's office has denied the destruction of these cemeteries, where fighters from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) are buried.
On Friday, masked men lobbed Molotov cocktails and hand grenades at security forces, and local media reported there had been shooting between the demonstrators and security forces.
The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) vice-president Sezgin Tanrikulu slammed the "execution" of the two men, while the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) demanded Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan apologise.
Citing the autopsies, Turkish media said one of the men, aged 34, had been shot six times and the other, aged 32, twice.
Thousands of Kurds, some carrying the flag of the PKK, attended the two victims' funerals on Saturday.
Police also used tear gas and water cannon in Istanbul to break up a protest in solidarity with the two Kurdish victims.
The incidents come after months of calm between the Turkish state and the PKK, which declared a truce in March following clandestine negotiations with the country's spy agency.
However the process stalled after Kurdish rebels announced in September they were suspending their retreat from Turkish soil, accusing the government of failing to deliver on promised reforms.
The PKK, which is blacklisted as a terrorist organization by Turkey and much of the international community, launched an insurgency seeking self-rule in the southeast in 1984 that has claimed about 45,000 lives.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/08/2013 00:00 ||
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#2
The nice young lady who rang up my grocery store purchases today, who claims to vote religiously, has absolutely no interest in signing up for the ACA, which she considers a rip-off.
[An Nahar] The U.S. State Department on Friday fended off criticism for commissioning a $1 million sculpture for its London embassy, saying it was "a good use of our limited resources."
The piece by Irish-born artist Sean Scully was purchased as part of the department's Art in Embassies program and will be reportedly installed at the new mission due to open in 2017.
"This piece was purchased under the market price after considerable negotiation with both the artist and the gallery. This is an important part of our diplomatic presence overseas," deputy State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said.
Abstract artist Scully, who became an American citizen in 1983, lives in New York and has twice been nominated for the prestigious Turner Prize.
The Art in Embassies program had "played a leading role in U.S. public diplomacy" for the past 50 years, Harf said.
"Where we can promote cross-cultural understanding... we think that's a good use of our limited resources," Harf told journalists.
The State Department requested some $2.5 million for the 2013 program which is a public-private partnership involving 20,000 participants including artists, galleries and museums.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/08/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
promote cross-cultural understanding.
by spending a million dollars on a big Irish rock,( the long pause that follows is because I am looking for a knife ).
I want to cut a big slice out of your cross cultural Embassy driven gizzard.
#5
Just keep this in mind for the next time Krugman is bloviating about the evil Tea Party cutting food stamps to the poor. $1mm would feed a lot of people.
Posted by: Matt ||
12/08/2013 9:31 Comments ||
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Or provide for some security at an embassy somewhere...
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/08/2013 11:13 Comments ||
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#4 How did the London embassy get a 1M authorization through the Brit hating WH?
Subtle perhaps, but "artist" [Sean Scully] is an Irishman, in long-standing self-imposed exile. I doubt you'll find much of Beatrix Potter's or Dayan's work at the State Department or the White House.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia
...Second and fourth President of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead...
