Friday, January 31, 2014

Six In The Morning Friday January 31

US accuses Syria of stalling on chemical plan

Pace of removal has "languished", ambassador says, with only four percent of chemical stockpile handed over.

Last updated: 31 Jan 2014 04:06

The United States has called on Syria to take immediate action to comply with a UN resolution to remove its chemical weapons materials, noting just four percent of Syria's declared chemical stock has been eliminated.

Efforts to remove these materials from Syria have "seriously languished and stalled", said ambassador Robert Mikulak in a statement to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) on Thursday.

"Syria must immediately take the necessary actions to comply with its obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention, Executive Council decisions, and UN Security Council Resolution 2118," said Mikulak, the US permanent representative to the OPCW.

Timelines adopted last year required that 100 percent of "priority one" chemicals be eliminated by December 31, 2013, while the deadline for removing "priority two" chemicals is Feburary 5. That deadline will also not be met.

The Syrian government has attributed the delays to "security concerns", saying it needs additional equipment to ensure their safe transportation - a claim Mikulak rejected.

Ukrainian protester says he was kidnapped and tortured

Opposition activist Dmytro Bulatov is found outside Kiev after going missing and says kidnappers beat him and cut his face

Oksana Grytsenko in Kiev and agencies
theguardian.com, Friday 31 January 2014 08.50 GMT

A Ukrainian opposition activist who went missing last week says he was kidnapped and tortured, the latest in a string of mysterious attacks on anti-government protesters in the two-month-long political crisis.

Dmytro Bulatov, a member of Automaidan, a group of car owners that has taken part in the protests against the president, Viktor Yanukovych, went missing on 22 January.

Bulatov was discovered outside Kiev on Thursday. He says his kidnappers beat him severely, sliced his ear and cut his face.

The protests started after Yanukovych backed out of an agreement to deepen ties with the European Union, but quickly came to encompass an array of discontent over corruption, heavy-handed police and dubious courts.

Gifts, perks and Moroccan luxury: How Goldman Sachs 'won over Libyans'

Establishing a relationship of “trust” with the LIA allowed the bank to make $350m from a series of trades worth $1bn that ultimately proved worthless

The legal claim, lodged by Libya’s new regime, claims that poorly qualified and naive staff were courted with chocolate and aftershave and were lavishly entertained on a corporate credit card issued to Youssef Kabbaj, the bank’s former head of North Africa.

The coveted internship, in London and Dubai, was allegedly handed to Haitem Zarti, brother of the fund’s deputy director, Mustafa Zarti, who owed his position to his friendship with Saif al-Islam, Colonel Gaddafi’s son whom he had met while studying in Vienna.

Such placements are more usually fought over by top-performing graduates from the world’s leading universities.

In Taliban country: inside the city of Jalalabad

As US troops leave and the Taliban try to reinforce the idea that they are in control, 2014 will be an important year for Afghanistan

John D McHugh

Jalalabad sits next to the Kyber Pass and Pakistan, and has a largely Pashtun population. It used be said that although not every Catholic was in the IRA, almost every IRA man was a Catholic, and the same rule could easily be applied to the Pashtuns; they aren’t all Taliban, but it’s hard to find a Talib who is not a Pashtun. Thus the Taliban have widespread support in this part of Afghanistan, and the city has seen a lot of violence over the past 12 years as first the Americans and then the Afghan government tried to control the place.

For a westerner, getting to Jalalabad is not easy. There is no civilian airport, so the only way to reach the city is to drive across the mountain passes, the same route on which 16,000 British soldiers and subjects were massacred as they fled from Kabul in 1842. And in the 21st century, it is still considered one of the most dangerous roads in the world. Not only are there are almost daily fatalities on the road from car accidents, but the Taliban regularly attack vehicles, burning trucks and cargo, while robbing and sometimes murdering travellers.

Living dangerously in the 'new' Egypt

Ruth Pollard

Middle East Correspondent

It doesn't take long for a crowd to turn on you on the streets of Egypt these days.

A finger pointed, an accusation levelled, and you are literally running for your life.

For months now I have been hesitant to even pull my notebook from my bag when I am reporting from the street, such is the animosity against, and suspicion of, foreign journalists.

But I am lucky - I can usually move through a crowd, observe the mood, chat to a few people and leave quickly before drawing too much attention.

Not so photographers, whose cameras have become a magnet for angry crowds and security services who smash, grab and detain.

Two weeks ago I was a few blocks from Cairo's Tahrir Square, interviewing stallholders and passers-by about the constitutional referendum due to begin the next day.

CAR's sectarian strife worsens despite French, AU troops

Sapa-IPS | 31 January, 2014 09:42

Reports of horrific revenge killing continued to emerge from the Central African Republic Wednesday, less than 24 hours after the Security Council voted to increase the international troop presence there and levy sanctions against those it suspects of war crimes.

Over 2,000 people have been killed and one million - a quarter of the population - displaced since a coalition of northern, predominantly Muslim rebels calling themselves Seleka ("alliance" in the local Sango language) seized power in March 2013.

Following the deployment of peacekeepers and the resignation of president and former Seleka leader Michel Djotodia earlier this month, the group began a hasty but violent retreat from the capital and several contested rural towns.

Ignoring Asia