Six In The Morning

With Arms for Yemen Rebels, Iran Seeks Wider Mideast Role



By ERIC SCHMITT and ROBERT F. WORTH Published: March 15, 2012
In the past several months, Iran appears to have increased its political outreach and arms shipments to rebels and other political figures in Yemen as part of what American military and intelligence officials say is a widening Iranian effort to extend its influence across the greater Middle East. Iranian smugglers backed by the Quds Force, an elite international operations unit within Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, are using small boats to ship AK-47s, rocket-propelled grenades and other arms to replace older weapons used by the rebels, a senior American official said. Using intercepted cellphone conversations between the smugglers and Quds Force operatives provided by the Americans, the Yemeni and Indian coastal authorities have seized some shipments, according to the American official and a senior Indian official.

Secrets of the Assads' emails are revealed by rebels
Messages show the dictator and his wife obsessed with shopping while Syria suffers

Jerome Taylor Thursday 15 March 2012
Syrian opposition groups managed to hack into the personal emails of President Bashar al-Assad and his British-born wife, Asma, monitoring them for nearly a year until the accounts were closed down. The contents of the emails, some of which were made public last night, paint a devastating portrait of a dictator and his wife swapping YouTube videos, buying luxury goods and dismissing international demands for Mr Assad to step down as loyalists spearheaded a brutal crackdown that has led to 8,000 deaths over the past year.

Top Chinese leader Bo Xilai purged, one day after criticism
One of the crown princes of the Chinese Communist Party has been abruptly purged ahead of China’s once-in-a-decade change of leaders this Autumn.

By Malcolm Moore, Beijing 6:48AM GMT 15 Mar 2012
On the Ides of March, 62-year-old Bo Xilai became the victim of the first major political assassination in China for six years. A one-line report published on the website of the People’s Daily, the official Party newspaper, said Mr Bo, a former Commerce minister and a member of China’s 25-man Politburo, would be replaced as party secretary of the sprawling central city of Chongqing. His replacement, Zhang Dejiang, is a North Korea-educated economist and vice premier in charge of China’s energy, telecommunications and transport sectors.

Outrage, violence greets Kony 2012 video in Uganda
It has been viewed more than 77-million times around the world, but not by those who know the Joseph Kony best: his victims in northern Uganda.

LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM - Mar 15 2012 08:57
That changed on Tuesday night when thousands flocked to watch Kony 2012, the video made by a US charity urging a grassroots campaign against the fugitive warlord that has gone viral. The film was projected on to an ersatz cinema screen fashioned from a white sheet, held up by metal poles, in a town park. The reaction? Puzzlement, then anger, which boiled over into scuffles and stone-throwing that sent organisers fleeing for cover. There was particular criticism of the Stop Kony campaign's use of merchandise, such as bracelets and T-shirts, which victims said they found offensive.

Greeks ditch middleman to embrace 'potato revolution'
The crowds keep building: hundreds of Greeks are queuing up to take part in what they're calling the "potato revolution".

15 March 2012 Last updated at 00:59 GMT By Mark Lowen BBC News, Athens
It is a simple idea with simple products. Thousands of tonnes of potatoes are sold directly from the farmer to the consumer, cutting out the costly middleman and so slashing prices by more than half. The seed of the potato movement was planted in northern Greece a few weeks ago and is proving so successful that it's now come down to Athens, growing ever more popular as Greeks struggle with the worst recession in modern history.

At least 500 to run for Egyptian presidency
Eection officials say 500 have obtained applications to officially declare their candidacy for the vote, which follows last year's ouster of longtime authoritarian leader Hosni Mubarak.

By Hamza Hendawi, Associated Press
At least 500 Egyptians have taken the first step to run for president, a sign of the excitement generated by the country's first presidential elections in which the outcome is in doubt, election officials said on Wednesday. They said the 500 have obtained applications to officially declare their candidacy for the vote, which follows last year's ouster of longtime authoritarian leader Hosni Mubarak. Beside known presidential hopefuls who have been seriously campaigning, the applicants included a wide range of obscure Egyptians in different professions like journalists, judges, lawyers and school teachers, they said.