Police spokesperson Pedro Cossa on Thursday denied rumours that the army has been called on to restore public order. According to Cossa, “the army was called on to carry out the clean-up in the cities and not to restore order. Since last night it has helped Maputo City Municipal Council to clean the city”.

Cossa stated that the police have the responsibility to ensure the safe movement of people on the roads.

Commenting on the situation on Thursday morning, the spokesperson said that all is relatively calm. There were still points of disturbances on the outskirts of Maputo, with incidents along the Avenida Acordos de Lusaka, Avenida de Angola, the neighbourhood of Magoanine and the city of Matola.

Three people have died and dozens injured in the neighbourhood of Benfica, on the outskirts of Maputo, as a result of riots that have spread in the southern Mozambican cities of Maputo and Matola.

Because of this, Cossa called on the population to return to normal life, but for parents and carers to avoid abandoning children to make sure that they are not harmed in the disturbances.

Currently the police are patrolling all entrances to Maputo and are out in force in the city centre.

Read more here.

After many words and vitriolic exchanges, Silvio Berlusconi has reached a conclusion. Gianfranco Fini is out; he has been officially ejected from Berlusconi’s People of Freedom (PDL) party, reports Corriere della Sera.

The historic break between the two founders of the PDL was formalized by a document read yesterday by the Premier in which he ejected from the party three members: Italo Bocchino, Carmelo Briguglio and Fabio Granata. “We’ve no longer confidence in Fini, who has created a real opposition in line with the left. We can’t go on as a divided party,” said Silvio Berlusconi during a press conference. “We tried every way to mend relations with Fini but it was useless. I don’t want to accept his way of criticizing our government any longer.”

However, according to the Premier  “the government is still strong and safe.” But the questions remains: what’s the future for the government and will it be able to withstand the opposition in Parliament?

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“L’Aquila can’t collapse: it’s a city that knows how to fly”. This new message of hope is now written on a t-shirt  which thousands of L’Aquila wore in Rome on Wednesday as they protested against the Berlusconi government’s handling of the earthquake-shattered city. There were moments of tension: two young men were injured, and even L’Aquila’s mayor, Massimo Cialente, was struck by police batons.

Their slogan was: “It’s a shame, you’ve got golden salaries, we’ve got rubble”. Demonstrators requested that the government halt all taxation of L’Aquila residents. They also demanded a series of measures to boost employment and the economy by establishing effective procedures for reconstruction and funding. “These aren’t privileges, but fairness and rights!” shouted the demonstrators. “We’re here to defend our survival. If we return to pay taxes today, with a salary of €2000  we can put only €600 in our pockets.”

The mayor of L’Aquila, who lead the demonstrators, was received by President of the Senate, Renato Schifani. Though initially Mayor Cialente aimed to lead the protest outside the Parliament, “there was an unexpected blockade by the police,” Cialente said. “When I went to the Senate, we were in agreement that they would open a gap. It’s a shame that people are still away from home: the earthquake wasn’t enough, now the beatings.”

Read more here.

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The cabinet on Tuesday decided to lift the emergency decree in five provinces but renewed it for another three months in Bangkok and 18 other provinces, deputy government spokesman Supachai Jaisamut said.

The Centre for the Resolution of the Emergency Situation (CRES) on Monday night agreed to recommend the emergency decree be renewed in all 24 provinces.

The decree was invoked on April 7, about three weeks after the red-shirts of the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD) began their protest in Bangkok. It has a three-month life and was to expire on Wednesday morning.

Mr Supachai said the cabinet decided not to renew the decree in Si Sa Ket, Kalasin, Nan, Nakhon Sawan and Nakhon Pathom provinces. The National Security Council (NSC) was of the opinion that the situation in these provinces had settled and that the decree could be still be reinstated there if the red-shirts renewed their anti-government activities.

Prime Minister’s Office Minister Ong-art Klampaiboon said Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva had proposed that the decree be lifted in the five provinces where the situation was reported to have improved and government officials had cooperated with the government. His proposal was based on the NSC’s opinion.

Most of the cabinet members initially agreed with Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban, who wanted use of the decree to be renewed in all 24 provinces.

Read more here.

A tenuous sense of stability seems to be returning to southern Kyrgyzstan, just weeks after the region experienced the worst bout of violence since independence. But, below the surface, Uzbeks are still seething, and some experts worry that prevailing conditions may represent only a temporary lull.

The surprisingly large turnout of Uzbeks in Kyrgyzstan’s June 27 constitutional referendum prompted provisional government leaders to sound an upbeat note about the process of reconciling the Kyrgyz and Uzbek communities in southern Kyrgyzstan, following five days of violence in mid-June that left hundreds dead and hundreds of thousands displaced.

et even though Uzbeks voted in higher-than-expected numbers, it doesn’t mean that they have forgotten the recent past. Observers note that many Uzbeks — who appear to have suffered disproportionately in terms of both casualties and property damage – are thinking about revenge. These feelings are fueled in part by a widespread perception among Uzbeks that Kyrgyz provisional leaders are trying to cover-up the June 10-14 violence. Uzbeks also believe that authorities are conducting follow-up operations designed to neutralize the Uzbek community’s ability to exert influence over the political process. Under current circumstances, then, genuine reconciliation between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks would seem a long way off.

It could get worse before things get better, observers fear. The key, they say, is whether Uzbeks act on their desire for revenge by obtaining guns in large quantities. Because of the sensitive topic, many sources for this story requested anonymity, citing fears of violent reprisals.

Nazira Satyvaldiyeva, an expert in conflict resolution and head of the Eurasia Foundation’s Osh field office, suggested that lingering fear is prompting both Uzbeks and Kyrgyz to seek arms. “Both Kyrgyz and Uzbek friends tell me, ‘I am scared, I have to buy a gun. I have to defend my family and my house.’ Uzbeks and Kyrgyz, and even Russians, are saying this,” Satyvaldiyeva said.

“Now we have clear divisions between people with guns and those who want to continue living a peaceful life,” she continued. “I think the main thing we have now is that people are scared and fear brings more problems.”

To address the fear factor among Uzbeks, Satyvaldiyeva expressed support for an independent investigation into southern Kyrgyzstan’s violence. The provisional government has thus far resisted such an idea, saying it intends to conduct its own investigation. The problem is many Uzbeks doubt the provisional government is committed to uncovering the root causes of the violence.

To skeptical Uzbeks the arrests of some Uzbek leaders offers proof that the provisional government is not intent on justice, but instead is using the violence to enhance its political position.

Read more here.

It has come to this: under pressure from the international community for its handing of the violence in southern Kyrgyzstan, the provisional government in Bishkek is blaming the media.

Officials are complaining bitterly about what they claim is biased western media coverage of the violence in southern Kyrgyzstan, which has claimed hundreds of lives and displaced hundreds of thousands. Allegedly slanted reporting, provisional leaders add, helped fan unrest and spread negative stereotypes about ethnic Kyrgyz.

Journalists rushed to Osh, the scene of the most severe Uzbek-Kyrgyz clashes on June 11-14. Western reporting found clear evidence of atrocities committed by both sides. Western reports also found that a vast majority of casualties comprised Uzbeks, and that Uzbek neighborhoods appeared to suffer more damage than did Kyrgyz areas of the city.

In addition, an overwhelming proportion of those displaced were Uzbeks.

“It can hardly be put in any doubt that the scale of attacks on Uzbeks was huge and that Uzbeks seem to have suffered overwhelmingly,” said a western reporter not affiliated with EurasiaNet.org, who covered the violence in southern Kyrgyzstan. The reporter spoke on condition of anonymity out of concern about possible provisional government retaliation.

Provisional leaders insist that members of former president Kurmanbek Bakiyev’s family stoked the violence out of a desire to keep Kyrgyzstan unstable. Maxim Bakiyev, a son of the former president, has denied the allegation, countering that the provisional government is trying to make him a scapegoat.

Rights groups have called for an independent investigation into the violence. The provisional government has so far resisted the idea, contending that it will carry out its own investigation.

Read more here.

Civil Society Organisations (CSO’s) have expressed concern about the spate of oil spillage in the country even when commercial production of the commodity had not commenced.

They therefore called on the government to halt the menace to safeguard the country’s ecosystems and livelihood support systems. “We deplore this gradual but systematic characteristics of ecosystem and livelihood misfortune heralding the country’s young oil sector. “If this goes unchecked it has a huge potential for negative ecosystem and environmental imbalance and its attendant ramifications for local socio-economic and livelihood support systems.”

This was contained in a statement issued by Noble Wadzah, a representative of Oilwatch-Ghana in Accra on Wednesday. Oilwatch-Ghana represents a plethora of environmentally-biased CSO’s in the country.

The statement said during the preparatory stages for securing the mandate for commercial offshore drilling, Kosmos Energy and Tullow Oil indicated that their production activities would not pose significant environmental damage, particularly in the marine environment. It said Kosmos Oil description of the first incident of oil spillage as “technical” did not mean that the occurrence had no effect on the environment.

“For oil bearing communities, oil spills present an even more frightening experience particularly for us in Ghana where the extent to which legal frameworks to control, sanction and address compensations issues are not fully in place yet.”

The CSO’s called on government to, as a matter of urgency, institute full scale investigation into the recent oil spills in order to determine the underlying causes to avert such occurrences in future.

Read more here.

We lack information on what happened to a certain Mr. Andrew J.Hall, who a year ago was the head of the Phibro energy-trading unit of Citigroup. Considering the importance of his compensation, we certainly hope for him that he keeps the job for an n number of decades. Last August, his contract entitled Mr. Hall to net $100 million for his 2009 exertions. The problem was that Citigroup, the banking colossus his Phibro company belonged to, was losing so much money that the federal government was forced to rescue it with taxpayer’s dollars.

Consequently, the US Treasury Secretary instructed Kenneth Feinberg, a high caliber lawyer, to study how to reduce the nonsensical emoluments of upper officers of  corporations which public money saved from extintion. It was not rational that the man in the street would pay the exhorbitant largesses that in better times the ‘market laws’ assigned to some managers. Said managers – Mr. Hall not included- resulted very good at sinking the balance sheets of their corporations.

As aboveadmitted, we don’t know the  developments that followed the appointment of lawyer Feinberg. Then it appeared that regulating the earnings of some top bankers had become a first priority. The US Congress discussed ad hoc legislation, meant to curtail too high corporate compensations, in given cases: when profits and capital gains are only apparent or openly negative, so public money must be called to rescue companies that are ‘too big to fail’. However, it must be recalled that previous efforts  had to be abandoned, so executive pay rose to offensive highs.

Opponents of  regulation are numerous and combative: the American heritage supports them.  Shareholders whose dividends or even capitals are damaged by the enormous pay packages, tend to excuse overcompensated executives. The lust for dollars is thought to be a sacred birthright, one not to be infringed upon even when the aim is legitimate -protecting the American taxpayer. In fact, slashing taxes in recent years (the top federal marginal rate on the highest earners was 70% in 1980, it is 35% today) has not antagonized the public opinion. Capitalism triumphed on enemies as formidable as communism. Why should hypercapitalism be obstructed by the grievances of the middle-to-lower classes?

Nobody can say when, if ever, the man in the street will perceive the wrongness of some capitalist practices. The religion of the market and of the free initiative is weaker in Europe than in America. But even in the Old Continent top incomes reach  astronomical levels nowadays. Simply put, the man in the street accepts subjection to the moneyed minority. He respects the vested interests of the few. That’s reality: although not a smart one.

Judging by some appearances (also from some data), Asia’s third largest nation and Islam’s most populated country has settled down to an almost calm, improving reality. Just twenty years ago such a prospect looked impossible. Indonesia was wrestling with overpopulation, poverty, corruption, political turbulence, a too far-flung national geography (from Malacca to Australia) and an excessive ethnic diversity.

This was a land of pertinacious hunger- very big, almost 2 million sq.km., but too rich on mountains, active volcanoes, its agricultural area used to be 9%  of the total surface area. On the island of Jawa (7% of the republic) lives two thirds of the population. Its capital, Jakarta, the seat of central government, numbered around 5 million in 1980; the figure has more or less doubled. Indonesia’s scant plains, with a thousand people per sq.km. (1,200 in Jawa), are among the world’s most populated. When the country became independent its residents did not probably reach 70 million. They are 235 million today.

Present signs of hope are the relative scarcity of terrorism and political violence, a more balanced allottment of power between the central government and the provinces (the latter aggregate some 13,000 islands), plus economic indicators such as the growth of GNP, of foreign direct investments and of per capita income. The worst consequences of terrorism and of the 2004 tsunami have been forgotten. Some observers believe that Indonesia has become ‘a normal country’, while a few years ago she was facing furious separatist insurgence, Christian-Muslim violence, Islamic extremism.

Probably it’s safe waiting a couple of years before taking the above signs at their face value. The least modernized among the three hundred ethnic groups live just a few steps out of the Stone Age. In Iran Jaya, the primitive easternmost frontier, head hunting, cannibalism and tribal wars are recent memories among natives. They still do not need matches to ignite dry grass, also depend on skulls to repel evil spirits from villages. So the astonishing proliferation of skyscrapers in a few metropolises and the 9,5 million cars and motorcycles of Greater Jakarta must not be taken as absolute proof of progress of the whole nation.

Before 1949, Indonesia was a united country just in the Majapahit empire (14th century). From the early 1600s Dutch colonialists dominated an aggregation of kingdoms and principalities. In WW2, the Dutch East Indies were conquered by Japan. After 1945, the Dutch returned in arms, but the nationalists of Sukarno triumphed. A short try was  made at reconciling independence with membership in a sort of Dutch commonwealth; but the exploiting domination of Holland (long based on the so called ‘van der Bosch system’: forced labor) had generated too much resentment. In 1956 the Indonesian republic cut all residual links with the former colonial masters.

Indonesia is rich both in cultural and natural resources. The local capitalists in partnership with foreign corporations are making good business developing the material wealth. Corruption and ecological devastation are inevitable, poverty is still widespread. If political, social, religious strifes do not erupt again, a few of the optimistic prospects will perhaps come true.

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In the wake of outrage over failure to get former Union Carbide chief Warren Anderson, extradited to India, government on Tuesday asserted that case against him in connection with the Bhopal gas tragedy was not over and he can be procured and tried.

Maintaining that the case is not over, the Law Minister said in case he can be “obtained” he can still be tried.

In 2003, a request for extradition of Anderson was made to the US side under India-US bilateral extradition treaty. This request has already been reiterated on more than one occasion, MEA sources said today.

Asked whether government was making or would make efforts to extradite Anderson, he said he could not comment on the issue.

Nearly 26 years after world’s worst industrial disaster left over 15,000 dead, former Union Carbide India Chairman Keshub Mahindra and six others were yesterday sentenced to two years imprisonment. The outcome of the case came under attack from civil rights activists and political parties.

89-year-old Anderson, the then Chairman of Union Carbide Corporation of USA, who lives in the United States, appeared to have gone scot-free for the present as he is still an absconder and did not subject himself to trial. There was no word about him in the judgement of the Bhopal court.

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