Six In The Morning

Syrian war is everybody's problem

By Frida Ghitis, Special to CNN

Editor's note: Frida Ghitis is a world affairs columnist for The Miami Herald and World Politics Review. A former CNN producer and correspondent, she is the author of "The End of Revolution: A Changing World in the Age of Live Television." Follow her on Twitter: @FridaGColumns

( CNN) -- Last week, a huge explosion rocked the Syrian capital of Damascus, killing more than 50 people and injuring hundreds. The victims of the blast in a busy downtown street were mostly civilians, including schoolchildren. Each side in the Syrian civil war blamed the other.

In the northern city of Aleppo, about 58 people -- 36 of them children -- died in a missile attack last week. Washington condemned the regime of Bashar al-Assad; the world looked at the awful images and moved on.

Syria is ripping itself to pieces. The extent of human suffering is beyond comprehension.

Don't mention the Iraq war, William Hague tells cabinet

Tory foreign secretary's directive not to discuss legality of war ahead of 10th anniversary sparks anger from Liberal Democrats

• Nick Hopkins
• The Guardian, Friday 1 March 2013

William Hague has provoked a bitter row within the coalition by privately writing to other members of the cabinet urging them not to discuss the case for, or the legality of, the Iraq war in the runup to the 10th anniversary of the invasion later this month, the Guardian can reveal.

In a confidential letter, the foreign secretary told senior members of the government they should not be drawn on the controversial issues that drew the UK into a politically divisive conflict that led to the death of almost 200 British troops and tens of thousands of Iraqis.

But the instruction from Hague last week has infuriated Liberal Democrat ministers within the government, who intend to defy the edict.

EUROZONE CRISIS

Italian election triggers EU identity crisis

Italy is no longer striking a "bella figura." The country's post- election chaos has shaken the very foundations of the European Union as the idea of a politically united Europe appears to suffer a blow.

Rome's Colosseum appears somewhat run-down, with its enormous pillars stained gray by pollution and its basement vaults fallen down. Yet it continues to be a first-class European cultural good. Now, with the Italian capital's coffers empty, a luxury fashion company is financing the site's renovation, to the tune of 25 million euros ($33 million).

Turkey's Zionism comment 'dark and false'

March 1, 2013 - 1:50PM

JERUSALEM: Israel's prime minister accused his Turkish counterpart on Thursday of making a "dark and false" statement by calling Zionism a crime against humanity – a comment likely to hit efforts to repair ties between the two former allies.

The Turkish premier's statement, made at a UN meeting in Vienna a day earlier, was also condemned by the head of Europe's main rabbinical group who called it a "hateful attack" on Jews.

"Just as with Zionism, anti-Semitism and fascism, it has become impossible not to see Islamophobia as a crime against humanity," Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said at the UN Alliance of Civilisations forum, according to Turkish media reports.

Brutal cops shame SA

GRAEME HOSKEN | 01 3月, 2013 00:36

Mozambican taxi driver Mido Macia lay for hours bleeding to death, alone in a cell at a police station in Daveyton, on the East Rand, without medical attention.

For nearly four hours, the 27-year-old - the sole breadwinner for his one-year-old son, Sergio, and 23-year-old wife, Jacquelina - lay dying in a crumpled heap, in his own blood and faeces.

His alleged crime: refusing to obey police officers who ordered him to stop blocking traffic with his vehicle in Daveyton township's main street.

His punishment: being dragged behind a police van for about 500m to the police station, where he was allegedly repeatedly beaten in a sustained attack that prisoners in neighbouring cells say went on for almost two hours.

The police's weapons: allegedly fists, boots, truncheons and torches.

Marijuana cannon: Mexican police confiscate improvised border drug cannon

Marijuana cannon: Police told the Televisa network that the device was made up of a plastic pipe and a crude metal tank that used compressed air from the engine of an old car.

By Associated Press

MEXICALI, MEXICO

Police in the border city of Mexicali say they have recovered a powerful improvisedcannon used to hurl packets of marijuana across a border fence into California.

Police told the Televisa network that the device was made up of a plastic pipe and a crude metal tank that used compressed air from the engine of an old car.

The apparatus fired cylinders packed with drugs that weighed as much as 30 pounds, police. It was confiscated last week after U.S. officers told Mexican police that they had been confiscating a large number of drug packages that appeared to have been fired over the border. Mexican police on the border have recovered a series of similar devices in recent years.