The (nuclear) non-proliferation regime is increasingly challenged by states that exploit ambiguity in rules and rifts in the international community

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By Mark Heinrich

VIENNA (Reuters) – The U.N. nuclear watchdog has failed to use all its powers or to beef them up if inspectors are obstructed, leaving the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in tatters, a former top agency official says.

The International Atomic Energy Agency seeks to catch covert diversions of nuclear energy into bomb-making and foster peaceful uses of the atom. Exposure of suspect nuclear activity in North Korea, Libya, Iran and Syria over the past decade has shaken the Vienna-based watchdog.

“The (nuclear) non-proliferation regime is increasingly challenged by states that exploit ambiguity in rules and rifts in the international community to pursue nuclear weapons capabilities without fear of reprisal,” said Pierre Goldschmidt, who was global head of IAEA inspections in 1999-2005.

“Lax and inconsistent compliance practices threaten non-proliferation efforts by giving some states more leeway for evading rules than should be tolerable in an effective non-proliferation regime,” he wrote in a paper for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace think-tank.

Goldschmidt said the IAEA was not fully applying the verification authority it already had. Moreover, he said, its 35-nation governing body could not agree on how to beef up such powers when obstructed by states under investigation.

To deter would-be proliferators, states had to fear that any secret bomb project was likely to be caught early and penalties — condemnation by IAEA governors and possibly referral to the U.N. Security Council — was not just possible but unavoidable.

“Unfortunately neither of these two deterrents is credibly in place today,” said Goldschmidt, who is Belgian. As a result, the 39-year-old NPT had been “eroded to the point of collapse.”

U.S. President Barack Obama says there must be “real and immediate consequences” for those caught flouting the NPT and he wants a significant boost in the budget for IAEA inspections.

SPECIAL INSPECTIONS

Goldschmidt said the IAEA should reassert a right to impose mandatory “special inspections” in countries refusing to grant broad access to inspectors to resolve intelligence reports of stealthy work to weaponize nuclear materials.

He cited Syria, where inspectors last June found “significant” uranium traces at a spot alleged by Washington to have been a nascent plutonium-producing reactor before Israel bombed the target to rubble in 2007.

Syria denies the accusations but has also denied IAEA requests for a second visit to the site and to three others, as well as a look at debris from the bombing.

Goldschmidt said the IAEA had not applied a clause in Syria’s nuclear safeguards agreement saying the agency could resort to a special inspection, allowing short-notice searches anywhere, if information provided by a country was not deemed “adequate for the agency to fulfill its responsibilities.”

He suggested the IAEA looked hapless in repeatedly urging a state to voluntarily open up in response to repeated refusals, as it has been doing with Syria, as well as with Iran.

“If the only consequence is that the (IAEA) director-general reports at each Board meeting that no progress had been made, this will encourage any non-compliant state to adopt similar obstructive tactics,” said Goldschmidt.

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Iran blamed the United States on Saturday for bombings that targeted Shi’ite Muslims in Iraq

By Arshad Mohammed and Waleed Ibrahim

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Iran blamed the United States on Saturday for bombings that targeted Shi’ite Muslims in Iraq but U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she saw no signs of a slide backward into sectarian war.

Clinton, stressing in a visit to Baghdad that U.S. support would not flag as its troops prepare to withdraw from the nation they invaded in 2003, said she did not think bombs that killed 150 people in two days would rekindle widespread fighting.

The attacks in Baghdad and northeastern Diyala province targeted in large part Shi’ite Muslims, many of them pilgrims from Iran, triggering fears of reprisals against a once-dominant Sunni minority that could kick off a new cycle of killing.

Clinton, speaking to reporters in Kuwait late on Friday before flying to Baghdad on Saturday, said it was not likely.

“I think the suicide bombings … are, in an unfortunately tragic way, a signal that the rejectionists fear that Iraq is going in the right direction,” she said.

Iran’s top authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, pointed a finger at Tehran’s old foes, the United States and Israel.

“The main suspects in this crime and crimes similar to that, are American security and military forces,” he said in a statement read on state radio on Saturday.

He said U.S. forces, on the pretext of fighting terrorism, had occupied an Islamic country and “killed tens of thousands of people there and increased insecurity there day after day.”

AIR OF DREAD

An air of dread has spread through Baghdad following the attacks, further eroding a measure of normality and optimism that had possessed the city earlier this year but which has now made way for growing apprehension.

While violence has dropped sharply, major political issues remain unresolved, such as settling control over the disputed city of Kirkuk, passing national oil legislation, and deciding the relative strength of central and regional authorities.

Rival political and armed groups jockey for influence and reconciliation between Sunni and Shi’ite remains elusive, a worrying trend as U.S. combat troops prepare to withdraw from cities in June and all U.S. troops pull out by the end of 2011.

Analysts say violence could spike ahead of national elections due at the end of the year in which the increasingly assertive Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki will face off against fellow Shi’ites, Sunnis and increasingly alienated Kurds.

Baghdad’s ties have deteriorated with Kurds in their northern region as Maliki seeks to strengthen central power and assert control in disputed areas, another threat to stability.

Iraqi officials blame the attacks on Sunni Islamist al Qaeda, which although weakened still carries out frequent bombings, especially in ethnically mixed areas in the north.

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Recession fuels worries of workplace violence

By Ellen Wulfhorst

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A worker recently laid off by a U.S. financial services company grew so upset that the firm had him followed to be sure he didn’t strike out violently at his former co-workers or bosses.

“Tough times will cause people to do crazy things,” said Kenneth Springer, whose company Corporate Resolutions Inc. did the surveillance. “People are taking more precautions.”

Indeed, stories of workplace violence are filling headlines of late — the San Diego bus mechanic who killed two co-workers or the unemployed man in upstate New York whose 12 shooting victims included a receptionist and a teacher.

With such jarring tragedies, fears of violence fueled by financial worries are growing as the recession puts strain and stress on anxious workers, experts say.

Job losses, job uncertainty and slashed budgets are all pressures that could push someone over the edge.

“People are flat out concerned,” said James Cawood, a security expert and author of “Violence Assessment and Intervention: the Practitioner’s Handbook.”

“People that are staying in companies where there has been significant downsizing and there’s also been major dislocation … are worried at every level,” he said. “Even in down economic times, I’m doing more training now than I’ve done in years.”

“A LONG STREAK OF PROBLEMS”

Workplace violence can range from harassment and intimidation to violence and homicides, experts say.

While economic stress can make some people violent, it won’t turn just anyone into a killer, said Laurence Miller, author of “From Difficult to Disturbed: Understanding and Managing Dysfunctional Employees.”

“People shouldn’t be sitting around wondering if someone they’ve been working with for years who has been a regular guy and no real problem is going to suddenly snap and go ballistic on them,” he said. “It’s usually somebody that’s had a long streak of problems.”

Moreover, people prone to violence tend to reveal their intentions, experts say.

“People aren’t mushrooms sitting in a dark closet by themselves and all of a sudden one day explode,” Cawood said. “If you listen and observe what they’re actually doing and saying, they’re communicating.”

STATISTICS WILL TAKE YEARS TO ANALYZE

Statistics on workplace violence in this recession will take years to compile and analyze, experts say. From 1997 to 2007, the most recent year for which data is available, there were more than 7,000 occupational homicides nationwide, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.  Continued…

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Is Intergalactic War Inevitable?

Former Canadian Minister of Defense and Deputy Prime Minister, Paul Hellyer, thinks so.

“UFOs, are as real as the airplanes that fly over your head …… I’m so concerned about what the consequences might be of starting an intergalactic war, that I just think I had to say something.”

–Paul Hellyer

http://news.yahoo.com/s/prweb/20051124/bs_prweb/prweb314382_1

In the spirit of keeping discussions “technical” in nature, how can the IT community prepare for such an intergalactic war waged against an even smarter ET community? ETs certainly have AT which would have our own IT community working not only OT, but certainly UT as well.

And if an evacuation is necessary, to where would we evacuate? (And let’s not even think about the “food chain” thing.)

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-6230-0.html?forumID=8&threadID=185118&start=0

Piracy incidents nearly doubled across the globe

By Jonathan Saul

LONDON (Reuters) – Piracy incidents nearly doubled across the globe in the first quarter of 2009 almost entirely due to an upsurge in attacks by gangs off the Somali coast, the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) said on Tuesday.

The London-based watchdog recorded 102 attacks worldwide in the first three months of 2009 compared with 53 in that period a year ago, with 61 attacks in the Gulf of Aden and off the east coast of Somalia compared with 6 in the first quarter of 2008.

Somali pirates have made millions of dollars in ransoms hijacking commercial vessels in the busy shipping lanes of the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean, despite patrols by foreign navies off the Somali coast, disrupting aid supplies and trade routes.

Twenty attacks were recorded off Somalia’s east coast with 18 of those in March alone, which included four hijackings. That compared with seven incidents in the fourth quarter of 2008. The IMB said 41 incidents were reported in the Gulf of Aden region and 5 vessels hijacked.

A total of 34 vessels were boarded, 29 ships fired upon and nine hijacked worldwide, the IMB said.

“In the majority of incidents the attackers were heavily armed with guns or knives,” the watchdog said. “Violence against crew members continues to increase.”

“Given the current state of the global economy, there are concerns that piracy may increase. Navies and coastguards must continue to maintain their physical presence,” it said.

The IMB said apart from Somalia, Nigeria continued to be a high risk area with nearly all attacks related to vessels supporting and connected to the oil industry.

It said seven incidents had been recorded by the IMB in Nigeria, but added that unconfirmed reports indicated at least another 13 attacks had occurred. That compared with 10 incidents in the same period in 2008.

The IMB said only one incident was reported in the Malacca Strait off Indonesia’s coast in the period, compared with 5 recorded in the same period a year ago.

“The littoral states should be complimented for their continued efforts in maintaining and securing the safety of this strategic trade route,” the IMB said.

(Editing by Louise Ireland)

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NATO frees hostages from pirates, new ship seized

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By Mohamed Ahmed

MOGADISHU (Reuters) – Dutch commandos freed 20 Yemeni hostages on Saturday and briefly detained seven pirates who had forced the Yemenis to sail a “mother ship” attacking vessels in the Gulf of Aden, NATO officials said.

In a separate incident, gunmen from Somalia seized a Belgian-registered ship and its 10 crew, including seven Europeans, further south in the Indian Ocean. A pirate source said the vessel, the Pompei, would be taken to the coast.

Somali sea gangs have captured dozens of ships, taken hundreds of sailors prisoner and made off with millions of dollars in ransoms despite an unprecedented deployment by foreign warships in waters off the Horn of Africa.

NATO Lieutenant Commander Alexandre Fernandes, speaking on board the Portuguese warship Corte-Real, said the 20 fishermen were rescued after a Dutch navy frigate on a NATO patrol responded to an assault on a Greek-owned tanker by pirates firing assault rifles and grenades.

Commandos from the Dutch ship, the De Zeven Provincien, chased the pirates, who were on a small skiff, back to their “mother ship” — a hijacked Yemeni fishing dhow.

“We have freed the hostages, we have freed the dhow and we have seized the weapons… The pirates did not fight and no gunfire was exchanged,” Fernandes told Reuters. The Corte-Real is also on a NATO anti-piracy mission.

He said the hostages had been held since last week. The commandos briefly detained and questioned the seven gunmen, he told Reuters, but had no legal power to arrest them.

“NATO does not have a detainment policy. The warship must follow its national law,” he said.

“They can only arrest them if the pirates are from the Netherlands, the victims are from the Netherlands, or if they are in Netherlands waters.”

He said an unexploded rocket-propelled grenade was later found on board the tanker, the Marshall Islands-flagged MT Handytankers Magic. managed by Roxana Shipping SA of Greece.

A Belgian government crisis center spokesman said fears grew for the Pompei, a dredging vessel, after it put out two alarm signals early on Saturday when it was about 600 km (370 miles) from the Somali coast en route to the Seychelles.

Fernandes said the ship was carrying two Belgian, four Croatian, one Danish and three Filipino crew members.

“A helicopter from EU naval force Operation Atalanta flew over and confirmed the hijacking visually,” he told Reuters.

CHAOS ONSHORE

A pirate source who said he was on board the Pompei told Reuters in Mogadishu by satellite telephone that the pirates would take it to a coastal base. “We have hijacked a Belgian ship. We will take it to Haradheere,” he said.

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Russia’s Medvedev warns NATO over Georgia war games

Guy Faulconbridge

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warned NATO Friday that planned military exercises in neighboring Georgia were an attempt at muscle-flexing by the Western alliance that could hinder efforts to mend ties.

Russia fought a brief war with Georgia last year and is vexed by what it describes as NATO support for the ex-Soviet state, a crucial transit route for Caspian Sea oil and gas to Europe long controlled by Moscow.

NATO says it does not understand why Moscow is upset by the long-planned exercises involving 1,300 troops from 19 countries from May 6 to June 1.

“This is the wrong decision, a dangerous decision,” Medvedev told a news conference at his state residence outside Moscow.

“Decisions of this kind are aimed at muscle-flexing,” he said. “Such decisions are disappointing and do not facilitate the resumption of full scale contacts between the Russian Federation and NATO.”

Tensions over Georgia have been running high since Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili’s failed bid to retake the pro-Moscow breakaway region of South Ossetia in August.

Russia repelled the attack but provoked international condemnation for driving its troops further into Georgian territory and then recognizing South Ossetia and another rebel region, Abkhazia, as independent states.

Georgia’s Foreign Ministry accused Russia of “yet another undisguised attempt to impose its will on the international community and to interfere in the internal affairs of the sovereign state of Georgia.”

“Russia’s actions clearly indicate that its aggression against Georgia has not come to a halt for one day,” it said in a statement.

Abkhazia’s separatist leader Sergei Bagapsh said the region was reinforcing its border with Georgia and confirmed earlier announced plans to host a Russian naval and an air base, adding that the deal with Moscow would be signed “fairly soon.”

“Because Western nations will now hold their exercises — allegedly to support Georgia — we will hold similar exercises (with Russia) in response, both in Abkhazia and South Ossetia,” Bagapsh told a news conference in Moscow.

“Georgia must decide for itself how it wants to exist — at the epicenter of fighting or as a stable and peaceful state.”

WAR GAMES

NATO cut all formal ties with Russia as a result of Moscow’s intervention in Georgia, but earlier this year they agreed to resume relations.

NATO says the exercises, to be held 20 km (12 miles) east of the capital Tbilisi, will be based on a fictitious U.N.-mandated, NATO-led crisis response operation and will not involve heavy weaponry.

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Russia : NATO , to cancel planned military exercises in Georgia

Fromt the episode  Today with Nato, tomorow without , typical Russian style.

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By Conor Humphries

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia called on NATO on Thursday to cancel or postpone planned military exercises in Georgia which it said were “a provocation.”

“This is absurd and a provocation,” Russia’s envoy to NATO, Dmitry Rogozin, told Reuters by telephone. “I have asked the NATO secretary general … to postpone these exercises or to cancel them.”

NATO said on Wednesday it would hold military exercises next month in Georgia, a former Soviet republic promised eventual alliance membership, whose territory was invaded by Russia last August.

Russia, which considers Georgia part of its traditional sphere of influence, invaded Georgia after driving back an attempt by its pro-Western leadership to retake the breakaway South Ossetia region.

“I, as Russia’s official representative, consider these exercises should be canceled,” he said.

(Writing by Guy Faulconbridge)

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US food aid ship escapes Somali pirate attack

By ELIZABETH A. KENNEDY, Associated Press Writer Elizabeth A. Kennedy, Associated Press Writer – 25 mins ago

MOMBASA, Kenya – Somali pirates fired grenades and automatic weapons at an American freighter loaded with food aid but the ship managed to escape the attack and was heading Wednesday to Kenya under U.S. Navy guard, officials said.

Despite President Barack Obama’s vow to halt their banditry and the deaths of five pirates in recent French and U.S. hostage rescue missions, brigands seized four vessels and more than 75 hostages off the Horn of Africa since Sunday’s dramatic rescue of an American freighter captain.

That brought the total number of sailors being held by Somali pirates to over 300 on 17 different ships — a distinct surge in the number of captives over the last few days.

Pirates can extort $1 million or more for each ship and crew — and Kenya estimates they raked in $150 million last year.

The Liberty Sun’s American crew was not injured in the latest attack but the vessel sustained some damage, owner Liberty Maritime Corp. said.

Still, the attack foiled the reunion between the American sea captain rescued by Navy snipers and the 19-man crew of the Maersk Alabama who he had saved with his heroism.

Capt. Richard Phillips was planning to meet his crew in the Kenyan port of Mombasa and fly home with them Wednesday. But Phillips was on the USS Bainbridge when it was diverted to help the Liberty Sun, and the crew left Mombasa without him Wednesday on a chartered plane.

“We are very happy to be going home,” crewman William Rios of New York City said before departing. “(But) we are disappointed to not be reuniting with the captain in Mombasa. He is a very brave man.”

Maersk spokesman Gordan van Hook said crew members would arrive late Wednesday at Andrews Air Force base in Maryland. Their reunion with Phillips will now take place in the United States, he said, without elaborating.

Liberty Sun sailors used one of the same tactics Phillips employed to foil the pirates — blockading themselves inside the engine room.

“We are under attack by pirates, we are being hit by rockets. Also bullets,” crewman Thomas Urbik, 26, wrote his mother in an e-mail Tuesday. “We are barricaded in the engine room and so far no one is hurt. (A) rocket penetrated the bulkhead but the hole is small. Small fire, too, but put out.”

The Liberty Sun “conducted evasive maneuvers” to ward off the pirates, said U.S. Navy Lt. Nathan Christensen, spokesman for the Bahrain-based 5th Fleet.

“That could be anything from zigzagging to speeding up to all kinds of things,” he said. “We’ve seen in the past that that can be very effective in deterring a pirate attack.”

The USS Bainbridge responded to the Liberty Sun’s call for help but the pirates had left by the time it arrived five hours later, Navy Capt. Jack Hanzlik said.

A small detachment of armed U.S. sailors are now on the Liberty Sun as it continued its journey to Mombasa. The ship, with 20 American mariners, had left Houston with a load of humanitarian food aid for the U.N. World Food Program. Some of that aid was destined for Somalia, where nearly half the country’s 7 million people depend on food aid.

This year, Somali pirates have attacked 79 ships and hijacked 19 of them. One pirate declared they are grabbing more ships and hostages now to prove they are not intimidated by Obama’s pledge.

“Our latest hijackings are meant to show that no one can deter us from protecting our waters from the enemy because we believe in dying for our land,” Omar Dahir Idle told The Associated Press by telephone from the Somali port of Harardhere.

U.N. spokesman Peter Smerdon said more food aid was to have been delivered by another cargo ship hijacked by pirates on Tuesday, the Lebanese-owned MV Sea Horse. It was headed to Mumbai, India, to pick up 7,327 tons of WFP food for Somalia.

“WFP is also extremely concerned that people in Somalia will go hungry unless the Sea Horse is quickly released or a replacement ship can be found,” Smerdon said.

Pirates say they are fighting illegal fishing and dumping of toxic waste in Somali waters but now operate hundreds of miles from there in a sprawling 1.1 million square-mile danger zone.

A flotilla of warships from nearly a dozen countries has patrolled the Gulf of Aden and nearby Indian Ocean waters for months. They have halted many attacks but say the area is so vast they can’t stop all hijackings.

The Gulf of Aden, which links the Suez Canal and the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean, is the shortest route from Asia to Europe and one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.

In an unusual nighttime raid, pirates seized the Greek-managed bulk carrier MV Irene E.M. before dawn Tuesday, with at least 21 crew. Hours later, they commandeered the MV Sea Horse carrying 19 crew. They also captured two Egyptian fishing trawlers carrying 36 fishermen.

Yemen’s coast guard rescued 13 Yemeni hostages and their fishing trawler in a shootout Monday with pirates. No casualties were reported.

Meanwhile, three Somali pirates have been brought to the French city of Rennes to face an investigation, a French judicial official said Wednesday. They were arrested Friday in an operation to free the Tanit, a French ship seized in the Gulf of Aden.

Four French hostages were freed and one was killed, along with two pirates, in that raid.

___

Associated Press writers contributing this report include Mohamed Olad Hassan in Mogadishu, Somalia; Tom Maliti in Mombasa; Michelle Faul, Malkhadir M. Muhumed and Todd Pitman in Kenya; Eileen Ng in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Adam Schreck in Manama, Bahrain and Angela Charleton in Paris.

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EU presses Moldova over Romania

The protesters accuse the incumbent Communist party of rigging Sunday’s election [Reuters] The European Union has urged Moldova to resume normal relations with Romania, which the former Soviet republic has accused of stoking post-election violence. Moldova expelled Romania’s ambassador on Wednesday and blamed its neighbour for violent street protests that Vladimir Voronin, its president, described as an attempted coup. In a joint statement, the foreign ministers of France, the Czech Republic and Sweden said: “While understanding the complexity of the Moldovan-Romanian relations, we call on the government of Moldova to resume normal relations with Romania.” The European Commission, the EU’s executive body, also stressed that it fully respected the sovereignty of the tiny state after Russia raised concerns that demonstrators, many of them pro-EU, wanted to undermine its independence. Voter lists As police continued to patrol Chisinau, the capital, the opposition continued to accuse the incumbent Communist party of rigging Sunday’s election. The Reuters news agency quoted one of the country’s opposition parties as saying that Moldova’s central election commission had agreed to allow the opposition parties to check voter lists. A spokesman for the Our Moldova Alliance party said: “Three opposition parties have received approval from the central election commission to check the electoral lists.” Checking the lists was one of the opposition parties’ central demands during the violent anti-government protests which saw about 200 people arrested and 90 injuries. The commission  finalised the election results on Wednesday, giving the Communists 60 of 101 seats in the new parliament. Russian concerns Russia’s foreign minister said Mosocw was ‘deeply disturbed’ by the protests [EPA] Most of present-day Moldova, Europe’s poorest country, was  part of Romania until Stalin annexed it to the Soviet Union in 1940.It won independence when the Soviet Union fell in 1991. Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, said Moscow was “deeply disturbed” by the protest flags and slogans because they showed that the demonstrators “were obsessed with the idea of destroying Moldovan statehood”. Asked about Lavrov’s statement, a spokesman for the European Commission said: “Moldova is a sovereign country. The EU respects its sovereignty.” Journalists banned International press freedom groups criticized on Thursday a decision by Moldova to ban 18 journalists working for Romanian and international media from covering the unrest. Reporters Without Borders and the Committee to Protect Journalists condemned what they called an “unfair and dangerous decision by the Moldovan authorities”. Paris-based Reporters Without Borders said the ban prevented proper media coverage of the situation. The journalists were stopped from entering Moldova on Wednesday. Other Romanian journalists were sent back from Chisinau airport. al jazeera.com