A member of the official inquiry into the Iraq war has praised Gordon Brown just weeks before the Prime Minister gives evidence about his role in the conflict.
Sir Martin Gilbert said he was aware of the hard work undertaken by Mr Brown when he was asked to accompany him on an official visit to Israel last year.
The distinguished historian made the comments in an interview in which he condemned “anti-Semitic” criticism that two of the five Chilcot committee members are Jews.
He said more senior people should speak out against the “terrifying” rise anti-Semitism and anti-Israeli opinion in Britain.Sir Martin praised Mr Brown - who agreed last week to give evidence to the inquiry before the general election - for his support for Israel and Jews.
“One of the curious things about Britain today is that we have had this terrifying sort of rise in crude anti-Israel anti-Semitic feeling on the one hand, often fuelled by one or two newspapers,” he said.
“On the other hand we have a Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, who is totally committed to Israel and feels very close to Jewish people.
“He asked me to come with him last year when he came to the Knesset (the Israeli parliament) and I watched in the period before his visit just how carefully he worked on the visit... I was impressed he was spending so much time and effort to get it right.”
The comments in an interview to an Israeli radio station are likely to be seized upon by critics of Sir John Chilcot’s inquiry who have claimed that politicians, their advisors and senior civil servants have not faced tough enough questions from the committee.
The Prime Minister is expected to be questioned by the Iraq Inquiry about suggestions that Tony Blair told the United States that Britain would participate in the war a year before the invasion.
Mr Brown, who was Chancellor at the time of the war, will be asked to explain the budget for the Armed Forces after complaints from some commanders that soldiers had been left without sufficient body armour, helicopters and armoured vehicles.
Sir Martin said during the interview that he was delighted that being Jewish was not a bar to being a senior figure in public service in Britain but added that there should be more effort to challenge anti-Semitic hostility.
He said it was “appalling” that two national newspapers carried articles which said Jews should not be on the inquiry panel after he and the military historian Professor Sir Lawrence Freedman were appointed last year.
“When it was announced there as a really unpleasant series of newspaper articles in just two newspapers and also on the blogosphere pointing out that two of the five members of this commission of inquiry were Jews and saying that this would make us unsuitable because as Jews we would support Israel,” he said.
Sir Martin said: “I couldn't see what this had to do with Iraq except that they said that as Israel supported the war in Iraq and America supported it and America is of course controlled by the Zionist lobby therefore we would not be impartial in our inquiry because we would favour the war because Israel favoured the war.
“Well, apart from the fact, that as far as I can see, at that time Israel regarded Iran as a greater danger in March 2003, it is just appalling.”
“I mean, what were the religions or characteristics or ethnic backgrounds of the other three members? They were of no interest to these anti-Semites. So that was very unpleasant.”
Sir Martin, who describes himself as a proud practising Jew and Zionist, urged other senior figures to speak out during an hour-long interview with an online radio station which broadcasts from a Jewish settlement in the West Bank.
“I think the crude popular anti-Israel attitude here (in Britain) is something that I would like to see more senior figures speak out against,” he said. “It does happen but I think it has become serious enough now for more figures to do it.”
Sir Martin added: “I certainly don’t despair but it is not pleasant. People follow the trends and newspapers.... the two that are particularly hostile to Israel, have a tremendous influence.”
The articles criticised by Sir Martin were by Richard Ingrams in The Independent and by Sir Oliver Miles, a former British Ambassador to Libya, Greece and Luxembourg, in the Independent on Sunday.
Source:The Times
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Thursday, January 28, 2010
Massive Toyota recall spreads to China and Europe
Toyota’s massive recall of more than seven million vehicles in the United States — sparked by reliability problems with accelerator pedals — is to be extended to Europe and China, the company revealed today.
The announcements came hours after the company added a further 1.09 million vehicles to the tally of cars involved in its US recall. It is thought that at least 75,000 vehicles will be recalled in China.
Toyota drivers in the UK were none the wiser by lunchtime today as to whether their cars will be part of the global recall.
A spokesman for the company in London said: "We want to get the message out that there will be a recall but data is still being collated as to which exact models and exact number of cars."nitial speculation suggests American-built Toyota RAV4's imported into the UK could be among those in the recall.
The spokesman declined to comment on that or on whether faulty mechanisms form part of the UK-built Toyota model, the Avensis and the Auris.
In a statement Toyota GB said: "There is a possibility that certain accelerator pedal mechanisms may, in rare instances, mechanically stick in a partially depressed position or return slowly to the idle position.
"This is caused because the accelerator pedal mechanisms concerned may become worn. This progressive wear, combined with certain operating and environmental conditions, can cause friction in the mechanism to increase and intermittently result in the accelerator pedal being harder to depress, slow to return or, in the worst case, stick in a partially open position.
"In case of occurrence, the driver may notice that the accelerator pedal is progressively harder to depress or is slower to return. A rough or chattered feeling may also be experienced when depressing/releasing the accelerator pedal.
"Toyota will implement a recall in Europe for this matter. The details of corrective action and implementation will be communicated directly to customers with vehicles potentially affected. The models and exact number of potentially affected vehicles is under investigation.
"A running change in production using different parts has already been implemented model-by-model in the European production. Therefore there is no need or intention to stop production in Europe.
"Whilst this condition is rare we advise customers who have concerns to contact Toyota GB Customer Relations (0800 1388744) for assistance ahead of the recall instructions being issued."As further information becomes available it will be posted at www.toyota.co.uk."
Motoring groups are telling Toyota owners and drivers to get in touch with their local dealer or garage.
"If you are unsure, our advice if you are a Toyota customer is to get in touch with your Toyota dealer," said a spokesman for the RAC motoring organisation.
"If your car is developing any worrying signs you should get in touch with your local garage or dealer."We are currently still attempting to get details on the extent of the recall and how far this extends to Toyota's European operations."
The company said that it had “no need or intention” of halting vehicle production at its European factories.
American owners of the affected vehicles are being asked to bring them in for inspection after a series of incidents in which the accelerator pedals became stuck in the depressed position, causing accidents in some cases.
The latest US recall covers a range of models, including the Highlander and Corolla.
Toyota took the rare step yesterday of suspending production and sales of eight Toyota models built at its factories in the US.
The models affected by the suspension represent 70 per cent of those sold in the US in December, and include the popular Camry.
If the recall does affect a large number of vehicles in Europe, analysts said, it may suggest that the problem relates more to fundamental design than to specific production issues.
The three recalls in the US — 4.2 million vehicles in November, 2.3 million vehicles last week and 1.09 million today — are designed to check for two possible faults.
One problem appears to centre on the floor mats, which can come unstuck and cause the pedals to catch.
The second, more serious, problem is mechanical.
Toyota has said that the accelerator pedal can, in a worst case, stick in a “partially depressed position” when the mechanism becomes worn.
On its US website, the company recommends that drivers “step on the brake pedal with both feet using firm and steady pressure.”
The recalls, which are being treated as a rare opportunity by Toyota’s rivals to seize market share, could not come at a worse time for the Japanese company.
It is battling to restore the company to profit after fiscal 2008 saw Toyota’s first full-year loss since it switched from making looms to building cars 60 years ago.
The announcements sent Toyota’s shares tumbling heavily, adding a further 4.3 per cent fall to a rout that began last week.
Fitch, the credit ratings agency, said that Toyota's A+ credit rating, once the pride of Japanese industry, had been placed on watch for a possible downgrade.
“The recalls and sales and production suspension cast a negative light on Toyota's reputation for quality, just as the company emerges from an unprecedented downturn in the auto industry,” Fitch said.
Source:The Times
The announcements came hours after the company added a further 1.09 million vehicles to the tally of cars involved in its US recall. It is thought that at least 75,000 vehicles will be recalled in China.
Toyota drivers in the UK were none the wiser by lunchtime today as to whether their cars will be part of the global recall.
A spokesman for the company in London said: "We want to get the message out that there will be a recall but data is still being collated as to which exact models and exact number of cars."nitial speculation suggests American-built Toyota RAV4's imported into the UK could be among those in the recall.
The spokesman declined to comment on that or on whether faulty mechanisms form part of the UK-built Toyota model, the Avensis and the Auris.
In a statement Toyota GB said: "There is a possibility that certain accelerator pedal mechanisms may, in rare instances, mechanically stick in a partially depressed position or return slowly to the idle position.
"This is caused because the accelerator pedal mechanisms concerned may become worn. This progressive wear, combined with certain operating and environmental conditions, can cause friction in the mechanism to increase and intermittently result in the accelerator pedal being harder to depress, slow to return or, in the worst case, stick in a partially open position.
"In case of occurrence, the driver may notice that the accelerator pedal is progressively harder to depress or is slower to return. A rough or chattered feeling may also be experienced when depressing/releasing the accelerator pedal.
"Toyota will implement a recall in Europe for this matter. The details of corrective action and implementation will be communicated directly to customers with vehicles potentially affected. The models and exact number of potentially affected vehicles is under investigation.
"A running change in production using different parts has already been implemented model-by-model in the European production. Therefore there is no need or intention to stop production in Europe.
"Whilst this condition is rare we advise customers who have concerns to contact Toyota GB Customer Relations (0800 1388744) for assistance ahead of the recall instructions being issued."As further information becomes available it will be posted at www.toyota.co.uk."
Motoring groups are telling Toyota owners and drivers to get in touch with their local dealer or garage.
"If you are unsure, our advice if you are a Toyota customer is to get in touch with your Toyota dealer," said a spokesman for the RAC motoring organisation.
"If your car is developing any worrying signs you should get in touch with your local garage or dealer."We are currently still attempting to get details on the extent of the recall and how far this extends to Toyota's European operations."
The company said that it had “no need or intention” of halting vehicle production at its European factories.
American owners of the affected vehicles are being asked to bring them in for inspection after a series of incidents in which the accelerator pedals became stuck in the depressed position, causing accidents in some cases.
The latest US recall covers a range of models, including the Highlander and Corolla.
Toyota took the rare step yesterday of suspending production and sales of eight Toyota models built at its factories in the US.
The models affected by the suspension represent 70 per cent of those sold in the US in December, and include the popular Camry.
If the recall does affect a large number of vehicles in Europe, analysts said, it may suggest that the problem relates more to fundamental design than to specific production issues.
The three recalls in the US — 4.2 million vehicles in November, 2.3 million vehicles last week and 1.09 million today — are designed to check for two possible faults.
One problem appears to centre on the floor mats, which can come unstuck and cause the pedals to catch.
The second, more serious, problem is mechanical.
Toyota has said that the accelerator pedal can, in a worst case, stick in a “partially depressed position” when the mechanism becomes worn.
On its US website, the company recommends that drivers “step on the brake pedal with both feet using firm and steady pressure.”
The recalls, which are being treated as a rare opportunity by Toyota’s rivals to seize market share, could not come at a worse time for the Japanese company.
It is battling to restore the company to profit after fiscal 2008 saw Toyota’s first full-year loss since it switched from making looms to building cars 60 years ago.
The announcements sent Toyota’s shares tumbling heavily, adding a further 4.3 per cent fall to a rout that began last week.
Fitch, the credit ratings agency, said that Toyota's A+ credit rating, once the pride of Japanese industry, had been placed on watch for a possible downgrade.
“The recalls and sales and production suspension cast a negative light on Toyota's reputation for quality, just as the company emerges from an unprecedented downturn in the auto industry,” Fitch said.
Source:The Times
Barack Obama: I don't quit - let's start again
A week after the worst political setback of his presidency Barack Obama used his first State of the Union address to rally his party, talk up the struggling American economy and challenge Republicans to stop “just saying no”.
Cheered on by Democrats who were yearning for a glimpse of the magic they saw in their President-elect a year ago, Mr Obama mounted a populist attack on Wall Street excess and responded to public anxiety over unemployment by demanding a new jobs Bill “on my desk without delay”.
He vowed to veto spending that would increase the deficit that has so enraged American voters, but at the same time refused to abandon his cherished – and expensive – goals for reforming US healthcare and investing in clean energy.
With his party still reeling from the loss of a crucial Massachusetts Senate seat Mr Obama was forced to restate the soaring themes of his election victory in the language of a fighter. “We have finished a difficult year,” he said. “We have come through a difficult decade. But a new year has come. A new decade stretches before us. We don’t quit. I don’t quit. Let’s seize this moment to start anew.”
As expected Mr Obama had harsh words for the lobbyists who he accuses of trying to sabotage his signature reforms of US healthcare and financial regulation. Demanding that they be forced to disclose all contacts with the White House or Congress, he attacked a recent Supreme Court ruling that ends limits on what special interests can spend on political campaigns.
“I don’t think American elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, and worse, by foreign entities,” he said. “They should be decided by the American people.”
He also lashed out at Republicans even as he appealed yet again for a new era of bipartisanship. In a reference to the Massachusetts seat and the need for a “supermajority” to pass any legislation, he said: “If the Republican leadership is going to insist that 60 votes in the Senate are required to do any business at all in this town, then the responsibility to govern is now yours as well. Just saying no to everything may be good short-term politics, but it’s not leadership.”
Occasionally both sides rose to applaud. They did so when Mr Obama demanded a tax on bankers’ bonuses and again for his unexpected expression of support for increased offshore oil and gas drilling – a concession to Republicans that could unblock opposition to a climate change Bill at a time when most of the Administration’s domestic agenda is paralysed.
Minutes into the address Mr Obama defied expectations by declaring that “our union is strong”. He used the line – familiar from past State of the Union speeches – despite sagging poll numbers and anger among voters over a budget deficit of $1.4 trillion (£864 billion) and counting.
Invoking an American spirit of “great decency and great strength”, he said: “I have never been more hopeful about America’s future than I am tonight. Despite our hardships, our union is strong. We do not give up. We do not quit. We don’t allow fear or division to break our spirit.”
Mr Obama was still working on the address with his chief speechwriter, Jon Favreau, 28, late yesterday. He used it to urge both main parties to overcome “the numbing weight of our politics” and find the common ground that has eluded them for the past year.
In a gesture to his liberal base, the President said that he would seek the repeal of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy instituted by President Clinton on gays in the military. He also admitted that he and his team had made mistakes in their first year. Most were unspecified but he owned up to a failure to communicate his aims for health reform more clearly.
No detailed strategy was expected for saving the healthcare Bill that dominated Mr Obama’s first year in office, and none was offered. Mr Obama restricted himself to a plea “to come together and finish the job for the American people”. Earlier, Senator Harry Reid, who led round-the-clock negotiations on the Bill until the Democrats lost their Senate supermajority last week, said that there was “no rush” to get it passed.
Elsewhere in the 70-minute speech Mr Obama listed modest initiatives to ease the burden of recession on hard-pressed middle class families. These included a $4 billion funding increase for schools and renewed promises of tax credits for small businesses and childcare in the budget next week. The President also announced a bipartisan commission on deficit reduction and a symbolic pay freeze for senior White House staff.
He rallied his rank and file with the words: “I would remind you that we still have the largest majority in decades, and the people expect us to solve some problems, not run for the hills.”
Eager Democrats were reserving aisle seats by 8am to ensure that they had a chance to shake Mr Obama’s hand when he made his way to the podium for his biggest set-piece political speech of the year, but polls published yesterday showed that three quarters of Americans believe that their federal government is not working and 58 per cent feel that their country is heading in the wrong direction.
At least 30 million viewers were expected to tune in for the speech.
Source:The Times
Cheered on by Democrats who were yearning for a glimpse of the magic they saw in their President-elect a year ago, Mr Obama mounted a populist attack on Wall Street excess and responded to public anxiety over unemployment by demanding a new jobs Bill “on my desk without delay”.
He vowed to veto spending that would increase the deficit that has so enraged American voters, but at the same time refused to abandon his cherished – and expensive – goals for reforming US healthcare and investing in clean energy.
With his party still reeling from the loss of a crucial Massachusetts Senate seat Mr Obama was forced to restate the soaring themes of his election victory in the language of a fighter. “We have finished a difficult year,” he said. “We have come through a difficult decade. But a new year has come. A new decade stretches before us. We don’t quit. I don’t quit. Let’s seize this moment to start anew.”
As expected Mr Obama had harsh words for the lobbyists who he accuses of trying to sabotage his signature reforms of US healthcare and financial regulation. Demanding that they be forced to disclose all contacts with the White House or Congress, he attacked a recent Supreme Court ruling that ends limits on what special interests can spend on political campaigns.
“I don’t think American elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, and worse, by foreign entities,” he said. “They should be decided by the American people.”
He also lashed out at Republicans even as he appealed yet again for a new era of bipartisanship. In a reference to the Massachusetts seat and the need for a “supermajority” to pass any legislation, he said: “If the Republican leadership is going to insist that 60 votes in the Senate are required to do any business at all in this town, then the responsibility to govern is now yours as well. Just saying no to everything may be good short-term politics, but it’s not leadership.”
Occasionally both sides rose to applaud. They did so when Mr Obama demanded a tax on bankers’ bonuses and again for his unexpected expression of support for increased offshore oil and gas drilling – a concession to Republicans that could unblock opposition to a climate change Bill at a time when most of the Administration’s domestic agenda is paralysed.
Minutes into the address Mr Obama defied expectations by declaring that “our union is strong”. He used the line – familiar from past State of the Union speeches – despite sagging poll numbers and anger among voters over a budget deficit of $1.4 trillion (£864 billion) and counting.
Invoking an American spirit of “great decency and great strength”, he said: “I have never been more hopeful about America’s future than I am tonight. Despite our hardships, our union is strong. We do not give up. We do not quit. We don’t allow fear or division to break our spirit.”
Mr Obama was still working on the address with his chief speechwriter, Jon Favreau, 28, late yesterday. He used it to urge both main parties to overcome “the numbing weight of our politics” and find the common ground that has eluded them for the past year.
In a gesture to his liberal base, the President said that he would seek the repeal of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy instituted by President Clinton on gays in the military. He also admitted that he and his team had made mistakes in their first year. Most were unspecified but he owned up to a failure to communicate his aims for health reform more clearly.
No detailed strategy was expected for saving the healthcare Bill that dominated Mr Obama’s first year in office, and none was offered. Mr Obama restricted himself to a plea “to come together and finish the job for the American people”. Earlier, Senator Harry Reid, who led round-the-clock negotiations on the Bill until the Democrats lost their Senate supermajority last week, said that there was “no rush” to get it passed.
Elsewhere in the 70-minute speech Mr Obama listed modest initiatives to ease the burden of recession on hard-pressed middle class families. These included a $4 billion funding increase for schools and renewed promises of tax credits for small businesses and childcare in the budget next week. The President also announced a bipartisan commission on deficit reduction and a symbolic pay freeze for senior White House staff.
He rallied his rank and file with the words: “I would remind you that we still have the largest majority in decades, and the people expect us to solve some problems, not run for the hills.”
Eager Democrats were reserving aisle seats by 8am to ensure that they had a chance to shake Mr Obama’s hand when he made his way to the podium for his biggest set-piece political speech of the year, but polls published yesterday showed that three quarters of Americans believe that their federal government is not working and 58 per cent feel that their country is heading in the wrong direction.
At least 30 million viewers were expected to tune in for the speech.
Source:The Times
Haiti miracle: Daline Etienne, 16, survives earthquake for 15 days
Hundreds of Haitians cheered, wept and gave thanks to God last night as a 16-year-old girl was pulled from beneath the rubble of her house, 15 days after the earthquake.
Daline Etienne was barely alive with very low blood pressure, but medics with the French rescue team that saved her were confident that she would pull through. Her rescuers thought that she might have survived on Coca-Cola.
“It’s a joy, it’s a miracle. Everyone is rejoicing,” said Bertony Daudier, one of the huge crowd that gathered to watch the drama unfold in the San Gérard district of Port-au-Prince.
The incredible story began at around midday when four men searching for possessions in the ruins of a house heard a noise in the wreckage beneath them. “We shouted, ‘Is anyone there? Is someone there?’,” Rousvelt Luc said. “We heard a voice saying, ‘Yes, yes’.”
The French rescue team arrived at about 5pm and embarked on a race to extract Daline before nightfall. She was trapped beneath a huge concrete slab in her pancaked house, with the stench of decomposing bodies permeating the air.
Claude Fuilla, the chief medic on the French rescue team, said that when they arrived at the site he climbed down into a hole. “At first all I could see was her hair,” he said.
They widened the tunnel for better access to examine her. “We tried to stabilise her before we did anything else because she couldn’t hold on for many more hours if we took too long to get her out,” Mr Fuilla said. Her rescuers managed to put her on a drip.
At about 5.45pm, as the sun was setting, they pulled her out to the elation of a crowd that has known nothing but misery for the past fortnight. As they cheered and applauded, she was carried over the rubble on a stretcher to a waiting ambulance.
She did not move and she was covered in dust and looked almost lifeless. Commander Samuel Bernes, of the rescue team, said: “She just said, ‘Thank you’. She’s very weak, which suggests that she’s been there for 15 days.”
“It’s a miracle. God has watched over her and Jesus got her out,” Mr Fuilla said.
Daline was rushed to the Hôpital Lycée Français where doctors opted to fly her by helicopter to a French naval ship off the coast of Haiti for treatment. Michel Orcel, a doctor at the hospital, said: “We can’t explain how she survived all that time. She is going to live. There is no doubt.” He said that she appeared to have no more than a few cuts on her legs.
Mr Fuilla said that there were three reasons why Daline might have survived: she was young and in good health; she seemed to have been protected in a cavity by a wall on each side; and she seemed to have had access to liquid. Mr Fuilla said that she had mumbled the word “Coca” — French for Coca-Cola.
Within minutes of an ambulance rushing Daline off to hospital, darkness fell but the crowd lingered, anxious to savour a rare moment of joy that will boost the spirits of a city where more than 150,000 people have died, 1.5 million are homeless and an estimated 50 per cent of the buildings have been destroyed or damaged beyond repair.
Source:The Times
Daline Etienne was barely alive with very low blood pressure, but medics with the French rescue team that saved her were confident that she would pull through. Her rescuers thought that she might have survived on Coca-Cola.
“It’s a joy, it’s a miracle. Everyone is rejoicing,” said Bertony Daudier, one of the huge crowd that gathered to watch the drama unfold in the San Gérard district of Port-au-Prince.
The incredible story began at around midday when four men searching for possessions in the ruins of a house heard a noise in the wreckage beneath them. “We shouted, ‘Is anyone there? Is someone there?’,” Rousvelt Luc said. “We heard a voice saying, ‘Yes, yes’.”
The French rescue team arrived at about 5pm and embarked on a race to extract Daline before nightfall. She was trapped beneath a huge concrete slab in her pancaked house, with the stench of decomposing bodies permeating the air.
Claude Fuilla, the chief medic on the French rescue team, said that when they arrived at the site he climbed down into a hole. “At first all I could see was her hair,” he said.
They widened the tunnel for better access to examine her. “We tried to stabilise her before we did anything else because she couldn’t hold on for many more hours if we took too long to get her out,” Mr Fuilla said. Her rescuers managed to put her on a drip.
At about 5.45pm, as the sun was setting, they pulled her out to the elation of a crowd that has known nothing but misery for the past fortnight. As they cheered and applauded, she was carried over the rubble on a stretcher to a waiting ambulance.
She did not move and she was covered in dust and looked almost lifeless. Commander Samuel Bernes, of the rescue team, said: “She just said, ‘Thank you’. She’s very weak, which suggests that she’s been there for 15 days.”
“It’s a miracle. God has watched over her and Jesus got her out,” Mr Fuilla said.
Daline was rushed to the Hôpital Lycée Français where doctors opted to fly her by helicopter to a French naval ship off the coast of Haiti for treatment. Michel Orcel, a doctor at the hospital, said: “We can’t explain how she survived all that time. She is going to live. There is no doubt.” He said that she appeared to have no more than a few cuts on her legs.
Mr Fuilla said that there were three reasons why Daline might have survived: she was young and in good health; she seemed to have been protected in a cavity by a wall on each side; and she seemed to have had access to liquid. Mr Fuilla said that she had mumbled the word “Coca” — French for Coca-Cola.
Within minutes of an ambulance rushing Daline off to hospital, darkness fell but the crowd lingered, anxious to savour a rare moment of joy that will boost the spirits of a city where more than 150,000 people have died, 1.5 million are homeless and an estimated 50 per cent of the buildings have been destroyed or damaged beyond repair.
Source:The Times
Karzai says Afghans will need '15 years of help'
President Karzai of Afghanistan warned today that his country's security forces would require another 15 years of Western support before they are able to sustain themselves.
Ahead of the opening of the London Conference on Afghanistan, Mr Karzai told the BBC that he foresaw a gradual reduction in support over a lengthy timeframe.
“With regard to training and equipping the Afghan security forces, five to 10 years will be enough,” he said. “With regard to sustaining them until Afghanistan is financially able to provide for our forces, the time will be extended to 10 to 15 years.”
His comments were at odds with the tone of Gordon Brown’s opening address to the conference, which sought to stress a timeframe of less than a year until Western forces begin a transition of responsibility to their Afghan counterparts.The Communique that will end the conference, a document already leaked to The Times, forsees a gradual transfer starting late this year or early next in the more benign provinces. Afghan forces will be in the lead of the majority of provinces within three years and overall control will pass to Afghan forces within five years.
Concurrent with the military surge, led by 30,000 new US troops, the Prime Minister set out details to leaders from more than 60 countries of a complementary “civilian and political surge” that will include a drive to reconcile and reintegrate Taliban fighters.
After a bloody year for Nato forces in Afghanistan, during which 520 troops died including 108 from Britain, Mr Brown told delegates: “By the middle of next year, we have to turn the tide in the fight against the insurgency.”
Standing alongside Mr Karzai, the Prime Minister went on to detail plans that Western leaders hope will lead to the reintegration of what the Afghan President called the “disenchanted brothers” of the Taleban.
The Prime Minister detailed a new £500million fund that is to offer inducements to Taleban fighters who promise to lay down their arms and sever their ties with Al-Qaeda and other terrorist networks.
The exact nature of the proposed engagement remains unclear, with Afghan officials and some British officials appearing to push a more conciliatory line than is coming from Washington.
Speaking at the start of the conference President Karzai told leaders that he wished to “reach out to all” and asked that the Saudi leader King Abdullah act as an intermediary in a process of engagement with the Taleban leadership. Saudi Arabia, one of only three countries to recognise the original Taleban government, has played a discreet role in previous unofficial talks between the Karzai government and representatives of the Taleban
The Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said yesterday that any reconciliation with the Taleban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar was "probably a bridge too far" after he gave safe haven to al-Qaeda to launch the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
"He has the blood of thousands of Americans on his hands," he told reporters in Washington.
But Mark Sedwill, the former British Ambassador and newly appointed Nato civilian representative in Afghanistan, suggested that talks with the Taleban would inevitably lead to engagement with “unsavoury characters.”
"If we are going to bring conflicts like Afghanistan, civil conflicts, to an end, that means some pretty unsavoury characters have to be brought within the system," he said.
The Taleban has been dismissive of suggestions that fighters can be “bought” by the new plan and today restated on its website that the withdrawal of Western forces is a precondition to any negotiation with the leadership. However, the insurgent movement has been careful in recent months to distance itself from Al-Qaeda’s agenda stressing that it poses “no threat to the West”.
Among the measures that are to accompany the reconciliation drive as part of a concurrent “civilian surge” in Afghanistan are plans for a new training programme for some 12,000 Afghan bureaucrats, a key deficiency in a country beset by both literacy rates of less than 30 per cent and endemic corruption. Agriculture, the mainstay of the Afghan economy, is to receive another £72 million from the British taxpayer.
As the West tries to accelerate a transition to Afghan control that will provide an ultimate exit strategy, Mr Brown said that the proportion of development money channelled through the Afghan government is to be increased to 50 per cent of the total, a move matched by Afghan government commitments to clamp down on endemic corruption. The International Monitory Fund and the World Bank are to announce further debt relief for Afghanistan totalling $1.6 billion.
British police training and mentoring teams are to be doubled from April, Mr Brown said, as part of an international effort to build Afghan forces that will see the Afghan Army expanded from 134,000 this October to 171,600 by October 2011. The Afghan police are to grow in number from 109,000 in October to 134,000 by October 2011.
Source:The Times
Ahead of the opening of the London Conference on Afghanistan, Mr Karzai told the BBC that he foresaw a gradual reduction in support over a lengthy timeframe.
“With regard to training and equipping the Afghan security forces, five to 10 years will be enough,” he said. “With regard to sustaining them until Afghanistan is financially able to provide for our forces, the time will be extended to 10 to 15 years.”
His comments were at odds with the tone of Gordon Brown’s opening address to the conference, which sought to stress a timeframe of less than a year until Western forces begin a transition of responsibility to their Afghan counterparts.The Communique that will end the conference, a document already leaked to The Times, forsees a gradual transfer starting late this year or early next in the more benign provinces. Afghan forces will be in the lead of the majority of provinces within three years and overall control will pass to Afghan forces within five years.
Concurrent with the military surge, led by 30,000 new US troops, the Prime Minister set out details to leaders from more than 60 countries of a complementary “civilian and political surge” that will include a drive to reconcile and reintegrate Taliban fighters.
After a bloody year for Nato forces in Afghanistan, during which 520 troops died including 108 from Britain, Mr Brown told delegates: “By the middle of next year, we have to turn the tide in the fight against the insurgency.”
Standing alongside Mr Karzai, the Prime Minister went on to detail plans that Western leaders hope will lead to the reintegration of what the Afghan President called the “disenchanted brothers” of the Taleban.
The Prime Minister detailed a new £500million fund that is to offer inducements to Taleban fighters who promise to lay down their arms and sever their ties with Al-Qaeda and other terrorist networks.
The exact nature of the proposed engagement remains unclear, with Afghan officials and some British officials appearing to push a more conciliatory line than is coming from Washington.
Speaking at the start of the conference President Karzai told leaders that he wished to “reach out to all” and asked that the Saudi leader King Abdullah act as an intermediary in a process of engagement with the Taleban leadership. Saudi Arabia, one of only three countries to recognise the original Taleban government, has played a discreet role in previous unofficial talks between the Karzai government and representatives of the Taleban
The Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said yesterday that any reconciliation with the Taleban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar was "probably a bridge too far" after he gave safe haven to al-Qaeda to launch the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
"He has the blood of thousands of Americans on his hands," he told reporters in Washington.
But Mark Sedwill, the former British Ambassador and newly appointed Nato civilian representative in Afghanistan, suggested that talks with the Taleban would inevitably lead to engagement with “unsavoury characters.”
"If we are going to bring conflicts like Afghanistan, civil conflicts, to an end, that means some pretty unsavoury characters have to be brought within the system," he said.
The Taleban has been dismissive of suggestions that fighters can be “bought” by the new plan and today restated on its website that the withdrawal of Western forces is a precondition to any negotiation with the leadership. However, the insurgent movement has been careful in recent months to distance itself from Al-Qaeda’s agenda stressing that it poses “no threat to the West”.
Among the measures that are to accompany the reconciliation drive as part of a concurrent “civilian surge” in Afghanistan are plans for a new training programme for some 12,000 Afghan bureaucrats, a key deficiency in a country beset by both literacy rates of less than 30 per cent and endemic corruption. Agriculture, the mainstay of the Afghan economy, is to receive another £72 million from the British taxpayer.
As the West tries to accelerate a transition to Afghan control that will provide an ultimate exit strategy, Mr Brown said that the proportion of development money channelled through the Afghan government is to be increased to 50 per cent of the total, a move matched by Afghan government commitments to clamp down on endemic corruption. The International Monitory Fund and the World Bank are to announce further debt relief for Afghanistan totalling $1.6 billion.
British police training and mentoring teams are to be doubled from April, Mr Brown said, as part of an international effort to build Afghan forces that will see the Afghan Army expanded from 134,000 this October to 171,600 by October 2011. The Afghan police are to grow in number from 109,000 in October to 134,000 by October 2011.
Source:The Times
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Venezuelan cable television channel taken off air
A Venezuelan cable television channel critical of President Hugo Chavez has been taken off the air after refusing to broadcast footage of the president's speeches.
Radio Caracas Television, an anti-Chavez channel known as RCTV disappeared from the airwaves shortly after midnight over its failure to comply with new regulations requiring that Mr Chavez's speeches be televised on cable as well as terrestrial television.
Diosdado Cabello, the director of Venezuela's state-run telecommunications agency, warned cable operaters on Saturday evening that they could find themselves in jeopardy if they kept channels that broke the new regulations, which came into force last month.
"They must comply with the law, and they cannot have a single channel that violates Venezuelan laws as part of their programming," he said.
RCTV did not broadcast a speech by the president to his political supporters during a rally early on Saturday.
The station's removal from cable and satellite television prompted a cacophony of protests in Caracas neighborhoods as Mr Chavez's opponents leaned out apartment windows to bang on pots and pans. Others shouted epithets and drivers joined in, honking car horns.
"They want to silence RCTV's voice," said Miguel Angel Rodriguez, the channel's most popular talk show host. "But they won't be able to because RCTV is embedded in the hearts of all Venezuelans," he said.
The US Embassy in Caracas expressed concern about the decision.
"Access to information is a cornerstone of democracy and provides a foundation for global progress. By restricting yet again the Venezuelan people's access to RCTV broadcasts, the Venezuelan government continues to erode this cornerstone," a spokeswoman, Robin Holzhauer, said.
Venezuela's telecommunications agency has said in the past week that under new rules, two dozen local cable channels including RCTV must carry government programming when officials deemed it necessary.
Channels on the open airwaves are already subject to the measure, which Mr Chavez often uses to force all the country's TV channels and radio stations to broadcast his speeches.
Mr Cabello that other violations committed by cable channels included failing to warn viewers of sexual and violent content as well as broadcasting more than two hours of soap operas during the afternoon, instead of dedicating it to children's programmes..
He did not specify which TV channels had purportedly violated the law, but RCTV said it was the target. It accused the agency of pressuring cable providers to drop channels that were critical of the government.
When he denied RCTV a renewal of its over-the-air broadcast licence, Mr Chavez accused the station of plotting against his government and supporting a failed 2002 coup.
In August, the government forced 32 radio stations and two small TV stations off the air, saying some owners had failed to renew their broadcast licenses while other licences were no longer valid because they had been granted long ago to owners who were now dead. Officials said they planned to take more stations off the air.
Source:The Times
Radio Caracas Television, an anti-Chavez channel known as RCTV disappeared from the airwaves shortly after midnight over its failure to comply with new regulations requiring that Mr Chavez's speeches be televised on cable as well as terrestrial television.
Diosdado Cabello, the director of Venezuela's state-run telecommunications agency, warned cable operaters on Saturday evening that they could find themselves in jeopardy if they kept channels that broke the new regulations, which came into force last month.
"They must comply with the law, and they cannot have a single channel that violates Venezuelan laws as part of their programming," he said.
RCTV did not broadcast a speech by the president to his political supporters during a rally early on Saturday.
The station's removal from cable and satellite television prompted a cacophony of protests in Caracas neighborhoods as Mr Chavez's opponents leaned out apartment windows to bang on pots and pans. Others shouted epithets and drivers joined in, honking car horns.
"They want to silence RCTV's voice," said Miguel Angel Rodriguez, the channel's most popular talk show host. "But they won't be able to because RCTV is embedded in the hearts of all Venezuelans," he said.
The US Embassy in Caracas expressed concern about the decision.
"Access to information is a cornerstone of democracy and provides a foundation for global progress. By restricting yet again the Venezuelan people's access to RCTV broadcasts, the Venezuelan government continues to erode this cornerstone," a spokeswoman, Robin Holzhauer, said.
Venezuela's telecommunications agency has said in the past week that under new rules, two dozen local cable channels including RCTV must carry government programming when officials deemed it necessary.
Channels on the open airwaves are already subject to the measure, which Mr Chavez often uses to force all the country's TV channels and radio stations to broadcast his speeches.
Mr Cabello that other violations committed by cable channels included failing to warn viewers of sexual and violent content as well as broadcasting more than two hours of soap operas during the afternoon, instead of dedicating it to children's programmes..
He did not specify which TV channels had purportedly violated the law, but RCTV said it was the target. It accused the agency of pressuring cable providers to drop channels that were critical of the government.
When he denied RCTV a renewal of its over-the-air broadcast licence, Mr Chavez accused the station of plotting against his government and supporting a failed 2002 coup.
In August, the government forced 32 radio stations and two small TV stations off the air, saying some owners had failed to renew their broadcast licenses while other licences were no longer valid because they had been granted long ago to owners who were now dead. Officials said they planned to take more stations off the air.
Source:The Times
Desperate Haitians learn to tackle earthquake aftermath alone
Every day, the relief trucks roar past the high pink walls of the New Hope Ministry in Mariani, on the coast road west of Port-au-Prince.
Every day, people shriek and wave in the hope of persuading them to stop. Some drivers slow down and shout that they will come back tomorrow.
Yet by Friday morning, 10 days after Haiti’s earthquake struck, nobody from the government or any relief agency had walked through the heavy metal gates of the American-owned missionary compound to confront the mayhem within.
Public frustration with the slowness of the aid effort and the government’s declaration that the search and rescue operation had been terminated increased yesterday with the freeing of a young man who had been trapped for the 11 days since the earthquake struck Port-au-PrinceA 24-year-old man was freed from beneath the collapsed Napoli Inn. The record for surviving an earthquake is 14 days set by a man trapped beneath a gym in the 1990 earthquake in the Philippines who had access to rain water.
On Friday I had paid my second visit to the New Hope Ministry, hoping that the misery I had witnessed earlier in the week would have been brought under control: that the aid supplies spreading through the fast-rotting shantytowns at the centre of Port-au-Prince would have reached this forlorn outpost only a few miles out of town.
Instead, I found Father Emil Samedi sitting at a small desk just inside his gate, exhaustion etched on his face, his words filled with despair.
“I’ve been up and down this country and every door is closed,” the priest said. “We are running out of food; our children are throwing up water.
“They keep saying that the government is having a meeting and that soon someone will come. But no one comes and I no longer know what I should do.”
To pass time as he waited for assistance, he decided to conduct a census. Living rough in less than an acre of space around the mission church are 2,027 people.
The plight of New Hope’s forgotten refugees — and countless earthquake survivors like them — highlights both the challenge and the daunting obstacles confronting relief co-ordinators.
Aid is flowing at last. But there is no visible mechanism in place to ensure that it reaches those most in need.
I had found New Hope by chance. Driving around Port-au-Prince earlier in the week, I had absent-mindedly switched on the car radio. There was mostly crackle and hum, but suddenly the dial fell on a strong, clear signal broadcasting a discussion in French and Creole from a hilltop station in Pétionville, a well-to-do suburb that emerged from the earthquake comparatively unscathed.
The station, Signal-FM, was broadcasting from offices a few blocks from my hotel. When I arrived, there was a crowd at the door, and as I squeezed past, a woman pressed a piece of paper into my hand.
“Please give this to them,” she said. “Please tell them we need help.” Inside the studio I found Mario Viau and his wife, Sheyla, presiding over what turned out to be the only radio station in the capital that had broadcast through the earthquake without interruption.
“When the building started shaking, we put on some music and went outside and waited,” said Viau. “When we realised the building was still standing, we went back indoors.”
I handed over my piece of paper, and Sheyla Viau winced. “We’ve had 5,000 of these,” she said. “So many people desperate for help.”
She handed me a sheaf of notes that were being read out on air, all heart-rending pleas for aid or information.
“Emmanuelle is looking for her father, Eric Leconte,” read one. “Jacques Arsène, if you’re alive, contact your daughter Farah,” read another.
One particularly elaborate note prompted me to write down the details. There was a church at Carrefour, a sprawling slum on the western edge of the city, and it housed 3,000 refugees.
“We have pregnant women, new-born handicapped, injured. Need food medicine water tent.” The church’s name was the Eglise du Dieu Vivant — the Church of the Living God.
Early the next morning I headed west. It didn’t take long to realise how difficult the distribution of aid would be along that blighted so-called highway. At every junction there were colossal traffic jams as buses and trucks laden with Haitians tried to make their escape from the city.
Quite apart from the heaps of earthquake rubble, overturned vehicles and unfilled axle-breaking potholes, long stretches of the road are flooded from a tidal surge and broken water pipes.
It passes the capital’s main petrol storage terminal, where a long line of tankers in both directions routinely blocks all lanes as they manoeuvre into position for loading. The average speed is less than 5mph.
I never found the Eglise du Dieu Vivant. A couple of false starts led to hour-long detours through streets choked with people. Houses that had crumbled into the street forced us to turn down rock-strewn alleys that were little wider than goat paths. We got more and more lost. If I could not reach the church in a small rented car, how on earth would an international relief agency deliver aid by truck?
Finally we stopped at the New Hope Ministry in search of directions home. And that was how I walked into yet another of Haiti’s infinite warrens of refugee hell.
Father Emil was out that day, scouring the city for help, and I was greeted by Robinson Decembre, a 33-year-old Haitian recently returned from Miami.
He was so astounded to see a foreigner coming through his gate that he could barely get his complaints out fast enough.
“The pastor is running back and forth trying to get aid, we’re receiving nothing, it’s terrible, it’s terrible, we have no water, no kind of medical attention, we have so many babies, you’re the first [outsider] we’ve seen, we need Red Cross here, we need everything.”
Sprawled over the lawn behind him was the chaotic jumble of mattresses, tarpaulins and blankets that has become a familiar sight in every open space across the region.
“We’ve searched for the mayor but the mayor is nowhere,” said Decembre. “We asked the government and two services but no one will help us.”
Nearby I noticed a woman holding a child with what seemed to be a white crease in its head. I took a closer look, and established that the boy, Adson Jr, aged two, had been hit by a chunk of falling concrete that had actually dented his skull. There was no sign of blood, but the uncovered, untreated wound seemed to have oozed a white substance.
The mother had already taken him to a clinic in Carrefour, only to find hundreds of patients waiting outside. With nowhere to stay, she returned to New Hope.
On Monday I had driven south over the mountains to Jacmel, a seaside resort on a perfect horseshoe bay. Radio reports had spoken of mass devastation. The mountain road was said to be cut off by landslides. No aid was getting through.
The road not only proved to be open — to small four-wheel-drive vehicles only — but a visit to the tiny port yielded a triumph of British ingenuity. There stood Stuart Coles of Plan International, a charity based in Woking, Surrey, supervising the unloading from Dominican coastguard vessels of 4,000 family tents, crates of water, sugar and tea and piles of plastic tarpaulins.
The charity’s staff in the neighbouring Dominican Republic had talked local officials into finding them boats, and had sailed for six hours around the coast, long before the US, the United Nations, the World Food Programme or anyone else was bringing in relief.
“We’ve been working in Haiti since 1973,” said Coles. “We were in a position to move fast, so we did.”
By the end of Monday, hundreds of families who had lost their homes six days earlier had moved into British tents.
There was no such luck for the New Hope Ministry, where Jules Damus, a local community organiser, pulled me away to see the first-aid clinic he was trying to establish in the ruins of another church nearby.
Helped by Odette Pierre, a former nurse who would dispense basic health advice, he had painted a small sign that he proudly hung on the broken gate of the ruined church. “Sant Santé,” it read in Creole — health centre.
But what about medicine, bandages, doctors, I asked him. His “clinic” didn’t have a single sticking plaster, let alone morphine, electricity or water.
Damus shrugged. “We cannot wait for others to help us,” he said. “We have to start helping ourselves.”
Source:The Times
Every day, people shriek and wave in the hope of persuading them to stop. Some drivers slow down and shout that they will come back tomorrow.
Yet by Friday morning, 10 days after Haiti’s earthquake struck, nobody from the government or any relief agency had walked through the heavy metal gates of the American-owned missionary compound to confront the mayhem within.
Public frustration with the slowness of the aid effort and the government’s declaration that the search and rescue operation had been terminated increased yesterday with the freeing of a young man who had been trapped for the 11 days since the earthquake struck Port-au-PrinceA 24-year-old man was freed from beneath the collapsed Napoli Inn. The record for surviving an earthquake is 14 days set by a man trapped beneath a gym in the 1990 earthquake in the Philippines who had access to rain water.
On Friday I had paid my second visit to the New Hope Ministry, hoping that the misery I had witnessed earlier in the week would have been brought under control: that the aid supplies spreading through the fast-rotting shantytowns at the centre of Port-au-Prince would have reached this forlorn outpost only a few miles out of town.
Instead, I found Father Emil Samedi sitting at a small desk just inside his gate, exhaustion etched on his face, his words filled with despair.
“I’ve been up and down this country and every door is closed,” the priest said. “We are running out of food; our children are throwing up water.
“They keep saying that the government is having a meeting and that soon someone will come. But no one comes and I no longer know what I should do.”
To pass time as he waited for assistance, he decided to conduct a census. Living rough in less than an acre of space around the mission church are 2,027 people.
The plight of New Hope’s forgotten refugees — and countless earthquake survivors like them — highlights both the challenge and the daunting obstacles confronting relief co-ordinators.
Aid is flowing at last. But there is no visible mechanism in place to ensure that it reaches those most in need.
I had found New Hope by chance. Driving around Port-au-Prince earlier in the week, I had absent-mindedly switched on the car radio. There was mostly crackle and hum, but suddenly the dial fell on a strong, clear signal broadcasting a discussion in French and Creole from a hilltop station in Pétionville, a well-to-do suburb that emerged from the earthquake comparatively unscathed.
The station, Signal-FM, was broadcasting from offices a few blocks from my hotel. When I arrived, there was a crowd at the door, and as I squeezed past, a woman pressed a piece of paper into my hand.
“Please give this to them,” she said. “Please tell them we need help.” Inside the studio I found Mario Viau and his wife, Sheyla, presiding over what turned out to be the only radio station in the capital that had broadcast through the earthquake without interruption.
“When the building started shaking, we put on some music and went outside and waited,” said Viau. “When we realised the building was still standing, we went back indoors.”
I handed over my piece of paper, and Sheyla Viau winced. “We’ve had 5,000 of these,” she said. “So many people desperate for help.”
She handed me a sheaf of notes that were being read out on air, all heart-rending pleas for aid or information.
“Emmanuelle is looking for her father, Eric Leconte,” read one. “Jacques Arsène, if you’re alive, contact your daughter Farah,” read another.
One particularly elaborate note prompted me to write down the details. There was a church at Carrefour, a sprawling slum on the western edge of the city, and it housed 3,000 refugees.
“We have pregnant women, new-born handicapped, injured. Need food medicine water tent.” The church’s name was the Eglise du Dieu Vivant — the Church of the Living God.
Early the next morning I headed west. It didn’t take long to realise how difficult the distribution of aid would be along that blighted so-called highway. At every junction there were colossal traffic jams as buses and trucks laden with Haitians tried to make their escape from the city.
Quite apart from the heaps of earthquake rubble, overturned vehicles and unfilled axle-breaking potholes, long stretches of the road are flooded from a tidal surge and broken water pipes.
It passes the capital’s main petrol storage terminal, where a long line of tankers in both directions routinely blocks all lanes as they manoeuvre into position for loading. The average speed is less than 5mph.
I never found the Eglise du Dieu Vivant. A couple of false starts led to hour-long detours through streets choked with people. Houses that had crumbled into the street forced us to turn down rock-strewn alleys that were little wider than goat paths. We got more and more lost. If I could not reach the church in a small rented car, how on earth would an international relief agency deliver aid by truck?
Finally we stopped at the New Hope Ministry in search of directions home. And that was how I walked into yet another of Haiti’s infinite warrens of refugee hell.
Father Emil was out that day, scouring the city for help, and I was greeted by Robinson Decembre, a 33-year-old Haitian recently returned from Miami.
He was so astounded to see a foreigner coming through his gate that he could barely get his complaints out fast enough.
“The pastor is running back and forth trying to get aid, we’re receiving nothing, it’s terrible, it’s terrible, we have no water, no kind of medical attention, we have so many babies, you’re the first [outsider] we’ve seen, we need Red Cross here, we need everything.”
Sprawled over the lawn behind him was the chaotic jumble of mattresses, tarpaulins and blankets that has become a familiar sight in every open space across the region.
“We’ve searched for the mayor but the mayor is nowhere,” said Decembre. “We asked the government and two services but no one will help us.”
Nearby I noticed a woman holding a child with what seemed to be a white crease in its head. I took a closer look, and established that the boy, Adson Jr, aged two, had been hit by a chunk of falling concrete that had actually dented his skull. There was no sign of blood, but the uncovered, untreated wound seemed to have oozed a white substance.
The mother had already taken him to a clinic in Carrefour, only to find hundreds of patients waiting outside. With nowhere to stay, she returned to New Hope.
On Monday I had driven south over the mountains to Jacmel, a seaside resort on a perfect horseshoe bay. Radio reports had spoken of mass devastation. The mountain road was said to be cut off by landslides. No aid was getting through.
The road not only proved to be open — to small four-wheel-drive vehicles only — but a visit to the tiny port yielded a triumph of British ingenuity. There stood Stuart Coles of Plan International, a charity based in Woking, Surrey, supervising the unloading from Dominican coastguard vessels of 4,000 family tents, crates of water, sugar and tea and piles of plastic tarpaulins.
The charity’s staff in the neighbouring Dominican Republic had talked local officials into finding them boats, and had sailed for six hours around the coast, long before the US, the United Nations, the World Food Programme or anyone else was bringing in relief.
“We’ve been working in Haiti since 1973,” said Coles. “We were in a position to move fast, so we did.”
By the end of Monday, hundreds of families who had lost their homes six days earlier had moved into British tents.
There was no such luck for the New Hope Ministry, where Jules Damus, a local community organiser, pulled me away to see the first-aid clinic he was trying to establish in the ruins of another church nearby.
Helped by Odette Pierre, a former nurse who would dispense basic health advice, he had painted a small sign that he proudly hung on the broken gate of the ruined church. “Sant Santé,” it read in Creole — health centre.
But what about medicine, bandages, doctors, I asked him. His “clinic” didn’t have a single sticking plaster, let alone morphine, electricity or water.
Damus shrugged. “We cannot wait for others to help us,” he said. “We have to start helping ourselves.”
Source:The Times
'Bin Laden' claims Christmas Day bomb plot
A new audio tape said to be from Osama Bin Laden that claims responsibility for the Christmas Day airline bombing attempt in Detroit has warned of further attacks against America.
The short recording purporting to be from the al-Qaeda leader, which was aired on Al Jazeera television, said: “The message delivered to you through the plane of the heroic warrior Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was a confirmation of the previous messages sent by the heroes of the September 11.”
On Christmas Day, Mr Abdulmutallab, a Nigerian national, allegedly attempted to blow up the Northwest Airlines flight he was sitting on as it approached Detroit Metro Airport. But the bomb he was said to have been hiding in his underwear failed to explode.
He told police shortly afterward he had been trained and instructed in the plot by al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen.
RELATED LINKS
Hijack plot caused new UK terror alert
Live pigs blasted in terror attack experiments
I found Osama Bin Laden’s fifth bride
More than 60 messages have been broadcast by bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahri, al-Qaeda’s number two, and their allies since the September 11 attacks in 2001.
The tape was aired after MI5 raised the terrorist threat level in Britain from "substantial" to "severe" — meaning that counter-terrorism agencies believe that an attack is "highly likely".
It is believed that intelligence whispers from America that an al-Qaeda affiliated group is close to finalising another atrocity coupled with a conference on Yemen and Afghanistan in London this week led to the decision.
The measure was approved by the Government's Cobra emergency committee and announced by Alan Johnson, the Home Secretary, who said he wanted to stress that “there is no intelligence to suggest than an attack is imminent.”
David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, said today that it would “very stupid” of him to comment on the intelligence behind the change in threat level.
“The fact is though that these people will stop at nothing; they will try every trick in the book, they will use advanced technology, they will use all the mechanisms of open society that we depend on for their own terrible purposes.
“And they will try to strike Christians, Muslims, Jews randomly.”
The Government had a responsibility to keep the terrorist threat to the UK “under very careful scrutiny”, he added.
“We think it’s right to keep the public informed about the general threat level.”
Mr Miliband said the Christmas Day attack demonstrated “the links that can exist between different terrorist groups”.
But he told BBC One’s Andrew Marr Show that he would wait to see whether the tape was authentic.
“Let’s wait to see what he actually says; we know that the al-Qaeda senior leadership are in the badlands of the Afghan-Pakistan border, probably on the Pakistan side,” he said.
“We know too that the Detroit attack was the first time that al-Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula, which is a sub-group of the al-Qaeda franchise ... represents an attack on the West rather than an attack within the Middle East.
“Let’s see what he says but it obviously demonstrates both the dangers that exist but also the links that can exist between different terrorist groups.”
Mr Miliband said that there was an important meeting about Yemen on Wednesday. The meeting in London, called by Gordon Brown, will be attended by representatives of the Yemeni government, regional powers and Britain’s allies, probably including US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
It will come one day before a key conference in London on the future strategy of allied forces in Afghanistan, to be attended by President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan.
Source:The Times
The short recording purporting to be from the al-Qaeda leader, which was aired on Al Jazeera television, said: “The message delivered to you through the plane of the heroic warrior Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was a confirmation of the previous messages sent by the heroes of the September 11.”
On Christmas Day, Mr Abdulmutallab, a Nigerian national, allegedly attempted to blow up the Northwest Airlines flight he was sitting on as it approached Detroit Metro Airport. But the bomb he was said to have been hiding in his underwear failed to explode.
He told police shortly afterward he had been trained and instructed in the plot by al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen.
RELATED LINKS
Hijack plot caused new UK terror alert
Live pigs blasted in terror attack experiments
I found Osama Bin Laden’s fifth bride
More than 60 messages have been broadcast by bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahri, al-Qaeda’s number two, and their allies since the September 11 attacks in 2001.
The tape was aired after MI5 raised the terrorist threat level in Britain from "substantial" to "severe" — meaning that counter-terrorism agencies believe that an attack is "highly likely".
It is believed that intelligence whispers from America that an al-Qaeda affiliated group is close to finalising another atrocity coupled with a conference on Yemen and Afghanistan in London this week led to the decision.
The measure was approved by the Government's Cobra emergency committee and announced by Alan Johnson, the Home Secretary, who said he wanted to stress that “there is no intelligence to suggest than an attack is imminent.”
David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, said today that it would “very stupid” of him to comment on the intelligence behind the change in threat level.
“The fact is though that these people will stop at nothing; they will try every trick in the book, they will use advanced technology, they will use all the mechanisms of open society that we depend on for their own terrible purposes.
“And they will try to strike Christians, Muslims, Jews randomly.”
The Government had a responsibility to keep the terrorist threat to the UK “under very careful scrutiny”, he added.
“We think it’s right to keep the public informed about the general threat level.”
Mr Miliband said the Christmas Day attack demonstrated “the links that can exist between different terrorist groups”.
But he told BBC One’s Andrew Marr Show that he would wait to see whether the tape was authentic.
“Let’s wait to see what he actually says; we know that the al-Qaeda senior leadership are in the badlands of the Afghan-Pakistan border, probably on the Pakistan side,” he said.
“We know too that the Detroit attack was the first time that al-Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula, which is a sub-group of the al-Qaeda franchise ... represents an attack on the West rather than an attack within the Middle East.
“Let’s see what he says but it obviously demonstrates both the dangers that exist but also the links that can exist between different terrorist groups.”
Mr Miliband said that there was an important meeting about Yemen on Wednesday. The meeting in London, called by Gordon Brown, will be attended by representatives of the Yemeni government, regional powers and Britain’s allies, probably including US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
It will come one day before a key conference in London on the future strategy of allied forces in Afghanistan, to be attended by President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan.
Source:The Times
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Alastair Campbell: Blair pledged UK to war in notes to Bush
Tony Blair sent President Bush a series of secret notes in the run-up to the Iraq war in which he promised that Britain would "be there" if it came to military action against Saddam Hussein, it emerged today.
The existence of the letters, sent from Downing Street in 2002, was revealed by Mr Blair's chief spin-doctor, Alastair Campbell, as he gave evidence to an independent inquiry into the origins of the Iraq war.
The former director of communications at No 10 was the biggest name yet to testify before Sir John Chilcot's panel, where he was questioned for almost five hours – two hours more than originally scheduled.
Mr Blair will appear before the panel at a later date, as will Gordon Brown, who Mr Campbell said today had been part of Mr Blair's "inner circle" on Iraq.Mr Campbell stubbornly defended his old boss, insisting that Mr Blair had done his best to resolve the stand-off over Iraqi chemical and biological weapons "without a shot being fired".
He pointed out that that it was Mr Blair who insisted that the Americans turn to the UN Security Council for a diplomatic solution to the row.
He also dismissed as misguided earlier testimony from Sir Christopher Meyer, the then British Ambassador in Washington, that Mr Blair had undergone a major change of heart during a summit at Mr Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas, in April, 2002.
Sir Christopher told the panel last year that a deal had been "signed in blood" at Crawford to oust Saddam by force.
But under persistent questioning from Sir Roderic Lyne, who was British Ambassador in Moscow at the time, Mr Campbell was forced to admit that Mr Blair had made it clear to the White House that the US would not be left to go it alone in an eventual invasion.
Asked whether Mr Blair had ever written to Mr Bush as the crisis gathered pace in 2002 and, if so, what he had said, Mr Campbell replied, "the Prime Minister wrote quite a lot of notes to the President".
"I would say the tenor of them was that... we share the analysis, we share the concern, we are going to be with you in making sure that Saddam Hussein is faced up to his obligations and that Iraq is disarmed," Mr Campbell added.
"If that cannot be done diplomatically and it is to be done militarily, Britain will be there. That would be the tenor of the communication to the President."
Sir Roderic was quick to jump on the existence of the notes, prodding the veteran spin-doctor as to who would have seen them. Mr Campbell said that he himself had done so, as had the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, and several others.
He said that the Chilcot panel must also have seen them, adding: "They were very frank and advisory."
The main thrust of Mr Campbell's testimony was to insist that Mr Blair had hoped for a peaceful resolution right until the eve of the invasion, even if his "instinct" had been that Britain should stand by its ally.
He said that right up to the Commons vote on March 18, 2003, authorising military action, Mr Blair had held out the hope that President Saddam could be disarmed through the United Nations."His instinct was that we should be with the Americans. Does that mean that you tailor your policy to suit theirs? No," Mr Campbell said.
"The Prime Minister made clear throughout this was disarmament of Saddam Hussein through the United Nations."
Questioned about his own role, Mr Campbell denied that he had sought to "beef up" the Government’s now notorious dossier on Saddam's supposed weapons of mass destruction, insisting that he had given only "presentational" advice on the drawing up of the document published in September 2002.
He said that he never sought to override the intelligence judgments of the report’s author — Sir John Scarlett, chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC).
"At no time did I ever ask him to beef up, to override, any of the judgments that he had," he said. "At no point did anybody from the Prime Minister down say to anybody within the intelligence services ’You have got to tailor it to fit this judgment or that judgment’. It just never happened.
"The whole way through, it could not have been made clearer to everybody that nothing would override the intelligence judgments and that John Scarlett was the person who, if you like, had the single pen."
Mr Campbell said Sir John insisted throughout that he was "100 per cent in charge" of the process of compiling the dossier. But, early in September 2002, Mr Campbell confirmed that he chaired two meetings in No 10 to discuss the publication of the report.
"John Scarlett said to me, ’This is a document the Prime Minister is going to present to Parliament, there are massive global expectations around it, and I need a bit of presentational support’, and that is what I gave him," Mr Campbell said."I think it entirely not just appropriate but absolutely necessary that I should have done that. I was the person who was charged by the Prime Minister to advise him on all the presentational aspects to do with the dossier."
Mr Campbell insisted that the dossier had never been intended to make the case for war against Saddam, but was simply meant to show why Mr Blair was becoming increasingly concerned about his WMD programme.
Mr Campbell said he drafted Mr Blair’s foreword to the dossier, in which he said that intelligence showed "beyond doubt" that Iraq had chemical and biological weapons, although the Prime Minister at the time had "almost certainly" re-written it.
He rejected Sir John’s earlier evidence to the inquiry that he did not believe that he could have changed the foreword as it was a "political statement" by Mr Blair.If John Scarlett or any of his team had had any concerns of real substance about the foreword, then they know they could have raised those directly with the Prime Minister," he said.
"I don’t believe that if any of the JIC thought that the foreword in any sense over-stated the case to a degree that would impact the work that they had done — hit its credibility — they didn’t feel they had the opportunity to say something."
But Mr Campbell admitted that a second intelligence dossier published in February 2003, which also included material taken from an academic journal on the Middle East, had been a "mistake".
He said the intention had been to expose Saddam’s efforts to undermine the UN weapons inspections process in the light of new intelligence from MI6. However when it became known how it was put together — leading it to be dubbed the "dodgy dossier" — he acknowledged that it was damaging to public trust.
"That did not help, let’s put it that way," he said. "That was a really difficult episode."
Mr Campbell said that Mr Blair always shared the American analysis that Saddam led an "awful, brutal, dictatorial" regime that posed a threat to the stability of the region.
He insisted that even at the Crawford meeting Mr Bush had not been talking about military action, although he disclosed that there was a small planning team at US Central Command in Tampa, Florida, that was looking at the military options.
"The context that I am trying to give you is not that George Bush is saying to Tony Blair, ’We have got to go to war’. It was not like that at all," he said.
Source: The times
The existence of the letters, sent from Downing Street in 2002, was revealed by Mr Blair's chief spin-doctor, Alastair Campbell, as he gave evidence to an independent inquiry into the origins of the Iraq war.
The former director of communications at No 10 was the biggest name yet to testify before Sir John Chilcot's panel, where he was questioned for almost five hours – two hours more than originally scheduled.
Mr Blair will appear before the panel at a later date, as will Gordon Brown, who Mr Campbell said today had been part of Mr Blair's "inner circle" on Iraq.Mr Campbell stubbornly defended his old boss, insisting that Mr Blair had done his best to resolve the stand-off over Iraqi chemical and biological weapons "without a shot being fired".
He pointed out that that it was Mr Blair who insisted that the Americans turn to the UN Security Council for a diplomatic solution to the row.
He also dismissed as misguided earlier testimony from Sir Christopher Meyer, the then British Ambassador in Washington, that Mr Blair had undergone a major change of heart during a summit at Mr Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas, in April, 2002.
Sir Christopher told the panel last year that a deal had been "signed in blood" at Crawford to oust Saddam by force.
But under persistent questioning from Sir Roderic Lyne, who was British Ambassador in Moscow at the time, Mr Campbell was forced to admit that Mr Blair had made it clear to the White House that the US would not be left to go it alone in an eventual invasion.
Asked whether Mr Blair had ever written to Mr Bush as the crisis gathered pace in 2002 and, if so, what he had said, Mr Campbell replied, "the Prime Minister wrote quite a lot of notes to the President".
"I would say the tenor of them was that... we share the analysis, we share the concern, we are going to be with you in making sure that Saddam Hussein is faced up to his obligations and that Iraq is disarmed," Mr Campbell added.
"If that cannot be done diplomatically and it is to be done militarily, Britain will be there. That would be the tenor of the communication to the President."
Sir Roderic was quick to jump on the existence of the notes, prodding the veteran spin-doctor as to who would have seen them. Mr Campbell said that he himself had done so, as had the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, and several others.
He said that the Chilcot panel must also have seen them, adding: "They were very frank and advisory."
The main thrust of Mr Campbell's testimony was to insist that Mr Blair had hoped for a peaceful resolution right until the eve of the invasion, even if his "instinct" had been that Britain should stand by its ally.
He said that right up to the Commons vote on March 18, 2003, authorising military action, Mr Blair had held out the hope that President Saddam could be disarmed through the United Nations."His instinct was that we should be with the Americans. Does that mean that you tailor your policy to suit theirs? No," Mr Campbell said.
"The Prime Minister made clear throughout this was disarmament of Saddam Hussein through the United Nations."
Questioned about his own role, Mr Campbell denied that he had sought to "beef up" the Government’s now notorious dossier on Saddam's supposed weapons of mass destruction, insisting that he had given only "presentational" advice on the drawing up of the document published in September 2002.
He said that he never sought to override the intelligence judgments of the report’s author — Sir John Scarlett, chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC).
"At no time did I ever ask him to beef up, to override, any of the judgments that he had," he said. "At no point did anybody from the Prime Minister down say to anybody within the intelligence services ’You have got to tailor it to fit this judgment or that judgment’. It just never happened.
"The whole way through, it could not have been made clearer to everybody that nothing would override the intelligence judgments and that John Scarlett was the person who, if you like, had the single pen."
Mr Campbell said Sir John insisted throughout that he was "100 per cent in charge" of the process of compiling the dossier. But, early in September 2002, Mr Campbell confirmed that he chaired two meetings in No 10 to discuss the publication of the report.
"John Scarlett said to me, ’This is a document the Prime Minister is going to present to Parliament, there are massive global expectations around it, and I need a bit of presentational support’, and that is what I gave him," Mr Campbell said."I think it entirely not just appropriate but absolutely necessary that I should have done that. I was the person who was charged by the Prime Minister to advise him on all the presentational aspects to do with the dossier."
Mr Campbell insisted that the dossier had never been intended to make the case for war against Saddam, but was simply meant to show why Mr Blair was becoming increasingly concerned about his WMD programme.
Mr Campbell said he drafted Mr Blair’s foreword to the dossier, in which he said that intelligence showed "beyond doubt" that Iraq had chemical and biological weapons, although the Prime Minister at the time had "almost certainly" re-written it.
He rejected Sir John’s earlier evidence to the inquiry that he did not believe that he could have changed the foreword as it was a "political statement" by Mr Blair.If John Scarlett or any of his team had had any concerns of real substance about the foreword, then they know they could have raised those directly with the Prime Minister," he said.
"I don’t believe that if any of the JIC thought that the foreword in any sense over-stated the case to a degree that would impact the work that they had done — hit its credibility — they didn’t feel they had the opportunity to say something."
But Mr Campbell admitted that a second intelligence dossier published in February 2003, which also included material taken from an academic journal on the Middle East, had been a "mistake".
He said the intention had been to expose Saddam’s efforts to undermine the UN weapons inspections process in the light of new intelligence from MI6. However when it became known how it was put together — leading it to be dubbed the "dodgy dossier" — he acknowledged that it was damaging to public trust.
"That did not help, let’s put it that way," he said. "That was a really difficult episode."
Mr Campbell said that Mr Blair always shared the American analysis that Saddam led an "awful, brutal, dictatorial" regime that posed a threat to the stability of the region.
He insisted that even at the Crawford meeting Mr Bush had not been talking about military action, although he disclosed that there was a small planning team at US Central Command in Tampa, Florida, that was looking at the military options.
"The context that I am trying to give you is not that George Bush is saying to Tony Blair, ’We have got to go to war’. It was not like that at all," he said.
Source: The times
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