Docudharma Times Sunday March 29

 The Courts Are

Coming For You

Alberto

Obama Will Face a Defiant World on Foreign Visit



By HELENE COOPER

Published: March 28, 2009

WASHINGTON – President Obama is facing challenges to American power on multiple fronts as he prepares for his first trip overseas since taking office, with the nation’s economic woes emboldening allies and adversaries alike.

Despite his immense popularity around the world, Mr. Obama will confront resentment over American-style capitalism and resistance to his economic prescriptions when he lands in London on Tuesday for the Group of 20 summit meeting of industrial and emerging market nations plus the European Union.

The president will not even try to overcome NATO’s unwillingness to provide more troops in Afghanistan when he goes on later in the week to meet with the military alliance.

Spanish judge accuses six top Bush officials of torture

 Legal moves may force Obama’s government into starting a new inquiry into abuses at Guantánamo Bay and Abu Ghraib

?Julian Borger and Dale Fuchs in Madrid

The Observer, Sunday 29 March 2009

Criminal proceedings have begun in Spain against six senior officials in the Bush administration for the use of torture against detainees in Guantánamo Bay. Baltasar Garzón, the counter-terrorism judge whose prosecution of General Augusto Pinochet led to his arrest in Britain in 1998, has referred the case to the chief prosecutor before deciding whether to proceed.

The case is bound to threaten Spain’s relations with the new administration in Washington, but Gonzalo Boyé, one of the four lawyers who wrote the lawsuit, said the prosecutor would have little choice under Spanish law but to approve the prosecution.

“The only route of escape the prosecutor might have is to ask whether there is ongoing process in the US against these people,” Boyé told the Observer.

USA

Confederate holiday provokes a war between the Souths

Confederate defenders seek to honor their history. Many who cherish the modern New South decry the campaign as reminder of slavery’s legacy. ‘This is a new day,’ a Georgia legislator says.

By Dahleen Glanton

6:18 PM PDT, March 28, 2009

Reporting from Atlanta — In a cultural war that has pitted Old South against New, defenders of the Confederate legacy have opened a fresh front in their campaign to polish an image tarnished, they say, by people who do not respect Southern values.

With the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War coming up in 2011, efforts are underway in statehouses, small towns and counties across the South to push for proclamations or legislation promoting Confederate history.

Alabama, Virginia, Mississippi, Texas, Louisiana and Florida observe Confederate History Month in April. Georgia has recognized it by proclamation since 1995, and the state Senate recently passed a bill that would make it official — assuming the measure passes muster in the state House, which could be problematic.

Most Southern states recognize Confederate Memorial Day as a legal holiday. Some celebrate it on the June birthday of Confederate President Jefferson Davis, but Texas and Arkansas observe it on Jan. 19, the federal holiday for the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

Jewish writer raises a storm in America with his report from a ‘tolerant’ Iran



Paul Harris in New York

The Observer, Sunday 29 March 2009

A row has broken out over allegations of antisemitism at the New York Times, America’s most vaunted name in journalism and a newspaper with a large Jewish readership.

The storm centres on a column about Jews in Iran written by New York Times journalist Roger Cohen and a cartoon attacking the recent war in Gaza.

The newspaper, and Cohen in particular, has been accused of being too critical of Israel and an apologist for Iran and its leader, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Cohen’s column was written from Iran about the country’s small Jewish minority. His piece acknowledged the difficulties the group experienced and portrayed them as part of an Iranian society that he said was more tolerant, democratic and sophisticated than many American critics allowed.

Middle East

Keys to the kingdom: Inside Saudi Arabia’s royal family

The crown prince is seriously ill, and Saudi Arabia’s normally secretive royal family is openly clashing over who will take the throne, reports Hugh Miles

Sunday, 29 March 2009

A dispute over Saudi Arabia’s royal succession burst into the open yesterday, revealing a power struggle in which one of the most senior princes in the oil-rich kingdom is reported to have disappeared. The prospect of instability in a country that is not only the world’s largest oil exporter but also a key Western ally at the heart of the Middle East will cause serious concern in Washington, London and beyond.

Rumours are rife over the position of Prince Bandar bin Sultan, 60, son of the heir to the Saudi throne, who has not been seen in public for weeks. Prince Bandar is better known abroad than almost any other member of the Saudi royal family, not only for his extravagant lifestyle, but because of his daring foreign policy initiatives during 22 years as the Saudi ambassador in Washington, where he played an important role after 9/11 and during two Gulf wars. His absence from public life comes at a sensitive time in Saudi Arabia: his father, Crown Prince Sultan, is gravely ill with cancer, throwing the succession to King Abdullah into question.

US and Iran open Afghanistan peace talks

As Obama unveiled his new strategy on Afghanistan, his officials attended a historic meeting with an old enemy

From The Sunday Times

March 29, 2009 Christina Lamb

IRANIAN and American officials have held their first talks about ending the war in Afghanistan amid signs that President Barack Obama’s efforts to thaw relations with Tehran are paying off.

While television cameras focused on Obama in Washington during the unveiling of his strategy for Afghanistan last Friday, US and Iranian diplomats were holding a remarkable meeting in Moscow.

The Russian initiative brought together Patrick Moon, the US diplomat in charge of south and central Asia, and Mehdi Akhundzadeh, Iran’s deputy foreign minister, as well as a British diplomat who has been acting as a mediator.

“We’ve turned a page to have Iranians and Americans at the same table all discussing Afghanistan,” Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, told delegates.

Europe

It started in Hawaii but it took an Irishman to get the world surfing

… and today’s surfers are heading to Ireland in search of big wave thrills

By Emily Dugan and Paul Bignell

Sunday, 29 March 2009

It started as the sport of Hawaiian kings, on the clement shores of the paradise islands. But now claims are emerging that the origins of modern surfing – an international sport and a multimillion-pound industry – can be traced to the far-from-sunkissed island of Ireland.

Surfers from the Californian coast to the swells of Cornwall owe a debt to George Freeth, the son of an Irish immigrant from Ulster who arrived in Hawaii at the turn of the century.

According to the film Waveriders, to be released next month, the young Freeth’s Hawaiian uncle gave him a traditional board – a massive, solid wood plank that was 20ft tall and weighed 200 pounds. In a stroke of inspiration, the Irishman decided to make it smaller.

A life in the day of: Jose Manuel Durao, EC president

Has he got the toughest job in the world? Jose talks about meeting people his mother disapproves of

From The Sunday Times

March 29, 2009

I wake up, almost mechanically, at 6am, unless I’m extremely tired. I can usually manage my day on five to six hours’ sleep, but as I can often find myself travelling to three countries in a day, I may nap on a train or plane. I have a shower, shave and dress in 20 minutes.

I always wear a classic suit in grey or dark blue, a blue or white shirt, dark blue or black socks. As I dress I listen to classical, opera or jazz.

The precious time is before 9am, when I have no phone calls and no one is trying to see me. That’s when I read my briefings and papers and make plans. For breakfast I just have coffee and an apple, because I have to watch my weight. But then I’ll often have a working breakfast at 8am at the Commission. We don’t serve an English breakfast, which I love – just croissants.

Africa

Al-Qaeda’s spreading tentacles in West Africa opposed by traditional leaders

Traditional Islamic leaders from across West Africa are meeting to try and form a common front against al-Qaeda’s growing influence in the region.

By Amil Khan in Bamako, Mali

Amid the hectic bustle of people and vehicles on the streets of Mali’s capital city, Bamako, there are signs of the growing influence of austere Islamic practice that is causing social rifts across Africa.

In the market next to the grand mosque in the centre of town, Muslim women with their hair covered but their shoulders and arms bare barter for T-shirts emblazoned with photos of US President Barack Obama. In another part of the market, a young man in the austere Saudi-inspired dress of trousers hitched up at the ankle and long beard berates a bookstall owner for not carrying the “right sort of works”.

In Zimbabwe, law has a long road ahead

The new unity government has raised hopes that President Mugabe’s regime would face justice for years of political killings, arrests and torture. But many opposition activists remain jailed.

By Robyn Dixon

March 29, 2009

Reporting from Banket, Zimbabwe — The man and woman who came to the 5-year-old boy’s house in October were friendly and smiled a lot. They carried a bag of dried beans and asked where his mother was.

Alan Mutemagawu was thrilled — his mother would be happy to get the beans. Proudly, he led them the hour’s walk to the village where she was in hiding from Zimbabwean security agents.

The smiling couple didn’t say much. But his mother didn’t look pleased when Alan turned up with the visitors.

“She looked sad. She didn’t say goodbye. She just walked away with them,” the boy said recently at his grandmother’s house, near the village of Banket. Neighbors found him crying after the visitors — state security agents — took away his mother, Violet Mupfuranhehwe, and his 2-year-old brother, Nigel. He found out later that they’d also taken his father, Collen Mutemagawu.

Asia

Indonesia crews resume dam rescue

Bodies are still being recovered more than two days after a dam burst near the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, killing at least 93 people.

The BBC

Disaster officials said about 700 rescuers and volunteers continued to sift through debris trying to find dozens of people still unaccounted for.

The Situ Gintung dam gave way early on Friday after hours of rain, deluging about 400 homes in Tangerang district.

Residents likened the onrush of water to the impact of a tsunami.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono visited the scene on Friday and promised to help families reconstruct their homes.

See map of affected area

Torrents of water mixed with boulders and debris crashed through a 70m (230ft) gash in the dam, sweeping away buildings in the Cirendeu suburb of the town of Ciputat.

Supersonic BrahMos missile test fired successfully



29 Mar 2009, 1334 hrs IST, PTI

NEW DELHI: For the second time in a month, the Block II version of the supersonic BrahMos cruise missile with a striking range of 290 km, successfully hit its target during a test at the Pokhran firing range on Sunday, DRDO officials said.

“The missile was successfully launched at 1115 hours in the morning and in the next two-and-a-half minutes, it hit the bull’s eye in the Pokhran firing range in Rajasthan,” an official said.

This was the third test-firing of the latest Block II version of the missile.

During the test, Army’s Director General of Military Operations Lieutenant General A S Sekhon, Artillery School Commandant Lt Gen Rao and Additional Director General (Artillery) Major General V K Tiwari were present.

Latin America

Mexico’s drug gangs drive film crew out of town

Escalating violence is forcing Hollywood and US tourists to stay away. Guy Adams reports

Sunday, 29 March 2009

Mexican drug cartels don’t like rivals treading on their territory; they don’t like the police poking around; and now, it seems, they don’t much care for Hollywood taking an interest in their business.

Producers of a film about the murder of a cocaine smuggler, which would have starred Eva Mendes, Josh Hartnett and Sir Ben Kingsley, have been forced to abandon filming on the Mexican coast after the movie-makers received death threats.

Queen of the South, based on a novel by Arturo Perez-Reverte, was due to be filmed in Sinaloa, on the country’s northern coast. But, following a decision by Jonathan Jakubowicz, its Venezuelan director, and two of his producers, the plug has now been pulled on the project. “I’ve worked really hard to make this beautiful movie, but the safety of my family and my team comes first,” Jakubowicz told Variety. “Making this movie [would have] put us all at risk, not only in Mexico but in the US.”

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