News For Read

Iran-Venezuela ties worry US

2009-08-13T05:23:00.000-07:00

By Danielle Kurtzleben

WASHINGTON - Some foreign policy experts are saying that the deepening relationship between Iran and Venezuela, while worrisome, is not currently a major threat to United States interests.

Speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), three leading academics in the fields of Iranian, Venezuelan and US foreign policy examined the relationship between Iran and Venezuela.

Over the past decade, Iran and Venezuela have increasingly cooperated with each other economically and militarily. President Mahmud Ahmadinejad of Iran and his counterpart President Hugo Chavez have expressed support of each other's most unpopular policies - often while expressing antipathy towards the US as well.
David Myers, professor of political science at Pennsylvania State University, characterized the relationship between these two US antagonists as potentially problematic for US interests, but not immediately threatening.

"I would argue that there's at least enough there that it bears watching," said Myers, adding, "I don't think it's a major national security threat."

Since Chavez became president in 1999, he has visited Iran seven times, and Ahmadinejad has visited Venezuela twice in the same period.

During this time, the relationship between the two countries has extended into a wide range of areas. Iran and Venezuela opened up travel between the two countries in 2007 with weekly flights between Tehran and Caracas.

Economic cooperation has also grown. The countries in April inaugurated the Iranian-Venezuelan Development Bank, a joint venture to fund development projects in both countries. Together, they pledged US$200 million towards the effort.

In addition, Iran has begun manufacturing operations in Venezuela - establishing plants there that produce bicycles, tractors, cars and cement.

The countries enjoy significant military cooperation - Iran provides training and support to the Venezuelan military, having embedded its officers with Venezuelan units since 2006. Myers also noted that, in part due to Iran's influence, Venezuela's military has adopted asymmetric warfare as its official doctrine.

This military relationship was further cemented in April, when, on a visit to Caracas, Iranian Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammed-Najjar pledged "full support to promote the Venezuelan military's defense capabilities in the framework of mutual defensive agreements".

Iran and Venezuela have a history of advocating for each other's interests, even when most other countries disapprove. Chavez, for example, has voiced support for Iran's uranium-enrichment program. This program causes fears among the US and many other countries about Iran's potential for building nuclear weapons - though Iran insists that it is purely for civilian purposes.

Chavez also congratulated Ahmadinejad on being declared president for a second four-year term after June's Iranian presidential elections, the results of which are widely disputed, both within and outside of Iran.

The US and Venezuela have had a checkered relationship in recent years.

Chavez often refers to the US as the "evil empire" and has accused it of orchestrating the 2002 Venezuelan coup that removed Chavez from power for a short time.

Relations between the US and Venezuela appear to have softened somewhat since the inauguration of Barack Obama as the US president. Obama and Chavez exchanged a handshake and engaged in polite conversation at the April 2009 Summit of the Americas in Trinidad, where Chavez also presented Obama with a book.

The US and Venezuela also reinstated their ambassadors to each other's countries this year. Venezuela had expelled the US ambassador in 2007, and the US pulled its ambassador out of Venezuela in response.

More significantly, the US and Venezuela found some common ground in opposing the June coup in Honduras that removed president Manuel Zelaya from office.

Yet, last week saw more anti-American rhetoric from Chavez. At the news of the expansion of the US military presence in neighboring Colombia - ostensibly for counter-narcotic purposes - Chavez called the US "the most aggressive nation in the history of humanity”.

US relations with Iran are even rockier. The US does not currently have diplomatic ties with Tehran - considering the Islamic Republic a state sponsor of terrorism and opposing its uranium-enrichment program. Obama has extended an invitation to Ahmadinejad to talk about Iran's nuclear program and has set September as the deadline for Iran to accept.

In its attempts to extract change from Iran on its nuclear policy, the US's main tool has been economic sanctions - limiting Iranian purchases of US food and medical products. Several Iranian banks are also prohibited from transferring money to or from US banks.

Since June's elections, the US has considered even stricter sanctions that would cut off Iran's imports of gasoline and other refined oil products. A bill allowing the imposition of such sanctions was the topic of a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing last week.

The Venezuela-Iran alliance serves in part to undermine US economic sanctions on Iran. By cooperating with or buying Venezuelan businesses, the Iranian government can effectively do business with US companies or even within the US.

Myers in particular cited the Iranian government's May 2008 purchase of Venezuelan bank Corp Banca CA, thus circumventing the US embargo and effectively allowing Iran to conduct business within the US.

Military cooperation between Iran and Venezuela is even more troubling to top defense officials in the US, who have expressed dismay at Iran establishing a military presence in the US's own "strategic back yard”.

Given the flurry of activity between Iran and Venezuela in the past six months alone, Myers said it would appear that this alliance can only grow: "I think the prognosis is that the ties between Venezuela and Iran are going to be strengthened in the future, not weakened."

Yet, the Iran-Venezuela alliance's significance in terms of US interests is questionable.

Mohsen Milani, professor and chair of the Department of Government and International Affairs at the University of South Florida, said at CSIS that Iran currently had more important issues than its relationship with Venezuela to consider - such as the continuing unrest caused by the June elections and a steadily worsening economic situation.

"Venezuela is not at the top of Iran's priorities," said Milani. "If I were to grade it, I'd give it a C+/B-."

John Walsh, a senior associate at the Washington Office on Latin America, a Washington-based non-governmental organization that promotes human rights and democracy in the region, characterizes Iran's benefits from its relationship with Venezuela as mostly strategic.

"My sense, with regard to Iran's interests in a more high-profile relationship with Venezuela, is that it is part of [Iran's] strategy of balancing its own geopolitical prospects," Walsh told Inter Press Service. "If it feels hemmed in, which it does, and insecure at home, it is another card to play, in terms of how it relates to, in particular, the US."

Chavez's benefits from Iran also go beyond economic and military interests. "If you believe, as Chavez does, that we are now in a multipolar, as opposed to a unipolar moment, then relationships among countries normally considered peripheral are going to take on increasing importance," said Walsh.

He added, "Venezuela is involved with Iran, so then Venezuela has more play with the US."

Walsh said that the US should exercise care that its rhetoric regarding Latin America's relationships to Iran does not become reductive. "There is a lot of talk in Washington that suggests a new Cold War mentality," wherein Latin American countries can easily be broken down and categorized by their political affiliations, he said.

"I think that the issue of Iran's relationship with certain countries is used to persuade people that that is the case. I think it is much more complicated," said Walsh.

He added that he considered such thinking to be not only simplistic, but wrongheaded. "Just consider how Latin American countries view the Iranian regime, and how some feel that Iran has supported terrorism on their own soil. So it is not like people are lining up to align themselves one way or the other."

(Inter Press Service)

2009-06-22T21:04:00.001-07:00

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Economic Good News and Bad News

2009-06-17T20:55:00.000-07:00

Given the nature of the terrible problems George W. Bush has left us, I remain thankful every day that someone rational and intelligent like Barack Obama is our President (can you imagine McCain or Bush trying to manage all this? Oh, wait, we just had eight years of that). Thanks to Obama's leadership and strong action, there is actually some good news to report on the economy: we've gone from triple red alert, every day in a panic crisis to some measure of day to day stability. That is a good thing, and Obama should get an enormous amount of credit for it. The fact that there is any good economic news at all is a huge relief after all the horrible news of the last nine months.

The question now is whether we can go from stabilizing the economy to actually improving it, and whether the improvement that does happen translates into real benefits in the economic conditions for most Americans. A Washington Post story with a very positive spin about how the economy is getting better quoted. Anil Kashyap, an economist at the University of Chicago, saying this: "The feeling is that for now we've avoided the Great Depression. But the real economy is still in pretty bad shape."

The good news is that President Obama's steady leadership and aggressive intervention seems to have stabilized the economy and returned confidence to our economic institutions. He deserves credit for that, and is getting it for the American public. But the bad news is still extremely bad; if unemployment stays incredibly high or even climbs higher, if home prices don't start coming back, if wages don't start climbing again, if health care costs and grocery prices stay high, if start-up businesses still are having trouble getting loans -- if all of this continues for a long time to come, we are all in very deep trouble.

The American people know how deep our problems are, and will be patient for awhile. They clearly appreciate how Obama has handled things so far. But the Obama team needs to understand how important it is to deliver on tangible things that create jobs and make the economic condition of middle-class people better. Given how awful things were on January 20, the President deserves a great deal of credit for keeping our entire economic system from sliding into another Great Depression. That achievement won't be enough to sustain him, though, if the real economy doesn't start to get better. The President needs to be focused like a laser beam long-term economic issues that will ultimately decide the fate of his Presidency: creating jobs, increasing middle-class incomes, solving the health care crisis. If the country sees him fighting for these things, and making real progress, he will be re-elected in a landslide and set the stage for a long-term progressive majority.

Cross-posted at OpenLeft.com

Iran Tightens Crackdown and Claims U.S. Interference

2009-06-17T09:05:00.000-07:00

TEHRAN — Iran expanded its crackdown on journalists on Wednesday and for the first time directly accused the United States of interference in the disputed presidential election, summoning the Swiss ambassador, who represents American interests in Tehran, to complain of “interventionist” statements, according to news reports quoting the semi-official Fars news agency on Wednesday.
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President Obama said a day earlier that it would be counterproductive for the United States “to be seen as meddling.” But he has also said he was “deeply troubled by the violence” in Iran and that democratic values needed to be observed.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry officials, without being specific about which comments they were reacting to, expressed “protest and displeasure,” the news agency said.

Opposition leaders, meantime, called for more mass defiance.

In a message on a Web site associated with him, Mir Hussein Moussavi, the main opposition candidate in the election, called on his supporters to rally again on Thursday, and to go to their local mosques to mourn protesters killed in the demonstrations, officially numbering seven. His call directly challenged Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who had urged Mr. Moussavi to work through the country’s electoral system in contesting what was declared a landslide victory for the incumbent, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Iranians using the Internet messaging service Twitter had already spread the word that another silent demonstration was scheduled for 5 p.m. Wednesday and called on protesters to wear green, the signature color of the opposition. The BBC estimated that tens of thousands had gathered in central Tehran in the afternoon, but in the face of the government’s expansive new measures against journalists, did not say what information it had access to.

The sense of threat against the opposition was growing. Reuters reported that Mohammadreza Habibi, the senior prosecutor in the central province of Isfahan, had warned demonstrators that they could be executed under Islamic law.

“We warn the few elements controlled by foreigners who try to disrupt domestic security by inciting individuals to destroy and to commit arson that the Islamic penal code for such individuals waging war against God is execution,” Mr. Habibi said, according to the Fars news agency. It was not clear if his warning applied only to Isfahan or the country as a whole, Reuters said.

The government’s new restrictions were directed at blocking communications between opposition supporters and any news coverage of their activities.

The Associated Press reported that the powerful Revolutionary Guards threatened restrictions Wednesday on the digital online media that many Iranians use to communicate among themselves and to send news of their protests overseas. In a first statement since last Friday’s vote, the Revolutionary Guards said Iranian Web site operators and bloggers must remove content deemed to “create tension” or face legal action, The A.P. said.

In Paris, Soazig Dollet, a spokeswoman for Reporters Without Borders, a press freedom advocacy group, said at least 11 reporters had been arrested since the elections and the fate of 10 more was unclear since they may either be in hiding or under arrest.

On its Web site, the organization said Aldolfatah Soltani, a lawyer and human rights activist, had been detained along with “10 or so opposition activists, politicians and civil society figures” in Tehran and three other cities — Tabriz, Isfahan and Shiraz.

On Tuesday, the government revoked press credentials for foreign journalists and ordered journalists not to report from the streets. On Wednesday, government officials telephoned or sent faxes to reporters in Tehran working for foreign news organizations ordering them not to venture outside to cover events being held without an official permit. That included rallies by supporters of Mr. Moussavi and news conferences or other public events held without the government’s approval, reporters in Tehran said. At least one newspaper has stopped printing.

Government officials told journalists that they were at risk on the streets following an incident on Tuesday when a photographer was stabbed and wounded while covering a rally. Two well-known analysts, Sayeed Leylaz and Mohammad-Reza Jalaipour, were detained Wednesday and were likely to be held for several days, associates and family members said.

Defying the restrictions, new amateur video surfaced outside of Iran on Wednesday, apparently showing a government militia rampaging through a dormitory area of Tehran University late Tuesday or early Wednesday.

Support for the protests came from some unusual quarters. Five Iranian soccer players, including captain Ali Karimi, wore green wristbands in an apparent sign of support for Mr. Moussavi at a World Cup Asian qualifying match in South Korea, The A.P. said, quoting state television.

The Fars news agency also reported that the partial recount of votes ordered Tuesday by the Guardian Council, the 12-member body of jurists which supervises elections and holds veto power over legislation in Iran, had begun. A recount of votes in Kermanshah, a Kurdish province, showed that "there has been no irregularity," the news agency reported.

The recount, intended as a effort to meet the opposition’s concerns, has failed to halt the unrest. On Tuesday, large protest by thousands of supporters of Mr. Moussavi that stretched for miles along a major thoroughfare in Tehran. The marchers, dressed largely in black and green, marched mostly in silence, some carrying signs in English asking, “Where is my vote?”

Despite the media crackdown, extraordinary accounts about the protests in Tehran and other cities have reached the outside world. On Tuesday, many Web sites posted a wrenching video that purported to show the shooting death of a student in Isfahan in a shooting by pro-government militia members. Other videos showed limp and bleeding demonstrators in Tehran after the unprecedented protests on Monday.

The numbers of opposition protesters on Tuesday did not match those on Monday, when hundreds of thousands of Iranians joined the demonstrations, enraged that the conservative president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was declared the winner of Friday’s election with 63 percent of the votes.

Worry over the future of Iran, a country crucially important for its oil, its proximity to Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, its nuclear program and its ties to extremist groups, spilled over its borders.

In Vienna, Mohamed ElBaradei, the head of the United Nations atomic energy watchdog, said in a BBC interview that he believed Iran wanted to develop nuclear weapons technology “to be recognized as a major power in the Middle East.”

Nazila Fathi reported from Tehran and Alan Cowell from Paris. Sharon Otterman contributed reporting from New York.

Source : New York Times

Mega-Prabowo Bertemu Lagi Hari Ini,Rani Juliani bagaimana kabarnya?

2009-05-13T19:50:00.000-07:00

Menjelang batas akhir pendaftaran capres-cawapres pada 16 Mei, Gerindra dan PDIP terus melakukan komunikasi politik. Rencananya kedua partai akan melakukan pertemuan hari ini.

Dijadwalkan tim kecil PDIP dan Gerindra bertemu pukul 09.00 WIB, Kamis (14/5/2009). Namun tempat pertemuan kedua partai ini dirahasiakan. Agendanya membahas koalisi capres-cawapres.

Informasi pertemuan ini disampaikan anggota Dewan Penasihat Pusat PDIP Sabam Sirait di Hotel Mid Plaza, Jl Sudirman, Jakarta, Rabu (13/5/2009) kemarin.

"Besok (hari ini) tim Gerindra dan PDIP akan bertemu lagi sekitar pukul 09.00 WIB besok pagi di suatu tempat. Kami, tim yang ini, akan bertemu lagi baru setelah itu mereka berdua (Mega-Prabowo)," ungkapnya.

Jika pertemuan tim kecil itu lancar, maka Megawati Soekarnoputri akan bertemu Prabowo Subianto. Disebut-sebut sudah ada persetujuan Mega maju sebagai capres dan Prabowo sebagai wakilnya.

Namun tentunya semua masih bisa berubah. Apalagi melihat karakteristik kader kedua partai yang sama-sama menginginkan jagoannya maju sebagai orang nomor satu.

Lha Rani Juliani bagaimana kabarnya di tengah hiruk pikuk ini?

Rani Juliani,Primadona para koruptor hari ini?

2009-05-01T22:38:00.000-07:00

Akankah para koruptor yang terjerat kasus di KPK bersenang untuk sesaat?

Masalah perempuan. Itulah isu yang santer terdengar dalam kasus pembunuhan Direktur PT Putra Rajawali Banjaran (PRB) Nasrudin Zulkarnaen. Konon, pembunuhan berencana itu terjadi karena cinta segitiga antara wanita itu, Nasrudin dengan pejabat tinggi negara.

Siapa perempuan yang lekat di hati kedua pria yang telah berumur itu? Secantik apakah wanita yang jadi pemicu konflik direktur dan pejabat negara begitu? Itulah beberapa pertanyaan publik yang muncul. Publik tentu penasaran mengapa seorang pejabat tinggi negara sampai tega membunuh hanya gara-gara perempuan.

Sumber di kepolisian menyebut, gadis itu bernama Rani Juliani. Gadis berusia 22 tahun itu konon pernah menjadi caddy di Modernland, tempat biasa Nasrudin bermain golf. Sumber kepolisian kadang menyebut perempuan itu Tika, kadang inisial K.

Dari blog pribadi Rani di blogspot.com, Sabtu (2/5/2009), gadis berbintang cancer itu tercatat sebagai mahasiswi di STIMIK Raharja Tangerang. "Karena Raharja berfokus kepada bidang yang saya minati yaitu bidang komputer sehingga dalam mengembangkan minat saya menjadi mudah," begitu tulis Rani dalam postingan berjudul 'Mengapa Saya Memilih Perguruan Tinggi Raharja'.

Blog tersebut tidak terlalu aktif. Sejak dibuat pada November 2008, hanya ada dua tulisan yang ditulis gadis berambut panjang itu. Rani juga memajang fotonya yang sedang berpose di tengah padang rumput, diduga lapangan golf.

Dalam profilnya, Rani menulis ingin menjadi seorang wanita karir yang sukses dan mapan. Gadis kelahiran 1 Juli 1986 itu juga mengaku menyukai film-film James Bond.

"Saya seorang gadis yang manies menurut pengamatan orang-orang di sekeliling aku. Diriku lahir pada tanggal 01 Juli 1986, jangan lupa ngado yah. Aku anak ke 3 dari 4 saudara, tadinya mau bungsu, tapi bonyok gue doyan," begitu tulisnya dalam 'Mengenai Saya'.

Sejak nama Rani disebut-sebut, blog tersebut ramai dikunjungi pembaca. Itu terbukti dari banyaknya komentar yang ditinggalkan para pengunjung. Namun banyak pengunjung yang mencaci perempuan yang keberadaannya kini tak diketahui itu. (ken/nrl)

Hows Free is the free market?

2009-04-27T22:14:00.000-07:00

by Noam Chomsky

The public pays the costs and the rich get the benefit--markets for the poor and plenty of state protection for the rich.

There's a conventional doctrine about the era we're entering and the promise that it's supposed to afford. In brief, the story is that the good guys won the Cold War and they're firmly in the saddle. There may be some rough terrain ahead, but nothing that they can't handle. They ride off into the sunset, leading the way to a bright future, based on the ideals that they've always cherished: democracy, free markets and human rights.

In the real world, however, human rights, democracy and free markets are all under serious attack in many countries, including the leading industrial societies. Power is increasingly concentrated in unaccountable institutions. The rich and the powerful are no more willing to submit themselves to market discipline or popular pressures than they ever have been in the past.

Let's begin with human rights, because it's the easiest place to start: they're actually codified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, passed unanimously by the United Nations General Assembly in December, 1948. In the United States there's a good deal of very impressive rhetoric about how we stand for the principle of the universality of the Universal Declaration, and how we defend the principle against backward, Third World peoples who plead cultural relativism.

All this reached a crescendo about a year ago, at the Vienna Conference. But the rhetoric is rarely besmirched by any reference to what the Universal Declaration actually says. Article 25, for example, states: "Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood."

How are these principles upheld in the richest country in the world, with absolutely unparalleled advantages and no excuses for not completely satisfying them? The US has the worst record on poverty in the industrialized world a poverty level which is twice as high as England's. Tens of millions of people are hungry every night, including millions of children who are suffering from disease and malnutrition. In New York City 40% of children live below the poverty line, deprived of minimal conditions that offer some hope of escape from misery and destitution and violence.

Let's turn to Article 23. It states: "Everyone has a right to work under just and favourable conditions." The ILO has just published a report estimating the level of global unemployment--understood to mean the position of not having enough work for subsistence--in January 1994 at about 30%. That, it says accurately, is a crisis worse than that in the 1930s. It is, moreover, just one part of a general worldwide human rights catastrophe. UNESCO estimates that about 500,000 children die every year from debt repayment alone. Debt repayment means that commercial banks made bad loans to their favourite dictators, and those loans are now being paid by the poor, who have absolutely nothing to do with it, and of course by the taxpayers in the wealthy countries, because the debts are socialized. That's under the system of socialism for the rich that we call free enterprise: nobody expects the banks to have to pay for the bad loans that's your job and my job.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation estimates that 11 million children die every year from easily treatable diseases. WHO's head calls it a silent genocide: it could be stopped for pennies a day.

In the US, of course, there is currently a recovery. But it's remarkably sluggish, with less than a third of the job growth of the previous six recoveries. Furthermore, of the jobs that are being created, an enormous proportion more than a quarter in 1992Ùare temporary jobs and most are not in the productive part of the economy. Economists welcome this vast increase in temporary jobs as an "improvement in the flexibility of labour markets". No matter that it means that when you go to sleep at night you don't know if you're going to have work the next morning it's good for profits, not people, which means that it's good for the economy in the technical sense.

Another aspect of the recovery is that people are working longer for less money. The workload is continuing to increase, while wages are continuing to decline which is unprecedented for a recovery. US wages as measured by labour costs per unit output are now the lowest in the industrial world, except for Britain. In 1991 the US even went below England, although England caught up and regained first place in the competition to crush poor and working people. Having been the highest in the world in 1985 (as one might expect in the world's richest country), US labour costs are today 60% lower than Germany's and 20% lower than Italy's. The Wall Street Journal called this turnaround "a welcome development of transcendent importance". It is usually claimed that these welcome developments just result from market forces, like laws of nature, and the usual factors are identified, such as international trade and automation. To put it kindly, that's a bit misleading: neither trade nor automation has much to do with market forces.

Take trade. One well-known fact about trade is that it's highly subsidized with huge market-distorting factors, which I don't think anybody's ever tried to measure. The most obvious is that every form of transport is highly subsidized, whether it's maritime, aeronautical, or roads or rail. Since trade naturally requires transport, the costs of transport enter into the calculation of the efficiency of trade. But there are huge subsidies to reduce the costs of transport, through manipulation of energy costs and all sorts of market-distorting fashion. If anybody wanted to measure this, it would be quite a job.

Take the US Pentagon, a huge affair. A very substantial part of the Pentagon is intervention forces directed at the Middle East, across the whole panoply of intimidation devices to make sure nobody gets in the way if the US tries to intervene. And a large part of the purpose of that is to keep oil prices within a certain range. Not too low, because the US and British oil companies have to make plenty of profit, and these countries also have to earn profits which they can then send back to their masters in London and New York. So, not too low. But also not too high, because you want to keep trade efficient. I'm not even mentioning so-called externalities, like pollution and so on. If the real costs of trade were calculated, the apparent efficiency of trade would certainly drop substantially. Nobody knows how much.

The Insurance Crisis

2009-04-17T21:19:00.000-07:00

What's it about?

There are plans afoot to limit the amounts that Australians will be able to recover in negligence lawsuits. As well, there would be constraints in the ability to sue doctors and adventure travel companies (and the like). It is hardly surprising that this proposition, contained in a Federal Government review, has caused wide-ranging reactions. Would you be surprised that the medical lobby, together with the insurance industries, are very much in favour of the proposal? How about lawyers? On the whole they appear to disapprove. And the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) is concerned at the intrusion into consumer rights. The Victorian Government has weighed in as well. They want to cap personal injury awards, as well as other limits, as part of an overall effort to address rising insurance premiums.

The insurance crisis has dominated our news media over the past year, especially concerning the plight of community and voluntary groups who cannot get public liability insurance, or must pay premiums hikes as high as 1000 per cent. It has not been unusual for voluntary groups to pay more in premium costs than the income they receive from the public events the insurance covers.

Who is for & against

There is a battery of high profile professionals and bodies arrayed against these proposals. Professor Fels, Chair of the ACCC, put it this way: "We can't think of any circumstance where it is or should be acceptable for a supplier to mislead or deceive a consumer causing injury or death." The lawyers agree: they see no real connection between the rise in public liability insurance and the volume of litigation.

The Australian Medical Association believes the proposals would ease the fears of their member doctors, many of whom now claim to be under pressure from the threat of medical malpractice lawsuits and exorbitant premiums.

Why is insurance scarce?

How often nowadays do you hear of yet another small business driven to the wall because they cannot secure public liability insurance? We have Governments, local and State, rescuing public swimming pools from the brink of closure; recreational clubs forced to shut down; and myriad other small business that cannot service their clients without insurance cover. Why is this so?

It is a world-wide problem. In an example cited by the U.S. General Accounting Office, an insurance company offered to cover a portion of a building's worth for a premium of $800,000. Before Sept. 11, the building was fully insured for a premium of $60,000. That date, of course, was the attack on the World Trade Centre in New York. In another case, a building company in New York could not find a bank to provide financing for a proposed apartment complex because the building contractor could not get secure terrorism insurance. The project would have employed five hundred building workers.

There are any number of possible reasons for the insurance crisis: the September 11th terrorist attacks and the consequent re-insurance problems; reduced profitability for insurance companies; the collapse of the HIH insurance group; increasing litigation.

What's the solution?

In this debate there is no agreement about the nature of the problem, and therefore little room to move towards resolution. For instance, the Queensland Law Society believes that the solution to the public liability insurance crisis lies in a community effort to pool their cover in group insurance schemes. Along with many groups, lawyers' representatives believe that proposed caps to negligence pay-outs do not address the problem - it might be said that, on the whole, lawyers' groups blame the dynamics of the insurance industry and market conditions for the crisis. They believe, with some justification, that it is up to a Court to decide whether a person's injuries warrant a damages pay-out. "Problems in the insurance market are principally insurance problems, not problems of the legal system," said Law Council President, Tony Abbott.

The Law Council of Australia's submission to the first phase of the government's Negligence Review Panel argued for a collection of moderate changes to the law, rather than drastic legislative changes and interference in the judicial system. The problem for lawyers, as a group, is that there is little public sympathy for them, especially so-called plaintiff lawyers - until, of course, you are the victim of an injury and you need a lawyer to prosecute your claim!

It does seem that consumers need to better understand the basic legal components of duty of care and negligence. It's not enough to simply bury our heads and hope the insurance crisis will go away - like all public issues that arise from scarcity, we must ensure that as far as possible we avoid injury and accept some responsibility for our own actions. The Law Council has also proposed that that an action for negligence could not be advanced unless the risk of a person's actions causing harm was more than 'remote or fanciful'. It also seems sensible to reduce the time limit that can pass before a claim can be made for alleged negligence, as well as making people who undertake "risky" recreational activities accept the actual risk inherent in the activity.

There are no easy solutions to the insurance crisis, and little can be done about market conditions in the insurance industry, but the community should be cautious when asked to overturn the legal system and the discretion of judges and juries to make reasonable awards. On the other hand, where giddy litigants look to work the system, it would be best to use legislation to make sure they have a bona fide claim before they can plead their case.

By Geoffrey Winn
Creative Director
www.law4u.com.au

The Problem With AIG's Credit Insurance Payouts

2009-04-05T11:42:00.000-07:00

Every day, insurance companies sell policies to homeowners to cover the cost of damage in the case of fire. Why would those companies agree to pay out in full to a policyholder even if a fire had not occurred?

That is the type of question being asked about the federal government’s bailout of American International Group in which the insurance company funneled $49.5 billion in taxpayer funds to financial institutions, including Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch. The payments, which amount to almost 30 percent of the $170 billion in taxpayer commitments provided to A.I.G. since its near collapse last September, were disclosed by the company on Sunday.

The company had resisted identifying the recipients of the taxpayers’ money for months, citing confidentiality agreements.

But instead of quieting the controversy, the disclosure of the amounts paid to A.I.G.’s customers has created still more questions and unease over the insurer’s rescue, arranged by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the United States Treasury.

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* Business

Critics argue that the government’s decision to pay buyers of A.I.G. credit insurance in full and across the board was an inappropriate use of taxpayer money. In addition, these people say, options not pursued by the government could have allowed taxpayers to benefit from future gains or at least have done a better job of limiting the potential for losses.

The criticism surrounds the action taken by the government on credit insurance that A.I.G. had written and sold to large and sophisticated investors, mostly financial institutions. The banks that did business with A.I.G. bought credit insurance to protect against possible defaults on debt securities they held or had underwritten.

* Biggest AIG Counter Parties

But when A.I.G.’s credit rating was cut last year, the company was required to post collateral on these insurance contracts. The need to quickly deliver cash that it did not have created the downward spiral that brought it to the brink.

What upsets some people is that the government paid the counterparties in full even though the underlying securities had not experienced widespread, or perhaps even any, defaults.

“It is inappropriate to be giving money to A.I.G. for them to give it out to their counterparties equally,” said Robert Arvanitis, chief executive of Risk Finance Advisors in Westport, Conn., and an expert in insurance. “If we decide that another bank will be in trouble because A.I.G. fails, then we should decide explicitly that the bank should be supported. We should not simply give everybody 100 cents on the dollar.”

Should You Buy Private Health Insurance?

2009-04-05T11:33:00.000-07:00

ELIZA GREENE HAS done the unthinkable. The 50-year-old retired CPA, who lives in Oakland, Calif., recently opted out of her husband's employer-sponsored health-insurance plan. At $875 a month for family coverage, it was simply too expensive, she decided. She was determined to find something more affordable. And she did.

Greene logged onto eHealthInsurance.com, an Internet-based insurance broker, and found comprehensive medical insurance for herself and her two sons for just $133 a month. Her husband, meanwhile, decided to stay on his law firm's plan, since he has a preexisting condition, and since he pays just $250 a month. In total, the family now saves nearly $500 a month on health insurance premiums.

Did Greene have to endure a lot of hassle to make this happen? Not at all, she says. By buying a plan with the same insurer her husband's employer uses, she didn't even have to switch doctors. "It has been fabulous," she says.

Until recently, no one with access to group health insurance would have dreamed of opting out and buying coverage on the individual market. Prices were simply too high. Yet as health-care expenses soar and companies shift an increasing percentage of those costs onto their workers, individual coverage is quickly becoming a viable alternative.

According to a recent Kaiser Family Foundation report, employer-sponsored health-care costs rose 7.7% in 2006. This follows a 9.3% hike in 2005, and a 11.2% jump in 2004. Today, employers pay, on average, $3,615 a year for single-person coverage and $8,508 for family coverage. They pass 16% of that premium, on average, to individual employees, and 27% of it to families. Smaller employers often charge their employees significantly more, in some rare cases as much as 100%. And the situation is expected to continue. Some 40% of large employers say they are "very likely" to increase employee contributions next year, according to the Kaiser report.

But before you dump your employer's plan in favor of an individual one, make sure you have a clear understanding of what you might gain and lose. Some people might decide that a generous health plan is worth the price. Others might decide that the extra money could be better spent elsewhere. Consider the following pros and cons of going it alone.

The Pros

Save Money. In most states, it's possible for healthy families to find competitively priced coverage on the open market. According to eHealthinsurance.com, the average premium for a single person in California, for example, is just $101 a month, while family coverage costs $257 a month. Plenty of employers charge their workers more than that.

And if you're looking for a stopgap while you're between jobs, you could buy even cheaper coverage. These plans cost on average just $81 a month for a single person and $234 a month for a family, according to eHealthInsurance.com.

Pay for What You Need. When you choose an employer's health-insurance plan, you don't have many options. You might be able to choose between a few different plans, but the employer sets the prices and the coverage amounts. When you buy health insurance on the private market, however, you decide which services are worth paying for and which ones aren't. By choosing a plan with a higher deductible, or one that doesn't cover, say, chiropractic care, you can save yourself hundreds of dollars a month, says Robert Hurley, vice president of customer care for eHealthInsurance.com.

It's Yours No Matter Where You Work. Plenty of Americans stick it out at dead-end jobs just to keep their health benefits. If you buy coverage through a private health plan, you won't have this worry. By law a health insurer can't drop you, provided you pay your premiums in a timely fashion. When you leave an employer, on the other hand, you say goodbye to its health insurance. If you're fortunate enough to work for a company with at least 20 employees, you do have the option under COBRA to keep those benefits for 18 months. But it'll likely cost you a lot more, since you'll probably have to cover the entire cost of the premium.

The Cons

Less Comprehensive. Dollar for dollar, employer plans provide considerably more coverage than individual plans. "When you go into the individual market, you'll [likely] buy a whole lot less coverage, even if you're paying the same amount of money," says Karen Pollitz, project director of the Georgetown University Health Policy Institute. Why the disparity? Pollitz explains that with an individual policy, a bigger percentage of the premium goes to cover overhead, such as marketing and paying claims, than to health services.

Strict Underwriting Standards. If you have a preexisting condition, you might be out of luck. While a group plan must insure all employees and family members, individual plans can -- and do -- reject applicants with less healthy profiles. They can also offer coverage with sky-high premiums that exclude certain illnesses. That's why some families, such as the Greenes, decide to leave a sick family member on the group plan and to find alternate coverage for the other healthy members.

Expect Rate Increases. In most states, private health-insurance plans are what the industry calls "rated," says Georgetown's Pollitz. This means premiums rise with age. So a person who buys coverage at age 50 might find it prohibitively expensive by, say, 55. Some people get around this by changing plans from time to time, since new rates tend to be lower than renewals. But as people age, it becomes more difficult to jump around and individual policies get pricier.

One final word of advice: If you do decide to forego your employer's plan, make sure to secure an individual policy first. The last thing you want to do is opt out of a group plan and then find you can't get comprehensive coverage on your own. Oftentimes, an employer won't let you back into its group plan until the following year's open-enrollment season.

Lowering your insurance quotes

2009-04-05T11:28:00.000-07:00

Viewers have been in touch about getting car insurance renewal quotes that are higher than those offered to new customers.

Gill Vigus has been with Zurich for 12 years and found out about the gap in price after requesting a new quote on her insurer's website.

"My insurance renewal came through and it was £572, which I thought was rather high. So I started to do a search on the internet and found out that I could get it for £370 online with Zurich.

"I phoned up customer services regarding this and they told me I'd be better having a new policy online if I wanted the lower rate," she told Working Lunch.

Saved £200

Gill saved herself over £200 simply by cancelling and starting a new policy with the same company.

She was also able to keep her eight years no-claims bonus, with the only difference being that her excess rose from £50 to £100.

Zurich have told the programme in a statement that Gill paid more than new customers because she was a telephone customer.

"We have a variety of channels through which people can access our products - and those different channels carry higher or lower operating costs...the web will almost always be cheaper, given there are lower people costs involved.

"As Mrs Vigus had originally bought her products as a phone customer, we would have assumed she had a preference to deal with us over the phone, so would not have automatically assumed she would be happy to be an online customer."

£137.55 cheaper

Zurich say they currently do not have the technology to transfer telephone into online accounts, which is why Gill had to start again.

Viewer Rob Pickering had a similar experience with his provider Direct Line when he went online and got a quote of £487, which was £137.55 cheaper than his renewal one.

He also signed up as a new customer and saved himself the difference.

"All insurers want to be at the top of the best-buy table on the internet," says Editor of Money Week, Merryn Somerset-Webb.

"That's very important for their sales. So they put their lowest possible prices on, and those are the prices you get on your first year, but that price doesn't make your insurer any money at all. Quite often it loses them money. So in their second year of giving you as a client, what they want to do is put the price up as much as possible," she added.

Inertia

Cars
In 2005 4.2 million claims were made on car insurance in the UK

In Gill's case, she feels that her loyalty has not been reciprocated by her insurer.

Despite feeling let down, she has decided to stick with Zurich because she has other insurance policies with the company.

Professor Vince Mitchell from Cass Business School says that companies often rely on either customers' loyalty or inertia not to look for a better deal.

For those willing to shop around, it could be worth trying out price comparison websites - not forgetting to find out what their own provider is offering new customers online.

World Bank gives China $710m loan

2009-04-04T02:54:00.000-07:00

The World Bank has said it is giving China a $710m (£487m) loan to help rebuild areas hit by last year's Wenchuan earthquake.

The money will finance reconstruction projects in the infrastructure, health and education sectors in the two most-affected provinces Sichuan and Gansu.

The earthquake, which hit on 12 May 2008, was China's worst for 30 years, measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale.

Almost 90,000 people were killed and five million were left homeless.

"This project will assist many communities affected by the devastating earthquake to rebuild their lives by restoring essential services," said project manager Mara Warwick.

Last year, China's leaders allocated 70bn yuan ($10bn; £7bn) to a reconstruction fund for the earthquake.

It is estimated the disaster cost China $123bn in direct economic losses.

Solyndra Offered $535 Million Loan Guarantee by US DOE

2009-04-04T02:52:00.000-07:00

Fremont, CA, March 20, 2009 – Solyndra, Inc. announced today that it is the first company to receive an offer for a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) loan guarantee under Title XVII of the Energy Policy Act of 2005.

Solyndra, a Fremont, California- based manufacturer of innovative cylindrical photovoltaic systems, will use the proceeds of a $535 million loan from the U.S. Treasury’s Federal Financing Bank to expand its solar panel manufacturing capacity in California.

"The leadership and actions of President Barack Obama, Energy Secretary Steven Chu and the U.S. Congress were instrumental in concluding this offer for a loan guarantee," said Solyndra CEO and founder, Dr. Chris Gronet. "The DOE Loan Guarantee Program funding will enable Solyndra to achieve the economies of scale needed to deliver solar electricity at prices that are competitive with utility rates. This expansion is really about creating new jobs while meaningfully impacting global warming."

Designed specifically for commercial, industrial and institutional rooftops, Solyndra’s proprietary photovoltaic (PV) systems generate significantly more solar electricity per rooftop at a lower installed cost than conventional flat panel PV technologies. Further, Solyndra’s PV systems are fast and economical to install due to the simple horizontal mounting and unique air?flow properties of the solar panels. Solyndra’s panels are fully certified for U.S. and international use and have been commercially shipping since July 2008.

The guaranteed loan, expected to provide debt financing for approximately 73% of the project costs, will allow Solyndra to initiate construction of a second solar panel fabrication facility (Fab 2) in California. On completion, Fab 2 is expected to have an annual manufacturing capacity of 500 megawatts per year. Solyndra and DOE will finalize the transaction upon completion of definitive documentation and satisfaction of certain conditions precedent. Over the life of the project, Solyndra estimates that Fab 2 will produce solar panels sufficient to generate up to 15 gigawatts of clean, renewable electricity??enough to avoid 300 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

Further, Solyndra estimates that the construction of this complex will employ approximately 3,000 people, the operation of the facility will create over 1,000 jobs, and hundreds of additional jobs will be created for the installation of Solyndra PV systems, in the U.S.

"DOE, in consultation with independent consultants, performed a thorough investigation and analysis of our project’s financial, technical and legal strengths," said Dr. Kelly Truman, Solyndra’s Vice President of Marketing, Sales and Business Development. "We are proud to be the first company to pass this comprehensive review, and we would like to acknowledge the exceptional efforts of the staff of the DOE Loan Guarantee Program Office."

Goldman, Sachs & Co. acted as exclusive financial advisor to Solyndra in connection with this loan guarantee application.

About Solyndra

Solyndra designs and manufactures photovoltaic systems, comprised of panels and mounting hardware, for the commercial rooftop market. Solyndra employs high?volume manufacturing based on proven technologies and processes to meet the needs of the global solar market. Using proprietary cylindrical modules and thin?film technology, Solyndra systems are designed to provide the lowest installed cost per system and the highest solar electrical energy output for typical low slope commercial rooftops. Headquartered in Fremont, CA, Solyndra operates a state?of?the?art 300,000?square?foot fully automated manufacturing complex. Learn more at www.solyndra.com.

For press inquiries, please contact press@solyndra.com.

Green Mortgages Save On Energy, Loan Costs

2009-04-04T02:51:00.000-07:00

One of the best tools for making your dream home more affordable while saving on the cost of power, heating and cooling is the energy-efficient, or "green," mortgage.

Green Mortgage Loan

Most energy-efficient mortgage, or EEM, programs let you qualify for bigger loans than you would otherwise by folding in the additional cost of making improvements for energy efficiency or of purchasing an already energy-efficient home. Another version of the green mortgage provides discounts on loan fees or interest rates for homes that are certified as energy-efficient.

Because mortgage interest payments are tax-deductible, an energy-efficient mortgage can be a more cost-effective way to finance home-energy improvements than using a credit card, bank loan or cash, which usually offer no tax benefits.

The Federal Housing Administration, Fannie Mae and the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs each have some version of a green mortgage. Freddie Mac, while having no formal energy-efficient mortgage program, allows lenders to take the projected utility savings from home upgrades into account when setting the loan amount.

Energy Star Mortgage a deal for buyers
In February 2009, the Energy Programs Consortium, a nonprofit policy research group in Washington, D.C., launched its new Energy Star Mortgage in Maine as a joint effort with the state housing agency there.

The consortium was formed 10 years ago by a handful of state and federal energy and regulatory agencies to coordinate energy policy and programs. Last month, it adopted the "Energy Star" label, which refers to a system adopted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Energy for applying an energy-efficiency rating to appliances, equipment and new homes.

_____________________________________
More Mortgage Advice From Bankrate.com:

* Do You Need Mortgage Help?
* Mortgage Deduction Savings Exaggerated
* The Basics of Refinancing

_____________________________________

The consortium's Energy Star Mortgage program targets families who are buying new homes or refinancing existing ones to encourage them to make the structures more energy efficient and, therefore, more affordable, says Mark Wolfe, the group's executive director.

It is designed to help homeowners save a minimum of 20 percent on energy costs. And like most other green mortgage programs, the Energy Star Mortgage incorporates the cost of energy-saving improvements into the loan. This type of mortgage also takes into account any existing state weatherization or energy-efficiency benefit, Wolfe says.

Finding a Small-Business Bank Loan

2009-04-04T02:47:00.000-07:00

With the country going through its worst financial crisis of the last 70 years, it's not so easy for small businesses to obtain bank loans.

But that doesn't mean banks have completely turned their backs on small businesses. It just means that owners of these businesses must work harder to get banks to open their lending spigots.

The big picture
Financial institutions are definitely curtailing their loan activity. Federal Reserve data show that the total of commercial banks' business loans has stagnated between $1.5 trillion and $1.52 trillion between May and early September.

Several elements of the credit crunch are limiting loans. First, banks already have so many troubled loans on their balance sheets that they are reluctant to make new ones that carry any risk, says Bob Seiwert, director of commercial lending for the American Bankers Association, or ABA.

"Second, there is a liquidity crisis.
Banks need money to lend. If they can't sell the loans on their books, they can't get money to make loans to you and me," he says.

In addition, the economic slowdown has curbed the formation and growth of small businesses, crimping their demand for bank loans.

Banks also report that "the borrowers they see are less creditworthy than a year ago," says Eric Zarnikow, associate administrator for capital access at the Small Business Administration, or SBA.

The number of loans the SBA guarantees will probably drop to somewhere between 75,000 to 80,000 this year from 110,000 last year, he says. That represents a decline of up to 32 percent.

But not all banks are sitting on their hands. "We're expecting double-digit growth in our small-business lending this year, which is quite a reversal of past years," says Kent Stone, who oversees much of small business lending for U.S. Bank.

The number and quality of loan applications from small businesses are rising at U.S. Bank, he says. Dwindling competition accounts for much of that.

"A number of our peers, especially in fast growing markets, such as the West, are having troubles. Other competitors continue to change strategy," turning away from small-business lending, Stone says.

"We're instilling a sense of normalcy despite times that are anything but that."

Improve your chances
Experts recommend taking the following steps to improve your chances of receiving a loan in this difficult environment.

1. Establish a strong bond with your bank before requesting a loan
"The most important thing you have with your bank is not money; it's the relationship you have with the bank," says Rich Sloan, co-founder of StartUpNation, a small business consulting firm in San Francisco.

Japan, ADB extend $350-M loan to RP

2009-04-04T02:46:00.001-07:00

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the lending arm of the Japanese government will be extending $350-million in official development assistance to the Philippines this year to help finance the country's development policy programs.

The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) will provide Y9.29 billion ($94 million), its first development loan to the Philippines this year, to the programme, the finance department said in a statement Tuesday.

The Philippines had signed a programme loan that will fund the second phase of the government's development policy support programme which aims to improve the management of public spending, especially in infrastructure and social services projects. ODAs typically also aim to improve fiscal and macroeconomic stability, governance in public expenditure management, anti-corruption, and investment climate.

The loan has a maturity of 30 years, which include a 10-year grace period and a concessional interest rate of 1.4 percent per annum.

JICA, World Bank, and ADB are the three largest sources of foreign assistance in the Philippines.

The Philippines, one of Asia's biggest sovereign debt issuers, has said it wants to tap more development loans to fund a wider budget deficit this year of 177.2 billion pesos ($3.66 billion), or 2.2 percent of GDP, and would only resort to market borrowings if it fails to get such concessional loans. - with Reuters

Firm pays Y7 million for damage from secondhand smoke

2009-04-04T02:39:00.000-07:00

SAPPORO —

A construction material maker in Takikawa, Hokkaido, has agreed to pay a 7 million yen settlement to an employee who said he has developed a chemical sensitivity from secondhand smoke at its office, his lawyer said Friday.

After joining the company in January 2007, the 35-year-old employee suffered headaches and nausea as co-workers smoked at their desks in the office. The company rejected his request to set up a smoking area and fired him in November 2007. He filed a lawsuit in January 2008 seeking that the dismissal be nullified, prompting the company to rehire him and set aside a smoking room. The employee sought some 23 million yen in compensation for damage to his health.

DPJ to unveil stimulus package proposals next week

2009-04-04T02:38:00.000-07:00

TOKYO —

The main opposition Democratic Party of Japan is set to unveil a package of proposed economic stimulus measures next week, featuring subsidies for the purchase of environmentally friendly cars and allowances for children, party lawmakers said Friday. According to the draft of the package, subsidies will be provided for people buying eco-friendly cars and each child of junior high school age or younger would be entitled to a monthly “child allowance” of 26,000 yen.

The DPJ will also propose enhancing the quake resistance of public facilities and increasing the salaries of regular care workers. In a bid to boost employment, the party will propose providing up to 120,000 yen per month to long-term unemployed people while they undertake vocational training. The package would cost 10 trillion to 20 trillion yen.

Deceitful relationship between US and UK (part II)

2009-04-04T02:21:00.000-07:00

By Ivan Simic

World War I and II

For some time British-American relations had been cool and often suspicious. Various maneuvers from the United States convinced British leaders that the US could not be relied on.

The United States originally pursued a policy of neutrality during the WWI. This resulted in increased tensions with Berlin and London. Both the United Kingdom and Germany engaged in propaganda campaigns designed to win over the United States. The British were able to guarantee a price for American cotton producers. The US was most affected by the loss of trade with Germany and Central Europe.

When a German U-boat sank the British liner Lusitania in 1915, with 128 Americans aboard, the US President Woodrow Wilson vowed, "America is too proud to fight". Americans demanded an end to attacks on passenger ships. Germany immediately complied with the US demands.

Then Britain's secret Royal Navy cryptanalytic group (Room 40), intercepted and decoded “Zimmermann Telegram”, a coded telegram dispatched by the Foreign Secretary of the German Empire, Arthur Zimmermann, on January 16, 1917, to the German Ambassador in Washington, Johann von Bernstorff, at the height of World War I. It was a proposal to Mexico to join the war as Germany's ally against the United States, Mexico rejected proposal.

British revealed the Zimmermann Telegram to the United States, the revelation of its contents in the American press on March 1 caused public outrage that contributed to the United State’s declaration of war against Germany. Wilson called for war on Germany and its allies, which the US Congress declared on 6 April 1917. As a reminder: WW I started in 1914, almost three years before the first US troops arrived in France (1st Division) in June 26, 1917.

Naval rivalry between British Empire, US and Japan and Great Depression marked the era between WWI and WWII.

Special Relationship

Period of the so called “special relationship” between Britain and the United States was about to start.

2009-04-04T02:11:00.000-07:00

Japanese gov't erroneously reports launch of N Korean rocket

2009-04-04T02:06:00.000-07:00

TOKYO —

The Japanese government provided incorrect information that North Korea had launched a rocket Saturday because a Defense Ministry radar system detected a path of some object and that was communicated as information on a missile launch, causing confusion and irritation among local municipalities and the public.

The government released information that ‘‘North Korea appears to have launched a projectile’’ at 12:16 p.m. through its information-conveying system called Em-Net, but said five minutes later that it was a ‘‘detection failure.’’

The confusion occurred after the North’s official Korean Central News Agency reported earlier in the day that the satellite ‘‘will be launched soon.’’ North Korea has called it a communications satellite, but it is suspected by many as a long-range ballistic missile test.

The Defense Ministry said that radar in Chiba Prefecture ‘‘detected some kind of path’’ over the Sea of Japan and the information was conveyed as North Korea’s rocket launch. The ministry is analyzing what the radar actually detected.

The government issued a statement saying, ‘‘We extremely regret issuing such wrong information.’’

A misstep was also reported at the local level in Japan’s northern areas, where part of the rocket was to pass over if the rocket flies according to the plan announced by North Korea.

Before the central government’s false report, the Akita prefectural government issued an erroneous report to all municipal governments in the prefecture that North Korea ‘‘fired a missile,’’ and one of the municipal offices communicated the report to all households through a radio transmission for disaster management.

According to prefectural officials, a Self-Defense Force member at the prefectural government’s disaster preparedness headquarters received a communication from the Defense Ministry that it was ‘‘launched at 10:48 a.m.’’

The SDF member verbally communicated the message to a prefectural government official, who then passed on the information to relevant officials of all the municipalities through mobile phone text messages six minutes later, the officials said.

The town of Happo, with a population of some 9,300, passed on the information to residents through the radio.

But the residents were given wrong information due to the central government’s incorrect information, with one man living there saying, ‘‘What’s going on?’’

Sixteen of the 25 municipalities in the prefecture conveyed the central government-issued information to their residents via a community wireless system and other ways, and corrected the information later.

Tottori Prefecture, also on the Sea of Japan, issued faxes to its municipalities soon after the central government issued the wrong information and had to hastily correct the content. An official at Iwate Prefecture also expressed disappointment over the fuss.

Afghan focus for key Nato summit

2009-04-04T02:03:00.000-07:00

The challenges Nato faces in Afghanistan are set to dominate the agenda as leaders of the alliance meet in France for a day of summit talks.

In a symbolic show of unity to mark Nato's 60th anniversary, leaders crossed a bridge from Germany to be greeted by President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Security is tight in Strasbourg for the summit, and French police have again used tear gas against protesters.

Meanwhile, leaders have so far failed to agree on a new secretary general.

The summit is being jointly hosted by Germany and France.

Dozens of people have been arrested over the past two days in the run-up to the gathering.

Sternest challenges

Nato leaders walked across a footbridge over the Rhine - a symbol of the unity and peace in Europe that Nato has helped to defend.

OBAMA'S TRANSATLANTIC VISIT
3 April: Obama meets Sarkozy in France and Merkel in Germany
4 April: Leaders walk across the Rhine and hold North Atlantic Council meeting in Strasbourg
5 April: Obama in Prague for US-EU summit
6-7 April: Obama visits Turkey

But the sternest challenges facing the alliance now lie thousands of miles away in Afghanistan.

The main business of Saturday's meeting in Strasbourg is to re-energise Nato to win a war that everyone accepts is not going very well, says BBC diplomatic correspondent Jonathan Marcus, reporting from Strasbourg.

Last month, Mr Obama set out a new strategy for the conflict.

In addition to more troops, he wants to send more funding and trainers to build up Afghanistan's security forces, as well as expert advisors to reinforce the country's crumbling infrastructure.

Speaking in Strasbourg on Friday, he appealed to European leaders to unite in support of the fight against al-Qaeda in Afghanistan.

"It is probably more likely that al-Qaeda would be able to launch a serious terrorist attack in Europe than in the United States because of proximity," he said.

HAVE YOUR SAY

Nato came into existence in a period when Cold War hostilities had become quite strong. What's the meaning of its existence in today's world?

Deboshree, Delhi
Send us your comments

"This is not an American mission, this is a Nato mission, this is an international mission."

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has offered a temporary increase in troops ahead of Afghanistan's presidential elections in August.

But despite European expressions of support for the new American strategy, it was not clear whether the long-term pledges sought by the US would be forthcoming.

Turkish opposition

Nato leaders had been widely expected to endorse a new Nato chief at a gala dinner held in Germany to open the summit on Friday.

NATO: KEY MOMENTS
Founded 1949, largely to block Soviet expansion into Europe
Twenty-six member states who vow to defend each other
Militarily dominated by the US
Acted in non-member state for first time in 1995 - implementing military aspects of Bosnia peace accord
Operated outside Europe for first time in 2003 - in Afghanistan

New doctrine for new threats
New start for US and Russia

Big European powers had backed Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen to replace Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, who steps down at the end of July.

But Turkey expressed opposition, based on Mr Rasmussen's stance over the publication in 2005 by a Danish newspaper of caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad.

Many Muslims around the world were angered when Mr Rasmussen refused to censure the paper, invoking freedom of speech.

The disagreement is an embarrassing start, says our correspondent Jonathan Marcus, but leaders appear determined that this will not over-shadow a gathering intended to re-launch the alliance for the 21st Century.

Porsche Finds Fortune From Unlikely Outsourcing

2009-04-04T02:00:00.000-07:00

UUSIKAUPUNKI, FINLAND — Outsourcing to less-expensive places like India, China, Taiwan and Eastern Europe became routine for many American and Western European companies over the past decade. But what’s Porsche doing in Finland?

Since 1997, Porsche, the German sports car manufacturer, has headed north to this tongue-twister of a Finnish town instead of east, a move that helps explain why it is still making money even as so many automakers are tapping government aid to weather the worst industry downturn in a generation.

During the fat years, Valmet Automotive cranked out thousands of cars in Uusikaupunki to supplement Porsche’s production in Germany. Now, the assembly lines here are slowing, which means that Valmet, rather than Porsche, is bearing much of the burden of the global auto industry’s distress.

“We are a lean organization, but at the end of the day, there is a threshold here,” said Ilpo Korhonen, Valmet’s president. “We can’t run like this forever.”

Porsche, the maker of the celebrated 911 two-seater and the Cayenne sport utility vehicle, developed a production system — call it über-outsourcing — that is inspired by Japanese models of lean manufacturing and the kind of contract manufacturing common in the electronics industry. But Porsche has taken the notion even further and, at least so far, its highly supple system is molding well to the contours of an unforgiving world economy.

“This crisis will be the absolute test for the Porsche model,” said Jürgen Pieper, co-head of research at Bankhaus Metzler in Frankfurt. “Right now, Porsche is anything but a fair-weather company.”

Nothing symbolizes Porsche’s ability to steer through the storm more than its plans to introduce the Panamera, an entirely new sports car, during this difficult year for the industry.

Fulfilling a long-held dream of its founding family, the company will unveil a four-door sports car, which aims to blend Porsche’s legendary flair with a little modern functionality, at an auto show in Shanghai on April 19. Porsche designed the Panamera, which will be made in Leipzig, with one eye on Asian markets, where wealthy customers often have chauffeurs and want more space in back than a traditional sports car can offer.

Like every automaker these days, Porsche has had to buckle down and find ways to save money, and it is nipping and tucking where it can to save €100 million, or $130 million. In the first half of its current financial year, which ran from August to January, Porsche’s sales tumbled 12.8 percent, to €3.04 billion, as deliveries fell 26.7 percent. It also booked €6.84 billion during the period from the financial derivatives it used to secure control of Volkswagen.

But Wendelin Wiedeking, Porsche’s chief executive, has assured the 2,500 workers at its Stuttgart plant that their jobs are safe, securing a vital flank in a country where workers are represented on the board.

Automakers universally outsource production of parts or sections of vehicles, and some even contract for the assembly of small numbers of automobiles. This strategy shifts part of the financial risk of a downturn onto suppliers, since a falloff in demand forces manufacturers to curtail production of cars, but not spark plugs, headlights and the like.

Porsche, though, is notable for using an outside company, Valmet, to assemble one of its main product lines, the Cayman, and its convertible sibling, the Boxster. In some sense, the innovation makes Porsche the only major virtual vehicle manufacturer, a company that designs and markets sports cars without actually cranking them all out on its own production line.

The bread and butter of Porsche’s work in Stuttgart is the classic 911 sports car, but with demand for that model now falling, it is pulling Boxster production out of Uusikaupunki back to Germany. Though the system creates fiendishly complex logistical challenges, Stuttgart can keep running at capacity, evading the industry’s hoary problem of covering the fixed costs of factories and labor.

Nigeria issues final ultimatum to Pfizer

2009-04-03T03:21:00.000-07:00

Earlier, Aliyu Umar, the Kano state attorney general told AfricaNews that there was an alleged agreement of a settlement to the tune of USD $75million that has not been honored by Pfizer.

“We are heading to court by 4th of April if we do not hear anything regarding our agreement with Pfizer” he said. Aliyu admits that there are agreements for out of court settlement but he declined on details and terms of this agreement.

The American drug maker was alleged to have conducted illegal meningitis drug trials that led to the death, paralysis and brain damage of about 200 children involved in the 1996 failed clinical studies.

Nigeria instituted a suit against the drug company, demanding USD2billion in damages. The drug company denied the charges on grounds that the scientists who conducted the trial kept to standards and acted lawfully.

A press statement released by Pfizer spokesperson, Chris Loder said: "The parties must also agree on specific health initiatives to ensure the benefits of the settlement are transparent and realized. Pfizer's intention is to bring the Trovan matter to a fair and final resolution and we are committed to remaining at the negotiating table until that is accomplished," said the statement.

The statement however, failed to admit any agreement regarding monetary settlement. The drug company is facing a double suit, one from the federal government of Nigeria, which is seeking USD $7billion and a separate civil suit from the Kano state government which is claiming USD $2.5billion.

Pfizer treated 100 meningitis-infected children with an experimental antibiotic called Trovan. Another 100 children, who were control patients in the study, received an approved antibiotic, ceftriaxone — but the dose was lower than recommended, the family attorneys alleged.

As many as 11 children in the study died, and others suffered physical disabilities and brain damage. Pfizer has insisted its records show that none of the deaths was linked to Trovan or substandard treatment, noting that the study showed a better survival rate for the patients on Trovan than those on the standard drug, and that mental damage and other serious disabilities are known aftereffects of meningitis.

Council to the Nigerian government Umar Aliyu, said his clients will not relent in ensuring that justice was upheld in the trial and that it will not chicken out of the trial.

“we are determined to ensure that the right thing in done regarding this process, this is our final condition to Pfizer… they should claim responsibility for their clinical failure and do the right thing… this is our stand” Aliyu said.

http://www.africanews.com/site/Nigeria_issues_final_ultimatum_to_Pfizer/list_messages/24100

Virgin Blue passenger plane forced to land in Melbourne after being hit by lightning strike

2009-04-03T03:20:00.000-07:00

PASSENGERS on a Virgin Blue jet hit by lightning today say they were scared as the plane returned to Melbourne Airport after aborting a flight to Launceston.

Flight DJ1370 was 10 minutes into its journey this afternoon (AEDT) when the 737 was struck "multiple times'' by lightning, a Virgin spokeswoman said.

The captain of the aircraft, carrying 117 passengers and six crew, made an immediate decision to turn back to Melbourne.

One passenger told the Nine network he saw a "couple of flashes, a couple of pops'' during the flight as Melbourne endured a heavy storm punctuated by lightning strikes.

"It was a bit scary,'' he said.

Another passenger, a woman, said the plane got "very jumpy''.

"There was a lot of turbulence,'' she said.

The airline spokeswoman said there was no panic among the passengers as the captain turned the plane around.

The jet was taken out of service for an engineering inspection and another aircraft was arranged to take the passengers to Launceston.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25285030-421,00.html

Man falls to death in front of train at Tamachi Station in Tokyo

2009-04-03T03:16:00.000-07:00

TOKYO —

A man fell from a platform into the path of an approaching train on the Yamanote line at JR Tamachi Station in Tokyo shortly after 8 a.m. on Friday. The man, who has not been identified, was killed instantly, police said, adding he appeared to be in his 30s.

JR officials said 109 train operations were suspended, affecting 180,000 commuters. Besides the Yamanote line, connecting lines such as the Saikyo and Keihin Tohoku lines were also affected and delayed for up to 100 minutes.

Police are currently investigating the circumstances of the man’s death and said it is too early to tell if he jumped, was pushed or fell due to rush hour crowding on the platform.

© 2009 Kyodo News. All rights reserved. No reproduction or republication without written permission.

Crisis sheds light on Sino-France cooperation

2009-04-03T03:07:00.000-07:00

The deepening financial crisis is a vital factor behind French President Nicolas Sarkozy's most recent pledge not to support "Tibet independence" in any form, Chinese analysts have noted.

"Now more than ever, cooperation is the main focus for all countries confronted by the ongoing crisis. A tense Sino-French relationship works directly against this," Feng Zhongping, European studies director at the China Institute of Contemporary International Relations, told China Daily yesterday.

A joint statement issued on Wednesday by the two countries said: "France fully recognizes the importance and sensitivity" of the Tibet affairs and reiterated "the position that Tibet is an integral part of Chinese territory".

It said France refused to back any claim of "Tibetan independence" and that both countries adhered "to the principle of non-interference in each other's affairs".

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/g20/2009-04/03/content_7644861.htm

World Leaders Pledge $1.1 Trillion to Tackle Crisis

2009-04-03T03:06:00.000-07:00

LONDON — Struggling to bridge deep divides over how to revive a paralyzed global economy, the leaders of the world’s largest economies agreed Thursday to bail out developing countries, stimulate world trade and regulate financial firms more stringently. But President Obama conceded that there were “no guarantees” that those measures would reverse the biggest global downturn in six decades.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Britain, host of the Group of 20 summit meeting called to fight the crisis, announced at its conclusion that the leaders had committed to $1.1 trillion in new funds that would greatly increase the capital available to the International Monetary Fund. The goal would be a revival in trade, which is expected to contract this year for the first time in 30 years.

But the combination of loans and guarantees fell short of an injection of fresh fiscal stimuli into the economic bloodstream — the result of a stubborn division between Continental Europe and the United States over whether to act now or wait to see whether existing spending measures took effect.

Moreover, the final accord was far more forceful in addressing the plight of emerging economies that had been sideswiped by the financial crisis than it was in addressing the deep recession in the largest countries where the crisis began.

The proposed remedies, some critics said, treat some peripheral effects of the crisis rather than its thorniest causes. On the critical question of how to grapple with trillions of dollars in “toxic assets” clotting the financial system in Europe and the United States, there was a declaration of goals but few specific actions.

Still, the meeting eased fears that leaders would repeat the failure of a similar gathering in 1933, which was followed by a surge of protectionism that prolonged the Great Depression. It also gave Mr. Obama a high-profile debut on the world stage. He projected contrition about America’s role in starting the meltdown, extolled global resolve to find a way to end the downturn and mediated a dispute between the presidents of France and China over tax havens.

“Today, we’ve learned the lessons of history,” Mr. Obama declared in a news conference in which he was noticeably relaxed, taking questions from journalists from India and China. But he also said that getting more than 20 countries to agree to common steps was particularly hard because “each country has its own quirks.”

The meeting, he said, exemplified the power of developing nations, heralding a new age in which decisions about the future of the global economy will no longer be made by an elite club of Western powers that have set the global rules since the Bretton Woods agreement in July 1944.

Mr. Brown, who organized the meeting in a hangarlike conference center in London, said: “This is the day the world came together to fight against the global recession. Our message today is clear and certain: we believe that global problems require global solutions.”

The most concrete step was a $750 billion reinforcement of the resources of the monetary fund, which has emerged from years of waning relevance to become the first responder in this crisis, lending billions of dollars in emergency loans to dozens of countries.

In addition, the leaders agreed to provide $250 billion in trade credits, needed to finance cross-border trade that has declined roughly 10 percent as a result of the credit crisis and the economic downturn.

Among other steps Mr. Brown detailed were new regulations on hedge funds and rating agencies, as well as a crackdown on tax havens, which will be publicly identified and subjected to sanctions if they do not agree to share tax information with the authorities of other countries. A senior Obama administration official cautioned that the sanctions were “future oriented.”

Stock markets around the world, especially in emerging nations, rose in the hours leading up to the announcement.

In the United States, however, investors seemed less cheered about a deal emerging from the Group of 20 than about an arcane change in American accounting regulations that would make it easier for banks to defer writing down the value of their most troubled toxic assets. Many financial experts had been hoping that world leaders would address how to dispose of those assets rather than leave bankers to use accounting changes to make them appear less crippling.

“The rich countries are in denial about the depth of the problems remaining in their financial sectors,” said Kenneth S. Rogoff, a professor of economics at Harvard. “They want to congratulate themselves for taking all the right steps already, as if the only problem now is how to help emerging markets.”

In the end, the leaders also papered over one of their most public disputes: whether countries around the world should commit to even greater fiscal stimuli than they had already enacted.

France and Germany balked at American pressure, saying their social safety nets accomplished much of the goal. Mr. Obama largely surrendered the point, agreeing to vague wording that allowed nations the leeway of promising to take whatever steps were necessary for “sustained growth.”

The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, lavished praise on Mr. Obama, saying he “pushed very hard to come to concrete solutions and to have a fruitful discussion.”

The Group of 20 did agree on new global rules to govern the pay and bonuses of bankers. The leaders also agreed to “name and shame” countries that erected trade barriers, intended to resist growing protectionist sentiment.

But a European push for sweeping global regulation of the financial markets was blunted, to a large degree, by the United States. While the leaders agreed to create a new Financial Stability Board to monitor the financial system for signs of risks, they stopped well short of giving regulators cross-border authority, something France has long advocated.

Instead, the leaders agreed to more closely coordinate their regulation of “systemically important” financial institutions. They did not, however, agree on a mechanism to resolve cross-border disputes that might arise in the winding down of insolvent banks, an issue that might yet arise if global banks like Citigroup or Royal Bank of Scotland fell deeper in trouble.

“The regulatory part was close to a zero,” said Simon Johnson, a professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Mr. Johnson said that despite the failure to reach an agreement on more stimulus programs, he considered the meeting a success for Mr. Obama. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner had led the push to reinforce the monetary fund, and he won more than analysts had expected.

In addition to its vastly larger financial resources, the monetary fund was given a mandate to act as an early warning system for financial risks.

China is expected to contribute $40 billion. Japan and the European Union each pledged $100 billion. The United States has said it will contribute $100 billion, too, though that requires Congressional approval.

In addition to $500 billion in loans, the Group of 20 approved a one-time issuance of $250 billion in Special Drawing Rights, the synthetic currency of the fund, which will be parceled out to all its 185 members.

Reflecting the rise of China, India and other emerging nations, the leaders called on the fund to overhaul its management by 2011 to better reflect the economic weight of its member states.

“Today is the proof that the I.M.F. is back,” said the fund’s managing director, Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

Julia Werdigier contributed reporting.

Obama in France, Germany before NATO talks

2009-04-03T02:27:00.000-07:00

LONDON - U.S. President Barack Obama arrived in France on Friday for a NATO summit where he will seek backing for his new strategy in the war in Afghanistan.

After proclaiming "I think we did OK" at a 20-nation economic summit in London a day earlier, Obama wasteaming up with the two European leaders who gave him the most grief over his failed bid for more recession-fighting stimulus, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Obama was due to meet Sarkozy and hold a U.S.-style town hall meeting with French and German youths before crossing the nearby border for talks with Merkel.

msnbc.com news services
updated 5:35 a.m. ET April 3, 2009