Lewinsky regrets having affair with Clinton 
Washington, May 7
Monica Lewinsky has broken her silence on her 1990s affair with then US President Bill Clinton, saying he took advantage of her even though it was a “consensual relationship” and she became “suicidal” after the scandal became public.

Monica Lewinsk

Moscow, May 7
Western powers today launched a desperate last-gasp drive for a diplomatic solution to stop Ukraine sliding into civil war, as fighting spread closer to the Russian border.

The head of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, Swiss President Didier Burkhalter, was to meet Russian leader Vladimir Putin after Moscow quashed a German-led plan for new peace talks.

And Britain's Foreign Secretary William Hague held talks in Kiev, as the Western-backed government there stepped up its military offensive to seize back a string of eastern towns and cities under the control of pro-Russian gunmen.

On the ground, local media reported that Ukrainian security forces had “liberated” the town hall in the port city of Mariupol near the Russian border.

Explosions and gunfire were also heard overnight in the flashpoint eastern town of Slavyansk, an AFP reporter there said, as the military advanced on rebel-held positions in the centre of what has become a hotbed of separatist activity.

Authorities there claim to have killed more than 30 rebels in a relentless assault on the city. But they have also lost at least nine personnel and three helicopter gunships in the battle with well-armed separatists.

The Russian flag that used to fly over the town hall has been taken down and rebels said they could either stay in the barricaded building they have held for several weeks or abandon it as the situation demands.

Nearly 90 people have died in less than a week in military operations or clashes between pro-Russians and supporters of Ukrainian unity, leading French President Francois Hollande to warn of “chaos and the risk of civil war”.

Germany too has said it fears an all-out military conflict, as Putin weighs whether to launch an invasion with the estimated 40,000 troops he has stationed on the border.

With relations between Moscow and the West plumbing depths not seen since the end of the Cold War, the USA and Russia continued to trade barbs as the clock ticked towards an independence referendum planned in eastern Ukraine on May 11.

US Secretary of State John Kerry dismissed the vote as “bogus” and drew parallels with a referendum in Crimea that was annexed by Russia in March. — AFP 

Beijing, May 7
Tensions rose today over China’s maritime disputes with its neighbours in the South China Sea as the Philippines detained a Chinese fishing vessel and its crew while Chinese and Vietnamese ships collided in a confrontation over oil exploration rights.

Reports from the Philippines said that 11 Chinese fishermen aboard a fishing boat were seized by Filipino police today in the disputed waters around Half Moon Shoal in the South China Sea.

Several armed men forced themselves onto the boat and fired four or five shots in the air.

They then took control of the boat, the Tanmen fishing association in China’s Qionghai City in Hainan Province said.

Another Chinese fishing boat managed to escape, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

This is first major flare up between the China and the Philippines in recent months over the South China Sea dispute which involves claims by both countries over islands and reefs.

Reacting to the incident, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying told a media briefing here that China has indisputable sovereignty over Nansha islands and adjacent waters including the barrier reef where the incident has taken place.

“We ask the Philippine side to release the vessel and the crew ask Manila to stop taking further pro-active actions,” she said, adding, that a Chinese maritime police boat has arrived in the area.

Chinese Foreign Ministry and the Chinese Embassy in Manila have already lodged protest representations with the Philippines' government.

About the reports of collision of Chinese and Vietnamese ships over attempts by a Chinese rig to drill in the disputed waters, she said the drilling activities of the rig are within China's territorial waters.

“The disruptive activities by Vietnamese side is a violation of China’s sovereign rights,” she said.

Incidentally, earlier China had objected to India undertaking drilling activities off the areas claimed by Vietnam in the recent past. — PTI

Washington, May 7
Monica Lewinsky has broken her silence on her 1990s affair with then US President Bill Clinton, saying he took advantage of her even though it was a “consensual relationship” and she became “suicidal” after the scandal became public.

“I, myself, deeply regret what happened between me and President Clinton. Let me say it again: I, myself, deeply regret what happened,” the former White House intern says in an article she has written for the Vanity Fair magazine.

In the article, Lewinsky (40) says it is time to stop “tiptoeing around my past and other people’s futures. I am determined to have a different ending to my story. I've decided, finally, to stick my head above the parapet so that I can take back my narrative and give a purpose to my past. What this will cost me, I will soon find out,” she says in the article, excerpts of which were released by the magazine.

The full article will be available on May 8.

Maintaining that her affair with Clinton was one between two consenting adults, Lewinsky writes that it was the public humiliation she suffered in the wake of the scandal that permanently altered the direction of her life, according to Vanity Fair.

“Sure, my boss took advantage of me, but I will always remain firm on this point: it was a consensual relationship,” she says in the article.

“Any ‘abuse’ came in the aftermath, when I was made a scapegoat in order to protect his powerful position...The Clinton administration, the special prosecutor’s minions, the political operatives on both sides of the aisle, and the media were able to brand me. And that brand stuck, in part because it was imbued with power,” she writes.

Writing for the first time about her affair with Clinton, Lewinsky says, “It's time to burn the beret and bury the blue dress.” Lewinsky says she was compelled to break her years-long silence about her affair with Clinton following the story of gay Rutgers University student Tyler Clementi, who committed suicide in 2010 after his Indian-origin roommate spied on his sexual encounter with another man.

In the article, Lewinsky says she too had become suicidal after the news of her affair with Clinton broke in 1998 and reading about Clementi made her “own suffering” take on a “different meaning”.

Lewinsky, however, clarifies in the essay that she has never actually attempted suicide but had strong suicidal temptations several times during the investigations and during one or two periods after that.

Lewinsky writes that following Clementi’s tragedy “my own suffering took on a different meaning. Perhaps by sharing my story, I reasoned, I might be able to help others in their darkest moments of humiliation." — PTI

Bangkok, May 7
Thailand’s beleaguered premier Yingluck Shinawatra and nine Cabinet ministers were today dismissed from office by a court that found her guilty of abuse of power for the benefit of her powerful family, plunging the country into fresh political turmoil.

The Cabinet immediately appointed Niwattumrong Boonsongpaisan as the caretaker premier, hours after the Constitutional Court unanimously ruled that Yingluck had a part in the transfer of Thawil Pliensri from the position of National Security Council secretary general.

The court said the transfer was done in an unusual haste in only four days and there was discrepancy in dates of documents related to the transfer hence the process was irregular.

“Therefore, her prime minister status has ended...Yingluck can no longer stay in her position acting as caretaker prime minister,” presiding judge Charoon Intachan said in a televised ruling.

Jubilant anti-government demonstrators, who accuse Yingluck of acting as a proxy for her fugitive brother Thaksin and have been demanding her ouster for the last several months, blew whistles outside the court. In the ruling, the court said Yingluck took part in the approval of the transfer.

Yingluck, 46, has argued that she assigned her deputy to handle the issue so she did not take part in it.

The court also found nine ministers who were part of Yingluck’s cabinet to be complicit in the decision and ordered them to be removed from their office.

“Transferring government officials must be done in accordance with moral principle,” the court said. — PTI

New York, May 7
An Indian-origin man is among six persons charged with carrying out a $30 million bank fraud conspiracy and faces up to 30 years in prison if convicted.

Manjeet Bawa, 46, of New York and other co-defendants contracted to buy homes in Nassau and Suffolk Counties from innocent sellers at market prices.

The defendants then submitted fraudulent loan applications to the warehouse lenders that nearly doubled the true sale prices of the homes. They also inflated their personal assets and concealed significant liabilities to get loan. The six defendants face up to 30-year imprisonment and could be ordered to forfeit 19 residential properties traced to the bank fraud or up to $30 million in a money judgment.

“The conduct is an example of the type of corrupt mortgage-lending practices that preceded the bursting of the real estate bubble, the loss of faith in securitised mortgage obligations," US Attorney Loretta Lynch said. — PTI

Kano, May 7
Terror group Boko Haram massacred hundreds in Nigeria's northeast, even as the police offered $3 lakh for information leading to rescue of more than 200 schoolgirls held hostage by Islamists.

The latest insurgent attack targeted Gamboru Ngala town on the border with Cameroon, where gunmen this week razed scores of buildings and fired on civilians as they tried to flee.

Area senator Ahmed Zanna put the death toll at 300, citing information provided by locals, in an account supported by numerous residents.

Zanna said the town had been left unguarded because the soldiers based there were redeployed towards Lake Chad in an effort to rescue more than 200 girls kidnapped by the group on April 14. — AFP