{jcomments on}OMAR, AGNEWS, BXL, le 12 février 2010 – Xinhua- February 12, 2010–The International Criminal Tribunal (ICT) Prosecutor on Rwandan genocide sitting in Arusha, Tanzania has given Kenya up to June 23, 2010 to furnish the court with intelligence report about Rwandan fugitive Felicien Kabuga.
RWANDA
ICT Seeking Rwandan Genocide Fugitive Felicien Kabuga In Kenya
SPECIAL REPORT BY XINHUA CORRESPONDENT BEN OCHIENG/ www.coastweek.com/ Xinhua/12022010
‘United States convinced beyond reasonable doubt that
Kabuga resides in Kenya and he is able to operate freely
under protection’
.
NAIROBI (Xinhua) — The International Criminal Tribunal (ICT) Prosecutor on Rwandan genocide sitting in Arusha, Tanzania has given Kenya up to June 23, 2010 to furnish the court with intelligence report about Rwandan fugitive Felicien Kabuga.
If Kenya failed to beat the deadline, the court will ask the United Nations Security Council to impose sanctions on Kenya.
U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues Stephen Rapp told an international press conference in Nairobi that his country and the ICT were convinced about Kabuga’s presence in Kenya and is being protected by some high-ranking people in the Kenyan government.
“We are convinced beyond reasonable doubt that Kabuga resides in Kenya and courtesy of his immense resources, he is able to operate freely under protection.
“We have intelligence reports that he was last seen south of Nairobi in 2007,” said Ambassador Rapp.
“He has huge investments in Kenya and is able to move in and out of the country at his free will.”
The Ambassador said a request by the ICT Prosecutor to the Kenyan Government for information on the fugitive through the National Security Intelligence Service (NSIS) has been largely ignored hence the June deadline.
“After the expiry of the June deadline, the U.S. government will take matters from there.
“I don’t want to specify which measures we will take then but certainly things will no longer be the same.
“This is the message I brought to Kenya during my meetings with Kenyan Government officials and members of the civil society.”
Rapp said Washington knew a lot about Kabuga through intelligence reports given by the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi and the ICT Prosecutor.
“The Kenyan government’s defense has been that the run-away left the country and is no longer around.
“If he left, where did he go, under which name did he travel, what airline did he use and what date did he leave?
“This information is adequate to lead us somewhere.”
The American envoy stressed that Kabuga is somebody that should not be welcomed anywhere but should instead be handed over to the ICT to meet his justice.
UGANDA
Church of Uganda’s position on Homosexuality Bill
www.monitor.co.ug/By Henry Luke Orombi /Friday, February 12 2010
The Church of Uganda associates itself with the concerns expressed in the Anti-Homosexuality Bill 2009. However, instead of a completely a new Bill, the Church recommends a Bill that amends the Penal Code Act (Cap.120) addressing loopholes, in particular:
Protecting the vulnerabilities of the boy-child.
Proportionality in sentencing;
And, ensuring that sexual orientation is excluded as a protected human right.
Further, we recommend involvement of all stakeholders in the preparation of such a Bill in order to uphold Uganda’s values as they relate to human sexuality.
Church’s position on homosexuality
The Church of Uganda derives her mandate and authority from the canonical scriptures of the Old and New Testament, as the ultimate rule and standard of faith, given by inspiration of God and containing all things necessary from salvation. Her mission is to “fulfil Christ’s mission through holistic teaching, evangelism, discipleship and healing for healthy and godly nations.”
The Church’s position on human sexuality is consistent with its basis of faith and doctrine, and has been stated very clearly over the years as reflected in various documents. From a plain reading of Scripture, from a careful reading of Scripture, and from a critical reading of Scripture, homosexual practice has no place in God’s design of creation, the continuation of the human race through procreation, or His plan of redemption. Even natural law reveals that the very act of sexual intercourse is an experience of embracing the sexual “other”.
The Church of Uganda, therefore, believes that “Homosexual practice is incompatible with Scripture” (Resolution 1.10, 1998 Lambeth Conference). At the same time, the Church of Uganda is committed at all levels to offer counselling, healing and prayer for people with homosexual disorientation, especially in our schools and other institutions of learning.
The Church is a safe place for individuals, who are confused about their sexuality or struggling with sexual brokenness, to seek help and healing.
The objective of the Bill
The Church of Uganda appreciates the spirit of the Bill’s objective of protecting the family, especially in light of a growing propaganda to influence younger people to accept homosexuality as a legitimate way of expressing human sexuality.
We particularly appreciate the objectives of the Bill which seek to:
provide for marriage in Uganda as contracted only between a man and woman;
Prohibit and penalise homosexual behaviour and related practices in Uganda as they constitute a threat to the traditional family;
Prohibit ratification of any international treaties, conventions, protocols, agreements and declarations which are contrary or inconsistent with the provisions of the Act;
Prohibit the licensing of organisations which promote homosexuality.
Need for a Bill that amends existing laws
We affirm the need for a Bill in light of the existing loopholes in the current legislation, specifically sections 145-148 of the Penal Code Act (Cap 120), which do not explicitly address the other issues associated with homosexual practice such as procurement, recruitment and dissemination of literature. That notwithstanding, the ideal situation would be one where necessary amendment is made to existing legislation to also enumerate other sexual offences such as lesbianism and bestiality. This would not require a fresh bill on homosexuality per se but rather an amendment to the existing provisions which would also change the title to something like ‘The Penal Code Unnatural Offences Amendment Bill’.
Recommendation
As Parliament considers streamlining the existing legislation, we recommend that the following issues be taken into consideration:
Ensure that the law protects the confidentiality of medical, pastoral and counseling relationships, including those that disclose homosexual practice in accordance with the relevant professional codes of ethics.
Language that strengthens the existing Penal Code to protect the boy child, especially from homosexual exploitation; to prohibit lesbianism, bestiality, and other sexual perversions; and to prohibit procurement of material and promotion of homosexuality as normal or as an alternative lifestyle, be adopted.
Ensure that homosexual practice or the promotion of homosexual relations is not adopted as a human right.
Existing and future educational materials and programmes on gender identity and sex education are in compliance with the values and the laws of Uganda.
The involvement of additional stakeholders in the evaluation of the gaps in the existing legislation, including, but not limited to, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, its Department of Immigration and other relevant departments.
The undertaking of a comprehensive legislative and literature review of all the laws and literature related to the subject at hand in order to identify the actual gaps in the existing legislations.
Conclusion
As a Church, we affirm the necessity of appropriate amendments within the existing legislation and corresponding Penal Code sections. The Church of Uganda, being a part of the Anglican Communion, reiterates her position on human sexuality and her desire to uphold the pastoral
position of providing love and care for all God’s people caught up in any sin and remaining consistent with Holy Scriptures of the Christian Church.
The Most Rev. Orombi is the Archbishop of the Church of Uganda
TANZANIA:
CONGO RDC :
Official Says MONUC Continues Help with Integrating Ex-Combatants Into Army
Peter Clottey/ www1.voanews.com / 12 February 2010
An official of the United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) says the group has been successful in helping with the integration of tens of thousands of former combatants into Congo’s national army.
| Washington, DC
An official of the United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) says the group has been successful in helping with the integration of tens of thousands of former combatants into Congo’s national army.
Kevin Kennedy, MONUC’s Public Information director said contrary to initial reports, the group has not issued an ultimatum to Congo’s remaining armed groups either to integrate into the national army FARDC or become civilians.
“First of all, we did not issue any sort of ultimatum. In fact, the ultimatum that has been issued had been issued by the Congolese authorities. There had been various exercises in the course of last 10 years in which various armed groups have been either disarmed demobilized or have entered into the Congolese national army,” he said.
There was speculation that MONUC gave a 45-day ultimatum to the remaining armed groups either to integrate into the national army or become civilians.
But Kennedy said the government signed peace agreements with various armed groups that would ensure their integration into the national army.
“There have been a number of agreements that have brought this about. The most recent one was in March of last year, and there have been a number of armed groups that have been integrated into the Congolese army during that period…The government… basically set a deadline now for those that remain. MONUC is in the business of helping the authorities of the DRC to disarm and demobilize or to integrate former members of armed groups within the terms and conditions that the government set down for those exercises,” Kennedy said.
President Joseph Kabila’s government recently issued an ultimatum to various armed groups either to integrate into the national army FARDC or face a possible military action.
MONUC has so far helped with the administration’s efforts to integrate former combatants into the Congolese national army.
Kennedy said MONUC will continue supporting efforts to reintegrate former combatants into either the national army or into society.
“The assistance with disarmament, demobilization, and the reintegration of former combatants into society or their integration into the army has been something that MONUC has done for a number of years. MONUC supports the Congolese efforts along those lines, as do different parts of the UN system and the international community,” Kennedy said.
KENYA :
ANGOLA :
SOUTH AFRICA:
S. Africa president at low point in midst of scandal
By The New York Times /February 12, 2010
JOHANNESBURG — It was the 20th anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s release from prison, a high point in South Africa’s history, but for the current president, Jacob Zuma, who delivered his state of the nation address Thursday, the moment arrived at a low point in his own 10-month-old tenure.
As the frail Mandela, 91, basked in an affectionate welcome from Parliament, the contrast between the exalted promise of South Africa’s transition from apartheid to multiracial democracy and its messy, if vibrant, political present never seemed sharper.
Zuma’s presidency has been shaken by his admission that despite his exhortations for South Africans to prevent the spread of HIV by using condoms, he had unprotected sex with yet another 30-something daughter of a family friend, fathering a child out of wedlock.
Zuma, 67, who has 20 children, three wives and a fianc e, apologized for the affair last weekend, several days after the story broke, and sought to reclaim the moral high ground Thursday in a live televised speech before Parliament. He made no mention of the scandal, which has transfixed the nation and emboldened his critics, but repeatedly paid tribute to the man considered the father of the nation.
Politically, news of Zuma’s affair has proved a blow. His party initially insisted that “there is nothing wrong that the president has done.” But after the public uproar failed to die, he apologized.
In a separate case, Zuma admitted in 2006 to having unprotected sex with an HIV-positive 31-year-old woman who was the daughter of a close comrade from the struggle. The episode surfaced because she accused him of rape. He was tried and acquitted.
Now the pattern has repeated itself. Members of Parliament gasped Thursday when Zuma praised his new child’s mother’s father, Irvin Khoza, who leads the nation’s World Cup organizing committee. The fact that Zuma had again had sex without a condom with a much younger woman has renewed questions about his judgment in a country where AIDS has reduced life expectancy.
He just illustrates that problem,” said Salim S. Abdool Karim, who runs the Durban-based Center for the AIDS Program of Research in South Africa. “We have to convince him and everyone else to change our sexual norms.”
South Africa to Maintain Stimulus, Plans New Industrial Policy
February 12, 2010/By Mike Cohen/Bloomberg
Feb. 12 (Bloomberg) — South African President Jacob Zuma said his government will maintain spending measures and introduce new industrial policies to foster growth and create jobs as the economy exits its first recession in 17 years.
“Economic indicators suggest we are now turning the corner,” Zuma said in his state-of-the-nation address to parliament in Cape Town yesterday, which was attended by Nelson Mandela, the nation’s first black president. “It is too soon though to be certain of the pace of recovery. Government will not therefore withdraw its support measures.”
Africa’s largest economy returned to growth in the three months through September, expanding an annualized 0.9 percent, after shrinking in the previous three quarters.
The government sought to limit the fallout of the global credit crisis by increasing the budget deficit, providing loans to distressed companies, setting up a fund to retrain fired workers and establishing public works programs to create temporary employment.
Zuma unveiled plans to increase access to housing, improve literacy in schools and encourage independent electricity producers to supply power to the national grid. A new industrial policy, to be released by the trade ministry within two weeks, will focus on creating “green jobs” and building more labor- intensive industries, he said.
The government’s plans to spend 846 billion rand ($110 billion) on infrastructure over the next three years would also help create work and stimulate growth, he said.
New Policy
“The speech was pretty unsurprising and there was little new policy on the economic front,” said Peter Attard Montalto, an economist at Nomura International Plc in London. “We must await the new industrial policy to see what that can deliver.”
The central bank expects the economy to expand 2 percent this year and 3 percent in 2011. In October, the National Treasury forecast 1.5 percent growth this year and 2.7 percent next year, estimates that will be revised when Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan presents his budget on Feb. 17.
South Africa’s 24.3 percent unemployment rate is the highest of 62 countries tracked by Bloomberg. Zuma has been under pressure from his labor union allies, who helped him win control of the ruling African National Congress in 2007 and the presidency in May, to do more to combat joblessness and poverty.
“We are concerned that there was too little recognition of the extent of the massive crisis of unemployment, poverty and inequality, and consequently no plans for a new economic growth path,” the Congress of South African Trade Unions, the country’s biggest labor grouping, said in an e-mail. “There is no evidence yet that we are on track to create new jobs on the scale required and bring down the world-record levels of inequality.”
Job Pledge
In his last state-of-the-nation address eight months ago, Zuma pledged to create 500,000 part-time jobs by the end of last year.
“By the end of December, we had created more than 480,000 public works opportunities, which is 97 percent of the target we had set,” Zuma said.
Zuma paid tribute to Mandela, who was freed from prison 20 years ago, as the frail 91-year-old looked on from the public gallery. Mandela served as president from 1994 until 1999, following the country’s first all-race elections.
New initiatives announced by Zuma include the introduction of literacy tests at schools and the establishment of a 1 billion-rand fund to encourage banks to extend housing loans to the poor.
Affordable Housing
“We are working to upgrade well-located informal settlements and provide proper service and land tenure to at least 500,000 households by 2014,” Zuma said. “We plan to set aside over 6,000 hectares of well-located public land for low income and affordable housing.”
Zuma didn’t refer to calls by the ruling African National Congress’ youth league to nationalize the country’s mines, or to the possible revision of the central bank’s inflation-targeting mandate.
“There was a precious lack of detail” in Zuma’s speech, said Helen Zille, leader of the Democratic Alliance, the biggest opposition party. “The big challenge is to implement policies and to make them work.”
–Editors: Louis Meixler, Peter Hirschberg.
AFRICA / AU :
Blatter again defends SA against World Cup criticism
Jean-Jacques Cornish/www.eyewitnessnews.co.za/12022010
FIFA President Sepp Blatter has once again stepped in to defend South Africa as a venue for the 2010 World Cup.
He said criticism of South Africa masks a disrespectful prejudice.
Bayern Munich President Uli Hoeness recebtly said awarding the World Cup to South Africa was FIFA’s worst decision ever. Earlier this year Phil Brown, manager of English premiership team Hull, said the separatist attack against Togolese players in Cabinda before the African Cup of Nations in January put a question mark against the World Cup.
Blatter called this “anti-African prejudice”.
He denounced a feeling in the old world that Africa should not organise the World Cup.
Blatter also said it was nonsense to link a terrorist attack for political reasons in Angola with the soccer tournament in South Africa, thousands of kilometres away.
It is estimated around 11 000 000 tourists come to South Africa every year.
African Union commends Nigeria’s power transfer
By Ayo Okulaja/234next.com/February 12, 2010
The African Union Commission Chairperson, Jean Ping, has commended the appointment of Nigeria’s Vice President, Goodluck Jonathan, as Acting President and Commander-In-Chief of the Armed Forces in the absence of President Umaru Yar’Adua, who has been away to Saudi Arabia due to ill-health for over two months.
Mr. Ping, in a statement issued yesterday from Addis Abba, the African Union’s (AU) headquarter, commended the government and people of Nigeria for resolving what he referred to as “a delicate and sensitive political situation within the constitutional and legal provisions available without recourse to violence or unconstitutional means.”
Strengthening democracy
He praised the power transfer process as a “respect for the Constitution, good governance; democracy and the rule of law” which he claims “are being deepened in Nigeria and are becoming irreversible.” “Nigeria has proven it practices at home what it preaches on the continent,” the AU official said. He said this, “strengthens the African Union’s strong commitment to constitutionality and rejection of unconstitutional means to resolve political problems in Africa.”
Mr. Ping also lauded and encouraged Nigeria’s military to continue their support for constitutionality.
“This is a path that Nigerians and other Africans have chosen at the just concluded session of the Assembly of the Union, through the strengthening of AU’s instruments relating to unconstitutional changes of Government,” he said.
He said he wishes the ailing Mr. Yar’Adua a speedy recovery and pledged the support of the Commission to the acting president.
Mr. Jonathan was declared acting president of Nigeria by the National Assembly last Tuesday, after 78 days after Mr. Yar’Adua flew to Saudi Arabia for medical treatment.
UN /ONU :
Nigeria needs more than Goodluck to avert crisis
Josephine Whitaker/www.opendemocracy.net/12 February 2010
Nigerian Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan named acting president in bid to resolve crisis. Claims emerge of deliberate army assault on civilians in Congo. Al-Shabaab preempts crackdown with assault on capital. Tymoshenko refuses to admit defeat in dangerous show of defiance. All this and more in today’s update.
Nigerian Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan was named acting president in a resolution passed by both houses of the Nigerian National Assembly on Tuesday night. The move by Nigerian law-makers came after Nigeria’s state governors called on Yar’Adua to step down earlier this week, threatening to storm the assembly if legislators in the two houses failed to act.
The decision to elevate Jonathan comes as the leadership crisis in Nigeria, which began when President Umaru Yar’Adua left the country last November for medical treatment in Saudi Arabia, enters its third month. His absence has seen ongoing power struggles within the Nigerian political elite, as competing interest groups seek to resolve the crisis in their favour. It is hoped that the Jonathan’s promotion, approved by the executive council on Wednesday, will bring to an end months of drift, which has in recent weeks threatened to develop into civil unrest.
Jonathan addressed the senate on Tuesday evening, calling on Nigerian politicians to move forward in a more decisive way to tackle the pressing issues faced by Nigeria today. Africa’s most populous state is grappling with sectarian strife in the north and militant separatism in the south’s oil rich delta.
The openSecurity verdict: Nigeria has been essentially leaderless since November, when the president left the country for medical treatment. Yar’Adua has repeatedly refused to disclose details of his illness – thought to be due to a heart condition – and has never specified how long he may be out of the country. The government’s failure to transfer power in the president’s absence has provoked protests in Abuja and Lagos. A recent interview with Yar’Adua conducted by the BBC, in which president sounded decidedly frail and refused to commit to return to the country, caused further concern across Nigeria.
Although the government has finally acted to replace Yar’Adua, at least temporarily, it is not yet clear whether this will improve an already tense political situation or if it will simply be a source of fresh controversy and power-grabbing.
Supporters of the move, including many state governors and clear majority of law-makers, claim that it is the only way to move forward in Yar’Adua’s continued absence. Others have painted the resolution as a positive step for democracy in Nigeria, in so far as it has circumvented the possibility of yet another coup.
However, concerns about the decision to elevate Jonathan have surfaced quickly. Some analysts believe that the actions of the National Assembly are essentially unconstitutional, and will therefore compound the crisis of leadership. The basis of these fears is that the president has so far failed to communicate directly with Senate, instructing it to empower the vice president as a temporary replacement. Senate leader David Mark has argued, however, that Yar’Adua’s radio interview with the BBC sufficed in the absence of a formal communication. Such a contentious argument has not been without its critics, such as Senator Garba Lado, who maintain that the constitutional requirement for notice of absence have not been met.
Dissidents within the People’s Democratic Party may not support Jonathan’s presidency. Leadership in the PDP traditionally alternates between north and south, and it is feared that Yar’Adua’s northern supporters will not support Jonathan, who was previously governor of the oil-rich Bayelsa state in the south of the country. Many figures in the PDP who have opposed attempts over the last three months to transfer power to Jonathan are benefiting from the vacuum created by the president’s absence, Wole Soyinka, Nigeria’s Nobel Prize winning writer, suggested in an interview with CNN.
Nigerian politicians appear to have found a political solution, if not a constitutional one, to the three month leadership crisis they have been facing. Many questions, however, remain unanswered. Whether Jonathan will step down before forthcoming national elections, or whether he will bring the elections forward to give himself a mandate to rule, remain open questions. His quick move to sack Yar’Adua’s minister of justice, Michael Aondoakaa, is a clear attempt to exert dominance over his rivals. Although such moves may unite the cabinet, the country remains as divided and unstable as ever.
Government forces suspected of attack on civilians in DRC
Reports are emerging from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) that Congolese army forces took part in an attack on civilians in eastern DRC earlier this month. Sources suggest that at least one civilian was killed, and nine more abducted by Congolese army forces in Kakenge village, south Kivu province on 1 February. According to a local leader, quoted on the UN-sponsored radio channel, the violence occurred less than 100 metres from FARDC (Congolese army) positions, and lasted for over three hours.
This incident comes hot on the heels of intense criticism last year of the UN-supported army offensive against Rwandan rebel forces in the east of the country. The joint operation, which began in March 2009, has been accused of leading to 7,000 rapes and displacing almost one million civilians in the last eleven months alone.
The UN is currently reviewing its mandate for MONUC, its 20,000-strong mission in the DRC. Analysts believe that Joseph Kabila, the country’s president, is keen to see a reduction in the mission in time for the country’s fiftieth independence anniversary celebrations, on 30 June this year.
New evidence of atrocities against civilians perpetrated by the national army is likely to give some in the UN fresh incentives to reduce MONUC’s size and scope of operations. A MONUC spokeman interviewed about this latest incident suggested that, if proved true, it could make future cooperation between the UN and FARDC more difficult.
Fresh fighting in Mogadishu as rebels pour into capital
Rebels affiliated with al-Shabaab, a hardline Islamist militia committed to overturning the Federal Transitional Government (FTG) of President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed are reported to be entering the capital, Mogadishu, in droves, according to eyewitness reports.
Skirmishes between government forces and rebels, almost a daily occurrence on Mogadishu, are also reportedly on the increase. Yesterday, a rebel attack on the presidential palace prompted African Union retaliation, leaving at least thirty civilians dead. A separate gun battle between police and soldiers killed approximately eight government security forces.
Commentators believe that the increase in violence is a prelude to a long-awaited government offensive against al-Shabaab and Hizbul Islam, another Islamist militant group, in southern Somalia. In a country that has lacked effective government for almost twenty years, the FTG is widely held to lack meaningful control over more than a few strategic blocks in the capital. Al-Shabaab, which last week formally declared its allegiance to al-Qaeda, is rapidly increasing its hold over the south of the country.
This latest intensification of fighting has, unsurprisingly, displaced yet more civilians, contributing to what is already one of the worst displacement crises in the world.
Tymoshenko refuses to concede power after defeat
Ukranian prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko, has refused to step
down after her party lost a presidential election on Sunday by a margin of less than four percent.
In her first public address since her electoral defeat, Tymoshenko attacked Viktor Yanukovich and his party, who were judged to have won the internationally-backed presidential poll by 3.48%. Tymoshenko and her party have accused Yanukovich of winning votes with false pledges on social spending. Tymoshenko is also reported to have instructed her lawyers to contest the results of the election, claiming electoral fraud. Yanukovich was forced to rerun the 2004 election after allegations of massive voter fraud.
Shortly after the cabinet meeting in which Tymoshenko made her attack, her first deputy Oleksander Turkynov said in a separate statement that his party would not “resign voluntarily”. However, Ukrainian newspaper Ukrainska Pravda has reported that approximately half of Tymoshenko’s team disagree with her hard-line stance, and want to assume their responsibilities as the official opposition.
This grappling for power in Ukraine threatens to destabilise the country just five years after its pro-western Orange Revolution ushered Tymoshenko’s party into power. The political uncertainty may also delay the resumption of International Monetary Fund lending, which was suspended last year after the government failed to keep its promises of fiscal restraint.
USA :
Awethu, SABMiller, Simeka May Move: South Africa Equity Preview
February 12, 2010/By Nicky Smith and Janice Kew/Bloomberg
Feb. 12 (Bloomberg) — The following is a list of companies whose shares may have unusual price changes in South Africa. Stock symbols are in parentheses after company names and prices are from the last close.
South Africa’s FTSE/JSE Africa All Share Index fell for a second day, sliding 8.57, or less than 0.1 percent, to 26,350.60.
Awethu Breweries Ltd. (AWT SJ): The maker of sorghum beer said it sold a property and its assets in South Africa’s Gauteng province to United National Breweries Ltd. for 6.78 million rand ($881,000). The company said the proceeds will be used for working capital requirements and to explore other investment opportunities. Awethu slid 2 cents, or 20 percent, to 8 cents.
Medi-Clinic Corp Ltd. (MDC SJ): The second-largest publicly traded hospital group in South Africa was raised to “buy” from “hold” at Citigroup Inc. Medi-Clinic shares were unchanged at 24.30 rand.
SABMiller Plc (SAB SJ): The world’s second-largest brewer was rated new “overweight” at Barclays Capital. Overweight means investors should hold more of the shares than represented in benchmarks. SABMiller fell 70 cents, or 0.4 percent, to 199.50 rand.
Simeka Business Group Ltd. (SBG SJ): The information- technology company said it posted a loss of as much as 35 cents a share in its fiscal first-half. The shares were unchanged at 16 cents.
Wilson Bayly Holmes Ovcon Ltd. (WBO SJ): The South African construction company was raised to “buy” from “hold” at Citigoup Inc. Shares in the company were unchanged at 102 rand.
Shares or American depositary receipts of the following South African companies closed as follows:
Anglo American Plc (AAUK US) rose 1.9 percent to $18.65. AngloGold Ashanti Ltd. (AU US) added 4.6 percent to $38.66. BHP Billiton Ltd. (BBL US) gained 4.2 percent to $60.77. DRDGold Ltd. (DROOY US) advanced 6.4 percent to $6.28. Gold Fields Ltd. (GFI US) climbed 3.8 percent to $11.91. Harmony Gold Mining Co. (HMY US) rose 4.2 percent to $9.58. Impala Platinum Holdings (IMPUY US) added 1.7 percent to $24.85. Sappi Ltd. (SPP US) jumped 4.6 percent to $4.13. Sasol Ltd. (SSL US) rose 1.4 percent to $36.07.
–Editors: Alastair Reed, Vernon Wessels.
Shah’s son wants help for Iran’s opposition
www.washingtonpost.com/By ELAINE GANLEY/The Associated Press /February 12, 2010
PARIS — Reza Pahlavi, whose father, the shah of Iran, was toppled from power 31 years ago, said Thursday the international community must step up its support for Iran’s opposition movement and stop focusing on the country’s nuclear program.
In an interview with The Associated Press, Pahlavi said nations such as the United States should not “even bother” with a new round of sanctions regarding Iran’s nuclear program, if punitive measures merely maintain the status quo.
Instead, he suggested the kind of encouragement that helped end South Africa’s apartheid system and influenced the breakup of the Soviet Union.
Pahlavi, 50, said that should include dialogue with Iran’s opposition, which has kept up periodic street protests in the country since the disputed June presidential elections despite a fierce crackdown.
He also said the opposition needs outside technological support to beat government eavesdropping and Internet crackdowns in Iran, and to “stay connected” with the outside world.
“The world is facing a regime today that is totalitarian, racist, fascist, and yet what has been done about it?” he said in Paris during a visit from the U.S., where he lives outside Washington D.C.
“To this day no one has officially said … enough is enough,” he said.
As he spoke, Iran celebrated the birth of the Islamic Republic in 1979 and the overthrow of Pahlavi’s father, the late Mohammed Reza Pahlavi.
The shah’s son said Western leaders must reach out to Iran’s opposition movement, but instead they have displayed “bashfulness,” “hesitancy” or even “passivity.”
He criticized what he called President Barack Obama’s tepid outreach to the Iranian people and their exiled opposition.
He noted that 40 Nobel Prize winners appealed to Obama and other world leaders this week in a New York Times ad to let the Iranian people “know that we are on their side.”
“I never thought I would see the day when Joan Baez sings … in Farsi,” Pahlavi said, referring to the folk singer’s recent version of “We Shall Overcome” – sung partially in the Iranian language. “For God’s sake, it has become an international cry” going unheeded by world leaders.
Pahlavi recommended “tacit” dialogue with Iran’s opposition and diplomatic outreach to isolate the regime.
Iranian officials claim foreign powers are behind the country’s reform movement, but Pahlavi insisted that is not correct.
Western nations are pressing for a possible fourth set of U.N. sanctions on Iran for its failure to comply with U.N. resolutions aimed at guaranteeing it cannot produce nuclear weapons.
Pahlavi said a window of opportunity may slip away while the world is “dilly-dallying” over sanctions, instead of focusing on issues such as human rights abuses in Iran.
“External sanctions against the regime do not suffice. You have to bring into your calculation … an element of pressure from within,” he said. “And the only way (to) do that is by strengthening the hand of the people inside the country.”
If sanctions are “going to be all you’re going to be doing while keeping the status quo, don’t even bother,” he said.
Pahlavi said he wants to see a peaceful transition, via civil disobedience, to a parliamentary democracy with a “clear separation of religion from government.”
He said he favors a referendum so Iranians can choose their form of government, and he predicted change could come “within a matter of months – if not maybe a couple of years tops” – if society is “empowered” and dialogue not limited to the regime.
“Nothing bars the world from having a line of dialogue with the opposition and that, strangely, has been absent,” he said.
The level of support that Pahlavi or other exiled opposition movements have inside Iran today is unclear. Three decades after the Islamic Revolution, Iranian youth, the majority population, has never known the country as a monarchy.
Last month, authorities hanged two men convicted of belonging to outlawed monarchist groups and plotting to overthrow the Islamic regime.
Black America loses gamble in electing first black president
By Phillip Jackson /www.jsonline.com/ Feb. 12, 2010
In 2008, black America placed most of its political capital, spiritual energy and financial resources into electing the first black president of the United States. Black community leaders – political, spiritual and media – led us to believe that electing a first black president was a natural extension of the civil rights movement.
They were wrong. In fact, electing the first black president might well have ended the civil rights movement. Black America mistakenly traded the future of its young black men for a black president.
Young black men in America are beyond living in a “state of emergency.” Many of them range from “barely surviving” to “no longer existing.” This tragedy can be seen in prisons and jails across America, where black men make up 50% to 80% of prison and jail populations although we are less than 7% of the total U.S. population.
Despair also can be seen in our families, where more than 70% of our children are born into single, female-headed households, and in colleges and universities, where black male populations on many major college campuses total a mere 1% to 3%.
Granted, these were all problems before the first black president took office; however, the bottom line is that this president has not committed himself in any way to directly address these issues.
In
so many ways, the energy used to support a first black president was energy that should have been used to educate black children, rebuild black families and economically revitalize black communities. As a way of saving our struggling communities, black America took a gamble on supporting a first black president. But we lost.
Over and over, the black community has reached out for help from this first black president, and over and over, he has said, “No!” This first black president has been clear that his job is not to help black Americans but to help all Americans.
All Americans do not need the same help that young black men need. We need only walk down any city street in almost any predominantly African-American community to see residue of the human wreckage of millions of young black men nationwide.
Few leaders – those same political, spiritual and media leaders who advised us to campaign for this black president – engaged in proactive measures to prevent this “silent genocide.” The mass destruction of young black American men has been effectively ignored by almost everybody – the government, the media and much of the philanthropic community. And even most black faith leaders stand by and watch this preventable, ongoing, horrific loss of our young black men.
Too few of us are asking: Who are young black women going to marry? Who will be good fathers to tens of millions of black fatherless children? Who will anchor strong families in the black community? Who will build and maintain the economies of black communities? Who will young black boys emulate as they grow into men? Will black America be a viable and valuable community in 20 years?
This demise of black America is happening in front of our eyes because so few of us – black, white or other – really care about these young black men.
Electing America’s first black president seems to have cleansed the conscience of most Americans for destroying many past generations of black people. What a cruel hoax to believe that if a black man can become president, then young black men do not have any problems that America is obligated to address.
Correcting the problems of young black men in America will require a comprehensively structured, sufficiently financed, professionally managed, ethically led and committed multipronged effort to systemically address and shift the cascading negative outcomes for black men and boys. Simply telling black men to “man up” will not work.
The real shame of this catastrophe is not that America can’t save young black men; the shame is that America won’t make the effort to save young black men! Compared with massive government bailouts and frivolous expenditures, the resources required to save America’s young black men are minuscule. Saving young black men is an investment in America! A successful effort to save young black men must also address habits, attitudes and behaviors of these youth that have pushed them to the precipice of irrelevance, obsolescence and nonexistence.
To date, precious little has been put in place to stop the ongoing destruction and annihilation of young black men. When our first black president has been asked about helping black men in America, his retort, “I will do what is best for all Americans,” is woefully insufficient to address the endangered status of millions of black males in America.
The president must do the best for both, not just for America. In fact, doing what is best for young black men is what is best for America!
Phillip Jackson is founder and executive director of the black Star Project in Chicago.
Can Jacob Zuma wrap himself in Nelson Mandela’s cloak?
By Scott Baldauf Staff writer /www.csmonitor.com/ February 12, 2010
South Africans celebrated the 20th anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s release from prison Thursday. President Jacob Zuma has strategically scheduled his State of the Union speech for the same day.
Johannesburg, South Africa
It’s a common political trick to wrap oneself in the hallowed garments of previous political giants. President Obama evoked a certain John F. Kennedy charm, with a dash of Martin Luther King Jr., during his 2008 presidential campaign. President Bush evoked Franklin Roosevelt’s cool resolve in the days after the Sept. 11 attacks.
And South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma, by scheduling his State of the Nation address on the 20th anniversary of the release of former President Nelson Mandela – the most unifying political figure in South Africa’s history – is hoping that some of Mr. Mandela’s gravitas rubs off as well.
If it works, it couldn’t come at a better time.
Mr. Zuma has been dogged by a sagging economy, his party’s failure to improve the lives of the poor, and by a spate of sex scandals. Wittingly or not, by comparing himself to Mandela, Zuma has set the bar of expectations very high indeed.
“The ANC itself has acknowledged what the central issues are, which is that the way public services are administered is inadequate,” says Steven Friedman, a political analyst and director of the Center for the Study of Democracy at Rhodes University and the University of Johannesburg. “The reason we have these protests, is that people are not being listened to and people are not being paid attention to.”
Like President Obama, Zuma came to office less than a year ago on the shoulders of voters who had long felt disenfranchised from their government, and who gave their vote to a man who promised to look after the poorest of the poor. He was elected on promises to create jobs, improve schools and health care, and to get the economy moving again.
While Zuma won applause from the business community for choosing an economic team that eschewed populist measures like nationalizing the mining industry, the past year has otherwise not been kind to Zuma. Far from creating half a million new jobs since his election, Zuma watched the global recession eat away 900,000 jobs from South Africa, leaving an official unemployment rate of 24 percent but realistically a country where only 41 perecent of the working population are employed.
Defined by scandals
In the absence of good news, Zuma has allowed himself and his reputation to be defined by continuous scandals among his political appointees, and also controversial stories about Zuma’s personal life – including an admitted affair outside his three concurrent marriages, producing a 20th child – have taken over .
One State of the Nation speech cannot erase that, but it could potentially give South Africans hope that the man in charge of their country does have a strategic plan for the road ahead.
To take the sting out of the scandal, Zuma issued an apology for fathering infant daughter with the adult daughter of South African soccer boss, and personal friend, Irvin Khoza. “”I deeply regret the pain that I have caused to my family, the ANC, the (tripartite) alliance and South Africans in general.”
Subsequent messages from his office have focused on the positive. Evaluations Minister Collins Chabane told reporters that Zuma would lay out the broader outlines for his government’s priorities, while leaving the specifics to his ministers. “”For us it’s to build an efficient, caring and more responsive administration,” Mr. Chabane said.
The buzz on Twitter
The President’s office even ventured into the social media world of Twitter. “President Zuma is in his study at Genadendal putting the finishing touches to tonight’s State of the Nation Address,” tweeted a message from @PresidencyZA, the official Twitter page of the South African president.
But unlike the halls of parliament, where respectful decorum is strictly followed, Twitter is a cacophonous free-for-all, and South Africans have been sending rather less hopeful messages about their expectations for Mr. Zuma’s speech.
“Wonder if he will be addressing just his kids or us too?” wrote a Twitter user named @ajkock.
A writer named “Black Sash” writes, “Sash asks Zuma to tell country in State of the Nation how Soccer World Cup will benefit the 5 million unemployed in SA?”
Adam Habib, vice chancellor of University of Johannesburg says that Zuma has “a challenge, which is that there is a feeling that there isn’t much leadership, on the big issues, such as economic policy, unemployment, service delivery, and the global economic crisis. You have to say, these are our dilemmas, and here are the two or three options we have and this is what we have to do.”
Will Zuma do that? “No,” says Mr. Habib.
Given past statements by ANC ministers and the fact that Zuma has timed his speech to the 20th anniversary of Mandela’s release, Zuma is likely to play up the positive. “I think he’ll play up the Mandela’s release, rah-rah, the World Cup is coming and we have to put our best foot forward, and he’ll give passing mention of unemployment, rural development, health care and crime,” says Habib.
From ‘Free Frank’ to ‘Billionaire Bob’ and beyond
By Julianne Malveaux /tri-statedefenderonline.com/12022010
‘The History of Black Economic Empowerment’/by Dr. Julianne Malveaux/NNPA News Service
Why, the email asks, do we still have Black History Month?
The writer might be white, or she might not. She identifies herself as a “conscious woman” and sends the email to one of my public addresses. She seems chagrined that “race still matters” and wants to initiate an exchange of views with hers at the foundation – studying black history is obsolete. We have a black president, the woman writes. Black people have made so many strides. Aren’t you holding on to the past, she argues, when you insist on having this month to study black history?
I am not in the habit of engaging in email debates with folks who are ill-informed, so I ignore the note. Still, I am intrigued enough by it to print it out and paste it to my desktop for a few days.
When I pick up high school history books, I see African-American history sprinkled through, like seasoning, as opposed to being placed at a base. And I think of the tremendous vision of Dr. Carter G. Woodson, the second African American to receive a Ph.D. from Harvard (after W.E.B. DuBois) and the founder, in 1915, of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH). Woodson wrote the masterpiece “The Mis-Education of the Negro” and founded Negro History Week in 1926. By 1976, the week had expanded into African American History Month. The Association, based in Washington, D.C., sets a theme for Black History Month each year (notice that I use Black and African American interchangeably – for me they are the same thing). This year the theme is “The History of Black Economic Empowerment.”
Economics is the study of who gets what, when, where and why. It is the study of the way the factors of production – land, labor, capital and creativity – are paid in rent, wages, interest and profit. It is the history of the knife, of how the pie is sliced. And it is the story of why African Americans get so much less than our fair share of the pie.
We get less than we deserve, not for lack of wanting or trying, but because the playing field for us has never been level. For centuries we could not accumulate wealth in the United States because we were the source of wealth for others.
Free Frank McWhorter’s story is compelling, but it is not the only story of a slave who bought back his freedom. And whenever I write or think those words, something twists in my stomach, the notion that someone had to buy himself, but also in the case of Free Frank, buy himself and a dozen or so of his relatives. Buy yourself, cut a deal with the person who owns you, as if there is honesty in this deal cutting.
Free Frank used his free time to work to save money to buy himself back and thanks to his descendent, Dr. Juliet Walker, we know the story. We don’t know the story of the laundry women who did the same thing; don’t necessarily know their names. But we know that the economic paradigm – the study of who gets what, when, where and why – informed those women’s decisions.
Fast forward from Free Frank to Billionaire Bob. Bob Johnson, that is, the brother who conceived of BET and then sold it to Viacom, creating dozens of millionaires and turning himself into a billionaire. Fast forward from buying oneself to selling a window to a people. Johnson is to be admired as a consummate entrepreneur, one who leveraged an idea into a profit center into a fortune. With both Free Frank and Billionaire Bob, we have to ask what is left for the people they may have leveraged, or may not have.
Because the history of commerce so frequently embraces men and ignores woman, it is important to make it clear that the history of African-American economic empowerment has a women’s twist, too. There are early women to lift up such as Dr. Sadie Tanner Moselle Alexander, who was the first to receive the doctorate in economics in the United States, or Madame C.J. Walker, the first black woman millionaire. Maggie Lena Walker was the first to start a bank in Richmond, Va. Mary Ellen Pleasant was an economic player, an investor in the Gold Rush in the early days in San Francisco.
We still have Black History Month, I would tell my motley correspondent, because the story has still not been told. I am grateful and humbled by the vision of Dr. Woodson, and by his commitment to remind us of who we are, again and again. Those who have inherited his mantle, the sisters and brothers of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, have taken up the baton of his vision and are about to pass it on. In the words of Dr. Maya Angelou, “And still we rise.”
(Dr. Julianne Malveaux is president of Bennett College for Women. She can be reached at presbennett@bennett.ed.)
CANADA :
This is Canada’s night
Let’s just hope it doesn’t rain on our parade
www.torontosun.com/By STEVE SIMMONS, QMI Agency/12th February 2010
VANCOUVER – Fifteen years and maybe 15 million crises later, John Furlong can’t wait to exhale.
He’s just not sure when.
This is his day. This is our night, Canada’s night. Finally, after all the talk, the rhetoric, the endless television commercials, the protests, the financial troubles, and the weather reports, and the non-stop buildup, we have an Olympic Games.
And let the show and the snow begin, at least one of which we’re not certain of.
“Inside, I’m dying to say I’m eurphoric, but I don’t want to say it,” said Furlong, the impressive CEO of the Vancouver Olympic Committee. He began this Olympic journey as a conversation some 15 years ago.
He wanted to bring the Olympics to Vancouver – the Summer Olympics. Instead, he ended up with the Winter Olympics and summery weather.
“We’ve climbed a lot of mountains, hit a lot of obstacles, met a lot of challenges… We had a vision,” said Furlong. “We wanted to do something to affect the whole country. We wanted to make a difference.”
Tonight it all begins.
Tonight the rest of Canada can sit back, enjoy, and marvel at the spectacle that is any Olympic Games.
Just not Furlong. Not yet. This is a Winter Olympics, unlike any before it. Really, it’s almost two Olympic Games in one. This is a tale of two cities, one of snow and one of rain, one outdoors in the mountains and one of indoors in the largest cosmopolitan city to house a Games, one in which there is built in atmosphere in Whistler and yet uncertainty in Vancouver.
An Olympics almost divided from the start, trying hard to be one: Just how this ends up will be impacted by just how the Olympic hockey tournament proceeds and whether the weather cooperates. The later remains a significant problem.
And that is out of the hands of the organizing committee, which has left almost no stone unturned in leading to this day. They can control buses and venues and what goes on in the Athlete’s Village: Weather, they can’t.
And a truth: In preparing for the Games, the Vancouver organizing committee studied 20 years of local weather reports in order to come up with every conceivable plan. And then January came, the warmest January in the history of the city.
“The weather has not been our friend,” said VANOC’s Cathy Priestner-Allinger. “It continues to challenge us.” Rarely has an Olympics began with the odd juxtaposition of excitement and contigency. Yesterday, it rained and was foggy at Cypress Mountain. “Visibility is an issue,” said Priestner-Allinger, “We’re keeping a close eye on all of this.”
The tension from the organizing committee is about pulling everything off correctly. They are described from the inside as perfectionists. They want to pull off “an extraordinary Games.” They can’t control what they can’t control.
“It’s the tension you feel before the big game,” said Furlong, his big Games beginning today at ski jump and tonight at what is already being described as a magical opening ceremony. “In the early days, you start off thinking like you know a whole lot and you end up realizing how little you know. But we’ve done everything we could have done.”
Every Olympics takes on its own personality, its own shape, its own feel. Some work. Some don’t.
The buildup rarely foreshadows the reality.
Beijing was supposed to be a disaster: It was anything but. Calgary had no shortage of scandals leading up to 1988: Then the city embraced the Games like few have before it or since. The pages begin to turn tonight: The stories about to be unfold.
Finally, let the Games begin.
AUSTRALIA :
EUROPE :
CHINA :
Somali pirates release fishing vessel from Taiwan, China
English.news.cn/ Xinhua/2010-02-12
NAIROBI, Feb. 11 (Xinhua) — Somali pirates have released a fishing boat from Taiwan, China, and all of its crew held since April, a regional maritime official said Thursday.
“The Taiwanese ship was released this morning. The fishing vessel which has a crew of 30 from various Asian nationalities was seized in April last year,” Andrew Mwangura, East Africa’s coordinator of the Africa Seafarers Assistance Program, told Xinhua.
The Win Far 161 was seized last April 4 near an island in the Seychelles, more than 1,100 kilometers off the coast of Somalia.
The ship carried a crew of 30 — 17 Filipinos, six Indonesians, five from the Chinese Mainland and two from Taiwan, China.
Mwangura said 27 crew members were said to be safe, though a Chinese sailor and two from Indonesia died in captivity.
The coordinator could not confirm whether a ransom was paid to secure the release of the 700-ton ship and crew.
Piracy has been rampant off Somalia since the country slid into chaos after warlords toppled military dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.
Somali pirates now hold at least seven ships and more than 160 crew members.
The hijackings have prompted the international community to deploy security forces in the area to deter the pirates.
Editor: yan
FACTBOX-Sources of tension between China and U.S.
Fri Feb 12, 2010 /Reuters
BEIJING, Feb 12 (Reuters) – U.S. President Barack Obama
plans to meet Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama on Feb.
18, a move immediately denounced by China. [ID:nTOE61B002] The Obama administration delayed meeting the Dalai Lama,
who has lived in exile since a failed Tibetan uprising in 1959,
until after Obama’s November visit to Beijing so as not to
inflame tensions with China, which accuses the monk of
separatism. With the two giant nations joined at the hip economically,
Sino-U.S. tensions are unlikely to escalate into outright
confrontation, but could make cooperating on global economic
and security issues all the more difficult. Here are the main sources of tension: CURRENCY AND DEBT The United States complains that China keeps its currency
artificially undervalued, thus unfairly helping exporters. China has unofficially pegged the yuan CNY=CFXS to the
dollar since mid-2008, meaning its currency has weakened
against other trade partners as the value of the dollar has
slid. Beijing is concerned the value of its dollar holdings
could be eroded by massive debt issuances to fund the U.S.
stimulus. China held $789.6 billion in U.S. Treasuries at
end-November, displacing Japan in September 2008 as the largest
foreign holder. U.S. lawmakers want to take action on the yuan, but U.S.
law makes it difficult to investigate alleged subsidies.
[ID:nN20226990] Rash U.S. moves that threaten China’s massive purchases of
U.S. debt, and its funding of the U.S. deficit, are unlikely. TRADE AND INVESTMENT A World Trade Organisation panel is judging U.S. duties on
Chinese tyres, after the United States for the first time
imposed safeguard duties agreed to when China joined the WTO. Other trade disputes centre around steel products, poultry,
Chinese tariffs on raw materials exports, and quality and
safety concerns over Chinese-made food, toys and other goods
that Chinese manufacturers view as a type of protectionism. U.S. firms investing in China complain about intellectual
property theft, murky regulations, corruption and unfair
advantages enjoyed by domestic rivals. China complains about investment barriers on the U.S. side,
citing resource investments blocked on national security
grounds. In 2009, U.S. exports to China totalled $77.4 billion, but
were dwarfed by $220.8 billion in exports from China to the
United States, Beijing’s second biggest trade partner. Falling
demand thanks to the financial crisis narrowed the trade gap. DIPLOMATIC AND MILITARY INFLUENCE Exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama makes
frequent visits to the United States, and is due to meet U.S.
President Barack Obama on Feb. 18. China fears that ethnically
distinct Tibetan areas will strive for independence, taking
with them one-sixth of China’s current territory — an area
rich in minerals and water resources. Taiwan remains a sore point. China has threatened sanctions
against companies making weapons or planes involved in the U.S.
plan to sell $6.4 billion of arms to Taiwan. [ID:nLDE614203] Beijing has never renounced the use of force to bring
self-ruled and democratic Taiwan, which it considers its
sovereign territory, under its rule. The United States is
legally obliged to help the island defend itself. As China has grown to the world’s third-largest economy, it
is gaining greater clout, especially in Asia and Africa. It is also upgrading its military and space capability, and
Washington has said Beijing should be more open about its
defence spending and strategic intentions. China is wary of the United States’ global military
strength. U.S. patrols in waters China considers its exclusive
zone led to minor incidents last year. In 2001 a U.S. spy plane
was forced to land in China after colliding with a Chinese
fighter. China and the United States work together in talks over
North Korea’s nuclear weapons programme. China worries that if
its neighbour collapses refugees could destabilise northeast
China. Washington also wants China to put stronger pressure on
North Korea, as well as Iran, over their nuclear activities. INTERNET FREEDOMS U.S. Internet firms have fared poorly in China, which
censors content and blocks many foreign websites, including
popular social media such as Twitter and Facebook, and YouTube. On Jan. 12, Google Inc (GOOG.O: Quote, Profile, Research) said it might pull out of
the country after a sophisticated cyber-attack, adding that it
would seek talks about offering a legal, uncensored search
engine in China. [ID:nN12211882] U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called on China to
openly and thoroughly investigate the attacks and made a broad
case for global Internet freedom on Jan. 21 [ID:nTOE60K02Y]
(Writing by Ben Blanchard and Lucy Hornby; Editing by Alex
Richardson)
INDIA :
BRASIL:
EN BREF, CE 12 février 2010 … AGNEWS / OMAR, BXL,12/02/2010
