Six In The Morning

Chinese migrant workers riot in Guangdong

Migrant factory workers from Sichuan clash with police as social tensions boil over in prosperous southern province

• Reuters in Beijing
• guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 27 June 2012 08.12 BST

Hundreds of Chinese migrant workers rioted and clashed with police this week in a fresh outbreak of social unrest in the economic powerhouse of Guangdong.

The southern province, one of China's major coastal manufacturing zones, is home to a large population of migrant factory workers drawn from across China.

But in recent years, perceived discrimination and abuse by authorities have triggered strikes, clashes and riots.

UK ready to take on Israel over fate of children clapped in irons

Report funded by Foreign Office details claims of routine abuse for Palestinian youths

TERRI JUDD 

 

 

WEDNESDAY 27 JUNE 2012

The Foreign Office revealed last night that it would be challenging the Israelis over their treatment of Palestinian children after a report by a delegation of senior British lawyers revealed unconscionable practices, such as hooding and the use of leg irons.

In the first investigation of its kind, a team of nine senior legal figures examined how Palestinians as young as 12 were treated when arrested. Their shocking report Children in Military Custody details claims that youngsters are dragged from their beds in the middle of the night, have their wrists bound behind their backs, and are blindfolded and made to kneel or lie face down in military vehicles.

irishtimes.com - Last Updated: Wednesday, June 27, 2012, 10:33

SF's McGuinness to meet queen during Belfast event

GERRY MORIARTY, Northern Editor

A “sterile” zone has been created around the Lyric Theatre in south Belfast this morning to prevent the press and public having any close access to the building where Queen Elizabeth and Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness are to meet face to face for the first time.

Also in attendance at the reception will be President Michael D Higgins, who with Queen Elizabeth is patron of Co-operation Ireland, organisers of the reception.

Discussions were continuing last night about what images would be released from the event. Buckingham Palace said this morning the meeting would be filmed.

The initial handshake between the queen and Mr McGuinness will remain private but farewells between the two - when another
handshake is expected - will be filmed and photographed.

Militant groups in Africa seek to 'co-ordinate efforts'

27 JUN 2012 06:23 - DAVID SMITH

Three of Africa's most dangerous militant groups are co-ordinating their operations and represent a deepening threat to security, the US has warned.

General Carter Ham, head of the US military's Africa Command, said there were signs that Boko Haram in Nigeria, al-Shabab in Somalia and al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb were sharing money and explosive materials and training fighters together.

"Each of those three organisations is by itself a dangerous and worrisome threat," Ham told an African Centre for Strategic Studies seminar in Washington. "What really concerns me is the indications that the three organisations are seeking to co-ordinate and synchronise their efforts – in other words, to establish a co-operative effort amongst the three most violent organisations ...

Assad forces world powers to think againBy Victor Kotsev Just as he appointed yet another cabinet, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Tuesday declared on state television that his country was "in a real state of war from all angles". This was a change of rhetoric by Assad, who until recently insisted that he was only fighting gangs of "terrorists" sponsored from abroad. "When we are in a war, all policies and all sides and all sectors need to be directed at winning this war," he added.  The war is very real, although speculations of imminent North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) involvement seem premature and exaggerated. Tuesday was one of the bloodiest days in the 15-month rebellion, with extraordinarily heavy fighting reaching the capital. Unconfirmed reports have it that a major Republican Guard compound guarding in the presidential palace came under sustained assault, and opposition groups claimed that at least 115 people were killed in the country during that day only. Elsewhere, the Syrian regime has reportedly lost effective control over large swathes of territory.

Mohenjo Daro: Could this ancient city be lost forever?

By Aleem MaqboolBBC News, Mohenjo Daro, southern Pakistan

Pakistani officials say they are doing their best to save one of the most important archaeological sites in south Asia, Mohenjo Daro. But some experts fear the Bronze Age site could be lost unless radical steps are taken.

It is awe-inspiring to walk through a home built 4,500 years ago.

Especially one still very much recognisable as a house today, with front and back entrances, interconnecting rooms, neat fired brick walls - even a basic toilet and sewage outlet.

Astonishingly, given its age, the home in question was also built on two storeys.