Gazette 02-24-14

Monday February 24th 2014

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Ukraine arrest warrant for ex-leader

Ukraine has issued an arrest warrant for fugitive ousted President Viktor Yanukovych, the interior minister says.

Arsen Avakov said on Facebook that a criminal case had been opened against Mr Yanukovych and other officials over "mass murder of peaceful citizens".
MPs voted to remove Mr Yanukovych on Saturday after months of deadly protest sparked by his rejection of an EU deal in favour of closer ties with Russia.
Russia's PM has said he doubts the legitimacy of Ukraine's new leaders.

"We do not understand what is going on there. There is a real threat to our interests and to the lives of our citizens," Russian media quoted Dmitry Medvedev as saying.

"There are big doubts about the legitimacy of a whole series of organs of power that are now functioning there."
Russia, furious at the loss of its political ally, has already accused the opposition of seizing power, and has recalled its ambassador for consultation.
Newly appointed interim President Olexander Turchynov has said Ukraine wants to establish relations with Russia on an "equal and good-neighbourly footing that recognises and takes into account Ukraine's European choice".
Parliament has until Tuesday to form a new unity government.

Egyptian government unexpectedly resigns

The military-backed interim government of Egypt has resigned en masse, the country's interim Prime Minister said in a televised address Monday. 

Hazem el-Bablawi said that the cabinet "took a decision to offer its resignation to the president of the republic," but did not give a specific reason for the action. 
The move was first reported by the state-run newspaper Al-Ahram, and confirmed to Reuters by an unnamed Egyptian official prior to el-Bablawi's address. The official said that the move was done to clear legal hurdles for army chief Field Marshal Abdel Fattah al-Sisi ahead of his declaration of candidacy for Egypt's presidency. 
Sisi was serving as defense minister in the government, and would have needed to leave the post before running for president. However, that does not explain why the entire cabinet felt the need to resign as well. The next presidential and parliamentary elections in Egypt are due to take place sometime this year.
The government was sworn in on July 16, less than two weeks after the ousting of former Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi. Its resignation comes amid a host of strikes, including one by public transport workers and garbage collectors. An acute shortage of cooking gas has also been making front page news the past few days.

Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman Arrested: Mexico's Sinaloa Drug Chief Taken Alive

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The head of Mexico's Sinaloa Cartel was captured overnight by U.S. and Mexican authorities at a hotel in Mazatlan, Mexico, the Associated Press has learned.
A senior U.S. law enforcement official said Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was taken alive overnight in the beach resort town. The official was not authorized to discuss the arrest and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Guzman, 56, was found with an unidentified woman. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the Marshals Service were "heavily involved" in the capture, the official said. No shots were fired.
Guzman faces multiple federal drug trafficking indictments in the U.S. and is on the DEA's most-wanted list. His drug empire stretches throughout North America and reaches as far away as Europe and Australia. His cartel has been heavily involved in the bloody drug war that has torn through parts of Mexico for the last several years.
Known as a legendary outlaw and the world's most powerful and elusive drug lord, Guzman had been pursued for several weeks. His arrest comes on the heels of the takedown of several top Sinaloa operatives in the last few months and at least 10 mid-level cartel members in the last week.
The son of Sinaloa's co-leader and Guzman's partner, Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada, was arrested in November after entering Arizona, where he had an appointment with U.S. immigration authorities to arrange legal status for his wife.

Top Pakistan Taliban commander Asmatullah Shaheen 'shot dead'

A senior Pakistani Taliban commander has been shot dead in a militant stronghold near the Afghan border, security sources and relatives say.

Asmatullah Shaheen was ambushed as he drove through a village near Miranshah in North Waziristan, reports said. Three aides in the vehicle also died.
It is unclear who killed them. There has been no word from the militants.
Shaheen was briefly the TTP (Pakistani Taliban) interim leader after its chief Hakimullah Mehsud was killed last year.
Mehsud died in a US drone strike in November and was later replaced by a new leader, Mullah Fazlullah. 

Since then, there have been a series of attacks in which unidentified gunmen have targeted militants in the tribal areas, puzzling observers about who could be behind them.

The attacks have taken place against a backdrop of continuing militant violence across Pakistan and a limited military operation against Taliban strongholds, despite attempts between the two sides to hold peace talks.
Those talks broke down last week after a Taliban faction said it had killed 23 security force personnel in retaliation for the killing of militant fighters by the army.
Shaheen, who is believed to have supported peace talks, is the most senior militant to die since Hakimullah Mehsud was killed.
He was ambushed in the village of Dargah Mandi, about 5km (3 miles) north-west of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan.


Taliban Checkpoint Attack Kills 21 Afghan Soldiers

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Hundreds of heavily armed Taliban insurgents attacked army checkpoints in eastern Afghanistan on Sunday, officials said, killing 21 soldiers in the deadliest single incident for the Afghan army in at least a year.
In response to the assault — which also left several Afghan soldiers missing — President Hamid Karzai postponed a planned trip to Sri Lanka.
Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi, who is spokesman for the Defense Ministry, said "hundreds" of foreign and Afghan insurgents crossed the border to mount the attack, which took place in the remote and mountainous Ghazi Abad district of Kunar Province in the early morning hours.
Azimi did not specify which border, but Kunar lies next to Pakistan. It's a militant stronghold, and many Arab and other foreign insurgents are believed to operate there alongside the Afghan Taliban.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for Sunday's attack in an emailed statement, saying that one of their insurgents was killed and two were wounded.
The group has escalated attacks in recent months as it tries to take advantage of the withdrawal of foreign troops at the end of 2014. Casualties among Afghan troops have been rising significantly since they took the lead in the war against the Taliban. Since the beginning of 2014, 84 Afghan army soldiers have been killed.

Opposition protesters set up blockades in parts of the Venezuelan capital

Traffic has come to a halt in parts of the Venezuelan capital because of barricades set up by opposition protesters across major thoroughfares.

The protests are part of a wave of anti-government demonstrations that have swept Venezuela since Feb. 12 and have resulted in at least 10 deaths. The protests in the capital Monday were peaceful. Police and National Guard troops stood by but did not act to remove the barricades despite the effect on the morning commute.
Opponents of President Nicolas Maduro blame his government for the country's high crime rate and economic troubles They say his socialist-inspired polices have led to shortages of basic goods and high inflation despite Venezuela's oil wealth.
Maduro has called for a national peace conference this week to address the unrest.

Scandal of Europe's 11m empty homes

More than 11m homes lie empty across Europe – enough to house all of the continent's homeless twice over – according to figures collated by the Guardian from across the EU.
In Spain more than 3.4m homes lie vacant, in excess of 2m homes are empty in each of France and Italy, 1.8m in Germany and more than 700,000 in the UK.
There are also a large numbers of vacant homes in Ireland, Greece, Portugal and several other countries, according to information collated by the Guardian.
Many of the homes are in vast holiday resorts built in the feverish housing boom in the run up to the 2007-08 financial crisis – and have never been occupied.
On top of the 11m empty homes – many of which were bought as investments by people who never intended to live in them – hundreds of thousands of half-built homes have been bulldozed in an attempt to shore up the prices of existing properties.
Housing campaigners said the "incredible number" of homes lying empty while millions of poor people were crying out for shelter was a "shocking waste".

Steinitz after meeting US’s top Iran negotiator: Israel reserves right to act independently 

Israel reserves the right to assess the Iranian situation and make the necessary decisions independently, Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz said Sunday after emerging from some five hours of talks with Wendy Sherman, Washington's top Iran negotiator.

"Israel reiterated and made clear its position that an agreement with Iran must include dismantling its ability to progress toward a nuclear weapon," Steinitz said, using code for Israel's long-standing position that the world needed to insist that Iran dismantle all it's uranium enrichment capabilities. This position clashes with that of the world powers currently negotiating with Iran, which is now seemingly willing to allow Iran some enrichment capability.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu made the same point publicly at the opening of the weekly cabinet meeting, saying he was concerned Iran believed it could "realize its plan to be a nuclear threshold state, with an enrichment capability that it thinks cannot be touched, and with the ability to develop both nuclear weapons and intercontinental missiles, which it is continuing to work on unhindered." "This combination of enrichment, weapons and launch capabilities, means that Iran is, in effect, receiving everything and giving almost nothing," he said. "That is the current situation." Netanyahu said that the long-term agreement now being negotiated between the P5+1 (the US, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany) and Iran cannot be allowed to render permanent this current state of affairs.

Trained snipers escalate violence in Bangkok

Bangkok: Mysterious gunmen who appear to be highly trained are backing anti-government protesters on Bangkok’s streets as Thailand’s three-month political crisis becomes increasingly violent.
Protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban has acknowledged the presence of the gunmen despite claiming his movement to topple prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra is peaceful, telling his supporters: “They are helping us. They help us as we are fighting Yingluck with only our bare hands.”
The gunmen have become known as the “popcorn shooters” after one of them used a popcorn bag to cover his automatic rifle during a gun battle outside a shopping centre in a northern Bangkok suburb on February 1.

Several other gunmen also used high powered weapons that day against pro-government “red shirt” supporters.

Unidentified figures have emerged several times in recent weeks as protesters have clashed in Bangkok.
In one incident that embarrassed police last Wednesday, three men walked behind police lines during a bloody clash near government buildings blockaded by protesters in Bangkok’s historic quarter.
Police had arrested and cuffed protest leader Somkiat Pongpaibul who was wanted on treason charges and was sitting in the back of a police vehicle.
The unidentified men grabbed Mr Somkiat and hustled him away before police could react.
Mr Somkiat could not help police with their inquiries.
While Mr Suthep, a former deputy prime minister in a military-backed government, denies knowing the identity of the men, his supporters have begun wearing “popcorn shooter” t-shirts.
Meanwhile, Mr Suthep’s People’s Democratic Reform Committee has accused Ms Yingluck’s government of being behind a spate of deadly weekend attacks against anti-government protesters that killed three children and injured almost 60 people.
The committee’s co-leader Satit Wongnontoey claimed the state was “backing” armed forces who attacked protesters in Bangkok and at a rally in eastern Thailand.

US plans to reduce its military size to pre-World War II level: Report

WASHINGTON: The US plans to shrink the size of its military to its smallest force since pre-World War II level and eliminate an entire class of Air Force attack jets, according to a media report.

US defence secretary Chuck Hagel's proposal, outlined by several Pentagon officials, would be aimed at reducing defence spending in the face of government austerity, after a pledge by US President Barack Obama to end US involvement in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, The New York Times reported.

The plan would leave the military capable of defeating any enemy but too small for long foreign occupations and would involve greater risk if US forces were asked to carry out two large-scale military actions at the same time, the paper said, citing Pentagon officials.

"Success would take longer, they say, and there would be a larger number of casualties," the NYT said.

"You have to always keep your institution prepared, but you can't carry a large land-war defence department when there is no large land war," the paper quoted a senior Pentagon official as saying.

Over all, Hagel's proposal, the officials said, is designed to allow the American military to fulfill US President Obama's national security directives: to defend American territory and the nation's interests overseas and to deter aggression ? and to win decisively if again ordered to war. 

Susan Rice defends 2012 Benghazi comments, warns Russia on Ukraine 

WASHINGTON -- National Security Advisor Susan Rice on Sunday defended controversial statements she made during a round of 2012 TV appearances about the attack on a U.S. mission in Benghazi, saying there was never an attempt to mislead the public.

During an interview on NBC’s “Meet The Press,” Rice also expressed hope that the chaos in Ukraine would soon lead to a unity government and warned Russia that it would be a "grave mistake" to intervene militarily in the conflict.
It marked Rice’s first appearance on a network Sunday show since September 2012, just days after the attack in Libya that claimed the life of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other U.S. personnel.
Her adherence to administration talking points at the time -- that the attack appeared to be a “spontaneous” response to protests in Egypt over an offensive YouTube video -- were later cast into doubt and continue to be a source of debate. Some accused the administration of attempting downplay the terrorist involvement in the attack.
At the time, Obama and other administration officials defended Rice, who was then the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. But blowback from her appearances likely cost her an appointment as secretary of State in Obama’s second term.

Big Labor, ‘looking for revenge,’ expects to dump $300 million into 2014 elections

Big Labor pledges it will go all in, again, in its drive to knock out its top political adversaries in 2014. 
And one of the biggest targets is Wisconsin Republican Gov. Scott Walker, hero to conservatives, bane of the left for his public-sector collective bargaining reforms. 
Michael Podhorzer, political director of the AFL-CIO, in a New York Times piece last week said the nation's labor unions look to spend at least $300 million going after Republicans in this fall's elections. 
Much of that spending is expected to be dropped on four industrial battlegrounds - Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, traditional union strongholds. Big Labor also wants Florida. 
"Their hope is to not only oust the Republican governors of those states, but also to flip several of the legislative chambers. In all five states the Republicans control both houses," the Times piece notes. 
Organized labor spent about $300 million in 2010 targeting elections. This time around, the unions intend to hammer a theme they see as the winner this election year: Boosting the minimum wage.

Clinton plays a starring role in Ky. Senate race

During Bill Clinton’s first-inaugural festivities, a 14-year-old girl from Kentucky presented the new president with an honorary bouquet of red roses at the base of the Lincoln Memorial.

Two decades later, that girl, Alison Lundergan Grimes, is a candidate to become Kentucky’s first female senator. And Clinton — an uncle figure whom Grimes counts as a friend, mentor and adviser — is playing a starring role in her campaign and will appear at a sold-out Grimes fundraiser Tuesday.
As Grimes weighed whether to run for the Senate, Clinton took nearly an hour out of a visit last year to Owensboro, Ky., to huddle privately with her. Hillary Rodham Clinton provided her counsel as well. They both offered their unconditional support and talked about how much fight it will take for a Democrat to unseat Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, a wily campaigner known for vilifying his opponents.
“I think what the Clinton family, from President Clinton to Secretary Clinton, and I have in common is that we don’t scare easy — no matter the bully,” Grimes said in an interview. She added that Clinton’s presidency left an indelible impression on her and that she is now “a strong Kentucky woman” hoping to follow his lead.

Administration faces high court battle over EPA regs

The Obama administration is squaring off at the Supreme Court with industry groups and Republican-led states over a small but important program aimed at limiting power-plant and factory emissions of gases blamed for global warming. 
The justices are hearing arguments Monday in a challenge to a regulation that forces companies that want to expand industrial facilities or build new ones that would increase overall pollution to evaluate ways to reduce the carbon they release. Carbon dioxide is the chief greenhouse gas. 
The case comes to the court as President Obama is stepping up his use of executive authority to act on environmental and other matters when Congress doesn't, or won't. Opponents of the Environmental Protection Agency's program at issue call it a power grab of historic proportions. 
Republicans have objected strenuously to the administration's decision to push ahead with the regulations after Congress failed to pass climate legislation, and after the administration of President George W. Bush resisted such steps. Both sides agree that it would have been better to deal with climate change through legislation. 
In 2012, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit concluded that the EPA was "unambiguously correct" in using existing federal law to address global warming.
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