[Iran Press TV Latest] Lebanese authorities have discovered thousands of forged identity cards only three days ahead of watershed parliamentary elections in the country. According to a Thursday report by Asharq al-Awsat, Lebanese security agents have confiscated over 4,000 falsified ID cards and have adopted concrete measures to identify those behind the forgery and bring them to justice.
Learned a few tricks from ACORN?
The Al-Hayat newspaper, meanwhile, in a report cited two sorts of forgery regarding the identification cards. According to the report, the perpetrators had resorted to counterfeit ID cards together with ones which carry the names of Lebanese expatriates who have neither acquired Lebanese identity cards nor are expected to cast ballots in the decisive parliamentary elections.
Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora and Interior Minister Ziad Baroud have promised to implement necessary measures to lower the chances of voter fraud during the elections. "We have taken strict measures and we will take even more measures to bring the situation under control," Baroud said in an address to a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday night.
Lebanon's parliamentary elections are scheduled to take place on June 7. The ballot vote is of significant importance as it pits the pro-Western majority against the opposition powerhouse led by Hezbollah.
Former American president Jimmy Carter is set to lead the international delegation tasked with vote observation.
Kiss the Cedar Revolution goodbye ...
Last month, the European Union deployed nearly 90 personnel to Lebanon to keep an eye on the electoral process. Arab monitors are also in the country and will stay there until the election results are officially announced on June 10.
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[ADN Kronos] A bid by US president Barack Obama to reach out to the Muslim world has already come under attack from Islamists in the Middle East. Obama delivered an historic speech in the Egyptian capital Cairo on Thursday in which he sought to create a "new beginning" in relations between America and the Muslim world.
An MP from the Lebanese Shia movement Hezbollah was one of the first to attack the president's overture. "The Islamic world does not need moral or political sermons. It needs a fundamental change in American policy beginning from a halt to complete support for Israeli aggression on the region, especially on Lebanese and Palestinians, to an American withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan," said Hassan Fadlallah.
Mohamed Habib, deputy leader of Egypt's banned Muslim Brotherhood, echoed Fadlallah's criticism. "It's a public relations address more than anything else," he said. "There's an unjust perspective on the part of the American president towards the Palestinian issue, one that does not differ from former president Bush's and the neoconservatives' perspective."
Meanwhile, an Israeli minister rejected Obama's call for the dismantling of illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
"In his speech, Obama ignored the fact that Palestinians are yet to renounce the path of terror...Our relations with the Americans are based on friendship and not on surrender. With regards to natural growth in the settlements we must tell the Americans -- No more," said Israel's minister of science and technology Daniel Hershkowitz, quoted by Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth.
Javier Solana, the European Union's foreign policy chief, praised Obama's speech and said it would open a "new page" in relations with the Arab and Muslim world.
The secretary-general of the Arab League, Amr Moussa, told Dubai-based Arab TV network al-Arabiya that Obama's speech was based on dialogue rather than attacks against Islam and thus "different from that position adopted by the administration of George W. Bush."
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[Iran Press TV Latest] Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei says the US administration cannot bring about changes through the expedient of paying lip service.
"Creating change and a new image, cannot be gained by paying lip service and mottos, but through practical moves and compensating for US injustice towards the Iranian nation and other nations in the region," Ayatollah Khamenei told a gathering of people, who were marking the 20th death anniversary of the late Founder of the Islamic Republic, Imam Ruhollah Khomeini.
The Iranian leader's comments in Tehran on Thursday came only hours before the US President Barack Obama's delivered his much anticipated address to the Muslim world from Cairo.
"The previous US administration's aggressive measures, military interventions and discriminatory actions painted an ugly picture of the US and Muslim nations deeply hate the US," Iran's leader said.
He also put American accusations against Iran's nuclear program in clear perspective. And though he has done this many times in the past, apparently Iran's detractors have not been listening or are playing the old game of the 'West knows best' in circumstances wherein western hegemony is facing an interesting, generally unforeseen and unprecedented mix of global challenges.
"The US is trying to block the Iranian nation's legitimate right to use nuclear technology by telling lies and accusing Iran of trying to make nuclear bombs," the leader said.
"The Iranian nation and its officials have repeatedly declared that nuclear weapons have no place in Iran's defense system and it has even been declared that using nuclear weapons is an Islamic Haram (religiously forbidden)," Ayatollah Khamenei added.
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[Iran Press TV Latest] Britain rejects a comment by the Iranian president that former British premier Tony Blair had sent a letter of apology to Iran over the Marines case.
The rejection came one day after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in a televised debate with rival Mir-Hossein Moussavi said that a letter by Blair had prompted Tehran to release the 15 British sailors who were arrested by Iranian forces for illegal entry into Iranian waters in 2007.
"The sailors were captured and after the issue reached a climax, Mr. Blair sent a letter of apology. He said they would change their policy toward Iran. The related documents are in the Foreign Ministry ... I believe that one of the most beautiful things the Islamic Republic did was to release the sailors," Ahmadinejad had said.
The sitting president had made his remarks after Moussavi criticized Ahmadinejad over his foreign policy approach and cited the case as an example of the current administration's failed policies.
An official with Britain's Foreign Office, however, told the BBC Persian website that the Blair administration had not apologized to the Iranian government in 2007.
After the arrest of the sailors, some letters were exchanged between the British embassy to Tehran and Iranian officials, but the letters were not meant as an apology because the incident basically did not happen in the Iranian territorial waters, the Persian-language report cited the spokesman as saying.
Fifteen British sailors and marines -- detained on March 23, 2007 for illegal entry into Iranian waters -- were released by Tehran on April 4.
At that time, an advisor to the Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei had also said that Tehran had received a letter from the British prime minister before the release of the 15 British personnel.
On the release, Ali-Akbar Velayati then explained that Iran had achieved its "objectives" in the political standoff with Britain over the arrests.
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#1
well, if in this entire ordeal, the best the UK say is that they didn't apologize to Iranian pirates, then we have a pathetic situation here.
[ADN Kronos] Two Lebanese workers employed by the United Nations in Lebanon were released on Thursday after facing claims they were allegedly spying for Israel, the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon said. "UNIFIL is assisting the Lebanese authorities in their investigations, per the agreement between Lebanon and the UN on the situation of UNIFIL," said UNIFIL spokesperson Yasmine Bouziane.
According to Lebanon News, Bouziane said that Lebanese authorities notified UNIFIL about the arrest of two employees on 26 May on claims that they were allegedly spying for Israel.
She added that both have returned to their jobs after primary investigations.
Lebanon is understood to be holding 30 suspects, 21 of whom have already been charged.
Several others have confessed to have worked for the Israeli intelligence service Mossad. Israel has not commented on any of the arrests.
Lebanon and neighbouring Syria remain technically at war with the Jewish state.
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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
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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.
