Senin, 23 Juli 2012

United Nations secretary-general arrives in Serbia


Ban is holding separate talks with Jeremić - who will in September take over as UN General Assembly chair - and Serbian President Tomislav Nikolić and, PM-designate Ivica Dačić.
In Ban's talks with Serbian officials, special emphasis is expected to be placed on Kosovo, where the UN secretary-general will visit the members of the UN mission and meet with officials of the government in Priština.. 

While in Kosovo, Ban will also visit the medieval Serb Orthodox monastery of Visoki (High) Dečani, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. He will also travel to the town of Prizren. 

Ban's tour of the Balkans started on July 20, and he has so far visited Slovenia, Croatia, and Montenegro. After Belgrade and Priština, the UN chief will travel to Macedonia, and then Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Minggu, 22 Juli 2012

Officials in southern Russia held over floods

Russian police have arrested three officials in the southern Krymsk region accused of failing to warn residents of disastrous flooding earlier this month.

The former head of Krymsk district, who had already been fired for his handling of the floods, and the mayor of Krymsk town are among those held.

The floods claimed the lives of 171 people, mostly in the town of Krymsk.
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"Essentially ignoring the weather service forecasts, the suspects did not inform the population about the looming danger and did not take steps to evacuate people," spokesman for the Investigative Committee said to Russian TV, according to the AFP news agency.

The floods were the first major disaster of President Vladimir Putin's third term in office, and federal authorities have been eager to show they are heeding criticism of the official response, which has been voiced even in normally pro-government media outlets.

Echoes of 1878

The Balkans Game, Then and Now
by , July 20, 2012

"The Balkans of today is a product of Imperial intervention, created and maintained by force, deception and propaganda. Those who served Empire’s purposes – e.g. Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, the Albanians or the Bosnian Muslims – feel they should have gained more in the bargain. The Serbs, who lost out at every turn, aren’t willing to concede any more. None are happy with the status quo. Yet the Empire persists in efforts to make it final."

Sabtu, 21 Juli 2012

Punk Band Feels Wrath of a Sterner Kremlin

MOSCOW — When four young women in balaclavas performed a crude anti-Putin song on the altar of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in February, it seemed like just one more episode in a season of audacious, absurdist and occasionally offensive protest.

Instead, the case of the young punk rockers, whose group is called Pussy Riot, is becoming a bellwether event in the Russian capital, signaling an end to the chilly tolerance the Kremlin displayed in response to the winter’s large demonstrations.

The three women arrested after the performance have been held in custody for more than four months, a term that was extended on Friday by six months, through next January. They could be sent to prison for seven years.

Preliminary hearings in the case offered some of the most striking courtroom images since the trial of Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky, which took place in the same building. While that case tested Russians’ feelings toward a billionaire businessman, this one picks as its targets slender young women with hooded sweatshirts and Twitter accounts — avatars of the protest movement itself.
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The government picked a ripe opportunity to crack down, since many Russians found the cathedral performance offensive. It took months for the case to provoke support for the women, even in the opposition-minded city of Moscow. But the balance seemed to shift last month, when a roster of famous artists and musicians, including some vocal supporters of Mr. Putin, signed a petition contending that the case “compromises the Russian judicial system and undermines trust in the authorities.”

Jumat, 20 Juli 2012

Serb leaders from northern Kosovo send open letter to Ban

KOSOVSKA MITROVICA -- Heads of the four north Kosovo municipalities sent on Thursday an open letter to the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon ahead of his tour of the region.

In it, they underlined that the entire Serb community and the four Serb municipalities in the northern part of the province are at serious risk, and that in the process of finding a solution for the Kosovo issue, the UN and UN SC Resolution 1244 must not be circumvented.

Taking into account numerous killings, incidents and pressures, the security situation in Kosovo and Metohija gives a cause for concern, the letter reads, adding that the lives, human rights and freedoms of members of the Serb ethnic community are at particular risk.

Underscoring that in the last 13 years, more than a thousand Serbs were killed, while tens of thousands Serb houses and apartments are still usurped, or were burnt down or demolished, four municipal presidents claim that several hundred thousand Albanians still possess arms, and that they have not been disarmed as was stipulated in UN SC Resolution 1244.

“The fact that more than a thousand (ethnic) Albanians, who committed murders and serous crimes against Serbs, have the full freedom of movement and take part in the political life, as they have not been prosecuted, is yet another cause for concern,” the letter reads.
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Together with Albanian leaders from Priština, certain international actors and power centers intend to the complete the project of Kosovo's independence by using force, the letter adds.
Inquiry Seeks Accomplices of Bomber in Bulgaria

BURGAS, Bulgaria — Police officers fanned out across the tranquil beach towns here on the Black Sea on Friday, searching for clues to the identity of the bomber who blew up a bus filled with Israeli tourists on Wednesday, focusing new attention on his possible accomplice or accomplices.

Bulgaria’s interior minister, Tsvetan Tsvetanov, said at a news conference Friday that investigators had determined that the suicide bomber, who died along with five Israeli tourists and a Bulgarian bus driver, was a foreigner. He later told state television that the attacker used nearly seven pounds of TNT to build his bomb.

“He couldn’t have been alone, a person alone in an unknown country,” said a senior Bulgarian official familiar with the investigation. “We believe it took at least a week to organize.”
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Micky Rosenfeld, a spokesman for the Israeli police, said a team of eight forensics officers had spent about 12 hours at the site in Burgas. They returned late Thursday night with “a lot of evidence,” Mr. Rosenfeld said, which they are giving to Israeli and other security agencies.

The Bulgarian Interior Ministry said in a statement that experts from France, the United States and Switzerland working for Interpol were expected to arrive here on Friday. At the news conference in Burgas on Friday, Mr. Tsvetanov said investigators would have to sift through “more than 100 bags” of evidence gathered from the crime scene to determine the full picture of the attack before details could be made public. The investigation is painstaking work, he said, noting that the remains of the bomber were dispersed “in a 50-60-meter perimeter,” or up to nearly 200 feet.

The intensity of the investigation reflected not only the severity of the crime, but its international significance. Israel immediately blamed Iran and its surrogate, Hezbollah, a charge Iran denied. American officials speaking on the condition of anonymity identified the suicide bomber as a member of a Hezbollah cell operating in Bulgaria.
Finland Rejects Talk of Euro Exit After Backing Spain Rescue

Finnish Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen dismissed speculation his government is considering dropping the euro should the debt crisis deepen after the Nordic nation’s parliament agreed to back a Spanish bank bailout.

“We will not and do not consider exiting the euro,” the premier said today in an interview in Helsinki. “We want to be at the heart of European development. A stronger euro, a better euro is the only, and reasonable, thing for Finland.”

Finland’s demand that bailouts come with strict terms such as austerity and burden sharing, coupled with Katainen’s rejection of common bonds, has prompted economists including Nouriel Roubini to suggest the nation may ultimately quit the euro in protest.
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Finland, which saw the anti-bailout party the “The Finns” become the third-biggest in elections in 2011, also demanded collateral to back a second bailout for Greece last year. It was not an easy decision to back Spain, Katainen said.

“It was a necessary decision to take, even though it’s very hard,” he said. “It’s unpopular, but we have to take responsible moves and steps because the economic situation is so challenging.”