Dubai Firm Submits to Broader U.S. Review WASHINGTON - A United Arab Emirates company formally submitted Friday to a highly unusual, broader examination by the Bush administration of potential security risks over its plans to take over significant operations at major U.S. ports.
The British company runs major port operations in New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia.
The Treasury Department , which governs the review panel, is expected to conduct another preliminary scrutiny t... (more)
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All British soldiers to be out of Iraq in 12 monthsAll British and United States troops serving in Iraq will be withdrawn within a year in an effort to bring peace and stability to the country.
The news came as defence chiefs admitted privately that the British troop commitment in Afghanistan may last for up to 10 years.
The planned pull-out from Iraq follows the acceptance by London and Washington that the presence of the coalition, mainly composed of British and US troops, is now seen as the main obstacle to peace... (more)
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Cheney daughter leads ‘cold war’ on mullahsTHE war in Iraq is her father’s business but Elizabeth Cheney, the American vice-president’s daughter, has been given responsibility for bringing about a different type of regime change in Iran.
Cheney, a 39-year-old mother of four, is a senior official in the State Department, which has often been regarded as hostile territory by Dick Cheney’s White House team. Nonetheless father and daughter agree it would be better for the mullahs’ regime to collapse fro... (more)
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Military chief warns of more Iraq shrine attacksBOMBING the Samarra shrine was a new and successful tactic by al-Qaeda terrorists trying to spark civil war in Iraq, according to the chief of the US Central Command.
Despite relative calm at the weekend, General John Abizaid warned of more such bombings.
"They got more of a reaction from that than they had hoped for," he said on a two-day visit to Iraq.
"I expect we'll see another attack in the near future on another symbol. They'll find some other p... (more)
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Nato may help US airstrikes on IranWHEN Major-General Axel Tüttelmann, the head of Nato’s Airborne Early Warning and Control Force, showed off an Awacs early warning surveillance plane in Israel a fortnight ago, he caused a flurry of concern back at headquarters in Brussels.
It was not his demonstration that raised eyebrows, but what he said about Nato’s possible involvement in any future military strike against Iran. “We would be the first to be called up if the Nato council decided we shoul... (more)
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Syria flays Israel for 'nuclear dumping'Syria has accused Israel of using the Golan Heights as a dumping ground for nuclear waste - a charge the Jewish state's ambassador to the world's disarmament body flatly rejected.
Bashar Ja'afari, the Syrian Ambassador, told the 65-nation Conference on Disarmament that all Arab states were committed to creating a zone in the Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction.
"However, Israel, which has unambiguous support from major nuclear weapon state... (more)
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Thousands march to protest church attackThousands marched through Nazareth on Saturday afternoon in protest after a Jewish man detonated firecrackers in the Basilica of the Annunciation in the city the night before.
Police sources estimated some 3,500 people participated in the march. They said before it began that no police would be deployed during the protest, but that forces in the northern district were on high alert.
The eldest daughter of the Jewish man who detonated firecrackers inside the major Ch... (more)
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Chavez prepares his people's army to confront USVenezuela begins training a vast army of civilian reserves today to fight off the attack its Left-wing president, Hugo Chavez, says the United States is plotting against it.
The oil-rich state aims to teach up to two million volunteers, from the unemployed to office workers, shop assistants and housewives, basic military skills such as marching in step or shooting to kill.
If it reaches that size, the force will be the largest civilian reserve army in the Americas, ... (more)
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China ups military budget by 14.7%Beijing (dpa) - China on Saturday said it had increased its military budget for this year by another 14.7 per cent, following similar large increases in recent years.
The defence budget for 2006 is set at 283.8 billion yuan (35.1 billion dollars), a spokesman for the National People's Congress (NPC), China's nominal parliament, told reporters.
NPC spokesman Jiang Enzhu defended the increase as "moderate" and "in line with China's rapid economic develo... (more)
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Russian General Threatens Redeployment of Mid-Range NukesIs Russia seriously considering putting nuclear pressures on Europe to a degree not seen since the last dark days of the Cold War? Or are a group of Russian generals trying to derail the reformist military policies of President Vladimir Putin and his Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov?
U.S. military analysts are asking these questions after a well placed, senior Russian general Wednesday was reported in a major Moscow newspaper as saying Russia might consider opting out of the 1987 In... (more)
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Russia Accuses Berezovsky of Trying to Overthrow Putin, Demands UK HandoverThe Russian Prosecutor General’s Office has opened a new criminal case against an exiled oligarch Boris Berezovsky on charges of engaging in activity aimed at the forcible seizure of power in Russia, Interfax news agency reported. On March 1 Russian authorities sent documents to the UK Home Office to have Berezovsky extradited.
The case is now being investigated by the Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB). If British authoities agree to extradite Berezovsky, he will... (more)
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Negroponte: Iraqi Balkanization on ScheduleJohn Negroponte, Henry Kissinger understudy and death squad ambassador to Honduras, has admitted the Straussian neocon and Jabotinsky Likudite plan to break “all Arab states into smaller units” is on schedule (a plan going back at least to Moshe Sharett, the second Israeli PM, according to Livia Rokach, daughter of Israel Rokach, Minister of the Interior in the Sharett government), thus implementing “balkanization and vassalization,” as Rokach described it in her book, Is... (more)
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Iran Blames U.S. of Destroying Russian Efforts to Solve Nuclear ProblemIran top nuclear negotiators have accused the United States of trying to destroy Russian efforts to solve the Iranian nuclear problem.
The AFP quoted one of the Iranian officials, Ali Larijani, as saying at a press conference in Moscow that “the Americans’ insistence on referring the Iran nuclear dossier to the UN Security Council signifies the destruction of the Russian proposal.”
Larijani called the United States an “obstacle” to the ... (more)
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80% of U.S. Ports Already Foreign-OwnedMost of the terminals at America's major ports are already foreign-owned, according to a senior official with the largest U.S.-owned ports operator, SSA Marine.
In an interview with National Public Radio on Sunday, SSA Vice President Bob Waters explained that there are 15 major ports in the U.S., comprising about 100 terminals.
We operate seven of those terminals," he said, adding that the next biggest American ports operator, Maher Terminals, manages one terminal.<... (more)
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CFR President: State sovereignty must be altered in globalized era: In the age of globalization, states should give up some sovereignty to world bodies in order to protect their own interestsFor 350 years, sovereignty -- the notion that states are the central actors on the world stage and that governments are essentially free to do what they want within their own territory but not within the territory of other states -- has provided the organizing principle of international relations. The time has come to rethink this notion.
The world's 190-plus states now co-exist with a larger number of powerful non-sovereign and at least partly (and often largely) independent acto... (more)
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British Defense Secretary Warns Of Looming Water WarsClimate change could become a major source of global conflict over the next 30 years, with countries battling for control of water supplies, British Defense Secretary John Reid has warned.
He pointed to a looming collision between a growing world population and increasingly scarce water resources, saying violent confrontations between states would become more likely as global warming caused deserts to engulf land, ice fields to melt and water supplies to become contaminated.
... (more)
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China to ban torture of prisonersChina is planning to introduce a new law banning police from using torture to extract confessions.
The Xinhua newsagency reports the Law on Penalties for Offences against Public Order, effective from the beginning of March will also bar evidence obtained with threats, from being used to pursue prosecutions.
A spokesperson for the Ministry of Public Security says the law stipulates evidence obtained by torture, threatening or cheating can not be used as the basis for... (more)
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UK Government Tells Exiled Tycoon Berezovsky Not to Plot Against Russian President PutinBoris Berezovsky, the Russian businessman who is now living in Britain under political asylum has been warned by the government not to campaign for the overthrow of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, the Financial Times said.
Britain’s foreign secretary Jack Straw said on Monday that Berezovsky’s refugee status could be reviewed at any time if he was “using the UK as a base from which to foment violent disorder or terrorism in other countries”.
... (more)
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Toll in Iraq's Deadly Surge: 1,300Grisly attacks and other sectarian violence unleashed by last week's bombing of a Shiite Muslim shrine have killed more than 1,300 Iraqis, making the past few days the deadliest of the war outside of major U.S. offensives, according to Baghdad's main morgue. The toll was more than three times higher than the figure previously reported by the U.S. military and the news media.
Hundreds of unclaimed dead lay at the morgue at midday Monday -- blood-caked men who had been shot, knifed,... (more)
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China warns Taiwan of 'disaster'China has warned that Taiwan's decision to scrap a council on reunification with the mainland could bring disaster.
The move will "create antagonism and conflict within Taiwan and across the strait," China's ruling Communist Party and government said in a statement.
Mr Chen announced on Monday that the National Unification Council and its guidelines would "cease to function" due to China's "military threat".
China said Mr Chen was pushing Taiwan towar... (more)
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BREAKING: Dubai Ports World Boycotts IsraelFrom this morning’s Jerusalem Post:
The parent company of a Dubai-based firm at the center of a political storm in the US over the purchase of American ports participates in the Arab boycott against Israel, The Jerusalem Post has learned.
The Jerusalem Post notes that “US law bars firms from complying with such requests or cooperating with attempts by Arab governments to boycott Israel.” Once upon a time, opposing such boycotts was important to... (more)
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German Intelligence Gave U.S. Saddam's Defense Plan, Report SaysIn providing the document, German officials offered more significant help to the U.S. than their government has publicly admitted.
WASHINGTON, Feb. 26 - Two German intelligence agents in Baghdad obtained a copy of Saddam Hussein's plan to defend the Iraqi capital, which a German official passed on to American commanders a month before the invasion, according to a classified study by the United States military.
In providing the Iraqi document, German intelligence off... (more)
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