the Government Corruption News blog

Protesters in Kabul shouted ‘Death to America,’ as anger towards US forces grows [Reuters]

Hundreds of protesters have clashed with police and security forces in Afghanistan in a second day of angry demonstrations over reports that copies of the Quran were burnt at an airbase used by NATO and coalition troops.

An Afghan government source told Al Jazeera that seven people have been killed during Wednesday’s protests and 32 have been wounded, but no exact location was given.

In Kabul, the capital, several people were reported wounded as demonstrators blocked a major highway outside Camp Phoenix, a US base in the city. Police said protesters threw stones, smashed car windows and charged at police lines.

But a police spokesman denied that police officers had shot at protesters.

“People are marching towards Kabul. Police are trying to stop them. We have sent more reinforcements to the area,” the spokesman said.

A second protest erupted in west Kabul, involving about 100 university students, a police spokesman said, adding that riot police were present and the demonstration was under control.

According to AFP, one person was killed and 10 were wounded when shots were fired at anti-US demonstrators in the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad. Protesters there praised the leader of the Afghan Taliban, shouting “Long live Mullah Omar!”, Reuters reported.

The US embassy said on Wednesday it was locked down and had suspended all travel in Afghanistan.

US apology

The protests, which followed reports of the discovery by local labourers of charred copies of the Quran as they collected rubbish at the Bagram airbase, prompted apologies from the US government and the commander of NATO-led forces in Afghanistan.

Leon Panetta, the US defence secretary, issued an apology for the ”inappropriate treatment” of Islam’s holy book at the base and backed General John Allen’s call for ”swift and decisive action to investigate this matter”.

“These actions do not represent the views of the United States military. We honour and respect the religious practices of the Afghan people, without exception,” he said.

Al Jazeera’s Bernard Smith reporting from Herat said: “These protests that began outside the Bagram base on Tuesday, have now seemed to have spread to other cities across Afghanistan.”

Hundreds of protesters besieged Bagram, about 60km north of Kabul, on Tuesday, firing slingshots and petrol bombs at the gate of the base.

Quran copies ‘not burnt’

Reports suggest US personnel had confiscated materials that they suspected Taliban prisoners were using to send messages.

Carsten Jacobson, a spokesman for the NATO-led international force in Afghanistan, said an investigation had been launched into the issue and preliminary information showed that Quran copies had not been burned.

“Fortunately for all of us, local workers recognised the type of material and intervened. Actually the disposal process was stopped in time but it led to protests over the day. As far as we know, and the investigations are ongoing, they were not burned. But we have to wait for the results.”

Allegations that NATO troops working inside the base had set fire to copies of the Quran were first reported by a senior government official.

“It is surprising that after all these years American and NATO forces have been here in Afghanistan and all the lessons they have learned about how important it is to treat Islamic material with due respect, this sort of thing is still happening,” our correspondent said.

“That is what causes so much offence here in Afghanistan and adds fuel to the anti-American and anti-foreigner feelings.”

Similar protests have in the past turned violent in Afghanistan, an extremely devout Islamic nation where an insult to the religion carries the death penalty.

Some 10 people were killed and dozens of others were injured during days of unrest caused last April over the burning of a copy of the Quran by an American pastor, Terry Jones, in Florida.

Article source: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia/2012/02/201222261457220606.html

Ethiopian and Somali troops have captured the strategic Somali city of Baidoa from al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabab fighters, who vowed to avenge the loss.

Baidoa, 250km northeast of the capital Mogadishu, is one of the main bases of the anti-government group, and Wednesday’s capture deals a major blow to the fighters, who control large parts of southern and central Somalia.

“We have taken control of Baidoa without a single shot, it is a great day for the people who are now welcoming us warmly,” said Muhidin Ali, a Somali government military commander in Baidoa.

“We are at the centre now and moving towards every corners of the town, to ensure that we are in full control,” Ali added. “The enemy fled the city before our army has reached the town empty.”

Sporadic shooting was reported on the outskirts of the town, but residents said the city was largely calm.

‘More bloodshed’

“The takeover does not mean that the enemy will enjoy the city, there will be more bloodshed,” said Sheikh Mohamed Ibrahim, a Shabab commander.

“The areas they took will only be the graveyards of the Christian invading forces and their apostate Somali militia.”

Ethiopian troops, who moved into southern and western Somalia in November, began a major push on Tuesday towards Baidoa, which hosted the transitional parliament before Shabab rebels seized the town in 2009.

“There was no fighting, the Somali troops and the Ethiopian forces entered the town, setting up their base at the police station and the main crossroads in town,” said Abdulahi Hassan, a resident.

“People are out in the streets watching the soldiers who are gradually moving into the different parts of the city.”

The rebels are already struggling financially and face increasing pressure from regional armies and pro-government forces. The rebels still control the southern port town of Kismayo, a major source of income.

Witnesses had said earlier that Shabab fighters and their families were seen fleeing Baidoa towards rebel-held Afgoye.

“Many people, most of them al-Shabab families and supporters, are fleeing Baidoa,” said Hussein Ali, a resident. “They are heading towards the Afgoye.

Article source: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/africa/2012/02/20122221485262611.html

Omar Shakir, an activist in the neighbourhood of Bab Amr, told Al Jazeera that the deaths of Marie Colvin, a US reporter working for the UK’s Sunday Times newspaper, and French photographer Remi Ochlik occurred as a building used by activists as a media centre was shelled on Wednesday.

Nine people were reportedly killed in addition to the journalists. Sunday Times photographer Paul Conroy was said to be injured, along with two other reporters.

Victoria Nuland, a US state department spokesperson, said the incident was “another example of the shameless brutality of the Assad regime”.

France demanded access to the victims of the attack and summoned Syria’s envoy to Paris.

“I am asking the Syrian government to immediately stop attacks and respect  its humanitarian obligations,” Alain Juppe, the French foreign minister said.

“I have asked our embassy in Damascus to require the Syrian authorities provide secure medical access to assist the victims with the support of the International Committee of the Red Cross,” he said in a statement.

Government forces bombarded the Bab Amr neighbourhood for a 20th straight day, according to activists, leaving at least 30 people killed in the area on Wednesday.

‘Extraordinary figure’

“Marie was an extraordinary figure in the life of The Sunday Times, driven by a passion to cover wars in the belief that what she did mattered,” Sunday Times editor John Witherow said in a statement.

“She believed profoundly that reporting could curtail the excesses of brutal regimes and make the international community take notice.”

The statement said the newspaper was doing what it could to get Conroy to safety and to recover Colvin’s body.

In a phone interview with British broadcaster BBC on Tuesday, Colvin described the situation in the area as “absolutely sickening”.

She said she had witnessed the death of a two-year-old boy after he was hit by shrapnel, and said there was a “constant stream of civilians” in the field clinic she visited.

“No one here can understand how the international community can let this happen,” she said.

Colvin was an experienced foreign correspondent and was named Foreign Reporter of the Year by the British Press Awards in 2001.She lost an eye to a grenade while working in Sri Lanka.

Ochlik had photographed the Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions as well as the war in Libya. His work was published in Le Monde Magazine, Time magazine and The Wall Street Journal, among other outlets.

Hours after the bombardment that killed the journalists, Syria’s information ministry said journalists illegally inside the country should report to the government.

“The ministry asks all foreign journalists that have entered Syria illegally to go to the nearest centre for immigration and passports to resolve the situation according to the laws in force,” the ministry said in a statement on Syria TV.

Shortage of medicine

In Homs, activist Hadi al-Abdallah, described the humanitarian situation in Bab Amr as “catastrophic” on Wednesday morning.

“Water has been cut off from Bab Amr for 18 days,” he told Al Jazeera. ”There’s no electricity, cooking oil or even bread. Many people are literally on the brink of starvation.

“People have fled their homes in fear of being bombed. They took refuge in a mosque, and there they were bombed too.”

The Homs Revolutionary Council reported a shortage of medicine, and said a large number of killed civilians were buried under the rubble of buildings damaged in the shelling.

In the nearby Inshaat neighbourhood, the council said security forces, supported by the army and by armoured vehicles, had carried out house raids and arrests.

Bab Amr is a stronghold of the armed opposition, but activists say most of those killed in the assault on the area are civilians.

The Local Co-ordination Committees says about 3,000 people have been killed in Homs province since the uprising began in March last year. The activist network says more than 8,000 people have been killed nationwide.

Official media said government forces were targeting “armed terrorist groups who have been terrifying citizens and attacking security forces and robbing public and private property”.

State-run news agency SANA cited residents of Homs saying food and services were available and that reports claiming the opposite were “lies”.

‘Two evils’

The opposition Syrian National Council (SNC) said on Wednesday it was coming to the view that military intervention was the only solution to the nearly year-old crisis in the country.

“We are really close to seeing this military intervention as the only solution. There are two evils, military intervention or protracted civil war,” Basma Kodmani, an SNC spokeswoman, told a news conference in Paris.

Kodmani said the SNC was also proposing that Russia, an ally of Syria, help persuade Damascus to guarantee safe passage to humanitarian convoys ferrying aid to civilians. She said the SNC proposed setting up corridors from Lebanon to the besieged city of Homs, from Turkey to Idlib and from Jordan to Deraa.

Meanwhile, Russia’s foreign ministry spokesman said Russia was supporting the International Committee of the Red Cross’s call for a daily two-hour ceasefire to provide aid to the population of Syria.

Alexander Lukashevich said Russia was using its contacts with both the Syrian government and the opposition to help settle humanitarian issues.

Article source: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/02/201222291445322238.html

Hadi promised big political, economic and social changes as he cast his vote in a Sanaa neighbourhood on Tuesday [AFP]

Polls have closed in the presidential election in Yemen, with reports indicating high turnout in many areas despite calls for a boycott from the opposition and deadly violence in the south.

As the only candidate in the race, Abd-Rabbou Mansour Hadi, the vice-president, is set to take power, ending the 33-year rule of Ali Abdullah Saleh.

The Reuters news agency quoted an official from the election security committee as estimating a turnout of 80 per cent in Tuesday’s vote, although final results will not be known for several days.

Turnout was likely to be lower in the south, where the boycott call and security concerns kept many at home.

Southerners, who accuse the north of grabbing their resources and discriminating against them, are demanding a divorce from the north with which they fought a civil war in 1994 after political union in 1990.

The Election Commission said in a statement that voting was halted in nine southern electoral districts, out of a national total of 301, because of the chaos.

Khamis al-Dayani, an election committee official, said nine of up to 300 polling areas in the country had experienced severe disruption.

‘Qualitative leap’

Hadi cast his vote at a polling station near his house in the capital, Sanaa. The station was changed at the last minute because of reports of a bomb threat.

“This is a qualitative leap for modern Yemen,” he said after voting.

“There will be big political, economic and social change, which is the way out of the crisis that has ravaged the country.”

However, Saleh, who over the years has built a strong web of tribal and family relations, could still hold considerable sway after Hadi is installed.

Despite the vote’s predetermined result, voting was brisk in Sanaa and some other cities, prompting election officials to keep the polls open two extra hours.

Long queues formed early in the morning outside polling stations in Sanaa amid tight security.

Yemen has more than 10 million registered voters, in a population of 24.7 million, according to the latest census.

Voters dipped their thumbs in ink and stamped their finger print on a ballot paper bearing a picture of Hadi and a map of Yemen in the colours of the rainbow.

“We are now declaring the end of the Ali Abdullah Saleh era and will build a new Yemen,” Tawakul Karman, the prominent Yemeni human rights activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner, said as she waited to cast her ballot outside a Sanaa university faculty.

Elsewhere in Yemen, security forces fired on protesters throwing stones during an anti-election rally in front of a polling station in al-Hota, the capital of the southern Lahej province, killing two, witnesses and local officials said.

In Makala, another southern city, at least 16 people were injured in clashes between security forces and people opposed to the election.

An explosion struck a voting centre in the southern port city of Aden on the eve of the vote.

Streets deserted

The streets of Aden were nearly deserted and intermittent gunfire could be heard. Masked youths carrying rifles and machine guns patrolled junctions, preventing people from reaching polling stations.

Abdel-Aziz Yehiya, the election commission head in Aden province, said voting had gone well in most places, but that unknown armed men had seized 44 ballot boxes out of some 800 total.

For more on Yemen, visit our Spotlight page

After polls closed, Victoria Nuland, the US state department spokeswoman, congratulated the Yemeni people for “carrying out this successful presidential election and taking the next step in their democratic transition”.

However, she said, the election was “only the first step in a long, complex transition” including constitutional and voting system reforms.

The UN special envoy to Yemen, Jamal Benomar, called on all parties in the country to abide by the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC)-brokered power transfer deal.

“The international community and the United Nations Security Council would closely monitor this process,” he said in Sanaa.

As part of the US -backed deal brokered by Yemen’s Gulf neighbours, Saleh is stepping down in exchange for a blanket immunity from prosecution.

Saleh is now in the US for medical treatment after an attack on his palace in June left him badly burned, and hastened his descent from power.

Article source: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/02/201222117511739757.html

Iran says its nuclear programme is for civilian purposes [IRIB Iranian TV/Reuters]

The International Atomic Energy Agency has said that its team visiting Iran was denied access to the Parchin military site where it suspects nuclear activities are carried out.

“It is disappointing that Iran did not accept our request to visit Parchin during the first or second meetings,” IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano said on Wednesday. “We engaged in a constructive spirit, but no agreement was reached.”

“Intensive efforts were made to reach agreement on a document facilitating the clarification of unresolved issues in connection with Iran’s nuclear programme,” the IAEA said in a statement.

The team led by Herman Nackaerts, the Vienna-based agency’s chief inspector, was due back home later on Wednesday.

The visit was the second in less than a month and was aimed, the IAEA had said, at clarifying all “outstanding substantive issues” surrounding Tehran’s nuclear programme, in particular what it called “possible military dimensions.”

Iran’s envoy to the IAEA, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, was quoted by the Iranian news agency ISNA as saying the talks had been intensive and covered “cooperation and mutual understanding between Iran and the IAEA.”

“These negotiations will continue in the future,” Soltanieh said.

The trip was also seen as an important precursor to a possible resumption of talks between Iran and the P5+1 powers, the United States, China, Russia, France, Britain and Germany, which broke down in Turkey 13 months ago.

An IAEA report in November said that Iran had carried out activities in a number of areas “relevant to producing” a nuclear weapon. Iran denies it is seeking to develop nuclear weapons and said the report was based on forgeries.

Since its publication, the United States and the European Union have ramped up sanctions on Iran’s oil sector amid speculation of Israel launching a pre-emptive attack on Tehran’s nuclear sites.

Article source: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/02/201222202920481596.html

Some prisoners were injured after a riot broke out at Kerobokan prison in Denpasar [Reuters]

Indonesian police have stormed a prison on the resort island of Bali in an attempt to regain control after a riot by inmates.

Prisoners took control of Kerobokan prison, forcing guards to flee, and set fire to parts of the jail following the riot late on Tuesday.

Hundreds of armed police and army personnel stormed the prison early on Wednesday, witnesses said. Shots were heard, and officials said several people had been injured.

“We are still trying to control the situation at the Kerobokan prison. We are trying to make the inmates go back into their blocks,” said Saud Usman Nasution, a national police spokesman.

Police said two inmates were shot in the legs as they confronted a crowd wielding sticks and throwing bricks. 

Australia’s foreign ministry earlier said it was urgently checking on the welfare of 12 Australian prisoners held at the
prison, but Indonesian police said none of about 60 foreign prisoners were among the casualties.

Fighting at the jail broke out late on Tuesday when inmates attacked a guard post, police said.

Carly Waters, a reporter for Australia’s Channel 7, was on the scene, and told Al Jazeera that the entrance had been badly burned, and over a hundred heavily-armed police had shown up to take control of the situation.

“They are bringing in supplies, like generators,” she said.

The prison is home to 1,200 inmates. The Australian prisoners include convicted drug traffickers Schappelle Corby
and the so-called Bali Nine.

Police said the prison warden fled and prisoners took control after setting fire to offices late on Tuesday.

Nasution said tensions at the prison had been growing since a knife fight between two inmates a week ago, leading to a
split in the wider prison population into rival gangs.

Article source: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-pacific/2012/02/201222214359113438.html