Drone attacks, CIA activities and lack of progress in Afghanistan are fuelling a rift between the US and Pakistan Bitter disputes over covert CIA activities and drone attacks inside Pakistan, lack of progress over peace talks in Afghanistan, and rising Islamist-led opposition to the presence of foreign forces in the region are fuelling the biggest crisis in US-Pakistan relations since the 9/11 attacks, Pakistani politicians, army sources and intelligence officers say. Pakistan is seen by Washington and London as a vital ally in the “war on terror”, while the Pakistani government and army say they remain committed partners 10 years after the Afghan conflict began. But harsh US criticism of Islamabad’s counter-terrorism campaigns in Pakistan’s western tribal areas, repeated in a White House report last week, and “blowback” from the US military surge in Afghanistan are testing the relationship to breaking point, officials warn. “We will not accept the stigmatising of Pakistan,” said Salman Bashir, Pakistan’s foreign secretary. “We need to re-examine the fundamentals of our relationship with the United States to get greater clarity. There has been a pause. Now we must start again.” Rehman Malik, Pakistan’s interior minister, said the Americans should stop blaming others for their difficulties in Afghanistan, where violence has worsened in the past year and reconciliation efforts have made little progress. “If the strategy is not right, all the stakeholders have to share responsibility,” Malik said. Pakistan had suffered “unimaginably” since the “war on terror” began, he added. “We are not just fighting for Pakistan, we are fighting for the whole world. If this country is destabilised, the whole region is destabilised … so please, stop the blame game. We are your partners. We are victims, not part of the terrorists.” The rift comes at a dangerous moment for the US and its Nato allies as the Afghan conflict enters the “endgame” and they begin the process of handing over control of security to Afghan forces – and start withdrawing troops in July. US criticism of Pakistan centres on ongoing suspicions that its powerful spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI), continues to support Taliban and other militant groups active in Afghanistan and Kashmir, partly in a bid to retain influence over a post-withdrawal government in Kabul. Last week members of a US congressional committee accused Pakistan of playing a double game, while the White House described its counter-terrorism efforts in tribal areas as disappointing. Pakistani anger focuses in turn on three main areas: unauthorised CIA activity inside the country, Pakistan’s perception that the US is keeping it “out of the loop” on Afghanistan, particularly in respect of mooted peace talks with the Taliban, and what Islamabad sees as the US failure to appreciate the full cost and impact of the “war on terror” on Pakistan’s economy and social cohesion. “The main problem we face is the presence of foreign forces in Afghanistan. This is the main problem for the whole region,” an intelligence official said. “The ‘war on terror’ fuels extremism in Pakistan’s society.” Unmanned drone missile attacks launched by the CIA at targets inside the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan have inflamed anti-US feeling in Pakistan, making it increasingly difficult to justify the continuing “war on terror” alliance, a senior security official said. “In the long term, it [the drone attacks] is completely counter-productive because it alienates the population and restricts our ability to shape our security environment,” the official said. Pakistan’s army had conducted several campaigns to suppress Taliban groups and al-Qaida operatives and sympathisers in Pakistan since 2001, including in South Waziristan and Bajaur as well as in Swat, north of Islamabad, the official said. But the army was resisting US pressure to launch another offensive in north Waziristan. “What do they [the US] want us to do? Declare war on our whole country?” the official asked. “The Americans need to devise a strategy but better still, share the [drone] technology with us,” interior minister Rehman Malik said. “There is big anti-American feeling. We would like to urge that the drone attacks be stopped.” Tensions over CIA activities peaked earlier this year when Pakistan arrested a CIA contractor, Raymond Davis, after a shooting incident. Davis was publicly named, held in detention for 47 days and interrogated, before eventually being released after payment of $2.3m in compensation. The affair followed the withdrawal last December of the CIA station chief in Pakistan after his name was published in local media – an unprecedented security breach. Whether by coincidence or design, a drone attack last month, launched the day after Davis was released, killed dozens of people in north Waziristan and sparked widespread outrage. The Pakistani army chief, General Ashfak Kayani, called the attack a “violation of human rights” and said the dead were tribal leaders, not terrorists. The prime minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, called the attack “irrational”. Pakistan has since moved to expel hundreds of US personnel, many of whom are believed to work for the CIA or US special operations, by not renewing their visas. In a tacit acknowledgement of how serious the rift has become, the US invited General Ahmed Shuja Pasha, head of the ISI, for talks in Washington this week. Pasha is understood to have met Leon Panetta, the CIA director, and Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff. There have been no further drone attacks since the Waziristan strike. Salman Bashir, Pakistan’s foreign secretary, said Pakistan was deeply concerned about the apparent lack of progress in reconciliation efforts in Afghanistan. Bashir said Pakistan welcomed some of the steps taken so far, such as the establishment of the Afghan High Peace Council and attempts to reintegrate Taliban foot soldiers. But he said the peace process could not be left to the Afghan government alone. He questioned how serious the US was about direct talks with the Taliban leadership – and whether such a process was even feasible – while complaining that Pakistan was being kept in the dark about US intentions. “It’s between the Americans and the [Afghan] opposition. But we don’t know who the opposition is. To start with it was al-Qaida and the Taliban. Now it’s al-Qaida affiliates and other groups. So who do you talk to? Is it Mullah Omar? Are there preconditions or end conditions? We need to sort this out,” Bashir said. There was a lack of “strategic coherence” about the US approach in Afghanistan and a growing sense of urgency as the July deadline for the beginning of US troop withdrawals neared, he added. Bashir is expected to hold fence-mending talks in Washington later this month. Depending on the outcome, Pakistan’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, may make his first official visit to Washington in May. The senior security official said Pakistan could only help the Americans in Afghanistan if it knew what their strategy was. “Share it with us. What is your plan? Do you plan to stay for five years, for 20?” But the official warned that the new US military offensive in Afghanistan masterminded by General David Petraeus, and the accompanying rise in casualties, were making it more difficult to achieve a peace settlement. “The whole idea that a big military surge would induce the other side to ask for reconciliation is flawed. It goes against the whole history of Afghanistan.” Pakistan United States Afghanistan CIA Unmanned drones Simon Tisdall guardian.co.uk
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Brent council votes in favour of closing Kensal Rise – along with five others – to improve services at its remaining libraries The author Zadie Smith’s campaign to save a north-west London library opened by Mark Twain in 1900 has ended in failure after Brent council voted in favour of closing half the libraries in the borough. In a noisy meeting, lobbied by demonstrators, the council’s executive Labour group voted to close six libraries, including Kensal Rise, which Smith and several fellow authors had campaigned to save, in favour of improving services at its remaining libraries and opening a large central library near Wembley stadium in two years’ time. Smith, the author of the best-selling novel White Teeth, had argued that studying at the library had helped her academic career. Her fellow author Philip Pullman said: “It is a sad day for Brent that the council has not been persuaded, despite all the arguments put forward.” A third author, Deborah Moggach, told the protesters: “Libraries are beyond price, they are our street corner universities. They are a centre for the community.” The council argues that its remaining libraries will have more facilities and be better equippedbe open seven days a week and have ebooks and audio, free wireless and internet access, an online reference library and more books to borrow. One Liberal Democrat councillor told the council some residents would have to walk two miles to get to a library in future: “It’s devastating,” said the councillor, Jack Beck. Opponents claim that most residents oppose the plans, but the council said that although 82% of those who responded to its survey were against the closures, they represented fewer than 1% of borough residents and a petition still amounted to only 4%: mostly from residents opposing particular closures. The Harrow Observer reported that Morris Cohen, 90, a Neasden resident, told the meeting: “Elderly people use the library as a home, not just a library. Neasden used to be a no-go area and the library has been a positive influence.” But James Powney, the council cabinet member responsible for environmental and cultural issues, said: “In two years’ time more people will visit Brent libraries, more people will borrow books and a wider proportion of our population will use them.” Libraries Public sector cuts London Local government Zadie Smith Stephen Bates guardian.co.uk
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The ‘new’ MG is a car doing its best to be the very model of a modern Sino-British sports saloon Let’s be clear. This is not an MG that many, if any of us, will recognise. The “new” MG6 is a rebadged Roewe 550, a British-engineered car that made its debut at the 2008 Beijing Motor Show. Although styled by a British designer – Tony Williams-Kenny, formerly with the Japanese car maker, Mitsubishi – the Roewe is manufactured by SAIC (Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation), the state-owned Chinese company that took over the Nanjing Automobile (Group) Corporation that bought out MG Rover in 2005. Confused? You will be when you see the MG6, a car doing its best to be the very model of a modern Sino-British sports saloon. Even then, the MG – assembled at Longbridge from body shells, engines and gearboxes shipped from the People’s Republic – has something of the look of a new German Audi crossed with a Korean airport rental car. Only the time-honoured octagonal MG badge prominent on the car’s nose and in the centre of its steering wheel suggests that this is, somehow, a distant relation of the quintissentially British cars once made at Abingdon and Longbridge. Perhaps, it doesn’t matter. The original MG vanished a long time ago, although fans of the marque remain as die-hard as ever. Now spring is here, just look how many MGBs with their crisp Anglo-Italian styling (a bit of Frua, a lot of Don Hayter) and distinctive hollow exhaust note are out on the roads. The rebadged SAIC Roewe 550 with its global looks and hard, drab interior does at least offer engineering jobs in the West Midlands and there will be many there who will back the car to the hilt. The MG6 brochure says: “In every detail you’ll find a fond nod to MG’s glory days – Le Mans, Goodwood, land speed records and true British sporting endeavour.” You won’t, yet if the car succeeds, might worthy successors to fondly remembered sporting machines from Abingdon be on the cards? Who knows, but as the old Chinese proverb says, you must persevere to accomplish seemingly impossible tasks. Design Automotive industry Manufacturing sector Motoring Jonathan Glancey guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Coulter claims only ‘liberal’ media are promoting the Trump ‘Birther’ story. Then Van Susteren lets Trump do his thing
April 12, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media Ann Coulter had an interesting theory about Donald Trump’s Birtherism, which she explained last night to Sean Hannity. It seems that it’s all a plot by the liberal media to discredit conservatives: COULTER: Well, I think maybe I’ve been watching too much Charlie Sheen, because Donald Trump seems perfectly sane to me. Um, I don’t know where he gets this two million dollars Obama has spent to keep his birth certificate quiet — he posted his birth certificate on his Web page. I am glad that Donald Trump is bringing it up, so that people who haven’t really been paying attention and don’t know that the American Spectator, Human Events, Fox News, ummm — you know, every conservative outlet has already shot down this rumor — which, by the way, was started by the Hillary Clinton campaign. Now they will have a chance to find out this is Donald Trump’s Pierre Salinger moment — you can’t believe everything you read on the Internet, Obama has produced his birth certificate, there were announcements that ran in two contemporaneous Hawaiian newspapers at the time, the head of the Hawaiian medical records has announced, ‘I have seen the long form you all want,’ um — I don’t know why the long form is considered more credible than the short form, they’re both from the same office. The State Department accepts the short form — or as we call it, the birth certificate. Hawaii accepts the birth certificate, short form — so it is a conspiracy theory that won’t die on the Internet, but every responsible conservative organization to look at it has shot it down. Which is why you normally hear it being talked about exclusively on the liberal cable stations. HANNITY: Well, it’s an interesting point, and one of the main people demanding it be released is, interestingly, thrill-up-our leg Chris Matthews … why don’t they just release it? It does raise a question. But you bring up good points, not the least of which — we’re going to talk to Donald Trump on this show later this week, we’ll ask him — I think a broader, bigger issue here is that, all of a sudden an issue that was on the periphery a little bit, he hits it, hits it hard, and people take note. So what is it about him that, you know, when he speaks, people listen — and you know, those issues resonate. COULTER: Well, two things. I think the main thing is, no conservative who talks on TV or has a column or has a magazine has mentioned the birth certificate, because we’ve looked at it and have discounted it. You have people who want to get hits to their Website or want to get listeners to their radio show will keep ginning people up about this. But it is one of the rare conservative con — well, I suppose it’s more conservative than liberal, only because it’s anti-Obama, but I don’t even know that these are conservatives promoting it. As I say, this came out of the Hillary Clinton campaign. So Donald Trump is the only person who would be invited on a TV show who is pushing the Birther thing. That’s why it’s getting attention and of course, liberals are delighted. I know Obama is delighted. … No, you’ll notice who’s asking him about it — it’s the liberal media. They want to keep talking about it because it helps discredit all opposition to Obama. There are a lot of reasons to think Obama is a very bad president who is doing very bad things to this country. The idea that he was born in Kenya is not one of them. But it allows liberals, the mainstream media, the White House itself to go, well, the opposition is these crazy birthers. Well, no it isn’t. You haven’t heard that on Fox News. You haven’t heard it in Human Events and National Review or American Spectator — all of which have shot it down. Too bad that the right-wing media themselves kinda shoot down Coulter’s theory. You’ll notice, for instance, that Coulter conspicuously omits from her list of “responsible” right-wing news organs WorldNutDaily , the center of the Birther Universe and — last we checked — a self-proclaimed “conservative” outlet. Indeed, its writers regularly appear on, you guessed it , Sean Hannity’s show. Oh, and they also publish Coulter’s syndicated column. Indeed, all this rant really proves is that Coulter doesn’t watch Fox. Because if she did, she would know that Trump has been given free rein to spout his theories on Fox . And as if to drive that point home, who should appear on Fox the very next hour? Donald Trump , phoning in to Greta Van Susteren’s show and trumpeting his Birther theories yet again — with only murmurs of contradiction from Van Susteren. Of course, this isn’t the only time Trump has been on Fox News promoting these theories with only the slightest hint of pushback, and certainly no tough questions. He had another phone-in with Van Susteren that produced more of the same nonsense. When he went on Bill O’Reilly’s show , the pushback was almost unnoticeable, especially by O’Reilly standards. And it isn’t relegated to just Trump appearances. When Sarah Palin went on Jeanine Pirro’s show this weekend, both she and the host thought Trump’s Birtherism was just peachy — giving it a Fox News endorsement, not the debunking that Coulter claims is the standard at Fox. For that matter, the most avid defender of Trump’s Birtherism at Fox has been — you guessed it — Sean Hannity himself. For three nights running one week, Trump’s Birther theories got big boosts from Hannity and his guests : Click here to view this media Guess he must have forgotten about that when Coulter tried to claim you “never hear that” on Fox News. And obviously, Coulter herself hasn’t been watching Fox.
Continue reading …It’s great that we managed to avoid a government shutdown, but Jon Stewart isn’t very happy with anyone involved. Last night , he excoriated everyone: the media that breathlessly counted down from 179 hours to two, the previous Democratic-controlled Congress that didn’t pass a budget because they live in “Sucksylvania. Population:…
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Minamisoma straddles the 20km perimeter from Fukushima plant, and residents are divided on whether to stay or go The debris strewn along the coastal neighbourhoods of Minamisoma should be proof enough of the devastation wrought by the tsunami that hit Japan’s north-east coast on 11 March. But for the past month this sprawling town in Fukushima prefecture has been confronted by a second, more insidious threat: radiation. Minamisoma is a town living in a state of nuclear limbo. Its southern reaches lie just inside the 20km (12 mile) radius from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant that has been declared an evacuation zone. Farther north, residents have been told to remain indoors or consider leaving. Thenon Tuesday the government announced that five additional communities, possibly including more neighbourhoods inside Minamisoma, are to be included in an expanded evacuation zone amid fears over the long-term effects of radiation seeping from the Fukushima plant. Even before that advice was issued, the majority of Minamisoma’s 71,000 people had voted with their feet. The first hydrogen explosion at the plant prompted an exodus that saw the population plummet to just 10,000. Petrified residents barely had time to mourn the 1,470 local people listed as dead or missing before abandoning their homes. Shops and restaurants closed, suppliers refused to enter the town, and for a few chaotic days the only vehicles on the streets were self-defence force trucks and dozens of buses laid on to take evacuees to hundreds of temporary shelters across Japan. The government’s chief spokesman, Yukio Edano, said the crisis had not caused any direct damage to the health of people living near the plant. “The accident itself is very serious, but we have set our priorities so as to avoid damage to people’s health.” His claim is backed by a recent radiation reading in Minamisoma that measured 0.9 microsieverts per hour – or 7,884 microsieverts per year – which is little more than that received in a chest CT scan and, say experts, poses no immediate threat to health. But the new evacuation plans have added a layer of uncertainty to a community already gripped by fear. Some residents who initially evacuated are now returning to the area, reassured by data showing that radiation is well below dangerous levels. At a local health centre medical workers in protective clothing offer free radiation checks for residents and visitors. “People here are already traumatised by memories of the tsunami and the struggle to survive the nuclear crisis,” said Kyohei Takahashi, a gynaecologist who initially left Minamisoma but returned a few days later. He came back to find patients deprived of essential care and hospitals emptied of staff. “At the start we had no food or medicine – we couldn’t even administer intravenous drips,” said Takahashi, 72. “At first the streets were dead. But now there are a few cars on the road and some shops have reopened. Radiation levels are very low, but people are still anxious about the future. “It could be months before things settle down. Until then, all I can do is my job. If we all work together we can make something of this town, even if it takes years. But it will never be the same again.” The emergency at Fukushima Daiichi, now rated on a par with the Chernobyl disaster in its severity, has split the community he serves. Yoshitaka Okawa, who has worked for a subcontractor at the plant for 19 years, is one of the few residents who have remained in the city throughout the crisis. He loses sleep not over radiation, but over the friendships that he fears may have been irreparably damaged by his pleas to neighbours not to abandon the town of his birth. “I’ve been working at Fukushima Daiichi for almost two decades. I know all about millisieverts and microsieverts [of radiation], and I have never considered leaving,” says the 60-year-old, an employee of a firm that decontaminates nuclear plant workers. Okawa has not been back to the plant since 11 March, when he fled the No 5 reactor building following the 9.0-magnitude earthquake. “I’m due to retire, so I won’t be going back. As things are, I couldn’t even if I wanted to. “But other people in the town don’t think rationally. When the media report that radiation is several thousand times above legal limits, they panic. “The people I feel sorry for are farmers whose lives have been ruined by radiation scares, and the old people who have been unable to leave. When I see people in Tokyo panic-buying water or choosing not to buy certain produce, I wonder if they have any feelings for fellow Japanese who are genuinely in need of help.” Minamisoma’s plight drew worldwide attention last week after its mayor, Katsunobu Sakurai, pleaded for help in an 11-minute YouTube video with English subtitles. “We are left isolated,” said a clearly exhausted Sakurai, dressed in his familiar crisis uniform. “I beg you, as the mayor of Minamisoma, to help us.” The town’s commercial infrastructure, he said, lies in tatters. “The only places open are local banks and credit unions,” he said in an interview with the Mainichi Daily News. “The supermarkets are still not running. There are no daily supplies that people living here desperately need. “If the city doesn’t maintain its essential services, evacuated residents won’t know which way to turn. The government must do all it can to address the nuclear accident and give us an idea of when it will be resolved.” But as Japan’s prime minister Naoto Kan has acknowledged, it is a question to which no one knows the answer. And for all his optimism over the radiation threat, Okawa concedes that the unease it has generated has changed Minamisoma beyond recognition. “As long as the power plant is in trouble, this town might as well be dead. You walk to the station and everything is shuttered. At night the streets are dark and empty. This used to be a fun, lively place to live. But not any more.” Japan disaster Japan Justin McCurry guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Feuding with the media apparently isn’t enough for Donald Trump—he’s now got a beef with Bill Cosby, as well. Trump has taken exception to comments made by Cosby on the Today show last week and has issued a statement branding the comedian a two-faced backstabber, TMZ reports. Cosby told…
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Arianna Huffington faces $105m lawsuit from unpaid contributors over her sale of the Huffington Post to AOL Arianna Huffington, her website and AOL were on the receiving end of a $105m (£64.5m) lawsuit by a group of angry bloggers unhappy that she sold the Huffington Post for $315m without them being paid a penny. The class action is led by Jonathan Tasini, a writer and trade unionist, who wrote more than 250 posts for Huffington Post on an unpaid basis until he dropped out shortly after the news and comment site was sold to AOL earlier this year. Tasini complained that “Huffington bloggers have essentially been turned into modern day slaves on Arianna Huffington’s plantation” and said he was bringing the action because “people who create content … have to be compensated” for their efforts. The complainant and his lawyers estimate about 9,000 people wrote for the Huffington Post on an unpaid basis – and argue that their writings helped contribute about a third of the sale value of the site, the basis of their $105m claim for compensation. Tasini was behind a successful lawsuit on behalf of freelance journalists against the New York Times a decade ago. He won a 2001 supreme court judgment that concluded copyright for print and online versions of an article were separate – meaning writers have to assign permission for a publisher to use both. Huffington Post was founded in 2005 by Huffington and Ken Lerer – initially recruiting some high-profile writers such as Alec Baldwin and Larry David. But their ranks were swelled by a team of less well-known unpaid bloggers to boost output. Their combined efforts helped improve traffic and revenues – which totalled $31m last year – until the site became a takeover target for AOL. Huffington and Lerer are thought to have taken the lion’s share of the $315m payout, although the exact amounts has not been disclosed. The Huffington Post said any class action lawsuit would be “completely baseless”. In a statement, the website said: “Our bloggers utilise our platform to connect and ensure that their ideas and views are seen by as many people as possible. It’s the same reason hundreds of people go on TV shows – to broadcast their views to as wide an audience as possible.” Last month, when visiting London, Huffington defended her policy further. She said “there’s got to be a distinction between everybody who works for a media company and everybody who blogs for a media company”, and noted that all media organisations depended on unpaid contributions. “If people go on Newsnight, they don’t get paid,” she added. However, Tasini promised to wage a passionate campaign, saying he was “pissed off and angry” and that he would “picket her home” in his campaign. New York law firm Kurzon Strauss is advising Tasini on the suit, which has been filed in the southern district court of New York. A spokesman for the Huffington Post said the lawsuit was without merit. He added: “Bloggers use our platform – as well as other unpaid group blogs across the web – to connect and help their work be seen by as many people as possible. It’s the same reason people go on TV shows: to promote their views and ideas. HuffPost bloggers can cross-post their work on other sites, including their own.” • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly “for publication”. • To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook . Huffington Post Arianna Huffington Digital media Media business Media law Intellectual property United States AOL Internet Blogging Dan Sabbagh guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Two American servicemen were killed in Afghanistan last week in what is believed to be the first case of friendly fire deaths involving a Predator drone. The pair were killed by a Hellfire missile after Marines under fire called in a strike, military officials tell NBC. The Marines were viewing…
Continue reading …Washington Mayor Vincent Gray and several city council members were among 41 people arrested at a Capitol Hill protest against the budget deal. Gray and his colleagues were charged with unlawful assembly for blocking passage on the street and were taken to a Capitol Police facility before being released late…
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