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Iraqi Refugees Reluctant to Return
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Newly-returned Iraqi refugees from Syria wait at a hall in the Al-Mansur hotel to receive the financial aid promised by the Iraqi government to the returning refugees.
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Only 4 percent of Iraqi refugees surveyed in neighboring Syria have plans to return to their homeland, the UN refugee agency said Tuesday.
According to AP, nearly 90 percent have no plans to return, while the remaining 6 percent don’t know, said Jennifer Pagonis, spokeswoman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.
Most of those who plan to stay away--61 percent--said they are under direct threat in Iraq. Others said the general insecurity in the country is the reason they want to remain abroad, she said.
Most of the Iraqis interviewed left Iraq after the 2003 US-led invasion. Of those, the majority have left since 2006 when sectarian violence became worse.
The survey, conducted March 2-18 for UNHCR by the IPSOS market research organization, found that many of the refugees are in touch with others who have returned and reported back that conditions were unsatisfactory, Pagonis said.
More than a third have visited Iraq themselves once or twice in the past year.
Syria hosts the largest number of Iraqi refugees, about 1.5 million.
White House Caution
Meanwhile, White House officials this week privately cautioned lawmakers not to go too far in restricting US aid to Iraq, warning that doing so might only prolong the war, now in its sixth year.
The Bush administration did not slam the door on proposals in Congress that would insist Iraq do more to pay for its rebuilding efforts. In the meantime, independent investigators conclude in a report that substantial US support continues despite Baghdad’s anticipated $70 billion windfall in oil revenues.
The soaring cost of fuel prices and duration of the war have spurred the latest effort in Congress to get the Iraqis to pay more toward rebuilding efforts. Democrats and even some Republicans say American taxpayers are footing too much of the bill, including an expensive and painfully slow operation to train and equip Baghdad’s security forces.
“There’s going to have to be some honest-to-goodness pressure“ to get the Iraqis to take charge, said Rep. Ike Skelton, chairman of the House Armed Services committee.
Push Into Sadr City
Dozens of fighters ambushed a US patrol in Baghdad’s Sadr City, firing rocket-propelled grenades and machine gun bursts as the American push into the city increasingly faces pockets of close urban combat.
US forces struck back Tuesday with guided rockets that devastated at least three buildings in the densely packed district that serves as the Baghdad base for the Mahdi Army group.
The US military said 28 militiamen were killed as the US patrol pulled back.
Local hospital officials said dozens of civilians were killed or wounded as the result of US strikes.
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Berri Awaits Response to Dialogue Offer
Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said Tuesday that he was awaiting the response from the ruling coalition to his dialogue initiative, Xinhua reported.
“The speaker is waiting for the majority to respond to the dialogue initiative in order to set the date and invitations,“ a statement released by the information office said.
Sources close to Berri said Tuesday that the speaker will be the sponsor and host of the dialogue, and talks with the opposition would be held with Christian opposition leader MP Michel Aoun, said the statement.
On late Monday, the ruling March 14 forces announced to assign MP Saad Hariri to discuss with Berri ways to ensure the election of a new head of state on May 13, which is the 19th attempt to choose a president.
The majority linked their return to the negotiating table to the “unconditional election of a president“ on May 13. The ruling coalition previously rejected Berri’s dialogue initiative, accusing him to be an opposition leader who can not sponsor dialogue, and they refused to open dialogue before electing a new president.
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Pakistan Leaders Pledge to Restore Judges
Pakistani leaders were set for last-gasp talks Wednesday on how to meet their pledge to restore judges ousted by President Pervez Musharraf.
The US-backed president purged the Supreme Court last year to stop legal challenges to his continuation in office. The parties that routed Musharraf’s allies in February elections and now form Pakistan’s new government have promised to reinstate the judges by the end of April, AP said.
But on deadline day they remain deadlocked over how to do it, triggering speculation that the government could crumble--and grant a reprieve to the embattled president.
The coalition is led by the parties of Asif Ali Zardari, who is the widower of assassinated ex-leader Benazir Bhutto and former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
Party officials said the two men would meet Wednesday in Dubai after their lieutenants failed to resolve the issue in marathon talks. Sharif said ahead of the talks that he wants to keep the coalition intact.
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Egypt’s Gaza Proposal Moving Ahead
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File picture shows a national conference of leaders of the Palestinian factions in Gaza against the US-hosted peace conference in Annapolis, November 26, 2007.
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Palestinian factions meeting in Cairo for talks with Egyptian security officials have agreed to an Egyptian proposal for a truce with Israel starting in the Gaza Strip, state news agency MENA said on Wednesday.
“All the Palestinian factions have agreed to the Egyptian proposal on a truce with Israel,“ MENA said, citing an unnamed high-level Egyptian official.
The official said the Egyptian proposal included a “comprehensive, reciprocal and simultaneous truce, implemented in a graduated framework starting in the Gaza Strip and then subsequently moving to the West Bank,“ MENA added.
“This proposal is a phase of a broader plan that aims at providing an appropriate atmosphere before lifting the blockade and ending the state of Palestinian division,“ it said.
All-Out Peace
Egypt invited 12 Palestinian groups for talks to form a consensus on a proposal for a six-month ceasefire, floated by the Palestinian resistance group Hamas last week.
Although it wants Palestinians to stop firing missiles across the border, Israel has dismissed the offer as a Hamas ploy to gain time to prepare for more fighting.
“We are in favor of the truce, on the condition that it be balanced, reciprocal, equal and comprehensive, to include Gaza and the West Bank as well,“ Talal Nagy of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command told reporters on Wednesday.
“We support the truce on that basis that it be reciprocal, simultaneous and start in Gaza and extend to include the West Bank as soon as possible, but this does not mean we will end the resistance to the Israeli occupation,“ added Ghazi Hussein of the small group Saiqa.
Absence of Hamas, Fatah
Leading Palestinian factions of Hamas and Fatah did not attend the talks.
Hamas had proposed a six-month truce between Israel and Palestinians in Gaza, with an option to extend it to Palestinians in the West Bank.
Hamas on Monday briefed the Palestinian factions on its final response to the peace efforts, saying it will accept a truce deal that includes lifting the siege and halting of Israeli strikes for six months.
Reciprocate
The Palestinian resistance movement of Jihad said on Tuesday it had approved a truce with Israel starting in the Gaza Strip, but reserved the right to respond to Israeli attacks in the West Bank.
A truce between Israel and the Palestinians in Gaza would take some pressure off Egypt, a key regional mediator.
Egypt does not want to be viewed as aiding the blockade of Gaza or to have Palestinians storm the Egyptian border with the coastal strip, as Hamas did earlier this year, allowing hundreds of thousands of Gazans to cross into Sinai.
Israel Closes Hamas Charity
Israeli army said it has forced the closure in a West Bank city of offices of a charity affiliated with Hamas. The army spokesman said that troops early Wednesday shut down financial offices of the charity, AP reported.
Israel believes the charity group works to recruit operatives and raise money for militant activities.
Remove Key Checkpoints
A joint study by several Israeli ex-generals and Palestinian officials said Israel could remove 10 major West Bank checkpoints quickly.
The report released Wednesday said these checkpoints no longer fulfill a crucial security need, yet their removal could significantly improve Palestinian trade.
The study follows warnings by the World Bank that the Palestinian economy is not likely to grow this year. The bank says that’s largely because of continued Israeli movement restrictions and despite massive foreign aid.
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Maliki Vows to Disarm Militants
Iraq will disarm militants by force if they do not lay down their weapons, Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki said on Wednesday adding his government wants to build a single national army.
Al-Maliki told reporters at a news conference inside Baghdad’s fortified Green Zone on Wednesday ’’We can’t build a state along with militias.“
He set four conditions -- begin militia disarm, stop interfering in state affairs, stop running their own courts and hand over wanted fugitives -- or face a military assault, alalam.ir reported.
He said “To refuse these conditions means the continuation of the government’s efforts to disarm them by force.“
“There is no alternative to these conditions. The alternative is the continuation of force and clashes until we reach the end, to get rid of the weapons and the gangs who are carrying weapons.“
Maliki launched a crackdown against fighters loyal to anti-America cleric Muqtada Al-Sadr last month in the southern city of Basra.
After initial setbacks, the Basra offensive appears to have been a success in driving militants from the streets there.
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Turkish Official Killed
A Turkish security official was killed on Tuesday during clashes with the outlawed Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK) in southeastern Turkey, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported.
Sadr City Casualties
At least 925 people have been killed and 2,605 wounded in clashes between Mahdi Army and US and Iraqi forces in Baghdad’s Sadr City that began last month, AFP reported.
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Russia to Send More Troops to Georgia
Russia’s Defense Ministry on Tuesday announced an increase in peacekeeping forces to two Georgian separatist provinces in response to what it called aggressive moves by Georgia.
“The development of events has created the need for an increase in the peacekeeping contingent in the conflict zones“ of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the ministry was quoted as saying by state-run RIA Novosti news agency.
Russia maintains a peacekeeping force in both areas under agreements with Georgia in the 1990s following wars in which separatists broke from Georgian control and established close ties with Moscow. The defense ministry, which accused Georgia of massing troops near the rebel areas, did not say how many extra soldiers were being sent. About 2,000 Russians serve in Abkhazia and about 1,000 in South Ossetia.
Blast Near Italian Embassy In Yemen
An explosion went off Wednesday near the Italian embassy in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, but the apparent attack caused no injuries, a security official said.
The embassy in central Sanaa is next to a government building and the headquarters of the opposition Socialist party and it was not immediately clear what the target was, AP said. The explosion was caused either by a hand grenade or a bomb, the security official said.
Security forces sealed off roads leading to the area of the explosion, said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not allowed to speak to the media.
Yemen is a key US ally in the Middle East but also the ancestral homeland of Osama bin Laden and it has been the site of violence against foreigners before.
Earlier this month, three projectiles hit a foreigners’ housing complex in Sanaa but caused no injuries. The complex is in an upscale neighborhood that also houses UN buildings.
Afghan Forces Trade Fire With Gunmen
Security forces traded gun and rocket fire with unknown assailants holed up in a Kabul house on Tuesday, officials said.
A spokesman for the intelligence service, Saeed Ansari, said the troops wanted to capture the suspects alive, but gave no details on who was targeted.
Zemerai Bashary, the Interior Ministry spokesman, described the suspects as An Associated Press reporter at the scene said that both sides were trading rocket-propelled grenade and automatic gunfire. The gunmen appeared to be holed up inside a house, in a densely populated area in western Kabul near a popular park, Babur’s Garden.
Egypt Finds Fuel Tunnels to Gaza
Egyptian security forces have discovered five tunnels used to smuggle petrol and goods into the Gaza Strip, a security official said on Tuesday.
Two of the tunnels contained plastic tubes 850 meters long that were used to pump black market petrol into the isolated territory, AFP said.
No one was arrested when the tunnels were discovered north of the Rafah border crossing on Monday evening.
Israel has repeatedly accused Egypt of doing too little to counter alleged arms smuggling through tunnels dug from Gaza into Egypt. The accusations have been vehemently denied by Cairo.
Palestinian groups are meeting in Cairo on Tuesday to discuss an Egyptian-mediated truce with Israel aimed at ending the Jewish state’s punishing blockade of Gaza since Hamas took over there in June.
Turkey Easing Free Speech Limits
Turkey’s Parliament has softened a law restricting free speech that has been used to prosecute Nobel Prize winner Orhan Pamuk and other intellectuals.
The Parliament voted 250-65 Tuesday in favor of a government-backed proposal to make changes to Article 301 of Turkey’s penal code, AP reported.
Thousands of people have been prosecuted and 745 were convicted under the law and its precursor since 2003.
The government says that amending the law will enhance Turkey’s bid for membership in the European Union, which has long criticized the measure for curbing free speech.
Critics say the amended law leaves in place many other restrictions on free speech.
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Another Blunder
By Ehsan Bakhshandeh
There are some speculations about the suspected nuclear links between North Korea and Syria. US president George Bush on Tuesday defended the disclosure of intelligence over the alleged Syrian nuclear reactor.
The White House claimed last week that Syria is building a secret nuclear reactor.
Syria, however, said on Monday that US accusations that it had been building a nuclear reactor until its destruction in an Israeli air raid last September were “as bogus as“ American claims that Saddam Hussein’s regime had weapons of mass destruction in 2003.
It seems the Bush administration wants to revive the “untrue scenario“ of Iraq’s WMDs five years ago this time in Syria.
Seven months after Israeli planes violated Syria’s airspace and raided the alleged nuclear site, American officials have now provided the US Congress with a report, claiming that the site was a nuclear facility for producing plutonium. The White House report also said that the evidence found by the Central Bureau of Investigation is identical to the CIA report about WMDs in Iraq five years ago.
In 2003 and only months before the US-led invasion of Iraq, the US State Department released documents claiming that Saddam was developing WMDs. The then secretary of state Collin Powel even presented some photos to prove his claim on Iraq’s WMDs. However, later it was revealed that the documents and photos were all forged and fabricated. This might be the same case about Syria.
But this time not only the government in Damascus but also others across the world even in the United States reacted to Washington’s claim.
In an interview published in the Qatari-daily “Al-Watan“ on Sunday, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad ridiculed the US accusations.
Syria’s ambassador to the US Imad Moustapha also reacted by saying “It was a Syrian military warehouse. It was a military location but it has nothing to do whatsoever with nuclear technology.
Tht Syrian daily “Al-Baath“ has compared the photographs of the bombed site shown to US congressmen to the images Washington presented to the UN Security Council as alleged evidence of Iraq’s non-conventional arsenal in the run-up to the US-led invasion. “When you look at these pictures... a single image comes to mind -- that of former US secretary of state Colin Powell accusing Iraq of hiding weapons of mass destruction and presenting as proof a dossier of photographs,“ “Al-Baath“ wrote.
Former US ambassador to UN John Bolton has also questioned one of the key pieces of US evidence that a North Korean shown in photographs from the Syrian facility was a nuclear scientist. The intelligence officials said the man was recognized from the six-party talks on North Korea’s nuclear activities.
“I would have been surprised had North Korea permitted any of its nuclear scientists anywhere near the six-party talks,“ Bolton said, adding “That would be running the risk they might have said something true!“
Bolton’s skepticism echoed doubts raised shortly after the briefing Friday, when a South Korean newspaper “Munwha Ilbo“ cited a government official in Seoul who identified the individual in question as Jung Tae-yang--a North Korean Foreign Ministry official.
Scott Ritter, who served from 1991 to 1998 as a United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq, has also cast doubt at the US evidence.
“We have interior photographs and exterior shots and nothing that links the two. If you’re bringing this evidence to a court of law, you would have trouble having anybody say this is definitive evidence that links the allegations to this specific site in question,“ he said, adding that there is also no evidence on the destruction of the alleged facility.
Instead of informing the International Atomic Energy Agency of a possible development of a nuclear site in Syria, the US withheld the intelligence and supported the Israeli bombardment. Perhaps Bush wants his successor to also experience his utter failures in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Israeli Charges Dismissed
The UN peacekeeping force in south Lebanon has dismissed Israeli allegations that it has been ignoring Hezbollah activity near the border.
Israeli officials on Sunday accused UNIFIL of intentionally concealing information about Hezbollah activities south of the Litani River in Lebanon to avoid conflict with the group, Press TV reported.
The Israeli sources claimed there have been reports that UNIFIL soldiers identified armed Hezbollah operatives, but did nothing and did not submit full reports on the incidents to the UN Security Council.
UNIFIL spokeswoman, Yasmina Bouziane, released a statement late Monday saying, “These reports inaccurately represent the way in which UNIFIL operates and repeat the factual inaccuracies in disregard of our public statement that gave a full account of the incident.“
The UN Resolution 1701 put an end to the 33-day war between the Zionist regime and Hezbollah in 2006.
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FRIDAY, MAY 2
LUCERNE, Switzerland - Rose D’Or Festival (to May 6). The Rose d’Or or Golden Rose is a highly prestigious television award which is focused on entertainment-based programming, excluding dramas and documentaries.
WASHINGTON - The US Internal Revenue Service will begin sending the first of more than 130 million economic stimulus payments on May 2 and expects to complete the first round of payments by early July. The payments are part of a $152 billion economic stimulus package signed into law last month by President George W. Bush to try to stave off recession amid a deepening housing and credit market crisis.
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