The Star Online: World Updates
The Star Online: World Updates |
- Kerry delivers a love letter to France, in French
- Ousted Nasheed faces Maldives run-off after split poll results
- Egypt army attacks Sinai Islamists as militancy spreads
| Kerry delivers a love letter to France, in French Posted: PARIS (Reuters) - French, it is said, is the language of love. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry flaunted his fluency in the language on Saturday to deliver something of a love letter to France, one of the few world powers that seems likely to join the United States in any military action against Syria. Following the British parliament's August 29 vote to reject any British use of force against Syria, which the United States accuses of gassing its own people with sarin, France has made no secret of its desire to play Washington's supporting partner. Speaking in French for eight minutes beneath the gold-painted cherubs of one of the Quai d'Orsay's elegant salons, Kerry traced the history of U.S.-French relations beginning from the American Revolution, while glossing over their many tiffs. "When he visited General de Gaulle in Paris more than 50 years ago, President Kennedy said, and I quote, 'The relationship between France and the United States is crucially important for the preservation of liberty in the whole world,'" Kerry said. "Today, faced with the brutal chemical weapons attacks in Syria, that relationship evoked by President Kennedy is more crucial than ever," he added. Not to be outdone, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius broke a taboo by speaking in English at a news conference in the Foreign Ministry's elegant building on the banks of the Seine, where he once chided a reporter, "Here, sir, we speak French." While Kerry's performance might be seen as flattering a French government that is one of the few to back U.S. President Barack Obama's call for air strikes to deter Syria from using chemical arms, it may help convince a sceptical French public. An IFOP poll published on Saturday showed 68 percent of French were against an intervention in Syria. France took no part in the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, which it strongly opposed, but joined the United States, Britain and others in a military intervention that helped oust Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. POLITICAL LIABILITY, DIPLOMATIC ASSET Kerry, who learned French as a boy, found his fluency a liability during his 2004 U.S. presidential campaign, feeding an image of the Democrat as a wealthy elitist that his Republican opponent, then-President George W. Bush, exploited. As a diplomat, however, it is an asset, allowing him to speak directly to the French about their unhappy history with chemical warfare during World War One as one reason why the French government is sensitive to its alleged use in Syria. "Some of the very first lethal chemical weapons attacks happened here, on French soil, during the First World War and a large number of these victims of these deadly, indiscriminate weapons were young French soldiers, just 19 or 20 years old," he said. Fabius, an experienced politician best known for having been France's youngest prime minister, showed a rare moment of intensity and outrage about an August 21 attack in Syria in which the Syrian government is accused of using sarin gas. Syria, embroiled in a 2-1/2-year-old civil war in which more than 100,000 are believed to have died, denies that. "You have to look at the images of these children in rows with the shrouds over them, not an injury, not a drop of blood? And they are there and they are sleeping forever," Fabius said, visibly shaken. "There's a dictator who did it and is ready to start again," he said gesticulating with his fists. "This concerns us, too. You can't say that globalization is everywhere except for terrorism and chemical weapons." As if to underscore their countries' ties, Kerry and Fabius went for a walk outside the Foreign Ministry on a pleasant Paris evening, where, later, the sky to the west was lit with gold and to the east by a rainbow. "France and the United States stand shoulder to shoulder. Some ask why? Just look at history. Each time that the cause is just, France and the United States stand together," Fabius said. "We are exceedingly grateful to have France by our side," said Kerry. (Reporting By Arshad Mohammed; Editing by Peter Cooney) |
| Ousted Nasheed faces Maldives run-off after split poll results Posted: MALE (Reuters) - Former Maldivian leader Mohamed Nasheed will face a run-off election on September 28 after his win in the presidential poll ended without a majority, provisional results showed on Sunday, nearly 20 months after his removal ignited months of unrest. Nasheed, the Maldives' first democratically elected president, was forced from office in February 2012 in what his supporters call a coup. The turmoil tarnished the Indian Ocean archipelago's image as a tropical holiday paradise. Nasheed, running against three rivals, had secured 45.45 percent of the total polled, according to the early results, Election Commissioner Fuwad Thowfeek told reporters. He missed a required majority of 50 percent, as the votes were split among the other three contenders. Nasheed's main rival, Abdulla Yameen, a half-brother of Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, who ruled for 30 years and was considered a dictator by opponents and rights groups, polled 25.35 percent, the preliminary results showed. Gasim Ibrahim, a resort tycoon, media business owner and formerly a finance minister under Gayoom, secured 24.07 percent, while Nasheed's successor and incumbent leader Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik performed the worst, with just 5.13 percent. Nasheed and Yameen will face each other in a run-off election on September 28, the election commissioner confirmed. The election commission will release final results of the first round on September 14, Thowfeek said. "Any boxes needed to be recounted will be recounted within this time and if required, make adjustments. Counting will be done in the presence of observers and representatives of candidates," he said. Transparency Maldives, which deployed 400 observers to monitor the poll, said it was "largely peaceful", except for a few minor counting disputes. "The incidents that have happened on election day will not have a material impact on the outcome," said Aiman Rasheed, an official of Transparency Maldives. RUN-OFF FOR SECOND TIME Nasheed unseated Gayoom in a run-off election in 2008. Critical challenges facing the next president include a rise in Islamist ideology, human rights abuses and lack of investor confidence after Waheed's government cancelled the country's biggest foreign investment project with India's GMR Infrastructure. Mohamed Aslam, a senior member of Nasheed's Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) and a former minister of housing and environment, said his party did not get the votes it expected in Male, the capital, and one of Nasheed's strongholds. Analysts and human rights defenders say the Maldives has been in limbo since Nasheed's resignation, prompting a voter turnout of 88 percent, up from 85 percent in the 2008 vote. "I've been waiting 19 months for this day. So I got here as early as I could. It's my way of standing up against the coup," said voter Ismail Shiyaz, 39, a supporter of Nasheed. Others, like Rooya Hussain, were less certain. "I don't think any of these candidates are suitable," she said. "However, I cast a valid vote for one of them. Let's see if this brings any change for the better." Nasheed said earlier he had support in the ranks of the military and police, expressing confidence he would get half the vote to win in the first round. "Voting today is significant because we are going to establish a legitimate government," Nasheed said soon after he voted. Nasheed was forced to resign in 2012 after mutinying police and military forces armed opposition demonstrators and gave him an ultimatum. His removal sparked unruly protests by his supporters and a heavy-handed police crackdown, pushing the country into crisis. A Commonwealth-backed commission of inquiry later concluded that his removal did not constitute a coup. The Maldives, a sultanate for almost nine centuries before becoming a British protectorate, held its first fully democratic vote in 2008 with Nasheed defeating Gayoom, an autocrat who was then Asia's longest-serving leader. (Additional reporting and writing by Shihar Aneez in Colombo; Editing by Clarence Fernandez) |
| Egypt army attacks Sinai Islamists as militancy spreads Posted: CAIRO (Reuters) - The Egyptian army launched an attack against Islamist militants in North Sinai on Saturday, killing at least nine people, security officials said. Two Egyptian soldiers were killed late on Saturday when an improvised explosive device detonated in a road in the North Sinai town of Sheikh Zuweid near the border with the Gaza Strip, security sources said. Radical Islamists in the rugged desert region adjoining Israel, who expanded into a security vacuum left by the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak in 2011, have been staging almost daily assaults on security forces and other targets. Dozens of tanks and armoured vehicles backed by attack helicopters were used earlier in Saturday's operation near Sheikh Zuweid, a few kilometres (miles) from the Palestinian Gaza Strip, security sources said. The army said nine militants had been arrested. Since the army toppled Islamist President Mohamed Mursi on July 3, and especially since security forces killed hundreds of Islamists when they smashed protest camps in Cairo on August 14, there have been online calls from Islamist radicals for wider attacks on the state. Egyptian memories of an Islamist insurgency in the 1990s were revived on Thursday when a suicide bomber blew up a car bomb next to the interior minister's convoy in Cairo. A week ago, militants fired rocket-propelled grenades at a ship passing through the Suez Canal on the Sinai's western edge, vital to world trade as well as Egypt's depleted state finances. On Saturday, a bomb exploded at a Cairo police station for the second time in less than a week, state media said, although no one was hurt. In addition, explosives were found on the railway line between the cities of Suez and Ismailia along the Suez Canal, but defused before they could do damage, according to the state news agency MENA. No one has claimed responsibility for any of the attacks, although a video apparently of the Suez attack was posted on YouTube with an Islamist logo. But the army-backed rulers have incensed Islamists inside Egypt and abroad with their violent crackdown on Mursi's Islamist movement, the Muslim Brotherhood, most of whose top leaders have been arrested and accused of terrorism or inciting violence. The Brotherhood, sworn to peaceful resistance, dismisses the accusations as a pretext for the crackdown by a "putschist regime", and has defied the crackdown to bring thousands onto the streets across Egypt three times in eight days. NEW TARGETS The military-backed government now also appears to be turning its sights on other groups - opposed to the Islamists - who helped topple Mubarak in 2011 hoping to establish an open civilian democracy in Egypt. A judicial source said the public prosecutor was examining complaints from private citizens against 35 prominent democracy and rights activists, many of them important players in the 2011 uprising. They include activist Ahmed Maher, blogger Ahmed Douma and liberal politician Amr Hamzawi, the judicial source said. Such prosecutions have long been seen as a tool of political intimidation in Egypt and are often instigated by supporters of the government. Liberal politician Mohamed ElBaradei, who was deputy president in the interim government before resigning, has been targeted in a similar case. The latest complaints accuse activists of accepting money from the United States and other countries, the source said. Hamzawi said on Twitter that "claims that I got foreign money are completely untrue, the campaign of fabrication and distortion must immediately stop". "These are fake accusations," rights lawyer Gamal Eid told Reuters. "(The complaint) is from people who know that it is false but who try to silence activists' demands for the realisation of the demands of the revolution." The prosecutor's office was not available for comment on the issue. Separately, a leftist lawyer accused of belonging to a secret organisation and spreading lies about the military appeared before military prosecutors in Suez, but was later released, judicial sources said. Haitham Mohamedeen, a rights activist who belongs to the Revolutionary Socialist movement, a group critical of the army, had been arrested in Suez on Thursday. It was not clear whether the case against him had been dropped. Egyptian journalist Ahmed Abu Deraa also remained in detention after his arrest in North Sinai on Wednesday. The military prosecutor accused him of spreading lies and giving military information to secret organisations, a source at the prosecutor's office said. "The detention of Ahmed Abu Deraa harks back to the Mubarak era, when journalists faced formidable obstacles reporting on military activity in the Sinai peninsula," said Robert Mahoney, deputy director of the Committee to Protect Journalists. (Writing by Kevin Liffey; Editing by Peter Cooney) |
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