Most Interesting Topics on US, Iran,Pakistan & Specially On my Global Journalist's Community

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Nuclear watchdog agency fails to elect new chief
International Atomic Energy Agency members are in a deadlock amid a split between industrial powers and developing nations over the approach to arms control.
By Julia Damianova and Borzou Daragahi
March 28, 2009
Reporting from Beirut and Vienna -- Diplomats meeting in Vienna failed Friday to elect a new leader for the world's nuclear watchdog agency amid a hardening split between industrial powers and developing countries over how best to control atomic weapons and energy.

The International Atomic Energy Agency said its 35-member board could not muster the two-thirds majority needed to elect a director-general to replace Mohamed ElBaradei, who is retiring. The Egyptian ElBaradei, winner of the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize, put arms control in the international spotlight and led the agency during a crucial period when Iran and North Korea emerged as nuclear players.


Afghan returns home a little more whole
'We want a change,' Iran reformist says
Iran's Khamenei says Obama overture not enough
More on Iran from Borzou Daragahi
Whatever Iranian officials might feel about U.S. troubles in Afghanistan and Pakistan, there is a rising alarm in Tehran over the torrent of drug dealing, human trafficking and violence connected to the mayhem in the region that is washing across Iran's eastern border.

The Islamic Republic announced Thursday that it will join the United States in dispatching official delegations to two international conferences on Afghanistan. The Obama administration has welcomed Tehran's intended participation at one in the Netherlands.

U.S. and Iranian interests overlap in Afghanistan, perhaps more than on any other issue. The Obama administration, which has committed itself to diplomatic outreach to Tehran, has favored a greater Iranian role in efforts to stabilize Afghanistan as a way of building trust between the long-estranged U.S. and Iran and resolving disputes, especially over Iran's nuclear program.

But Iranians say they're wary of getting burned, as they say they were after quietly cooperating with the Bush administration in 2001 and '02 when the U.S. overthrew the Taliban government in Afghanistan and brought President Hamid Karzai to power. That brief flowering of diplomatic contacts ended with former President George W. Bush labeling Iran as part of an "axis of evil" along with North Korea and Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq.

Since then Iran has ramped up its nuclear program, which it says is for civilian purposes, in defiance of U.S. demands to halt it. It has also increased its support for Arab militant groups fighting Israel, a key American ally. But increasingly, Tehran finds its interests coinciding with the U.S. in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the resurgence of the Taliban and the warfare have created a vortex of chaos drawing in Iran.

"Iran and the United States have a fundamental point of interest in the region vis-a-vis Afghanistan," said Sadegh Zibakalam, professor of political science at Tehran University. "Both want to see a moderate, democratic, stable Afghanistan because if there is chaos in Afghanistan, it means opium to Iran and Afghan refugees in Iran."

Russian officials said Thursday that they would be willing to help break the ice between Iranian and American officials at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization conference on Afghanistan, which opens today in Moscow.

Iran is sending Deputy Foreign Minister Mahdi Akhundzadeh, and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Patrick Moon will represent the U.S.

"We assume that the launch of such a negotiating process would help reduce tensions in the situation surrounding Iran and the region on the whole," Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko told reporters.

Iran is also attending the conference on Afghanistan at The Hague next week, after staying away from such meetings. But some Iranian analysts cautioned not to read too much into Tehran's decision; their concerns were underscored by Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hasan Qashqavi, who told The Times that the "level of participation is yet to be determined" for the Hague conference. Iran might dispatch a low-level envoy, suggesting an ambivalent response to U.S. gestures.

Iranians are wary of giving Americans a possible public-relations victory without getting anything in return.

"Whenever they need us, they use our influence; but as they reach their objectives, they treat us as a major threat in the region," said a recent editorial in the conservative Siasat Rooz newspaper.

But even some Iranian hard-liners have begun to welcome the idea of cooperating with the U.S. and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in helping secure Afghanistan, calling it a victory for Iranian steadfastness.

There are practical matters as well. Iranian officials say the drug war has cost their nation more than $600 million in the last two years. About 3,700 Iranian security officials were killed and 11,000 maimed in more than 12,000 clashes between traffickers and police officers between 1989 and 2003, according to Iranian statistics cited in a United Nations report.

All indications are that the problem is worsening as Afghanistan descends further into lawlessness. From 2006 to '07, drug seizures, as measured by weight, jumped 35% for heroin, 37% for opium and 52% for hashish, according to figures on the website of Iran's Drug Control Headquarters.

Total drug seizures rose from 155 tons in 2001 to 618 tons in 2007, almost all of it opium, heroin and hashish from Afghanistan; addiction is rapidly becoming Iran's top public health problem.

Tehran has been digging canals, raising earthen berms and laying out barbed wire. Still, the drugs flow in, sometimes strapped to camels crossing the desert, sometimes protected by well-armed gangsters equipped with satellite technology and automatic weapons.

"The more the Islamic Republic of Iran interacts in the regional and international arenas, the better," Hamid Reza Haji-Babai, a member of the parliamentary leadership, said Thursday. Easing tension between Iran and the U.S. "can be achieved within these interactions and participation in conferences."

Perceptions and politesse will play a significant role in determining the level of Iran's participation at the summit. Tehran canceled on French President Nicolas Sarkozy's Afghanistan conference in December after he said he would never shake hands with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a comment Iran decried as insulting.

Not one Iranian official, not even Tehran's ambassador to France, attended that conference.

daragahi@latimes.com

Mostaghim is a special correspondent.
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FOREIGN EXCHANGE
In Pakistan, fighting terrorists the five-star way
At the Marriott where 50 people died in a terrorist attack, an attentive staff is anxious to put visitors at ease — although the hotel still seems deserted. Most of the workers lost friends in the attack. Outside, security is tight.
An attack in September killed 50 people at this Islamabad Marriott. Now it's open again with intense security, deep discounts and plenty of available rooms.
By Mark Magnier
March 27, 2009
Reporting from Islamabad, Pakistan -- I'm living on the edge and doing my bit to make sure the terrorists don't win -- from the cloud-like, pillow-swamped bed of a luxury hotel.

As a correspondent, I've stayed in some shaky places over the years, from camping beneath Iraqi underpasses during the U.S.-led invasion to tenting it in an abandoned nunnery in East Timor amid civil war. So my hardship post rattling around in the five-star Marriott Hotel in Islamabad recently is about as good as it gets for danger duty.


Room service, please. Oh stop, not another mint on my pillow.

It's all a cakewalk, as long as you don't stop and think where you are: the site of a horrific attack in September that killed more than 50 people in the Pakistani capital. Somewhat understandably, the images beamed around the world of an explosives-packed truck ramming the security gate have damped customer enthusiasm.

The 24-foot-deep, 59-foot-wide crater has been filled in, replaced by a massively reinforced 12-foot-high wall and a pyramid berm structure of the sort used in war zones.

There are also dogs, dozens of police officers and guards with machine guns, high-intensity lighting that makes you look like you're at a Dodgers night game, sophisticated vehicle barriers and state-of-the-art X-ray machines. And a sniper sitting on the parapet.

Inside, though, it's another planet. Sonatas waft from a lonely piano player. A house band croons over in the dining area, its plaintive tones bouncing tinkle-tinkle off the opulent chandeliers. The silver glistens, the marble shines.

At one point as I sit for a meal, I count 17 employees all ready to serve yours truly, the only customer in sight.

Most of the workers lost friends and suffered near misses. Now they're not only worried about their security but their jobs. They try incredibly hard to be cheerful and make you feel welcome and mean nothing but the best. But every time I cross the lobby, I feel like something of a pied piper being followed by a small posse chirping, bobbing and Uriah Heeping as I head for the elevator. Can I help you navigate? Everything absolutely, totally, completely all right with your stay? Are you sure?

Why am I here? In part I suppose I'm slightly less risk-averse than some others, which may have drawn me to this profession. And I believe it's important to support the hotel and its staff. I also believe lightning tends not to strike twice. At least while I'm here, I hope.

And did I mention the rates are extremely reasonable -- a third the price of other hotels in town? As a sweetener, they've thrown in an endless mini-bar. We're in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, so there's no alcohol. But every time I have a chocolate bar, some juice, a cookie, a replacement magically appears. The tooth fairy does exist.

One of the nights I'm there, the hotel hosts a big wedding, returning some of the bustle to the place. Mostly it's pretty deserted. I chat with a few fellow guests. There's a German married to a French diplomat here on assignment who seems to spend most of his time lifting weights.

An Australian of Pakistani descent has come to Islamabad to visit relatives. "I'm very worried, very nervous," she says. "But I've been staying at the Marriott for 20 years and felt it was important to stay here." And a retired Spanish hunter with two satellite phones has just returned from killing some beasts near the insurgent-filled Swat Valley. He doesn't seem afraid of anything, let alone a high-profile luxury hotel.

I stop in for a chat with Zulfiqar Ahmed, the hotel's hospitable general manager, who offers me tea. The hotel was targeted, he said, because it's been a symbol of globalization, international trade and modernity in Islamabad.

Ahmed had just started in the job when the attack hit, and his first day was consumed with arranging funerals, helping the families of dead and injured employees, making sure there was counseling for the traumatized.

Throughout the hotel's accelerated rebuilding process -- it was accommodating guests three months later -- he received a string of personal threats. These came, he believes, from militants with an interest in seeing the hotel fail.

"Having destroyed us," he said, "it wasn't acceptable to allow us to rebuild."

The hotel's soft launch and discount rates have been extended through April and occupancy is slowly improving, he said. But he knows that the hotel's, and the nation's, recovery will take time.

"A place like Egypt is very nice with its pyramids and museums, but God blessed Pakistan with such incredible beauty," he said. "Until they improve the law and order in this country, however, it's foolish to think people will come and visit in large numbers."

So this is what it feels like to stay in a symbol of globalization, I reflect, as I amble back to my room, double-check the restocked mini-bar and gaze out the window at the elaborate security barriers outside my five-star bubble.

mark.magnier@latimes.com

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JOURNALISM IN THE AMERICAS
Newspaper Editors to Replace Cancelled Convention with Online "Webinars"
Since tough economic times caused the American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE) to cancel its annual convention in April, ASNE will offer a series of Webinars to newsroom leaders and editors.
Ten Webinars have been scheduled, with more on the way:
* Civilizing Online Comments: What Technology Can and Can't Do; March 31
* Leading Your Staff into the Twitterverse; April 7
* After the Launch: A Candid Assessment of Detroit's New Publication Plan; April 8
* Sharing Content; April 15
* ASNE Survey Results; April 16
* Live Blogging as Stories Unfold; April 21
* Journalism, Audience and Advertising on the Web; April 23
* The Continuous News Desk of the Future; April 29
* Mobile Trends; April 30
* Maintaining Journalistic Values Online; May 28
More information and registration information can be found here. The Webinars are free to ASNE members and cost $50 for non-members.

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JOURNALISM IN THE AMERICAS

U.S. Journalist Held in Iran To Remain in Detention
U.S.freelance journalist Roxana Saberi told her father this week that Iranian officials said she would remain in prison “for months or even years,” the Associated Press reports. Saberi was initially arrested for purchasing alcohol but was held because she had been illegally working in Iran after her press credentials had been revoked.
Earlier this month, Iranian officials announced Saberi would be released soon.
She is being held in Evin Prison in Tehran. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), two journalists have mysteriously died in Evin Prison, where many political prisoners are held. An Iranian blogger died there last week under questionable circumstances, The New York Time's Lede Blog reports. An Iranian-Canadian photojournalist also died in 2003 from a brain hemorrhage that resulted from a beating at the prison, CPJ reports.

U.S. Journalist to Be Freed Soon, Iran Says
Iran has completed its investigation of Iranian-American freelance journalist Roxana Saberi and will release her in the next few days, an official from the Iranian prosecutor's office said Friday, Reuters reports. Iranian officials said she had been working illegally as a correspondent in the country since her press credentials were withdrawn two years ago.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called for the journalist's release at a press conference and said the State Department was working through Swiss authorities to seek more information about Saberi's detainment, since the U.S. does not maintain diplomatic relations with Iran, the Associated Press reports.
Saberi has been detained in Iran for more than a month. She was initially arrested for purchasing alcohol, which is illegal in Iran.
U.S. Journalist Held in Iranian Prison
Iranian officials confirmed Tuesday that they are holding 31-year-old freelance journalist Roxana Saberi on court order, but refused to provide further details on her detainment near Tehran, the Associated Press and the French news agency AFP report.
An Iranian foreign ministry spokesman said Saberi was engaged in "illegal" activities because she continued working in Iran after the government revoked her press credentials in 2006, the AP said.
Saberi's father said the reporter was detained in late January for purchasing a bottle of wine, which is illegal in Iran, according to NPR, for whom Saberi has reported. Saberi's family and Iranian press freedom advocates told the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) they believe the possession of wine—for which people are usually released from custody within a few days—was only a pretext for detaining the journalist.
Reza Saberi, the journalist's father, told NPR he received a call from his daughter on Feb. 10 from an unknown location, saying she was detained and would be released in a few days. He has not heard from her since.
CPJ has called Iran "the sixth-leading jailer of journalists," with more than 30 colleagues investigated or detained there in 2008.
Roxana Saberi has been living in Iran for six years, completing her Masters in Iranian studies and international relations. She has also contributed reporting to NPR, BBC and other international media outlets, NPR adds.
By Maya Srikrishnan at 03/03/2009 - 10:43

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Citizens and Former Journalists Create their Own News Sources After Newspapers Fail
After this month's shutdown of Denver's Rocky Mountain News, several of its reporters banded together to create the online-only InDenverTimes.Com, the first effort of its type by a group of former reporters from a large daily, Scooping the News reports.
Residents of Carbondale, Colorado, did something similar after losing their weekly newspaper, The Carbondale Valley Journal. Local resident Rebecca Young felt the loss when she was unable to attend a friend's funeral since there was no obituary to let her know he had died. So she decided to start a new newspaper, Sopris Sun (named for a nearby mountain peak), The Los Angeles Times reports.
To Young, the community needed information about local life: births, deaths, proposed developments, and high school sports scores, DeeDee Correll writes for The Times. Young and six other residents started the Sopris Sun as a nonprofit, staffed mostly by volunteers. Collaborators of the free weekly paper have doubts about its future, but for now, its Carbondale readers just seem enthusiastic that a newspaper exists again, Correll reports.

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Edited & Reproduced by MUKTI MAJID (Onbehalf of 'The Monthly Muktidooth',Dacca,Bangladesh

Iranian Blogger Dies in Prison/

Iranian Blogger Dies in Prison
A young Iranian blogger who had the audacity and courage to criticize the country's most revered mullahs has died in Tehran's notorious Evin Prison, according to his attorney.
Mohammad Ali Dadkhan, the attorney of Omir Mir Sayafi (above), said even though the death has not been officially confirmed, he quoted prison officials as saying his client committed suicide and has demanded an immediate investigation.
Here is from Agence France-Presse via Canada.com:
Dadkhah said another prisoner in Evin, a Dr. Hessam Firouzi, "had warned officials in the jail of the state the young blogger was in.

"Dr Firouzi called me from the jail to say Omid had a slowed heartbeat and he had taken him to the infirmary, but that doctors there did not take this seriously and said he was faking it," Dadkhah said.

He added Firouzi reported that Sayafi had also been very depressed.

The blogger, aged around 25, was sentenced in February to 30 months in jail for insulting Khamenei and Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, founder of the Islamic Republic.

Sayafi was first arrested in April last year and released on bail after 41 days before being detained again this year.

Iran has launched a crackdown on bloggers and Internet users deemed to be hostile to the authorities and their Islamic values.
Another Iranian blogger, Hossein Derakhshan, who started a press freedom revolution by teaching Iranians how to blog in Farsi, was arrested on Nov. 1 after traveling to Tehran from his country of residence, Canada.
He has been charged with spying for Israel.
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News and Media Law Leaders Endorse Principles for Internet Press Freedom

NEW YORK -- A conference of leading journalists, media lawyers and online news executives, meeting June 26-28 in New York, endorsed a set of 16 principles representing fundamental guidelines for maintaining and protecting the freedom and independence of Internet news, and suggested actions to implement it.
The Statement of Vienna, a body of 16 principles adopted Nov. 21 in Vienna, Austria, as the fundamental guidelines for protecting press freedom on the Internet by members of nine leading global press freedom organizations. The Statement affirms, among its principles, that “news media in cyberspace and via international satellite broadcasts should be afforded the same freedom of expression rights as traditional news media. ...” (Full text of the Statement follows).
The conference, titled Press Freedom on the Internet, was co-sponsored by the World Press Freedom Committee and the Communications and Media Law Committee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York.
The conference panels included the following topics:
The Associated Press Approaches New Press Freedom Challenges
Overview of Internet News
Growing Internet Restrictions
Press Freedom Issues at the World Summit on the Information Society
Supporting Internet Press Freedom Globally and How the Internet Can Promote Press Freedom
Where in the World Can Internet Publishers be Sued? Which Countries' Laws Should Apply?
"pressfreedom.com"
The Global Internet Freedom Act: Effective Tool for Democracy?
Endorsement of the Statement of Vienna -- and Strategies for Its Implementation
The conference featured some of the world's most renowned experts on press freedom and the Internet, including the following:

-- Tom Curley, in one of his first public statements since taking over June 1 as president and CEO of The Associated Press, said Internet issues - especially relating to intellectual property rights -- are among the greatest concerns for the AP’s worldwide operations. “In every meeting I go to, there are issues around piracy and threats to our revenue stream,” he said. Other concerns include “considerable threats to getting access to information, what happens to that information and what we are responsible for,” he said.
Curley noted that AP has just designated New York lawyer John Keitt as general counsel with special responsibility for addressing intellectual property and other business development issues.
-- Rep. Christopher Cox, R-Calif., co-sponsor with Rep. Tom Lantos (D-Calif) of a bill to establish an office of Global Internet Freedom, explained his purpose in introducing the bill, which is expected to reach the floor of the House of Representatives in early July.
-- Geoffrey Robertson, noted British human rights lawyer, described the new challenges the Internet poses for publishers, who are now becoming targets for libel suits from all corners of the world based on complaints by plaintiffs that they have been wronged by material appearing on the Internet, even if it originates in another country.
-- Kim Holmes, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs, declared that the United States will defend press freedom rights at the United Nations and UNESCO, and at an upcoming World Summit on the Information Society.
Others making statements included experts in news, journalism education, media law and Internet technology:
Leonard Sussman, senior scholar in international communications at Freedom House;
Shanthi Kalathil, author of global studies of Internet freedom, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace;
Xiao Qiang, director of the China Internet Study Program at UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism;
Ben Edelman, who has written extensively about Internet blocking, Harvard Law School;
Guy-Olivier Segond, Special Ambassador, World Summit on the Information Society;
Henrikas Yushkiavitshus, Adviser to UNESCO Director General Koichiro Matsuura;
Andres Garcia Lavin, former President, Inter American Press Association and
International Association of Broadcasting;
Mogens Schmidt, Assistant Director, Press Freedom and Democracy, UNESCO;
Ronald Koven, European Representative, World Press Freedom Committee;
Adam Clayton Powell III, Visiting Professor, Annenburg School for Communication, USC;
Timothy Balding, Director General, World Association of Newspapers;
Tala Dowlatshahi, U.S. Representative, Reporters Without Borders;
Mick Stern, Webmaster, Committee to Protect Journalists;
David Schulz, Esq., Clifford Chance LLP;
Jan Constantine , Esq., News American Publishing Co.;
Kevin Goering, Esq., Coudert Bros. LLP;
Stuart Karle, Esq., Dow Jones & Co.;
Kevin Goldberg, Communications lawyer with Cohn & Marks; WPFC General Counsel;
Jane Kirtley, Silha Professor of Media Ethics and Law, University of Minnesota School of Journalism and
Mass Communication;
Paige Anderson, Staff Counsel for Global Internet Policy Initiative, Center for Democracy and Technology;
Roger Parkinson, former president, World Association of Newspapers;
Andrew Nachison, Director, The Media Center, American Press Institute;
Seymour Topping, San Paulo Professor of International Journalism, Columbia University;
Richard Winfield, Clifford Chance US LLP; former AP General Counsel.
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Press Freedom Issues at the World Summit on the Information Society
A Worthy Democratic Initiative or a Worldwide Effort to Bring Back Old Forms
of Censorship and Government Intrusion?

By M. Kalyanaraman

New York City, June 30, 2003 -- A panel discussion on "Press Freedom Issues at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS)" brought out the conflicting pulls on agenda of this UN-sponsored initiative during a press freedom on the Internet conference.
The civil society groups and the media were against the WSIS attempts to codify rights saying it would limit them and instead wanted the summit resolution to enforce, not just recognize, Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Article 19 states, "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."
The conference also exposed the various cross currents within the UN regarding the summit, which will be held in December of this year and in 2005.
Drawing on the past experience of UNESCO, Henrikas Yushkiavitshus, adviser to UNESCO Director General Koichiro Matsuura, and Mogens Schmidt, Assistant Director of UNESCO’s Press Freedom and Democracy Unit, said the draft resolution shares many features of the 1982 New World Information and Communication Order (NWICO) in which the UNESCO played an important part.
They pointed that the WSIS Bucharest declaration legitimized press censorship in countries like the former Soviet Union and lead to Great Britain and the United States leaving UNESCO.
They expressed their peeve that the UNESCO, which has learned important lessons from the last summit, has been marginalized this time and instead the International Telecommunication Union has been given the responsibility of organizing the summit.
But Guy-Olivier Segond, Special Ambassador to the WSIS, said the media and other groups, including the UNESCO, have been given a place at summit conferences, though the governments of the 191 UN member states will ultimately have the last word.
James Ottaway (left), WPFC's Chairman, and Guy-Oliver Segond, Special Ambassador to the WSIS, discussed their opposing views about the merits and the dangers of the summit's agenda and objectives.

Segond insisted the goals of the summit are legitimate and refused the contention that this is an attempt to bring back to life the NWICO principles.
James H. Ottaway Jr., chairman of World Press Freedom Committee (WPFC) and Senior Vice-President of Dow Jones & Co., said he is happy that Article 19 has been given central priority in the draft resolution. And that it has been opened up to civil society and media voices. But, he pointed out that 60 percent of the 191 countries that will decide the outcome have no free press.
"We are distinctively worried about this," he said.
Ronald Koven, the European representative of WPFC, said in NWICO countries tried to define a "right to communicate," beyond Article 19, as a collective right of groups and nations.
"This meant the right of governments like the Soviet Union to claim time or space in other people's broadcast or printed press to put across their propaganda," said Koven.
Koven said there are similarities to the draft papers for this summit. He added that just as the previous summit added baggage to rights only to allow governments to restrict them, this summit’s draft paper describes the information society as a new world order which also deals with economic and social development.
Andrés García Lavín, former President of the Inter American Press Association and International Association of Broadcasting, said some nostalgic people were bringing in old ideas and sophisticated rhetoric into the summit draft.
"Press, radio and television are not services but means of freedom,” he said. “And they should not be clubbed with other economic and social goals.”
UNESCO’s Schmidt said that WSIS’s goal of cultural diversity was a NWICO buzzword also, while the actual issue should be just Article 19.
Segond rejected the WPFC charge that the world summit was a threat to press freedom, indicating that since more than 91 percent of Internet users live in countries that have only 19 percent of the total population, the WSIS has to deal with policy issues relating to these realities.
Segond, a Swiss and former President of the State Council of the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland, insisted he was well aware of the principles of press freedom and democracy, indicating he comes from the world’s oldest democracy. He added Article 19 will be a priority at the summit.
Giving a positive view of NWICO, Segond said the right to communicate was a new concept for many countries. And they tried to tackle it at that conference.
“One of the aims of this summit was to contribute to preserving identities without diminishing positive aspects of internationalism," he said.
Regarding the complaint about the power given to governments, he said he agreed that they were not perfect institutions but they will decide many issues.
He also said the World Electronic Media Forum, one of the WSIS’s five preparatory meetings, was intended for media representatives, who along with other civil society groups, will have a role in the outcome of the summit.Iranian Blogger Dies in Prison

Yushkiavitshus, a Lithuanian and former Soviet-era official, suggested former Warsaw Pact member states like the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland as examples of the kind of censorship and unintended consequences initiatives like WSIS can bring about.
“These countries have a better memory of what the lack of freedom of expression in society means. Among their leaders are personalities who themselves fought and made sacrifices for human rights and fighting spirit is still alive there,” he said.

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March 19, 2009

Two U.S. Journalists Detained by North Korea and otherside of the World

Two U.S. Journalists Detained by North Korea
Seoul - --
The two reporters, Euna Lee and Laura Ling, and their Chinese guide were taken into custody by North Korean soldiers after ignoring warnings to stop filming in the reclusive country. Both were working for former Vice President Al Gore’s online media outlet Current TV and were arrested near the Tumen River dividing North Korea and China, the Associated Press reports from Seoul, South Korea.
The journalists were trying to interview North Korean defectors hiding in China, according to an activist who claims he helped them plan their trip. A separate AP story says they were drawn to the border to tell stories about refugees fleeing North Korea.
Their capture adds a new dimension to tension on the Korean peninsula, Hong Kong’s Asia Times Online reports. “Now negotiators must work furiously to extricate the pair from North Korean custody while worrying about North Korea's plan to launch a missile-cum-satellite some time between April 4 and April 8,” Donald Kirk reports from Seoul.
Gore has asked U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for help in securing the pair's release, and Washington has sought China’s assistance, Seoul’s English-language JoongAng Daily reports. “The journalists were reportedly standing on a frozen Tumen River, which blurred the border mark,” the paper says. The Committee to Protect Journalists also pushed for their safe release.
Two American journalists were missing Thursday after they were reportedly detained by North Korea for ignoring warnings to stop shooting footage of the reclusive country.
Journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee, reporters for former Vice President Al Gore's online media outlet Current TV, were seized Tuesday along the China-North Korea border, according to news reports and an activist who had worked with them. Their Chinese guide also was detained, although a third journalist with the group, Mitch Koss, apparently eluded capture.
U.S. officials expressed concern to North Korean officials about the reported detentions and said they were working with the Chinese government to ascertain the whereabouts of the Americans.
In San Francisco, an employee of Current TV told reporters: "There will be no comment on the situation anytime today."
The arrests come at a time of heightened tension on the Korean Peninsula, with North Korea declaring its intention to shoot a satellite into space next month. Fearing the launch will be a cover for the test-fire of a long-range missile, regional powers are urging the North to refrain from firing any rockets.
In Washington, the top U.S. commander in the Pacific, Adm. Timothy Keating, called the launch a threat to U.S. security.
"We'll be prepared to respond," he told lawmakers, adding that "the United States has the capability" to shoot down any missile.
Reporters Without Borders urged Chinese authorities to intercede on Lee and Ling's behalf "as they were probably on Chinese soil when they were arrested."
The group ranks North Korea lower than any other Asian country on its press freedom index.
This article appeared on page A - 6 of the San Francisco Chronicle
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U.S. missile strikes take heavy toll on Al Qaeda, officials say
Predator drone attacks in northwest Pakistan have increased sharply since Bush last year stopped seeking Pakistan's permission. Obama may keep pace as officials speak of confusion in Al Qaeda ranks.
By Greg Miller
March 22, 2009
Reporting from Washington -- An intense, six-month campaign of Predator strikes in Pakistan has taken such a toll on Al Qaeda that militants have begun turning violently on one another out of confusion and distrust, U.S. intelligence and counter-terrorism officials say.

The pace of the Predator attacks has accelerated dramatically since August, when the Bush administration made a previously undisclosed decision to abandon the practice of obtaining permission from the Pakistani government before launching missiles from the unmanned aircraft.

U.S. shot down Iranian drone aircraft over Iraq in February
Pakistan says missile strike kills 8 near Afghan border
Pakistan's Asif Ali Zardari may become a figurehead
Since Aug. 31, the CIA has carried out at least 38 Predator strikes in northwest Pakistan, compared with 10 reported attacks in 2006 and 2007 combined, in what has become the CIA's most expansive targeted killing program since the Vietnam War.

Because of its success, the Obama administration is set to continue the accelerated campaign despite civilian casualties that have fueled anti-U.S. sentiment and prompted protests from the Pakistani government.

"This last year has been a very hard year for them," a senior U.S. counter-terrorism official said of Al Qaeda militants, whose operations he tracks in northwest Pakistan. "They're losing a bunch of their better leaders. But more importantly, at this point they're wondering who's next."

U.S. intelligence officials said they see clear signs that the Predator strikes are sowing distrust within Al Qaeda. "They have started hunting down people who they think are responsible" for security breaches, the senior U.S. counter-terrorism official said, discussing intelligence assessments on condition of anonymity. "People are showing up dead or disappearing."

The counter-terrorism official and others, who also spoke anonymously, said the U.S. assessments were based in part on reports from the region provided by the Pakistani intelligence service.

The stepped-up Predator campaign has killed at least nine senior Al Qaeda leaders and dozens of lower-ranking operatives, in what U.S. officials described as the most serious disruption of the terrorist network since 2001.

Among those killed since August are Rashid Rauf, the suspected mastermind of an alleged 2006 transatlantic airliner plot; Abu Khabab Masri, who was described as the leader of Al Qaeda's chemical and biological weapons efforts; Khalid Habib, an operations chief allegedly involved in plots against the West; and Usama al-Kini, who allegedly helped orchestrate the September bombing of the Marriott Hotel in the capital, Islamabad.

Al Qaeda's founders remain elusive. U.S. spy agencies have not had reliable intelligence on the location of Osama bin Laden since he slipped across the Pakistan border seven years ago, officials said. His deputy, Ayman Zawahiri, remains at large after escaping a missile strike in 2006.

But the Predator campaign has depleted the organization's operational tier. Many of the dead are longtime loyalists who had worked alongside Bin Laden and were part of the network's hasty migration into Pakistan in 2001 after U.S.-led forces invaded neighboring Afghanistan. They are being replaced by less experienced recruits who have had little, if any, history with Bin Laden and Zawahiri.

The offensive has been aided by technological advances and an expansion of the CIA's Predator fleet. The drones take off and land at military airstrips in Pakistan, but are operated by CIA pilots in the United States. Some of the pilots -- who also pull the triggers on missiles -- are contractors hired by the agency, former officials said.

Predators were originally designed as video surveillance aircraft that could hover over a target from high altitudes. But new models are outfitted with additional intelligence gear that has enabled the CIA to confirm the identities of targets even when they are inside buildings and can't be seen through the Predator's lens.

The agency is also working more closely with U.S. special operations teams and military intelligence aircraft that hug the Pakistan border, collecting pictures and intercepting radio or cellphone signals.

Even so, officials said that the surge in strikes has less to do with expanded capabilities than with the decision to skip Pakistani approval. "We had the data all along," said a former CIA official who oversaw Predator operations in Pakistan. "Finally we took off the gloves."

The Bush administration's decision to expand the Predator program was driven by growing alarm over Al Qaeda's resurgence in Pakistan's tribal belt.

A 2006 peace agreement between Islamabad and border tribes had allowed the network to shore up its finances, resume training operatives and reestablish connections with satellite groups.

The Bush administration had been constrained by its close ties with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, who argued against aggressive U.S. action. But by last summer, after a series of disrupted terrorist plots in Europe had been traced to Pakistan, there were calls for a new approach.

"At a certain point there was common recognition of the untenable nature of what was happening in the FATA," said a former senior U.S. counter-terrorism official, referring to Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas where Al Qaeda is based.

The breaking point came when Musharraf was forced to resign mid-August, officials said. Within days, President Bush had approved the new rules: Rather than requiring Pakistan's permission to order a Predator strike, the agency was allowed to shoot first.


Related:
Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, center, waves to supporters at his residence in Islamabad, the capital. Some ruling-party stalwarts portrayed his reinstatement as fulfillment of a pledge by the late Benazir Bhutto.
After the uproar over Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, many question whether the president will be able to maintain full power.
By Laura King
March 17, 2009
Reporting from Islamabad, Pakistan -- On a day of delirious public celebrations over Pakistan's popular chief justice getting his job back, President Asif Ali Zardari stayed conspicuously out of sight.

The 52-year-old president, whose popularity had been flagging even before Pakistan's latest political crisis, was like an unwelcome guest Monday at a raucous nationwide party, pilloried for his heavy-handed treatment of activists who championed the cause of Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry.

Now diplomats, analysts and ordinary Pakistanis are questioning whether Zardari, who seemed to have badly misread public opinion, will be able to hang on to his dual roles as head of state and leader of the Pakistan People's Party.

Many senior People's Party members were horrified by authoritarian measures Zardari ordered to try to suppress a march by backers of opposition leader Nawaz Sharif and members of a lawyers movement that fought for two years for Chaudhry's reinstatement.

The crackdown included hundreds of arrests and tight restrictions on political gatherings. Information Minister Sherry Rehman quit over the weekend to protest threatened restrictions on a major TV channel, Geo. Amid the backlash against him, commentators suggested that Zardari might be reduced to a figurehead president, with Prime Minister Yusaf Raza Gillani, who was relatively untainted by the controversy, taking on more authority.

"The party is in a difficult situation after this development, and the feeling of being upstaged by a rival is definitely going to leave a bitter taste," said Ahmed Bilal Mehboob, executive director of the nonprofit Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency.

Mehboob said he expected that sentiment to translate into a curtailment of Zardari's "unbridled authority" as president -- a legacy of Zardari's predecessor, Pervez Musharraf, a general who granted himself extraordinary powers.

Some analysts said a split was possible between pro- and anti-Zardari camps within the People's Party, which was the largest vote-getter in parliamentary elections 13 months ago. According to polls, it has since lost ground to Sharif.

Zardari is regarded in the West as an important ally in the battle against a powerful Islamic insurgency; Sharif has close ties to Islamist parties and is viewed with some wariness by the Obama administration.

At celebratory gatherings across the country Monday, People's Party stalwarts pointedly avoided mention of Zardari, instead seeking to portray Chaudhry's reinstatement as fulfillment of a pledge by Benazir Bhutto, Zardari's assassinated wife. "This outcome is in accordance with her wishes," said Aitzaz Ahsan, the most prominent and respected leader of the lawyers movement.

The danger that the Chaudhry affair could have spiraled out of control also carried an explicit reminder that Pakistan's powerful military still considers itself a guardian of public order.

Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ashfaq Kayani has signaled his intention to stay out of politics as much as possible. But Kayani met with Zardari shortly before the government's decision to reinstate the jurist was announced at daybreak Monday, and Pakistani media reports said the discussion was pivotal in resolving the crisis.

Zardari's isolation both within his party and from the public at large was a recurring theme as the crisis escalated. His spokesman was obliged to deny repeatedly that Zardari planned to resign. In a front-page commentary on Monday in the influential English-language newspaper Dawn, Editor Zaffar Abbas spoke of a "besieged leader" holed up in his presidential palace, gazing out at the maze of fortifications that had been erected to keep protesters from the capital.

Although the U.S. Embassy issued a statement praising the "statesmanlike" decision to reinstate Chaudhry, Western envoys took note of Zardari's fast-eroding stature inside and outside his party.

"Face it -- this isn't a guy with a lot of friends," said one diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to express his country's views.

"It's hard to see what his long-term future could be now," said a second Western envoy, also speaking on condition of anonymity.

Before her death in December 2007, Bhutto, a former prime minister, anointed Zardari, together with their college-age son Bilawal, as her successors. Some of her closest associates harbored doubts about her husband's moral and intellectual fitness but acquiesced out of respect for her memory.

The president had pledged more than a year ago to reinstate the chief justice, who was fired by Musharraf and gained prominence as a symbol of resistance to military rule. But once in office, Zardari repeatedly delayed giving Chaudhry back his job.

Many in Pakistan suspect the president was motivated by fears that the Supreme Court under Chaudhry might revive old corruption cases against him. That in turn brought back memories of Zardari's past. As a minister in his wife's Cabinet in the 1990s, he was derisively known as "Mr. 10%" for allegedly demanding kickbacks.

Within the ruling party, frustration had built over the last month as the lawyers' campaign to reinstate Chaudhry was successfully appropriated by Sharif. The opposition chief forced Zardari's hand by leading throngs of followers toward the federal capital for what was to have been a massive protest rally Monday.

That planned sit-in was called off after the government, in an eleventh-hour reversal, agreed early Monday that Chaudhry and the other judges would be returned to the bench this week.

"By acting sooner, Zardari could have avoided a great deal of trouble for both himself and the People's Party," said Khurram Khan, who joined the rejoicing crowds outside Chau- dhry's residence. "Everyone will remember that."

The celebrations began before dawn and continued late into the night. The stock market surged 5%. Lawyers and their supporters handed out sweets in the traditional gesture of celebration. Amplified music blared from an impromptu open-air party in the yard of Chaudhry's villa. "Justice restored," read one of many banner headlines.

Chaudhry himself spent the day greeting well-wishers behind closed doors, emerging only briefly to wave to the crowd and the cameras. Although his fate became a highly charged political issue, associates said he wanted to avoid the appearance of partisanship by making any victory speech.

Celebrations aside, Monday brought new reminders of the threat posed by Islamic insurgents. An apparent suicide bombing in the city of Rawalpindi, adjacent to Islamabad, killed at least five people. And for the second day in a row, militants attacked truck stops outside the northwestern city of Peshawar, torching vehicles and supplies bound for Western troops in Afghanistan.

"So maybe this is one day when we can feel good again," said Anjum Baqir, swaying in time to the music wafting from Chaudhry's yard. "And tomorrow we will return again to all our worries."

laura.king@latimes.com

Special correspondent Zulfiqar Ali in Peshawar contributed to this report.


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EU Envoy to Cuba Urged to Seek Release of Jailed Journalists
On the sixth anniversary of the mass arrest of 75 dissidents on the island (including 29 independent journalists), 21 reporters and editors remain behind bars. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has urged the EU's envoy, Luis Michel, to push for their release and to urge Raúl Castro's government to grant freedom of expression to all Cubans.
CPJ also publishes an account by Óscar Espinosa Chepe, a journalist jailed in 2003 who was released in 2004 for health reasons. Espinosa recalls the conditions of his prison in Guantánamo, more than 560 miles (900 km.) from his Havana home. He shared a cell with 36 common prisoners, received contaminated drinking water, and endured intensive interrogations. Despite his freedom, Espinosa says he still receives threats and must keep guard against neighborhood informants who monitor his activities.


(Re:Edited:by THE EDITOR/PUBLISHER"THE MONTHLY MUKTIDOOTH",DACCA,BANGLADESH)