Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Clinton Warns Against Hasty Exit for Mubarak in Egypt
Clinton Warns Against Hasty Exit for Mubarak in Egypt
By MARK LANDLER
Published: February 6, 2011
MUNICH — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned on Sunday that removing President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt too hastily could threaten the country’s transition to democracy.
Odd Andersen/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in Munich. She made her comments on the way home from a conference.
Multimedia
Related
The Lede Blog: Updates From Day 12 in Egypt (February 5, 2011)
News Analysis: As Mubarak Digs In, U.S. Policy in Egypt Is Complicated (February 6, 2011)
America’s Journeys With Strongmen (February 6, 2011)
Among the Muslim Brotherhood(February 13, 2011)
Her remarks were the Obama administration’s most explicit sign yet of its growing emphasis on averting instability in Egypt, even at the expense of the key demand from the Egyptian protest movement: Mr. Mubarak’s immediate removal.
Citing the Egyptian Constitution, Mrs. Clinton said that if Mr. Mubarak stepped down now, Egypt would have to hold elections for a new president in 60 days — too little time for the government or the opposition to organize a credible vote.
Her comments, made to reporters on the way home from a conference in Munich, echo what administration officials have said privately and some of what the White House’s temporary diplomatic emissary to Cairo, Frank G. Wisner, said publicly on Sunday: Mr. Mubarak is likely to remain in the picture, at least a while longer.
Mrs. Clinton reiterated that Mr. Mubarak’s future was up to the Egyptian people and declined to discuss what role he should play between now and September, when Egypt is scheduled to hold an election in which he has said neither he nor his son Gamal will compete.
But Mr. Mubarak’s resignation now would set off a chain of events, Mrs. Clinton said. Under the Constitution — a document she conceded not having thought about before this week — the speaker of Parliament would step in as a caretaker president, followed by quick elections.
“Now the Egyptians are the ones who are having to grapple with the reality of what they must do,” she said, noting that opposition leaders, including Mohamed ElBaradei, had also talked about the need for time. “That’s not us saying it; that’s the Egyptians saying it,” Mrs. Clinton said.
She made no mention of the desired outcome frequently discussed by protest leaders: that Mr. Mubarak would step down, the Constitution would be suspended for a transition that could take up to a year, the current Parliament would be unseated and then new elections would be held.
For nearly two weeks, as the protests have raged in Cairo, the administration has struggled to square its ties to Mr. Mubarak, a stalwart ally for nearly three decades, with its desire not to be seen as abandoning the demonstrators, who are crying for the president’s immediate departure.
PressTV - US may extend stay in Iraq
PressTV - US may extend stay in Iraq
US Ambassador to Iraq James Jeffrey said on Friday that more US military forces may be needed to counter what he called “threats to Iraq's stability, [and they] will remain in 2012."
The prospects of a longer US military stay in Iraq contradict the clauses of a 2008 agreement between Baghdad and Washington.
The agreement established that US combat forces would withdraw from Iraqi cities by June 30, 2009, and that all US forces would be completely out of Iraq by December 31, 2011.
The Iraqi government initially intended to hold a popular vote on the agreement but later succumbed to US bully-tactics and accepted the agreement.
Since the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, more than 1,300,000 people have been killed in Iraq, 4.7 million displaced, 5 million children orphaned -- nearly half of the country's children -- and the health status has deteriorated to a level not seen since the 1950s.
GMA/PKH/MMN
American officials suggest that tens of thousands of US troops in Iraq may extend their stay in the country well beyond the 2011withdrawal deadline.
US Ambassador to Iraq James Jeffrey said on Friday that more US military forces may be needed to counter what he called “threats to Iraq's stability, [and they] will remain in 2012."
The prospects of a longer US military stay in Iraq contradict the clauses of a 2008 agreement between Baghdad and Washington.
The agreement established that US combat forces would withdraw from Iraqi cities by June 30, 2009, and that all US forces would be completely out of Iraq by December 31, 2011.
The Iraqi government initially intended to hold a popular vote on the agreement but later succumbed to US bully-tactics and accepted the agreement.
Since the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, more than 1,300,000 people have been killed in Iraq, 4.7 million displaced, 5 million children orphaned -- nearly half of the country's children -- and the health status has deteriorated to a level not seen since the 1950s.
GMA/PKH/MMN
Harper, Obama agree to integrate border, creating security and trade perimeter
Harper, Obama agree to integrate border, creating security and trade perimeter:
Read more: http://www.canada.com/business/Harper+Obama+agree+integrate+border+creating+security+trade+perimeter/4225641/story.html#ixzz1DNJi7pUr
President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Stephen Harper attend a joint news conference in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington, Feb. 4, 2011.
Photograph by: Jim Young, Reuters
WASHINGTON — Prime Minister Stephen Harper and U.S. President Barack Obama are seeking a sweeping deal to establish a North American security and trade perimeter, opening talks Friday that could lead to jointly operated Canada-U.S. border facilities, an integrated entry-exit system to track travellers and the deployment of "cross-designated" law enforcement officers to intercept terrorists and criminals
Read more: http://www.canada.com/business/Harper+Obama+agree+integrate+border+creating+security+trade+perimeter/4225641/story.html#ixzz1DNJi7pUr
Monday, February 7, 2011
Kurt Haskell Interview (Links For More Information)
The Haskell Family Blog
http://haskellfamily.blogspot.com/
News Resource Links
http://haskellfamily.blogspot.com/
News Resource Links
Haskell Family: FBI has changed accounts 4 times; our story is the same since day one
http://www.infowars.com/haskell-family-fbi-has-changed-accounts-4-times-our-story-is-the-same-since-day-one/
State Department Admits They Let Him On Plane:
The Sharp Dressed Man Who Aided Mutallab Onto Flight 253 Was U.S. Government Agent
CHRISTMAS DAY BOMBER WAS A US GOVERNMENT PLANT
US judge urges 'underwear bomber' to use a lawyer
Kurt Haskell on Alex Jones
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Friday, February 4, 2011
Thursday, February 3, 2011
New York City Council Bans Smoking In Public Parks, Stretches Of Beach
New York City Council Bans Smoking In Public Parks, Stretches Of Beach
Many Believe The Big Apple Has Become A Nanny State
February 2, 2011 11:49 PM
A woman smokes in Union Square. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — Smokers have just one message for Mayor Michael Bloomberg and City Council members: butt out of our business.
“We’re outside. We should have freedom to smoke,” City Hall Park smoker Harvey Forbes told CBS 2’s Magee Hickey.
By a vote of 36 to 11 on Wednesday the City Council approved a bill to ban smoking in all city parks, beaches and pedestrian plazas.
“People who have made the decision not to smoke have civil liberties too and their health and their lives should not be negatively impacted because other people have decided to smoke,” Council Speaker Christine Quinn said.
1010 WINS Reporter Carol D’Auria gets comments from City Council Speaker QuinnCouncil members who voted against the ban said they see it as an invasion of individual rights.
“We have this crazy idea that we can change the way people behave. You can’t have salt, you can’t have sugar. Hop on a bicycle because it’s bad to drive your car. It’s ridiculous. What’s next?” said minority whip Eric Ulrich, adding when asked if New York City is becoming a police state, “I think so. It’s a slippery slope.”
Bill & Trapper Return To BTR | endtimewatchmen.com
Bill & Trapper Return To BTR | endtimewatchmen.com
Bill , Trapper , Travis , Jay
Fri FEB 4th
10:30 eastern/9:30central/8:30mountain/7:30pacific
Polish Prime Minister and EU Parliament Fund NGOs to Instigate From Within Belarus, Warning the Head of the Country that the Same Thing that NGOs Did
Donors pledge $120 million aid for Belarus opposition
WARSAW — Belarussian opposition groups won pledges of 87 million euros ($120 million) from donor nations Wednesday at a conference organised amid moves to put the squeeze on President Alexander Lukashenko.
Poland, the host of the conference and which neighbours Belarus, said that Lukashenko should expect to face the kind of popular uprising that has swep the Arab world as he announced the figure to journalists.
"Summing up, I can say there will be 87 million euros in aid, and most of these are new resources," Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski told reporters at the gathering.
"Perhaps the examples of Mr Ben Ali, Mr Mubarak and others will make President Lukashenko reflect that the path he has chosen is not the best one for himself personally," Sikorski said, referring to the ousted Tunisian leader and Egypt's embattled president.
The 36-nation "Solidarity with Belarus" was the first of its kind to focus on bolstering financial support for Belarussian NGOs, the independent media, students and others who have fallen foul of the regime.
It comes in the wake of the mass arrests which followed Lukashenko's December 19 disputed re-election for a fourth term, extending a rule that stretches back to 1994.
"This is a very important gesture of solidarity and it says to us 'You are not left alone in the face of this horror,'" Belarussian campaigner Eva Neklyayeva said at the Warsaw meeting.
Her father Vladimir Neklyayev, 64, was arrested after standing against Lukashenko in the election, and was Saturday placed under house arrest after being released from prison.
Neklyayeva told AFP he has been denied hospitalisation after suffering four medical crises in Minsk's infamous KGB prison where he spent over a month. Hundreds of other Lukashenko opponents remain behind bars.
"We call for the release of all those arrested, and that they are cleared of all allegations," top EU official Stefan Fule said in Warsaw.
Fule, the member of the EU's executive European Commission responsible for ties with the bloc's neighbours, told the conference that Brussels planned to quadruple its aid to 15.6 million euros, over 2011-2013.
"As a clear demonstration of our unequivocal support to civil society in these difficult times, we will increase our funding," he said.
He said 1.7 million euros would be released urgently to help the families of detainees.
Poland -- which has been accused by Lukashenko of trying to topple him -- announced it was doubling its aid to groups including the independent media, earmarking some 10 million euros.
The funds cover the operating costs of the Warsaw-based Belast TV, the only Belarussian-language station broadcasting in Belarus which is not controlled by the authorities there.
US officials said Washington was increasing aid by a third to 15 million dollars, Sweden's Foreign Minister Carl Bildt announced seven million euros for independent Belarussian media, and Germany pledged 6.6 million euros.
The Warsaw meeting came just days after the EU and United States slapped a new raft of sanctions -- including a travel ban and asset freeze -- on Lukashenko and 157 associates.
Belarus has been defiant, with its foreign ministry on Tuesday calling the moves against its leaders "unjustified" and threatening to take reciprocal steps.
Western pressure on Lukashenko, after previous attempts to coax him into improving ties, has brought a thaw in his on-off relationship with Russia.
In Moscow Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that while the post-poll crackdown had been "unacceptable", Western sanctions were "politically-motivated."
Some 200 representatives from all 27 EU member nations, Canada, the United States, EU candidates Croatia and Macedonia, plus ex-Soviet Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine attended the fundraising drive.
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