Six In The Morning

UN chief heading to Iran despite US, Israeli objections

　'The secretary general is fully aware of the sensitivities of this visit,' spokesman says

By RICK GLADSTONE
Efforts led by the United States and Israel to isolate Iran suffered a setback on Wednesday when the United Nations announced that Ban Ki-moon, the secretary general, would join officials from 120 countries in Tehran next week for a summit meeting that Iran has trumpeted as a vindication of its defiance and enduring importance in world affairs. Mr. Ban’s decision to attend the meeting of the Nonaligned Movement, announced by his spokesman, Martin Nesirky, came despite objections from both the Americans and Israelis, including a phone call from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel. It was announced a few days after the new president of Egypt, a country that has long been estranged from Iran, said he would attend the summit meeting as well, a decision that had already unsettled the Israelis.

Indian Army in the line of unfriendly fire
South Asia

By Siddharth Srivastava
NEW DELHI - A rising incidence of violent face-offs between officers and soldiers in the Indian Army is becoming a worry for the establishment. The reasons are related to harsh working conditions, high risk to life due to the nature of the work, low pay, lack of leave, and indifferent management of the lower ranks. At least three violent incidents have been reported in the recent past, prompting the defense minister and the army top brass to conduct brainstorming sessions to prevent such occurrences turning into a wider trend. The latest instance was at Samba in Jammu & Kashmir, triggered by the suicide of a jawan (young soldier).

Green Climate Fund to discuss $100bn pledged by rich countries
UN body set up to be world's single biggest source of financing for climate change mitigation faces complex and difficult task

Fiona Harvey guardian.co.uk, Thursday 23 August 2012 07.00 BST
The fate of billions of dollars of promised funding from rich countries to help the developing world adapt to climate change will be discussed on Thursday in Geneva, at the first meeting of the UN's Green Climate Fund. The fund is meant to be the biggest single funding route for the $100bn (£63bn) that developed countries have pledged should flow to poor nations each year by 2020, to help them cut greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to the effects of global warming. But key decisions – such as where the fund should be headquartered, who should run it, how it will operate and how it can raise funds – will be delayed for months.

We'll make a killing out of food crisis, trading boss boasts
Drought is good for business, says Glencore chief

JAMES CUSICK THURSDAY 23 AUGUST 2012
The United Nations, aid agencies and the British Government have lined up to attack the world's largest commodities trading company, Glencore, after it described the current global food crisis and soaring world prices as a "good" business opportunity. With the US experiencing a rerun of the drought "Dust Bowl" days of the 1930s and Russia suffering a similar food crisis that could see Vladimir Putin's government banning grain exports, the senior economist of the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation, Concepcion Calpe, told The Independent: "Private companies like Glencore are playing a game that will make them enormous profits."

Greek PM pleads with EU partners for more time to reform economy
The Irish Times - Thursday, August 23, 2012

DEREK SCALLY in Berlin
GREEK PRIME minister Antonis Samaras has pleaded with EU partners to give Greece more time – if not more money – to enable its reform programmes stanch a “bleeding economy”. Before heading to Berlin and Paris tomorrow, Mr Samaras was warned by euro group chief Jean-Claude Juncker that Athens was on its “last chance”. “All we want is a little more air to breathe to get the economy going and increase government revenue,” Mr Samaras told Germany newspaper Bild yesterday.

Force inevitable if Mali talks fail: Nigerian president
Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan said yesterday that regional troops would definitely intervene in Islamist-occupied northern Mali if negotiations with the extremists failed to yield a solution.

Sapa-AFP | 23 8月, 2012 08:42
The regional bloc "ECOWAS will definitely intervene militarily (but) first and foremost we are negotiating", said Jonathan, who was on a 24-hour visit to Senegal, after talks with President Macky Sall. He said regional leaders were focusing on stabilising an interim government in Bamako, which was shaken up on Monday to form a wider unity government after a March 22 coup plunged the nation into crisis. The option of a military intervention from a 3,300-strong Economic Community of West African States standby force has been on the table for months but "very little" has been done to implement this, Mali's Defence Minister Yamoussa Camara admitted recently.