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Jailed Chinese dissident Liu awarded Nobel Peace Prize
Students protest varsity fee hike in Britain |
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Anti-WikiLeaks Bill introduced in US Congress Myanmar building N-sites: WikiLeaks
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Jailed Chinese dissident Liu awarded Nobel Peace Prize Oslo, December 10 US President Barack Obama, a Peace Prize laureate last year, called on Beijing for the prompt release of 54-year-old Liu, who was jailed last year for 11 years for subversion. In Beijing, police stepped up patrols at key points today, including Tiananmen Square, where witnesses say hundreds or thousands were killed when troops crushed reform protests, and Liu's apartment where his wife is believed to be under house arrest. Authorities tightened a clampdown on dissidents. Western news websites, including the BBC and CNN, appeared to have been blocked. But there were no signs of trouble in the Chinese capital where memories of Tiananmen have faded for many as China has risen as a global economic and political power while guarding the Communist Party's tight hold on society. "We can to a certain degree say that China with its 1.3 billion people is carrying mankind's fate on its shoulders," Norwegian Nobel committee chairman Thorbjoern Jagland said at the ceremony in Oslo's grey-walled City Hall. The thousand guests rose to a standing ovation when he called for Liu's release. "If the country proves capable of developing a social market economy with full civil rights, this will have a huge favourable impact on the world. If not, there is a danger of social and economic crises arising in the country, with negative consequences for us all." The absence of the laureate was symbolised at the ceremony by an empty chair and a large portrait of Liu, bespectacled and smiling. After his speech, Jagland placed the Nobel award on the chair, amid applause. It was the first time that a laureate under detention had not been formally represented since Nazi Germany barred pacifist Carl von Ossietzky from attending in 1935. Norwegian actress Liv Ullmann read out an address made by Liu, who was closely involved in Tiananmen and more recently helped found the reform group Charter 08, to a court during his trial for subversion in December 2009. "Hatred can rot away at a person's intelligence and conscience. (The) enemy mentality will poison the spirit of a nation, incite cruel mortal struggles, destroy a society's tolerance and humanity, and hinder a nation's progress toward freedom and democracy," the address said. But the former literature professor saw cause for hope. "I, filled with optimism, look forward to the advent of a future, free China. For there is no force that can put an end to the human quest for freedom, and China will in the end become a nation ruled by law, where human rights reign supreme." —
Reuters
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Students protest varsity fee hike in Britain London, December 10 The move to shift the burden of paying for university teaching from state to student is the first test of the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition's intent to push through austerity cuts as it tries to erase a record budget deficit. It provoked fury from young protesters who have staged a series of demonstrations in recent weeks. Some protesters attacked a limousine taking Charles, the heir to the British throne, and his wife Camilla to a London theatre. The car was spattered with paint and a window was cracked, but the couple were unhurt. Protesters laid siege to the finance ministry close to Parliament, battering open a door and chanting "we want our money back" as they clashed with riot police on the threshold of the building. They later smashed shop windows in Oxford Street, one of the main shopping streets in the capital. Mounted police were used earlier to try to disperse protesters outside Parliament. — Reuters
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Anti-WikiLeaks Bill introduced in US Congress
Washington, December 10
The House version of the bill was introduced in the House of Representatives yesterday by Congressman, the Senate version was introduced last week by Senators John Ensign, Joe Lieberman and Scott Brown. The move comes in response to WikiLeaks’s publication of thousands of classified diplomatic cables. The Securing Human Intelligence and Enforcing Lawful Dissemination Act (SHIELD) would give the government the flexibility to pursue Assange for allegedly outing confidential US informants. Ranking Member and Chairman-elect of the House Committee on Homeland Security, King said the legislation will give the Department of Justice additional tools to prosecute future disclosures by WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange or others. King had previously called on Attorney General Eric Holder to prosecute Julian Assange under the Espionage Act. This legislation expands the Attorney General’s authority to prosecute leaks of intelligence, he said. “Julian Assange and his associates who operate and support WikiLeaks have not only damaged US national security with their releases of classified documents, but also placed at risk countless lives, including those of our Nation’s intelligence sources around the world,” King said. This legislation will give the Attorney General additional tools to do just that,” he said.— PTI
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Myanmar building N-sites: WikiLeaks London, December 10 A Burmese officer quoted in a cable from the US embassy in Burma said he had witnessed North Korean technicians helping to construct an underground facility in foothills more than 480km north-west of Rangoon. “The North Koreans, aided by Burmese workers, are constructing a concrete-reinforced underground facility that is ‘500ft from the top of the cave to the top of the hill above’,” according to the cable. The site is the Irrawaddy river town of Minbu in Magwe division, west-central Burma. — PTI
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Protesters attacked government buildings and damaged a car carrying Prince Charles after Parliament voted on Thursday to raise fees paid by university students in a vote which divided Britain's coalition government.
