[Arab News] Riek Machar, vice president of the government of Southern Sudan confirmed Saturday that the people of southern Sudan will vote for secession from the north in a referendum scheduled to take place Sunday.
Machar, who is also vice president of Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement (SPLM), the ruling party in southern Sudan, ruled out an outbreak of civil war in the event voters in the south win the referendum to split from the north.
In an interview with Arab News, he blamed some quarters in the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) of pushing southerners to vote for secession. He denied the United States or the West are pushing southern Sudan to split.
Machar expressed confidence that outstanding issues between the north and the south, such as the border demarcation and dispute over the oil-rich Abyei area, would be solved peacefully.
He said that over 60 percent of border issues have been solved and the remainder will be dealt with after the referendum.
Abyei, now in the state of West Kordofan, which covers an area 10,460 sq km, was granted special administrative status by the 2004 protocol that ended the civil war. The area, inhabited by southern Negok Dinak and northern Missiriya tribes, is considered a historical bridge between the northern and southern parts of Sudan.
Machar expressed hope that the north would extend a hand to the new state to enable it stand on its feet and build its institutions. He pointed out that maintaining good relations based on joint interests would benefit both sides.
He said relations between the people in the south and those in the north are deep-rooted and play a crucial role in having the two sides maintain good, friendly and cooperative relations.
He pointed out that among the key challenges facing the new state is the provision of basic health and education services as well as building infrastructure, adding that oil revenues, which would be owned by the south, would help greatly in this process.
Machar promised to honor agreements signed with Chinese, Malaysian and other oil companies working in oilfields in the south.
He did not rule out the establishment of diplomatic ties between the new state and Israel. He said he objects to the label in the Sudanese passport that states that the holder is allowed to travel to all countries except Israel.
Machar said good relations with Israel could help the new state play a role in resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict.
However, The infamous However... he denied any existing relationship with Israel and noted that there are no direct flights between Israel and southern Sudan. "In the future nothing forbids us having such flights, though."
On the eve of the voting, two rebel groups clashed with southern Sudan's military, resulting in at least nine deaths. The attacks against the SPLA happened late Friday and Saturday.
"Why is it happening now? The intention or the motive behind must be undermining the referendum," said Gen. Acuil Tito Madut, the inspector general of the south's police. "Once these fights break out in these states that will mean some people will not vote and once people don't vote that means the required percentage is not achieved."
In order for the referendum to pass, a simple majority must vote for independence and 60 percent of the 3.9 million registered voters must cast ballots.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/09/2011 00:00 ||
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[Al Jazeera] North Korea has reiterated a proposal for unconditional talks with South Korea, in an apparent bid to ease tensions on the peninsula.
The North's latest offer comes days after South Korea dismissed earlier calls for negotiation from the country.
"We do not want to see the present South Korean authorities pass the five-year term of their office idly without North-South dialogue," the North's Committee for Peaceful Reunification of Korea said in a statement.
"There is neither conditionality in the North's proposal for dialogue nor need to cast any doubt about its real intention."
The statement was released to the country's official Korean Central News Agency.
Chun Hae-Sung, a South Korean unification ministry official, said South Korea will review the latest offer but that the North has not sent an official request for talks.
The South had earlier this week dismissed calls for talks by the North, saying the country should show that it has changed through actions, rather than words.
Lee Jong-Joo, a South Korean unification ministry front man, said this fresh offer for talks was more concrete than the previous one.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/09/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
TOPIX/WORLD NEWS > VARIOUS > SOUTH KOREA TO [closely]PROBE/ANALYZE NORTH TALKS OFFER.
Words, impressions, + proper Korye syntax...@.
* ION PEOPLES DAILY FORUM > US STUDY SAYS PLA MILITARY DRIVE TARGETS TAIWAN.
ARTIC = CHINA may be willing = planning to unilater ESCALATE a US-CHINA CONFRONTATION OER TAIWAN BY LAUNCHING A CONVENTIONAL-ONLY "FIRST STRIKE" OR "PREMMPTIVE STRIKE" AGZ REGIONAL US BASES BEFORE ALSO LAUNCHING A MASSIVE, "D *** THE TORPEDOES/CABBAGE" [= Casualties] FOLLOW-ON PLA CONVENTIONAL BLITZ AGZ TAIWAN PROPER, IN THE BELIEF BY CHINA THAT THE US WILL NOT MIL RESPOND IN KIND ONCE IT IS CONVINCED THAT NOT-A-CONTINENT-OR-CONUS TAIWAN WILL BE MIL LOST TO THE PLA LONG BEFORE EFFEC US MIL RELIEF ARRIVES.
IIUC, IOW STUDY > CHINA = believes that US POTUS = NatComAuthor will concede IN ORDER TO AVOID ESCALATION FROM CONVENTIONAL WAR TO [limited?full-scale?] REGIONAL, GLOBAL NUCLEAR WAR = MUTUALLY ASSURED DESTRUCTION???
SUB-SUB-IOW, CHINA DOES NOT = PREFERS NOT TO USE NUKES IN A FIRST/PREEMPTIVE STRIKE AGZ TAIWAN [or ROK or JAPAN, etal] BECUZ IT WANTS TO USE SAME AS "WARM-WATER PORTS" = FORWARD PLA STAGING AREAS.
#2
DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > US + JAPAN [broadly]AGREE TO COOPERATE ON SECURITY. More details to be revealed after SecDef Gates visit.
* SAME > CHINA READY TO BUY BRITISH HMS INVINCIBLE AIRCRAFT CARRIER?, indirectly via PCorrect-Deniable, Proxy? "Private" sale to major Hong Kong businessman???
* SAME > [Video] MORE [CPLAN] NAVAL SHIPS
GATHERED IN THE NAVAL BASE AT HAINAN ISLAND.
Read, INDIA + RUSSIA + JAPAN + US, etc. IN VIETNAM = CHINA-CLAIMED SOUTH CHINA SEA.
* SAME > US NAVY INTEL CHIEF: CHINESE MISSLE [Anti-Carrier = DF-21D ASBM] IS EFFECTIVE.
* SAME > US STUDY SAYS THAT CHINA'S NEW CARRIER-BASED AIRCRAFT PERFORMANCE WILL EXCEED/SURPASS US "SUPER-HORNET".
* SAME > CHINA'S NEW SHENGLONG SPACEPLANE FLEW SUCCESSFULLY. Test flight.
CHIN NETTERS > a number of MilBloggers are in favor of Beijing + PLA converting new J20 + Spaceplane into LR Strike, Space Stealth Bombers, TO BOMB GUAM + HAWAII + of course the JAPANESE in righteous Anti-US, anti-JAPAN indignation???
Terming the displacement of Pandits from the Valley as "one of the darkest chapters" in the history of Jammu and Kashmir, Union Minister Farooq Abdullah asked the displaced people for "forgiveness."
"One of the major tragedies that we had to go through was the ethnic cleansing that took place in the state of Jammu and Kashmir," said the former Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir at a book launch in the capital.
"I think it was one of the darkest chapters in the history of the state that will always remain and for which even for years if we ask God for forgiveness I wonder if it will ever come," he said.
The minister was alluding to the displacement of Pandits from the Valley at the peak of militancy in the early 1990s.
Posted by: john frum ||
01/09/2011 11:02 ||
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Yet as Chief Minister he did nothing to protect the hundreds of thousands of Kashmiri Hindus from being ethnically cleansed by the jihadis. He has done nothing to enable the Hindus to return to the Kashmir valley
Posted by: john frum ||
01/09/2011 11:06 Comments ||
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One of Pakistan's most liberal women and former information minister Sherry Rehman has been declared wajibul qatal, an apostate who deserves death.
The Sultan Masjid in the Defence Housing Authority, a posh housing scheme that was started for Pakistan military officers in Karachi -- commercial capital of Pakistan -- more than four decades ago, passed the death edict on Rehman for moving a resolution in Pakistan's parliament to amend the draconian blasphemy law and remove the death penalty from it to protect Pakistan's religious minorities, the Politico has reported.
Posted by: john frum ||
01/09/2011 00:00 ||
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Western nations should regularly broadcast that apostasy laws, and those who advocate them, are "barbaric" and "uncivilized". It is a terribly bad habit to dismiss such things as "internal affairs", because tolerating them leads to far worse abuses.
A serious effort should be made to publicly shame those who advocate such laws, and to make them international pariahs. Murdering people because they reject a religion, all religion, or atheism, is intolerable, and this must be stated clearly and unambiguously.
KARBALA / Aswat al-Iraq: Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari will be summoned to explain reports that spoke of Saudi Arabias decapitation of 40 Iraqis, parliament speaker Osama al-Nujaifi said on Saturday.
The Council of Representatives (parliament) will summon the foreign minister to explain these reports. The Foreign Ministry and other organizations concerned will clarify this issue so that we may take the proper measures, Nujaifi said during a symposium he held with officials in Karbala province today (Jan. 8).
Nujaifis statements came in response to questions by Karbala Provincial Council member Abbas Hassani, who called for condemning the executions and stopping prisoners swap with Saudi Arabia pending clarifications.
Saudis have reportedly beheaded Iraqis who lost their way while we repatriate Saudi terrorists to their country after they killed our sons in cold blood, Hassani, who chairs the Karbala Provincial Councils Reconstruction & Strategic Planning Committee, added.
The reports sparked wide-scale reactions on the Iraqi streets and political circles. The Iraqi human rights ministry called last week for launching an international probe into the reported beheadings, accusing Riyadh of decapitating dozens of Iraqi nationals without fair trials.
The ministry also urged the international community to intervene over the issue of hundreds of Iraqis detained in Saudi prisons.
In the last few paragraphs of the article, the writers take the Soddies to task for having a legal system that isn't up to international standards. My mind boggles a bit at Iraqis lecturing Soddies about legal proceedings, but I see this as a hopeful sign.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/09/2011 00:00 ||
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Is this based on any newspaper/government/NGO report, or is it just the old rumor mill?
#3
I'd bet they could find 40 Soddies in Iraqi jails...
for equal relations and all that
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/09/2011 10:38 Comments ||
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#4
Aswat al-Iraq is one of several Iraqi news agencies.
Yes, but I was referring to the "40" figure? Where did that number come from? Is there a list of names? What crime were they charged with? Where were these men executed?
Rumors can take a life of their own in many Arab countries. And not without good reason. The rumor mill may be more accurate that anything you're likely to find in a dictator's newspaper.
#5
"40" is a common figure used in that culture to mean "many". It's the whole "40 days and 40 nights" thing. Not literally 40. When a Bedouin says "40", they mean "more than a few" as in a dozen or more.
[Arab News] Moqtada Sadr said Saturday that his followers were still resisting the US enemy with all means. But Sadr tempered his fiery words by saying the new Iraqi government should be given a chance to get American forces out of the country in a "suitable" way.
In his first speech since returning from almost four years of self-imposed exile in Iran, the 37-year-old holy man whose Shiite militias once battled US troops stopped short of explicitly urging violence against Americans. But he left open the possibility that some 50,000 US troops in Iraq could be targeted before they are set to leave at the end of this year.
"Let the whole world hear that we reject America. No, no to the occupier," Sadr said during his 35-minute speech in Najaf, 160 km south of Storied Baghdad. "We don't kill Iraqis -- our hands do not kill Iraqis. But we target only the occupier with all the means of resistance," he added.
"We are still resisters and we are still resisting the occupier militarily and culturally and by all the means of resistance." Sadr has long branded the US military as occupiers in Iraq, and Washington considers him a security threat. Yet after winning 40 seats in March parliamentary elections -- and taking eight top leadership posts in the new government -- Sadr's political muscle makes him a force that cannot be ignored.
Addressing an adoring and frenzied crowd of thousands, Sadr called the US, Israel and Britain "our common enemies." "Maybe during the past few days and months, we forgot the resistance as we were busy with politics," Sadr said. "Our aim is to expel the occupier with any means. The resistance does not mean that everyone can carry a weapon. The weapon is only for the people of the weapons" -- fighters.
US Embassy front man David J. Ranz brushed off Sadr's remarks. "We listened to the speech, but heard nothing new," Ranz said.
A security agreement between Washington and Storied Baghdad requires all US forces to be out of Iraq by the end of the year. Although both Nuri Al-Maliki and the B.O. regime have maintained the roughly 50,000 US troops will leave by then, officials in both nations have acknowledged that Iraq is not yet ready to protect its borders from possible invasion. That's led to widespread speculation that Al-Maliki ultimately will ask a small number of American forces to remain.
Sadr rose to power after the March 2003 invasion and has since been revered by poor Iraqi Shiites. His Mahdi Army gunnies were a formidable foe of American troops and Iraqi government forces between 2004 and 2008, but Sadr decamped to Iran in 2007 under threat of arrest for allegedly killing another holy man. Although absent from Iraq for four years, he has maintained strict control over the political and military wings of his movement from his base in Iran.
It's not clear whether Sadr will remain in Iraq or return to Iran. Followers and detractors hung on his words, delivered outside his ancestral home, for signs of where he plans to take his political movement.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/09/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
You knew he would ...
To paraph the great AL BUNDY > "WHAT A SHOCK [Not]"!
ESPEC GIVEN ...
* PEOPLES DAILY FORUM > MEDIAS: IRAN SAYS IT CAN MAKE NUCLEAR FUEL RODS, PLATES, ala Iran Nuc Agency Chief + Acting FM SALEHI.
#2
this time stay around for awhile or at leats until someone gives you a labotomy
Posted by: chris ||
01/09/2011 15:45 Comments ||
Top||
#3
hmmm
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/09/2011 16:07 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Mooki has been in Snooki's basement a little too long; someone needs to tell him the Iraqis are in control so his occupiers are his government - makes tator sound a bit silly...or anti-Iraqi.
Over the weekend, the PA announced that it holds Hamas members in its prisons out of concern for their safety and to prevent Israel from getting them.
This announcement came while the PA and Hamas traded allegations over the arrest by Israel of six Hamas men shortly after they were released from a Palestinian prison in Hebron last Thursday.
PA officials said that Hamas brushed off warnings by the Palestinian security officials that the men's lives would be in danger once they left prison.
"Hamas said that they would be responsible for the safety of their men and that's why we released them," said Gen. Adnan Dumairi, spokesman for the West Bank security forces.
"The detainees and their families signed a document stating that they are fully aware of the risks and that they alone bear responsibility."
"Furthermore, we sent all parties our official 'We told you so' letter as soon as we heard about their deaths."
Chief PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat said that the Hamas members were kept in a PA jail so that they wouldn't be arrested by the IDF.
Nimer Hammad, political advisor to PA President Mahmoud Abbas, also struck back at Hamas for pressuring the PA to release the six detainees. "We hold Hamas men in our prisons to protect them from Israel," he said.
The men who were arrested by the IDF were identified as Wael Bitar, Majdi Obeid, Ahmed Uwaiwi, Muhanad Nairoukh, Wissam Qawasmeh and Mohammed Sukiyeh. Some of them are suspected of involvement in terrorist attacks against settlers near Hebron, IDF sources said.
A 66-year-old Palestinian, Omar Qawasmeh, was shot and killed by Israeli soldiers during the raid on the home of his nephew, Bitar.
Qawasmeh's wife claimed that the troops opened fire at him while he was sleeping in his bed.
The incident in Hebron extended the permanent crisis triggered a new crisis between the PA and Hamas, whose spokesmen accused the PA security forces of "collusion" with Israel and called for halting security coordination with Israel in the West Bank.
The PA accused Hamas of exploiting the incident. They also said that Hamas bears responsibility for the safety of the six men.
The PA also spoke out against Israel for arresting the six Hamas men and killing the elderly man.
"This is a campaign of incitement against the Palestinian Authority," said the PA governor of Hebron, Kamel Hmeid. "Israel is playing with fire. This is an unjustified crime that will lead to more instability in the region."
Hmedi said that Israel was seeking to undermine the PA and derail efforts to end the Hamas-Fatah crisis.
The Hamas men were released from prison because they had been on hunger strike for 40 days. PA officials said they were released after the intervention of the emir of Qatar and the head of the Islamic Movement in Israel -- Northern Branch, Sheikh Raed Salah.
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.
One of Pakistan's most liberal women and former information minister Sherry Rehman has been declared wajibul qatal, an apostate who deserves death.
[Arab News] Moqtada Sadr said Saturday that his followers were still resisting the US enemy with all means. But Sadr tempered his fiery words by saying the new Iraqi government should be given a chance to get American forces out of the country in a "suitable" way.
