Angry pakistanis stage protest : AOL Video feed

Eritrea-Djibouti war looms

Wed, 06 Aug 2008 09:47:13 -0400

Yet another crisis is looming in the Horn of Africa. It’s already the scene of fighting in Somalia, age-old violence and rifts, clan battles, warlords, Islamists sweeping into the region and of late, Al-Qa’ida. Now once again it appears two of the coastal nations, Eritrea and Djibouti, are on the verge of war. Our reporter in the region tells us that the two are eyeing a possible confrontation over a border dispute that’s run on for many years. There have already been clashes in recent months, skirmishes have led to casualties but now both sides are talking up the possibility of an all-out fight. While the International community is trying to persuade both sides not to get involved in any military confrontation, it’s clear that the West will support Djibouti if there is any battle with Eritrea. The Eritrean regime is described by many countries as being oppressive and dictatorial with many reports of people being forced to serve in its army. In fact, its army is one of the largest in the world, even though it’s only a small country. The level of support in the international community for Djibouti can be seen in the military presence there of both France and the United States. There are around 3,000 French troops in Djibouti and more than 1,000 from the United States. The American troops are not only involved in training local forces but a variety of activities throughout the Horn of Africa, including of late targeting what they believe are Al-Qa’ida operatives in the region. For its part Eritrea is involved in a variety of military operations, most notable with another of its neighbors, Ethiopia. Skirmishes continue between them to this day. At the same time the Ethiopians are fighting in Somalia alongside the Western-backed government there, whilst the Eritreans are supporting the Islamist rebels in Somalia.

South Asian Newsline Update

Thu, 27 Nov 2008 12:22:21 -0500

SAN-EPISODE # 2836 DATED 26 NOVEMBER 2008 WELCOME TO SOUTH ASIA NEWS LINE. I AM ARJUN CHAUDHURI WITH THE DAY’S NEWS….. THE TOP STORIES … HEADLINES PAKISTAN FOREIGN MINISTER ARRIVES IN NEW DELHI…. REITERATES RESOLVE TO IMPROVE BILATERAL TIES 500,000 INDIAN TEXTILE WORKERS MAY LOSE JOBS IN THE NEXT FIVE MONTHS AND……CYCLONE NISHA TO HIT SOUTHERN COAST OF INDIA TONIGHT… THOUSANDS EVACUATED PTC 1: NOW THE NEWS IN DETAIL…… NEW DELHI AND ISLAMABAD ARE SEEKING TO ADVANCE THEIR FOUR YEAR OLD PEACE PROCESS AS PAKISTAN FOREIGN MINISTER SHAH MAHMOOD QURESHI HOLD TALKS WITH HIS INDIAN COUNTERPART PRANAB MUKHERJEE IN NEW DELHI. VO1: Pakistan Foreign Minister Qureshi and Indian counterpart Pranab Mukherjee held discussions on a wide range of bilateral and regional issues including Kashmir. Earlier, on arriving in the capital, Qureshi said his visit will help bridge the trust deficit that exists between the two nations and aimed for more “confidence-building measures,” through sports and greater people to people contacts. UPSOUND/ SHAH MEHMOOD QURESHI Foreign Minister, Pakistan TRANSCRIPTION: We are here to build bridges, am here with the positive note. Indian (Cricket) Team is welcome to Pakistan, Indian are welcome to Pakistan, our doors are open and we want more people to people contact to enhance. VO3: The nuclear-armed South Asian neighbors have been seeking to improve ties since 2004, after they came close to fighting a fourth war the previous year. This is the first high-level meeting between the two sides since September this year when India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President Asif Ali Zardari met each other on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly. PTC 2: BEFORE HIS DEPARTURE TO INDIA, QURESHI ALSO MET BRITISH FOREIGN SECRETARY DAVID MILIBAND IN ISLAMABAD. MILIBAND WHO ARRIVED FROM AFGHANISTAN WELCOMED THE "REFORMING ZEAL" OF PAKISTAN'S CIVILIAN GOVERNMENT AND SAID IT WAS TURNING THE COUNTRY INTO AN OUTWARD-L...

Tropical storm claims lives

Fri, 29 Aug 2008 09:33:06 -0400

Residents and tourists alike fled Jamaica as a strengthening tropical storm Gustav lurched toward the island late Thursday after triggering floods and landslides that killed at least 67 people in Haiti and the Dominican Republic on the island of Hispaniola. At least 59 people died in Haiti from floods, mudslides and falling trees, including 25 around the city of Jacmel, where Gustav first struck land Tuesday. Eight more people were buried when a cliff gave way in the Dominican Republic. Marcelina Feliz died clutching her 11-month-old baby. Five more of her children were smothered in the wreckage beside her. Thursday night, Gustav was 55 kilometres off Jamaica but already lashing the island with tropical storm-force winds. Dozens of roofs were ripped from houses, trees were toppled and many roads were left impassable by floodwaters and debris. U.S. forecasters said the storm could grow to a hurricane before hitting the low-lying capital of Kingston early Friday and then moving on to the Cayman Islands. Forecasters said parts of Jamaica could get 635 millimetres of rain, which could trigger landslides and cause serious crop damage. Authorities told fisherman to stay ashore, and hotel workers secured beach umbrellas in the resort city of Montego Bay. Jamaican authorities ordered residents to evacuate low-lying areas including Portmore, a crowded and flood-prone area outside Kingston, and move into shelters. Kingston's main airport was closed and buses stopped running even as people streamed into supermarkets for emergency supplies. The storm is expected to pick up more strength from the warm waters south of Cuba and hug Jamaica's southern shore before making an almost direct hit on the Caymans by late Friday, likely as a strong Category 1 hurricane. Tourists are leaving the Caymans, and resorts are closing as Gustav approaches. ...

CSIS Human Rights Controversy

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 09:59:18 -0400

CSIS ignored human-rights concerns and did not take Omar Khadr’s age into account in deciding to interview him at the U.S. military's Guantanamo Bay prison, says a report from the independent committee that oversees the spy agency. - The Toronto-born Khadr, now 22, is being held at the U.S. detention centre in Cuba for allegedly throwing a grenade in Afghanistan when he was 15, killing an American soldier. He is the only Western citizen still detained at Guantanamo. - A report from the security intelligence review committee (SIRC), released Wednesday in Ottawa, said documents also show Khadr's U.S. captors threatened him with rape, kept him alone and would not let him sleep. Canadian Security Intelligence Service officers questioned Khadr at Guantanamo Bay in 2003 and shared the results of their interrogations with the Americans. - However, the report did not find that CSIS was complicit in Khadr's alleged torture at the hands of U.S. interrogators. - The committee recommended that CSIS take human-rights issues into consideration in future probes and also establish a policy framework to guide its dealings with young people. - "As part of this, the service should ensure that such interactions are guided by the same principles that are entrenched in Canadian and international law," the SIRC report said. CSIS reviewing report - CSIS "will give careful consideration to [the report's] findings and recommendations," the agency said in a statement. - "CSIS has had to adapt to the more recent phenomenon of youth radicalization and will consider SIRC's findings as it continues to assess how it deals with this threat." - Public Safety Minister Peter Van Loan said, "We are reviewing the report with interest. As you know, it deals with events that took place under the previous Liberal government." - Since the Conservatives came to power, they have implemented a new CSIS protocol for deal...

Clinton, Obama debates NAFTA

Tue, 04 Mar 2008 16:10:03 -0500

For the first time in the 2008 presidential campaign season, free trade - and specifically the impact of the North American Free Trade Agreement-- has become a major campaign issue. No where was that more evident than at the last Democratic debate between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in Ohio. Both candidates said they'd be willing to opt out of NAFTA-- unless it's renotiatiated. SOUNDBITE: Hillary Clinton, presidential candidate, saying (English): "When I started running for the Senate I have been a critic. I've said it was flawed." SOUNDBITE: Barack Obama, presidential candidate, saying (English): "It's inaccurate for Senator Clinton to say that she's always opposed NAFTA. In her campaign for Senate she said that NAFTA on balance had been good for New York and good for America." The difficulty for both candidates is that while NAFTA is seen as a bad word in many parts of Ohio, it is viewed very favorably in Texas....and both states hold primaries next Tuesday. President Bush weighed in on the matter at a White House news conference. SOUNDBITE: U.S. President George W. Bush saying (English): "Those of us who grew up in Texas remember what the border looked like when we were kids, and it was really poor. And you go down to that border today, it is prosperous on both sides of the river, to the credit of those who proposed NAFTA, and to the credit of those who got NAFTA through the Congress." But in Ohio, where according to the Economic Policy Institute, an estimated 50,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost in the aftermath of NAFTA, it's a different story..making it difficut for any presidential candidate to simply embrace or demonize the trade agreement. Paula Stern is the former chairwoman fo the U.S. International Trade Commission. SOUNDBITE: Paula Stern, former chairwoman for the U.S. International Trade Commission, saying (English): "I think it's always a good idea to revisit and see what the impact has been so that we can if you will lay the ...

Talented jazz musician dies

Tue, 25 Dec 2007 06:26:41 -0500

Jazz fans and Canadians both home and abroad are mourning the death of Oscar Peterson, the virtuoso known globally as one of the most talented musicians ever to play jazz piano. Peterson died Sunday night at his home in Mississauga, Ont., from kidney failure. He was 82. "The world has lost the world's greatest jazz player," Hazel McCallion, mayor of Mississauga and Peterson's friend, told CBC News on Monday afternoon. Renowned for his speed and virtuosity as a pianist, Peterson - who was born in Montreal and later made Toronto his home - made hundreds of recordings in his career, even after a stroke in 1993 disabled his left hand. "What he was able to achieve [after his stroke], playing with half of what most other pianists had, he was still light years ahead of every one else," said jazz broadcaster Ross Porter. Liberal politician and former Ontario premier Bob Rae said he "worshipped" Peterson as a musician and a fan, and hailed the pianist for his achievements. "The young Oscar was without question the greatest piano player of his time ... the greatest piano player player of jazz," Rae said, praising Peterson for "the dexterity of his right hand, the stride, the power of his left." "As he got older, the depth of his humanity came out in his compositions," added Rae. Over the years, Peterson's recording and performing partners included such stars as Charlie Parker, Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Nat King Cole and Stan Getz. Some of Peterson's most legendary works came after he teamed up to form the Oscar Peterson Trio in 1953. The trio created such classic recordings as 1955's At Zardis, 1956's At the Stratford Shakespearean Festival and 1957's At Concertgebouw. Lived for music's 'moments of great beauty' He formed another classic piano-guitar-bass trio in the 1970s with guitarist Joe Pass and Danish-born bassist Niels Pedersen. Peterson revelled in the kind of improvisation he could...

Canada Fights Seal Ban

Wed, 29 Jul 2009 10:50:51 -0400

The European Union’s new ban on the import of seal products is an unfair trade restriction and Canada will launch a World Trade Organization challenge, Trade Minister Stockwell Day announced Monday. - The EU approved the ban at a meeting of foreign ministers Monday without debate. - "We are very disappointed with this ruling," Day said in Montreal. "We believe strongly this violates the World Trade Organization guidelines." - Canada's seal hunt is practised according to procedures established, in part, by an EU study done in 2006, Day said. - The seal hunt has been determined by veterinarians to be humane and follows the environmental rules of sustainability, Day said, adding that Canada should be exempt from this particular ban. - "It is in our view inappropriate that a trade decision is taken which is not based on science," Day said. - Canada will be requesting WTO consultations, which will last 60 days. If an agreement is not reached during the consultation process, Canada will launch an official appeal, which will result in a court ruling on the ban, Day said. - Canada's East Coast seal hunt is the largest of its kind in the world, with an average annual kill of about 300,000 harp seals. Canada exported about $2.5 million worth of seal products to EU countries in 2008. - The restrictions apply to all products and processed goods derived from seals, including fur, meat, oil blubber and even omega-3 pills made from seal oil. But the ban exempts products from traditional hunts carried out by Inuit in Canada, Greenland, Alaska and Russia. - The import ban in all 27 EU member countries is expected to take effect in October. 'Shortsighted and irresponsible' - The European rules still let Canada ship seal products through Europe but it bars the promotion of the products. - Mary Simon, president of the national Inuit organization Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, called ...

LTTE suicide bomber

Wed, 28 Nov 2007 14:07:01 -0500

Sri Lanka, Nov 28(ANI): From an unknown location in Sri lanka, The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam leader Velupillai Prabhakaran on November 27, accused the international community of failing his rebel group. Meanwhile, an LTTE suicide bomber blew herself up near the office of a minority Tamil minister in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo on November 28th killing his personal secretary.