CEUTA, Spain - Spains King Juan Carlos on Monday started a controversial visit to the disputed enclave of Ceuta which has sparked a major diplomatic row with Morocco. Ceuta and another city enclave on the Moroccan coast, Melilla, have been in Spanish hands for centuries but are claimed by the north African country which recalled its ambassador to Madrid last week in protest at the kings first visit to the enclaves.
Juan Carlos arrived by helicopter to cheers of Long Live Spain and Ceuta is Spanish from tens of thousands of residents. He was given a 21-gun salute. The two-day visit to the enclaves by Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia is the first in his 32-year reign. It also comes against the backdrop of new Al Qaeda threats against Spanish, French and US interests in north Africa.
I have an engagement to honour face to face with Ceuta, with the Ceutans, with the Ceutan authorities but also with myself, Juan Carlos told the city assembly in a speech. I did not want to let any more time pass without coming to Ceuta to express to you our approval and our support, he addedwithout mentioning directly the row the visit had caused with Morocco. Spain cultivates a sincere friendship with its neighbours, he added.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/06/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
My two favorite enclaves. I think of them every time Spain whines about Gibraltar. Which is British.
#3
The question is : will the moroccan teevees air movies about the crusades (seen from the Master Religion's point of view), like that last time when there was a dispute about a tiny rocky island near one of those enclaves? This was very subtle.
#4
My two favorite enclaves. I think of them every time Spain whines about Gibraltar. Which is British.
The difference is that Ceuta y Melilla were never in Moroccan hands (Spanish and Portuguese since well before the founding of it). BTW, Gibraltar does not sit well in Spain. It could have pushed Franco in Hitler's arms and that would have meant losing the Battle of Atlantic und jetz würden Sie Deutsch sprechen.
#6
It could have pushed Franco in Hitler's arms and that would have meant losing the Battle of Atlantic
No. It would have meant no battle of the Atlantic, settling scores with the Japanese first, and then showing Hitler what a real bomber like the Peacemaker could deliver. And then all the Euros could goveretye po russkim yazikim until Reagan came along.
The United States and China agreed to work together to steer Iran away from its nuclear ambitions in talks that Chinese President Hu Jintao described Tuesday as "very candid and friendly."
Defense Secretary Robert Gates agreed with Hu's assessment. The two men spoke briefly with reporters before they met Tuesday morning for a discussion that was closed to the press. After a 90-minute meeting Monday with Chinese Defense Minister Cao Gangchuan, Gates said the two "agreed that is it important to pursue efforts to persuade the Iranian government to change their behavior and their policies peacefully, through diplomatic means."
And, with a nod to China's reluctance to support greater economic sanctions against Iran, Gates said he stressed to Cao the importance of using such pressure to convince the Iranian government "to make different choices." Tehran is suspected of seeking to develop nuclear weapons, something it denies.
Continued on Page 49
King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia had a historic audience on Tuesday with Pope Benedict XVI on the first official visit to the Holy See by a monarch from the ultra-conservative Muslim kingdom. The two octogenarians met for half an hour, conversing through interpreters. Abdullah, wearing a traditional blue, gold and white robe, offered the 80-year-old Benedict a gold sword encrusted with stones ... A strange gift.
... and accepted a 16th-century engraving of the Vatican from the pope.
Afterward the 84-year-old Saudi monarch, who was accompanied by a 12-strong delegation, met with the Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone.
Abdullah had arrived in Rome late Monday following visits to Geneva and London.
The Holy See does not have diplomatic ties with Saudi Arabia, which is home to Islam's holiest shrines in Mecca and Medina and applies a rigorous doctrine of Sunni Islam known as Wahhabism. Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal came to Rome in September to pave the way for the meeting, which had been expected to focus on the rights of Christians in Saudi Arabia and Islamic-Christian relations in general. Abdullah's visit comes as relations between the Vatican and the Muslim world have eased since the crisis provoked in September 2006 when Benedict appeared to link Islam with violence in a speech at Regensburg University, Germany.
The lecture sparked days of sometimes violent protests in Muslim countries, prompting the pontiff to say that he was "deeply sorry" for any offence and attributing Muslim anger to an "unfortunate misunderstanding".
It was not King Abdullah's first contact with the head of the Roman Catholic Church. He met Benedict's predecessor John Paul II in 1999 when he was crown prince to his half brother King Fahd.
The question of religious freedoms in Saudi Arabia for Christians and other non-Muslims remains an extremely sensitive one. In September, the US State Department annual report on religious freedoms noted some improvement in "specific areas" in Saudi Arabia but said "overall government policies continue to place severe restrictions on religious freedom." The report mentioned discrimination against non-Muslims, or against Muslims with practices different from Saudi Arabia's strict conservative Wahabi version of Sunni Islam. "Non-Muslims and Muslims who do not adhere to the government's interpretation of Islam continued to face significant political, economic, legal, social, and religious discrimination," it said. "Charges of harassment, abuse, and even killings at the hands of the muttawa (religious police) continued to surface. Saudi textbooks continued to contain statements of intolerance."
King Abdullah's stay in Rome is the third leg of a European tour that will also take him to Germany and Turkey. Abdullah's lavish three-day state visit to Britain, the first by a Saudi monarch in 20 years, sparked human rights protests. Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, who travelled to Riyadh in April, was to meet the Saudi king later Tuesday, while Foreign Minister Massimo D'Alema was to have talks with his Saudi counterpart Al-Faisal.
#1
The question of religious freedoms in Saudi Arabia for Christians and other non-Muslims remains an extremely sensitive one.
This is an absurd claim. There are no religious freedoms for anyone in "Arabia", either muslim or non-muslim.
And that is the last the civilized world will see of that 16th-century engraving. It would have been better to smash it on the pavement than hand it over to this barbarian king.
#2
a snow-globe of a cathedral in Mecca would've been nice
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/06/2007 11:14 Comments ||
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#3
Might be instructive for the beard to see that the Vatican has been around a long time with nary an oil well in sight...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
11/06/2007 11:58 Comments ||
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#4
"..he brings a golden sword as a gift, eh? Let me see what I got laying around here. Let's see, let's see. Oh, here is a box marked Valletta, should be appropriate..."
#5
(don't know how to upload pictures of my trip else I would - not pictures of the Popeye set I was too busy walking the approach from Ft. St. Elmo to Rabbit Medina, on the lookout for the cavalry raids. As the quote from the book said, when the populace was captured by the Turks and offered freedom in return for helping the Turk seige, "Better a slave of the Christians then a friend of the Turks.")
#7
swksvolFF, go ask the guys in the O Club. They do that kind of thing quite often there. (It's a clicky thingy in the yellow bar on the right margin of the main page. Tell AutoBartender to put your drink on my tab, 'k?) ;-)
#11
So what was the name of the theme song that the Vatican brass band played for His Rotundity the King?
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
11/06/2007 19:56 Comments ||
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#12
"Sympathy For The Devil"?
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/06/2007 21:15 Comments ||
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#13
I like it. Swiss guard with a drumroll while the Pope accepts the sword, treat it like the saud's surrender. Prosciutto and wine at the reception, chanting of 'The Song of Roland' as entertainment...
DUBLIN - Only one in four Irish people supports the new EU treaty, according to a poll Monday which could set alarm bells ringing in Brussels two years after voters torpedoed a previous blueprint. Irish backing for the treatyessential for the measures aimed at streamlining decision-making to come into forcehas halved over the past two years, the TNS mrbi poll in The Irish Times newspaper showed.
Ireland, which rejected a previous European Union treaty in 2001 only to overturn its decision, is constitutionally bound to hold a referendum on the treaty agreed at a summit in Lisbon last month. The so-called reform treaty must be ratified by all 27 EU member states to come into force. It replaces the constitution which was sunk by French and Dutch voters in referendums in 2005.
In Mondays poll, 25 percent of Irish people said they would vote yes to the treaty while 13 percent intended to vote no. Sixty-two percent said they did not know or had no opinion. The newspaper said that in a comparable poll on the proposed EU constitution in March 2005, 46 percent said they would vote yes against 12 percent who would vote no and 42 percent who had no opinion. Given that the content of the two treaties is almost identical, the sharp drop in support for the treaty indicates that the referendum result could be very close, commented the paper.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/06/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
> streamlining decision-making
that's code for taking power away from people, and handing it to unelected beurocrats. I'm sure that 1930s-1940s Germany was streamlined.
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Air Force temporarily grounded its fleet of Boeing Co. F-15 fighter-bombers, including those flying missions in Afghanistan, the service said, citing ``airworthiness concerns.''
The grounding of more than 700 aircraft, which includes F- 15E fighter-bombers that carry the largest U.S. precision guided weapons, took place after the crash of a Missouri Air National Guard F-15C fighter on Nov. 2. The Air Force said in a press release Sunday that it was suspending only ``non-mission critical flight operations'' while a safety board determines the cause. The service in a statement tonight said it broadened its actions to a worldwide grounding of F-15s that includes bases in England, Hawaii, Japan and the Middle East.
``All F-15 aircraft have been grounded, not just non-mission critical flight ops,'' the Air Force said. ``The grounding will remain in effect until conclusions are made'' by the safety investigation, the service said. Aircraft assigned to Afghanistan and patrols over U.S. airspace will be on ground alert in case of a major emergency, the service said. Lieutenant General Gary North, who commands U.S. Middle East aviation forces, said in a statement that in spite of the F-15 groundings the Air Force ``will accomplish all assigned missions'' in Afghanistan ``with a variety of fighter, attack and bomber aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles.''
The F-15, introduced in 1975, is no longer in production. The plane is the primary U.S. air-to-air fighter, and the ``E'' model is capable of carrying the largest laser-guided bombs. ``When they say all the F-15s are grounded that means America's top-of-the-line fighter is not flying,'' said Loren Thompson, a defense analyst with the Arlington, Virginia-based Lexington Institute. ``The F-15 is getting so old that we could endanger our global air superiority'' because of advances in Russian and Chinese fighter planes, Thompson said.
The U.S. is phasing out the F-15 with the new Lockheed Martin Corp. F-22 fighter. The Pentagon has limited the Air Force to buying 183 of the new aircraft instead of the more than 300 the service says it needs. The F-15 groundings and focus on the extent of its aging may buttress the case for more F-22s, Thompson said. ``This is going to force the Pentagon to rethink how many F- 22s it wants to replace the F-15,'' Thompson said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/06/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
Reported on the radio this morning as "all jets" were grounded after a plane "disintegrated" in flight.
Well, it is a more exiting story, that way.
Posted by: Bobby ||
11/06/2007 6:49 Comments ||
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#2
So is it really a safety concern behind the grounding? Or a bit of salesmanship for the F-22? Or some of each?
#3
Reported on the radio this morning as "all jets" were grounded after a plane "disintegrated" in flight.
At one point some near new Spitfires desintegrated in flight. It was found they were unstable longitudinally and that stressed the cell. Adding a few pounds of weight in the right place solved the problem.
Of course it could be that the F15 airframes are showing their age.
#5
If the problem cannot be addressed in a timely fashion are these numbers sufficient to forestall an attack to remove Iran's nuclear program? Does anyone know if the Israeli's have grounded their F-15s?
#6
Saw a picture of the wreckage...looks like the right V-stab was not present. Structural failure related to age, in-flight cyclic stress? Losing a stabilizer in flight is a quick way to ruin your day, glad the pilot got out. Go go ACES-2.
#7
So there was a problem with the F-15C. What was the age of that particular airframe? When were the last F-15E's built? I don't think that long ago, unless I am very mistaken. You have to think that there is some "we really need to replace all these planes" pressure going on here, but I am not one to make any determination about this.
#8
When the A6E Intruders started showing wing fatigue ( after VA-128 lost a wing over a bombing range) all a/c were grounded for inspections. cracks were detected and fixes created, and the birds flew for several more years, but maintenace manhours went through the roof due to increased inspection requirements. Did not lose another bird to a failed wing however. The USAF will work through this problem and the Eagles will be in the air again soon.
#10
Glenmore; yes it is and is suffering the same wing fatigue as my much loved Intruders. by 2013 they will all be retired, replaced by the (spit) EF-18G ( Growler, aka Electric Lawn Dart)
#14
NS IIRC the F-15s racked up a LOT of airtime during the no fly zone enforcement days pre 9/11. Planes and pilots both suffered some metal fatigue ....
Seriously, most folks don't realize just how much we overworked our planes & pilots enforcing Saddam's nofly bit. The air force academy had trouble filling faculty positions with rated officers for a number of years because the pilots kept being sent to duty there or in the balkans.
(CBS/AP) A 2-year-old girl born with four arms and four legs was responding well Tuesday to the early stages of extensive surgery to remove the excess limbs, organs and other body parts of her "parasitic twin," the lead surgeon said.
Lakshmi's twin stopped developing in their mother's womb. As the surviving fetus, Lakshmi absorbed the limbs, kidneys and other body parts of the undeveloped fetus. Her rare condition is called isciopagus.
The complications for Lakshmi's surgery are myriad: the two spines are merged, she has four kidneys, entangled nerves, two stomach cavities and two chest cavities. She cannot stand up or walk.
It's an extremely rare and difficult procedure. A team of neurosurgeons has separated the fused spines, and will next try to remove the extra limbs, then the rest of her "parasitic twin," said Dr. Sharan Patil, the orthopedic surgeon heading the operation. The surgery began early Tuesday.
"Certainly, it's a very risky operation," Patil told CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips. "There are a dozen cases done in the world, probably none of them in India so far."
"The child has been responding very well," Patil told reporters outside Sparsh Hospital in the southern city of Bangalore where Lakshmi is undergoing surgery, several hours into the surgery.
Patil warned that the surgeries would "take many, many hours on a continuous basis" - up to 40 hours - and involved 30 surgeons.
Before the operation began, he said there was a 20-25 percent chance Lakshmi would die during the operation. "It's a big team effort of a lot of skilled surgeons who will be putting their heart and soul into solving the problem of Lakshmi," Patil said.
It wasn't immediately clear if doctors expected her to ever be able to stand or walk - before the surgery, her limbs were severely atrophied.
Lakshmi is named for the four-armed Hindu goddess of wealth, and some in her poor village in the north Indian state of Bihar highly revere the little girl, her father, Shambhu, said. "Everybody considers her a goddess at our village," said Shambhu, who goes by one name.
He said the family feared people would try to make money from her and, after an unsuccessful attempt by a circus to buy her, they had kept her in hiding.
Dr Patil Mamatha said the hospital's foundation was paying for the surgeries because her family could not afford the medical bills.
Lakshmi is popular among the medical staff and other patients, Mamatha added. "She's a very cute girl," she said. "She's very playful and gets along well with others."
This kind of thing has always fascinated me, so I did some googling around for "isciopagus". Don't do that, because it's "ischiopagus".
Anyhow, reading about "parasitic twins" led me to this page. Let's not see Ms. Day on the front page of the Defender-Scimitar and Times-Picayune, please. But do read the heartwarming story of how her father suggested her current occupation.
#7
I've seen photos of many folks like this in the olde time freakshows. A very interesting sight, many parasitic twins seem to have been fairly benign additions to the "host". I wish this young lady all the luck in the world - sounds like she may need it.
#9
GK, no, just... Girl's name's Lakshmi. Goddess' name's Lakshmi too, with four arms and two legs... doctors promise to remove extra limbs, I have to wonder what do they mean... ;-)
#11
Apparently, there was a reason why parents named their girl Lakshmi => Kali has 8 arms, Lakshmi 4. Else they would name her Kali if she had 8 arms. Just FYI, Grumenk Philalzabod0723. ;-)
Vice Chief of Army Staff (VCOAS) General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani visited Tilla field firing ranges near Jhelum on Sunday to witness annual field firing and battle inoculation maneuvers conducted in near real operational environment, said ISPR in a statement. Ashfaq appreciated the training standard of troops who were participating in a large number in the exercise.
We've seen that training standard displayed to good effect in Swat and both Wazoos.
He said that all available means would be utilised to improve the operational capability of the Army in accordance with the prevailing and future operational environment.
I'm not sure they've got their finger on the pulse of the prevailing operational environment, unless they've keyed in on losing consistently to beturbanned yokels.
He emphasized the need for the Army to remain focused on professional excellence and not to lose sight of its primary function.
... which is providing jobs for officers.
Earlier, Corps Commander Rawalpindi Lieutenant General Mohsin Kamal received the General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani at Tilla field firing ranges. ISPR said Field Formations of Pakistan Army are presently undergoing an intensive spell of winter training in the field. Tactical exercises and field firing is being carried out in training areas in various parts of the country to enhance operational preparedness. Scope of training ranges from preparation for conventional operations to enhancement of skills and prowess required to succeed in operations against terrorists and extremists and urban area employment within the framework of low intensity conflict, ISPR added.
I think they've got a little way to go before they'll pass their field trials.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/06/2007 00:00 ||
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by Hillel Fendel
The head of the police investigative team probing Olmert's alleged intervention in the Bank Leumi privatization recommends charges against the Prime Minister.
According to a report in the Yisrael Hayom Hebrew-language commuter paper this week, the entire investigative team that was actively engaged in the probe supports the decision to indict the Prime Minister, in opposition to the stance taken by the head of the Police Department's Investigations Wing, Yochanan Danino.
The Bank Leumi case is one of four cases against the Prime Minister currently being investigated by the police. It involves suspicions that Olmert, as Acting Minister of Finance in late 2005, attempted to change the terms of the sale of the bank to fit the terms of two of his friends, who were in the bidding to buy it. The friends later dropped out.
The police have apparently found that had the sale gone through according to the amended terms, the State of Israel stood to lose $250 million. Olmert's defenders, on the other hand, say it is normal to amend the terms of a deal during the negotiating stage.
The investigation was opened based on testimony by Dr. Yaron Zelicha, the Finance Ministry's Accountant-General. Current Finance Minister Roni Bar-On attempted to cut short Zelicha's term in office because - Zelicha says - of his whistle-blowing, but the State Comptroller prevented him from doing so.
State Prosecutor Eran Shendar, who was to have made the final decision on an indictment against Olmert, has left his position. A replacement is to be chosen within a few weeks, and must be approved by the Olmert government.
Other Police Investigations
Another investigation against Olmert involves his purchase of a luxury apartment on Jerusalem's Cremeiux St. for a discount of at least $330,000, in exchange for Olmert's influence in expediting municipal construction. He is also under investigation in the matter known as the Investment Center case, for which State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss has recommended that Olmert be indicted for his intervention in a case involving his friend, former partner and current lawyer Uri Messer. Finally, the police are also investigating alleged political appointments Olmert made as Trade Minister in the Small Business Administration.
Winograd Removes Last Vestiges of Threat Against Olmert
Amidst all the police investigations against him, Olmert received some good news regarding the Winograd Commission that was charged with investigating the government's failures during the Second Lebanon War. The Commission informed the Supreme Court officially on Sunday that it does not plan to issue criticism of specific persons. It had long been expected that the Winograd recommendations would be so strong that Olmert would be forced to resign - whereas it now appears that Olmert has nothing to fear from Winograd.
An Iranian teenager sentenced to death for killing a drug dealer when he was 16 has escaped execution after the parents of the victim accepted 1.5 billion rials ($160,000) in blood money, his lawyer said on Monday.
But in another case that has put the spotlight on the Islamic Republics human rights record, lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh said a higher court had upheld a sentence of two and a half years in jail and 10 lashes for a womens rights activist. Sotoudeh is representing both Sina Paymard, a musician who was initially scheduled to be put to death last year, and Delaram Ali, who was convicted in July for attending a banned rally in favour of female rights.
Ali, 24, was accused of participating in an illegal gathering, propaganda activities against the system, and disrupting public order during a demonstration in Tehran in June 2006 at which scores of people were detained. The superior court confirmed the verdict, Sotoudeh told Reuters. I think they (the judiciary) want to execute this verdict as soon as they can. By sentencing her to lashes, she said the authorities wanted to tell Ali you are not important ... you are a small person.
Paymard, now either 18 or 19, was arrested in 2004 for stabbing a drug dealer in a Tehran park but his death sentence was postponed twice, giving the family more time to find compensation money.
The victims family first declined to accept the sum in compensation, which would allow the sentence to be commuted, and demanded the execution go ahead. But Sotoudeh said they had now changed their minds and on Sunday went to court: They took the blood money ... Sina will not be executed.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/06/2007 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
CEUTA, Spain - Spains King Juan Carlos on Monday started a controversial visit to the disputed enclave of Ceuta which has sparked a major diplomatic row with Morocco. Ceuta and another city enclave on the Moroccan coast, Melilla, have been in Spanish hands for centuries but are claimed by the north African country which recalled its ambassador to Madrid last week in protest at the kings first visit to the enclaves.
DUBLIN - Only one in four Irish people supports the new EU treaty, according to a poll Monday which could set alarm bells ringing in Brussels two years after voters torpedoed a previous blueprint. Irish backing for the treatyessential for the measures aimed at streamlining decision-making to come into forcehas halved over the past two years, the TNS mrbi poll in The Irish Times newspaper showed.
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Air Force temporarily grounded its fleet of Boeing Co. F-15 fighter-bombers, including those flying missions in Afghanistan, the service said, citing ``airworthiness concerns.'' 
by Hillel Fendel
