Iran Expanding Effort to Stifle the Opposition
By ROBERT F. WORTH
Published: November 23, 2009
DAMASCUS, Syria – After last summer’s disputed presidential election, Iran’s government relied largely on brute force – beatings, arrests and show trials – to stifle the country’s embattled opposition movement.Now, stung by the force and persistence of the protests, the government appears to be starting a far more ambitious effort to discredit its opponents and re-educate Iran’s mostly young and restive population. In recent weeks, the government has announced a variety of new ideological offensives.
A Warehouse Holds Families’ New Memories in Afghanistan
KABUL JOURNAL
By ALISSA J. RUBIN
Published: November 23, 2009
KABUL, Afghanistan – In his inaugural address last week, President Hamid Karzai proudly touted his country’s achievements in creating an Afghanistan with a “rehabilitated economic infrastructure” and “budding free-market economy.”
For the six families who live in a damaged warehouse on the southwest side of the capital, Kabul, the president might as well have been talking about another country.Like millions of Afghans, the families who have taken shelter here have been displaced by years of war.
USA
Blacks hit hard by economy’s punch
34.5 percent of young African American men are unemployed
By V. Dion Haynes
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
These days, 24-year-old Delonta Spriggs spends much of his time cooped up in his mother’s one-bedroom apartment in Southwest Washington, the TV blaring soap operas hour after hour, trying to stay out of the streets and out of trouble, held captive by the economy. As a young black man, Spriggs belongs to a group that has been hit much harder than any other by unemployment.Joblessness for 16-to-24-year-old black men has reached Great Depression proportions — 34.5 percent in October, more than three times the rate for the general U.S. population.
U.S. youths recruited to fight in Somali militia, authorities say
Young Somali Americans, many in Minneapolis, were lured to fight with an Al Qaeda-affiliated group, court documents allege. Eight suspects alleged to be part of that network face criminal charges.
By Josh Meyer
November 24, 2009
Reporting from Washington – Federal authorities unsealed criminal charges Monday against eight suspects alleged to be part of a U.S. recruiting network that sent young men to fight in Somalia — one of the largest militant operations uncovered in this country since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.The court documents disclosed how some older members of the Somali American community in Minneapolis are believed to have lured younger ones to fight in Somalia — some as suicide bombers — with an Al Qaeda-affiliated group known as Al Shabab, or “The Youth.”
Asia
The mystery of Dr Aafia Siddiqui
A Pakistani neuroscientist and mother of three is to stand trial in New York for attempted murder. But shadowy questions about her life remain – including her links to al-Qaida and her five ‘lost’ years
Declan Walsh
The Guardian, Tuesday 24 November 2009
On a hot summer morning 18 months ago a team of four Americans – two FBI agents and two army officers – rolled into Ghazni, a dusty town 50 miles south of Kabul. They had come to interview two unusual prisoners: a woman in a burka and her 11-year-old son, arrested the day before.Afghan police accused the mysterious pair of being suicide bombers. What interested the Americans, though, was what they were carrying: notes about a “mass casualty attack” in the US on targets including the Statue of Liberty and a collection of jars and bottles containing “chemical and gel substances”.
Guilty: China’s verdict on the man who helped quake victims
Beijing responds to US call for greater civil liberties with sentence for activist who criticised official response to disaster
By Clifford Coonan in Beijing Tuesday, 24 November 2009
A Chinese dissident was jailed for three years yesterday for trying to help victims of last year’s earthquake in Sichuan province.Huang Qi was sentenced less than a week after the US President Barack Obama urged China to grant its citizens greater human rights. The court ruling was interpreted as a clear sign that Beijing was unwilling to cede any ground on civil liberties.
Mr Huang, a 46-year-old political activist and campaigner, had asked awkward questions on behalf of parents who believed their children would have survived if their shoddily-built schools had not collapsed when the huge tremor struck Sichuan province in May 2008, killing 90,000 people.
Middle East
Yemeni refugees caught up in Middle East’s forgotten war
A long-running conflict between rebels and government forces has entered a dangerous phase with attacks by Saudi forces forcing thousands of families into overcrowded refugee camps
Hugh Macleod at Mazrak camp in north Yemen
guardian.co.uk, Monday 23 November 2009 22.44 GMT
Eyelashes still thick with the dust of a three-day journey, Nasser Mohammed stood with his family amid the plastic pots and bright blankets of the recently uprooted as children and old men gathered around the tent to hear his story.Speaking slowly, he told of their 60-mile trek from a village in the tough mountain scrublands of Yemen’s north-west after a warning from Saudi authorities that their lives were at risk.
“Please evacuate your homes in order to survive,” blared the message from loudspeakers across the Saudi side of the border.
Gulf: A choice between liberalisation or recovery?
When video showing a UAE royal family member apparently engaged in torture emerged this year, it passed virtually unreported in the Gulf. Such an episode may point towards an encroaching problem for the region, and its potential to reclaim economic glory in a post-recession world.
By Jamie Stewart Tuesday, 24 November 2009
“The energy can’t last forever; either it runs out, or the world turns to something else. They have the resources to do it right now. It’s up to them – in this blink of an eye – to make non-oil economies.”The comment is from Dr Christopher Davidson, who has been awaiting word on publication of his book for some time. ‘Abu Dhabi, Oil and Beyond’, charts the trajectory of the energy-laden UAE capital from its Bedouin origins to the verge of preeminence. But Davidson’s take on the story is by his own admission one which the city – along with its neighbour Dubai – would rather not be told.
Africa
Yes I remember holding you hostage – come and stay
When searching for an Ethiopian rebel who kidnapped him 33 years ago, a former Sunday Times reporter had an unexpected invitation
Jon Swain
I last saw Aregawi Berhe in the summer of 1976. The big news gripping Britain was the heatwave – back then, the hottest since records began – and the dramatic Israeli commando raid on Entebbe airport in Uganda to rescue 100 hostages held by pro-Palestinian hijackers.My mind was focused on neither. Aregawi Berhe had kidnapped me, and I was concentrating on survival.
At the time, Aregawi was a fierce young guerrilla leader in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray province. I was a young reporter on assignment for The Sunday Times, covering Ethiopia’s separatist wars.
‘Cruel’ Zulu bull-killing ritual challenged in court
Animal rights activists in South Africa are taking legal action against the Zulu king to stop a bull from being killed as part of a ritual next month.
The BBC Tuesday, 24 November 2009
Animal Rights Africa says dozens of bare-handed people kill the animal in a cruel and undignified way.
The group is suing Zulu King Goodwill Zwelithini in the hope of halting the practice, known as Ukweshwama.
A royal spokesman said the killing was a highly symbolic way of thanking God for the first crops of the season.
But animal campaigners say the Ukweshwama ritual does nothing to strengthen nation-building, social cohesion or peace.
In a statement, Animal Rights Africa quoted an eyewitness as saying the bull was tortured for 40 minutes during a previous ceremony.
Europe
France aims for key Commission job as Brown criticised for Ashton appointment
From The Times
November 24, 2009
David Charter in Brussels and Philip Webster, Political Editor
British diplomats are fighting a rearguard action to prevent France from taking the key financial job in Brussels after Baroness Ashton of Upholland’s appointment as foreign affairs chief.With Paris and Berlin setting their sights on controlling the EU’s economic agenda, a former French Foreign Minister, Michel Barnier, is being tipped to take the plum commission portfolio overseeing the internal market and financial services.
Germany is seeking the industry or energy jobs in the European Commission line-up due to be announced this month, while also preparing its national bank chairman to take over at the European Central Bank.
Simpsons episode lampooning Sarkozy and Bruni becomes internet hit in France
An episode of The Simpsons which lampoons Nicholas Sarkozy, the French President, and his wife Carla Bruni, the former model, has become a surprise internet hit in France.
Published: 8:09AM GMT 24 Nov 2009
Cartoon caricatures of Sarkozy and the first lady starred in an episode of the American animated show in the United States on November 15 in an episode entitled “The Devil Wears Nada”.
Their cameos passed largely unnoticed in France until Friday, when news websites started linking to pirated clips of the episode, creating a buzz which saw more than 117,000 fans linking to the DailyMotion site alone.
Latin America
The rise of Mexico’s La Familia, a narco-evangelist cartel
Mexico and the US are working together bring down Mexico’s newest, most violent drug cartel. Last month, 303 alleged La Familia members were arrested in 38 US cities. Fifteen members were indicted Friday in Chicago.
By Sara Miller Llana | Staff writer
APATZINGAN, MEXICO – They hand out Bibles to the poor in the rural foothills of the state of Michoacán. They forbid drug use, build schools and drainage systems, and declare themselves the protectors of women and children.But this is no church group. This is La Familia Michoacána, Mexico’s newest drug-trafficking gang, which now reigns over Mexico’s methamphetamine trade. What began as a self-declared vigilante group doing “the work of God,” now is seen as the nation’s most violent criminal group.
Its influence stretches well beyond this patch of Mexico called “La Tierra Caliente” or “Hot Land.” Last month, in the largest coordinated action against a Mexican trafficking organization north of the border, the United States arrested 303 alleged La Familia affiliates in 38 US cities. It was the culmination of “Project Coronado,” which has nabbed more than 1,100 suspects in 44 months.