Not universally loved

He even entertained thoughts of constructing a railroad track connecting Grutas to the capital city, with cattle cars like those that took the hundreds of thousands of Lithuanians deported by the Soviets to Siberia, to carry visitors to his park. He dismissed the idea as too complicated and expensive.

Danute Juodiene, a 45-year-old history teacher from the city of Kaunas, said he finds something new every time he visits.

“This time I found two new Lenin statues and new birds at their zoo”, Juodiene said.

But not everyone is amused by the park. Some have bitterly criticized it as an affront to those deported or killed during the Soviet occupation, which started during World War II.

“Malinauskas, a former farmer, does not care that these forests where Grutas park was built, once served as shelter for Lithuanian freedom fighters against Soviet occupants”, said Juozas Galdicas, a former Parliament member. “He does not care about painful history of Lithuania. What is purpose of this park? To laugh at our pain?”

Galdicas led a group of lawmakers who tried, but failed, to shut the park down, which prompted Malinauskas to erect wooden statues of them alongside the Soviet leaders.

“Those who are still afraid of shadows of the past deserve to stand here”, Malinauskas said.

Text 2.5 Not on our watch – how Hollywood made America care about Darfur

Cannes premiere is latest event to be used to draw attention to African crisis

Dan Glaister in Los Angeles

Saturday May 19, 2007

The scene will be familiar at Tuesday’s Cannes film festival party for Ocean’s 13. There will be a red carpet; there will be crowds of fans behind metal barriers; there will be a line of limousines and burly security guards. And there will be photographers shouting out the familiar names of the cosseted and famous: George! Brad! Matt! Don!

Don? The Don in question is not quite a star of the magnitude of a George Clooney or a Matt Damon, but he has managed to put his moderate fame to a use that many of his peers will envy.

In the three years since he starred in the true story of an unassuming hotel manager who helps refugees escape the genocide in Rwanda, Don Cheadle has devoted much of his time to bringing the world’s attention to another African tragedy: Darfur. Partly as a result of his efforts it has become one of the highest profile issues in the US, the subject of bumper stickers, full-page newspaper advertisements and a reborn student movement.

“Celebrities have been crucial in building awareness on a wide range of things that would otherwise be just a distant concern”, says the human rights activist John Prendergast, co-author with Cheadle of Not on Our Watch: The mission to End Genocide in Darfur and Beyond. “Clooney is smarter than any politician I’ve dealt with on this issue. Angelina [Jolie] is as clued in on the policy issues as any politician”.

Since 2003 at least 250,000 people have died and 2 million people have been displaced in Darfur, according to UN estimates. Cheadle has made numerous appearances at rallies and on talkshows to promote the cause, and is the co-producer of a documentary feature titled An Indifferent World.

Now Cheadle, along with his Ocean’s 13 co-star Clooney, has hijacked the premiere of Steven Soderbergh’s latest film to focus the gaze of Hollywood – and, by extension, the world – on Darfur. Tuesday’s party will be a benefit to aid the fledgling Not on our Watch Foundation, a fundraising and advocacy group that aims “to focus global attention and resources to stop and prevent mass atrocities”. But unlike most non-profit start-ups, this one boasts a stellar list of board members on its letterhead: Cheadle, Clooney, Damon, Brad Pitt and the Ocean’s 13 producer, Jerry Weintraub.

“All the guys have been to the Sudan this year”, Weintraub told reporters last week. “They saw this huge genocide and nobody doing anything about it”.

Darfur has mobilized activists and generated support like no other conflict or humanitarian crisis, particularly in the US. Even poker has got in on the action: an online poker site will announce a $1m (£500,000) donation at Tuesday’s party: Ocean’s 13 is, after all, a gambling movie.

“Some people would say Darfur has become Hollywoodised, that that creates diminishing returns”, says Dean Schramm, a Hollywood agent and one of the organizers of the Los Angeles Darfur Observance Day set for tomorrow. “I think the celebrities are acting as human beings. They’ve used their celebrity to try to effect change”.

Text 2.6 Famine Looms as Wars Rend Horn of Africa

Jeffrey Gettleman

The New York Times, May 17^th, 2008

DAGAARI, Somalia – The global food crisis has arrived at Safia Ali’s hut. She cannot afford rice or wheat or powdered milk anymore.

At the same time, a drought has decimated her family’s herd of goats, turning their sole livelihood into a pile of bleached bones and papery skin.

The result is that Ms.Safia, a 25-year old mother of five, has not eaten in a week. Her 1-year-old son is starving too, an adorable, listless boy who doesn’t even respond to a pinch.

Somalia – and much of the volatile Horn of Africa, for that matter – was about the last place on earth that needed a food crisis. Even before commodity prices started shooting up around the globe, civil war, displacement and imperiled aid operations had pushed many people here to the brink of famine.

But now with food costs spiraling out of reach and the livestock that people live off of dropping dead in the sand, villagers across this sun-blasted landscape say hundreds of people are dying of hunger and thirst.

This is what happens, economists say, when the global food crisis meets local chaos.

“We’re really in the perfect storm,” said Jeffrey D.Sachs, a Columbia economist and top UN adviser, who recently visited neighboring Kenya.

There has been a collision of troubles throughout the region: skimpy rainfall, disastrous harvests, soaring food prices, dying livestock, escalating violence, out-of-control inflation, and shrinking food aid because of many of these factors.

Across the border in Ethiopia, in the war-racked Ogaden region, the situation sounds just as dire. In Darfur, the United Nations has had to cut food rations because of a rise in banditry that endagers aid deliveries. Kenya is looking vulnerable, too.

A recent headline in one of Kenya’s leading newspapers blared, “25,000 villagers risk starving,” referring to a combination of drought, higher fertilizer and fuel costs and postelection violence that displaced thousands of farmers. “These places aren’t on the brink,” Mr.Sachs said. “They’ve gone over the cliff.”

The United Nations has declared a wide swath of central Somalia a humanitarian emergency, the final stage before a full-blown famine. But Christian Balslev-Olesen, the head of Unicef operations in Somalia, said the situation was likely to become a famine in the coming weeks.

Famine is defined by several criteria, including malnutrition, mortality, food and water scarcity and destruction of livelihood. Some of those factors, like an acute malnutrition rate of 24 percent in some areas of Somalia, have already soared past emergency thresholds and are closing in on famine range. Mr.Balslev-Olesen said Unicef recently reports of people dying from hunger and thirst. It is hard to know exactly how many, he said, tough local elders have put the number in the mid-hundreds.

“We have all the indicators in place for a catastrophe,” Mr.Balslev-Olesen said. “We cannot call it that yet. But I’m very much concerned it’s just a matter of weeks until we have to.”

Many people already consider Somalia a catastrophe. It has some of the highest malnutrition rates anywhere in the world. The collapse of the central government in 1991 plunged Somalia into a spiral of clan-driven bloodshed that it has yet to pull out of. The era began with a famine that killed hundreds of thousands of people.

The consensus now is that all the same elements of the early 1990s – high-intensity conflict, widespread displacement and drought – are lining up again, and at a time of the biggest spike in global food prices in more then 30 years. The United Nations says 2.6 million Somalis need assistance and the number could soon swell to 3.5 million, nearly half the estimated population. If there is excellent rain or a sudden peace, the crisis may ease. But weather projections and even the rosiest political forecasts do not predict that.

Whether Somalia slips into a famine may depend on aid, and right now, that does not look so good either. Eleven aid workers have been killed this year, and the United Nations officials say Somalia is as complicated – and dangerous – as ever.

Text 2.7 Palestinian TV uses Mickey Mouse to promote resistance

Mark Oliver and agencies

Wednesday May 9, 2007

Walt Disney’s daughter today described Hamas as “pure evil” for creating a television show in which a Mickey Mouse-style character encourages violent resistance to Israel and the US.

The al-Aqsa television station of Hamas, which dominates the Palestinian government, started showing Tomorrow’s Pioneers last month. It is hosted by a presenter called Farfur, who dresses in a Mickey Mouse suit.

He advises children to drink their milk as well as encouraging what Israeli critics have described as “hate-filled propaganda” against the “Zionist occupation” of Palestine.

In one clip which has appeared on YouTube, a young viewer speaking to Farfur by telephone recites a poem which includes the lines: “Rafah sings ‘Oh, oh’ Its answer is an AK-47”.

As the poem is being read out, Farfur pretends to shoot an assault rifle. Another child tells Farfur: “It is the time of death, we will fight a war”.

Today, Diane Disney Miller, 73, attacked the appropriation of Mickey Mouse, the comic character created in 1928 that became the Walt Disney company’s most familiar icon.

Ms Miller, who is the only surviving child of Walt Disney, who died in 1966, told the New York Daily News: “Of course I feel personal about Mickey Mouse, but it could be Barney as well.

“It’s not just Mickey, it’s indoctrinating children like this, teaching them to be evil. The world loves children and this is just going against the grain of humanity … What we’re dealing with here is pure evil and you can’t ignore that”.

In the show, Farfur’s co-host is a young girl called Sara who speaks about the struggle against Israel and the US. Farfur tells children they must pray in the mosque five times a day until there is “world leadership under Islamic leadership”.

The clip on YouTube includes a call for the US to pull out of Iraq and criticism of the US president, George Bush, and the US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice.

Israeli National News criticized the show, which it says broadcasts from Gaza via satellite to the Arab world, describing it as “teaching kids to hate and kill”.

Text 2.8 Israelis plan more homes on occupied land

· Jerusalem council wants three new settlements

· Palestinians say move will sabotage two-state aim

Conal Urquhart in Tel Aviv

Friday May 11, 2007

Jerusalem’s city council plans to build three new Jewish settlements on land it occupied in 1967, in contravention of international law, it was announced yesterday. The estates will be built on land that has been earmarked for a future Palestinian state, close to Bethlehem and Ramallah.

International law forbids construction on land acquired by war, but since 1967 Israel has built homes for around 500,000 Israelis in the West Bank and Jerusalem.

The construction is planned to link existing Jewish settlements in Jerusalem with each other and with settlements in the West Bank. Saeb Erekat, the head of negotiations for the Palestinians, said the building plans suggested that Israel had no real interest in peace. “Today it is obvious that Israel wants Jerusalem for only some of Jerusalem’s people”, he said. “I wish Israel would do what majorities of both Palestinians and Israelis want: accept the two-state solution and accept peace”.

While Israel says that it supports the creation of Palestinian state, its building projects – which include walls, fences, bypasses and tunnels as well as settlements – restrict the amount of land that would be available to the new state.

In 1967 Israel annexed East Jerusalem, but most of its residents are in limbo, neither residents of Israel, nor of the west bank. To ensure its hold on East Jerusalem Israel has built a series of settlements which divide the city from its hinterland in the West Bank. The annexation was condemned by the UN and has not been recognized by any major country.

“By severing East Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank”, Mr. Erekat said, “the Jerusalem-area wall and settlements mean no viable Palestinian state, no Palestinian capital in East Jerusalem, and thus no viable two-state solution”.

Mark Regev, a spokesman for the Israeli foreign ministry, said the government made no distinction between East Jerusalem and the rest of Israel. “There is a difference between Jerusalem, where we have sovereignty, and the West Bank where we do not and whose future will be the subject of future negotiations”.

According to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, the new communities would be aimed at housing ultra-orthodox Jews, the fastest growing sector of the Jewish community in Jerusalem. The paper quoted the planning committee as saying that “the committee sees fit to announce its intention to change the district outline plan in order to allow construction in airport area, and more”.

Yehoshua Pollak, the chairman of the committee, told Haaretz that up to 10,000 homes could be built in the area of Walaja, between the south-west of Jerusalem and Bethlem. “If you strengthen Walaja, you strengthen the connection with the Etzion bloc through the tunnel road”, he said. The Etzion bloc is a group of settlements south of Bethlehem which Israel hopes to keep, although its official position is that their future would be discussed in peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

The decision of the Jerusalem committee must be accepted by a national planning committee before construction can begin. A spokesman for Jerusalem city council said no final decision on the projects had been made, but there was an urgent need to build 20,000 new homes. “The local committee for housing and construction is considering various proposals for new neighborhoods, all inside the municipal area of Jerusalem”, he said.

Text 2.9 Revolt against the peasant president

The reform agenda of Bolivia’s left-wing leader, Evo Morales, is being challenged by right-wing militias and rich ranchers in a wealthy region that wants to push back the ‘pink tide’ in Latin America.

Rory Carroll and Andres Schipani in Santa Cruz

The Observer, Sunday May 4 2008

The tide of left-wing and indigenous movements sweeping to power across South America is about to hit a wall of resistance. In country after country the old order has collapsed, ending decades, and in some cases centuries, of rule by white elites. Their time is supposed to be up. Santa Cruz, however, did not get the memo. Hundreds of thousands of people in this wealthy lowland region of Bolivia are expected to vote for autonomy today in a referendum seen as a repudiation of the so-called “pink tide”.

It is an audacious – and illegal – challenge which Evo Morales, Bolivia’s first indigenous President, has denounced as a separatist plot. Alarmed left-wing allies such as Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez claim to detect Washington meddling. The insurgents are a coalition of rich ranchers, establishment politicians, right-wing militias and ordinary voters. They want to defend Santa Cruz’s economic interests – its cattle, soy crops and gas reserves account for almost 30 percent of GDP – as well as a sense of identity at odds with indigenous political ascendancy.

“This vote will show a new path for Bolivia, one that is peaceful and democratic,” said Branko Marinkovic, an opposition leader. The right to vote has to be respected. It is people at the ballot boxes who determine the future of a country.”

Others see less noble motives for the initiative. “Bolivia essentially used to function as an apartheid state, and the psychology of the elite is very defensive,” said Jim Shultz, director of the Democracy centre, a Cochabamba-based hthink-tank sympathetic to government aims.

Opposition leaders will use a referendum victory to try to loosen the control of the capital, La Paz, and shield Santa Cruz from government efforts to ‘refound’ Bolivia. At least three more states in the relatively prosperous lowlands may follow with their own autonomy votes.

Analysts say that could derail Morales’s administration, or at the very least force painful concessions in the draft constitution at the heart of his ‘democratic revolution’. Santa Cruz’s defiance may appear quixotic, given that just two years ago Morales, a Ilama herder turned trade union leader, won a historic mandate to empower an indigenous majority excluded from power since the Spanish conquest 500 years ago.

South America’s left-wing tilt has since strengthened; Ecuador and Paraguay elected radical outsiders as Presidents, Venezuela continued espousing socialist revolution, and Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Uruguay retained left-wing governments. Santa Cruz has swum proudly against the tide. Large, jubilant crowds thronged the streets this week chanting ‘Autonomia’ and waving the region’s green-and-white flags. They denounced Morales as a socialist autocrat who siphoned their wealth to the western highlands.

Since the government has declared the referendum as ‘illegal survey’ some 6,700 students and members of the Union Juvenil Crucenista, a quasi-militia which sports military gear, will staff polling stations. ‘We’re so proud of these kids. With them we have nothing to fear,’ said one middle-class woman at a rally.

Until a 1952 revolution, indigenous people were not allowed near the presidential palace in la Paz, let alone to vote, and their empowerment under Morales has discomforted many pale-skinned Bolivians. ‘Racism and exclusion is a part of this autonomy process,’ said Gabriela Montano, the President’s envoy to Santa Cruz. In a recent interview her boss was more forthright: ’They do not accept a peasant and an indigenous person as a President of the Repbublic.’

The opposition denies prejudice is a factor. ‘The voice of people is not racist. Democracy has no colours,’ said Marinkovic, the opposition leader.

No one denies money is a factor. Santa Cruz wants a greater share of gas revenues and big ranchers want protection from a land reform act which is supposed to redistribute giant estates to peasants.

Despite a plea from the President to stay away, several thousand government supporters have converged on Santa Cruz in the past 48 hours, vowing to disrupt a referendum they view as an attempt to destabilize their champion in La Paz. ‘We have to fight against this autonomy,’ said an indigenous woman in a traditional skirt and hat. ‘We would rather die than live like slaves.’

Opposition militants reportedly threw stones at buses of government supporters, prompting talk of retaliation by a radical indigenous group known as the Red Ponchos. ‘We want to defend national unity,’ said on Poncho member, Edgar Quispe. The group beheaded several dogs late last year as a warning to the opposition.

Text 2.10 North Korea fires two more short-range missiles in

defiant act after nuclear test

Richard Lloyd Parry, Asia Editor

Times May 26, 2009

North Korea fired more missiles into the Sea of Japan this afternoon in a further gesture of defiance a day after its underground nuclear test provoked outraged protests across the world.

Members of the United Nations Security Council worked overnight on a resolution that will reveal the degree of unity among its permanent members.

On Monday, even North Korea’s historical ally, China, joined in a unanimous condemnation of the test, but it remains to be seen whether the unusual consensus will extend to concrete steps such as sanctions.

South Korean media reported this afternoon that the North test launched two short-range missiles, after firing three more yesterday. Unlike the long-range rocket that was fired deep into the Pacific in early April, the testing of such smaller weapons does not violate international law or UN resolutions.

But in the circumstances, it represents a further provocation to North Korea’s international critics – as well as a reminder of the country’s considerable conventional defensive capabilities for any government that might be contemplating a military solution to the North Korean nuclear problem.

Barack Obama spoke overnight to South Korea’s President, Lee Myung Bak, and to the Japanese Prime Minister, Taro Aso.

The South Korean government responded to Monday’s test by announcing that it would join the Proliferation Security Initiative, a multinational effort by 94 countries to prevent the export of weapons of mass destruction and missile parts by countries such as North Korea by means of co-ordinated naval and air force patrols.

There was no immediate reaction from North Korea, which has threatened in the past to treat such a step as an act of war. But the state-controlled Workers Newspaper claimed that the US was planning the deployment of units of F22 fighters and interceptor missiles against it and warned of a “sinister and dangerous scenario of the US to put the Asia-Pacific region under its military control”.

It added: ”The present US administration is talking about what it called a ‘change’ and ‘bilateral dialogue’ but it is, in actuality, pursuing the same reckless policy as followed by the former Bush administration to stifle the DPRK by force of arms… The US would be well advised to halt at once its dangerous military moves against the DPRK if it wants to escape the lot of a tiger moth, bearing deep in mind that any attempt to make a pre-emptive attack on the DPRK is little short of inviting a disaster”.

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