| US winter storm causes chaos | |||
Massive storms have spread snow and ice across large parts of the United States, claiming the lives of at least 19 people. As Americans rushed to get home for the holidays, snow reached up to 60cm in some areas. Heavy snow has grounded flights, stranded drivers and forced scores of churches to cancel Christmas services. Tom Head, a judge in Lubbock County, in the southern US state of Texas, who is helping emergency workers deal with the storm, said officials have responded to more than 225 road accidents in his area since Thursday night. "We've had five to six inches of snow [about 13cm] but the wind has been blowing, so we've had drifts three to four feet [about 92cm] high," he told Al Jazeera on Friday. "It's slowed traffic down considerably. We've had a number of people stranded in cars. "The dangerous part is, it thawed out a little bit yesterday then it froze again so the roads are really slick." Nearly 100 flights from the Minneapolis-St Paul airport were cancelled by midday. By late afternoon, though, a spokesman said most flights were back on schedule. Two-hour-plus delays were reported at Houston's Hobby Airport, though by Thursday evening that was down to 15 minutes or less. The weather closed down Sioux Falls Regional Airport in South Dakota altogether late on Thursday. Drivers were encouraged to pack emergency kits before setting out during what is normally one of the busiest travel periods of the year. Slippery roads were blamed for at least 18 deaths this week as the slow-moving storm made its way across the country from the Southwest. The state set up shelters in central Oklahoma for motorists stranded overnight and closed all interstate routes and several turnpikes. | |||
|
Friday, 25 December 2009
US winter storm causes chaos
Missing US soldier in Taliban video
| Missing US soldier in Taliban video | |||||
The Nato mission in Afghanistan has confirmed that a man featured in a new Taliban video is a missing American soldier. The footage, released on Friday, showed US soldier Bowe Bergdahl in good health some five months after he was taken prisoner in Afghanistan's eastern Paktika province. An airborne infantryman, Bergdahl gives his rank, birth date, unit and mother's maiden name before beginning a lengthy verbal attack on the US conduct of the war in Afghanistan and its relations with Muslims. The US military had no immediate comment, though IntelCenter - an American contractor that tracks Taliban propaganda and works with the intelligence community and the military - said it had no reason to doubt the veracity of the footage. IntelCenter said the quality of the 36-minute video was good and has an English-language narration in parts. It also showed images of prisoners in US custody being abused. A statement read by Zabihullah Mujahid, a Taliban spokesman, appears at the end of the video and renews demands for a "limited number of prisoners" to be exchanged for Bergdahl. The statement adds that more American troops could be captured. Five month mission Bergdahl, who was serving with a unit based in Fort Richardson, Alaska, was 23 when he vanished just five months after arriving in Afghanistan.
On Friday, Nato said a joint Afghan-international force killed several Taliban fighters in Paktika while searching for a commander of the Jalaluddin Haqqani network that they link to al-Qaeda. US military teams have searched for Bergdahl, but it is not publicly known whether he is even being held in Afghanistan or neighbouring Pakistan. | |||||
|
| 'Explosion attempt' on US flight | |||
A reported attempt by a Nigerian man to light an explosive aboard a US passenger aircraft has been described by the White House as "an attempted act of terrorism". Abdulmutallab, who was overpowered by passengers and crew of Delta Flight 253, was taken into custody after the jet landed safely in Detroit. He suffered extensive third-degree burns and two passengers were slightly injured. Officials said Abdulmutallab tried to detonate an explosive device, apparently a mix of powder and liquid, as the flight, coming from Nigeria via Amsterdam, was approaching Detroit. Peter King, the senior Republican on the House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee, told Fox News channel: "When it did go off, he himself was seriously injured. He has third-degree burns." 'Terrorist connection' He told CNN that Abdulmutallab, 23, "did appear in a database as far as having a terrorist connection". "My understanding is ... that he does have al-Qaeda connections, certainly extremist terrorist connections, and his name popped up pretty quickly" in a search of intelligence data bases. Citing unnamed officials, the Wall Street Journal said the suspect had told investigators al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen had given him the device and instructions on how to detonate it. But NBC television, citing counterterrorism officials, said he "claims to have been acting on his own." A senior Homeland Security official, quoted by the New York Times, said the device "was made from a mixture of powder and liquid" and was "more incendiary than explosive." The official said Abdulmutallab told authorities he had explosive powder taped to his leg and used a syringe filled with chemicals to mix with the powder in an attempt to cause an explosion. The flight was carrying 278 people. The incident unfolded around noon local time (17:00 GMT). Measures enforced Homeland Security said enhanced security measures had been put into effect after the failed attack. "Passengers may notice additional screening measures put into place to ensure President Barack Obama, who is currently on holiday in Hawaii, was "actively monitoring" the situation, a White House spokesman said. "The president was notified of the incident this morning between 9am (07:00 GMT) and 9.30am Hawaii time by the president's military aide," Bill Burton said in a statement. After Obama was informed of the incident he held a secure conference call with John Brennan, his homeland security and counterterrorism adviser, and Denis McDonough, the National Security Council chief of staff . "[Obama] asked to arrange a subsequent secure call and... instructed that all appropriate measures be taken to increase security for air travel," the White House said. | |||
|
Asia marks tsunami anniversary
| Asia marks tsunami anniversary | |||
People across Asia are marking the anniversary of one of the world's worst natural disasters when an undersea earthquake unleashed a devastating wave that killed more than 220,000 people. But as the survivors remember the dead, experts warn that many countries in the region remain ill-prepared to face another killer wave. A solemn day of prayers and remembrance is to be held on Saturday in Indonesia's Aceh province, which lost almost 170,000 people in the Asian tsunami of December 26, 2004. Similar scenes are expected to play out in countries such as India, Sri Lanka and Thailand where more than 50,000 people were killed as the wall of water smashed into coastal communities from Kalutara to Phuket. Danger remains The 2004 tsunami was triggered by a 9.3-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Sumatra, and seismologists agree another event of that magnitude is almost certain to strike the quake-prone region again in the future. Sound alert systems have been developed in many countries to forewarn of impending danger, but getting that message out to seaside communities, and to children in particular, is still a challenge. "Disaster warnings save lives only if they reach the people at risk and are acted upon," she said. "An important part of the effort is to improve the knowledge of coastal communities about the risks they face and how to respond to them. "We won't know when the next major tsunami in the Indian Ocean will strike," she added. "But by learning from disaster response, recovery and preparedness efforts - we can ensure our future is a safer one." India has spent 32 million dollars on a tsunami warning system designed to detect all earthquakes above a magnitude of six on the Richter scale in the Indian Ocean, apparently within 20 minutes. Sri Lanka is ready to send SMS warning alerts to mobile phones in the event of a disaster, while Thailand has set up 103 towers equipped with loudspeakers along the coast and has increased its radio reach in the six seaside provinces. Indonesia has installed tsunami sirens in Banda Aceh, Bali and Padang, part of an integrated early warning system that relies on seismographs, satellites, tide gauges and deep-sea buoys to measure sudden surges in sea levels. Despite such efforts, Danny Hilman Natawidjaja, an earthquake expert with the Indonesian Institute of Sciences said many Indonesians were "still clueless" about how to identify and escape a tsunami. "The drills from the Disaster Management Agency are yet to be effective. They have a lot to learn," he said. The agency has carried out about 10 drills since 2004 but "there is still a considerable amount of delay time in the tsunami early warning system," Natawidjaja said. Corruption worries As the reconstruction effort winds down, there are also concerns about corruption related to the distribution of billions of dollars of international aid. Indonesia's tsunami reconstruction agency finished its work in April, having spent almost seven billion dollars on rebuilding including 140,000 new homes, 1,759 school buildings, 363 bridges and 13 airports. The reconstruction effort has generally been hailed as a success, but relief agencies have complained about widespread graft and questions remain about how much of the international aid was actually spent as intended. In Sri Lanka, the government is under pressure from a leading anti-corruption group to account for nearly half of the 2.2 billion dollars pledged to the country by foreign donors. The country will mark the anniversary with a drill to test the preparedness of people living along the island's coastline, Human Rights and Disaster Management minister Mahinda Samarasinghe said Friday. An estimated 31,000 people were killed in Sri Lanka while a million people were driven out of their homes. | |||
|
Bin Laden daughter 'in Tehran'
| Bin Laden daughter 'in Tehran' | |||
Saudi Arabia's embassy in Tehran has informed the Iranian authorities that one of al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden's daughters is in the embassy and wants to leave the country, according to Manouchehr Mottaki, Iran's foreign minister. It was the first acknowledgement by Iranian authorities that members of bin Laden's family do exist on Iranian soil. Mottaki spoke a day after Britain's Times newspaper reported that some of bin Laden's closest relatives, including children, were living in a secret compound in Iran. Saudi diplomats in Iran have been seeking Iranian permission for Iman to leave the country. "We were informed by the Saudi Arabian embassy ... some time ago that one of bin Laden's daughters is in the Saudi embassy in Tehran," Mottaki said on state television. "Upon determination of her real identity, she will be able to leave Iran with proper permits." He told Al Jazeera that he was concerned for his sister's health and he called on Tehran to release his relatives. He also called for the Saudi government to ensure his sister's departure from the country. Son's account The Times quoted Omar bin Laden, 29, who it said was Osama bin Laden's fourth-oldest son, as saying he had no idea that his brothers and sisters were still alive until they called him in November. They told him how they had fled Afghanistan just before the 9/11 attacks and walked to the Iranian border. They were taken to a walled compound outside Tehran where guards said they were not allowed to leave "for their own safety". | |||
|
Israeli troops kill Palestinians
| Israeli troops kill Palestinians | |||
Three Palestinians have been killed by Israeli soldiers while trying to cross the security barrier from the Gaza Strip into Israel, the AFP news agency reports citing a Palestinian medical source. A fourth Palestinian was wounded during the attempt to cross into Israel near the Erez border crossing on Saturday, the source said. The Israeli army declined to confirm or deny the report. In a separate incident, two members of Fatah - the party of Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president - were killed during an Israeli army incursion into Nablus in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian medical and security officials said. Hassan Abu Sheikh and Rayed Zorhi were shot dead by Israeli soldiers on Saturday who had entered the old town, they said. A woman was also injured. The Palestinian officials said neither of the men had been on the list of fighters being sought by the Israeli army and there had been no shots fired from their two houses, which had been surrounded by troops. The Israeli army declined to confirm or deny the reports when contacted by AFP. An Israeli settler was killed on Thursday when Palestinian men opened fire on his vehicle in the West Bank. | |||
|
Egypt blamed for Gaza convoy delay
| Egypt blamed for Gaza convoy delay | |||
British politician George Galloway has criticised Egypt for denying a humanitarian aid convoy permission to enter the Gaza Strip. The Viva Palestina convoy, containing some 210 vehicles and 500 people, is currently stranded in Jordan with Cairo refusing to allow it passage to Gaza through the Red Sea port of Nuweiba. The lorries are laden with European, Turkish and Arab aid - both food and medical supplies. "It's a strange Christmas for us. We are stuck ... hundreds of tonnes of aid which is desperately needed in Gaza," Galloway said in an interview with Press TV on Friday. "We are very sad not yet angry, but we will get angry if the days go by". But Hossam Zaki, an Egyptian port official, insisted that there would be "no entry from Nuweiba", saying "entry can only be through El-Arish". El-Arish is a port on Egypt's Mediterreanean coast, while Nuweiba is on the Red Sea. The Egyptian decision means the convoy would have to travel hundreds of kilometres by ferry around the Sinai peninsula and through the Suez Canal. Egyptian condition In a statement, the Egyptian foreign ministry said: "The Egyptian government welcomes the passage of the convoy into the Gaza Strip on December 27, on condition that it abides by the mechanisms in place for humanitarian aid convoys to the Palestinian people. "This includes most importantly, the entry of convoys through the port of El-Arish". Gaza has been under a stifling Israeli siege since a Hamas election victory and its decision to push Fatah armed forces from the territory in June 2007. The blockade has severely restricted essential supplies and placed Gazans in a dire situation, made worse by Israel's military assault last winter that reduced much of the territory to ruins. According to the latest UN report on the situation in Gaza, the ongoing Israeli blockade has triggered a "protracted human dignity crisis" with negative humanitarian consequences. "At the heart of this crisis is the degradation in the living conditions of the population, caused by the erosion of livelihoods and the gradual decline in the state of infrastructure, and the quality of vital services in the areas of health, water and sanitation, and education,” adds the report. | |||
|
China dissident jailed 11 years
| China dissident jailed 11 years | |||||
A Chinese court has sentenced a leading dissident to 11 years in prison for "inciting subversion of state power". Liu Xiaobo, a 53-year-old academic, who was previously jailed over the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, had been charged for co-authoring a document appealing for political liberalisation. The verdict was handed down by a Beijing court on Friday after a two-hour trial on Wednesday in which prosecutors accused Liu of "serious crimes". Liu's lawyer, Shang Baojun, said he had 10 days to appeal, but Liu's wife, Liu Xia, had said on Wednesday that her husband had no plans to appeal. Condemnation Friday's sentencing came despite calls by the US and EU for Liu's release. "We are deeply concerned by the sentence of 11 years in prison announced today," Gregory May, the US embassy's first secretary in China, told reporters outside the courthouse.
May was one of a dozen diplomats stopped by the authorities from attending the trial and sentencing. Jiang Yu, a Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman, told reporters this week that statements from embassies calling for Liu's release were "a gross interference of China's internal affairs". The highly-sensitive case has also been criticised by human rights groups, which said the trial was deliberately timed to coincide with the Christmas holiday period, in the hope that international media and foreign governments will overlook the case. New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) issued a statement condemning Liu's conviction on Friday, calling it a "travesty of justice". Phelim Kine, an HRW researcher in Hong Kong, told Al Jazeera that "today, we have seen the true face of the regime, and the true face is that the Chinese government uses the judicial system to silence dissent". Challenging one-party system The case against Liu centres on his co-authoring of a petition titled Charter 08, which calls for the protection of human rights in China and reform of the country's one-party communist system. Al Jazeera's Melissa Chan, reporting from Beijing, said Liu's conviction - the longest sentence for "inciting subversion" handed down since the crime was established in the 1997 reform of the criminal law - sent a clear message that the Chinese authorities do not tolerate his kind of opinions. The charter co-authored by Liu sought amendments to the constitution and called for a multi-party system in China, which our correspondent said may have been seen as a direct challenge to the Communist party. According to China Human Rights Defenders, a network of activists, the petition had been widely circulated online, and was signed by more than 10,000 people, including other dissidents and intellectuals. Among the signatories was Bao Tong, an aide to Zhao Ziyang, the late general secretary of the communist party purged for sympathising with the Tiananmen protests. Bao himself spent seven years in prison for sympathising with democracy advocates. Liu is the only person to have been arrested for organising the Charter 08 appeal, but others who signed it have reported being harassed. The petition, which said "we should end the practice of viewing words as crimes", specifically called for the abolition of subversion in China's criminal code - the very crime for which Liu was sentenced on Friday. | |||||
|
Liu Xiabao is a literary critic, a former professor of literature and human rights activistBishops quit after Irish sex probe
| Bishops quit after Irish sex probe | |||
Two Irish bishops have offered their resignation to Pope Benedict, after a government investigation highlighted a cover-up of child sex abuse by priests in Ireland over decades. The announcement on Friday, Christmas Day, increased the number of resignations of church leaders over the probe to four. Bishops Eamonn Walsh and Raymond Field said they hoped that their resignation might "bring the peace and reconciliation of Jesus Christ to the victims/survivors of child sexual abuse". There was no response from those who have been said to suffer sexual abuse at the hands of those implicated. The two bishops added in a statement: "Again we apologise to them". More than 170 cases of abuse have been found to have been covered up by Dublin church leaders. Incidents began to be revealed in 1995 but many records were hidden until 2004. 'Prevailing culture' The cases came to light after Andrew Madden, a former alter boy, made public the abuse he suffered at the hands of priests and the church's attempts to buy his silence in the mid-1990s. Walsh and Field, who worked in the Dublin archdiocese, said that they had informed Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of their resignation over the issue. Both said that the report had said that they had done nothing wrong. On Wednesday, Bishop Jim Moriaty of Kildare resigned saying that he had allowed the "prevailing culture" of abuse against children to go unchallenged. Bishop Donal Murray became the first bishop to resign last week following the report's publication. Last week Bishop Donal Murray of Limerik resigned following the report. Martin Drennan of Galway, a fifth Bishop named in the investigation, said that he did nothing to endanger children and will not resign. The four other bishops initially took this line. Madden said: "Martin Drennan will have to resign. We want full accountability". The report, published on November 26, said that Church leaders in in Ireland had allowed child sexual abuse by priests to take place on a significant scale over a period of 30 years. It said bishops had "obsessively" hidden abuse to protect the reputation of the Irish Catholic church from 1974 to 2004. | |||
|
Egypt blamed for Gaza convoy delay
| Egypt blamed for Gaza convoy delay | |||
British politician George Galloway has criticised Egypt for denying a humanitarian aid convoy permission to enter the Gaza Strip. The Viva Palestina convoy, containing some 210 vehicles and 500 people, is currently stranded in Jordan with Cairo refusing to allow it passage to Gaza through the Red Sea port of Nuweiba. The lorries are laden with European, Turkish and Arab aid - both food and medical supplies. "It's a strange Christmas for us. We are stuck ... hundreds of tonnes of aid which is desperately needed in Gaza," Galloway said in an interview with Press TV on Friday. "We are very sad not yet angry, but we will get angry if the days go by". But Hossam Zaki, an Egyptian port official, insisted that there would be "no entry from Nuweiba", saying "entry can only be through El-Arish". El-Arish is a port on Egypt's Mediterreanean coast, while Nuweiba is on the Red Sea. The Egyptian decision means the convoy would have to travel hundreds of kilometres by ferry around the Sinai peninsula and through the Suez Canal. Egyptian condition In a statement, the Egyptian foreign ministry said: "The Egyptian government welcomes the passage of the convoy into the Gaza Strip on December 27, on condition that it abides by the mechanisms in place for humanitarian aid convoys to the Palestinian people. "This includes most importantly, the entry of convoys through the port of El-Arish". Gaza has been under a stifling Israeli siege since a Hamas election victory and its decision to push Fatah armed forces from the territory in June 2007. The blockade has severely restricted essential supplies and placed Gazans in a dire situation, made worse by Israel's military assault last winter that reduced much of the territory to ruins. According to the latest UN report on the situation in Gaza, the ongoing Israeli blockade has triggered a "protracted human dignity crisis" with negative humanitarian consequences. "At the heart of this crisis is the degradation in the living conditions of the population, caused by the erosion of livelihoods and the gradual decline in the state of infrastructure, and the quality of vital services in the areas of health, water and sanitation, and education,” adds the report. | |||
|
Europe's Afghan role in 2010
| Europe's Afghan role in 2010 | ||
Europeans, Turks, Canadians and Australians accounted for more than one-third of the 504 multinational troops killed during the deadliest year so far in the war in Afghanistan. As we look ahead to 2010, Al Jazeera's Jonah Hull asked three Europeans what they think about their countries' role in the fighting. | ||
|
Child's story 5 years after tsunami
| Child's story 5 years after tsunami | ||
It is five years since the Indian Ocean tsunami struck. Thulaashi Suppiah was just twenty-two days old when it swept into her parents beach café in Penang, an island in north-west Malaysia. She recently celebrated her fifth birthday. Here is her family's story. | ||
|
Israel policy leaves many stranded
| Israel policy leaves many stranded | ||
But a month ago, Israeli authorities decided not to renew his permit, leaving the family's sole breadwinner stranded. Now, Darwish must decide whether to stay in his home or go to work and risk being denied permission to return. Al Jazeera's Nisreen El-Shamayleh reports from the occupied West Bank. | ||
|
What has the tsunami taught us?
| What has the tsunami taught us? | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| By Al Panico, Head of Tsunami Unit, IFRC | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
It is hard to believe that almost five years has passed since that horrific, fateful day in December 2004, when over 226,000 lives were lost in a few short hours. I became a Red Cross volunteer as a college student in 1972 after one of the worst hurricanes in the US and have worked on over a hundred disasters in dozens of countries in the Americas, Africa, Asia, and Eastern Europe since then. But none of them quite prepared me for the scale and complexity of the aftermath of the tsunami. At first I was dispatched as head of the International Federation's tsunami operation in Sri Lanka. Like countless others my first thoughts on seeing the scale of the devastation were, how are we going to cope with this? Two thirds of the coastline had been hit and the situation was chaotic at best. The immediate priority was to get tents, food and water to the thousands of people camped by the roadside who had lost everything. Managing expectations It was the same story in Indonesia but even bigger. The waves had come in higher, 20 metres in some stretches, driving inland for miles and destroying entire settlements along parts of the coast.
In Sri Lanka almost 120,000 homes had been damaged or destroyed and one of our challenges in those early days was managing public expectations, explaining that the rebuilding process would take at least five years and not six months. Today, the Red Cross/Red Crescent has helped to build over 51,000 homes across Sri Lanka, the Maldives and the Sumatran province of Aceh. We faced some huge challenges. Logistically we had to bring in hundreds of skilled workers from all corners of the world and employ thousands of local staff. Destroyed bridges and impassable roads in Aceh meant that we had to important one hundred trucks from Norway that could travel overland. Barges were brought from Singapore to transport building materials in Maldives and wood was sourced from Finland to build over 20,000 high quality shelters in Aceh. Overwhelmed In the Maldives we had to ship in everything to build houses for 4,000 people plus schools, power, water and sanitation systems on an uninhabited island, Dhuvaafaru. Then there were the political challenges. The resurgence of conflict in northern Sri Lanka meant that access to areas was difficult and projects had to be put on hold. Land titles in Indonesia meant that in many areas it took years to be able to start building permanent homes.
Government offices in tsunami areas were overwhelmed by the task at hand. Understandably, they did not have the capacity or structures to manage the thousands of organisations who arrived to help. The result was often frustrating delays and poor coordination. Aid was duplicated in some areas and tsunami survivors were often not involved or consulted about their needs. The good news is that we all learned from that and things changed quite quickly in the big scheme of things. The tsunami was a catalyst for improving the way that we manage disasters collectively. In recent years the UN cluster system came into being which means that there are now dedicated teams coordinating the response to disasters in specific sectors such as shelter, water and sanitation and health. The IFRC leads the shelter cluster. This approach was recently put to the test after the September 30 earthquake in Sumatra where temporary shelters went up faster than I have ever seen thanks to an improved system and better coordination. In my experience, we have been most successful in our tsunami recovery work when we really put communities in the driving seat. 'Owner-driven' In Sri Lanka the Red Cross developed an 'owner-driven' housing programme giving families cash and technical guidance to help them rebuild their homes.
Allowing families and communities to take action on their own behalf, without becoming dependent on external support, is one of the most important lessons we learned from the tsunami experience. But even though reconstruction will end soon, disaster prone communities still need to be made safer and better prepared. A huge amount has been done to improve the technology around early warning systems, but this approach has to go hand in hand with risk reduction programmes at the community level – which means making sure that people have the right information, skills and knowledge to take early action and prepare for disasters. This is a long-term job for Red Cross national societies in countries such as Thailand, Indonesia and Sri Lanka. Our focus on building back better has meant looking beyond just helping someone to build a house. People need an income and we have helped thousands of people get back on their feet by replacing lost assets such as fishing boats and nets, setting up cooperatives, providing cash grants so people can buy livestock, agricultural tools and seedlings. Experience gained The tsunami helped to develop our experience in these areas. We have embarked on a wide range of projects with partners who have the complimentary expertise in fields such as micro-credit and agriculture.
Ten years ago we would not have built massive water supply and treatment plants nor dug kilometres upon kilometres of pipelines that deliver water to new communities. But that is what building back better means – a holistic approach to recovery. Over the past five years it has been the stories of many ordinary people that I have encountered that will remain as my most enduring memories of the tsunami. One of these people is Dina Astita who lost her three boys to the tsunami in the town of Calang in Aceh. Dina was away at the time and it took her almost 20 days to get back home where she found 90 per cent of the town destroyed. Dina is now an active member of the Indonesian Red Cross psycho-social support team. She has a one-year-old son and has become a role-model in her community helping others to cope with their stress and emotional difficulties. For me, people like Dina are the true heroes of the tsunami.
He currently heads the Federation Tsunami Unit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
