Some World News as at 2006 08 16

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Some World News as at 2006 08 16 Iran and Syria praise Hizbollah's "glorious victory" Iran and Syria have praised Hizbollah for what they call a glorious victory over Israel. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad described the ceasefire as a victory for the entire Islamic world. He also said that the United States and Great Britain should be made to pay for the damage inflicted on Lebanon. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said Israel was an enemy which did not want peace. He said it was useless to negotiate with the country and that armed resistance against Israel was legitimate. Following the speech, German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier cancelled a trip to Syria. The German foreign minister was to have met the Syrian president on Wednesday. Israel's withdrawal from southern Lebanon may take place sooner than expected. Government spokesmen say the army may abandon some posts deep in Lebanese territory within 48 hours as long as they can be directly manned by UN troops. The recent UN Security Council ceasefire resolution calls for the stationing of 15,000 troops in southern Lebanon. Mexican riot police close off Congress area Hundreds of Mexican riot police have closed off the area surrounding the Congress building in Mexico City following clashes with supporters of left-wing presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. On Monday, dozens of people were injured, among them MPs from Mr Lopez Obrador's Party of the Democratic Revolution, when riot police used clubs and tear gas to break up a demonstration. Mr Lopez Obrador's supporters have been demonstrating for weeks in protest at what they say was a fraudulent victory by the conservative candidate Felipe Calderon. Mexican election officials ordered a recount of around nine percent of the ballots from the election, but the results have not yet been made known. It is expected that Mr Calderon will be declared the official winner. Angry responses to Japanese PM's war shrine visit China and South Korea have responded angrily to Japanese prime minister Junichiro Koizumi's visit to a war shrine where Japanese war criminals are among those honoured. They are particularly angry at the timing of Mr Koizumi's visit: 15 August is the anniversary of Japan's surrender at the end of the Second World War. Beijing and Seoul regard this as an insult to the victims of Japanese wartime imperialism in Asia and have summoned the Japanese ambassadors to account for it. Mr Koizumi dismissed China's and South Korea's criticism as "immature". The Japanese prime minister will step down next month. This is his sixth visit to the controversial war shrine but the first time he has done so on this significant date. Sri Lanka steps up security Security has been tightened in the Sri Lankan capital Colombo following a failed assassination attempt on a diplomat, in which seven people died. Three civilians and four bodyguards were killed in Monday's bomb attack on the convoy of a senior Pakistani diplomat. In addition, all schools in the area have been closed for fear that Tamil Tiger rebels might retaliate against a Sri Lankan air strike on what the rebels say was an orphanage in which over 60 girls were killed. The government says the bombed building was a Tamil Tiger training camp and that the youngsters killed were being trained by the rebel movement. A team working for United Nations children's organisation UNICEF denies this version of events, and says the dead were young locals attending a first aid course. Scandinavian mediators also say the building was not a rebel training camp but say they cannot rule out that the youngsters were being trained by the Tamil Tigers. Mediator in Dutch-Syrian kidnap case The foreign ministry plans to bring in a mediator to negotiate the return of two Dutch children from Syria to the Netherlands. The children, who are 10 and 13 years old, took refuge in the Dutch embassy in Damascus six weeks ago. The ministry says they were kidnapped by their Syrian father in 2004 and taken to Damascus without the permission of their Dutch mother. The father says the children came to Syria with him of their own free will and accuses the Dutch embassy staff of kidnapping them. The ministry hopes that an outside mediator with experience of such cases will be better able to convince the father that his children should be allowed to return to their mother in the Netherlands. Aceh celebrates one year of peace The people of Aceh took to the streets today to celebrate the first anniversary of the peace deal between the Free Aceh rebels and the Indonesian government. Tens of thousands of people gathered around the mosque in the provincial capital Banda Aceh. An official ceremony was attended by the leaders of the former rebel movement and representatives of the Indonesian government. Former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari, the main mediator in the conflict, was also present. The deal for which he was largely responsible came into effect on 15 August 2005 and brought an end to 30 years of fighting between the Free Aceh rebels and the Indonesian army. The rebels abandoned their separatist struggle in exchange for greater autonomy and a larger share in the profits from local natural resources. Ethiopia sends aid to flood victims The Ethiopian authorities have sent five motorboats with food to villages in the flood-stricken south of the country. The boats will also be used to evacuate residents from the area. Around 10,000 people have fled their homes after weeks of torrential rain caused a number of rivers to burst their banks. At least 125 people have died in the flooding. Last week, at least 250 people died following flash floods in eastern Ethiopia. Most of the casualties were surprised in their sleep. Nigerian rebels release foreign oil workers A Nigerian government spokesperson has confirmed that rebels in the Niger Delta have released two foreign oil workers, a Belgian and a Moroccan, who were abducted by armed men in the city of Port Harcourt on Thursday. Rebels in the Niger Delta frequently abduct foreign oil workers on the grounds that the local population, most of whom live in poverty, hardly benefit from the huge profits made by foreign oil companies. Belgians arrested in Somaliland The authorities in Somalia's breakaway region of Somaliland have arrested three Belgian immigration officials because they did not have the proper papers. The officials were accompanying a Somali man deported from Belgium. The Somaliland authorities said not only did the Belgians have no visas, but also they did not have the required documents for repatriating the man. The deportee was sent back to Ethiopia, from where the group had taken a connecting flight. Somaliland declared its independence from Somalia in 1991 following the overthrow of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre. However, the country is not recognised internationally. German birth rate at record low The German birth rate has fallen to perhaps its lowest level ever. Germany's Federal Statistics Office reports there were 686,000 births in 2005, while 830,000 people died. The number of immigrants also declined. The former East Germany has an even lower birth rate, and the city of Chemnitz is believed to have the lowest in the world. In 2005, German women had an average of 1.4 babies, whereas 2.1 are needed to keep the population steady. Earlier this year, the German government passed laws making it more attractive for couples to have children. New Zealand's Maori queen passes away The queen of New Zealand's indigenous Maori population, Te Arikinui Dame Te Atairangikaahu, has died at the age of 75. She reigned over the more than 500,000 Maori in New Zealand for more than 40 years. Although Dame Te Atairangi Kaahu did not have any political power, she played a major role in the renaissance of Maori culture and language. New Zealand's Prime Minister Helen Clark praised the queen for bringing Maori and European New Zealanders closer together. Dutch football legend dies Footballer Faas Wilkes has died at the age of 82. In the late 1940s, Wilkes was the first Dutch footballer to move to a foreign team for a substantial transfer fee. He began his career playing for Xerxes in his hometown of Rotterdam, but reached his peak between 1949 and 1956 at the Italian clubs Internazionale and Torino, and the Spanish club Valencia. He returned to Xerxes at the end of his career at the age of 40. In his 38 matches for the Dutch national team, Faas Wilkes scored a total of 35 goals, which made him the Netherlands' top scorer for decades.
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