Bush holds further talks in Egypt

Mr Bush wants Arab leaders t to expand political and economic freedom

US President George W Bush is holding further talks with Arab leaders in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, on the final day of his Middle East tour.

He will meet Palestinian PM Salam Fayyad and Jordan’s King Abdullah, but not Lebanon’s PM as had been planned.

Mr Bush will later urge the leaders to reject Iran and Syria, whom he called “spoilers” impeding progress, in a speech to the World Economic Forum.

On Saturday, he stressed his commitment to securing a Middle East peace deal.

The president made the remarks after holding talks with his Egyptian counterpart, Hosni Mubarak, and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas.

Reform call

In his weekly radio address, Mr Bush said that he would use his speech at the World Economic Forum on the Middle East on Sunday to again “make it clear that I believe we can get a [Palestinian] state defined by the end of my presidency”.

I will make clear that the only way to ensure true prosperity is to expand political and economic freedom US President George Bush

He would also urge Arab leaders to bring about freer economic markets, enact political reforms, allow greater participation in society for women and young people, and “reject spoilers such as the regimes in Iran and Syria”, he said.

“I will make clear that the only way to ensure true prosperity is to expand political and economic freedom,” he added.

Mr Bush said his fellow leaders ought to “embrace the changes necessary for a day when societies across the Middle East are based on justice, tolerance and freedom” and “move past old grievances”, thought to refer to Israel.

Before he arrived in Sharm el-Sheikh, Mr Bush was criticised by Egypt’s state-owned newspapers for “appeasing Israel” and hardly referring to Palestinians during a speech in Israel during its 60th anniversary celebrations last week.

He therefore spent much of Saturday working hard to convince the Arab world that he is “absolutely committed” to a lasting Israeli-Palestinian peace deal.

“It’ll be an opportunity to end the suffering that takes place in the Palestinian territories,” he said after holding talks with Mr Abbas.

Mr Bush is due to address the World Economic Forum later on Sunday

“It breaks my heart to see the vast potential of the Palestinian people really wasted. They are good, smart capable people who when given a chance will build a thriving homeland,” he added.

“I commit to you once again that my government will help achieve a dream, a dream that you have, and the truth of matter is, a dream that the Israelis have, which is two states living side by side in peace.”

Mr Bush had dinner with Mr Abbas on Saturday night. In their brief comments to the media ahead of the meal, there was no suggestion from Mr Abbas that he was losing faith or patience with the US.

Mr Abbas said he was confident of Mr Bush’s dedication to the goal of a final deal. The Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert, did not attend the meetings although he did send a delegation led by Defence Minister Ehud Barak.

The BBC’s Christian Fraser in Sharm el-Sheikh says there is general acknowledgement among negotiators that there will need to be some heavy lifting to achieve the rather lofty ambitions set out at Annapolis in November.

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Aid vessel hijacked off Somalia

East African maritime officials say pirates have hijacked a Jordanian ship off the coast of Somalia.

The Victoria, sailing from India with 4,000 tonnes of sugar donated by Denmark on board, was seized early on Saturday as it neared Mogadishu.

It has a crew of 12 from Pakistan, India, Tanzania and Bangladesh.

The seas off Somalia have some of the highest rates of piracy in the world, with a dozen vessels attacked this year, and three in recent weeks.

Last month the United States and France proposed a UN resolution allowing countries to chase and arrest pirates in Somalia’s territorial waters.

Contact with the Jordanian-registered Victoria was lost at 0500GMT when the boat was 55km (35 miles) off the Somali coast, Jordanian Transport Minister Alaa al-Batayneh said.

The boat is now reportedly heading north.

He said Jordan was working with the Danish embassy in Mogadishu to try to secure the release of the ship and crew.

Somali officials have blamed Western companies for paying ransoms after hijackings, saying this only worsens the problem.

In April, the 26 crew of a Spanish fishing boat were released after being seized by pirates, and a reported ransom of $1.2m (£600,000) was paid.

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BBC News–May 18, 2008

Burma rulers ‘inhuman’

The British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, tells Newshour that Burma’s cyclone has become a man-made disaster.

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Thousands Flee Flood in Sichuan Province

Our correspondent Henry Morton is in Sichuan, covering the aftermath of the devastating quake. Click on the video icons below to see his reports on the ground.

Thousands of Chinese fled to the hills on Saturday amid fears a lake formed near the epicentre of this week’s earthquake would burst its banks. The water level at the lake formed after aftershocks blocked a river was rising rapidly in Beichuan and “may burst its bank at any time,” the official Xinhua news agency said.

A paramilitary officer told Reuters the likelihood of the lake bursting its banks was “extremely big.”

A witness said by telephone the military was evacuating everyone in Beichuan, even rescue workers.

A Reuters journalist fled an area near the Beichuan Middle School, which President Hu Jintao visited on Friday. Soldiers were talking on the radio saying “all retreat” and there was a lot of dust in the air. Troops were leaving fast.

China has said it expects the final death toll from Monday’s 7.9 magnitude earthquake to exceed 50,000. About 4.8 million people have lost their homes and the days are numbered in which survivors can be found.

Cabinet spokesman Guo Weimin, taking a long pause to compose himself as he read from an updated casualty report at a news conference, put the death toll so far at 28,881.

Sichuan Vice-Governor Li Chengyun said more than 188,100 people have been injured and about 10,600 people remain buried under rubble. About 2.6 million tents are needed to shelter 4.8 million displaced residents, he added.

Hong Kong cable television said some 1.2 million people were also being evacuated in Qingchuan, 90 km (55 miles) northeast of Beichuan, as rising waters threatened to burst a lake’s banks.

There has been growing concern about the safety of dams and reservoirs which have been weakened in the mountainous province of Sichuan, an area about the size of Spain.

A cable repair worker was killed on Saturday, five days after the original disaster, when hit by rocks as a moderate aftershock, one of hundreds, hit Lixian county.

Many survivors were also found, including a German tourist who was pulled from rubble in Wenchuan after being buried for 114 hours, Xinhua said.

A 69-year-old villager was one of 33 people rescued in Beichuan. He was buried for 119 hours. Troops evacuated 18 scientists trapped in a forest in nearby Mianzhu.

On Friday, soldiers pulled 2,538 people from rubble, only 165 of whom were still alive, the cabinet spokesman said, an indication hope of finding survivors was slim.

“Although the time for the best chance of rescue, the first 72 hours after an earthquake, has passed, saving lives remains the top priority of our work,” President Hu told distraught survivors just over a week after a jubilant China celebrated the Olympic torch reaching the summit of Mount Everest.

BIGGEST SINCE THE COMMUNIST REVOLUTION

Premier Wen Jiabao said the quake was “the biggest and most destructive” since before the Communist revolution of 1949 and the quick response had helped reduce casualties.

That compares even with the 1976 tremor in the northern city of Tangshan which killed up to 300,000 people.

And as the weather gets warmer, survivors were worried about hygiene and asking questions about their longer-term future.

“What we don’t need now is more instant noodles,” said truck driver Wang Jianhong in the city of Dujiangyan. “We want to know now what will happen with our lives.”

In Sichuan and neighbouring Chongqing, at least 17 reservoirs have been damaged, with some dams cracked or leaking water. Several are on the Min river, which tumbles through the worst-hit areas between the Tibetan plateau and the Sichuan plain.

The Lianhehua dam, built in the late 1950s northwest of Dujiangyan, showed cracks big enough to put a fist in.

“When the dam is in this shape, we cannot feel relaxed,” said farmer Feng Binggui who has moved from his village below the dam into the hills.

China is also on precautionary alert against possible radiation leaks, the Ministry of Environmental Protection said. The country’s chief nuclear weapons research lab is in Mianyang, along with several secret atomic sites, but there are no nuclear power stations.

China has sent 150,000 troops to the disaster area, but roads buckled by the quake and blocked by landslides have made it hard for supplies and rescuers to reach the worst-hit areas.

Offers of help have flooded in and foreign rescue teams from Japan, Russia, Taiwan, South Korea and Singapore have arrived.

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Quake effort resumes after panic

Thousands of troops, rescue workers and civilians fled to higher ground

Rescue efforts are resuming in Beichuan in China, after the entire city was evacuated amid fears that it could be engulfed by a river bursting its banks.

The city was reduced to ruins by Monday’s earthquake, but efforts are still going on to find and dig survivors from the rubble.

But the search was halted on Saturday as rumours of a flood saw a stampede of people fleeing to higher ground.

Beichuan is near the epicentre of the quake believed to have killed 50,000.

On Saturday the number of confirmed deaths rose to 28,881. The Chinese authorities say that about five million people have been made homeless following the 7.9-magnitude quake.

Several people were dug out of the rubble on Saturday, including a 31-year-old woman in Deyang city, and a 33-year-old miner in Shifang, both about 124 hours after being buried.

The region shuddered again as a strong aftershock - measured by the US Geological Survey at 6.0 - struck at 0108 Sunday local time (1508 GMT Saturday).

There have been hundreds of aftershocks since Monday’s quake, some causing landslides which have made conditions even more difficult.

Panic

The BBC’s Paul Danahar in Beichuan says after the flood alert the city went from a scene of rescue and relief into mayhem.

“Everybody just ran - rescuers, army relief teams, medical workers and locals - and people who were in the process of being rescued had to be left behind,” he said.

QUAKE STATISTICS Up to Friday 16 May: 28,881 dead 198,347 injured 145 aftershocks above level 4, 23 above level 5, biggest 6.1 34,000 medical staff in quake zone 181,460 tents, 220,000 quilts despatched 6bn Chinese yuan ($860m, £440m) received in donations, from China and abroad Drinking water for 7m people restored Source: Chinese government In pictures: Beichuan evacuation See a detailed map of quake zone

“We were in the process of filming a man about to be pulled out after hours of digging and the rescue team had to abandon him and run.”

The Xinhua news agency warned that a lake, formed by landslides blocking a river, “may burst its bank at any time”.

However, the authorities later said the city was not under threat from the water.

Our correspondent saw troops returning to the city to resume the rescue effort, but no civilians.

Those inhabitants who had stayed in the city after the quake, or had returned to check on their property or search for loved ones, appeared now to be staying on the surrounding hillsides.

“It is not surprising,” he says. “This entire community has been shaken to its core, they are surrounded by unstable buildings which threaten to topple at any moment, and the people have been deeply traumatised by what has happened.”

Mass graves

The Chinese government has organised a massive search and rescue effort. It released figures on Saturday demonstrating the scale of the operation.

It said 198,347 people had been recorded injured, not just in Sichuan, where the quake struck, but in Gansu, Shaanxi, Chongqing, Hubei, Henan, and Guizhou provinces.

A woman found under the rubble some 124 hours after the quake

On Friday 26,801 personnel were sent on rescue and relief missions, while 34,000 medical staff were “in the frontline”, it said.

During the day 2,538 people were recovered from the ruins - 165 of whom were still alive.

It said some 181,460 tents, 220,000 quilts, and 170,000 cotton-padded garments had been despatched to the disaster area.

Rescue teams from South Korea, Singapore and Russia have joined Japanese and Taiwanese experts taking part in the massive search.

The specialist teams are equipped with sniffer dogs, and fibre-optic cameras and heat sensors to detect people buried under the rubble.

But experts say the chances of finding people alive are diminishing, and increasingly it is dead bodies which are being retrieved.

The authorities have resorted to burying the bodies in mass graves in an effort to prevent disease.

Uncertain times for survivors Dams pose flooding risk Life in tent city

People in the quake zone are being told to wear face masks and disinfectant teams are out in force.

The BBC’s Quentin Sommerville in Chengdu says that five days on China’s efforts are now squarely focused on getting help to those who survived the earthquake.

Rubble from destroyed buildings is being taken away, streets are being cleared and broken roads repaired.

In some of the worst hit areas, people now have tents, fresh water, and something to eat.

The authorities said temporary water supplies had been restored to 70% of quake-hit towns, and that communications and road links were being reopened.

But in more inaccessible parts of the province, the authorities are still struggling to get help to survivors.

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‘Plot’ delays Tsvangirai return

Mr Tsvangirai had planned to address a major MDC rally in Bulawayo

Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has postponed a return to Zimbabwe because of concerns about a plot to kill him.

“We have received information from a credible source concerning a planned assassination attempt,” his spokesman George Sibotshiwe said.

Mr Tsvangirai was set to return to campaign for a run-off presidential election against Robert Mugabe.

On Friday, the US ambassador warned post-election violence had made a fair second round run-off vote impossible.

James McGee told the BBC he had evidence that the police and military had been involved in “pure unadulterated violence designed to intimidate people from voting” in the election, which the electoral commission has set for 27 June.

Opposition and human rights groups have said hundreds of opposition supporters have been beaten up and at least 30 killed since the first round on 29 March.

According to official results, Mr Tsvangirai won the presidential poll, but not by enough to avoid a run-off with President Robert Mugabe. He has insisted he did pass the 50% threshold and so should have been declared the outright winner.

‘No choice’

After spending more than a month outside Zimbabwe since then trying to drum up international support, Mr Tsvangirai had been planning to return to Harare on Saturday and resume his campaign to oust Mr Mugabe.

We can’t say why he will not be coming today, except to say it’s due to circumstances beyond our control Nelson Chamisa MDC spokesman

He had been due to speak to newly-elected members of parliament from his party, who will form a majority for the first time since independence.

The MDC leader had also planned to address a major rally in Zimbabwe’s second city, Bulawayo, on Sunday.

The rally is still scheduled to go ahead, but Mr Tsvangirai’s spokesman said the politician’s return had been postponed indefinitely.

Last year, Mr Tsvangirai was treated in hospital after being assaulted by police.

The BBC’s Caroline Hawley in Johannesburg says that despite a campaign of state-sponsored violence and intimidation against MDC supporters, Mr Tsvangirai has no choice but to contest the run-off or allow Mr Mugabe to win by default.

‘Unadulterated violence’

Ambassador McGee warned that such “politically-inspired” violence cast doubt on whether a free and fair election could take place.

“Too many people have been killed, too many people have been maimed, too many people have been dislocated from their homes,” Mr McGee told the BBC.

He said the attacks involved “mainly beatings to the back and buttocks, we’ve seen quite a few broken limbs, we’ve seen cuts to the head”.

Mr McGee said he had met victims on a trip with British, Japanese, EU, Dutch and Tanzanian diplomats, during which he said they were harassed by police.

Along with so-called war veterans, he said they had evidence “police and military are involved in these attacks”.

It was “pure unadulterated violence designed to intimidate people from voting in the next election”, he said.

Deputy Information Minister, Bright Matonga, insisted that the Zimbabwean government did not support any violence, whether by MDC or Mr Mugabe’s Zanu-PF.

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U.S. Planning Big New Prison in Afghanistan

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By ERIC SCHMITT and TIM GOLDEN

Published: May 17, 2008

WASHINGTON — The Pentagon is moving forward with plans to build a new, 40-acre detention complex on the main American military base in Afghanistan, officials said, in a stark acknowledgment that the United States is likely to continue to hold prisoners overseas for years to come.

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Times Topics: Bagram Detention Center (Afghanistan)

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The proposed detention center would replace the cavernous, makeshift American prison on the Bagram military base north of Kabul, which is now typically packed with about 630 prisoners, compared with the 270 held at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

Until now, the Bush administration had signaled that it intended to scale back American involvement in detention operations in Afghanistan. It had planned to transfer a large majority of the prisoners to Afghan custody, in an American-financed, high-security prison outside Kabul to be guarded by Afghan soldiers.

But American officials now concede that the new Afghan-run prison cannot absorb all the Afghans now detained by the United States, much less the waves of new prisoners from the escalating fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban.

The proposal for a new American prison at Bagram underscores the daunting scope and persistence of the United States military’s detention problem, at a time when Bush administration officials continue to say they want to close down the facility at Guantánamo Bay.

Military officials have long been aware of serious problems with the existing detention center in Afghanistan, the Bagram Theater Internment Facility. After the prison was set up in early 2002, it became a primary site for screening prisoners captured in the fighting. Harsh interrogation methods and sleep deprivation were used widely, and two Afghan detainees died there in December 2002, after being repeatedly struck by American soldiers.

Conditions and treatment have improved markedly since then, but hundreds of Afghans and other men are still held in wire-mesh pens surrounded by coils of razor wire. There are only minimal areas for the prisoners to exercise, and kitchen, shower and bathroom space is also inadequate.

Faced with that, American officials said they wanted to replace the Bagram prison, a converted aircraft hangar that still holds some of the decrepit aircraft-repair machinery left by the Soviet troops who occupied the country in the 1980s. In its place the United States will build what officials described as a more modern and humane detention center that would usually accommodate about 600 detainees — or as many as 1,100 in a surge — and cost more than $60 million.

“Our existing theater internment facility is deteriorating,” said Sandra L. Hodgkinson, the senior Pentagon official for detention policy, in a telephone interview. “It was renovated to do a temporary mission. There is a sense that this is the right time to build a new facility.”

American officials also acknowledged that there are serious health risks to detainees and American military personnel who work at the Bagram prison, because of their exposure to heavy metals from the aircraft-repair machinery and asbestos.

“It’s just not suitable,” another Pentagon official said. “At some point, you have to say, ‘That’s it. This place was not made to keep people there indefinitely.’ ”

That point came about six months ago. It became clear to Pentagon officials that the original plan of releasing some Afghan prisoners outright and transferring other detainees to Afghan custody would not come close to emptying the existing detention center.

Although a special Afghan court has been established to prosecute detainees formerly held at Bagram and Guantánamo, American officials have been hesitant to turn over those prisoners they consider most dangerous. In late February the head of detainee operations in Iraq, Maj. Gen. Douglas M. Stone, traveled to Bagram to assess conditions there.

In Iraq, General Stone has encouraged prison officials to build ties to tribal leaders, families and communities, said a Congressional official who has been briefed on the general’s work. As a result, American officials are giving Iraqi detainees job training and engaging them in religious discussions to help prepare them to re-enter Iraqi society.

About 8,000 detainees have been released in Iraq since last September. Fewer than 1 percent of them have been returned to the prison, said Lt. Cmdr. K. C. Marshall, General Stone’s spokesman.

The new detention center at Bagram will incorporate some of the lessons learned by the United States in Iraq. Classrooms will be built for vocational training and religious discussion, and there will be more space for recreation and family visits, officials said. After years of entreaties by the International Committee of the Red Cross, the United States recently began to allow relatives to speak with prisoners at Bagram through video hookups.

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Personal Reflections on a Sleepless Night in Minneapolis

I’m sitting here watching that marvelous film, Dillinger, starring Warren Oates and Ben Johnson, produced in 1973–an underrated classic for sure– and I’m thinking of the following amalgam:

–my friends and relatives scattered around the globe: Europe, Africa, the US, are united by one thing: no one is corporate; everyone eats organic food and is saavy in technology and owns a laptop with wifi wireless; everyone travels the globe at will and has the means to do so so…; every owns a US passort in addition to other passports: notable ones: Israel, the UK, Nigeria, France…we’re all global citizens..yes!!!

and also this: Everyone of us is for Barack Obama as President of the US in January 2009…

Burma ‘guilty of inhuman action’

Aid agencies are warning supplies are not getting to the areas worst hit

UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown has condemned Burma’s military government for not allowing international aid to reach the victims of Cyclone Nargis.

Mr Brown told the BBC that a natural disaster had been turned into a “man-made catastrophe” because of the negligence of the ruling generals.

There is growing condemnation of Burma’s response to the 2 May cyclone, said to have killed at least 78,000.

France has said Burma is on the verge of committing a crime against humanity.

France and the US both have ships carrying large consignments of aid waiting off the Burmese coast, but so far the government has refused to allow relief aid arriving by sea directly to the worst affected areas.

Some 56,000 people are thought to be missing, according to the latest official figures - double the previous estimate.

‘Rule nothing out’

In an interview for the BBC World Service, Mr Brown said that Burma’s ruling generals would be judged by the world and their own people for thwarting the assistance offered by the rest of the world.

“This is inhuman. We have an intolerable situation, created by a natural disaster,” he said.

“It is being made into a man-made catastrophe by the negligence, the neglect and the inhuman treatment of the Burmese people by a regime that is failing to act and to allow the international community to do what it wants to do.

“The responsibility lies with the Burmese regime and they must be held accountable.” Aid agencies have also become frustrated by the slow progress at which relief supplies are getting to the areas worst hit, with many survivors still without food, water and shelter. Aid workers already inside Burma have been prevented from entering some areas.

The cyclone has filled many rice fields with sea water, destroying vital crops

However, the Burmese authorities have allowed the UN and some other agencies to hand out supplies directly. A team of 50 Indian medical personnel is also being allowed to fly into Rangoon on Saturday, equipped with medical supplies.

Asked if he believed it was time for forced air-drops of aid, Mr Brown said it remained an option.

“We rule nothing out and the reason we rule nothing out is that we want to get the aid directly to the people.”

But he said aid bodies were advising that the most effective course of action was to apply international pressure on Burma to force it to accept foreign aid.

The UK government was working with the international community to channel British aid through China and the countries forming the Association of South East Asian Nations (Asean), Mr Brown added.

“That’s what we’re trying to do as quickly as possible and with great speed.”

Asean is due to hold a high-level meeting on Monday that is expected to lay the framework for a broader aid donors’ conference.

‘Time is life’

Earlier, France’s UN envoy angrily rejected Burmese allegations the French ship in international waters off Burma’s coast was a warship, saying it was carrying 1,500 tonnes of food and medicine.

EXTENT OF THE DEVASTATION See map and satellite images Eyewitness: Barred from Burma Send us your comments

Speaking at the UN General Assembly in New York, Jean-Maurice Ripert warned that the Burmese military’s refusal to allow aid to be delivered to those who needed it “could lead to a true crime against humanity”.

“Hundreds of thousands of lives are in jeopardy and we think that the primary responsibility of the government of Myanmar (Burma) is to help and open the borders so that the international aid could come into the place,” he said.

The BBC’s Natalia Antelava says there has been little sign of official help in the delta this week and that foreign aid workers have been barred from the area.

She saw muddy river banks are lined with white, swollen bodies, and found survivors with barely enough rice to live on. Heavy rain has been lashing the region, compounding the survivors’ misery.

A Reuters team travelling to Kunyangon, around 100km (60 miles) south-west of Rangoon, found rows of beggars stretching for miles on either side of a road.

Men, women and children stood in the mud and rain, hands clasped together in supplication at the occasional passing aid vehicle.

The UN Humanitarian Co-ordinator, John Holmes, is due to visit Rangoon on Sunday in a bid to persuade the government to grant more access to UN relief workers and expand its aid effort.

Correspondents say that at this stage it is not clear who he will be able to talk to given that Burma’s leader, Gen Thein Sein, has refused to answer calls from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.

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BBC News—May 17, 2008

Burma aid on standby

The BBC’s Nick Bryant reports from onboard the USS Essex which could deliver aid within hours if given the go ahead.

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