W O R L D

Obama defends ‘just wars’
Oslo, December 10
The United States must uphold moral standards when waging wars that are necessary and justified, President Barack Obama said on Thursday as he accepted the Nobel Prize for Peace.

US President Barack Obama is applauded by Nobel Committee chairman Thorbjorn Jagland after he received the Nobel Peace Prize during a ceremony in the Main Hall of Oslo City Hall in Oslo on Thursday. — AP/PTI

Copenhagen Summit
US, China indulge in blame game over global warming
India against turning domestic pledges into international pact
Copenhagen, December 10
India today made it clear it would not convert its domestic carbon reduction pledges into a globally binding pact and said its targets were not up for review as the US and China exchanged barbs at the key climate talks here over the blame for global warming and funds to mitigate the problem.

Taliban threaten S Korea over Afghan troops
Kabul, December 10
The Taliban has threatened to retaliate against South Korea for its decision to send troops back into Afghanistan, according to a statement e-mailed to media outlets. South Korea has pledged to send 350 troops next year to protect its civilian aid workers, a move the Taliban charged violates a pledge in 2007 to withdraw permanently, in exchange for the release of 19 hostages.

Obama defends ‘just wars’

Oslo, December 10
The United States must uphold moral standards when waging wars that are necessary and justified, President Barack Obama said on Thursday as he accepted the Nobel Prize for Peace.

In a speech at the award ceremony in Oslo, Obama said violent conflict would not be eradicated “in our lifetimes”, there would be times when nations would need to fight just wars and he would not stand idle in the face of threats to the American people.

“Where force is necessary, we have a moral and strategic interest in binding ourselves to certain rules of conduct. And even as we confront a vicious adversary that abides by no rules, I believe that the United States of America must remain a standard bearer in the conduct of war,” he declared.

Nine days after ordering 30,000 more US troops to Afghanistan to break the momentum of the Taliban, Obama acknowledged the criticism of those who have said it was wrong and premature to award the Nobel accolade to a president still in his first year in office and escalating a major war.

He said America’s adherence to moral standards, even in war, was what made it different from its enemies. “That is a source of our strength. That is why I prohibited torture. That is why I ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bayclosed. And that is why I have reaffirmed America’s commitment to abide by the Geneva Conventions,” he said.

Acknowledging “a reflexive suspicion of America, the world’s sole military superpower”, he said his country could not act alone in confronting global challenges in Afghanistan, Somalia or other troubled regions. — Reuters

Copenhagen Summit
US, China indulge in blame game over global warming
India against turning domestic pledges into international pact

Copenhagen, December 10
India today made it clear it would not convert its domestic carbon reduction pledges into a globally binding pact and said its targets were not up for review as the US and China exchanged barbs at the key climate talks here over the blame for global warming and funds to mitigate the problem.

“We already have an agreement... we are quite prepared through our national communications to report what we are doing, but that is for the purpose of information only,” Chandrashekar Dasgupta, senior Indian negotiator at the climate change meet here, said.

“It is not subject to review, to verification, to re-negotiation, to dialogue or any such thing. It is a nationally determined voluntary target ... nothing less, nothing more,” said Dasgupta, who has also served as the Indian ambassador to China and European Union. India has set a goal of 20 to 25 per cent reduction in carbon intensity by 2020, compared to the 2005 levels.

Dasgupta’s remarks came a day after US special envoy on climate change, Todd Stern, said here that emerging countries like India, China and South Africa would not be given a “pass” on carbon emissions and that they needed to wrap up their “significant” proposals into an international agreement.

As environment ministers and negotiators from 192 countries discussed tackling climate change at their marathon meeting here, the US and China, the world’s two largest carbon emitters, traded heated exchanges.

“Provision of financial support to developing countries by developed countries is not an act of charity or philanthropy of rich people,” Yu Qingtai, China’s climate envoy, told reporters. “It is the legal and historical responsibility of the developed countries.”

However, Stern said “we absolutely recognise our historic role in putting emissions in the atmosphere, up there, but the sense of guilt or culpability or reparations, I just categorically reject that.” At this point of the negotiations at the Copenhagen conference, the commitments made on mitigation and finance by developed countries have not yet emerged and a lot of uncertainties remained in key outstanding issues, Indian officials here said.

“The level of ambition, which has so far been indicated by the major developed countries, does not really add up to what we would regard as being significant,” Shyam Saran, PM Manmohan Singh’s Special Envoy on Climate Change, said.

“It is not keeping in with minimum range of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change).” UN scientists from the IPCC have underlined the need for aggregate emission reduction by industrialised countries of between minus 25 per cent and 40 per cent over 1990 levels by 2020 with global emissions falling by at least 50 per cent by 2050.

The Kyoto Protocol signed in 1997 favoured legally binding measures committing 37 industrialised States to cutting emissions by an average of 5 per cent against 1990 levels over the period from 2008 to 2012.

In the BASIC draft prepared by India, China, Brazil and South Africa, countries taking nationally voluntary measures are obligated to report on how these are going through national communications to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the implementation of these targets are up for internal domestic review only.

Stern, the US climate change chief, also said that while China had made significant commitments, the world would like to see more. He urged Beijing to make “a real commitment,” highlighting that while the US emissions were flattening out and then going down, China’s emissions were steadily rising.

The US announced carbon emission cuts in the range of 17 per cent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 83 per cent by 2050. China is aiming to reduce carbon intensity by 40 to 45 per cent by 2020, compared to 2005 levels.

The Indian side noted here that if the US was assessing the “adequacy” of China’s commitment, India could be up next for this assessment, which negated the basic fact that these announced targets were “voluntary” and could not be subjected to an adequacy check. — PTI

Terror Links
5 Americans held in Pak

Washington, December 10
Five young American Muslims have been arrested in Pakistan and are under investigation for possibly trying to meet up with a terror group implicated in the December 2001 attack on Indian Parliament.

Frantic relatives and worried FBI agents have been searching for the five college students from the Alexandria area, a Washington suburb, for more than a week since their disappearance in late November. The FBI "is working with families and local law enforcement agencies to investigate the missing students and is aware of the individuals' arrested in Pakistan," FBI spokesperson said in a statement.

The agents are also working with the Pakistani authorities "to determine their identities and the nature of their business there, if indeed these are the students who had gone missing," she added. She said the investigation continued and declined to comment further. The men "are under arrest in Pakistan," said S.M. Imran Gardezi, press minister at the Pakistani Embassy in Washington. "The reasons for their visit to Pakistan are being investigated," said Gardezi.

"They are being investigated for alleged links to extremist groups." He did not give further details on the circumstances of their arrest, their names or where they were being held. But the Washington Post citing Pakistani media reports said the men, who are in their early 20s, were taken into custody at the home of an activist linked to Jaish-i-Muhammad, a jihadist group implicated in the Parliament attack and branded a terrorist organisation by the US. — IANS

Taliban threaten S Korea over Afghan troops

Kabul, December 10
The Taliban has threatened to retaliate against South Korea for its decision to send troops back into Afghanistan, according to a statement e-mailed to media outlets. South Korea has pledged to send 350 troops next year to protect its civilian aid workers, a move the Taliban charged violates a pledge in 2007 to withdraw permanently, in exchange for the release of 19 hostages.

South Korea has had no troops in Afghanistan since 2007 when it withdrew about 200 troops. The pullout was previously planned but followed the hostage standoff.

According to the statement sent yesterday from an e-mail regularly used by the extremist Islamist group, South Korea's leaders “should be prepared for the consequence of their action, which they will certainly face”. — AP