The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

Republican lawmaker Akin says sorry for ‘rape’ gaffe
Poll shows he is still slightly ahead of Democrat McCaskill

Washington, August 21
Republican Representative Todd Akin resisted pressure to quit the US Senate race in Missouri on Tuesday, releasing a new ad apologising for his inflammatory remarks about rape that have reinserted controversial abortion politics into the US presidential campaign.

In an ad released online, Akin again apologised for his comments on Sunday, when he claimed in a television interview that women could not get pregnant from "legitimate rape," even as senior Republicans condemned his remarks and called for him to step aside in the race.

"Rape is an evil act. I used the wrong words in the wrong way, and for that I apologise," Akin said. "The fact is, rape can lead to pregnancy. The truth is rape has many victims. The mistake I made was in the words I said, not in the heart I hold. I ask for your forgiveness," he added.

Akin, noting that he is the father of two daughters, also said he wanted "tough justice" for rapists and expressed compassion for victims.

The Republican challenger is running against Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill in the November 6 election. Tuesday is the last day for candidates to file in the Missouri race, giving Republicans until later in the day to submit a replacement, if Akin decides to drop out.

His comments have become a distraction ahead of the Republican convention next week to nominate Mitt Romney for US President. His comments have put the focus on social issues rather than Romney's main message of the economy and jobs. They also complicated Republican efforts to win the majority in the 100-member Senate.

But a poll late Monday night showed little effect from the controversy on the closely contested Missouri race. Findings from Public Policy Polling showed Akin ahead of McCaskill 44 per cent to 43 per cent, even though the majority of Missouri voters said his rape comments were inappropriate. Before the controversy, the polling firm found Akin ahead 45 per cent to 44 per cent.

On Sunday, Akin told KTVI television in St. Louis that the need for abortions in the case of rape was a tough question and that as far as pregnancy is concerned, "if it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down." — Reuters

What Akin said?

“It seems to me first of all, from what I understand from doctors, that's really rare. If it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”

Asks for forgiveness

“The fact is, rape can lead to pregnancy. The truth is, rape has many victims. The mistake I made was in the words I said, not in the heart I hold. I ask for your forgiveness.”

Obama, Romney slam remarks

Denouncing a Republican lawmaker’s remarks that women who suffer ‘legitimate rape’ rarely get pregnant, US President Barack Obama has termed them as ‘offensive’ while his White House rival Mitt Romney called them ‘inexcusable’, setting off an abortion debate that may impact the election campaign.

2 dead in Lebanon clashes echoing Syria conflict

Tripoli, August 21
Two persons were killed and more than 60 wounded in clashes between Sunni Muslims and Alawites in Lebanon’s northern city of Tripoli in another spillover from the war in neighbouring Syria, security and medical sources said on Tuesday.

Gunmen in the Sunni district of Bab al-Tabbaneh and their Alawite rivals in Jebel Mohsen exchanged gun and grenade fire in sporadic fighting overnight and into the day, despite action by Lebanese army troops deployed in the port city, residents said.

One of the dead men was identified by residents as Ahmed al-Farfour from Jebel Mohsen, a hill inhabited mainly by Alawites and which overlooks the predominantly Sunni area below. The other man was from the Hejjar family in Bab al-Tabbaneh.

An army statement said soldiers raided buildings used by gunmen and “retaliated swiftly against sources of gunfire”. It said five soldiers were wounded on Monday evening and another five, including an officer, were hurt on Tuesday by a hand grenade lobbed at an army base.

Aside from the army casualties, about 35 civilians or fighters were wounded in Bab al-Tabbaneh and 15 in Jebel Mohsen, residents and medics said. — Reuters

Use of chemical weapons red line for US, Obama warns Syria

Washington: US President Barack Obama has issued the toughest warning to his Syrian counterpart Bashar al-Assad, saying the use of chemical or biological weapons by Damascus would be a “red line” that would change his calculus significantly and provoke a foreign military intervention. “We cannot have a situation where chemical or biological weapons are falling into the hands of the wrong people,” Obama told reporters at the White House on Monday. “We have been very clear to the Assad regime, but also to other players on the ground, that a red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilised,” Obama said, outlining for the first time the point at which his administration could feel forced to intervene militarily in the Arab country’s raging conflict.

Japanese scribe killed covering fighting

Tokyo: A Japanese war correspondent was shot and killed while covering Syria’s civil war, her family and the government said on Tuesday. Mika Yamamoto worked for The Japan Press, an independent TV news provider that specialises in conflict zone coverage. She was hit by gunfire while she and a colleague were traveling with the Free Syrian Army in the northwestern city of Aleppo, said Masaru Sato, a spokesman with the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo.

Taliban attack damages US military chief's aircraft

Kabul/Washington, Aug 21
Taliban militants today fired rockets and damaged the special aircraft of the top most US military commander in Afghanistan's highly secure Bagram air base, but Gen Martin Dempsey escaped as he was not in the plane.

The rockets uprooted the main door of the C-17 aircraft used by the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, wounding two maintenance officers and also damaging an Apache helicopter gunship parked nearby, the ABC news reported quoting Pentagon officials.

A US military spokesman, Jamie Graybeal, told reporters that the shrapnel from the rockets struck the door of the plane, injuring two workers.

But the rockets posed no threat to the safety of Dempsey or his entourage who were asleep in their quarters at the time of the attack in the early hours of the morning.

Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for the attack, saying Dempsey's aircraft was "specifically targetted on exact information." Dempsey was on a crucial visit to Afghanistan to meet commanders of the NATO forces and Afghan top brass to discuss the recent surge in attacks by Afghan security personnel on their international colleague.

A total of 10 NATO soldiers have lost their lives in attacks billed as "green on blue" in the past two weeks.

A spokesman for the NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said that "Dempsey was nowhere in sight when the attacks took place." The American commander later left Kabul in another C-17 plane. — PTI

Obama ‘cancelled 3 kill-Osama missions’ until Hillary stepped in
Book claims that the US President sanctioning killing of the Al-Qaida supremo was a myth

London, August 21
US President Barack Obama put off operations to kill world's most dreaded terrorist Osama bin Laden three times before finally going ahead with the mission at the insistence of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a new book has claimed.

Citing unnamed sources within the joint operations command, Rich Miniter, a former Wall Street Journal and Washington Times reporter, claims that three 'kill' missions were called off by Obama in January, February and March 2011.

The President feared that the daring Navy SEALs operation to raid bin Laden's Pakistani hideout in Abbottabad "might go tragically wrong" and he would be blamed for it, the Mail Online reported claiming it had viewed excerpts of the book 'Leading from Behind: The Reluctant President and the Advisors Who Decide for Him'.

The book claims that the White House's carefully-crafted narrative of Obama as a decisive leader who sanctioned the killing of the Al-Qaida supremo was a "myth" and challenges a key element of Obama's re-election bid that his decision to kill Osama symbolises his resolute leadership.

At the start of his presidency, Miniter writes, Obama was "studiously undecided" about whether to kill the mastermind of 9/11. "He refused to weigh in or commit himself on even small matters related to a possible strike on bin Laden."

"Obama was often disengaged as the bin Laden operation took shape, he left critical decisions to the then-CIA Director Leon Panetta, then-Secretary of Defence Robert Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton," the book says.

The book describes Obama as heavily influenced by three women — Hillary, wife Michelle and longtime adviser and confidante Valerie Jarrett. Jarrett had opposed the idea since the beginning of his administration, Miniter said. "She worried about a backlash against the president if the operation failed, or even if it succeeded," the book says.

As a result, Obama was "studiously undecided" about what to do about bin Laden early in his term. "He refused to weigh in or commit himself on even small matters related to a possible strike on bin Laden," Miniter wrote.

But Hillary fought for a military strike during her regular weekly meetings with the President.

Meanwhile, the White House termed the report as "fabrication". "That is an utter fabrication. It's seems pretty clear that Miniter doesn't know what he's talking about," White House spokesman Josh Earnest said. — PTI

Oak Creek Sikhs reach out to other communities

New York, August 21
In the wake of the tragic gurdwara shooting, members of the Sikh community in Oak Creek are focusing on creating educational programmes to educate, spread awareness about Sikh faith and to reach out to other religious and civic groups.

The August 5 shooting "has been a wake-up call, the impetus for us to get out into the community," Kanwardeep Kaleka, who helps lead the youth group at the Oak Creek gurdwara, said.

Kaleka said Michael Wade Page, who had gunned down six members of the Sikh community, "came from a place of hate but most hate comes from ignorance."

Temple trustee Kulwant Singh Dhaliwal said in a report in the Milwaukee-Wisconsin Journal Sentinel that members of the community are working on an educational programme that they could offer first to schools.

The gurdwara's youth group is also looking at ways to spread awareness about the Sikh tenet of service to other communities.

Many in the Sikh community are also welcoming the chance to reach out to religious and civic groups to talk about themselves and their faith.

"There's a heightened interest in interfaith relationships and understanding of diverse faiths" since the shooting, said Tom Heinen of the Interfaith Conference of Greater Milwaukee. Pastor at congregation Faith Builders Jeff Pruitt said in the wake of the shooting, there will be an "effort to be much more inclusive and to learn about not only the Sikh faith, but others with whom there is much less familiarity." He said often in evangelical circles, people do not know how to reach out to people of other faiths. The congregation had yesterday organised a multifaith celebration, attended by about 1,000 people, as a show of support for the Sikh community.

Pruitt said he expects to draw flak from some fellow evangelicals for reaching out to "nonbelievers." "There is one stream of evangelical Christianity that sees such a strong Christian heritage to America that any other faith group, particularly immigrant faith groups, is seen as a foreign influence and not fundamentally legitimate," said David Neff, vice chairman of the board for the National Association of Evangelicals.

"That's compounded for Muslims and those, such as Sikhs, who are mistaken for Muslims because of the post-9/11 suspicions that they are a security risk," Neff said. — PTI

Spreading awareness

The gurdwara’s youth group is looking at ways to spread awareness about the Sikh tenet of service to other communities

Many Sikhs are welcoming the chance to reach out to religious and civic groups to talk about themselves and their faith

Temple trustee said members of the community are working on an educational programme that they could offer first to schools