Blair Accused Of Trying To 'Privatise' War In Iraq

Taken from the Independent, UK, 30 October 2006
By Kim Sengupta

The UK Government has been accused of reneging on pledges to control private security companies operating in Iraq because it wants to "privatise the war" as part of its exit strategy.

The Government has not only failed to bring in legislation promised four years ago, but has actively encouraged security firms in Iraq by giving them multimillion -pound contracts to take over duties which could have been performed by British forces, says the report published today by the charity War on Want.

Humanitarian groups, MPs and international lawyers have called for tighter controls on "mercenaries".

In Britain both the Foreign Office and the Ministry of Defence are believed to favour such a move. But, with the clamour for withdrawal from Iraq, Downing Street is said to view the private firms as a favoured option in expediting the pullout.

War on Want's campaigns director, John Hilary, said: "There are genuine worries that the Government is trying to privatise the Iraq conflict. The occupation of Iraq has allowed British mercenaries to reap huge profits. But the Government has failed to enact laws to punish their human rights abuses, including firing on Iraqi civilians.

"How can Tony Blair hope to restore peace and security in Iraq while allowing mercenary armies to operate completely outside the law?"

The study charts how the result has been boom times for security firms with the industry making $100bn a year (£53bn), mainly from Iraq and Afghanistan, with British firms among some of the top earners.

Just one firm, Aegis Defence Services, run by Col Tim Spicer, who was formerly enmeshed in the controversy over supplying arms to Sierra Leone, has increased its turnover from £554,000 before the war began in 2003 to £62m last year.

While British troop levels in Iraq currently stand at 7,200 - with plans to halve this number in the next six months - there are almost 21,000 British private security guards, part of an international force of 48,000 described by US senators as the "largest private army in the world".

The report, Corporate Mercenaries: The threat of private military and security companies, comes on the same day the British security industry holds its first annual conference in London, and also on the deadline given by the US General George Casey to improve security in Iraq. On Friday a National Audit Office report is expected to warn that Britain's armed forces are failing to recruit and retain sufficient soldiers to deliver the " required military capability".

In Iraq, all non-Iraqi military personnel and private military contractors were made immune from prosecution under the Coalition Provisional Authority's Order 17 for acts performed within terms of their contract by Paul Bremer, the American head of the CPA in June 2004.

It is unclear whether that has changed since the inauguration of the new Iraqi government. But, while British and American soldiers have faced courts martial over alleged crimes carried out in Iraq, not one security contractor has been prosecuted at home or in Iraq despite a significant number of allegations of abuse.

Security business
* Aegis Defence Services (UK)
The biggest British winner in Iraq, it increased its turnover from £554,000 in 2003 to £62m in 2005. The company, run by Lt-Col Tim Spicer, was awarded a contract worth $293m (£154m) by the CPA in Iraq.

* ARMORGROUP (UK)
The company's turnover has increased from $71m in 2001 to $233m in 2005. The Foreign Office and Department for International Development have awarded it contracts in Kabul, Baghdad and Basra.

* Control Risk Group (UK)
Turnover rose from £47m in 2003 to £80m in 2004. In Iraq it has been employed by the Pentagon, the CPA, the Office of Reconstruction and Development and USAID. It also provides guards for British government staff in Iraq.

* Erinys International (UK/South Africa)
Formed in 2003 with a contract of $100m from the CPA to guard oil sites and pipelines in Iraq. Led by a former political adviser to ex-Angolan opposition leader Jonas Savimbi.

* Blackwater (US)
Provided security guards and helicopters for the former CPA head, Paul Bremer, and the former US ambassador, John Negroponte.

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Last week we found out that most of the companies that won contracts to rebuild Iraq were sponging the money (absorbing it) via administrative costs, now we hear how the duties of the UK and US armies are being contracted out to private companies – this definately gives a new meaning to the term "Soldiers of Fortune".

Don't Mention The War: Israel Seeks Image Makeover!

Extracted from Yahoo News, 26.10.06
By Dan Williams (Reuters)

After decades of battling to win foreign support for its two-fisted policies against Arab foes, Israel is trying a new approach with a campaign aimed at creating a less warlike and more welcoming national image.

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, who has argued that the protracted conflict with the Palestinians is sapping Israel's international legitimacy, this week convened diplomats and PR executives to come up with ways of "rebranding" the country.

"When the word 'Israel' is said outside its borders, we want it to invoke not fighting or soldiers, but a place that is desirable to visit and invest in, a place that preserves democratic ideals while struggling to exist," Livni said.

The campaign is a departure from the government's long-held practice of "hasbara," or "explaining" itself to Western audiences that may have little sympathy for crackdowns on Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

Now Israel wants to create an alternative image abroad, focused exclusively on assets like tourist attractions and business innovations. In the words of one campaigner and ad executive, the aim would be to create "a narrative of normalcy."

"Israelis feel the need to explain themselves, to prove that they are in the right, but this doesn't always create empathy," said Guy Toledano, who represents British PR firm Saatchi & Saatchi and is helping the Foreign Ministry free of charge.

The brain-storming team has been asked to come up with four proposed strategies, one of which will be launched in January.

Palestinians, who have found it harder to push their own message abroad since the election of a Hamas Islamist government that has come under a Western aid embargo for its refusal to recognize the Jewish state, accused Israel of a white-wash.

"Nothing Israel can do in its campaigns or media influence cancels the fact that they are an occupying power," said Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat, a moderate.

Amir Gissin, public relations director at the Foreign Ministry, said that the image makeover was also about keeping Israel on the right side of the U.S.-led "war on terror."

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Whatever the Israeli government tries to do nothing can prevent it from concealing the truth about its domestic policies.

Many people can see that Israel's policies inflame the anti-Western violence of Islamist militant groups. It also encourages Jewish hatred.

The settlement issue in Palestine is one of the simplest puzzles to solve yet the Israeli government make it a difficult and complex issue by directly and indirectly encouraging settlers and funding of settlements from various global sources. There is little hope for the Palestinians as their land (illegially occupied) is slowly annexed little by little by Israal.



“When Israelis in the occupied territories now claim that they have to defend themselves, they are defending themselves in the sense that any military occupier has to defend itself against the population they are crushing... You can't defend yourself when you're militarily occupying someone else's land. That's not defence. Call it what you like, it's not defence”.
- Noam Chomsky

Inside Israel, Arab Christian and Muslims that were forced to leave the state of Israel during its creation are not allowed to come back to Israel but Jews from London, New York, Moscow (and all around the world) are allowed to buy properties and settle in Israel.

Today the United States invests approximately $6billion annually to Israel. About 60% of the aid represents Military Arms (these exclude free weapons). Since the creation of Israel, the United States has invested over $100 billion in taxpayer’s money to secure Israel. It is unlikely that Israel will ever pay this back.
Is it in Americans interest to back Israel? Many argue that the Israel has helped America combat Arab Nationalism in the Middle East, it scares it neighbours and protects US access to oil and other national resources and finally it helps the US in Central America with providing military assistant in regimes US propped dup in the 1980’s.

Why was this money not used to secure peace in the region and encourage Israel to co-operate and love thy neighbour? Isn’t this a worthwhile investment? Many people of all faiths (including Jews living inside Israel) have condemned the Israeli government for it violence yet whilst these atrocities are reported freely in Israeli media, the US media takes a different stance.

It has been reported that companies like CNN have different news coverage in the US to its international broadcast. The diluted news coverage of news in the Israel by the US media makes a mockery of journalism. Whilst the whole world sees what is happening in Israel, the American public are duped with misinformation or toned down Israeli attacks on Palestinians.

American news coverage is influenced by a complex set of institutional relationships. These influences can be thought of as a series of filters through which the news must travel before it emerges in the voices of news anchors. To understand how American news media report on the Middle East conflict, we need to understand how these institutional filters operate.

Among the most important of these filters are the business interests of the corporations that own the mass media, interests that extend beyond the United States and across the globe to the Middle East. The economic interests of media owners are shared by political elites, politicians and policymakers who form a second filter. These political elites have the power to access and influence mainstream media and are themselves part of a system dominated by corporate money and interests. The strategic importance of the Middle East to these two groups is reflected in media coverage of the region and of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.



A third filter, Israel's own public relations efforts, further affects the coverage. The government of Israel employs some of the largest American public relations firms as image consultants to coordinate its political and media campaigns. Nine Israeli consulates helped implement these PR campaigns by developing relationships with journalists and monitoring media outlets.

Scores of private American organizations, both Christian and Jewish, reiterate the official line and organize grassroots opposition to any coverage deemed unfavorable to Israel. The most important of these is AIPAC, the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, widely regarded as the most powerful foreign lobby in Washington. This institutional framework of American business and political interests in combination with Israeli public relations shapes media coverage of the Middle East.

At the same time, those progressive organizations opposing Israeli government policy, such as Jews Against the Occupation and Americans for Peace Now, rarely make it through these filters. Finally, if any news stories critical of Israeli policy do surface, there are a host of media watchdog groups that monitor and pressure journalists and media outlets, the most important of which is CAMERA.

For an accurate reporting on how the US media influenced by I STRONGLY RECOMMEND the links below (particularly the video of Peace, Propaganda and the Promised Land). It is only one hour and 20 minutes long – well worth the coverage.

Further Reading/ Viewing:
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Video: Peace, Propaganda and the Promised Land (US Media And the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict)
[Google Video] / [You Tube]

Democracy Now!: Censorship and propaganda in the US [Google Video]

Democracy Now!: The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy [You Tube]

Wikipedia: American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC)

Wikipedia: The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA)

SpeakeroftheTruth: To Israel With Love

Peace In The Middle East Stalled By Israel (But Is It Influenced By The US?)

The last couple of weeks we have seen numerous attempts for peace in the Middle East block by the government of Israel….

Israel snubs EU delegation due to far-Right MP (Reuters 29.10.06)
Israel said on Friday it would not welcome a delegation of European Union parliamentarians planning to visit the country this week if it included a far-right French member.

The Foreign Ministry said Israel objected to the inclusion of Marine Le Pen, daughter of far-right French leader Jean-Marie Le Pen, in the delegation.

A spokesman for the European Parliament said the delegation had postponed the trip. The delegation was scheduled to visit Israel and the Palestinian territories between October 28 and November 4. It was expected to meet Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

"We wanted to receive delegations from the European parliament, but the composition of the delegation made that impossible," Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said.

Jean-Marie Le Pen said Israel's refusal to meet his daughter ran "contrary to diplomatic traditions" and "basic democracy".

Livni cancels Qatar visit due to Hamas plan to attend summit (Haaretz, 29.10.06)
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni has decided not to attend an international conference in Qatar Sunday due to the expected participation of a Hamas delegation in the event.

Livni was invited to represent Israel at the UN-sponsored sixth International Conference on New or Restored Democracies in Doha. She had hoped to take advantage of her first visit to a Gulf state to strengthen Israel's ties with moderate Arab states. It was to be the most high-profile visit by an Israeli official to the Gulf state in 10 years.

Livni had learned previously that delegations from both the Palestinian parliament and from Hamas had been invited to the conference. After the Israeli representation in Qatar was informed that Hamas officials had accepted the invitation, Livni made the decision Saturday not to attend, three days after announcing her plans to travel to the Gulf state.

Israel has low-level relations with Qatar and maintains a trade representation office in Doha. Last month Livni met with Qatar's Foreign Minister, Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem bin Jabr al-Thani, at the UN General Assembly.

Sunday's conference will include speeches by many foreign ministers from Arab and European countries, as well as working meetings on strengthening democracy.

Israel must resist US pressure, engage in talks with Abbas, Assad (Ynetnews Opinion - 21.10.06)
Former Israeli governments always announced they would not bow to American pressure regarding the Middle East peace process. The assumption was that the American administration would pressure Israel to make far-reaching concessions in order to advance peace.

Today America is applying a different type of pressure aimed at preventing Israel from making concessions that would enable moving the peace wagon forward. But we shouldn't succumb to pressure of this type either.

Regarding the Palestinians, the Americans are insisting on full implementation of the international Quartet's roadmap. Anyone with eyes in their heads realizes that the first phase of the roadmap is not feasible in the atmosphere of the current balance of power between Fatah and Hamas. Mahmoud Abbas and his people are unable to dismantle the Hamas terror infrastructure.

If Israel is truly seeking a peace process it must suffice with a full ceasefire and cessation of Palestinian terror activities. When Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Chairman Mahmoud Abbas meet, in addition to an exchange of prisoners and the release of captive IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, it would suffice for them to announce the renewal of diplomatic negotiations based on existing agreements.

These agreements include the cessation of terror, recognition of Israel and a solution to disputes through negotiations and not violence.

What about Assad?
Regarding Syria, President Bush and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice unequivocally oppose Israeli-Syrian negotiations. We, however, have a strategic interest in dismantling terror in Iran, Syria, Hizbullah and Hamas. This we can do by means of diplomatic negotiations with the Syrians, a proposal occasionally being made by Syrian President Assad.

Clearly, in any preparations for talks it would be incumbent on us to demand that Syria end its support for Hamas and Hizbullah. These are crucial strategic interests for Israel. We have to heal the festering Palestinian wound and reach a settlement of two states living side by side in peace and security.

Moreover, we would do well to engage in negotiations with Syria in order to create leverage for a comprehensive settlement in the Middle East, which would guarantee Israel's security.

It appears that the Bush administration's policies are aimed at empowering the world towards democracy and ridding it of terror so that world countries would become part of the pro-Western spectrum. To this end, pressure is being exerted on various countries and attempts are being made to undermine their legitimacy.

Israel's interests, however, are different, particularly after the second Lebanon war when diplomatic settlements potentially became Israel's defensive shield. Once again we must not succumb to American pressure. In today's reality, we have to demonstrate more flexibility than is expected by our great friends.

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The opinion section of the Ynetnews reports pretty much sums up the situation. Israel needs to make friends and find a compromise with its Arab neighbours. How long can it sustain the support of the United States? How long can it secretly annex Palestinian land in the West Bank and Gaza Strip with settlements?

Just because Israel disagrees with the politics of any delegation that wants to meet them doesn’t mean that they should ignore meeting them.

As Foreign Minister, Livni should be reaching out, making new contacts and strengthening Israel's position in the region. There is no reason to fall into a rut and stagnation on the diplomatic front.

President Asad had called for peace talks with Israel yet this is denied. Why ruin this historic chance?

The European Union Foreign Policy Chief Javier Solana said following a meeting with Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah last week that “the Palestinian people have suffered and suffered a lot, and it is time that the occupation that started in 1967 is over.”

A few weeks ago U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the United States would work hard to create a Palestinian state free of the "daily humiliation" of Israeli occupation.

Yet they don’t want to bring Hamas and the Israeli government together. The US have been found out to be indirectly funding parties opposed to the democratically elected government of Hamas. We know historically this is not a good sign. The international boycott of the Hamas-led Palestinian government has yielded no results, and as poverty soars and civil war looms, time and options are running out for Israel, the Palestinians and the international community.

Hamas is ready for peace talks as according to the Jerusalem Post (Oct. 12, 2006) Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal has told London-based Arabic daily Al-Hayat that he was willing to accept a Palestinian state within 1967 borders, as well as a hudna [truce] with Israel but not to recognize the "occupation."The Hamas political chief also hinted at the possibility that his organization and the Hamas-led Palestinian government would recognize agreements with Israel the PA and PLO previously signed. Why waste the chance for peace?

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Hamas, should be given more time to accept any peace demands. In an interview published Kuwaiti news agency KUNA, Lavrov said Hamas could "move gradually toward accepting" the international conditions.

After Hamas won parliamentary elections in January, Moscow invited the militant group's leaders to visit over Israeli objections. Lavrov told Olmert in Moscow that keeping up contacts with Hamas could help to moderate them. Olmert told the Russians he disagreed. – Again why waste the chance for peace, why waste the chance for debate and any ongoing negotiations?

As Chirchill said : To jaw-jaw is (always) better than to war-war

Weekly Round Up: Stupid USA, "Not" Stupid, Hizbullah Used US Arms & Cobain Beats Elvis As Richest Artist!

The week started with a senior US official saying that the US were 'arrogant and stupid' in Iraq, then retracting the comment a day later. Midweek two British children were killed by a gas leak in a Corfu hotel and it has now been revealed that four staff at the hotel will face manslaughter charges. We also learnt that US contractors in Iraq were wasting a lot of money in so called administrative costs, Iraq was still paying Kuwait for its invastion, British journalits were being condemned for telling the truth! and Germany knew of CIA torture cells but did not tell anyone. The Week ended with Dick Cheyney saying that waterboarding was justified interrogation of prisoners and President Bush stating that the US did not torture its prisoners!

Here are all the other news from around the world...

North America
Schroeder suspicious of Bush's faith
Gerhard Schroeder, the former German chancellor, has described in his memoirs how he was suspicious of George Bush's constant references to his Christian faith.

"I am anything but anti-American," Schroeder told Der Spiegel in an interview to accompany the excerpt of the book which will go on sale on Thursday.

In the book, Schroeder, who led the Social Democrats to power in 1998, recalls that he had tears in his eyes as he watched television pictures of people jumping from the burning World Trade Centre on September 11, 2001.

He believed that Germany would have to react. He wrote: "It was important to me that Germany fulfill its requirements as an ally [of the US]".

While meetings with Bush at that time were friendly, Schroeder writes, he could not reconcile himself with the feeling that religion was the driving force behind many of the president's political decisions.

"What bothered me, and in a certain way made me suspicious despite the relaxed atmosphere, was again and again in our discussions how much this president described himself as 'God-fearing,"' Schroeder wrote, adding he was a firm believer in the separation of church and state.

"We rightly criticise that in most Islamic states, the role of religion for society and the character of the rule of law are not clearly separated," he added.

"But we fail to recognize that in the USA, the Christian fundamentalists and their interpretation of the Bible have similar tendencies".

Rumsfeld: 'Back Off' on Iraq Timeline Questions
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told reporters yesterday to "just back off" and "relax" instead of looking for differences between U.S. and Iraqi officials on benchmarks for progress in Iraq toward political and security goals, and he rejected the idea of penalizing any failure to hit the targets.

In a Pentagon news conference, Rumsfeld sparred repeatedly with questioners over reported discord between U.S. officials and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on a timeline for Iraqi security forces to assume more responsibilities from U.S. troops. Rumsfeld disputed a characterization of Iraqi forces as chronically failing to meet benchmarks, saying this assertion was "flat wrong" and that the Iraqis have "done a darn good job."

In response, Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said, "Today a secretary of defense, who should have been fired a long time ago, lost even greater touch with reality."

The White House also jumped into the fray today, accusing the "mainstream media" of having distorted Maliki's remarks in a Baghdad news conference yesterday and taken his words "out of context." In a statement, the White House said Maliki was clarifying that the U.S. government is not pursuing a timeline for withdrawing American forces from Iraq and was making the point that discussions of such a timeline were being driven by U.S. election-year politics rather than Bush administration policy.

Former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling Sentenced to 24 Years in Prison
At a hearing last Monday where Jeffrey Skilling continued to proclaim his innocence, U.S. District Judge Sim Lake of Houston sentenced Skilling, the former chief executive officer of Houston's Enron Corp., to more than 24 years in prison.

Lake denied Skilling's request to remain free on bail pending his appeal, but the judge allowed Skilling to remain in home confinement until the U.S. Bureau of Prisons orders him to report to prison. Lake granted a defense motion that Skilling serve his time in the Butner Federal Corrections Complex in Butner, N.C.

In May, a jury found Skilling guilty of 19 criminal charges stemming from the collapse of Enron, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in December 2001. Skilling stood trial alongside former Enron Chairman Kenneth Lay, but Lay died in July, and earlier this month Lake vacated Lay's conviction of 10 criminal charges because Lay's death made it impossible for him to appeal his conviction.

Lake sentenced Skilling to 292 months in prison, which was at the low end of the range of punishment dictated by the Federal Sentencing Guidelines. Lake said Skilling could have received up to 365 months in prison under the guidelines. Prosecutors and defense attorneys had stipulated the financial loss caused by Skilling's crimes at a minimum of $80 million, Lake said.

Mexico extradited 50 fugitives to U.S.
Mexico has extradited a record 50 fugitives to the United States this year, including several alleged drug traffickers, murders and rapists, U.S. Ambassador Tony Garza announced Tuesday.

Garza said the extraditions showed that Mexico is no longer a haven for U.S. criminals. "Fugitives allegedly committed crimes in the United States and thought they would enjoy free and unfettered lives south of the border," Garza said in a statement. "They were wrong."

In November, Mexico's Supreme Court removed an obstacle that had prevented many of the country's most notorious criminals from facing U.S. justice when it overturned a four-year ban on the extradition of suspects facing life in prison.

However, Mexico still refuses to extradite suspects who face the death penalty in other countries. Capital punishment is illegal here, and a 1978 treaty with the United States allows Mexico to deny extradition if the suspect could be executed.

Ottawa seeks to deport U.S. man "exiled" to Canada
An American sex offender who was sentenced by a U.S. judge to three years "exile" in Canada was arrested by Canadian border guards on Thursday and faces deportation, the government said.

Federal ministers and legislators had expressed deep unhappiness after a New York state judge allowed former teacher Malcolm Watson -- convicted of having sex with a 15-year-old girl -- to live in Canada on probation rather than spending time in a U.S. jail.

Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day said "We don't want to see Canada become a haven for pedophiles or any other person committing serious crime, we don't want U.S. courts getting the notion that we just take people here that they would have put in jail but they instead send to Canada."

U.S. authorities say Watson's relationship with the 15-year-old was consensual. The age of consent in Canada is 14 but it rises to 18 if the sex takes place within a relationship of trust or dependency, such as between a teacher and student.

Watson, a U.S. citizen, lives in southern Ontario near the U.S. border with his wife and children. He had commuted to work at a girls' school in nearby Buffalo, New York. The U.S. judge ruled that Watson could return to the United States only to report to his parole officer.

Protests erode law in Mexico's Oaxaca
With virtually no police in the streets, residents of this colonial town in rebellion are stepping in to fill the void — often with brutal consequences.

People accused of being thieves are tied to light posts and beaten, one home was torched and a man was stabbed to death with an ice pick as five months of protests erode the rule of law in what was once a major Mexican tourist destination.

Because there are no police patrols, masked and armed protesters roam the streets, seizing anyone they suspect of criminal activity. Often, they grab young men accused of trying to commit various crimes, tie them up for hours and beat them.

The conflict began in June, when police attacked striking teachers in the city's colonial center. Protesters rebelled, forcing police and other state authorities out of downtown, taking over television and radio outlets and scaring away tourists drawn to the region by its colonial architecture, Indian culture and handicrafts such as brightly colored wool rugs and black pottery.

Anthrax Attacks - New York Times Columnist Must Reveal Sources, Judge Rules
A federal judge has ordered the New York Times Co. to disclose the confidential sources used by Nicholas D. Kristof in columns that explored whether a former Army scientist was responsible for the deadly 2001 anthrax attacks.

The ruling, made public, came in a lawsuit filed by the former scientist, Steven J. Hatfill, contending that the paper defamed him in a series of Kristof columns in 2002 that identified him as a "likely culprit." Hatfill has been identified by authorities as a "person of interest" in the anthrax-spore mailings that killed five people and sickened 17. No one has been charged in the attacks.

The ruling is the latest in a series of court defeats for journalists trying to shield news-gathering activities from the legal process. Judges have ordered reporters covering issues ranging from baseball's steroid scandal to the investigation into the leak of CIA officer Valerie Plame's identity to disclose confidential sources. In the Plame case, former New York Times reporter Judith Miller spent 85 days in jail for refusing to comply.

But those were criminal cases; Hatfill's is a civil lawsuit. Legal experts said it is relatively common for judges to order journalists to reveal confidential sources in a libel lawsuit, but the journalist is rarely jailed for resisting.

Cobain beats Elvis as richest artist (deceased)
Death is not always the dumbest of career moves, especially if you are a rock star of enduring appeal. Kurt Cobain, the one-time frontman for Nirvana who committed suicide in 1994, earned $50m (£25m) over the past year, according to Forbes magazine's annual list of Top-Earning Dead Celebrities published yesterday.

That figure catapulted Cobain into first place, beating the most reliable of posthumous money-spinners, Elvis Presley, as well as a predominantly musical dozen of also-rans including John Lennon, Ray Charles and Bob Marley.

The list is a ghoulish, darkly humorous send-up of the Forbes list of the 400 richest Americans, timed to coincide with Halloween, but it is also a reflection on the extraordinarily lucrative world of licensing and merchandising deals involving artists no longer with us.

Top 10 'rich dead' list
1 Kurt Cobain ($50m - £26.3m), 2 Elvis Presley ($42m - £22.1m), 3 Charles Schulz ($35m - £18.4m), 4 John Lennon ($24m - £12.6m), 5 Albert Einstein ($20m - £10.5m), 6 Andy Warhol ($19m - £10m), 7 Dr Seuss/Theodor Geisel ($10ms - £5.3m), 8 Ray Charles ($10m - £5.3m), 9 Marilyn Monroe ($8m - £4.2m), 10 Johnny Cash ($8m - £4.2m).

South America
Former Iran leader wanted in Argentina
Argentine prosecutors asked a federal judge on Wednesday to order the arrest of former Iranian President Hashemi Rafsanjani and seven others for the 1994 bombing of a Jewish cultural center that killed scores of people.

The decision to attack the center "was undertaken in 1993 by the highest authorities of the then-government of Iran," prosecutor Alberto Nisman said at a news conference. He said the actual attack was entrusted to the Lebanon-based group Hezbollah.

The worst terrorist attack ever on Argentine soil, the bombing of the Jewish cultural center in Buenos Aires killed 85 people and injured more than 200 when an explosive-laden vehicle detonated near the building.

Iran's government has vehemently denied any involvement in the attack following repeated accusations by Jewish community and other leaders here.

The attack on the seven-story Jewish center, a symbol of Argentina's more than 200,000-strong Jewish population, was the second of two attacks targeting Jews in Argentina during the 1990s. A March 1992 blast destroyed the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, killing 29 people in a case that has also been blamed on Hezbollah.

Although Jewish community leaders and others have suspected the involvement of Middle East terrorists, a lack of progress in tracking down the masterminds has made families of the victims increasingly bitter.

In 2004, about a dozen former police officers and an accused trafficker in stolen vehicles were acquitted of charges that they had formed a "local connection" in the bombing.

Venezuela, Guatemala to seek new U.N. candidate
Venezuela and Guatemala have agreed in principle to end their contest for a coveted seat on the U.N. Security Council but have yet to agree on an alternate candidate, diplomats said.

The U.N. General Assembly resumed repetitive voting on Wednesday, with Guatemala beating Venezuela 109 to 72 - less than the two-thirds need in the 192-member General Assembly.

The Venezuelan and Guatemalan foreign ministers intend to meet in New York on Thursday to try to agree on a consensus candidate for the seat, one of two earmarked for Latin America on the 15-nation council, the diplomats said.

Guatemala is backed by the United States for the two-year seat while Venezuela has painted the race as a battle against Washington and its U.N. ambassador, John Bolton.

The new developments emerged during a meeting of the 35 Latin American and Caribbean U.N. members, convened after neither Venezuela nor Guatemala was able to win in 35 ballots conducted last week in the General Assembly.

Report: Pinochet gold deposit discovered
A Hong Kong bank has a multimillion-dollar gold deposit registered to Augusto Pinochet, the government said Wednesday. Newspapers put the total at some $160 million, but a lawyer and spokesman for the former Chilean dictator denied it.

Foreign Minister Alejandro Foxley said the Chilean government received information about the account "through one of our diplomatic missions abroad several days ago."

A spokesman for Pinochet, retired Gen. Guillermo Garin, said he had no information on the alleged deposit at the HSBC bank in Hong Kong. "I had never heard anything about this before, so I have never talked about this with him (Pinochet)," Garin told The Associated Press by telephone. "But I have no doubt whatsoever that this report has no real basis at all."

The discovery was part of an investigation into Pinochet's fortune abroad that began in 2004 after a U.S. Senate investigative committee disclosed that the 90-year-old former ruler held millions of dollars at the Riggs Bank in Washington. Since then, Pinochet's fortune at several foreign banks had been estimated at $28 million. He allegedly used false passports to open some of the accounts. Pinochet is under indictment on tax evasion charges, and the money has been frozen.

Nicaraguan Congress bans all abortions
Nicaragua's Congress voted Thursday to ban all abortions, including those that could save a mother's life.

If signed into law by President Enrique Bolanos, the measure would eliminate a century-old exception to Nicaragua's abortion ban that permits the procedure if three doctors certify that the woman's health is at risk. Fifty-two lawmakers voted for the measure. Nine lawmakers abstained and 29 others did not attend the legislative session.

Bolanos has proposed increasing prison sentences for illegal abortions — currently around six years — to 10 to 30 years for women who have the procedure as well as those who assist them.

The bill has drawn protests from women's rights groups, and the Women's Autonomous Movement has said it was prepared to seek an injunction to block the measure if it passed. Congress approved the bill despite a letter from European Union diplomats and U.N. representatives asking lawmakers to hold off on voting on the issue until after the Nov. 5 presidential elections.

Aside from Cuba, which permits abortions in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, Latin America has some of the world's most restrictive anti-abortion laws. El Salvador and Chile also ban all types of abortions.

Europe
Germany suspends 2 soldiers over photos
Germany's military has suspended two soldiers from duty in connection with photos of service members posing with skulls in Afghanistan, Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung said Friday.

The pictures published in the top-selling Bild daily provoked widespread expressions of disgust among politicians, and calls to improve training for foreign deployments.

Bild says the pictures were taken in early 2003; they show soldiers posing with the skull on the hood of their vehicle and one soldier holding the skull next to his exposed genitals.

Jung said that three other soldiers were under investigation in connection with more photos published by the RTL television channel and reportedly taken in 2004.

The military's top training official was being sent to Afghanistan to review the motivation and discipline of the German soldiers there, Jung said at a press conference.

"Our interest is in getting clarity as soon as possible," he said.

EU, U.S., to share criminal investigation information
The European Union endorsed an agreement with the United States to facilitate the exchange of information between EU and U.S. prosecutors on terrorism and cross-border criminal cases, it said on Tuesday.

The deal, endorsed by EU ministers on Monday, will allow the EU-wide prosecutors' office Eurojust to exchange information with U.S. counterparts on cases under investigation, said Maarit Loimukoski, a member of Eurojust representing the Finnish EU Presidency.

"It will facilitate the cooperation," said Loimukoski, one of the 25 prosecutors and judges who work at Eurojust's headquarters in The Hague.

The deal, to be signed between the European Union and the United States on November 6, follows a series of post-9/11 EU-U.S. agreements, including one on sharing of transatlantic air passenger data clinched this month after tough negotiations.

EU lawmakers and rights groups have been increasingly worried about protection of data privacy in such agreements.

Local councils are offered millions to bury nuclear waste
Tenders are to be invited from town halls to site nuclear waste bunkers in their areas in return for multimillion-pound investment in local services.

David Miliband, the Environment Secretary, confirmed yesterday the long-expected decision to bury the waste from Britain’s ageing civil nuclear power stations up to 1,000 metres (3,280ft) from the surface. The plan, which will cost £10 billion over several decades, will not involve nuclear waste being imposed on any community, Mr Miliband told the Commons.

Local authorities will be asked to volunteer to have dumps in their area, and the inducements will be attractive. The construction project could take 40 years to complete.

In July the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management recommended burying radioactive waste deep underground as the best option. It recognised that public resistance would be an obstacle — as it had been to proposals for deep disposal in the 1980s, which were abandoned.

Duncan McLaren, of Friends of the Earth, said: “Dumping nuclear waste in the ground is no solution to the problem of this country’s deadly radioactive waste legacy. Solving the problem should not begin with bribes but with a pledge not to create any more waste.” Nathan Argent, of Greenpeace, said: “There’s already enough nuclear waste in this country to fill the Albert Hall five times over.

“It could take several generations to find a so-called suitable disposal site, if indeed at all. Therefore a period of interim storage will be inevitable, meaning nuclear waste will continue to be trundled around the country for decades.”

Exodus of Iraqi spilling into Europe
Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have fled the unrelenting violence in their homeland since the U.S. invasion in 2003 — a mass exodus directed primarily to neighboring Arab countries. But a growing tide of Iraqis is seeking shelter and a new start in Europe, where Sweden is emerging as the destination of choice due to relatively lax immigration laws.

The number of Iraqis applying for asylum in the 25 countries of the European Union rose by nearly 50 percent to 7,300 in the first six months of the year, bucking a downward trend in the total number of asylum-seekers, U.N. statistics show.

One-third of them came to Sweden, a country of 9 million people with an Iraqi immigrant community of more than 70,000 which has so far resisted clampdowns on immigration seen elsewhere in the EU.

The latest immigration figures in Sweden show the surge has intensified in recent months. By October, nearly 5,000 Iraqis had sought asylum in the Scandinavian country this year — more than double the total in 2005. Unlike Sweden, other European countries "are becoming increasingly restrictive," said Migration Board expert Krister Isaksson, noting Denmark and Britain as examples.

Britain has seen a steady drop in asylum-seekers in recent years, as the government has tightened immigration laws and stepped up border controls. Britain and Poland are the only EU countries to have forcibly returned Iraqis whose asylum applications were rejected, according to the European Council on Refugees and Exiles.

Middle-East
Israel admits using phosphorus bombs during war in Lebanon
Israel has acknowledged for the first time that it attacked Hezbollah targets during the second Lebanon war with phosphorus shells. White phosphorus causes very painful and often lethal chemical burns to those hit by it, and until recently Israel maintained that it only uses such bombs to mark targets or territory.

The announcement that the Israel Defense Forces had used phosphorus bombs in the war in Lebanon was made by Minister Jacob Edery."The IDF holds phosphorus munitions in different forms," Edery said. "The IDF made use of phosphorous shells during the war against Hezbollah in attacks against military targets in open ground." Lebanon's President Emile Lahoud also claimed that the IDF made use of phosphorus munitions against civilians in Lebanon.

Edery also pointed out that international law does not forbid the use of phosphorus and that "the IDF used this type of munitions according to the rules of international law."

Some experts believe that phosphorus munitions should be termed Chemical Weapons (CW) because of the way the weapons burn and attack the respiratory system. As a CW, phosphorus would become a clearly illegal weapon.

The International Red Cross is of the opinion that there should be a complete ban on phosphorus being used against human beings and the third protocol of the Geneva Convention on Conventional Weapons restricts the use of "incendiary weapons," with phosphorus considered to be one such weapon.Israel and the United States are not signatories to the Third Protocol.

Russia says Hizbullah used US arms
Moscow believes it has settled its differences with Israel over concerns that Hezbollah militants used Russian missiles during their recent fighting in southern Lebanon, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said last Friday, and hinted that the guerrillas favored US and Israeli-made weapons.

Israel's claims that Hizbullah guerillas used Russian missiles during their 34-day war this summer have clouded improving relations between Israel and Russia, and were discussed by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert during his visit to Moscow this week.

"In my view, this subject in general is closed," Ivanov said in televised comments. He said that he could not reveal details, but that "exhaustive answers were given to the Israeli side," the Interfax news agency reported.

He also suggested that Russia believes Hizbullah guerillas used more US - and Israeli-made weapons than Russian ones, saying a report Thursday in the Russian daily Kommersant asserted that Russia gave Israel documents proving that claim was "in many ways close to the truth."

Israel does not accuse Russia of directly supplying Hizbullah, but maintains Russian arms were sold to Syria and Iran, which sent them on to their Hizbullah proxies. Ivanov had said in August that Israel had provided no evidence that Hizbullah had Russian-designed missiles.

Israel prisoner treatment condemned
An Israeli human rights group has accused the government of violating international law by moving Palestinian prisoners out of the occupied territories.

B'Tselem, a body that monitors human rights in the West Bank and Gaza, said in a report released on Thursday that most of the 9,000 Palestinians being held by Israel were illegally imprisoned inside the Jewish state.

"The vast majority of Palestinian prisoners are held in prisons inside Israel, and not in the occupied West Bank,in contravention of international humanitarian Law," said B'Tselem's communications director, Sarit Michaeli.

"In order to guarantee basic human rights, they should be transferred to prisons in the West Bank where Palestinians are allowed to travel," she said.

In a response sent to B'Tselem in August, the Justice Ministry said it did everything possible, within the constraints of security, to facilitate visits and said that it had denied only 41 of 4,616 visits requested since December 2005.

"The state has been acting relentlessly, despite the many security and administrative difficulties involved, to enable the existence of these visits," it said. The ministry did not directly address the allegation of the illegality of holding the prisoners in Israel.

Education minister instructs schools to mark Kafr Qasem massacre anniversary
Israeli Education Minister Yuli Tamir has instructed schools to devote time to mark the 50th anniversary of the Kafr Qasem massacre, in which border patrol troops killed 47 Arab citizens who were returning to their village from work. The anniversary will be marked on Sunday, October 29.

Tamir has instructed schools to address the massacre itself and the events that occurred following the massacre, including the court ruling that a command can be termed "blatantly illegal," and in such a case, a soldier must not obey it.

According to the minister's directive, "The massacre and the trial that followed it have become milestones in the national psyche of Israeli society and have instilled in generations of commanders and soldiers a moral border one should abide by."

Tamir decided to address the massacre in schools following a petition by the education committee within the Higher Arab Monitoring Committee.

On October 29 1956, during the first day of the Sinai war, three border patrol troops received a command to shoot anyone who broke the curfew imposed on Kafr Qasem.

The troops shot and killed 47 of the village's residents as they were making their way home from work, unaware of the newly imposed curfew. Among the dead were women and children. The soldiers involved in the massacre were sentenced to lengthy prison terms, but received pardons. The brigade commander was sentenced to pay the symbolic fine of 10 pruta (old Israeli cents).

Ahmadinejad opposes finger-print bill
Iran's fiercely anti-U.S. president has come out against a bill that would require Americans to be fingerprinted on arrival in Iran.

Speaking to a crowd in the northern Tehran suburb of Shemiranat, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he had asked Iranian legislators to set aside a bill that would require immigration officials to take fingerprints of all U.S. passport holders.

The bill, which passed a preliminary reading in the Iranian parliament earlier this month, was drafted by conservatives who sought to retaliate for the U.S. requirement that Iranian visitors be fingerprinted.

The U.S. measure, which also applies to nationals of some other countries, was implemented in 2002, in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington.

Small numbers of American passport holders visit Iran, mostly academics interested in Persian history and culture. However, some U.S. basketball players play for Iranian teams and U.S. wrestlers occasionally take part in tournaments in Iran.

U.N. Says Iraq Seals Data on the Civilian Toll
The United Nations office in Baghdad says that Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, has ordered the country’s medical authorities to stop providing the organization with monthly figures on the number of civilians killed and wounded in the conflict there, according to a confidential cable.

The cable, dated Oct. 17 and sent to United Nations officials in New York and Geneva by Ashraf Qazi, the United Nations envoy to Iraq, says the prohibition may hinder the ability of his office to give accurate accounts in its bimonthly human rights reports on the levels of violence and the effect on Iraqi society.

Concern over the numbers of civilians who have died in Iraq has risen sharply at a time when organized attacks by insurgents are swelling the numbers of victims and when a new report from a team of Iraqi and American researchers shows that more than 600,000 civilians have died in violence across Iraq since the 2003 American invasion.

Mr. Qazi, a former Pakistani diplomat, says that the order to let the prime minister’s office take over the release of the numbers came down a day after a United Nations report for July and August showed a serious upward spike in the number of dead and wounded. The leader of the Health Ministry in Iraq appealed to be allowed to continue supplying the figures to the United Nations but was turned down according to a subsequent letter from the prime minister’s office, Mr. Qazi’s cable said.

The most recent United Nations report, published in September, showed that 3,590 people were killed in July and 3,009 in August in violence across the country. Compiled by statistics from Baghdad’s central morgue and from hospitals and morgues countrywide, the report posited an average death rate of 97 people per day.

Poll: 30 percent of Israelis support pardon for Yigal Amir
On eve of 11th anniversary of Rabin's murder – about third of Israeli public believes that his killer should be pardoned. Figures jump to over 50 percent among right-wingers and religious public.

According to the poll data – five percent of the Israeli public supports pardoning the killer already at this point in time, while 25 percent believes that he should be pardoned in 25 years from now. Some 69 percent of respondents replied that they oppose a future pardoning. This marks a significant change compared to a similar poll conducted last year by the newspaper. Figures in 2005 showed that 76 percent of Israelis opposed any pardoning, while 18 percent believed the killer should be set free.

Rabin's son Yuval granted an interview to the newspaper in the week leading up to the 11th anniversary of his father's assassination. "On the inside I'm furious," he said when asked about the conjugal visit granted to Amir.

Then why did you remain silent when your father's murder was allowed by the state to bring Larissa into his cell?

"Why am I silent? I'll tell you why. I have no intention to address the killer or the conduct of the authorities. It is a national issue, not me and my family against the killer. It would be a mistake to face off one family against the other, it's a matter for the authorities. I'm not young anymore, it took me many years to get to where I am, but these days I try not to get angry over things that I am powerless over. I don't see a situation where if I say or do something it will change the outcome of things."

Rabin sees Amir's pardoning as almost unavoidable. "It's not that I don't know where the killers' story is expected to go from here. It's been spoken of in the media. It started with a conjugal visit, from there it will move on to the Briss for the child and his Bar Mitzvah and his wedding, and more children… and this is how this vile man's road to freedom will be paved. On the other hand, if I had spoken up there would be offensive comments asking: 'Is their family's blood redder?', this cannot be an argument between us and them, the state should deal with it, and here, it has. I don't see how an announcement made by myself or Dalia (Rabin's daughter) would have changed the atmosphere, certainly it wouldn't have changed the reality of the situation."

Asia
UN fears N Korea food crisis
North Korea faces desperate food shortages now that aid contributors are withholding donations after the country's nuclear test, according to the UN.

Viti Muntarbhorn, the UN human rights investigator for North Korea, said on Monday that the number of people getting UN food aid had dropped to 13,000 from 6.5 million a year ago. Much of this decline could be attributed to Pyonyang's restrictions on access.

North Korea tested seven missiles in July and then announced an underground nuclear test on October 9, which Muntarbhorn described as a "serious waste of resources". The UN Security Council responded by imposing sanctions but exempted humanitarian assistance.

North Korea has still not recovered from a brutal famine in the 1990s that experts believe killed about 2.5 million people, or 10 per cent of the population. Deadly floods earlier this year have also worsened food shortages.

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) also said last month that it had received only eight per cent of the $102 million it needs to provide 150,000 tonnes of food to North Koreans for the next two years.

Sri Lanka Tigers: Bombing their way to Swiss talks
Sri Lanka's Tiger rebels, who are in Geneva for peace talks, have been outlawed by the European Union, the United States and several other countries, but the international community still wants them at the negotiating table.

The United States describes Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers as "reprehensible terrorists," and the 25-member EU banned them in May. The group's trade mark suicide bombings regularly put them in news headlines.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) carried out their biggest suicide bombing less than two weeks before their meeting with government representatives this weekend in Geneva, killing 116 people, mostly sailors, in Sri Lanka's northeastern region of Habarana on October 16.

The truck bombing stunned the military establishment which had been riding on success for several months.

"It is difficult to negotiate with them because if they don't like something, they simply threaten to go back to fighting," a member of the Sri Lankan government delegation said.

"We are talking to them because of their firepower."

Until the Al-Qaeda attacks of September 11, 2001 in the United States, the Tigers held the world record for the most devastating strike against civil aviation.

In ’97, U.S. Panel Predicted a North Korea Collapse in 5 Years
A team of government and outside experts convened by the Central Intelligence Agency concluded in 1997 that North Korea’s economy was deteriorating so rapidly that the government of Kim Jong-il was likely to collapse within five years, according to declassified documents made public on Thursday.

The panel described the isolated and impoverished country as being on the brink of economic ruin and said that “political implosion stemming from irreversible economic degradation seems the most plausible endgame for North Korea.” The majority among the group argued that the North’s government “cannot remain viable for the long term” and could fall within five years.

Nearly a decade later, the assessment has not been borne out, and its disclosure is evidence of past American misjudgments about the internal dynamics of North Korea’s closed society. American intelligence agencies still regard North Korea as among the toughest of intelligence targets and have made little progress inserting human spies into the country to steal secrets about the government.

The assessment was produced by a group that included senior intelligence analysts, Pentagon war gamers and independent academic experts. It was made public on Thursday by the National Security Archive, a research group.

Nato forces kill 'up to 85' civilians in Afghan attack
Nato forces in Afghanistan have killed scores of civilians in a single operation, bombing them in their own homes as they celebrated the end of Ramadan.

Nato commanders were facing serious questions yesterday as the Afghan government said it had confirmed that at least 40 civilians were killed in Nato bombing raids in Panjwayi district, near Kandahar.

Nato said its own initial investigation found that only 12 "non-combatants" were killed, but it had no explanation for the discrepancy with the government's figures. Local Afghan officials said they believed as many as 85 civilians died - which would make the incident the worst single atrocity committed by Western forces in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban.

The attack came as Afghans celebratedEid al-Fitr, which marks the end of Ramadan. In 2002 a US air strike killed 46 civilians at a wedding party in Oruzgan.

The UN's Afghanistan mission said it was "very concerned" at the reports. It said in a statement: "The safety and welfare of civilians must always come first and any civilian casualties are unacceptable, without exception."

Nato will co-operate with an inquiry by the Afghan Defence Ministry. But Mr Afghanmal, of the provincial council, said: "An investigation has no meaning. These kinds of things have happened several times, and they only say: 'Sorry'. How can you compensate people who have lost their sons and daughters? The government and the coalition told the families that there are no Taliban in the area anymore. If there are no Taliban, then why are they bombing the area?"

Australasia
Australia Muslim cleric suspended
Australia's top Muslim cleric has been barred from preaching for up to three months, after comparing immodestly dressed women to "uncovered meat".

Sheikh Taj el-Din al-Hilali's comments, suggesting that women who did not wear a headscarf attracted sexual assault, have caused a storm of protest. Sheikh Hilali has since apologised for his comments, which he said had been misinterpreted and taken out of context.

Sydney's mosque association said the suspension would give the cleric time to consider the impact of his words. "I unreservedly apologise to any woman who is offended by my comments. I had only intended to protect women's honour," he said in a statement published in The Australian. "Women in our Australian society have the freedom and the right to dress as they choose," he added. But Australian Premier John Howard said the action was insufficient.

Many people - including some Muslim leaders - have called for the cleric to be dismissed from office. Sheikh Hilali sparked more controversy on Friday when, asked by reporters if he would resign, he responded: "After we clean the world of the White House first."

His English is poor, and it was difficult at times to make out precisely what he was saying.
"Sexual violence knows no ethnic, no race, no religious bounds,"

Africa
Rwanda opens probe of alleged French role in genocide
A Rwandan government-appointed commission launched a probe on Tuesday into allegations French troops supported soldiers behind Rwanda's 1994 genocide and helped facilitate mass murder.

Rwanda's Tutsi President Paul Kagame, whose government came to power after the genocide, has accused France of training and arming Hutu militias who were the main force behind a 100-day slaughter that killed 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus.

France had replaced ex-colonial power Belgium as Rwanda's main Western backer. When Kagame's Tutsi-dominated rebel army launched its war against the Hutu authorities in the early 1990s, France sent soldiers to Kigali.

France helped stop the advance of Kagame's forces and then stayed on, as military advisers, up to the start of the genocide.

Kigali says France backed the government of Rwanda's former President Juvenal Habyarimana, providing military training for government forces, despite knowing that some within the leadership were planning to use the troops to commit genocide. France, which sent in soldiers under a U.N.-authorised operation, has always denied any involvement in the killings.

Justice for many perpetrators in the genocide is still being meted out through the U.N.'s International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Tanzania and village courts known as gacaca. The ICTR has indicted more than 80 people for genocide-related crimes since its establishment in 1994.

Tunisia closes embassy over Aljazeera
Tunisia has closed its embassy in Qatar in protest against what it described as a hostile campaign by Aljazeera.

A Qatari diplomat said on Wednesday that all Tunisian embassy staff left the country last Thursday. Aljazeera, which has its headquarters in the Qatari capital, Doha, had aired two interviews with Moncef Marzouki, an opposition activist based in Paris who called for a "civil resistance" movement against the Tunisian government.

The Tunisian foreign ministry released a statement on Wednesday accusing Aljazeera of waging a "hostile campaign aimed at hurting Tunisia" and "turning its back on truth and objectivity every time it deals with news in Tunisia".

"By taking deliberately malicious positions vis-a-vis Tunisia, Aljazeera has broken all limits and transgressed the moral rules on which journalism is based," the statement said. It said that the embassy closure was directed at Aljazeera and did not reflect on Tunisia's relations with Qatar, which it called a "brother nation".

Correspondents banned: In the past, Arab governments in Libya and Morocco have also briefly recalled their ambassadors from Qatar to protest against Aljazeera broadcasts. Other Arab states such as Saudi Arabia and Bahrain have banned the station's correspondents. In August 2004, the Iraqi government closed Aljazeera's Baghdad office. The office remains closed, but the station operates in the Kurdish-ruled area of the north.

Reporter blacklisted 'for being Jewish'
A Jewish South African reporter has been 'banned' by the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) from providing news coverage from the Middle East, after her managing director said he did not want a "white Jewish girl" covering the region, the reporter told Ynetnews.

"I was a reporter and newsreader, and Snuki Zikalala was head of TV and radio news, so he was my line manager. He was not that great to work with," Paula Slier, the reporter, told Ynetnews.

In 2004, Slier went to Ramallah to cover Arafat's illness. While in the West Bank, Slier said she was informed that the SABC had "received a directive: 'No more reports from Paula.'"

"I tried to find out why they were not using my work anymore, and I was told by a senior manager in SABC, which obviously I can't name, that Zikalala said they don't want a white Jewish girl reporting from Ramallah, though the implication was from the whole of the Middle East," Slier said.

After it emerged that SABC's blacklist included a range of sources, including some critical of the South African government, SABC launched an investigation of itself. "When the investigation came out, Zikalala told the inquiry: 'From the movement I come from, we support the PLO.' And then he went on to call what was happening in the Middle East a 'Jewish war,' and then he said: We know Paula, we know the position which she holds," Slier said, quoting from the investigation.

The full investigation was published by South African newspaper the Globe and Mail, though SABC had initially tried to get a court order to ban the newspaper from publishing the full report.

Oil and gas discovered in Zambia
Zambia has announced its first discoveries of oil and gas reserves and is planning to invite foreign firms to conduct exploratory drills.

Samples taken over the weekend at a dozen sites in the northwestern provinces of Zambezi and Chavuma, near the border with Angola, confirmed gas and oil residues in the southern African country. The announcement of the discoveries was contained in a statement from the office of Levy Mwanawasa, Zambia’s president, who visited the area on Sunday.

"The microbial analysis showed that 12 sites were positive for oil and six for gas," Mwanawasa was quoted as saying during his field trip. "These results confirm the presence of oil and gas in the sub-surface of the two districts of Chavuma and Zambezi," Mwanawasa added.

Zambia has previously looked to its copper reserves as the main source of foreign currency. "This will be a long-term investment which will require a lot of money"

Truth Behind Saudi Arms Deal

The Secret Whitehall Telegram That Reveals Truth Behind Controversial Saudi Arms Deal

Taken from the Guardian, UK, Saturday October 28, 2006
By David Leigh and Rob Evans

The government was yesterday scrambling to recover secret documents containing evidence suggesting corrupt payments were made in Britain's biggest arms deal. The documents, published in full today by the Guardian, detail for the first time how the price of Tornado warplanes was inflated by £600m in the 1985 Al Yamamah deal with Saudi Arabia.

A telegram with the details from the head of the Ministry of Defence's sales unit had been placed in the National Archives. Yesterday it was hastily withdrawn by officials who claimed its release had been "a mistake".

Sir Colin Chandler's telegram was sent from Riyadh, where he was arranging the sale of 72 Tornados and 30 Hawk warplanes on behalf of the British arms firm BAE. It revealed that their cost had been inflated by nearly a third in a deal with Saudi defence minister Prince Sultan.

Sultan, who is crown prince, "has a corrupt interest in all contracts", according to a dispatch from the then British ambassador Willie Morris published in a recent Commons committee report. An accompanying Ministry of Defence briefing paper prepared for the then prime minister Margaret Thatcher describes Prince Sultan as "not highly intelligent ... He has prejudices, is inflexible and imperious, and drives a hard bargain". The Al Yamamah deal, worth £43bn in total, has long been the subject of allegations of secret commissions to Lady Thatcher's son Mark, and to several members of the Saudi royal family. All those involved have always denied the allegations.

The telegram from Sir Colin, now the head of budget airline easyJet, was unearthed by Nicholas Gilby, an anti-arms trade campaigner. After the Guardian showed it to the Ministry of Defence, officials were dispatched to the archives in Kew, where they loaded the files into a van and returned them to Whitehall's vaults. Campaigners had already copied all the papers and are planning to publish them on the internet.

Britain's politically sensitive Al Yamamah programme is under investigation by the Serious Fraud Office, which is probing corruption allegations against BAE.

The MoD documents reveal that the price of each Tornado was inflated by 32%, from £16.3m to £21.5m. It is common in arms deals for the prices of weapons to be raised so that commissions can be skimmed off the top. The £600m involved is the same amount that it was alleged at the time in Arab publications was exacted in secret commissions paid to Saudi royals and their circle of intermediaries in London and Riyadh, as the price of the deal.

Those allegations were treated with such concern in Whitehall in 1985, documents reveal, that a copy of the Arab magazine in question was immediately sent in confidence by the Foreign Office to Mrs Thatcher's chief aide at No 10, Charles Powell, with advice that officials "should simply refuse all comment". Yesterday, 20 years on, the MoD at first sought to take the same line. It insisted the Chandler telegram must have been leaked and said "we never comment on leaks".

In fact, a copy was released to the National Archives on May 8 by the Department of Trade and Industry.

Mr Gilby, the researcher from the Campaign Against the Arms Trade who discovered it, said yesterday: "I was astonished when I saw the Chandler telegram. This information has been withheld by every single British government department, including the National Audit Office, for more than two decades."

Last night, the DTI said : "The files were placed in the National Archive by mistake. Successive governments have regarded the Al Yamamah agreement to be confidential. The files have now been removed." The MoD said : "We regret the fact that this material has been made public. We attach great importance to the confidentiality of the government to government Al Yamamah agreement with Saudi Arabia, and in order to protect that confidentiality we are not commenting on these papers."

Included is a copy of the original UK-Saudi memorandum of understanding, signed at Lancaster House in September 1985 by Michael Heseltine, then defence secretary, and Prince Sultan. It is marked "Royal Saudi Air Force. Secret".

The National Audit Office, recently rejecting freedom of information requests for this document, claimed release would harm international relations.

The NAO also refused to release a copy of a 1992 report on the deals, even to the police. This official memo of understanding between the two parties records the total UK-Saudi deal as being worth "£3.5bn to £4bn".

It was a misleading figure. Commissions on arms deals were theoretically illegal under Saudi law. It was within weeks of its signature that Sir Colin was in Riyadh alongside BAE executives agreeing a package in private negotiations with Prince Sultan which, he explained to London, would actually total £5bn. Once weapons, spares and training were added in to the basic price, each single Tornado would end up costing the Saudi air force more than £60m.

Nick Harvey, the Liberal Democrat defence spokesman, said yesterday: "The government must now throw light on the veracity of these allegations. There is no doubt that this will only add to the growing calls for the NAO report to be published as it should have been 14 years ago." BAE refused to comment, saying: "Al Yamamah is a contract between the governments of the UK and Saudi Arabia." Sir Colin also declined to comment.

Ian Gilmour, a Conservative minister at the time, recently confirmed bribes were common on Saudi arms deals.

Lord Gilmour told BBC2's Newsnight: "You either got the business and bribed, or you didn't bribe and didn't get the business ... If you are paying bribes to high-up people in the government, the fact that it's illegal in Saudi law doesn't mean much."
FAQ: Wheeling and dealing

What is Al-Yamamah ?It is Britain's biggest arms deal, signed in 1985. Britain agreed to sell 72 Tornado and 30 Hawk warplanes to Saudi Arabia. The deal was renewed in 1993 when Saudis agreed to buy another batch of 48 Tornado warplanes. In a third stage to the Al-Yamamah agreement, signed last year, Britain is selling up to 72 more planes - called Typhoons - to the Saudis. The agreement, known as "the Dove" in Arabic, has kept BAE afloat for the last 20 years.

Why is it so controversial ?
Within weeks of the deal being signed in 1985, allegations of corruption surfaced. Those allegations have never gone away and are now being investigated by the Serious Fraud Office. Critics say that Britain should not be selling warplanes and military equipment to a regime which is barbaric and undemocratic. They say that the British government refrains from criticising the Saudis' appalling human rights abuses, in order not to upset the arms sales.

What has Mark Thatcher to do with it?It has been alleged that Lady Thatcher's son received secret commissions from the deal.

Read the documents (pdf)
1) Initial "Al-Yamamah" agreement signed by Britain and Saudi Arabia in September 1985 (known formally as a memorandum of understanding).
2) Telegram from Sir Colin Chandler, the then head of MOD's arms sales unit, in January 1986.
3) Briefing prepared by the Ministry of Defence for Margaret Thatcher for the Al-Yamamah deal, September 1985, containing descriptions of key Saudis.
4) Minutes of meeting between then defence secretary Michael Heseltine and Prince Sultan, in September 1985

-------------------------------------------------------------
Giving & taking bribes is common amongst the Saudi ministers. In a BBC Newsnight interview former Defence minister admitted that Britain's arms sales to Saudi Arabia was founded on bribery.

Lord Gilmour who was Minister and then Secretary of State for Defence in the 1970s admits "You either got the business and bribed or you didn't bribe and didn't get the business."

Newsnight sited several confidential government memos, one in particular from the head of defence sales, Harold Hubert, in 1972, speaks of using a company "to provide quasi-government oversight as well as passing on the douceurs".

Newsnight notes the Oxford English Dictionary defines a "douceur" as "a gratuity or 'tip'; a bribe".

Professor Mark Phythian of the University of Wolverhampton, who has written extensively about the trade, said: "I've never seen this expressed so openly before. I'm surprised it got past the censors."

Lord Gilmour said: "In those days you either went along with how the Saudis behaved or what they wanted or you let the US and France have all the business.

Questioned about the legality of 'douceurs' he said: "If you're paying bribes to high up people in the government (of Saudi) the fact that it's illegal in Saudi law doesn't mean very much."

Also former cabinet minister, Jonathan Aitken resigned in dramatic fashion in 1995 after the Guardian and Granada accused him of accepting bribes from Saudi businessmen in connection with arms sales.

Announcing his intention to sue for libel, he was found to have lied under oath about the truth of his stay at the Ritz hotel in Paris. Mr Aitken was forced to exchange the splendour of his Westminster house and extravagant lifestyle for a prison cell.

But bribery happens all over the world. A former German deputy defence minister, Holger Pfahls, had been sentenced to two years and three months in jail for accepting illegal payments. He admitted having received 2m euros (£1.4m; $2.5m) from an arms dealer, but denied lobbying on his behalf. Mr Pfahls insisted that he had done nothing in return for the money from Karlheinz Schreiber, which he had not declared to the tax authorities.

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How £1m Bribe Cash For Afghan Warlords Went Up In Some

The Mail on Sunday, 22nd October 2006
By CHRISTOPHER LEAKE

A secret slush fund of more than £1million sent to Afghan-istan to bribe local warlords was destroyed when the Special Forces aircraft carrying it burst into flames as it came in to land.

The cash - all in brand new American notes - was packed into two four-wheel-drive vehicles being carried on the RAF Hercules C-130 plane.

The money was intended to 'buy off' local warlords and turn them against the Taliban.

But as the aircraft approached the runway in volatile Helmand province, one engine erupted in flames and the blaze spread quickly.

The pilot managed to touch down and all those on board - including the new British ambassador in Afghanistan, Stephen Evans, and a group of SAS troops - fled to safety with just seconds to spare. But it was too late to extinguish the inferno, and the Hercules was destroyed - along with the vehicles and cash.

The aircraft from No 47 Squadron, based at RAF Lyneham in Wiltshire, had flown in secrecy from Kabul, in what is termed a 'black operation', to the crude dirt landing strip outside the town of Lashkar Gar.

Most of the cash had been packed into plastic bags in the back of the SAS vehicles and the remainder was on a pallet strapped to the inside of the aircraft's rear ramp.

Officially, the money was to support 'development projects' in Helmand. But a military source said: "We knew little about Helmand and needed to gather intelligence fast.

"It doesn't matter where you go in the world, people respond to cash. In Helmand, warlords who run the narcotics business have a lot of influence - and we needed to have that influence on our side."

Senior sources say the cash destroyed in the blaze in May was written off by the Foreign Office and replaced a month later by about £500,000 drawn from Government emergency cash reserves.

While there is no official record or audit trail to show how the cash was used, senior sources claim the money helped to 'turn' pro-Taliban warlords to support the UK.

A senior intelligence officer said: "Where we had to fight we did, and thank God we had the Paras in Helmand. But where we could we used cash to buy support."

The Ministry of Defence last night confirmed that a 'sizeable amount of cash' was being transported by the plane which caught fire.

Taliban V's NATO (Afghanistan: Tactics And Techniques)

Afghanistan: Tactics And Techniques
Extracted from the BBC, 11 July 2006

International forces in Afghanistan are facing mounting security problems. The Taleban - ousted from Kabul in the 2001 US-led invasion - have regrouped over the last couple of years, and are now a resurgent force in the south and east of the country.

Although there are no reliable estimates of their current manpower, Taleban tactics are nothing new.

Their fighters follow exactly the same principles of low-level guerrilla warfare as the mujahideen fighters who inflicted heavy losses on the Soviet army which occupied Afghanistan from 1979-89.

Leading defence analyst Colonel Christopher Langton from the International Institute for Strategic Studies told the BBC News website: "It's a well-practised Afghan way of operating. There has been no change in tactics since 2001. A far as they're concerned, it works.

"They're limited by the type of equipment they have. It's been a long time since they operated any tanks or armoured vehicles.

"They don't have any aircraft, they may have some anti-aircraft missiles. But they have an abundant supply of small arms and light weapons and ammunition."

Speed, surprise, mobility and flexibility are integral factors in such 'asymmetric' campaigns; where a smaller, irregular force faces a far larger, better-armed one. The history of such encounters often shows that the smaller, local force will fare better.

Favoured guerrilla methods include ambush, sabotage, roadside bombings and assassination. Afghanistan analyst Ayesha Khan from the UK-based Chatham House organisation said: "In the past six months the Taleban have certainly grown in confidence and momentum.

"They're increasingly employing bolder, more violent tactics such as suicide bombing and roadside bombs which we've seen in Iraq, and they're operating in larger units. "

MOBILITY
Taleban fighters often operate as a 'pick-up truck cavalry' force of adapted four-wheel drive vehicles such as the Toyota Hi-Lux. Nicknamed Ahu (the deer) these trucks are renowned for their sturdy design and reliability, and offer good manoeuvrability across harsh terrain.

They can carry up to ten guerrillas armed with heavy machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades, who fight either from the back of the moving truck, or dismount and adopt ground positions.

Colonel Langton told the BBC: "The Toyota is not just a mainstay, they exist in large quantities across the country. They're a vehicle of convenience - they don't have to ride horses, camels or walk. And they go anywhere."



Such a force can be quickly mustered into a surprise attack and equally quickly dispersed afterwards.

In isolation, Taleban vehicles often display no outward sign of their military purpose allowing them to blend into everyday scenery in towns and villages.

Motorbikes and push-bikes are also favoured as relatively quick, cheap and easy means of travelling distances over rough ground.

MANPOWER
Fighting units of Taleban consist mainly of Afghans, though according to recent reports numbers of Arab and Uzbek fighters may also be involved. Groups of fighters are usually organised along local/tribal lines and led by a senior, experienced commander.

Such units are sometimes amalgamated to form bigger contingents for more large-scale operations.



Afghan fighters are renowned for their tenacity and ability to fight in high-temperatures and often at high-altitude.

Colonel Langton said: "If they have a weakness, it's that they're a very much traditional organisation and by looking at their fighting and cultural traditions, you can see some things that are predictable.

"They're not easy to combat though because their low-level fighting skills are highly developed."

KEY WEAPON
The weapons used by the opposing forces in Afghanistan are the products of two very different eras.

The SA80, mainstay of British forces for around 20 years, has been dogged by problems involving its design and reliability but reports of battlefield problems have diminished since a multi-million pound re-fit.

By contrast the AK-47 has been in service in one form or another since the 1950s and, although the weapon of choice in many standing armies, has become a symbol of guerrilla struggle thanks to its reputation for ruggedness and simplicity of use.

An Interview With The Taliban (The Enemy Of NATO)

Last week the BBC had broadcasted an interview with Taliban forces in Afghanistan. The report from David Loyn proved very controversial amongst Members of the UK Parliament because it provided exclusive access to what the Taliban was thinking and how its forces mobilised against the British army in Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan.

Newspiece such as these are great to see as it gives a different story to what the government are spinning. The BBC & ITN provide better news coverage and independent analysis compared to many global news agencies including faux news and chicken noodle news. The public needs proper news not propaganda.

If you have 15 minutes to spare please watch the full report
Windows Media Player: The Taleban interview to the BBC

UK Commons leader Jack Straw has defended the BBC's decision to broadcast an interview with a Taleban spokesman. The report had been "informative" and "good" and it was "important to see the nature of these people", he told MPs.

"The difference is that in Taleban-controlled territory, anybody who steps out of line is killed.
"We are a democracy, and we are fighting for democracy in Afghanistan.

The Conservative defence spokesman Liam Fox called that "obscene", and the Daily Mail reported the views of the father of one British soldier who thought the BBC has acted irreponsibly, "undermining the war effort".

So much for promoting independent reporting!

This brings me to my second point. Why did we attack Afghanistan and demand a regime change? Yes Al-Qaida was based in Afghanistan and they were harboured by the Taliban who were then in power in Afghanistan but in the months leading up to the Septmber 11, 2001 attack, it is reported, the Taliban "outlined various ways bin Laden could be dealt with. He could be turned over to the EU, killed by the Taliban, or made available as a target for Cruise missiles." The Bush administration did not accept the Taliban's offer.

Washington and London’s desire to eliminate al-Qaida was wrongly combined with seeking regime change in Kabul - a goal the Security Council never authorised. A propaganda campaign demonised the Taliban so as to justify their removal as a victory, even though Osama bin Laden might not be found. We have very short memories. Didn't the British and US praise the Taliban after they defeated the Russians? So much so that the UK government of that time invited the Taliban to the party political conference and told the world that these are our new friends. In the US the Taliban were invited by the government and met oil companies (who had vested interests in Afganistan). How quickly friendships end! Now We have put warloads in control of the Afganistan and the cuntry is suffering. All that was required when the Taliban was in power was invetsment but it never materialised from the world.

The Taliban and their followers are simple people. The Guardian newspaper published an article where, two aid workers with long experience of working there, describes how under the Taliban security was better than it was before or after. In many regions they were flexible and pragmatic: humanitarian aid flowed, and girls' education continued in "home schools".

The Taliban was able to regroup by arguing that Afghanistan was getting nothing from its new occupation. The drug barons used their money to stir up opposition. The failure of aid policies to make a big difference in southern Afghanistan and increasing corruption in the government and the national army, are spreading the power base of the Taleban.

The trucking companies, who backed them first in 1994 when they emerged to clear illegal checkpoints on the roads, are now backing them again. This time the checkpoints are manned by Afghan government soldiers, who demand money at gunpoint from every driver.

"People were fed up with having to bribe governors, and other authorities. We rose up and saved almost the whole country from the evils of corruption and corrupt commanders. That's why people are supporting the Taleban again now." said Taleban official spokesman, Mohammed Anif.

But all know the story of Afghanistan's past victories over the British. Engraved in their collective folk memory of Afghanistan's warrior history are tales of the defeat of the British in 1842 and 1880 along with the defeat of the Russians in the 1980s.

Further reading:
BBC: Travelling with the Taleban, 24 October 2006

BBC: Afghan quick guide

BBC: Afganistan: Losing the drugs war

BBC: Afganistan: Key players

BBC: Afganistan: rbulent history

BBC: Afganistan: In graphics: Harsh realities Afghanistan at-a-glance

Speaker Of the Truth: Afghanistan and the war against drugs

Guardian: America's pipe dream A pro-western regime in Kabul should give the US an Afghan route for Caspian oil George Monbiot, October 23, 2001

Kuwaitis Still Getting Payouts For Damage Of 1990 Iraqi Invasion

Taken from the Independent, UK, Published: 27 October 2006
By Anne Penketh

Fifteen years after the first Gulf War, and three years after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, a UN commission is still paying out hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation to the victims of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.

The latest payments, totalling $417.8m (£220m), were made yesterday to governments and oil companies for losses and damages stemming from the Kuwaiti occupation, bringing the total paid out to more than $21bn (£11bn). The total claims that have been approved run to $52bn (£27.5bn) and will take many more years to complete.

The transfers by the Geneva-based Compensation Commission are not the only hangover from the Saddam era to be funded by Iraqi oil revenues. The UN weapons inspectors, now known as UNMOVIC, have never been wound up by the Security Council and still have $114m in their coffers - despite $200m having been shifted from their escrow account in June last year into the Iraq development fund. That was only months after $9bn went missing from the development fund.

The 34 arms monitors are still contracted to ensure the disarmament of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. Until the 15-member Security Council tells them to stop, or decides to use their expertise in another way, they are continuing to produce a three-monthly disarmament report.
"Every three months we go to the council, and they wring their hands and move on to the next piece of business," said one inspector.

Saddam's forces rolled into Kuwait in August 1990 at the start of a seven-month occupation which ended with the Iraqi soldiers blowing up Kuwait oilfields and pouring 10 million barrels of oil into the sea, causing an environmental disaster.

The final deadline for most compensation claims passed in 1997, but missing persons claims and those stemming from landmine or ordnance explosions were subsequently accepted by the Geneva-based UN Compensation Commission. It has received more than 2.6 million claims since 1991, totalling $368bn, seeking compensation for deaths, damage and losses.

Despite the overthrow of Saddam, the Security Council decided in June 2003 that the fund should not be frozen but would receive 5 per cent of all Iraqi oil and gas and petroleum products export sales.

Initial payments went to individuals and have now all been processed.

Yesterday's pay-outs, which included environmental claims, went to corporations, international organisations and the governments of Bosnia-Herzegovina, India, Kuwait, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the US.

The largest amount - $335.5m - went to Kuwait to pay for 38 claims, while the US was paid $10m for a single claim.

The proportion of corporations which have claimed damages from the occupation was not known, but the commission has received $44bn worth of compensation claims from oil companies with operations in the Persian Gulf.

The governments listed for yesterday's transfer had filed claims covering their costs in evacuating nationals from Kuwait, providing relief aid, damage to diplomatic property and harm to the environment.

Other claims include damage to government buildings, loss of equipment as well as estimates of the value of work carried out by contractors before the invasion.

The commission has also received 170 environmental claims stemming from the oil fires and the discharge of oil into the sea, that total $80bn.