Six In The Morning

Emergency power cable reaches Japan nuclear plant

Hopes rise at Fukushima plant of restarting cooling systems for reactors and spent fuel pools

Agencies

guardian.co.uk, Saturday 19 March 2011 03.55 GMT

Engineers rolling out an emergency power cable have reached Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant and are preparing to try and restart water pumps to cool overheated fuel rods that are threatening to melt down.

Eight days after the tsunami, Japan’s police agency has said 7,197 are dead and 10,905 missing. Some of the missing may have been out of the region at the time of the disaster. The waters are likely to have sucked many people out to sea – after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami many such bodies were never found.

There are hopes the external power cable can be attached on Saturday or Sunday, the plant operator has said.

Gaddafi called a ceasefire. But still the bombs fell

‘We need the West to give us arms so we can fight for our country’

By Kim Sengupta in Sultan, Eastern Libya Saturday, 19 March 2011

The warplane streaked across the sky, emerging through low clouds as its missiles landed, orange flames rising under dark plumes of smoke. A few minutes later came shattering volleys of artillery shells and rockets, announcing that Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s forces were moving forward.

This was Libya’s eastern front line, two hours and six minutes after the regime in Tripoli had officially declared a ceasefire after the UN resolution authorising military action in Libya.

In the west, tanks from Colonel Gaddafi’s forces rolled into the town of Misrata, the last remaining pocket of resistance in the region, where forces shelled homes, hospitals and a mosque, killing six people, according to local doctors who pleaded that a blockade be lifted allowing supplies of medicine and food to get in.

Egypt set for post-rebellion constitutional referendum

Egypt is set to vote on constitutional changes drawn up in the weeks since authoritarian ruler Hosni Mubarak was overthrown in a popular uprising.

The BBC  19 March 2011

The changes, if approved, will reduce the president’s time in office and oblige the leader to appoint a deputy.

The two established political blocs, the National Democratic Party and Muslim Brotherhood, back the proposals.

But pro-democracy activists say the changes do not go far enough and want the plan rejected.

They say the constitution needs to be entirely rewritten before elections can be held.

Polling stations were set to open at 0800 (0600 GMT).

Police coercing members to quit faith, sect claims



Tom Allard HERALD CORRESPONDENT

March 19, 2011  

JAKARTA: Members of the Ahmadiyah religious sect have been pressured by Indonesian security personnel to abandon the faith amid continual harassment of them, sect leaders say.

The military and government ministers have defended their actions, saying there has been no intimidation, only efforts to protect Ahmadis from violence.

Ahmadis have come under increasing attacks in the past 18 months, culminating in the killing of three adherents by a mob of hundreds of Islamists in Banten province last month.

NIA pushing constitutional limits, Chidambaram told FBI

Its powers ‘perilously close’ to violating provisions on Centre-State relations  

NIRUPAMA SUBRAMANIAN

Two months after the National Investigation Agency (NIA) was set up by an Act of Parliament, Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram confided to a top-ranking U.S. official that its powers could be challenged in the courts as violating constitutional provisions on Centre-State relations.

A U.S. Embassy cable (195165: secret, March 4, 2009) accessed by The Hindu through WikiLeaks quotes Mr. Chidambaram telling the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Robert Mueller at a meeting in New Delhi on March 3, 2009 that the NIA was a “new weapon in hand to combat terrorism,” but he appeared unsure of its constitutionality.

Warsaw suspends restitution for Polish Jews

Jewish organisations and the US government have raised objections to Poland’s decision to suspend work on the restitution of Jewish property confiscated by the Nazis during WWII and under communism.

POLITICS

Jewish organizations and the US administration have both raised objections to Poland’s decision to suspend work on the restitution of Jewish property confiscated by the Nazis during World War II and under communism.

The Polish government suspended work on the restitution package on March 10, due to its spiraling budget deficit. The decision comes just three years after Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced that a piece of legislation would be drafted to offer compensation totaling 20 percent of the property value for the Jewish families of former property owners.