NATO Convoy at Pakistani Border

The NATO secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen on Wednesday extended an invitation to the NATO meeting in Chicago to the Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari in a move to bring Pakistan closer to the decision-making process related to the situation in Afghanistan as the American army is ready to pull out of the Asian country at the end of a decade-long war.

NATO said in a statement that the meeting would underline the strong commitment of the international community to the Afghan people and to its future, and that Pakistan is to play an important role in the future of Afghanistan.

The two-day NATO meeting in Chicago is expected to focus on Afghanistan transition to a post-war era and the withdrawal of 130,000 NATO troops. Sydney Morning Herald assumes that though the invitation of the Pakistani government is unconditioned, in reality it is linked to the fact that Pakistan promised to open NATO’s supply routes over its borders with Afghanistan.

The supplies have been closed in November 2011, as the ties between America and Pakistan froze after the killing of Osama bin Laden in Pakistani Abbottabad town and the bombing of the American embassy in Kabul in September, which was linked to the foreign intelligence of Pakistan causing the American administration to cut off the funding for the Pakistani army.

Another reason which contributed to the closing of the border in November was that US jets and helicopters mistakenly bombed two border posts. Pakistan was very angry about the incursions of the American drone airplanes and commandos into their territory while chasing insurgents.

In the incident at the border, which cost the lives of 24 Pakistani soldiers, the Pakistani parliament demanded a formal apology but settled for a half-concession that the deaths were accidental and regrettable.

40 percent of the NATO’s non-weapons supplies for the war in Afghanistan come from the port of Karachi and is being introduced in Afghanistan across the border. In November, when the borders were closed, NATO had to appeal to other routes, more costly, in Central Asia.

One of the most important such transit points was the Manas Transit Center in Kyrgyzstan, which NATO used as transit center for the past year. Earlier in the year, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta went to Kyrgyzstan to talk to the authorities but the prolonging of the contract was not brought into issue, though the idea of turning the base into a totally civil airport was discussed.

The American troops need the Pakistani borders to be open so that the drawdown of the troops be made easier, while the Pakistani need the money the transit fees bring them if the contract with the NATO countries is operational again.

The presence of the Pakistani president is seen as an image coup, considering that Zardari refused to attend the last meeting on Afghanistan in Bonn last December in protest against the strikes against his country.

Pakistan’s presence in the talks about Afghanistan is crucial, because the country is considered to be the key to solving the violence in Afghanistan, as most of the insurgents stage their actions coming from Pakistan.

Pakistan is about to announce its decision to reopen the borders to NATO in a few days, at the end of months of negotiations. The deal will profit Islamabad as it is expected to receive the $1.3 billion in withheld “coalition support funds,” blocked last year, and higher tariffs for the border crossing. In exchange the Pakistani authorities must settle for less than a formal apology for the incident last November.

The new deal is supposed to be beneficiary for a lot of people in Pakistan, including the army itself, which has under cover economic firms controlling the oil tanker contracts of the NATO convoys, the entrepreneurs, the tribal militants and even the Taliban.

Charles Taylor

Liberian former president Charles Taylor on Wednesday said that witnesses had been threatened and paid to testify against him in a trial which found him guilty of aiding and abetting war crimes but cleared him of the accusation of having ordered crimes he was convicted of.

Taylor, which is the first former president to be tried and found guilty of war crimes since the WWII, said that many witnesses were coerced, paid and in many cases threatened by prosecution to testify the way they did. He made this allegations during a sentence hearing in which his lawyers hope to minimize the sentence which could go as high as 80 years in prison.

During the hearing Charles Taylor said that the United States and other western powers involved in actions in Africa and the Middle East are using the court to pursue colonial aims against the smaller countries.

He said that his case was related to the American desire to provoke a regime change in Liberia, a policy of the U.S. government, adding that he never stood a chance. He concluded that only time would tell how many African leaders would be destroyed.

He accused the prosecution of having received immense amounts of money from the United States government without accounting for the purpose the money was used for or how much of it was used. Taylor also said that the tribunal did not have “the full contextual picture” when they condemned him on 11 counts.

The prosecution demanded that Charles Taylor serve as much as 80 years in prison, adding that his position as president, his education and the duration of the conflict are aggravating circumstances. The defense asked for a more lenient sentence, arguing that 80 years in prison for a man who is 64 is in fact a life sentence.

During the hearing on Wednesday, Taylor was compared by the chief prosecutor with the Roman god Janus, the one with two faces. Taylor is said to have espoused peace while he was secretly undermining it.

The prosecutor went on using metaphoric language related to the former Liberian president by saying that the cutting of the roots of a plant causes the plant to die, which means that the conflict in Liberia and Sierra Leone died out after he was captured.

Taylor’s sentence is expected to be delivered by May 30, after which both sides are expected to launch appeals. If condemned, he is expected to serve his term in a maximum security prison in Britain.

On April 26, the international tribunal based in Sierra Leone found Taylor beyond reasonable doubt to have exercised a substantial influence on the rebel fighting in Sierra Leone but it was not him who controlled them or ordered them to carry their attacks. The prosecution failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt that he was part of a joint criminal enterprise. It was proved however that he had helped the rebels in Sierra Leone.

The 11 counts Taylor was judged for were grouped on three levels of proof: whether he had aided and abetted in the execution of crimes; whether he was involved in a joint criminal enterprise; whether he had control and command over the groups which committed crimes in Sierra Leone.

He was found guilty of all counts in as much as the guilt is of aiding and abetting. Revolutionary United Front in Sierra Leone was found of all the crimes Taylor was accused of. 1,000 children were said to have been curved “RUF” letters on their skin to prevent them from escaping. Children were used for mining, guard diamonds or even fight.

Charles Taylor was president from 1997 to 2003, when he resigned and went into exile, being surrendered in 2006 to the international tribunal. In 2007 he was moved from Freetown to The Hague, because of regional security concerns. Since the trial began, 94 prosecution witnesses and 24 defense witnesses were heard.

Taylor was accused of 11 counts among which crimes against humanity that led to the death of a million people, war crimes, terrorism, murder, rape, conscription of children. He was said by the prosecution during the trial to have masterminded the war in Sierra Leone in order to gain control over the diamonds in the mines of this country. He is said to have used diamonds to trade for weapons, and thus he made some $100 million out of trading gemstones.

In August 2010, model Naomi Campbell testified that she received some “dirty, small gems” from Taylor at a banquet in South Africa. Her deposition set the international investigators on his trail, opening their perspective of his implication in the Sierra Leone war.

Maj Gen Caesar Achellam

Uganda announced at the beginning of the week that it has captured one of the most important members of the Lord’s Resistance Army, coming a step closer to capturing the leader of the movement, Joseph Kony, who has been under an international arrest warrant since 2005, and was part of an awareness campaign started earlier in the year started by Jason Russell, an American film producer who posted on the internet a movie called “Kony 2012,” which went viral on Youtube, producing about 80 million views and boosting a campaign to capture one of the most brutal international killers.

On Monday, the Ugandan army announced it had captured Caesar Achellam, a major general in Kony’s army of 200 fighters, who was captured during an ambush along the river of the Mbou river in the Central African Republic.

A spokesman for the Uganda People’s Defense Force said that at the moment of his capture Achellam was armed with a AK-47 riffle and eight rounds of ammo, being held with his wife, a daughter and an aide.

The capture is said by the Ugandan army to encourage the members of the Lord’s Resistance Army to leave the ranks of the organization, which in turn would make the capture of Kony a lot easier.

The Major General Caesar Achellam was described by the spokesperson as a “big fish” which would provoke an “opinion shift” within the LRA. The Ugandan army said that it had been trailing Achellam for a month, and that he was coming from the Democratic Republic of Congo when he was ambushed by the army. He was paraded in front of the media, walking with a limp.

Achellam is said by experts to have been one of the closest allies of Kony’s and the mastermind of the relocation of the troops from northern Uganda. The loss of Achellam is said to be a big blow to Kony’s actions in the region and a boost of the manhunt, initiated by the Ugandan army in 2008, under the name “Operation Lightning Thunder,” which has pushed the rebels to Central African Republic.

The hunt for Kony was re-launched on March 24 by the African Union, which has mobilized some 5,000 troops in South Sudan, under Ugandan command, composed of troops from the countries where Kony operated in his days: Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan and the Central African Republic.

The Lord’s Resistance Army is said to have downsized to 200 to 700 people operating in the jungles of CAR, living off stolen cattle and fruits the environment provides. The task force is expected to hunt him down in very difficult conditions, with a lot of ground to cover, which compelled the United States army to participate in the operation with supplying the troops with plane, satellite information which is intended to help.

The African Union recognized that the “Kony 2012” video was “very helpful, important” in boosting the decision by bringing him to the spotlight and making the people all over the world aware of the atrocities Kony has committed.

Russell’s video was greeted by many people but also drew criticism from those who said that it did not catch the magnitude of the atrocity committed by Joseph Kony. The Ugandan government itself felt compelled to issue its own “corrective” version of the facts, criticizing some shortcomings of Kony 2012.

The most important thing the Ugandan government had to criticize was the fact that the video did not make it clear that Kony was no longer in Uganda, thus inducing the confusion that the Ugandan regime was not doing its best to apprehend him.

The second thing that upset the government in the African country was the fact that the video did not make any reference to the time of Kony’s actions, conveying the idea that Uganda was still a land of violence and backwardness, which was not true, since the country has evolved into a democratic society.

On April 21, Invisible Children, the organization which sponsored Russell’s work, staged a “Cover the Night” movement, in which young people posted posters in public places to increase awareness to the crimes Kony committed. The rolling of Kony 2012 in Uganda caused fury because the people were expected the crimes of Kony to be more thoroughly documented and presented by the film.

The Lord’s Resistance Army is a movement inspired by Protestant fundamentalism and Acholi nationalism, aiming at creating a theocratic state inspired by the Ten Commandments and the nationalist principles of the Acholi population in Uganda.

The movement was created and led by Joseph Kony, self-appointed as inspired by the Holy Spirit, and even incarnation of the divine Person. The leader is accused of having abducted 66,000 children whom he turned into soldiers or sexual slaves. Two million people have been displaced as a result of his actions.

Among the crimes he has committed, the most horrifying which can be singled out happened in November 2002, when his army compelled sixty people in South Sudan to eat a dead person they were mourning. As soon as they complied, the people were executed.

LRA killed 48 people in 2008 on Christmas time, kidnapping 120 people who were attending a Catholic concerto the same year. In DRC he is said to have killed 130 people in a village.

Kony was hunted down for the first time in 2009, in an operation which failed. In 2010, Barack Obama signed into law a bill referring to the disarmament of the LRA. In 2011, Obama sent 100 U.S. advisors to help the African authorities to capture him.

Map of Syria

United Nations reported on Tuesday that a convoy of U.N. unarmed observers was victim of a roadside bomb blast near the city of Hama, and that the vehicles were damaged but the observers were not harmed. The Syrian activists accuse the government of having killed 20 mourners who were attending a funeral in the same area. The convoy made of four vehicles was stuck by the explosion in the town of Khan Sheikhoun, near Hama, while three of the vehicles were damaged.

BBC reports that the head of the U.N. mission, Maj Gen Robert Mood, said that six observers had remained with the troops of the Free Syrian Army overnight, and that they were “happy and safe” where they were. The United Nations mission said that the observers would be evacuated within hours from the small town near Hama. The pro-governmental television said that the rebels opened fire against the U.N. observers, while the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that the government has shelled and shot at people attending a funeral.

A video posted on the internet shows the U.N. vehicles surrounded by people, anti-governmental protesters, before the explosion occurred. In a statement, the spokesman for U.N. special envoy Kofi Annan said that the vehicles were hit by an improvised explosive devise and that a patrol was sent in the area to recuperate the U.N. military observers.

On Wednesday morning the leaders of the UN Supervision Mission in Syria confirmed that the observers had not yet been recovered and that they had spent the night under Free Syrian Army protection.

A spokesperson for the Free Syrian Army said that the observers were under their protection because otherwise the Syrian regime would terminate them because they had witnessed a crime committed by it, thus endangering their lives.

The security forces are said to have opened fire on a Palestinian and Syrian refugee camp in the Golan Heights, in the southern province of Deraa, killing at least three people and a child, according to the estimate of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. A man was killed in a village near Deraa.

The Observatory, which is based in London, says that 900 people were killed since the ceasefire came into effect, on April 12, and 12,000 died since the revolt in Syria began in March 2011. The United Nations estimates that 9,000 people died since the beginning of the conflict in 2011.

The United Nations has more than 220 observers in the field and the number is expected to be completed to 300 until the end of the month. The United Nations is said to have some problems recruiting people, as volunteers do not come forth to sign in for the job, because the regime in Damascus has offered no safety guarantees and did not allow the observers to go in the field by helicopter of any kind of protection.

More than that, Syria has denied the access of some observers based on their nationality, and announced that no citizen of the Friends of Syria group would be allowed to come to Syria.

The observation mission is said to be the last chance of peace in Syria, and its predictable failure is expected to throw the country into civil war, as the western community does not have a contingency plan in case the plan fails.

Kofi Annan proposed in March the regime in Damascus to end conflict and pull out the military from the streets of the country. On April 12, Bashar al-Assad agreed to do so, but only in as much as the ceasefire was concerned, keeping the troops in the streets, and motivating the move with the fact that if he had complied with the U.N. demand, he would have left the streets into the hands of the rebels.

In fact, the analysts and Syrian activists believe, the move was only caused by the desire to intimidate the people away from flooding the streets and demanding the resignation of the president.

The ceasefire seems to have held so far in general, but there were many breaches in different parts of the country, where clashes have been reported and even collective deaths, which brought the agreement into question, with the activists believing it was just buying Bashar al-Assad some time to put down the rebellion.

The United States and the former French administration also expressed distrust of Assad’s promises to keep the plan working and demanded a deadline for the plan. The American State Department announced that no support would be showed for the Annan plan past the self-imposed three-month deadline unless some serious changes for the better can be spotted in the embattled country.

The western countries have no intention of going on with a prospect of a military intervention, considering that Syria is a different case than Libya, or other country which went through the Arab Spring last year. Besides, the change in France, the spearheads of the NATO action in Libya, is unlikely to favor any military intervention in Syria.

The fact that Russia and China are sure to oppose a military intervention, if one were to be proposed at some time in the conflict, is an extra reason for the parties involved to want the peace negotiations to succeed and the plan laid out by the special envoy Annan to pay off.

The conflict has created a humanitarian situation which the United Nations humanitarian agency is trying to fix, facing a reluctant government, and the need to address to at least one million people, who have been affected one way or another by the conflict.

The government insists that the Syrian Red Crescent distribute the goods to the people, while the U.N. agency emphasizes the need that these relief aids reach all the zones in the country, including those which are under the rebel control.

The same U.N. source released the information that about 56,000 people have registered as refugees in the neighboring countries, most of all in Turkey.

Karolos Papoulias

Greek president Karolos Papoulias is expected to meet with the leaders of the parties in order to appoint a caretaker prime minister who will organize the snap elections called for June after the political parties were unable to decide on forming a government following the election on May 6, which saw as winners right-wing New Democracy party, radical leftist Syriza, and Socialist PASOK.

The presidential decision comes after the leaders of the three winning parties tried and failed each to form a coalition to govern the country, and the president himself failed to create a national salvation government. The New Democracy and the PASOK are parties which signed an agreement to uphold the agreement with the European Union regardless of which one of them came to power after the elections.

Syriza in stead promised not to honor the agreement and to curve the austerity measures, and pledged not to strike any deal with the parties which had agreed with the measures of austerity, which the people of Greece rejected by their vote.

Syriza won 52 seats in the parliament, coming second to the New Democracy, which won 58 and received 50 more as bonus for coming first in the election. PASOK, the Socialist party, scored 48 seats, the Democratic Left, 19 seats, and the Independent Greeks, 33. Neo-Nazi Golden Dawn also scored 21 seats but it is not taken into account for any negotiation for government, being considered a far-right party.

Karolos Papoulias is expected to attempt to appoint a caretaker prime minister from among the judges at the Greek high court, in accordance with the constitution, if no political leader assumes the role of election organizer.

The political stalemate has brought Greece on the brink of economic default, with the most pessimist analysts predicting that a victory of the radical leftist Syriza would collapse all the European plans to save Greece and would bring the country in the situation of being forced to withdraw from the eurozone and revert to the national currency, a move which would send a shockwave throughout Europe, bringing with it an immediate downgrade of all the members in the zone, because the foundation of the eurozone, the assumption that no member country leaves the European economic and monetary unity, would be shaken.

On Tuesday, during a meeting between the two leaders of the European Union, German chancellor Angela Merkel, and newly installed president Francois Hollande, they both stressed out that their countries would fight to keep Greece in the eurozone, and that it is up to the Greek people not to decide otherwise, a message of support for the two “pro-Eurozone” parties New Democracy and PASOK, and an assurance which would calm the markets in the entire world, which are now expecting to see the outcome of the Greek new political crisis and its toll on the eurozone.

A bad sign of the new crisis is send by the population of Greece, which on Wednesday is said by the international media to have “stampeded” to the banks to pull out their savings, fearing the fallout of the new political situation.

700 million euro have been extracted from the local banks in one day alone, as the news about elections indicated that snap elections would be called. The number grows higher, amounting to 800 million, if taken into account the orders received by the Greek banks for German bounds.

The announcement was made on Tuesday by the Greek president Papoulias, who said that the leader of the national bank had told him that there was no reason for panic just yet, but that there was fear that things could evolve toward panic.

Estimates are that 2-3 billion euro has been pulled out of the banks over the last two years every month, with a surge in January, when 5 billion was withdrawn. People are concerned that a return to the national currency drachma and the exit from the eurozone would damage their savings irreparably.

Greece’s foreign lenders already announced that they would stop all funding if the agreements convened in March are not respected, which would mean the bankruptcy of the country and the exit of the eurozone.

The German Finance Minister on Wednesday announced that there would be no talk about the Greek bailout, that is the agreement would not be revised, while the president of the International Monetary Fund said that an “orderly exit” of Greece from the eurozone could be orchestrated.

Christine Lagarde said that the exit is something that would be extremely expensive and would put a great risk but that it is technically a possibility that must be taken into account.

According to the latest opinion polls, the leftist Syriza is considered the party that could emerge from these renewed elections as the most important party of the country, campaigning on the necessity to renegotiate the agreement with the European troika.

Syriza is said to want the renegotiation of the bailout agreement while also desiring to keep the country within the eurozone, which is the wish of 70 percent of the Greek population, according to opinion polls.  On Tuesday Greece announced it would make a “timely payment” on 435 million euro worth of debt due on May 15.

Angela Merkel and Francois Hollande

New installed French president Francois Hollande on Tuesday evening met with the German chancellor Angela Merkel in a long-expected meeting on the confronting views on the European economic crisis. Hollande arrived in Berlin Tuesday evening, on a second attempt to do so, after the first plane he was traveling with got stroke by lightening and he had to come back and resume the trip in another plane.

The president was sworn in earlier on Tuesday, in a low key ceremony intended to match with both the new mood in Europe, which is expressing anger at the austerity measures that swept across the continent, causing many leaders and parties to fall, and the promise of the new president to inaugurate an era of “sobriety” as compared to the luxury life style Sarkozy had while president of the republic.

On Tuesday, Hollande appointed the new French prime minister, and it was no surprise here either as Jean Marc Ayrault was expected to take the office because of his good ties with the German chancellor. The nomination was expected to be presented on Wednesday, but Hollande made it before he left for Berlin, probably as a means to set the stage for the negotiation with his new partner of European businesses.

In Berlin, the two leaders promised to help the countries in imminent default peril and those whose debts are placing their economies at risk recover. Hollande and Merkel have sharply different views on the way the European economy should be handled, with the French president favoring the economic growth, while the German chancellor has already implemented throughout Europe an austerity plan, which is now rebuffed all over the continent.

Hollande promised while campaigning to renegotiate the fiscal pact signed by the European Union member states earlier this year, and to replace it with a new one stimulating the economic growth. He maintained that the promise to renegotiate the treaty would be observed now that he was elected president.

The president said that the best to put all the proposals on the agenda was during the informal EU summit on May 23. Angela Merkel, who supported the right-wing candidate Sarkozy to the presidency to such an extent that the presidential campaign came to be known as “Merkozy,” played down the differences between her plan and Hollande’s proposals.

Euronews quotes her to say that the question is who has what kind of ideas about growth, since growth is a general concept and needs to reach to the people. Merkel added that there would be ground for cooperation in spite of the fact that there will also be different views on some aspects, but the cooperation does stand a chance.

In a joint press conference the two leaders held in Berlin, Angela Merkel said that they shared the responsibility for a good development in Europe, and that they would find solutions for every individual problem, while Hollande added he was willing to build a “balanced” and “respectful” relation with Germany.

Speaking about the summit which is about to be held next week, Hollande said that “everything should be put on the table” on that occasion, while the German chancellor said that it was important that Germany and France present their ideas together at the summit and work closely together to prepare it.

The general impression of the meeting is that in spite of their different views the two leaders worked hard to make their relation work in the best interest of solving the debt crisis.

One of the most important messages the two leaders conveyed to the people of Greece is that France and Germany are not about to let Greece fall or pull out of the eurozone. The encouraging message comes at a time when Greek president announced that a caretaker government would be installed in the country to lead to new elections, expected to be held at the end of June.

Greeks have rejected austerity measures and have voted for parties that campaigned against the austerity measures, and are expected to do this again. The second came Syriza, a radical socialist party which promised to annul all the agreements with the European Union, based on which Greece has received its monetary aid, which helped it avoid default.

Francois Hollande said that the countries in Europe want Greece to continue in the eurozone and to find solutions to pull out of its crisis, but that eventually the decision belongs with the Greek people and that he would respect it, whatever it may be.

Angela Merkel even noted the incident with the presidential airplane being struck by lightening and said that it could be a good omen, a sign of cooperation between the two countries.

Speaking at his inauguration in Paris earlier in the day, the new president said it was time to discourage “exorbitant income” and to accept that production must be put ahead of speculation. As for his mandate, he said that it would be a period of recovery, at the end of which France will rise again, building its strength on the effort of its creators, engineers, researchers.

He managed to unsettle investors with his criticism of the austerity measures which had been at the heart of the economic policies in Europe for the past few years.

The visit to Berlin has a symbolic value, offering a vision of French president’s priorities. The next visit is expected to be in Washington, where Barack Obama is campaigning for a re-election bid. Then he will attend the Group of Eight meeting, the NATO meeting and a G-20 meeting.

Hollande’s foreign policy is expected to affect NATO in as much as the participation of the French troops in different conflict is concerned, and is also a good sign for Turkey, whose bid for European membership could be renewed now that the new president could be more flexible.

Yulia Tymoshenko in Prison

Ukrainian High Court on Tuesday postponed a decision on the appeal formulated by the lawyers of Yulia Tymoshenko, the former prime minister of Ukraine, who is serving now a seven-year sentence in jail for abuse of power, until after the Euro 2012 soccer tournament commences.

The Kiev high court, which is the highest judicial instance, has delayed the hearing until June 26, a few days before the end of the tournament which is expected to commence on June 1 in Warsaw and to end by the end of the month in Kiev. Poland and Ukraine host the tournament, which has been boycotted by some Western states because of the Tymoshenko case.

The motion was forwarded by the prosecution and was firmly contested by the defense, marking a new turn in the legal complication surrounding Tymoshenko’s  conviction. The prosecution has argued that they introduced this movement to assure that Tymoshenko will be there, given that she is now being cared by the doctors in a clinic in Kharkiv.

The decision on the appeal is expected to be delivered deep into the Euro tournament by the time of the semi-finals. The European commissioners have already announced that they would boycott the entire event, and so have some prime ministers and political leaders in the western countries, including the chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel, who said that it was the will of the German people that she not be there.

The decision to postpone the hearing comes the same day the Ukrainian prime minister is in Brussels, where he is to see EU officials, including Catherine Ashton, the EU foreign policy chief.

Ukraine had to postpone a summit which was expected to be held in Yalta, but was boycotted by presidents of attending countries, on the same grounds they want to boycott the coming to the Euro 2012 soccer tournament.

Concerns have been raised by the European nations around the health condition of the former prime minister and the way she was treated in the prison in Kharkiv. Tymoshenko underwent a 20-day hunger strike as she accused the state penitentiary officials of having kicked her in the stomach. She put an end to it a few days ago, when she decided to take a treatment for her back problems in a hospital in Kharkiv, under the supervision of the German doctors that have been assisting her since she has had problems.

The government of the United States has joined the western countries which had demanded the release of Tymoshenko and her political associates and the restoration of their civil and political rights.

In a statement on the website of the American embassy in Ukraine it is said that the United States continues to be concerned about the condition Tymoshenko is in. The statement comes after American diplomats visit her in Kharkiv.

Moving Tymoshenko to the hospital for treatment, the statement reads, is a welcome step in the direction of improving her treatment, but it is not enough, as her medical condition should be respected and the former premier should be allowed to receive all the treatment she needs.

The diplomats returning from Kharkiv said that the opinion of the United States toward Tymoshenko was unchanged and that selective justice was not acceptable.

The lawyer of the former premier said on Tuesday that his client would not wait for the ruling of the Ukrainian high court and would refer the case to the European Court for Human Rights.

Yulia Tymoshenko was a prime minister of Ukraine between 2005 and 2010, and was accused last year of abuse of office while dealing with the Russian Gazprom a gas contract. She was found guilty and sentenced to seven years in prison.

Last month, she was called to a preliminary hearing in another case related to embezzlement which allegedly happened in the 1990s, when she was the head of the national energy company. If found guilty on the new charge, she risks 12 years in prison.

Greece and Europe

Greeks are expected to go back to vote in June after the talks between the most important parties in the country failed to offer a solution for the political stalemate created by the inconclusive result of the elections held a week ago. The announcement comes as the efforts made by the president of Greece, Karolos Papoulias, to bring the leftist Syriza party to commit to an alliance with the New Democracy party and the Socialist party in a national salvation government.

The elections are possible, analysts say, as soon as June 17, and they reflect the refuse of the newly emerged parties to implement the austerity measures convened by PASOK and the New Democracy party while they were in power over the past years. The leader of Syriza, Alexis Tsipras, said that the people have spoken and have decided that the austerity measures would no longer be acceptable for Greece, and that his party would not accept to make alliances with those who backed the austerity measures and are now hated by the people, who expressed their anger by the way they voted.

The three leading parties have been attempting to form in turn a government and to enlist the support of the other two, but they all failed, leaving the president with the option of proposing on Monday a government of technocrats, in an attempt to avoid the snap elections.

The political instability fuels the fear that Greece may be forced to leave the eurozone in spite of the support of the population for the unique currency, which is said by the opinion polls to run as high as 70 percent.

The talks to create a government collapsed on Tuesday and the leaders of the three more important parties announced that snap elections will be called in June.

In his speech of announcement of the elections, Socialist party leader Evangelos Venizelos said that the country was heading back to elections under very bad circumstances, and accused that “some people coldly put their short-term interests above the national interest.”

Venizelos said that the leader of the Democratic Left party had proposed a two-year government but that he insisted on including Syriza in the agreement, which is a radical leftist anti-bailout party.

Syriza came second in the election on May 6 by campaigning against the austerity measures and promised to form no alliance with other parties that support the austerity. The leadership of the party is counting on the popular vote to come first if the election re-runs, thus terminating Greece’s chances to stick to the agreed program with the European Union, which is expected to deliver Greece the rest of the money only if it implements the austerity measures people find so repulsive.

Karolos Papoulias on Tuesday announced that a meeting would be held on Wednesday in order to agree on a caretaker government to lead the country until mid-June, when the elections can be held again.

According to Greek constitution, the leaders of the parties must agree on a caretaker government until election day, and if they cannot, the president has the prerogative of appointing the chief justice of Supreme Administrative Court, the Supreme Court or the Court of Audits to act as prime minister until elections.

The polls indicate that the political landscape will not look anymore different after the next election, only that it annuls the possibility of negotiating for a government because by the next of June Greece will have to inform the European partners about the measures it has implementing to meet the demands of the international lenders, which have already announced that no aid disbursement would be held until the new government was formed.

Palestinians Celebrate Nakba Day

The Palestinians mark on Tuesday “Nakba Day” or “Day a Catastrophe” dedicated to the 64th anniversary of the establishment of Israel, which was proclaimed on May 14, 1948, and was celebrated this year on April 26, according to the Jewish calendar. Nakba Day is celebrated through rallies in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and neighboring Arab countries.

Palestinians are reported to have thrown stones at Israeli civilians and IDF. Hundreds attend Nakba Day rallies in Jerusalem and the West Bank, while thousands of Palestinians gathered in Ramallah for a major rally in Martyr Yasser Arafat Square on Tuesday.

Black banners and Palestinian flags were raised to mark the moment. The rally was attended by Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. The Palestinian Authority has suspended classes and work on Tuesday to allow as many Palestinian people as possible to attend the event.

Speaking on the occasion, Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas said he would never forget the beginning of the “continuous hardship” for his people. About five million Palestinians are scattered in the neighboring countries Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Some of them live in refugees camps being denied basic human rights, causing people to suffer, as Abbas says, whether they live in camps or in other countries. In Gaza, the Prime Minister Ismail Haniya said that the Palestinians would never give up their right to return.

On Tuesday morning stones were thrown at the Jews praying at Rachel’s tomb near Bethlehem. There were no injuries, and police has dispersed the protesters. In Hebron Palestinians threw stones at a military security forces checkpoint. IDF and Border Police dispersed the rioters with no damage or injuries.

Firebombs and stones were thrown by hundreds of Palestinians in Betunia, causing no harm, while 300 Palestinians gathered at Kalandiya checkpoint and a number of them clashed with the IDF troops, causing 20 Palestinians to be injured.

Four people were arrested by police in Isawiya, east Jerusalem, for throwing stones, five-year-old children participating in the process of stone throwing. Nakba Day was celebrated in the Gaza Strip by Hamas, Fatah and other Palestinian groups participating in a common rally.

The organizers of the rally called on the Palestinian protestors to meet at the U.N. headquarters in Gaza City. Israeli Defense Force has increased the alert level at its Syrian and Lebanese border, in an attempt to prevent the events last year from occurring. Last year at least a dozen people were killed as they had tried to rush Israel’s northern borders.

Nakba Day commemorates the exodus of hundreds of thousands Palestinians who had to flee their lands after the Jewish state was created on May 14 by a decision of the United Nations.

About 700,000 Palestinian people are said to have been displaced by the war that followed the proclamation of Israeli statehood in 1948. The Nakba Day comes a day after Palestinian prisoners in Israeli penitentiary system ended a weeks-long hunger strike by which they were demanded for better life condition.

They ended their strike as a result of an agreement by which they could receive more visits from their families and limits to the controversial Israeli policy of keeping people for years in prison without bringing a charge against them.

Some iconic Palestinian prisoners, like Hamas member Abdullah al-Barghouti, who is serving 67-life-in-prison sentences, were transferred from solitary confinement to general prison population. The hunger strike had a large popular support and threatened to throw the already tense bilateral relations in chaos.

The right of the Palestinians to return is an issue in the debates between the Palestinian and Israeli diplomacy, as an attempt to resolve the situation by a “two-state” creation proposal is being made by both sides.

Last Saturday the Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu responded to a letter Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas had addressed to him in April. In his letter, Abbas urged Netanyahu to recognize the 1967 borders of the Palestinian territories as borders of the future state of Palestine, and to stop all constructions in the settlements in the West Bank.

The letter that was delivered to Abbas through the Israeli negotiator Yitzhak Molcho is said to comprise no clear answer to any of the demands made by the president of the Palestinian Authority. Israel and the Palestinian Authority have been in a deadlock for years, as the settlement issue in the West Bank has come in the way and could not be overcome since September 2010.

Champs Elysees Ceremonial

Francois Hollande on Tuesday became the president of France as he was sworn in the office during a ceremony which happened at the Champs-Elysees Palace in central Paris. Hollande becomes the first Socialist president of France in decades, at a time when the European economic union seems to be shaky as a result of the outcome in the Greek crisis.

The ceremony is said to have been deliberately conducted in a low key, with the new president vowing to unite France, to have an honest and fair mandate and to bring the much needed calm in the country. He saluted the contribution of previous president, mentioning the attachment to republic’s values of the former president Chirac, but was unable to mention any achievement of outgoing Sarkozy, to whom he wished however luck in his “new life.” He promised to uphold “scrupulous sobriety of behavior,” a subtle reference to the way Sarkozy behaved himself as president of France.

After walking on the red carpet in the Champs Elysees courtyard, Hollande and Sarkozy went to meet inside the palace, on which occasion the outgoing president handed over the country’s nuclear codes. Then he received the official chain of office, a collar weighing a kilogram with the names of the Fifth Republic engraved on it, then he visited the tomb of the unknown soldier under the Arc of Triomph and had lunch with former Socialist prime ministers.

In the afternoon he is expected to greet the crowds in Paris, and on Wednesday he will appoint a prime minister from the list he has made since he was elected.

Hollande won a narrow victory against president Nicolas Sarkozy in the presidential runoffs on May 6, when he scored 51 percent while his opponent had 49 percent. His victory is a moment to treasure for the Socialist party, which hasn’t had a president since Francois Mitterand.

Hollande, who promised to bring a new economic view for the French people and for the Europeans as well, is to travel to Berlin later in the day, where he is expected to meet Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, in a first contact as president with the situation in the field of the European economy.

During the campaign, Hollande promised to bring a new vision about going through crisis, emphasizing the need to develop the economy rather than to apply budget spending cuts.

In his inauguration speech, Hollande said that his mandate was to turn France around and to open a new way for the European Union. He promised to challenge Merkel’s vision of spending cuts by proposing a growth-friendly measures to boost economy and cause the recover of the heavily indebted states.

The meeting with Merkel however comes at a time when Greece is in default danger again due to high political instability caused by the inconclusive result of elections held a week ago, in which no party has gain enough to be able to form a government, given that the smaller parties refuse to make alliances with the parties that signed the austerity measures, because they say that the people has decided this.

As re-run of elections in Greece is a scenario that can come to pass in June, dragging the country out of the eurozone. As Greece is preparing to go back to its national currency, in spite of the promises made by the European officials not to let this happen, French economy itself is stalling and growing at a very slow rate, which is sure to make Hollande’s job to curve unemployment and stagnation a lot harder.

Former center-right president, Nicolas Sarkozy, lost elections because of the economic situation of France, where unemployment reached high rates and the social problems became more pressing every day, causing the people to cast an angry vote on May 6, something they did all over Europe, signaling that the shrinking of economy is no longer an acceptable option and different policies must be implemented.

It is against this background that Hollande launched his electoral promises to accelerate the growth of the economy, causing many analysts to say that they were more of populist propaganda than real doable things.

Bank of France expects stagnation for the second quarter of the year after an anemic growth in the first quarter, while the European Commission has already warned France that without a change in finance policies it would miss the 3 percent deficit of gross domestic product it has set for the next year.

The consequences of layoffs in the private sector, the incapacity to recruit 60,000 people in the national education system and other economic decisions that were put off for the duration of the electoral campaign will have to be dealt with by the newly installed president.

The large companies are expected to announce massive layoffs they have refrained from during the campaign for fear of inflaming the debate more than it already was inflamed.

Later in the week, Hollande will tackle the first assignment in foreign policies, as he is scheduled to meet president Barack Obama, and attend the Group of Eight and NATO meetings.

The United States is expecting Hollande to change the foreign policies with regard to the French involvement in the conflicts in the world, accelerating the drawdown of the troops from Afghanistan.

Hollande is also expected to appoint a new prime minister, and to do more than that, restoring the dignity of the office. During the campaign, he promised to restore the PM’s office to what it used to be, that is the office that executes the governmental policies laid out by the president. The candidate with most chances to become the next PM of France is Jean-Marc Ayrault, a man of which it is expected to smooth the path of cooperation with Germany’s Angela Merkel.

Dalai Lama Meeting David Cameron

China on Tuesday accused Dalai Lama of spreading false information about the Communist regime and deceiving the world after he expressed, in an interview for Sunday Telegraph, concern related to an inside information he received from Tibet that assassination plots are being mulled by the regime.

In an interview a few days ago, Dalai Lama said that according to his information, Chinese agents would attempt to poison him using Tibetan women who would pose as devotees seeking blessing. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said that Dalai Lama is always wearing his religious cloak through the world, spreading false information and confusing the public. He also said the spiritual leader is always engaged in “anti-China splittist activities.”

Speaking about Dalai Lama’s disclosure about an alleged plot on his life masterminded by Chinese agents, Hong Lei said that it was not even worth refuting.

In his interview for the Sunday Telegraph, Dalai Lama said that the Tibetan women seeking his blessing would have their heads and scarves poisoned and that they would poison Dalai Lama while he touched them in order to bless them.

The spiritual leader said that there was not way to cross-check the information, so he did not know if it was true. On Monday, Dalai Lama met with David Cameron, British Prime Minister, before receiving the $1.8 million of the Templeton Prize, money which he announced to offer for charity.

Dalai Lama said he was living within a high security cordon in his palace at the foothills of Himalaya mountains, in the city of Dharamsala. He had been advised by the Indian security to take the matter seriously into consideration, because though he is one of the most distinguished international figures, he still has enemies in China and the Buddhist sects.

Though the information cannot be confirmed, Dalai Lama’s security is to be increased just to be on the safe side, since such information cannot be dismissed altogether. China and the Tibetan government-in-exile have had a very poor relation for the past 50 years, with China accusing Dalai Lama of wanting to secede Tibet from its control, and the Tibetan leaders demanding for the observance of their cultural and religious rights.

The self-immolation of 30 monks for the last year and the protests against Chinese government staged by the Tibetans in China and in India have soured the already tense relations even more.

China has accused Dalai Lama of instigating the people to kill themselves in order to embarrass Beijing, although Dalai Lama has always said that he was against the self-immolation practice, which he deemed as an attempt to the sanctity of life.

The Chinese government seems determined to put an end to Dalai Lama’s influence over the Tibetan people or to turn it into a source of influence of their own. Thus, China announced that it would no longer recognize a newly embodied Dalai Lama after this one passes away, prompting Dalai Lama to announce that he might decide to pass on the features of the reincarnation when he grows 90 years old so that the people may recognize him without any possibility of deceit or he might just end the institution altogether so that no manipulation may be possible through it.

Chinese argue that he cannot pass on anything without their consent, while Dalai Lama says that it is his prerogative to determine when and how he will be reincarnated. He is also consulting with scholars to see whether renouncing to the Dalai Lama institution is doable.

Last year, he made a first step toward confining Dalai Lama’s powers to spiritual matters alone, when he renounced political power, and put it into the hands of a government led by prime minister Lobsang Sangay. He motivated this decision by the advanced age which does not allow him to perform all his functions with the same proficiency.

By taking the office, which the Chinese do not recognize, Sangay became the first leader of a Tibetan government to have been born out of Tibet and never have seen his country, as well as the first secular leader of this theocratic nation.

Sangay, educated in Harvard, promised to carry on the dream of Dalai Lama for a democratic and secular society for Tibetans. The most important thing, however, is that, in Dalai Lama’s words, the appointment of Lobsang Sangay allays the disputes over the identity of the new Dalai Lama and the Chinese authorities after he dies.

A secular government, the spiritual leader said, is bound to allow the community develop and avoid chaos even when the Dalai Lama is no more.

Attack in Damascus

Massive protests occurred in Syria on Friday hours after two explosions killed at least 55 people in the capital of the country, Damascus, fueling the worries that the country was slipping into civil war, and piling to this the possibility that the al-Qaeda, or al-Qaeda-like, groups have arrived in Syria.

Two cars exploded in the capital of Syria, which has been confronting with anti-presidential protests for the last 14 months, being considered the deadliest attack since the beginning of the revolution. The attacks are part of a string of similar attacks carried out since the U.N. observers arrived on the ground in Syria to monitor a ceasefire agreed in March and implemented on April 12, when the shooting and the crackdown stopped for the most part of the country.

State-run television said that a suspected suicide bomber was killed on Friday in Aleppo, the northern economic hub of the country, and that his car was having on board some 1,200 kilos of explosives.

The Syrian government addressed the United Nations Security Council, urging that some measures to combat terrorism in Syria be taken immediately. In a letter to the U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, the leaders in Damascus say that it is clear that their country is going through a terrorist attack, a claim they had been making since March 2011, when they launched the attack on the population, at the beginning of the conflict. The Syrian government spoke of “escalating crimes” in their country.

Later on Friday an explosive was heard near the Baath party headquarters in Aleppo. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said there was no casualty reported in the blast but that a guard was killed in a fire trade following the explosion.

On Saturday, a militant group assumed responsibility for the attacks a day before by a video which did not present any evidence to back the idea that a Islamist group called al-Nusra Front had anything to do with the bombings.

The message was said to come from the “Chamber of Mujahideen,” that is the holy warriors. Activists and rebel Free Syrian Army said that they did not execute the attack and that the government is using it to stain their reputation.

The al-Nusra Front said that the undertook the operation of blasting the “dens of the regime,” to target the Palestinian and security branches. They said that the attacks were a retribution for the attacks staged by the military against the neighborhoods of Damascus, Idlib, Deraa, and Hama.

The message advises Bashar al-Assad to stop the persecution against the Sunni people, otherwise he would “bear the sins of the Alawites.” “What will come will be most disastrous,” the message says, while advising Sunnis to avoid any security force branches and dens of the regime.

It is not the first time this group claims to have staged attacks in Syria, and the website they have used is often used by al-Qaeda to relay its messages, which prompted the analysts and columnists to assess that al-Qaeda-related organizations may have arrived to Syria.

Meanwhile, the U.N. observers fanned out in Syrian cities in order to check the way the ceasefire is being observed, amid fear that the arrangement with the United Nations to stop the fighting is very shaky.

50 U.N. observers have been displayed so far, and 300 more are expected to be deployed until the end of May, in accordance with the U.N. resolution offering it a legal framework. The mission is expected to last for 3 months, during which time it is expected to report every two weeks to the UNSC.

The deployment of observers hit a little snag as the regime refused to offer the U.N. personnel the right to move free inside the country, or to use helicopters. The fact that Syria can reject the observers based on different motives like their citizenship or the fact that they are citizens of a Friends of Syria country, and that they have to go in the field with no protection amplifies the problem when it comes to recruiting people for the job.

On Friday many people have taken to streets to protest the attacks in Damascus and the loss of live and to demand the ouster of the president and his regime. Few incidents were reported on the occasion, and anger is said to be building.

Experts say that it would take a while to determine who is responsible for the attacks on Damascus, and if al-Qaeda has nothing to do with it, it is certain that the organization will take it as an invitation to come.

Karolos Papoulias

Greek President Karolos Papoulias on Saturday is preparing to hold talks with the leaders of the parties that scored in the last parliamentary elections last weekend, in an attempt to create an emergency government after the problems revisit the Greek economy.

Last Sunday Greek population voted against the parties which backed the bailout program and the austerity measures, making it impossible for the parties which are now represented in the parliament to form a government.

The move of president Papoulias comes after a third attempt this week to build a coalition failed as Socialist PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos did not succeed in convincing Syriza party leader Alexis Tsipras to form a government.

As a consequence, Venizelos rejected the idea of renewed elections, considering that nothing else could come out of them, and added that he would speak to the president hoping that “in his presence” everybody thinks clearer and more maturely.

The president of Athens Chamber of Commerce and Industry Constantine Michalos said that he had hopes a government would emerge of these negotiations and that a second set of elections would not be called for June 10 or 17, because, in his own words, Greeks could have a government by then but they wouldn’t have a country anymore as it would be torn apart by the economic problems.

His dim perspective seem to be built on hard facts such as the fact that the political instability brought the Athenian stock exchange to its lowest in 20 years, causing euro to sink to the lowest since January.

The political situation has raised the possibility that Greek economy sink again in default and the country leave the eurozone and return to drahma, as the bailout solution could fail to stabilize the economy.

It is expected that the president of Greece press the political parties to agree to a government of national salvation, but experts think it is unlikely to succeed, and the process could last for days.

Venizelos has agreed to form a coalition with center-right New Democracy party led by Antonis Samaras but they need a third party to complete the percentage in order to launch a government, and none of the other parliamentary parties want to associate with them, because they are considered by the population as the primary responsible for the dramatic situation Greece is going through.

Earlier in the week, New Democracy attempted to form the government and failed and so did the Syriza left-wing bloc, which came second in the election. Syriza rejects the bailout agreement which has brought many social problems and refuses to accept to offer the support to the parties which had promised to uphold the bailout agreement no matter who came to power.

The leaders of Syriza argue that the rejection of the austerity measures was decided by the people of Greece, who voted for them, adding that the voters denounced it through the ballots they cast and no one had a right to keep on going on these measures after the people had decided that the measures are not acceptable.

Syriza is said to have hopes that a new ballot would help them emerge victorious but a overall majority that would allow them to rule alone is highly unlikely to be obtained.

In a 300-seat parliament, New Democracy is holding now 108 seats in the new parliament, 50 0f which are a bonus for winning elections, Syriza has 52 seats, that is 6 less than the center-right party (not considering the bonus 50 seats), PASOK scored 41 seats, Independent Greeks have 33, the Communist 26, the Neo-Nazi Golden Dawn 21 and the Democratic Left 19 seats.

As talks about Greece leaving the eurozone intensify, the German chancellor and officials urged Greece to abide by the agreement signed with the European countries, warning that a leave from eurozone would destabilize the European common currency but would hurt the Greek interests worse than any other country in the European community.

The chief of the German federal bank said that unless Greece makes good on its word to implement the bailout measures agreed earlier this year with the European partners the bailout financial support could be stopped. PASOK and the New Democracy are the parties which reached an agreement to uphold the bailout agreement if they were to come to power.

Fitch rating agency is of the opinion that a pullout of Greece from the eurozone would place all the remaining 16 countries on “rating negative watch,” with the perspective of possible downgrades, because it would annul the fundamental tenet of the eurozone, that is that the membership of the European Economic and Monetary Union is irrevocable.

Electoral Billboard in Egypt

An Egyptian administrative court in Behna, in the Nile Delta, 40 kilometers north of Cairo, on Wednesday ruled for the presidential election on May 23 to be suspended, in a move which adds to the confusion and turnaround situations which have accompanied the presidential electoral process in Egypt.

The decision provoked derision among Egyptians and is expected to be changed by a higher instance. In its motivation, the court argued that the Supreme Elections Commission overstepped its mandate by calling the elections on May 23, adding that the Supreme Council of Armed Forces was the only institution which could make this call.

The decision was a procedural one and referred to the fact that the electoral commission had no right to set the date. Some legal experts argue though that the low court which issued this ruling had a problem of legitimacy itself and that the ruling was not valid.

According to a source that spoke on condition of anonymity for Washington Post, the decision can easily be appealed. The candidates seemed little affected by the situation as they continued their campaigning and preparations for the first televised debate on Thursday.

The electoral process is expected to go on undisturbed by this ruling, given that the Supreme Military Council has expressed on Wednesday that it wanted the voting to start on May 23. The election of the president of Egypt follows the election of the parliament and is the final act in the changes that occurred in the north African state since former president Hosni Mubarak was removed from power by a 18-day revolution in January and February 2011.

The ruling of the court in the Nile Delta comes at a time when the Egyptian cabinet went through a reshuffle process which affected culture, labor, higher education and parliament affairs ministers. Prime Minister Kamal el-Ganzouri, appointed by the ruling military, retained his office.

The Muslim Brotherhood has demanded that it be allowed to form its own cabinet since it won the elections held in November but the military refused to permit that.

The electoral commission authority has been disputed on the occasion of the issuance of the list comprising the 13 contenders which were allowed to participate in the competition.

The election of a president in Egypt has been marked by a series of unusual decisions, first of which was the decision made by Muslim Brotherhood to have its own candidate to the election, a move seen by the entire political landscape as an attempt to monopolize power after winning by a landslide victory the parliamentary seats.

The nomination of Khairat el-Shater was seen as a form of seeking to grasp all the power in the state, considering that the presidential office holds a key statute in the power structure of the country.

The nomination of a Muslim Brotherhood candidate was followed by the announcement made by former chief of intelligence Omar Suleiman that he would candidate also, a move that was seen by many as a return to Mubarak’s era but also as a sign of stability, considering that the country has been going through a social turmoil since the fall of a regime which was based on a stability achieved mainly by coercion methods specific to autocratic rulers such as Mubarak.

Then El-Shater and Suleiman were disqualified on the basis of the fact that the first had been accused in the past of being part of a “banned group,” even though the group was the Muslim Brotherhood which now rules the country, while Suleiman was not able to raise the signatures needed for his candidacy to be enlisted.

The string of disqualifications also affected Hafez Abu Ismail, a radical Salafi scholar, who was banned from participating in election because his grandmother had a double citizenship, Egyptian and American, which according to the Egyptian law bars the kin from public offices.

Since the ruling was made against Abu Ismail in spite of the fact that the Interior Ministry issued a statement by which it was saying that there was no record of Abu Ismail’s grandmother asking permission to get an American passport. This triggered a wave of protests in the capital of the country.

A fourth major player in the race is Ahmed Shafiq, former prime minister in the days before the fall of Mubarak. He was barred from participating in election on the basis of a law passed by the parliament which prohibited the cronies of the former regime to run for president.

Shafiq’s bid was reinstated 24 hours later considering that he could not have been construed as a real crony of Mubarak, being appointed as PM at a time when the regime was almost gone. The electoral commission has referred the case to the Supreme Court and a ruling is being awaited. In the meanwhile Shafiq is among the 13 allowed to run for president.

The presidential race is being marked by another move that happened in January, when president hopeful Mohamed ElBaradei, former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, announced he was retiring from the race considering that the regime has not been able to create a democratic framework for Egypt.

Earlier in the year, a court in Egypt has dissolved the constituent assembly, which was meant to draft a new constitution on the basis of the lack of representativeness, after the liberal, the secularist and the Christian Copts pulled out of it, accusing the Brotherhood of monopolizing it with the intention of drafting a Islamist constitution.

There was a concern that the military rulers would postpone the election of a president until after a constitution came into effect, because the military has its own stakes in it, considering that it must protect its own privileges and make sure that it escapes possible prosecution for the way the country was handled through the transition period.

Border Zone

South Sudan on Wednesday accused Sudan of bombing border zones in South Sudan, in violation of the United Nations Security Council resolution, which demanded of the two Sudanese country to ceasefire immediately, threatening that otherwise they would be submitted to sanctions.

According to South Sudanese military spokesman Kella Dual Kueth, Sudan bombed by aviation and shelled four northern states: Unity, Upper Nile, Western Bahr el Ghazal and Northern Bahr al Ghazal. They said that the air strikes began on Monday and continued on Tuesday and Wednesday.

According to the South Sudanese military, the Sudanese troops have used three military air planes to drop bombs on the northern zones of South Sudan.

Sudan and South Sudan have accepted to settle their differences within 90 days according to a roadmap laid out by the African Union. In case they do not meet the African Union deadline, the disputes between them would be settled by a binding international arbitration.

The two Sudans must settle disputes over oil revenues, citizenship and border delimitation. The border clashes which erupted last month displaced tens of thousands on both sides of the border, creating a serious humanitarian crisis.

South Sudan occupied the oil-rich zone called Heglig, which is fueling most of the Sudanese output of oil, being extremely important for the Sudanese economy.

Sudan reacted by passing a law in the parliament calling the South Sudan the “enemy,” while the president promised that the action of the Sudanese army would only stop in the capital of Juba.

South Sudan agreed to pull out from Heglig after the pressure applied by the international community. The president Salva Kiir demanded that Ethiopian peacekeepers be brought in the Abyei region, which has expressed the desire to separate from Sudan.

The differences between Sudan and South Sudan are due to the oil revenue sharing, as the South complained that Sudan was demanding a huge fee for the transport of oil and was stealing some of it through tie-in pipelines.

In a visit to China, South Sudan demanded that a new pipeline be build by China so that the country may escape the need to work with the northern neighbor. China has interests in both Sudans, supporting their oil industry.

During the vote on the resolution at the UNSC, China and Russia opposed the idea of sanctions and abstained from vote. The fact that they did not veto it is considered to be due to the fact that the draft was proposed by the African Union.

Tariq al-Hashemi

Turkish Deputy Prime Minister on Wednesday announced that the country would not extradite Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, which has been on the run for a few months after the government in Baghdad accused him of implication in terror activity. Officially, al-Hashemi maintained that he was visiting the Gulf countries, denying that he was on hiding.

Interpol issued a “red bulletin” in the name of al-Hashemi following the request of Baghdad. Diplomatic sources said that this red bulletin did not mean that al-Hashemi was under some sort of international arrest warrant. Red bulletins are based on national arrest warrants and are accepted as long as they do not break the Interpol regulations.

Turkish Deputy PM said that Turkey could not extradite someone they supported. He emphasized that Turkey supports al-Hashemi and that it would continue to do so. Al-Hashemi is still the Vice-President of Iraq and he enjoys diplomatic immunity. He added he had no knowledge whether this situation would be subjected to reevaluation in the next period.

The official said that the Vice President was in Turkey to be treated of his health problems, and reminded that Turkey had its own requests for people in Iraq which had staged acts of terror on Turkish territory, and that the Iraqi government has not complied with these requests.

Al-Hashemi is being tried in absentia under the accusation of terrorism and guiding and financing death squads that targeted government officials and Shiite pilgrims. The trial was postponed until after May 10, as al-Hashemi’s lawyer demanded that a parliament special court be established to hear the case.

Tariq al-Hashemi has denied all charges and pledged that he would not return to his country as long as he is under this charge, which he called politically motivated. The Vice President is member of the Sunni party which has won most of the seats in the parliament in the 2010 elections.

The Iraqi national government is dominated by Shiite politicians and a power for sectarian influence is being waged between Sunni and Shiite. The sectarian-motivated power struggle lies at the heart of the decision of the Vice President to seek refuge in Sunni-dominated countries.

Since he was charged with terrorist activity, al-Hashemi sought refuge first in the autonomous northern province of Iraqi Kurdistan, where he was sheltered in spite of the federal pressure from Baghdad. In Kurdistan, al-Hashemi took advantage of the oil dispute between Arbil and Baghdad, as the capital was accusing Kurds of stopping the oil production.

Iraqi Kurdistan and the government in Baghdad have an agreement by which Kurdistan delivers all the oil it produces to the government and Baghdad sells the oil and gives Kurdistan half of the revenue. The Iraqi government has accused Arbil of smuggling oil through Turkey without observing the national agreement.

When his staying in Kurdistan could no longer be prolonged without endangering bilateral relations, al-Hashemi fled to Doha, Qatar, and then to Saudi Arabia. Both countries refused to heed to Iraqi demand to surrender him.

Last month, Iraqi government wanted to make a glamorous comeback on the international scene, and for that purpose hosted a summit of the Arab League, which was dominated by the Syrian dispute and also by the sectarian divide among the Arab countries, as most of the Sunni monarchies in the Gulf sent lower-level bureaucrats to attend the meeting in Baghdad, thus undermining the efforts of the Shiite-dominated government.

While in the Saudi Arabia, al-Hashemi said, without presenting however any hard evidence to support his claim, that the Iraqi premier Nouri al-Maliki had opened the Iraqi air space to Iranian aviation which smuggled weapons in embattled Syria.

Even though no evidence was presented, al-Hashemi’s words were enough for the Saudi media to say that the Iraqi government cannot be trusted, because it was supported by the Iranian regime.

Tariq al-Hashemi was the highest-ranking Sunni official in the Shiite-dominated government of Nouri al-Maliki. His version of the facts attempts to make believe that the entire ordeal he is going through is caused by the hatred of the premier, which is set to revenge on him.

Turkish newspaper Todayszaman on May 2, speaking about the possibility at the time that Turkey may harbor al-Hashemi, laid out the legal framework which would make Turkish decision perfectly legal.

Thus, according to Zaman, Turkey and Iraq had an agreement signed on September 19, 1989, which entered into effect in 1995, whose Article 43 states that the two states agree to extradite suspects against whom the other state has launched judicial provisions.

Article 47 of the agreement says that the request can be turned down if the motif of the state to prosecute someone is related to race, religion or political opinion. Since Turkey believes that behind the al-Hashemi case lies a religion-motivated prosecution, it can perfectly invoke this article to motivate its decision.

Tariq al-Hashemi had demanded that the trial be moved in Kirkuk, a city which is divided between Sunni Arabs and Kurds, but his request was rejected by the government which said the case was purely criminal and that the government could not intervene in it. A judicial panel rejected the plea to move the case to Kirkuk and set the starting date of the case for May 3.

B. Netanyahu and S. Mofaz

Israel on Wednesday accused Iran of stalling negotiations over its nuclear program weeks before the talks on its uranium enrichment facilities are expected to commence in Baghdad on May 23, in a format that comprises the five members of the Security Council and Germany.

The move comes at a time when Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu surprised the entire political landscape of his country with his alliance with opposition party Kadima, which renders the talk about snap elections in September obsolete and offer him the possibility to have a stronger government.

The alliance, which was deemed by Israeli media as “the deal of a lifetime,” or “the largest coalition in Israel’s history,” brought Netanyahu the designation of “king of Israel,” “bestowed upon him” by Israel Hayom news editor Amir Mizrokh.

The media representing the Arab speaking population in Israel however considers that this huge political coalition has two purposes: to boost the activity in the settlements and the aggression against Arab Palestinians and to prepare a war on Iran.

Palestinian paper Al-Ayyam speaks of a government of national unity, which is able to convey the world the message that Israel is prepared to undertake an attack on Iran if it comes to this. However, the paper says that this is all it is, a message, and no more than this.

London-based Al-Quds al-Arabi reports that Israel only makes national unity governments when it wants to go to war, and argues that this is a government of war, not of peace.

On Wednesday, Benyamin Netanyahu threatened that he could order an attack on Iran, if he considered that the diplomatic sanctions and the negotiations failed and Iran continued enriching uranium, which the Israeli cabinet considers a deadly threat to its own existence.

Iran held a first round of talks about its nuclear program in Turkey last month, and they were considered a key step forward toward the meeting which started in Baghdad. On Wednesday, Netanyahu told Catherine Ashton, the EU foreign policy chief, that Iran was playing for time and added that the talks can be considered successful only if they convince Iran to abandon completely the uranium enrichment process, ship its current stockpile of enriched uranium and dismantle all underground enrichment facilities near the city of Qom, something Iran is not expected to do, considering that it has always defended its right to produce nuclear energy.

Netanyahu demanded that a “clear timeline” be set for Iran to comply with, but the diplomat who spoke under condition of anonymity about the talks between Netanyahu and Ashton did not say that the Israeli PM offered her an ultimatum.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barack said that Iran would soon enter “immunity zone,” which would make the military strike no longer a viable option. The United States military has offered Israel an assessment on the situation, by which Israel is advised not to engage in an attack against Iran because such a thing would only slow the Iranians down, without damaging their nuclear program beyond repair.

Furthermore, the American assessment said, Iran has some facilities deep within mountains, and an attack on them would be without any repercussion, because not even bunker-buster rockets could destroy them.

Intelligence reports coming from the United States and Russia continued to tell the Israeli government that the regime in Baghdad has not decided to make a nuclear bomb, though it may have the technology for it. The same was said by the Israeli chief of staff, Benny Gantz, who seemed to be in contradiction with the prime minister on the matter a few weeks back.

The United States proposed Israel to wait for the economic sanctions to kick in, which is something Israel agreed to do but not indefinitely. The meeting on Wednesday with Ashton was attended by Shaul Mofaz, new ally and former opponent of the unilateral military strike against Iran.

In the past, Mofaz was said to have advocated the coordination of attack with the United States, but his possible change of mind would give a boost to the military option.

During a visit in India, U.S. State Secretary Hillary Clinton appreciated the cut in Indian imports from Iran, adding however that there was room for more cuts. India was one of the countries which relied on imports from Iran and announced that it dropped its imports from the Islamic country, preferring to buy oil from other countries in the area, such as Iraq, Kuwait or Saudi Arabia.

Clinton’s visit to India with its highlight on the economic relation with Iran is a part of the enforcing of the sanctions decided by the American president against Iran in order to avoid military confrontation.

In February, the Obama administration imposed sanctions on Iranian central bank, saying that there was enough oil on the market to make up for the oil that would be lost in the embargo against Iran. The assessment covered the threat to close the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran made at the beginning of the crisis.

The sanctions which are expected to take effect in June are estimated to collapse Iranian economy and leave it with no power to support a nuclear program anymore. The Western leaders affirmed their hope that the sanctions were paying off, in spite of the boast of the Iranian leaders, who said that the embargo would have no bearing on their action.

The European Union and Japan also announced that they would reduce their imports of oil from Iran, prompting Tehran to threaten that some of the European countries will no longer be allowed to import from Iran.

Turkey, which is a regional partner of Iran, in spite of their different position on cooperation with the Western countries and the Syrian file, reviewed its previous opinion on oil imports from Iran, after it had announced it would only support a sanction that had the UN mandate. Last month, Ankara announced it wanted to diversify its suppliers by reducing Iranian imports by 20 percent.

Tymoshenko's Ambulance

Ukrainian former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who is serving a seven-year sentence in a penitentiary in Kharkiv for abuse of office, on Wednesday, has been moved from prison in a high-security police convoy to a local hospital, where she is expected to be treated for a back pain problem, which she has had for a few weeks. The move is expected to allay Western concerns over her wellbeing.

The move comes after her daughter has announced on Tuesday that her mother had agreed to end her hunger strike she has been on since April 20, when she accused the penitentiary personnel of having hit her in the stomach while forcing her to go to a state-run hospital against her will.

Tymoshenko was brought to the hospital and entered by a side entrance, being escorted by heavy police complement, which included several police cars. She was carried inside on a stretcher, and doctors have flanked her protecting her from the view of journalists and bystanders. Supporters nearby shouted “Freedom for Yulia.”

The state prison confirmed in a statement that Tymoshenko was taken to the local hospital for rehabilitation at the request of the international medical commission. She is expected to be treated by a German medical team, at her request.

On April 20, Tymoshenko was taken to the hospital to be examined after she failed to appear before a court where she was expected to hear the accusation made against her by the state in a case related to embezzlement of more than $400 million dollars in the 1990s.

She said that she refused to go to the hospital and that she feared she could be killed by the Ukrainian medics. She demanded that the German doctors inspect the hospital and participate in the medical procedures.

According to a statement made by her lawyer on April 20 Tymoshenko was dragged out of bed, kicked in the stomach, wrapped up in a blanket and taken to the hospital, where she refused to undergo medical procedures, and, consequently, was brought back to prison.

The penitentiary has a different version of the facts, saying that the former premier had agreed to go to the hospital after the German doctors offered her a positive estimation of the hospital’s capacities.

The district prosecutor said that Tymoshenko packed up her things to go but that then she sat on the bed and refused to move. The guardian, he said, took her by the arms and got her in the vehicle without getting physical with her.

He added that according to the legislation they had ground to use non-brutal force to get her to go to the hospital. The state penitentiary officials added that they did not even need to ask for her consent to go to the hospital, as the law makes it possible for them to force an inmate to get medically checked.

As a result of this episode, Tymoshenko went of hunger strike a move which brought her a lot of support from the Western countries, which demanded of the Ukrainian government to release her or at least to allow her to tend to her needs.

The Western countries have launched a boycott on a Ukrainian summit, which was expected to be held on Friday and Saturday in the resort of Yalta. Presidents from many countries, such as Slovenia, Germany, Italy, Czech Republic or Austria, refused to come to Ukraine, which prompted the government to announce on Tuesday that the summit would be postponed until further notice, with the notification of those in attendance through regular diplomatic channels.

Some governments have announced that they would boycott the Euro 2012 soccer tournament, which is expected to be held in Poland and Ukraine, from June 1, when it starts in Warsaw, until July 1, when it is expected to end in Kiev.

Polish government has expressed regret that the organization of the tournament hangs in the balance of a political matter, insisting that there should be no link between them. The same opinion was expressed by the Danish premier, who announced he would be in Kiev on July 1.

Some officials agreed that boycotting this competition would practically be a boycott of Tymoshenko’s work, considering that she worked very hard to convince the Union of European Football Associations to select Ukraine as host for the competition. According to diplomatic sources a decision on attending the matches that would be played in Ukraine is to be made on Monday at the headquarters in Brussels.

The Russian newly inaugurated president Vladimir Putin said that the soccer competition and the political events should not be intertwined. He offered to receive Yulia Tymoshenko to treat her problems in Russia, a proposal which was immediately rejected by Kiev.

On Tuesday, Ukrainian president attended the Day of Victory against the Nazi regime, and looked undisturbed in spite of the huge pressure amounting on him at the international level.

Yanukovych spoke to the veterans of the WWII, spoke out against the populism of all sorts, but remained silent about Tymoshenko’s case. He did call off the summit which was expected to start on Friday, a move which was deemed by the opposition as a “shameful failure” for Ukraine.

A member of the opposition said that the government in Kiev was dragging the country in international isolation. Vitaly Klitschko, world heavyweight boxing champion said that the government had no interest in meeting the European demands to observe human rights and democratic standards.

Blast near Deraa

A roadside bomb on Wednesday struck a Syrian military truck wounding six soldiers seconds after a convoy of the head of the U.N. observer mission passed by, amid threats from the Syrian rebel leader Col. Riad al-Assad, to resume the fight after the regime failed to honor its engagement to ceasefire.

The blast was heard 300 meters behind the convoy, which was headed for the southern city of Deraa. It was not clear who staged these attacks. Intense shelling has been heard across Syria on Wednesday in the cities of Hama, Deraa, Idlib and Homs provinces, threatening to end the ceasefire agreed in April.

The prospect of all-out war looms over the restive country, where almost 10,000 have been killed over a year and a month of crackdown, and was invoked on Tuesday by special envoy Kofi Annan, who briefed the United Nations Security Council on the results of the mission in Syria.

Kofi Annan said that the mission in Syria of the ceasefire observers was the last chance of the regime to avoid a full-blown war, and that the consequences of its failure could be incomprehensible.

Annan is expected to go to Damascus soon to seek adherence to the ceasefire which came into effect on April 12, but was violated by brutal outbursts by the military. He said that there has been some decrease in the military activity since April 12 but that there were also some serious violations of the agreement.

According to the British Ambassador to the U.N., the mission has 60 observers on the ground and a 37 civilian staff. 100 observers are expected to be deployed by the end of the week and 300 by the end of the month.

On Monday, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that the Syrian problem has become one of the gravest concerns of the international community. He remember the high death toll and said that it was unacceptable.

The Syrian ambassador to the United Nations said that his country was committed to peace and to the full success of the mission the government has agreed to. He blamed the tragedy in his country on armed perpetrators which he said were supported by Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other nations.

He added that the Syrian regime was committed to peace but that it could not do it alone, and lashed out at the international community, accusing it of failing to deal with the “terrorists” the way it dealt with the Al-Qaeda.

American ambassador Susan Rice said that the words of the Syrian ambassador were a diversion. She said she couldn’t say for sure that there were no foreigner fighting in Syria, but that it was not the main issue. The main issue, Rice said, was that the Syrian president continues to kill people.

Susan Rice reminded that the Obama administration was in favor of Annan’s plan, and that it has waited for it to produce some effects, but that the administration was not going to wait for more that 90 days to see results, and that it would examine other ways of applying pressure on the regime.

A few weeks ago, Susan Rice alluded that the Article 42 of the United Nations Charter could be invoked, an idea which was also considered by the French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe, when he said that the regime could not be allowed to insult the international community.

The move seems highly unlikely, since the Article 42 of the Charter authorizes the military intervention against a country which endangers the peace in the world. The United States is having an electoral year and does not seem to agree to the idea of going to war with Syria.

The military intervention has been ruled out by many European countries, and is considered undoable because of the opposition Russia and China would mount against it.

On Monday, the regime in Syria organized the first parliamentary elections in which the opposition was allowed to participate. The vote was seen by the government as a milestone of the new democratic era the country stepped into, but was boycotted by the opposition, which deemed it as a way to consolidate power for the leader Bashar al-Assad.

The American State Department went as far as to consider it a gesture “bordering on ludicrous,” because of the fact that it did not have any requirements of a democratic vote, the freedom of the citizens most of all.

The elections held in conditions of military occupation of the major cities come after the new constitution was voted amid tensions and the opposition boycott. By this new constitution, the right of the other parties to participate in elections is recognized and the mandate of the president is shortened to at most two consecutive seven-year terms in office.

Analysts consider that it would allow president Bashar al-Assad to seek two more mandates, and continue to be president for another 14 years, given that the new constitutional provision does not apply retroactively.

Yulia Tymoshenko

Ukraine on Tuesday announced that it has postponed the summit scheduled for Friday and Saturday at the Black Sea resort of Yalta because of the boycott of western countries which pulled out of it in protest to the way former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko is being treated in prison, where she is serving a seven-year term for abuse of office while being premier.

The Foreign Ministry issued a statement by which it said that the summit would be rescheduled at a later time and that the new date would be announced via diplomatic channels. The move comes after the presidents of Germany, Italy, Austria, Croatia, Estonia, Bulgaria and the Czech republic announced they would not attend the Yalta summit after Yulia Tymoshenko entered hunger strike on April 20.

The boycott is expected to extend on the Euro 2012 soccer tournament, which is expected to be held between June 1 and July 1 in Poland and Kiev. The tournament is expected to begin on June 1 in Warsaw and to end in Kiev on July 1.

German officials announced that the chancellor may take into consideration to heed to the words of the people in the country, who demand that the officials boycott the Euro 2012 because of the treatment applied to Yulia Tymoshenko.

The move is said to be shared by the premier of the Netherlands but not by the one of Denmark, who said that he would go to Kiev. The Polish government also protested against the idea of boycott, demanding that the matter of Tymoshenko be dissociated from the sports event.

The Russian president, who has offered to receive Tymoshenko for treatment in Moscow, reminded that sports and politics should not be mixed and expressed his hope that the sports tournament would not be affected by the case of former premier.

On Tuesday, Yulia Tymoshenko has refused to be treated for back pain problems at the state-run hospital in Kiev. State penitentiary personnel said that after conferring with her lawyers Tymoshenko might reconsider and accept to be treated under the supervision of the German doctors on Wednesday.

It is not clear yet whether the premier may decide or not to renounce her hunger strike. On Tuesday the German doctors who visited her said that the suffering of the former premier is a chronic one and needs special attention, and that it does not go away with some therapy and pills. The doctor said that it would take a while and that it could not be predicted how long, but it would take more than a couple of days.

Photographs of bruises on the arm and stomach, allegedly caused by the guardians who manhandled Tymoshenko, when she was taken to the hospital, were published on the internet, causing disquiet in America and Europe.

The Ukrainian officials refused to launch an investigation, saying that she “bumped into blunt objects.” The official report says that she was not punched in the stomach, and was not aggressed in any way, while asserting that some amount of force is permitted when getting a prisoner to do something they refuse to.

Yulia Tymoshenko is serving a seven-year sentence in Kharkiv being sentenced for abuse of office, a claim she has been rebuffing since the first day of the trial. Her condition prevented her from being present in the courtroom for preliminary hearing in another case she stands on trial for, being accused of embezzlement.