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Saturday,
April 12, 2003, Chandigarh, India   |
Anti-war
protests flare up
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ANTI-WAR COALITION SUMMIT IMF World Bank to help rebuild Iraq
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Colombo, April 11 The threat of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) epidemic has forced Norway to look for an alternative venue for the next round of peace talks between Sri Lankan Government and Tamil Tiger rebels. Kashmir on US agenda: Powell
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Anti-war protests flare up Madrid, April 11 In Spain, tens of thousands of people, mainly students, took to the streets to reinforce a nationwide trade union strike in protest against the war. In the capital Madrid, about 50,000 demonstrators marched, waving banners that read “Against the imperialist war.” Spanish film director Pedro Almodovar was among the protesters and said he was taking part in support of “everyone who says they hate and curse war.” Prado Museum in Madrid closed for two hours, with a reproduction of “Guernica” Picasso’s famed anti-war painting, placed at its doors. Further north in the Mediterranean city of Barcelona, at least 30,000 people hit the streets, chanting “Not a soldier, not a euro, not a bullet for this war.” In Greece, nearly 600 journalists stopped work for two hours and marched to the US Embassy to protest against the war and the casualties it has caused among their colleagues in the media. “Americans, murderers of people”, “Americans, murderers of reporters,” chanted the demonstrators. Eleven journalists and a Kurdish translator working for the BBC have been killed since the US-led war began on March 20 and another two are missing. In Athens, organisers have barred Britain from participating at a book fair where it was due to be the honoured country because of its participation in the “illegal US invasion” of Iraq. Instead, the fair, a popular annual event to be held on May 9 to 25, would be dedicated to anti-war books, the Athens Publishers and Booksellers Association said. In Paris, more than 100 demonstrators entered into the building housing the American Express offices and hung an anti-war banner on the first floor, organisers said. In Germany, a McDonald’s party bus and an advertisement for the food chain on a motorway were set alight in apparent anti-war protests. In Indonesia, some 150 protesters gathered outside the compound of the US firm Caltex on Sumatra island, demanding the firm’s US employees condemn the war within 24 hours or face expulsion from the country. In Britain and France, organisers vowed to go ahead with weekend anti-war protests planned in London and Paris. “We are organising meetings in many parts of the country which are bigger than those which took place before the war started,” said Andrew Murray, the chairman of the British Stop the War Coalition. The group has called a march through London tomorrow, during which participants are to lay flowers outside Downing Street in memory of those who have died in the conflict. Meanwhile anti-war activists in the USA were planning to refocus their message from anti-war to anti-occupation.
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ANTI-WAR COALITION SUMMIT
Saint Petersburg, April 11 "We said for a long time that he had to be brought down. We did not defend him, but said it should not be done by force," Mr Putin said after talks with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder. The comments were Putin’s first since US Marines swept into Baghdad on Wednesday, three weeks after US and British forces launched an invasion in Iraq to oust Saddam and strip Iraq of its alleged weapons of mass destruction. The Russian leader deplored "the means" that had been used to bring down the regime, stressing that "the destruction, the deaths, were a bad thing." He commented that "80 percent of the world’s countries were in a situation similar to Iraq. "Are we going to wage war on them all? he questioned. Mr Putin and Mr Schroeder were holding bilateral talks prior to a three-nation summit with French President Jacques Chirac, at which the three leaders were to discuss the post-war situation in Iraq. Mr Putin is also due to hold bilateral talks with Mr Chirac at which they will discuss a variety of bilateral issues and prepare the Group of Eight meeting at Evian in southeastern France next month.
AFP
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IMF World Bank to help rebuild Iraq Washington, April 11 A day after US-led forces swept through Baghdad, President George W. Bush’s administration moved quickly to demonstrate that the Iraqi people stand to gain substantial economic benefits from the toppling of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s government. Treasury Secretary John Snow said he would use the spring meetings of the 184-nation International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to begin gathering the resources needed to rebuild Iraq. Preliminary estimates of the cost of that effort have ranged from $ 20 per year for the first several years to as much as $ 600 billion over a decade. Snow and Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan will lead discussions among the finance officials from the world’s seven richest industrialised countries — the USA, Japan, Germany, France, Britain, Italy and Canada. In addition to lining up initial commitments from the IMF and the World Bank, Snow said he would seek support among the G-7 countries for forgiving a part of Iraq’s massive foreign debt, estimated to be as high as $ 200 billion. However, the G-7 discussions could prove contentious given that two of the nations — France and Germany — actively opposed the US-led war effort. They have also insisted that the United Nations take the lead in the reconstruction effort, an approach that is opposed by the USA, which is ready to instal its own interim administration headed by retired US Lt-Gen Jay Garner. World Bank President James Wolfensohn said yesterday some members of the World Bank’s board had taken the position that the United Nations must vote to modify its economic sanctions against Iraq before the World Bank would be able to begin helping Iraq even with technical assistance.
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SARS forces hunt for new talks venue Colombo, April 11 The next round of peace talks is scheduled to be held in Thailand between April 29 and May 2 and the parties have planned to discuss several key issues before the Tokyo multilateral donor conference in June. According to local reports, the Norwegian facilitators are seriously exploring the possibilities of holding the next round in Oslo and engaged in serious discussion with the LTTE Sri Lankan Government in this regard. Although not less than seven cases of SARS and two deaths have already been reported from Thailand, the Thailand Government said all patients involved were foreigners and there was no local outbreak of the disease. Thailand is the first country to host the Lankan peace talks and three of the six rounds of talks have already been held there. However, local reports quoting diplomatic sources said the final decision on the shift of venue would be taken once a report was received from the host country and the World Health Organisation (WHO). The LTTE’s chief negotiator and political adviser, Mr Anton Balasingham, is a heart patient, who underwent a kidney transplant surgery last year. He delayed his visit to the northern Wanni due to the fear of viral infection in the region as a result of flood.
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Kashmir on US agenda: Powell Islamabad, April 11 Mr Powell told state-run Pakistan Television last night that Washington was in close touch with India and Pakistan to help resolve their differences in a peaceful way. “We do have a very difficult and dangerous situation with respect to actions across the Line of Control (LoC),” he said, referring to the military ceasefire line dividing Kashmir between the two South Asian neighbours. “We are looking to help the two parties to resolve this in a peaceful way,” he said. “We do not believe there is a need now for any military action of any kind”, he added.
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