VIENNA: The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency has asked Israel to consider signing up to the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, according to a report made public Friday, in a boost to Arab-led pressure on the Jewish state to join the treaty.

Israel refuses to confirm it possesses a nuclear arsenal but is widely considered to be the Middle East’s only nuclear power.

Agency chief Yukiya Amano “invited Israel to consider to accede” to the treaty during a low-key visit to the country last month, said the IAEA report that was made public before a meeting of the Vienna-based watchdog’s board of governors.

In his talks with officials, Amano also asked Israel to “place all its nuclear facilities under comprehensive IAEA safeguards” and “conveyed the General Conference’s concern about the Israeli nuclear capabilities,” the report said.

Islamic nations have long called for Israel to open its nuclear program and join the treaty.

They saw their efforts rewarded a year ago when IAEA member states, at their annual Vienna conference, narrowly passed a resolution directly criticizing Israel and its atomic program, with 49 of the 110 nations present in support, 45 against and 16 abstaining.

The resolution expressed “concern about the Israeli nuclear capabilities,” and links it to “concern about the threat posed by the proliferation of nuclear weapons for the security and stability of the Middle East.”

The result was a setback not only for Israel but also for Washington and other backers of the Jewish state, which had lobbied for 18 years of past practice – debate on the issue without a vote.

A July 26 letter from Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman, included in Friday’s report, points the finger at Iran and Syria as the Middle East’s “real proliferation challenges” and called the resolution a politically motivated attempt to divert attention from them.

Attempts to single out Israel “seriously detracts from the international community’s attempts to address the actual and ongoing violations of international obligations in the nuclear sphere,” Liberman wrote.

The US and its allies consider Iran the region’s greatest proliferation threat, fearing that Tehran is trying to achieve the capacity to make nuclear weapons despite its assertion that it is only building a civilian program to generate power.

They also say Syria – which, like Iran is under International Atomic Energy Agency investigation – ran a clandestine nuclear program, at least until Israeli warplanes destroyed what they describe as a nearly finished plutonium-producing reactor two years ago. Syria denies that.

Friday’s report also included more than 40 letters from IAEA member states in response to an April request by Amano for proposals on how to persuade Israel to sign the Nonproliferation Treaty.

The letters reflect a deep rift among the international community on the matter.

Iran, for example, called Israel an “atrocious regime” and alleged that nuclear weapons in its hands were a source of serious danger to regional and international peace and security.

The US, in contrast, said it encourages all states that have not yet done so to join the Nonproliferation Treaty, but added it opposed the resolution adopted last September because it singles out Israel and mentions neither Iran’s noncompliance with its IAEA safeguards obligations, nor Syria’s refusal to cooperate with the agency.

China, meanwhile, said it “believes that Israel should join the NPT as a non-nuclear state” and allow international inspections of its atomic facilities. – AP

Tags:
UN
Israel
nuclear proliferation
treaty

LISBON: A Portuguese court sentenced six men to jail on Friday for sexually abusing dozens of children at a state-run care home and procuring minors to be raped at orgies, at the end of a marathon abuse trial.

The convicts included a star television presenter, a former ambassador, a doctor, a lawyer and a former administrator at the Casa Pia children’s home in Lisbon, who each received sentences of between five and seven years.

The heaviest sentence, 18 years, went to Carlos Silvino, a former driver and gardener at the home and the only defendant to have pleaded guilty to more than 600 cases of sex abuse and procurement of minors for prostitution.

A seventh defendant, the woman owner of a house where sex abuse sessions were said to have taken place, was acquitted after the longest running trial in Portuguese history, which opened in November 2004.

Prosecutors had called for minimum sentences of five years in the mass abuse case, which has deeply shocked Portugal.

In their verdict, the judges detailed dozens of cases of sex abuse and procuring minors for clients, committed against 32 children at the Casa Pia children’s home, which they considered to have been proven.

Six of the 32 alleged victims were in the packed courtroom to hear the judgment, which reportedly reached several thousand pages and took several hours to read out.

All six punched the air in sign of victory, smiling broadly with relief as the verdict was read out.

“We are all very happy,” one of them, Bernardo Teixeira, told reporters outside the courtroom. “At long last we can say that the paedophiles have been convicted.””I hope this day will allow us to show the country that the boys have told the truth from the start,”

Pedro Namora, a former Casa Pia resident now in his forties who suffered sexual abuse, said before the session began.

The court heard from nearly a thousand witnesses and experts, and the trial went on for so long that none of the defendants was in detention, the legal limit for pre-trial custody having expired.

The Casa Pia scandal broke in November 2002 when an inmate of the home for youngsters in difficult circumstances told the press of being raped by Silvino.

Other residents and former residents came forward to tell of rapes and “special evenings.”
Aside from Silvino, the defendants had consistently claimed their innocence, and said before Friday’s verdict that they would continue to fight the charges no matter what the verdict.

A number of other media and political figures have also been investigated and cleared in the case.

In March 2006, a court ordered the Portuguese government to pay two million euros (2.5 million dollars) in compensation to 44 former Casa Pia residents, saying it had failed in its duty to protect the children. – AFP
 

Tags:
Portugal
child
abuse
trial

BEIRUT: Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah on Friday said a UN investigating the murder of Lebanese ex-premier Rafiq Hariri did “not concern” him, because it had dismissed data provided by his militant group.

“We have said that the tribunal and its prosecutor do not concern us and subsequently we are not concerned with answering the questions or requests of the prosecutor,” Nasrallah said in a televised speech to mark the Iranian-inspired Quds (Jerusalem) Day.

“Weeks ago we said the resistance feels that it is being targeted, and we proposed a few ideas and revealed some evidence,” said Nasrallah, who has accused Israel of the 2005 murder of Hariri.

“The prosecutor commented on this evidence by saying… it was insufficient,” Nasrallah said.

On August 9, Nasrallah produced several undated clips of aerial views of various areas in Lebanon that he said were intercepted from unmanned Israeli surveillance drones. The clips included footage of the site of the Hariri assassination, shot several years before the murder.

The Lebanese government on August 17 submitted a copy of Hezbollah’s alleged evidence to the UN-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon, an international investigation into the February 14, 2005 bombing that killed Hariri and 22 others in Beirut, in response to a request by office of prosecutor Daniel Bellemare.

But Bellemare’s office said the evidence was incomplete and called for any remaining material to be submitted without delay.

“We gave what evidence we have to Lebanese jurisdiction based on the request of Lebanese jurisdiction,” Nasrallah said Friday.

“If this jurisdiction has any questions, we are ready” to cooperate, he added.

“But if this jurisdiction is just a mailbox between us and the prosecutor, then we are not ready.”

Syrian- and Iranian-backed Hezbollah, which fought a deadly 2006 war with Israel, is rumoured to be implicated in the tribunal’s pending indictment.

Nasrallah has warned against pointing to Hezbollah in the assassination, labeling the tribunal an “Israeli project.”

The Hariri murder triggered an international outcry and led to the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon in April 2005 after a deployment of almost three decades. The killing has been widely blamed on Syria, but Damascus has consistently denied involvement.

The Hague-based Hariri tribunal was set up by a UN Security Council resolution in 2007. There are currently no suspects in custody. – AFP

Tags:
Lebanon
UN
tribunal
Hezbollah
Israel

BIRMINGHAM: The former head of the International Cricket Council criticized the Pakistan Cricket Board on Friday for its handling of the fixing scandal that has engulfed the sport.

Ehsan Mani, president of the ICC from 2003-06, told The Associated Press in a phone interview that the PCB had ”lost the moral ground” after failing to take charge of a case which emerged last weekend when three Pakistan players — Salman Butt, Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif —were implicated in betting-scam allegations.

”If the allegations are proven, the whole thing is totally unacceptable,” said Mani, speaking from Islamabad.

”Everyone involved in cricket, especially the ICC and PCB, have always said they adopt a no-tolerance policy to this kind of thing.

”But what has been disappointing is that the PCB has not taken the lead in this case since the whole issue broke. Since it happened, the players would not have been in a fit state of mind to play a cricket match.”

”The PCB has done nothing except talk about playing those players until proven guilty and the ICC was forced to act. The PCB has lost the moral ground on this one,” Mani said.

Mani was Pakistan’s delegate when he served as a highly respected president of the ICC.

He improved relations between the Asian bloc and the western nations, and was instrumental in brokering lucrative media rights sales for the PCB.

Mani said he opposes the involvement of the Pakistan High Commission in what he deems a cricket matter.

”It is not right that the government should be involved in this,” Mani said. ”We cannot talk about the players at this stage but the PCB have not come out very well in this. They should have been taking a lead role.

”They have failed to educate the players and failed to monitor the movement of people following the players who they knew about and who they had warned the players not to have contact with. Only warning the players is not good enough. They (PCB) have lacked professionalism.”

Tags:
ehsan mani
match fixing
pakistan in england 2010

DERA ISMAIL KHAN: Pakistan’s Taliban threatened on Friday to launch attacks in the United States and Europe “very soon”.

The warning came after a renewal of militant violence in Pakistan this week that is piling pressure on a US-backed government overwhelmed by the flood crisis.

“We will launch attacks in America and Europe very soon,” Qari Hussain Mehsud, a senior Pakistani Taliban leader and mentor of suicide bombers, told Reuters by telephone from an undisclosed location.

Tags:
taliban
TTP
militants

DUBAI: A cargo aircraft crashed on Friday evening near Dubai international airport, the official United Arab Emirates WAM news agency reported, without saying whether there were any casualties.

The agency said the aircraft came down in an unpopulated area, while witnesses told AFP it crashed near the Emirates Road highway.

The satellite television channels Al-Arabiya and Al-Jazeera reported that members of the crew of the aircraft, which they said belonged to a US company, were killed in the accident.

It was not known how many people were on board, and no confirmation was immediately available from official UAE sources.

Tags:
dubai
plane crash

UNITED NATIONS: UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned twin suicide bombings in Pakistan Friday, declaring them “unacceptable.”

”The secretary-general strongly condemns the terrorist bombings in the Pakistani cities of Lahore and Quetta,” his spokesman said in a statement.

“These attacks, which deliberately targeted Shia Muslims and killed or injured scores of civilians, are unacceptable.”

Ban offered his “sincere condolences to the families of the victims and to the government and people of Pakistan.”

Tags:
lahore attack
shia attack
quetta attack
UN
pakistan bomb

DERA ISMAIL KHAN: The Pakistani Taliban have claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing that killed at least 50 Shia Muslims in Quetta on Friday.

The attack sharply drove up the toll of sectarian assaults in a country battered by massive flooding.

Taliban commander Qari Hussain Mehsud tells The Associated Press that though they are fighting the US and the Pakistani government, ”Shias are also our target.”—AP

Tags:
taliban
quetta ataack
quetta bomb

JERUSALEM: Israeli researchers have developed a new treatment for HIV that kills human cells infected with the virus and could lead to a breakthrough in treating AIDS, the Haaretz newspaper said on Friday.

Whereas current treatments focus on inhibiting the replication of the HIV virus, the new treatment destroys infected cells without damaging healthy ones, the newspaper said.

The process makes use of peptides, or short protein segments, which vastly increase the replications of the virus once it enters a cell, causing the cell’s self-destruction, Haaretz said, citing one of the researchers.

“The usual medications kill the virus that has entered the body during infection and the (peptide) treatment allows cells infected with the genetic load of the virus to be killed,” Abraham Loyter, who carried out the study, was quoted as saying.

The study was published in the peer-reviewed British journal “AIDS Research and Therapy” in August and was co-authored by Loyter, Aviad Levin, Zvi Hayouka, and Assaf Friedler.

The researchers could not be reached on Friday, a day off in Israel.

They have registered an Israeli patent but the treatment must still be tested on animals and humans, Haaretz said.

Around 33.4 million people suffer from the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) which causes AIDS. The vast majority, more than 30 million, live in low and middle-income countries, according to the World Health Organisation. —AFP

Tags:
HIV
AIDS
HIV treatment
HIV virus

LONDON: The head of the International Cricket Council has called the spot-fixing allegations against three suspended Pakistan players the most serious case of corruption to hit the sport since South Africa captain Hansie Cronje was banned for life 10 years ago.

Speaking on Friday, ICC chief executive Haroon Lorgat said allegations that Mohammad Asif, Mohammad Amir and Salman Butt conspired with bookmakers to deliver deliberate no-balls in last week’s fourth test against England were hugely detrimental to the image of cricket.

“In terms of corruption in the sport, this must rank as the next worst after the Hansie Cronje case,” Lorgat said.

Cronje admitted to forecasting results in exchange for money from a London bookmaker, prompting the ICC to create its Anti-Corruption and Security Unit.

The ICC could still widen the investigation into the allegations against Asif, Amir and Butt – whom it suspended late Thursday – to cover last year’s contentious test match against Australia in Sydney.

“The conclusion that we have come to is that there is a really arguable case to answer,” Flanagan said.

ACSU chairman Ronnie Flanagan said the current charges pertain only to last week’s fourth test against England but that the ICC could still look into what he called a “dysfunctional” tour of Australia by Pakistan.

“At this stage, we do not have such evidence to hand for that tour or that match.”

Flanagan added that there were separate ongoing investigations into other international sides but that he did not think that the current case was “the tip of an iceberg.”

Flanagan said the players had been charged under Article 2 of the code and the trio knew the specific charges against them, but declined to go into the details.

Article 2 relates to offences under the code, including corruption, betting and misuse of inside information.

The former Northern Ireland police chief said the charges all relate to the fourth and final Test between England and Pakistan at Lord’s, which finished with an England win on Sunday.

Calling it a complex investigation, he said that if the players were found guilty, they could face a life ban.

“We will go where the evidence takes us,” he said, adding that the ACSU was working very closely with the British police in their separate but parallel investigation.

ICC chief executive Haroon Lorgat expressed his “extreme disappointment and sadness” at the situation, but repeated that “we will not tolerate any sort of corruption in the sport.”

There is absolutely no truth to the suggestion that there is a conspiracy towards Pakistan cricket,” the South African added.

“There is a lot of sympathy for Pakistan and its players.”

Flanagan and Lorgat would not comment on reports in Friday’s edition of Britain’s Daily Mail newspaper that marked notes used in the sting operation that led to the allegations had been found in Butt’s locker.

Lorgat and Flanagan said the ICC reacted as quickly as it could to the initial allegations against the Pakistan trio.

The suspensions followed allegations by a British newspaper that Amir and Asif deliberately bowled no-balls at predetermined points in last week’s fourth test against England.

Amir, Asif and Butt were being questioned by police on Friday. They were first questioned late Saturday when the allegations were made public and had their mobile phones confiscated.

“There was no specific tipping point that caused us to act yesterday,” Flanagan said. “Rather it was the culmination of a process of examining all the evidence and taking legal advice.

“They have a case to answer in our disciplinary arena.” —Agencies

Tags:
spot-fixing scandal
spot-fixing
match-fixing
icc
pcb