Supporters greet Mikhail Saakashvili during his reelection campaign with a huge rally in Tbilisi, Jan. 4.

TBILISI, Georgia, Jan. 5--Georgians began voting Saturday in an election that could topple President Mikhail Saakashvili, the US-educated leader who set out to transform the former Soviet republic into a modern European state but has since been accused of authoritarian leanings.
Saakashvili became a symbol of democratic reform after leading mass street protests that ousted a Communist-era veteran from power following fraudulent elections in late 2003.
Now, the Rose Revolution hero is fighting not only to stay in office but to prove that he is still the democratic leader once so beloved in his homeland and admired in the West, AP said.
Saakashvili won a January 2004 election with more than 96 percent of the vote. His challenge Saturday is to win an outright majority and avoid a runoff two weeks later that would allow the opposition, now split among six challengers, to unite behind a single candidate.
Saakashvili has focused his campaign on increasing social welfare support. He has said the election has put at stake his plan to change Georgia into a country worthy of membership in NATO and the European Union.
He faces his toughest competition from Levan Gachechiladze, a member of parliament who represents an opposition coalition that wants to do away with the presidency.
If a parliamentary system is established, as the coalition wants, Gachechiladze would step down.
Meanwhile, Georgia’s opposition on Friday accused incumbent president, Mikhail Saakashvili, of having rigged upcoming presidential elections in advance and vowed to take to the streets of this former Soviet republic to protest the result, AFP said.
Opposition candidates said the outcome had already been determined through a series of campaign violations, including media bias in favor of Saakashvili and the use of state resources to support his campaign.
“If these kinds of things continue, and I am 100 percent sure that this is continuing, then we can’t recognize“ the election, leading opposition candidate Levan Gachechiladze told journalists after meeting with European observers.
Authorities insisted that the election Saturday would be conducted fairly and called on the opposition to recognize the results.
The snap election, called after violent unrest in November, is seen as a crucial test of democracy for this small Black Sea country, amid allegations of opposition coup plots and meddling by former ruler Russia.
Gachechiladze said Saakashvili was planning to use “non-legal and bad exit polls“ to claim victory and promised to “continue protests and everything under the constitution“ to oppose him.

Khaled Meshaal

DAMASCUS, Syria, Jan. 5--Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal called on late Friday for unconditional talks with the rival Fatah faction to halt violence between Palestinians but vowed to keep up the Islamist group’s armed struggle against Israel, Reuters reported.
“I urge my brothers in Fatah to solve the Palestinian crisis and restore national unity through unconditional dialogue,“ Meshaal said at a rally in the Syrian capital to mark the 20th anniversary of Hamas’ founding.
“We can manage the conflict with Israel together, without dropping the option of resistance.“
The statement followed an offer last week by President Mahmoud Abbas, who leads Fatah, to hold reconciliation talks if Hamas ceded control of Gaza. Abbas also renewed his call for Hamas to agree to early elections.
The rift between the two groups widened after Hamas defeated Fatah in a 2006 poll. At least five Palestinians were killed and 50 wounded in clashes in the Gaza strip between Fatah and Hamas activists shortly after Abbas made his remarks.
According to AFP, Meshaal also noted that Hamas will resist until the last Israeli soldier leaves Palestinian soil.
“Resistance will continue--no one can stop it“, he said.
He denied there had been contacts between the Islamist movement and “the Zionists who are our enemies“ and said Hamas had turned down a European proposal for such a meeting to discuss ways of calming the situation.
“Gaza is starving and surrounded but it is still resisting,“ Meshaal said. He called upon “Arab leaders to take a courageous decision in order to lift the embargo“ on the impoverished territory.
The Islamist leader also said an Israeli soldier seized by Gaza militant groups in a cross-border raid on June 15, 2006, would not be freed unilaterally.
“We will not free Gilad Shalit unless our prisoners are released“ by Israel, he said.

First phase of US preliminary elections began with the eye-catching victory of Barack Obama over his democrat contender, Senator Hillary Clinton. Advocates of Democrats in the State of Iowa preferred Obama over a female candidate. The former US first lady stood in third place after another contender, John Edwards.
In the Republican Camp, as its was expected, Michael Huckabee ranked first and former mayor of New York, Rudolph Giuliani who was expected to be the first chance of victory of Republican Party in the US presidential elections slated for November 2008 jumped to the sixth place.
Of course, candidates of both US main political parties have a long way to go for becoming an official candidate in the national conventions. They should fight with their rivals in 49 other American states and a small mistake can change their fate. Hence, an analysis of America’s future political landscape is not feasible due to primary results of the State of Iowa.
However, an important point that should be taken into consideration is that the majority of American voters from both Republican and Democratic camps are calling for major changes in their country. The votes by Iowans to a young black senator against Hillary Clinton shows the need for change in US politics more than anything else.
Despite her political successes during presence of her husband, President Bill Clinton, in the White House and also seven years of representing the people of New York in the Senate, Hillary shows the continuation of US policies of the past decade rather than representing the public will for change.
Of course, it is too early to consider Clinton as the loser of US preliminary elections. The veteran politician can change the electoral results to her interest in the coming days and also in the course of preliminary elections in other states. However, occupying third place in the small state of Iowa is not good news for someone who wants to become America’s 44th president.
Huckabee can represent the need for changes in the Republican Party as Obama can. Unlike Giuliani, Huckabee does not belong to the US neoconservatives and more than security concerns has promised the American people to abide by social and moral values and fight abortion and gay marriages. Huckabee also enjoys the support of the influential Christian Coalition who are known as Christian fundamentalists.
However, the first step in intra-party elections for Obama and Huckabee was successful. But, it goes without saying that maintaining the victory is more difficult than achieving the victory itself. And it is possible that changes will take place in the rankings of all candidates.

SEOUL, South Korea, Jan. 5--International efforts to put an end to North Korea’s nuclear program appeared to hit a snag Saturday after Pyongyang defiantly insisted it had lived up to its end of a six-party disarmament deal.
Days after the North Korea missed a December 31 deadline to disable its nuclear plants and provide a full declaration of its nuclear facilities, it insisted it had given the list to the United States in November, a claim Washington denied, reported AFP.
North Korea said it had been forced to slow compliance with the deal reached last February as the other parties to the agreement--China, Japan, South Korea, Russia and the US--had not held up their end of the bargain.
It accused the other parties of failing to deliver promised energy aid, and also said the United States had not “honored its commitments“ to remove Pyongyang from its list of state sponsors of terrorism.
“Looking back on what has been done, one may say that the DPRK is going ahead of others in fulfilling its commitment,“ the North Korean foreign ministry said in a statement released late Friday.
Top US envoy Christopher Hill was to arrive in Tokyo on Monday at the start of a regional tour likely to focus on efforts to kick start the long-running negotiations.
Analysts said the disarmament process had reached a turning point.
“Efforts to dismantle North Korea’s nuclear facilities are now at crossroads due to a dispute over a suspected uranium enrichment program,“ Paik Hak-Soon, an analyst at Sejong Institute in Seoul, told AFP.
“Both North Korea and the United States are in a dilemma over how to establish the pattern of action,“ he said, adding that the North would look for “strong incentives“ from Washington before proceeding with disarmament.
“The statement means that North Korea will not take further action until the United States and other parties reciprocate. They think they have done enough,“ Paik said.
Washington says it has evidence that Pyongyang imported material which could be used in a secret uranium enrichment program. The North has never publicly admitted any such operation.
On the issue of the nuclear declaration, White House spokesman, Tony Fratto, said the United States was “still waiting“ for North Korea’s full account of its nuclear programs.

A boy walks past a burning barricade in a street of the western Kenyan city of Kisumu, Jan. 3.

KISUMU, Kenya,
Jan. 5--A curfew slapped on the western Kenyan city of Kisumu earlier this week has been lifted following an improvement in the security situation, police said Saturday.
“The curfew was lifted after the security situation improved,“ a senior police official told AFP.
A daytime curfew was imposed Monday on Kisumu, the country’s third city and an opposition bastion, after violence broke out following the controversial announcement of President Mwai Kibaki’s reelection.
Meanwhile, Kenya’s opposition party demanded new presidential elections Friday as thousands of hungry slum dwellers swamped aid workers after days of deadly riots over the disputed vote cut supplies of groceries and water, AP reported.
A spokesman for President Mwai Kibaki said there would only be a rerun of the Dec. 27 election if a court orders it. Kenya’s high court, which can annul the vote and force a new one, was largely appointed by Kibaki.
“The government doesn’t reject or accept this. Only the court can call for the rerun of the election,“ Alfred Mutua told The Associated Press.
Kibaki won a second term in the election, but international observers say the vote tally was flawed. His rival, Raila Odinga, accused him of stealing the election.
Some 300 people have been killed and 100,000 left homeless in a week of turbulence that took an alarming ethnic twist, pitting other tribes against Kibaki’s Kikuyu people.
Shops and homes have been looted and houses and cars set ablaze, bringing chaos to a country considered an island of stability in violence-plagued East Africa.

LONDON, Jan. 5--British voters are likely to go to the polls in mid-2009, one of Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s closest allies indicated in an interview published Saturday.
Ed Balls, Brown’s long-time economic adviser when he was finance minister and now children, schools and families secretary, suggested to the Daily Telegraph a vote would be held in 18 months’ time, reported AFP.
The minister, often referred to as Brown’s “other brain“ and “the deputy chancellor“ during his boss’s former role, said the governing Labour Party had taken a hit in recent months, particularly over an early election U-turn.
But he added: “You can talk about cancelled elections until the cows come home, but no-one out there is. It has not been a big issue for the public.
“I don’t think it will have any impact on the general election result in a year-and-a-half’s time.“
Brown, who took over from Tony Blair in June, does not have to call a general election until May 2010 at the latest but had been expected to capitalize on his early popularity by calling a vote for last November.
But he ruled out an early poll, despite widespread briefing to the contrary by his trusted aides, just as a newspaper opinion poll of key marginal seats suggested he would lose his parliamentary majority if a vote was called.
Brown rejected accusations from opposition parties that he had lost his nerve and has since taken hits in the polls from the global credit crisis, the government’s loss of sensitive personal data and a new party funding scandal.