Free Internet Press Newsletter - Friday March 16 2007 - (813)

Friday March 16 2007 edition
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Arctic Ocean May Lose All Its Ice By 2040, Disrupting Global Weather 2007-03-15 21:26:54 Rapidly thinning Arctic sea ice may have reached a tipping point that threatens to disrupt global weather patterns, bringing intense winter storms and heavier rainfall to western Europe, scientists warned Thursday. Satellite images taken since 1979 show that ocean ice cover in the region has declined steadily, with an estimated 38,000 square miles now being lost every year. Computer models predict sea ice could vanish from the Arctic ocean completely as early as 2040. The loss of Arctic sea ice will have a dramatic impact on polar bears and other species that hunt among the ice floes, but it will also trigger erratic shifts in climate that will be felt around the world, scientists believe. The bitter Arctic fronts that blow across Colorado and the western United States may warm and bring less snow, while winter storm tracks across parts of Europe are expected to intensify and unleash torrential downpours. Read The Full Story Israel Risks Isolation After Rejecting Fatah-Hamas Coalition Government 2007-03-15 21:26:10 Israel seems to be heading for confrontation with Britain and the European Union after announcing a total boycott of the new Palestinian national unity government, due to be sworn in Friday after months of factional violence and political uncertainty. "Israel will not deal with this new government and we hope the international community will stand firmly by its own principles and refuse to deal with a government that says no to peace and no to reconciliation," said Mark Regev, the foreign ministry spokesman. Israel objects to the new government's failure to meet the three conditions laid down by the international community: recognise Israel, renounce violence and accept previous peace agreements. Britain and the E.U.  appear willing to deal with the unity government on a selective basis, and there are signs that even the U.S. - anxious to appease its conservative Arab allies - may part company with the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, over the issue. Washington conspicuously failed to announce a boycott of its own, saying it was reserving judgment. Read The Full Story House Appropriations Committee Keeps Timeline In Iraq War Budget Bill 2007-03-15 21:24:48 Democratic legislation to set timelines for the removal of troops from Iraq headed for a showdown on the House floor next week after the Appropriations Committee approved a $124 billion war funding bill Thursday that would end the U.S. role in the conflict by next year. The committee's vote kept the controversial legislation moving forward, even as the Senate scuttled its own legislation to bring troops home. After weeks of parliamentary wrangling, Senate Democratic leaders fell three votes short on a resolution that would have restricted the use of troops in Iraq and set March 31, 2008, as a target date for removing U.S. forces from combat. Two Democrats - Mark Pryor (Arkansas) and Ben Nelson (Nebraska) - along with independent Joseph I. Lieberman (Connecticut) voted against the Senate measure, and only one Republican, Gordon Smith (Oregon), voted for it. One of President Bush's strongest allies on Iraq, Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona), was campaigning in Iowa and missed the votes. Read The Full Story California Moves Up Presidential Primary Elections To February 2007-03-15 21:22:24 Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) signed legislation Thursday afternoon moving California's 2008 presidential primary to Feb. 5, shaking up the primary calendar and forcing campaigns to assess strategies. The move is expected to be copied by up to 15 states - including delegate-rich Florida, New York and Texas, which would create a super primary that could decide the parties' nominees. Several other states already hold their primary that day. "Now California is important again in presidential nominating politics ... and we will get the respect that California deserves," Schwarzenegger said at the bill signing. The California change follows other calendar changes that have accelerated the campaigns. As is tradition, Iowa goes first with its caucuses on Jan. 14 and New Hampshire holds its first-in-the-nation primary on Jan. 22. Read The Full Story Senate Jucidiary Committee Authorizes Use Of Subpoenas For Justice Dept. Officials 2007-03-15 14:32:34 The Senate Judiciary Committee Thursday authorized the use of subpoenas to compel the testimony of five Justice Department officials as part of an investigation into the firing of eight U.S. attorneys, but the panel put off a vote on subpoenas for top White House aides, including senior political adviser Karl Rove. Meeting in an executive session, the 19-member committee voted to authorize the issuing of 11 subpoenas - five for Justice Department officials involved in the firings and six for U.S. attorneys who were dismissed last year in the controversial purge. The subpoena authority gives the panel a fall-back position in case any of the current and former officials refuse to testify voluntarily or Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales reconsiders his pledge to let his subordinates appear before the committee. Some Democratic lawmakers and at least one Republican senator have called on Gonzales to resign over the firings, which critics have charged were politically motivated and carried out in a deceitful manner that involved false claims of poor performance and misleading statements to Congress. Read The Full Story Glaciers In Antarctica, Greenland Losing Ice 2007-03-15 14:31:56 Some of the largest glaciers in Antarctica and Greenland are moving in unusual ways and are losing increased amounts of ice to the sea, researchers said Thursday. While the Greenland changes appear to be related to global warming, it remains unclear what is causing the glaciers, or ice streams, of frigid Antarctica to be losing ice to the ocean in recent years, the researchers said. "In Greenland, we know there is melting associated with the ice loss, but in Antarctica we don't really know why it's happening," said Duncan Wingham, an author on the Science magazine review released Thursday. "With so much of the world's ice captured in Antarctica, just the fact that we don't know why this is happening is a cause of some concern." Read The Full Story Bush Criticizes How Prosecutors' Dismissals Were Handled 2007-03-15 01:55:37 President Bush said Wednesday that he had confidence in Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, but that he was “frankly not happy about” the way Gonzales had handled the dismissal of federal prosecutors, a move that has led to a Congressional investigation into whether the White House allowed politics to interfere with law enforcement. As Gonzales defended himself in television interviews, Bush, in Mexico on the last day of his Latin America trip, offered reporters his first explanation of his own role, saying that although he had relayed complaints to Gonzales about federal prosecutors, “I never brought up a specific case nor gave him specific instructions.” The president’s statement did little to tamp down speculation that Gonzales would be forced to resign. Nor did it settle the growing furor on Capitol Hill, where a Republican senator became the first in his party to call for  Gonzales to step down, and the new White House counsel, Fred F. Fielding, met with lawmakers on the possible testimony of administration officials, including the chief political adviser, Karl Rove. Read The Full Story Pentagon Issues Dire Look At Iraq 2007-03-15 01:54:46 The Pentagon Wednesday released its bleakest assessment of Iraq yet, reporting record levels of violence and hardening sectarian divisions in the last quarter of 2006 as rival Sunni and Shiite militias waged campaigns of "sectarian cleansing" that forced as many as 9,000 civilians to flee the country each month. Weekly attacks in Iraq rose to more than 1,000 during the period and average daily casualties increased to more than 140, with Iraqi civilians bearing the brunt of the violence - nearly 100 killed or wounded a day, according to statistics in the Pentagon's latest congressionally required quarterly report on security in Iraq. Those figures may represent as little as half of the true casualties because they include only violence observed by or reported to the U.S.-led military coalition, the report acknowledged. It cited a United Nations estimate, based on hospital reports, that more than 6,000 Iraqi civilians were killed or wounded in December alone. Read The Full Story Venezuela's Hugo Chavez Is Tied To Giuliani Firm 2007-03-15 01:54:07 Rudolph W. Giuliani's law firm has lobbied for years on behalf of an oil company controlled by the Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez,a strident critic of President Bush and American-style capitalism. Bracewell and Giuliani, the firm based in Houston that Giuliani joined as a name partner two years ago, handles lobbying in the Texas capital for the Citgo Petroleum Corporation of Houston, Texas. Citgo is the American subsidiary of Petroleos de Venezuela, the state-owned oil company that Chavez controls. Giuliani’s duties at his law firm do not include lobbying, but the financial relationship with a company affiliated with one of the most outspoken critics of the United States potentially exposes Giuliani to new scrutiny as he campaigns to become the Republican nominee for president in 2008. Read The Full Story Pentagon Officials Arrive In Ukraine To Discuss Missile Defense 2007-03-15 01:53:19 An American delegation headed by U.S. Ballistic Missile Defense Agency director Lt. Gen. Henry Obering arrived in Kiev, Ukraine, Wednesday, where the Pentagon's representatives and the Ukrainian authorities are to discuss plans to expand America's ballistic missile defense system into Poland and the Czech Republic. In the face of the increasing number of opponents to the idea, including most of Western Europe, Washington has clearly decided to attempt to placate the naysayers by sending Gen. Obering to explain the situation. The Pentagon delegation's visit to Ukraine was organized on the initiative of the American side. In Kiev, the meetings lasted from early in the morning until late in the evening and included talks with Defense Minister Vitaly Gaiduk, presidential advisor Vladimir Gorbulin, deputies from the Upper Rada (the Ukrainian parliament), and representatives from the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry. At the Americans' request, the meetings were held behind closed doors, with General Obering appearing in public only at a final press conference to discuss what brought him to Kiev and the talks that he had with Ukrainian military and government officials. According to General Obering, the American anti-missile facilities that may soon be installed in Poland and the Czech Republic are necessary only to neutralize the threats posed by Iran and North Korea. He insisted that these facilities are not a threat to Russia and that the U.S. has no plans to establish a similar system in Ukraine or the countries of the Caucasus. Read The Full Story	Russia Joins West In Turning Sanctions Screw On Iran 2007-03-15 21:26:34 Russia joined the west in stepping up the pressure on Iran Thursday over its suspect nuclear program by agreeing to tighten United Nations sanctions on the Islamic regime, a day after announcing a delay in the supply of nuclear fuel to it. With surprising speed, the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany agreed on a stiffer package of economic sanctions against Iran because of its refusal to stop enriching uranium, an operation the west believes is geared to an illicit nuclear bomb program, but which Tehran insists is aimed at energy generation. The British ambassador to the U.N., Sir Emyr Jones Parry, said he is introducing an agreed security council draft resolution to ban Iranian arms exports, restrict loans to and investment in Iran and lengthen a blacklist of Iranian officials and companies whose assets are being frozen. Read The Full Story Commentary: Russian Powerplay Over Kosovo Could Trigger New European War 2007-03-15 21:25:42 Intellpuke: The following commentary is by Simon Tisdall, an assistant editor of Britain's Guardian newspaper and a foreign affairs columnist. He was previously a foreign leader writer for the paper and has also served as its foreign editor and its U.S. editor, based in Washington, D.C.  In his commentary, Mr. Tisdall writes that, as tempers become frayed in Belgrade, a Russian powerplay over Kosovo could trigger a new European war. His commentary follows: In the evolving narrative of the Blair era, the Kosovo intervention is described as a key moment whose perceived success led fatefully to Afghanistan and Iraq. But after eight years of unpaid bills and hard choices deferred, a moment of reckoning is coming - and the legacy storyline is twisting dangerously awry. Kosovo's second war of independence may be only months away. Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. diplomat who negotiated an end to the Bosnian war, warned this week that Russian opposition to a U.N. plan for Kosovo's conditional, internationally supervised statehood may ignite a new conflagration. "Russia's actions could determine whether there is another war in Europe," Holbrooke said in a Washington Post op-ed article. A disastrous domino effect would then ensue. "If Moscow vetoes or delays the [U.N.] plan, the Kosovar Albanians will declare independence unilaterally," he said. "Some countries, including the United States and many Muslim states, would probably recognize them, but most of the European Union would not. A major European crisis would be assured. Bloodshed would return to the Balkans. NATO, which is pledged to keep peace in Kosovo, could find itself back in battle in Europe." Read The Full Story Russia Tightens Grip On European Union Energy Supply 2007-03-15 21:24:00 Russia Thursday consolidated its grip as the European Union's main energy supplier by agreeing to build a major oil pipeline across Bulgaria and Greece. The 175-mile, $1.2 billion (£619 million) pipeline will link Bulgaria's Black Sea port of Burgas with the Greek port of Alexandroupoli. The project will make it possible for the first time for Russian and Caspian oil to be transported directly to the E.U., avoiding Turkey. Speaking in Athens, where he flew to sign the deal with his Bulgarian and Greek counterparts, Russia's president Vladimir Putin Thursday said the long-delayed agreement would benefit all three countries. "We consider that reliable access to energy supplies is one of the conditions of our civilisation," said Putin. He added: "This pipeline demonstrates how all countries can benefit, not just in the Balkans but in Europe." The pipeline, however, comes at a time when E.U. leaders have become increasingly anxious about their dependence on Russian oil and gas. Russia already provides Europe with a third of its oil and 40% of its natural gas. Read The Full Story Surprising Activity Found At Yellowstone Supervolcano 2007-03-15 19:59:52 Supervolcanoes can sleep for centuries or millennia before producing incredibly massive eruptions that can drop ash across an entire continent. One of the largest supervolcanoes in the world lies beneath Yellowstone National Park,  which spans parts of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho. Though the Yellowstone system is active and expected to eventually blow its top, scientists don’t think it will erupt any time soon. Yet significant activity continues beneath the surface. And the activity has been increasing lately, scientists have discovered. In addition, the nearby Teton Range, in a total surprise, is getting shorter. The findings, reported this month in the Journal of Geophysical Researchâ€"Solid Earth, suggest that a slow and gradual movement caused by a giant hotspot of molten rock beneath a volcano can shape a landscape more than sudden ground movements caused by the volcano’s frequent earthquakes.  Read The Full Story Shaikh Mohammed Said To Confess To Other Acts, Including Daniel Pearl's Murder 2007-03-15 14:32:14 Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who took responsibility for the Sept. 11 attacks, said he decapitated the American journalist Daniel Pearl, according to a revised transcript released Thursday of his remarks at a military hearing held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, on Saturday. American officials and Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf have said that Mohammed took part in killing Pearl, a reporter for the Wall Street Journal, in Pakistan in 2002. Though Mohammed referred to Pearl in passing in the version of the transcript released Wednesday, he did not confess to the killing. The Pentagon held back the section about Pearl’s killing to allow time for his family to be notified, a Defense Department spokesman, Bryan Whitman told the Associated Press. The section said: “I decapitated with my blessed right hand the head of the American Jew, Daniel Pearl, in the city of Karachi, Pakistan. For those who would like to confirm, there are pictures of me on the Internet holding his head.” Read The Full Story Wholesale Inflation Rises 1.3 Percent In February 2007-03-15 14:31:42 The government’s measure of inflation at the producer level rose sharply in February, reflecting a broad increase in prices on everything from gasoline to cigarettes. The Labor Department said Thursday that its producer price index, which takes account of the prices businesses charge one another, rose 1.3 percent last month after falling 0.6 percent in January. The rise was a reminder that while inflation may have settled down somewhat, it still remains a significant threat to the economy. In recent weeks, stock markets worldwide have been jolted by fears that the United States economy is more vulnerable to a downturn than economists initially thought. But Wall Street appeared unmoved by Thursday's  report. In afternoon trading, stocks were up mildly from Wednesday, despite the fact that investors were expecting tamer numbers. Economists predicted inflation to tick up only 0.5 percent last month, according to a survey by Bloomberg News. Read The Full Story U.S. Mortgage Problems: How Bad Will It Get? 2007-03-15 01:55:20 The big question is: How bad will it get? So far, the rising mortgage defaults that panicked markets this week have been concentrated in areas of the country already reeling from layoffs in the automobile industry and in hurricane-stricken states on the Gulf Coast. In Mississippi and Louisiana, about 1 in 10 homeowners are failing to make their payments, fresh data show. Ohio, Michigan and Indiana, the nation's industrial heartland and the states suffering the country's highest unemployment, aren't far behind. Yet the repayment of mortgages is holding up well on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and in other parts of the country, including those that saw huge run-ups in property values in recent years. Read The Full Story Chiquita To Pay $25 Million Fine For Doing Business With Terrorist Group 2007-03-15 01:54:28 Cincinnati, Ohio-based Chiquita Brands International Inc. said on Wednesday that it would plead guilty to one count of doing business with a terrorist group, ending a three-year U.S. government probe into payments made by the banana company's former Colombian unit. Chiquita, one of the world's largest banana producers, said it would pay a fine of $25 million as part of the settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice. The Justice Department filed in federal court in Washington, D.C., a document detailing the payments made to a group called the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, a violent right-wing group that has been designated by the U.S. government as a foreign terrorist organization. In all, the company made more than 100 payments to the group from 1997 through February 2004 totaling more than $1.7 million, according to the court document. That included more than 50 payments exceeding $825,000 after the group was designated a foreign terrorist organization in September of 2001. Read The Full Story California Judge Dismisses Charges In Hewlett-Packard Case 2007-03-15 01:53:40 A California judge on Wednesday dismissed charges against Patricia C. Dunn, the former chairwoman of Hewlett-Packard, in a corporate spying case that gained national attention and prompted Congressional hearings on the protection of personal telephone records. Judge Ray Cunningham of the Santa Clara County Superior Court also agreed to dismiss a reduced misdemeanor charge against three other defendants in the case once they each perform 96 hours of community service. Dunn and the three others had initially been charged with four felony counts for their participation in a cloak-and-dagger investigation inside H.P., the world’s largest computer company. That investigation was set in motion when officials at Hewlett-Packard, including Dunn, sought to ferret out the identity of company insiders leaking information to the news media. Read The Full Story Right Extremist Le Pen Joins Volatile Race For France's President 2007-03-15 01:53:04 Jean-Marie Le Pen, the anti-immigration politician who stunned France and the world by finishing second in this country's 2002 presidential contest, formally placed his name on this year's ballot Wednesday, adding new uncertainty to an increasingly volatile campaign. Barely six weeks from the April 22 vote, the French election has become close and unpredictable. The two longtime front-runners - Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, candidate of the ruling Union for a Popular Movement party, and Socialist Party nominee Segolene Royal, who is vying to become the first female president of France - are facing a challenge from the surging campaign of Francois Bayrou of the Union for French Democracy. Polls indicate Bayrou is sapping support from both Sarkozy and Royal and has transformed the election into a three-way contest. In a survey published Sunday by the weekly newspaper Journal du Dimanche, Sarkozy was favored by 28 percent of the respondents, Royal and Bayrou by 23 percent each, and Le Pen by 13 percent. Read The Full Story
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