National affairs
Political Headlines:
1. Egypt supports hosting Israeli-Palestinian talks. (The International Herald Tribune)
Egypt's presidential spokesman says his country endorses a U.S. proposal to host key international players to follow up on Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
Spokesman Suleiman Awwad said Saturday that U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has asked Egypt to invite Israeli and Palestinian leaders and members of the Quartet of Mideast mediators to meet before U.S. President George W. Bush's term ends in January.
Bush has expressed hope for an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal before the end of the year, but Egypt and many other countries have voiced skepticism at the possibility.
Bush hosted a high-profile peace conference in Annapolis, Maryland, last November that drew 44 nations. But progress toward a peace deal has been limited.
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/10/04/news/ML-Egypt-Israel-Peace-Talks.php
2. Talks with Yemen on Red Sea piracy. (The Egyptian Gazette)
Ways to combat piracy in the Red Sea, bilateral relations and coordinating efforts to heal inter-Palestinian rifts were at the centre of talks between President Hosni Mubarak and Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh in Cairo yesterday.
“Mubarak and Saleh stressed that the Palestinian-Israeli talks on final status issues should go on regardless of the new Israeli government or the new US administration,” Egypt's official Middle East News Agency (MENA) quoted presidential spokesman Sulaiman Awwad as saying.Awwad added that Saleh had expressed support to Egyptian efforts to reconcile Palestinian factions. Egypt is expected next month to host dialogue talks among squabbling Palestinian factions. Mubarak and Saleh also discussed ways to secure the international navigation route in the southern region of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden as well as the two countries' efforts to combat piracy, added MENA. Meanwhile, Awwad said that Egypt endorsed a US proposal to host key international players to follow up on Israeli-Palestinian peace talks."US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has asked Egypt to invite Israeli and Palestinian leaders and members of the Quartet of Mideast mediators to meet before US President George W. Bush's term ends in January," Awwad said. Bush has expressed hope for an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal before the end of the year, but Egypt and many other countries have voiced skepticism at the possibility.
http://www.egyptiangazette.net.eg/gazette/home/detail_2_22.shtml
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*Regional and International Affairs
Political Headlines:
1. UN nuclear meeting indirectly criticizes Israel. (The Washington Times)
A U.N. nuclear conference indirectly criticized Israel on Saturday for refusing to put its atomic program under international purview, but the Jewish state evaded a Muslim-led attempt to link it to nuclear proliferation in the Mideast.
As in past years at the International Atomic Energy Agency's general conference, Iran, Israel's most outspoken foe, spearheaded the verbal attack on Israel, which is widely considered to have nuclear arms but has a "no tell" policy on the issue.
Chief Iranian delegate Ali Ashgar Soltanieh said Israel's nuclear capabilities represent a "serious and continued threat to the security of neighboring and other states."
And he took the U.S. and other Western backers of Israel to task for their "shameful silence" on what he said was the menace posed by Israel's atomic arsenal.
The meeting of 145 nations voted for a resolution urging all nations to open their nuclear activities to outside inspections and work toward the establishment of a Mideast nuclear weapons free zone.
With Israel the only country in the region considered to have atomic arms, passage of the resolution constituted indirect criticism of the Jewish state.
The resolution called on all nations in the Middle East "not to develop, test or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons," and urged nuclear weapons states to "refrain from any action" hindering the establishment of a Mideast zone free of nuclear weapons.
The United States and the European Union managed to block an effort by Muslim nations and their supporters to submit a resolution more directly critical of Israel and its "nuclear capabilities."
http://www.washtimes.com/news/2008/oct/04/un-nuclear-meeting-indirectly-criticizes-israel/
2. Path cleared for provincial elections in Iraq by January. (The International Herald Tribune)
Iraq's presidential council on Friday officially approved a law that clears the path for provincial elections to be held by the end of January.
Preparations can now go ahead for the first provincial elections in four years. But the breakthrough came only after Iraqi lawmakers agreed to set aside the divisive issues of power-sharing in the oil-rich northern province of Tamim, as well as the issue of how minorities will be represented.
Parliament approved the law unanimously on Sept. 24 following months of deadlock centering on a Kurdish-Arab dispute over the city of Kirkuk, which the Kurds seek to incorporate into their semiautonomous region in the north. Kirkuk is located in Tamim.
But Christians, Yazidis and other minorities objected to the exclusion of an article that would guarantee them a certain number of seats on local councils.
Firyad Rawndouzi, a Kurdish lawmaker, said that the three-member panel led by President Jalal Talabani had signed the law Friday and asked the Parliament "to solve the minorities problem."
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/10/03/mideast/iraq.php
3. Turks, Kurdish rebels in worst clashes in 8 months. (The San Francisco Chronicle)
The Turkish army clashed with Kurdish rebels in southeastern Turkey and northern Iraq in their deadliest battle in eight months, and the government vowed Saturday to fight the rebels at full force.
Fifteen soldiers and at least 23 insurgents were killed, the military said Saturday. Twenty more soldiers were wounded, the government said.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan returned early to Ankara from an official visit to Turkmenistan to lead an emergency security meeting, and President Abdullah Gul canceled a planned visit to France on Sunday.
"Whatever the cost, the fight will go on full force," Gul told reporters before meeting with the chief of the military.
Outraged Turks demonstrated in the streets in several cities, politicians denounced the rebels, and images of grieving families of fallen soldiers covered the Web sites of almost all newspapers.
The Iraqi government, the European Union, NATO and the U.S. Embassy in Ankara all condemned the rebels and supported Turkey. Iraq also called on Ankara to show restraint in its response.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/10/04/international/i003006D09.DTL
4. IAEA Head Calls for Iran To End Its Nuclear Secrecy. (The New York Sun)
A six-year probe has not ruled out the possibility that Iran may be running clandestine nuclear programs, the chief U.N. nuclear inspector said yesterday, urging Iran to reassure the world by ending its secretive ways.
At the opening session of the International Atomic Energy Agency's 145-nation conference, the European Union also urged Tehran to cooperate fully with a U.N. probe that is trying to assess all of its past and present nuclear activities.
"The international community cannot accept the prospect of Iran acquiring nuclear weapons," the European Union said in a statement.
Israel also took Iran to task for co-sponsoring Islamic attempts to label the Jewish state a nuclear danger to the Middle East.
http://www.nysun.com/foreign/iaea-head-calls-for-iran-to-end-its-nuclear/86816/
5. British commander: war in Afghanistan cannot be won. (The Washington Post)
Britain's commander in Afghanistan has said the war against the Taliban cannot be won, the Sunday Times reported.
It quoted Brigadier Mark Carleton-Smith as saying in an interview that if the Taliban were willing to talk, then that might be "precisely the sort of progress" needed to end the insurgency.
"We're not going to win this war. It's about reducing it to a manageable level of insurgency that's not a strategic threat and can be managed by the Afghan army," he said.
He said his forces had "taken the sting out of the Taliban for 2008" but that troops may well leave Afghanistan with there still being a low level of insurgency.
NATO commanders and diplomats have been saying for some time that the Taliban insurgency cannot be defeated by military means alone and that negotiations with the militants will ultimately be needed to bring an end to the conflict.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/05/AR2008100500459.html
6. Rice says US not trying to undermine Russia. (The Washington Post)
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Sunday rejected any suggestion that U.S. efforts to build closer ties to this former Soviet republic are meant to undermine Russian influence in Central Asia.
"This is not a zero-sum game," she told reporters flying with her to the Kazakh capital. U.S. gains need not mean Russian losses, she said.
"First of all, Kazakhstan is an independent country. It can have friendships with whomever it wishes," she said. "That's perfectly acceptable in the 21st century, so we don't see and don't accept any notion of a special sphere of influence" for Russia in this region.
Later at a joint news conference with her Kazakh counterpart, Foreign Minister Marat Tazhin, Rice said no one should question Kazakhstan's desire to have good relations with all countries in its region.
"This is not some kind of contest for the affection of Kazakhstan," Rice said.
Tazhin described his country's relations with the United States as "stable," and Kazakh relations with Russia as "excellent" and "politically correct." Asked by a reporter whether he considered his country to be in a Russian "sphere of influence," Tazhin said no, adding that he believed such a question was of interest mainly to academics and to journalists.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/05/AR2008100500259.html
7. U.S. envoy calls N. Korea talks "substantive". (The International Herald Tribune)
The chief U.S. nuclear envoy said Friday that he had had "very substantive" and "lengthy" talks in Pyongyang in an urgent effort to stop North Korea from reactivating its nuclear weapons program.
But the envoy, Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, said he would not call his three-day trip to the North a success until he got feedback from his boss, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and other nations involved in six-party nuclear disarmament talks on North Korea.
Earlier Friday, Hill crossed the heavily fortified inter-Korean border and arrived in Seoul to brief his South Korean counterpart, Kim Sook, about his trip to Pyongyang, where he met the top North Korean nuclear negotiator, Kim Kye Gwan, Foreign Minister Park Eui Chun and a representative of the North Korean military.
Kim Sook also said that members of the six-nation talks - the participants are the United States, the two Koreas, China, Russia and Japan - need more "discussions" on the results of Hill's trip.
The comments by Hill and Kim indicated that the American envoy was bringing with him a tentative compromise - or another North Korean counterproposal - for review by Washington and other parties to the talks.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/10/03/asia/korea.php
8. Russia Accuses U.N. Agency of Funding Georgian President. (The New York Sun)
Russia's confrontation with the West is escalating, with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov accusing the U.N. Development Program of collaborating with the financier George Soros to fund Mikheil Saakashvili's rise to the Georgian presidency.
Russia has long accused Mr. Soros of financing the 2003 Rose Revolution, and Mr. Saakashvili in particular. Yesterday, Mr. Lavrov called for an examination of the ties between Mr. Soros and the UNDP. "At the time, George Soros was sponsoring members of the Georgian government," Mr. Lavrov told reporters, adding that UNDP "funds and finances" were also used to support Georgian officials.
http://www.nysun.com/foreign/russia-accuses-un-agency-of-funding-georgian/86826/
9. Command for Africa Is Established by Pentagon. (The New York Times)
For decades, Africa was rarely more than an afterthought for the Pentagon.
American military affairs across the vast African continent were divided clumsily among three regional combat headquarters, those for Europe, the Pacific and the Middle East. Commanders set priorities against obvious threats, whether the old Soviet Union and then a resurgent Russia, a rising China or a nuclear North Korea, or adversaries along the Persian Gulf.
If deployment of fighting forces is an indicator, that historic focus north of the equator endures. But since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, a new view has gained acceptance among senior Pentagon officials and military commanders: that ungoverned spaces and ill-governed states, whose impoverished citizens are vulnerable to the ideology of violent extremism, pose a growing risk to American security.
Last week, in a small Pentagon conference hall, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, inaugurated the newest regional headquarters, Africa Command, which is responsible for coordinating American military affairs on the continent.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/05/world/africa/05command.html?ref=world
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US:
1. House approves historic bailout bill. (The San Francisco Chronicle)
In four long days, as credit markets froze, Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama worked the phones with President Bush. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger leaned on the California congressional delegation. The chairmen of General Motors and Chrysler allied with the small-town car dealer and banker in a full-court press on Congress. And in the end, they helped House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat from San Francisco, engineer the biggest bailout of the banking system in U.S. history.
The overwhelming 263-171 House vote for the $700 billion rescue erased a stunning defeat Monday that shocked Pelosi and her GOP counterpart, Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio. That defeat, and fear that inaction would lead to a once-in-a-century style economic collapse, set in motion the most extraordinary political alliance witnessed in modern times.
The nation's top leaders quickly rallied their combined forces behind an unprecedented and deeply unpopular government intervention in the U.S. economy, one that offended much of the public and the ideological wings of both parties just one month before a presidential election.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/10/03/MN2113B16U.DTL
2. Economic Unrest Shifts Electoral Battlegrounds. (The New York Times)
The turmoil on Wall Street and the weakening economy are changing the contours of the presidential campaign map, giving new force to Senator Barack Obama’s ambitious strategy to make incursions into Republican territory, while leading Senator John McCain to scale back his efforts to capture Democratic states.
Mr. Obama has what both sides describe as serious efforts under way in at least nine states that voted for President Bush in 2004, including some that neither side thought would be on the table this close to Election Day. In a visible sign of the breadth of Mr. Obama’s aspirations, he is using North Carolina a state that Mr. Bush won by 13 percentage points in 2004, and where Mr. Obama is now spending heavily on advertisements as his base to prepare this weekend for the debate on Tuesday.
By contrast, Mr. McCain is vigorously competing in just four states where Democrats won in 2004: Pennsylvania and New Hampshire, followed by Wisconsin and Minnesota. His decision last week to pull out of Michigan reflected in part the challenge that the declining economy has created for Republicans, given that they have held the White House for the last eight years.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/05/us/politics/05map.html?ref=us