[Aypee] Excerpt: Two gun Chow was lauded by U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California for his work as a former offender who had become a community role model, and praised by San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee for his "willingness to give back to the community." He posted pictures of himself on Facebook with Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom. All the while he was running a criminal operation, according to court documents.
Several years ago, undercover FBI agents assigned to Chow infiltrated the organization, and ultimately snared Yee and his campaign consultant Keith Jackson. And with 'Shrimp Boy's' political connections, it will likely be "years" before justice is done.
#3
And as was mentioned in the Wheelus O-Club yesterday, Chow was among the California legislators who last week voted against legislation extending that state's affirmative action.
The timing for this (aand the slew of other Federal arrests of Democrats nationally) is interesting.
#8
As surmised yesterday this is battlespace prep.
Get all the Dem corruption out and buried so that close to the election the 'pub baddies can be outed and monopolize all media coverage in the lead up.
[CHICAGO.CBSLOCAL] A reliably Democrat Chicago, aka The Windy City or Mobtown ... home of Al Capone, a succession of Daleys, Barak Obama, and Rahm Emmanuel,... bicyclist attacked by a machete-wielding assailant describes his narrow escape.
CBS 2's Chris Martinez reports.
The Humboldt Park man was just three blocks from his when he was hit.
The victim asked CBS 2 to conceal his face. He's still stunned by what happened over the weekend.
He was riding home when he spotted two men approaching from an alley. Then he noticed one of them had a machete.
"One of them hit the bike with the machete, in the back wheel, and that stopped me," the bicyclist says.
Pictures show the damage. There was a gash in the bike's tire, followed by the victim's question to the attacker: "I think I said, 'Oh, my God, you have a machete. Is this a joke?'"
His attackers' next move proved it was not.
"He got right in my face, but he just punched me in the face," he said.
That's when he noticed the second man was filming the attack with a camera phone.
The victim managed to escape on a flat tire. The bizarre run-in was especially puzzling because the bad guys never tried to take a thing.
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#1
Knock-out game escalation or jihadis on the prowl?
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03/28/2014 9:56 Comments ||
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[AnNahar] Hundreds of dead pigs are being recovered every month from a Chinese reservoir, partly due to government efforts to stop carcasses making their way onto the dining table, state media said Wednesday.
The revelations about the reservoir in Qionglai, in the southwestern province of Sichuan, are the latest scandal relating to food safety to hit China.
The news comes one week after authorities found 157 dead pigs in a river in Jiangxi province. A year ago China was stunned by the appearance of more than 16,000 dead pigs floating along parts of the Huangpu river which flows through the country's commercial hub Shanghai.
The dead creatures also started to drift along rivers into the Qionglai irrigation reservoir five years ago, the Western China City Daily reported.
Now an average of 500 carcasses are retrieved from it every month, the report said, citing Xu Bangchun, one of the two workers hired by local water resources authorities to deal with the remains.
"I have no time to do other things at home now that my main job every day is to recover dead pigs," said Xu, who also runs a family farm tourism business nearby.
There are more than 300,000 pig farmers along the three rivers that feed the reservoir, the paper said.
Some of them are believed to be dumping the dead animals into the waters, probably at night, it said.
Such carcasses were rare in the reservoir until 2005, when the government tightened controls to prevent meat from dead pigs being sold for food or other purposes such as fish feed, the report said, citing a farmer.
A government-subsidised pig insurance scheme was introduced to encourage farmers to dispose of fallen animals properly, it said, but excludes piglets -- which make up most of the floating carcasses -- because of their vulnerability to disease, the paper said.
#6
Dear China -- here in the barbarian west, we have businesses that turn dead livestock into profits. That way we don't have rivers and lakes choked with their carcasses.
P.S. -- the same businesses dispose of cattle, too.
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#7
Sixteen thousand dead pigs would raise quite a stink.
[AnNahar] Guinea battled Wednesday to contain an Ebola epidemic threatening neighboring countries as fear and confusion gripped communities under siege from one of the deadliest viruses known to mankind.
Global aid organizations have sent dozens of workers to help the poverty-hit west African nation combat the haemorrhagic fever, with health officials raising the corpse count by two to 63.
"On Monday, two more deaths were reported in our area. People are really frightened," Joseph Gbaka Sandounou, a unit manager for Plan International was quoted as saying in a statement released by the organization.
"They have seen people die in a matter of just two or three days. They are constantly worried who is going to be the next fatality."
The British-based charity said people of Guinea's southern forests -- the epicentre of the outbreak which began in February -- had been terrified by seeing neighbors bleeding severely as they were struck down by the virus.
"People have never experienced anything like this before. Rumors are rife among communities who are trying to come up with their own explanations," said Sandounou.
Ebola had never spread among humans in west Africa before February but five deaths being investigated in Liberia, one in Sierra Leone and others still being tested could bring the total in the epidemic to above 70.
"We are not at the end of this epidemic, we continue every day to record a number of new cases or fatalities," said Guinea's chief disease prevention officer Sakoba Keita, confirming the two new deaths.
"But the daily incidence is lessening. We believe the peak has passed."
The tropical virus -- described in some health publications as a "molecular shark" -- causes severe fever and muscle pain, weakness, vomiting and diarrhoea, shutting down organs and causing unstoppable bleeding in severe cases.
Other highly-contagious tropical bugs, including the Marburg virus and Lassa fever, can lead to similar symptoms but the authorities have not announced which other pathogens have been picked up in test samples.
"It is not just people but also the health workers who are extremely worried. When the epidemic broke out a number of health workers had no clue what they were handling nor did they have the protective gear," said Sandounou.
"As a result, a number of Ebola victims have been health workers. We heard reports that health workers turned patients away due to fear in some cases before the health administration swung into action."
Sierra Leone warned on Tuesday that a 14-year-old buried recently may have been infected in Guinea, while the deaths of four women and a boy in Liberia are being tested for the killer virus.
Guinea has banned inhabitants of the south from eating bats, a common feature of the local diet, as the creatures are considered to be the natural host of the virus.
Transmission of Ebola to humans can come from wild animals, direct contact from another human's blood, faeces or sweat, as well as sexual contact or the unprotected handling of contaminated corpses.
Doctors Without Borders, which is known by its French initials, MSF, said the spread of the disease was being exacerbated by people travelling to funerals in which mourners touch the dead person's body.
No treatment or vaccine is available for Ebola, and the Zaire species in Guinea -- first found in the Democratic Republic of the Congo ...formerly the Congo Free State, Belgian Congo, Zaire, and who knows what else, not to be confused with the Brazzaville Congo aka Republic of Congo, which is much smaller and much more (for Africa) stable. DRC gave the world Patrice Lumumba and Joseph Mobutu, followed by years of tedious civil war. Its principle industry seems to be the production of corpses. With a population of about 74 million it has lots of raw material... 38 years ago -- has a 90 percent death rate.
Guinea is one of the world's poorest nations despite vast untapped mineral wealth, with a stagnating economy, youth unemployment at 60 percent and a rank of 178th out of 187 countries on the UN's Human Development Index.
Plan, MSF and other aid organizations are working are providing treatment and sanitation facilities and relaying public health information, especially to schools, via the media and text messages.
MSF emergency coordinator Marie-Christine Ferir said the priority was isolating patients showing symptoms, protecting their families and neighbors while treating them with dignity.
"We want to avoid the danger of the population panicking and it is important to transmit all the information necessary to understand the disease and how people can protect themselves," she added.
#2
Wonder if Al-Queda or other bad guys are trying to figure out how to export this to the US or other infidels....
Would seem rather easy to place infected person in air terminal and pass the virus on....
[Yemen Post] In yet another report dedicated to Yemen's child marriage dossier, UNICEF published a blurb this Wednesday in which it calls on the authorities to protect all girls from a cruel fate by imposing a legal age limit on marriage.
Intent on bringing home the issue of child marriage by putting a face onto what UNICEF qualifies as violation of international law, the UN agency recall the tale of Laila, a young teen whose father, Nasser decided to wed even though she was only 13 years old, without so much as considering her feelings or life aspirations. While Laila was de facto married off, her family members stepped in before the union could be consummated, saving the young girl from a life she neither had chosen, nor wanted for herself.
"I started screaming, and my mother rushed out to grab me while my father angrily threatened to beat -- or even kill -- me, if I refused. I was helpless. It was like a nightmare. I saw my world crashing around me. I wanted the nightmare to end so I could be back at school with my friends," Laila told UNICEF when recalling the moment her father announced he had entered her into a marital contract.
Over the past year, Yemen has been plagued by such reports; maidens of tender years being forced into marriage with men much older than them, maidens of tender years being brutalized and harmed by their older husbands, maidens of tender years dying from injuries sustained on their wedding nights. Such reports, which it is important to note have often proven to be highly inaccurate and on many instances completely fallacious have led the international community to look on Yemen as a land where children, especially maidens of tender years are being systematically abused by their parents, no more than prizes to be sold to a lucrative wedding industry.
While child marriage remains an issue which requires immediate attention, normalization should not be tolerated as it would do a terrible disservice to all those who have indeed suffered such abuse.
UNICEF wrote, "In Yemen, child marriage of girls, sometimes as young as 8 years old, is widespread. The recent National Social Protection Monitoring Survey showed that 13% of girls under the age of 18 in Yemen are married, and that nearly half of women between the ages of 20 and 49 were married before their eighteenth birthday."
UNICEF's mention of data implies that a great majority of Yemeni families condone forcing their daughters into marriages they do not desire ... this is clearly a case of misinformation and misrepresentation. While 13% most girls arguably marry young, most of them do so at age 16. Many countries, among which the United States of America, allow such teen marriages.
A cluster of activists have suggested that rather than focus on an age limitation, the state should focus on consent as to ensure that only consensual marriages take place, especially since such a requirement falls in perfect alignment with Islam and thus will ensure that an endorsement from the religious authorities.
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[BUSINESSWEEK] Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... named Prince Muqrin bin Abdulaziz as second in line to the throne, the latest royal promotion as King Abdullah confronts unprecedented political instability in the Middle East and economic changes at home.
Muqrin, the king's half-brother who was born in 1945, was made second crown prince alongside his duties as second deputy prime minister, the official Saudi Press Agency said yesterday, citing a royal decree. King Abdullah named his defense minister and half-brother Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz, born in 1935, crown prince in June 2012, making the traditionalist former governor of Riyadh next in line to become king.
"By many accounts, Prince Muqrin is a close and trusted adviser to King Abdullah," said Fahad Nazer, a political analyst at Vienna, Virginia-based JTG, and a former official at the Saudi embassy in Washington. "His relative youth, extensive experience in government and knowledge of the West make him an attractive candidate. He appears to be a generally popular figure among many Saudis, whereas other royals may be more polarizing."
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[Dhaka Tribune] BNP Chairperson the loathesome Khaleda Zia Three-term PM of Bangla, widow of deceased dictator Ziaur Rahman, head of the Bangla Nationalist Party, an apparent magnet for corruption ... yesterday claimed that party founder Ziaur Rahman was the first president of Bangladesh as he proclaimed the independence of the country.
Tarique Rahman ...the elder son of former President of Bangladesh Ziaur Rahman Bir Uttam, and Khaleda Zia, former Prime Minister of Bangladesh. He is the Senior Vice Chairperson of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP). His nickname is Pino. There are allegations that Pino took a rakeoff from every foreign investment into the country while Mom was in office... , eldest son of Khaleda Zia and Ziaur Rahman, at a discussion in London first claimed that his father was the first president of the country citing the same logic.
"In 1971 when nobody was saying anything Ziaur Rahman proclaimed the independence. That's why he is the first president of the country. Awami league is scared of Ziaur Rahman as he is the announcer of independence," Khaleda said addressing a discussion at the Institution of Engineers, Bangladesh. Jatiyatabadi Mukktijodha Dal organised a discussion to mark the Independence Day where the former premier questioned the freedom fighters: "Did you free the country from the shackle of Pakistain to get shackled to another country?"
Khaleda on behalf of her husband Ziaur Rahman received the crest for his glorious role in the independence war. Khaleda Zia was also honoured with a crest for her role in the war.
Criticising the government for honouring the foreigners for their role in the Liberation War, Khaleda said: "The way foreigners were honoured it seemed that people of Bangladesh did not fight in the Liberation War."
Reminiscing her ordeal in 1971 she said: "During the Liberation War, I along with my two sons and wife of Colonel Mahfuz came to Dhaka from Chittagong by a steamer. I was then incarcerated Drop the rod and step away witcher hands up! and detained in different cantonments."
She however recognised the contribution of the Awami league and Bangabandhu to the liberation war, "They inspired people in the Liberation War. We will not deny it."
The BNP chief also said she was not proud of being the wife of a president or prime minister rather she feels proud of being the wife of the "proclaimer of independence."
She said fair election was not possible under a partisan government and it was "proved once again in the upazila parishad elections."
Khaleda asked the government to take the initiative to hold talks to restore caretaker government system to oversee the polls.
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The Last Trumpet's gonna sound, eventually.
[NBCNEWS] Tighter U.S. and European sanctions to contain Moscow's Ukrainian land grab will be tough to pull off. But if fully deployed, they could be very painful to Russia's already weakening economy.
For all the headlines, the sanctions invoked so far against Moscow for invading Crimea amount to little more than a slap on the wrist.
"The sanctions so far from the U.S. and Europe are primarily signaling, but they're not going to fundamentally change Russian behavior," former World Bank president Robert Zoellick told CNBC.
The "signals" include Russia's suspension from the Group of Eight major industrialized powers on the eve of a long-planned summit in Sochi. U.S. and European authorities have also frozen the assets of a handful of President Vladimir Putin's closest political allies.
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#1
Poor Russians, all the right thinking (or should it be rights-thinking?) People of the World are against them. Why does it sounds familiar?
#3
Don't worry, they still have the motorcycle 'militia' of Caracas with them. Oh, and Hamid Karzai. Oh, and the MILF, who apparently were hooked up by the same Russian arms dealer Leland Yee could hook ya up with.
The Third Smartest Man In The Room is out and about, doing his smart thing.
[AnNahar] Pentagon chief Chuck Hagel will travel to China and Japan next week after hosting a meeting of Asian defense ministers in Hawaii, amid tensions between Beijing and Tokyo over a disputed island chain.
The U.S. military has sought improved relations with its Chinese counterpart, arguing that stronger links will help avoid dangerous misunderstandings.
Beijing has made broad territorial claims in the South China Sea and East China Sea that are not recognized by Washington and its regional allies, including Japan.
Tokyo administers an island chain, known as Senkaku in Japanese and Diaoyu in Chinese, which is claimed by Beijing, which sometimes sends ships or aircraft to underline its position. Washington has appealed to both sides for restraint.
The gathering of defense ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in Honolulu on April 1 to 3 will mark the first time the group has met in the United States.
Hagel has made relations with ASEAN defense chiefs a priority and the meeting -- along with his subsequent tour of Asia -- underscored Washington's strategic pivot to the Pacific region, Pentagon front man Rear Admiral John Kirby told news hounds on Thursday.
Hagel's trip to Asia, his fourth in less than a year, offers "further evidence of the secretary's personal commitment to the president's rebalance to the Asia-Pacific region," Kirby said.
Apart from security cooperation, the ASEAN meeting was expected to focus on bolstering disaster relief efforts among governments, including cooperation between military and civilian agencies, he said.
The meeting comes as the United States and Asia-Pacific countries take part in an intense search effort for the wreckage of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, which went missing on March 8 with 239 people on board after taking off from Kuala Lumpur en route to Beijing.
The Pentagon's latest strategic plan anticipates an increase in the frequency and scale of humanitarian assistance efforts in coming years, and Hagel "believes that the United States and our partners must be prepared for that reality," Kirby said.
After the ASEAN session in Hawaii, Hagel will fly to Tokyo six months after launching a review of the U.S.-Japan military alliance.
The visit to Tokyo follows a landmark summit this week between President Barack Obama Jedi mind meld... , Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and South Korean President Park Geun-Hye in The Hague.
Washington has sought to defuse friction between Japan and South Korea, two allies considered crucial to U.S. interests as it seeks to confront the threat posed by North Korea and counter China's growing military might in the region.
After Japan, Hagel will travel to China for this first trip to the country since becoming defense secretary in 2013.
"The secretary views this relationship as crucial to our rebalance, and he will emphasize the importance of building trust, increasing openness and transparency and upholding international norms throughout his trip," Kirby said.
The United States has backed calls by other governments in the region for a "code of conduct" that would set up a framework for resolving a litany of competing territorial claims.
Hagel will wrap up his tour with a stop in Mongolia, which is "becoming a more important security partner for the United States," said Kirby, citing the country's troop contributions in recent years to U.S.-led missions in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"As one of the fastest-growing economies in the world, Mongolia also has a growing stake in stability across the Asia-Pacific," he said.
#1
Besides the US-VS-RUSSIA UKRAINE-CRIMEA CRISIS = US-VS-CHINA TAIWAN, OKINAWA-SENKAKUS, SOUTH CHINA SEA, INDIA, ...ETC.
* CHINA DAILY > NET CITIZENS COMPARE LOST CHINESE TERRITORIES TO CRIMEA CRISIS.
* WORLD NEWS > [Deccan Chronicle = Stars-n-Stripes] PACIFIC COMMANDER: US LACKS THE ABILITY TO CONDUCT SUCCESSFUL AMPHIBIOUS OPERATIONS.
US PACOM Chief USN ADM. Locklear.
Post-GWOT, 2014 Amerika's "1-to-1-1/2" UN Police Actions = Bush/Local Wars MOOTW global strategeery.
IOW, the RussFed + PLA + IRGC, etc. will face only those [FEW?]US Milfors + other USDOD, Allied already in-place save for those arriving or intervening from CONUS + CENTCOMS.
* RELATED VOICE OF RUSSIA > BUDGET CUTS MAY ERODE US ARMY ABILITY TO FIGHT LONG WAR [Major = Protractive Wars]: ARMY GENERAL.
US Army El Supremo Odierno.
* FYI WORLD MILITARY FORUM > US LAWMAKERS [Ron Paul]: US CANNOT SAVE UKRAINE NOR CAN AFFORD WAR AGZ RUSSIA.
Ditto as I've said said even before the Ukraine-Crimea Crisi began as per Rising China in East Asia-Pacific, to include Rising Iran.
* JAPAN TIMES > ABE READY FOR FULL-ON MILITARY DIRVE, i.e. Amendment of Article 9 of Japan's post-war Constitution + national military rearmament includ possibly NucWeaps.
China fears a Japanese Nuclear = Nuke-armed State, as Japan already has the Tech know-how to produce indigenous advanced Missles + other MilSys.
#4
But balloon launched navy dragoons are going to be the awesome, throw in a spacecraft which looks like a clipper ship and a battlemech which looks like an olde england phone booth weilding a pen and we're off.
#6
Good, then they can keep up appearances by meeting with the US ambassador to...wait, she's on the other side of the world getting drunk with her son on a nude beach.
[NEWS.YAHOO] America's cities are still growing, with the population boom fueled by people picking up and moving to find jobs in energy production across the oil- and gas-rich areas west of the Mississippi River.
New 2013 census information released Thursday shows that cities are the fastest-growing parts of the United States, and a majority of the metro areas showing that growth are located in or near the oil- and gas-rich fields of the Great Plains and Mountain West.
Neighboring cities Odessa and Midland, Texas, show up as the second and third fastest-growing metro areas in the country. Sara Higgins, the Midland public information officer, has a simple explanation: oil. "They're coming here to work," Higgins said.
Energy production is one of the fastest-growing industries in the United States, the Census Bureau said. The boom in the U.S. follows the use of new technologies, such as hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, to tap oil and gas reserves.
"Mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction industries were the most rapidly growing part of our nation's economy over the last several years," Census Bureau Director John H Thompson said.
According to its data, revenue for mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction grew 34.2 percent to $555.2 billion from 2007 to 2012. It also was among the fastest growers in employment as the number of employees rose 23.3 percent to 903,641.
The population boom does come with some challenges, said Andrea Goodson, the public information coordinator in Odessa, including the need for quick improvements to city infrastructure and housing to deal with the influx of new people.
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[DAWN] The UN General Assembly on Thursday adopted a Western-backed resolution declaring Crimea's breakaway referendum illegitimate and refusing to recognise Russia's annexation of the peninsula.
The non-binding resolution passed with a comfortable majority in the 193-member body, with 100 votes in favour and 11 votes against. More than 20 countries did not vote.
Ukraine, which drafted the resolution, had urged the international community to back the text, hoping an overwhelming show of support would ward off further Russian intervention on its territory.
"I am convinced that a strong vote today will help to deter further aggressive moves," acting Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Deshchytsya told the assembly.
"It sends an essential message that the international community will not allow what has happened in Crimea to set a precedent to further challenges to our rules," he added.
Western diplomats wanted a strong majority vote to press home what they say is Russia's isolation, but there had been fears that a high number of countries would abstain.
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#1
As things stand, the Bammer has promised to boost NATO in the Baltics + Poland [Eastern Europe, wid Vlad doing the same on his side allegedly all around the Ukraine.
IT COMES DOWN TO HOW BOTH SIDES WILL HANDLE UKRAINE PROPER.
Again, iff NATO-EU allow Russia to control or domminate the CRimea per se, in return Putin may allow a "moderate", non-threatening level of NATO Conventional Forces to be based in the Ukraine per se + possibly elsewhere in Russia's former Soviet satellites.
IMO Putin will not accept US-LED/ONLY MISSLE DEFENSE = GMD-TMD OR US-NATO NUCWEAPS IN THE UKRAINE PROPER UNLESS UNDER "JOINT" US-RUSSIAN CONTROL.
Given the above, + Soon-to-be-Nuclear Muslim Nations + even Radical Islam's Hard Boyz, IMO the US-Allies cannot be too serious or harsh on Russia as per ECON SANCTIONS IRREGARDLESS OF ANY DIPLOAMTIC-MEDIA RHETORIC TO THE CONTRARY.
A SEVERELY WEAK RUSSIA HELPS NO ONE BUT THE HARD BOYZ + JIHAD-IN-AMERIKA.
The Anti-US OWG Globalists cannot afford to miscalculate unless they are ready-n-willing to de facto RISK THEIR OWN HEADS.
The "GREAT GAME" TAKES NO PRISONERS NO MATTER WHOM OR WHAT, ETC. THEY ARE.
#2
* ION RUSSIA TODAY > OBAMA'S WORDS ON RUSSIA'S WEAKNESS ONLY EXPRESSES [not just US-specific "Panic" but also] "AGONY OF THE USA" - LEADING RUSSIAN SENATOR.
Valentina Matviyenko, Chief of Russian State Duma's Upper Parliament, whom says THE US STILL REFUSES TO ACCEPT THAT THE WORLD IS NO LONGER UNIPOLAR, + THAT COLD WAR RIVAL, POST-SOVIET RUSSIA IS NOW A MAJOR OR GLOBAL ECONOMIC FORCE IN THE WORLD.
#3
"It sends an essential message that the international community will not allow what has happened in Crimea to set a precedent to further challenges to our rules,"
[AnNahar] The International Monetary Fund announced on Thursday a $14-$18 billion bailout for Ukraine to avert bankruptcy for the crisis-hit country amid its escalating standoff with Russia.
So, a band aid. Hurrah.
The agreement in principle, worth the equivalent of 10.8-13.1 billion euros, is tied to tough reform conditions which will have a big impact on the Ukrainian economy and people.
The Fund's Ukrainian mission chief Nikolai Georgiyev said the rescue would form the central part of a broader package released by other governments and agencies amounting to $27 billion (19.6 billion euros) over the next two years.
Georgiyev said the actual size of the "standby agreement" would be determined only once the new Western-backed leaders of Ukraine implemented the reforms the Fund had sought in vain from the cabinet of Kremlin-backed president Viktor Yanukovych.
That government was toppled in February by three months of protests.
"The program will be approved by the IMF board when the steps that I mentioned are implemented," Georgiyev told news hounds after holding a decisive round of talks with Ukrainian President Arseniy Yatsenyuk on Wednesday.
"We expect (the approval) by the end of April."
The package announced by the Fund is only slightly smaller than that $15-20 billion (10.9-14.5 billion euros) requested by the former Soviet state's new leaders when Georgiyev's mission first arrived in Kiev on March 4.
The Fund has made an immediate end to Ukraine's costly gas subsidies one of its main conditions for the program's approval.
It also wants the central bank to stop propping up the Ukrainian currency and for the government to cut down on corruption and red tape.
Georgiyev called these two steps as a more committed effort to fight bureaucratic red tape and state corruption "the foundation for stable and sustainable growth".
The IMF program was announced one day after the Ukraine's state energy company Naftogaz said it would increase domestic heating gas prices by 50 percent on May 1.
Naftogaz added that rates for district heating companies would go up by 40 percent on July 1 and that further rate increases were likely in the coming years.
Ukraine's central bank has already limited its currency interventions -- a decision that has seen the hryvnia lose more than a quarter of its value against the dollar since the start of the year.
The IMF program's formal approval in April will set in motion the release of further assistance from both Washington and the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... Yatsenyuk said he expected European Union officials to send 1.6 billion euros ($2.2 billion) to Kiev within two months of approval of the loan deal.
The United States has also pledged $1 billion (720 million euros) in loan guarantees while Japan has promised up to $1.5 billion (1.1 billion euros).
Economist believe that the IMF decided to move faster than it may have initially wanted out of concern that the Ukrainian government could become insolvent within a matter of months.
Ukraine's fast-depleting reserves -- spent the previous years on propping up the currency at artificially high rates in order to avoid public discontent -- had reached levels sufficient to cover just two months of imports.
It also owes billion of dollars in foreign debt payment coming due within the next few months.
[FOXNEWS] Yulia Tymoshenko, former Ukrainian prime minister, announced Thursday that she will run for president. Tymoshenko, who was released from jail last month following the overthrow of President Viktor Yanukovych, returns as one of the most polarizing figures in Ukraine's political scene.
The vote is set for May 25.
I'll be surprised if Putin lets it happen...
"I will be the candidate of Ukrainian unity," the 53-year-old Tymoshenko said. "The west and center of Ukraine has always voted for me, but I was born in the east, in Dnipropetrovsk."
This will be her second attempt to secure the presidency -- she narrowly lost to Yanukovych in 2010.
Once Yanukovych was in power, Tymoshenko was brought to trial and convicted of abuse of office for negotiating a 2009 deal for Russian gas imports at an allegedly excessive price. The trial was widely seen as a political vendetta, but the gas deal and Russian President Vladimir Putin ...Second and fourth President of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead... 's comments that he found Tymoshenko easy to work with shadowed her image with many Ukrainians.
Tymoshenko struck a hostile stance toward Putin on Thursday, saying she considers him "the No. 1 enemy of Ukraine."
Her return to the forefront of public life brings back one of the most divisive ...politicians call things divisive when when the other side sez something they don't like. Their own statements are never divisive, they're principled... figures in Ukraine's political scene. She is variously admired as an icon of democracy and detested as a self-promoting manipulator with a shady past.
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#1
One thing I've noticed about Ukrainian politics: they all run on pro-Western (anti-Russian) platform, and they all come sucking up to Russia after being elected.
#3
I think it's also have something to do with a few million Ukrainians working in Russia and sending money home + where Ukraine major markets are, Pappy.
Dunno. Putin got what he wanted in the short term in Crimea without much more than moving his pieces around. Now he just needs to hang around on the border while Ukraine splits east/west over its internal politics. Not that a little provocation and disruption wouldn't hurt...
[DAWN] A court in Pakistain sentenced a Christian man to death for blasphemy Thursday, his lawyer said, over an incident that triggered a riot in the country's second-largest city.
Sawan Masih was convicted of insulting the Prophet Mohammed (PTUI!) during the course of a conversation with a Mohammedan friend in the Joseph Colony neighbourhood of Lahore in March last year.
More than 3,000 Mohammedans rampaged through Joseph Colony, torching some 100 Christian homes, after the allegations against Masih emerged.
Naeem Shakir, one of Masih's lawyers, told AFP: "The judge has announced the death sentence for Sawan Masih.
"We will appeal the sentence in the Lahore High Court."Verdict and sentence were announced inside the jail where Masih was held, Shakir said.
The country has had a de facto moratorium on civilian hangings since 2008. Only one person has been executed since then, a soldier convicted by court martial.
Pakistain has extremely strict laws against defaming Islam, including the death penalty for insulting the Prophet Mohammed (PTUI!), and rights campaigners say they are often used to settle personal disputes.
Masih has maintained his innocence and argued the real reason for the blasphemy allegation was a property dispute between him and his friend.
No one was killed in the rampage through Joseph Colony last year but the incident highlighted the sensitivity of blasphemy in Pakistain.
Some 97 per cent of the 180 million population are Mohammedan, and even unproven allegations can trigger a violent public response.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/28/2014 00:00 ||
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Link ||
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Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
Phuckin Muslim Extremeists ALL of them !!! they are like Aliens object overtake and overtule
[AnNahar] Iraq's health ministry said Wednesday it had found its first suspected polio ...Poliomyelitis is a disease caused by infection with the poliovirus. Between 1840 and the 1950s, polio was a worldwide epidemic. Since the development of polio vaccines the disease has been largely wiped out in the civilized world. However, since the vaccine is known to make Moslem pee-pees shrink and renders females sterile, bookish, and unsubmissive it is not widely used by the turban and automatic weapons set... case in 14 years, which could have originated in neighboring Syria where confirmed cases have sparked a region-wide alert.
The suspected case was found in a young boy in Bab al-Sham near Storied Baghdad, ministry front man Ziad Tariq told Agence La Belle France Presse.
He said the case was not yet confirmed and that samples had been sent to the United States for further testing, with results expected on Sunday.
If confirmed, it would be Iraq's first case of polio since 2000.
"We suspect the case originated in Syria," Tariq said. "We are afraid of that, we have thousands of refugees from Syria, and the health situation is complicated because Anbar is bordering Syria."
Anbar, a predominantly Sunni province in western Iraq, has been long been a source of unrest in Iraq.
In early January, anti-government fighters took control of all of the Anbar city of Fallujah, ... the City of Mosques, which might have somthing to do with why it's not called Center of Prosperity or a really nice place to raise your kids... and parts of the picturesque provincial capital Ramadi, some of which they still hold.
Late last year, the U.N. confirmed that at least 17 children in war-wracked Syria had been paralyzed by polio, in the country's first cases of the disease since 1999.
Fifteen of the cases were in the eastern province of Deir Ezzor, large swathes of which are under rebel control.
The outbreak in the midst of Syria's three-year-old civil war prompted the World Health Organisation and U.N. childrens' agency UNICEF to launch a vaccination campaign for 23 million children across the Middle East, which got under way in earnest this month.
Tariq said a vaccination campaign was already under way in Iraq and would run until April 6, over and above routine childhood vaccinations.
[AnNahar] Pope Francis will pray side-by-side with Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople Bartholomew in Jerusalem in a powerful sign of Christian unity during his May visit to Holy Land, the Vatican said on Thursday.
The prayer will take place in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built over the spots widely believed to be the sites of the crucifixion, burial and resurrection of Jesus.
The two will also sign a joint declaration when they meet on what will be the 50th anniversary of a visit to Jerusalem by two of their predecessors, Pope Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras.
"We are called to be one, and the pope is coming to remind us of this and renew the spirit of unity and fraternal love," Latin Patriarch Fuad Twal told news hounds in Jerusalem as he announced the program of the pontiff's May 24-26 visit to Israel, Jordan and the Paleostinian Territories.
During the brief trip, Francis will celebrate Sunday mass in West Bank city Bethlehem, where Jesus is believed to have been born.
He will meet Paleostinian and Syrian refugees and visit the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial.
But Twal warned the visit could be jeopardized if a strike by staff at Israel's foreign ministry is not resolved in time.
"If the strike goes on for two months, I don't think we can make the visit to Israel, but for sure the visit will be done in Jordan and Paleostine," said Twal, who is the Holy Land's senior Roman Catholic prelate.
However, a clean conscience makes a soft pillow... Father David Neuhaus, who represents Hebrew-speaking Catholics in Israel, said the government had pledged the visit would not be affected.
"Israel has given assurances, both from the prime minister's office and from the office of the foreign minister, that the strike will not affect the visit," Neuhaus said.
Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman's front man confirmed his remarks.
But a spokeswoman for the foreign ministry's labor union insisted that if the strike was not resolved, they would not facilitate the visit.
"As long we are on strike, we are not attending to the Pope's visit," she told Agence La Belle France Presse, indicating that a preparatory visit by Vatican officials, due to take place earlier this month, had been cancelled as a result of the industrial action.
Idiots. This is why government workers cannot be allowed to unionize.
#1
* See TOPIX > [Groong = Payvand News] CONTAINING IRAN IS HELPING PUTIN'S RUSSIA.
Energy = Pipeline Wars.
Again, as Merkel's Germany is now Russia's strategic partner + BFF in NATo-EU, that leaves the Nuke-happy Rising Muslim Powers, so-called "Neo-Ottoman" Turkey + Obama BFF, OWG Co-Superpower = OWG Caliphate-happy Rising Iran, + Count Dooku's Boyz, for Vlad = Russia to worry about.
By extension, Putin's responsibility as per the promotion + protection, etc. of Russia's strategic interests also includes the RUSSIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH + ALIGNED.
#2
FYI I'm looking on the Net to see iff the various Orthdox denominations will call a mass Confab = Universal Synod on the state of their Church-Faith.
[Ynet] Israeli official says reconciliation efforts with Ankara played a role in decision to allow construction materials and electric equipment in the Strip.
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.
[CHICAGO.CBSLOCAL] A 
[AnNahar] Hundreds of dead pigs are being recovered every month from a Chinese reservoir, partly due to government efforts to stop carcasses making their way onto the dining table, state media said Wednesday.
[AnNahar] Guinea battled Wednesday to contain an Ebola epidemic threatening neighboring countries as fear and confusion gripped communities under siege from one of the deadliest viruses known to mankind.
North Korea
...Second and fourth President of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead...
