Global support to free Suu Kyi on birthday

YANGON: Myanmar pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi marked a grim 64th birthday in prison on Friday, as activists took to the Internet and planned worldwide protests to press the military junta to free her.

Famous names including British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, footballer David Beckham and US actors George Clooney and Julia Roberts all offered support on a website while the United States and EU led political calls for her release.

The Nobel Laureate has spent 13 of the past 19 years in detention since the ruling junta refused to recognize the landslide victory of her National League for Democracy (NLD) in 1990 elections. She is now being held in Yangon's notorious Insein Prison during her trial for a bizarre incident in which an American man swam to her home.

Supporters at her National League for Democracy's headquarters in Yangon began the day by giving food to Buddhist monks at dawn, and were later due to release doves and balloons into the air in a symbol of freedom, witnesses said.

Security was tight, with plainclothes police officers videotaping people entering the building, uniformed policemen standing further away and five police trucks patrolling near the building.

"We have to hold the birthday party without the host again. We would be very happy if she could be released, we are hoping and praying for this," said senior party member Lei Lei.

In Washington, Myanmar exiles toasted the opposition leader at a birthday party on Capitol Hill while in London the wife of Prime Minister Gordon Brown hosted a screening of a film dedicated to her.

At least one minister and various charity bosses were to attend the showing of "Burma VJ", which a Foreign Office spokesman said "exposes the atrocities and injustices that have been taking place under the military regime."

European Union leaders are set to make a 64-word call on Friday for her release at the end of a two-day summit in Brussels. They will say she "tirelessly defended the universal values of freedom and democracy," according to a draft statement.

The US state department, in a birthday message, urged the junta to free Aung San Suu Kyi "immediately" and hailed her as a woman who has "dedicated her life to achieving democratic change and promoting progress in Burma."

"We, along with all of her admirers in Burma and abroad, look forward to the day when she will be able to celebrate her birthday in freedom," the state department statement said, using Myanmar's former name.

Campaigners across the world planned to mark the day with events ranging from live music and speeches in Malaysia, evening vigils in Ireland and Australia and debating forums in Thailand.

Other women Nobel laureates including Iran's Shirin Ebadi wrote in a joint message on the website that they looked forward to the day their "sister" would be free.

"We have to hold the birthday party without the host again. We would be very happy if she could be released, we are hoping and praying for this," senior party member Lei Lei said.

Aung San Suu Kyi faces five years in jail if convicted in her trial, which resumes on June 26. The court case has provoked international outrage and has been described as a "show trial" by US President Barack Obama.

A global petition was delivered on Monday to UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, signed by more than 670,000 people from 220 countries, calling for the release of all Myanmar's political prisoners, especially Aung San Suu Kyi.

At the US Capitol complex, Myanmar exiles and activists clinked glasses in salute to the opposition leader.

"We are sad that she is not in her house and not free, but we are not giving up our struggle and we will go on until she is released," Sein Win, Myanmar's "prime minister-in-exile" and a cousin of Aung San Suu Kyi, told the gathering.

US Congressman Joe Pitts said it was "astonishing" that some nations "continue to enable the brutal dictators of Burma to continue their attacks against their people."

He did not name countries, but China has been the key political, commercial and military backer of Myanmar.

"We must be more than 'concerned' or even 'deeply concerned.' The international community on behalf of the people of Burma must make it clear that the oppressive leaders of Burma will no longer be tolerated," he said.

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World's oldest man dies at 113

TOKYO: Tomoji Tanabe, the world's oldest man, died in his sleep at his home in southern Japan on Friday, a city official said. He was 113.


``He died peacefully. His family members were with him,'' said Junko Nakao, a city official in Miyakonojo on Japan's southern island of Kyushu. Tanabe died of heart failure, she said.

Tanabe, who was born September 18, 1895, had eight children — five sons and three daughters. The former city land surveyor also had 25 grandchildren, 53 great-grandchildren, and six great-great-grandchildren, according to a statement from the Miyakonojo city. He was certified by the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's oldest man when he was 111 years old.

Tanabe lived with his fifth son and daughter-in-law. His favorite meals were fried shrimp and Japanese miso soup with clams, the statement said. Tanabe drank milk every morning and read the newspaper. He also avoided alcohol and did not smoke, the statement said.

The city's mayor, Makoto Nagamine, said Tanabe was ``the symbol of the Miyakonojo known as a city of long life.''

``I feel very saddened by his death,'' Nagamine said in a statement. ``He cheered many citizens.''

Japanese people have among the world's longest life expectancies — nearly 86 years for women and 79 years for men — which is often attributed to the country's healthy diet rich in fish and rice.

The number of Japanese living past 100 has more than doubled in the last six years, reaching a record high of 36,000 people in 2008. The country's centenarian ranks are dominated by women, who make up 86 percent of the total.

Japan's centenarian population is expected to reach nearly 1 million — the world's largest — by 2050, according to UN projections.

Source:TOI

Air France to give crash victims €17,500 advance

PARIS: Air France's chief executive says the company will give about euro17,500 ($24,000) as an advance to the families of the victims of the crash of Air France Flight 447 from Rio de Janeiro to Paris.

Phillipe Gourgeon says the company's lawyers are in contact with the families of the 228 victims from 32 countries to make sure the money gets to them.

Gourgeon also says in an interview broadcast Friday on France's RTL radio that Air France is looking into holding a memorial for all of the victims of the May 31 crash.

Some families of French victims have accused Air France of a lack of sympathy and of failing to provide them with timely information on the investigation into the causes of the crash.

13 killed in bomb blast, drone attack in Pak

Islamabad, Jun 14 (PTI) At least 8 people died and over 20 injured in the latest round of bomb attacks in northwest Pakistan, as a US drone strike killed 5 suspected militants in South Waziristan tribal region, considered a stronghold of Taliban commander Baitullah Mehsud.

As the Pakistan Army expanded their operations against terrorists in the South Waziristan, the military today said 31 militants, including some foreign fighters, were killed in retaliatory air strikes.

The bomb blast occurred in Dera Ismail Khan town's Pir Market at a time when a large number of people were present. District Coordination Officer Mohsin Shah told reporters that eight persons were killed and over 20 injured in the blast. There were also reports of unidentified persons resorting to firing soon after the explosion.

Five persons were killed in a missile strike by a US drone in South Waziristan tribal region that is considered a stronghold of Taliban commander Mehsud.

The spy plane fired a missile at several vehicles and local residents said five persons were killed in the strike, the first drone attack in Pakistan's tribal belt since mid-May.

The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for attacks on Pearl Continental hotel on Tuesday and the twin bombings at mosques on Friday, exacting revenge for the military offensive against them. PTI

ULFA leader Paresh Barua arrested in Bangladesh?

ULFA leader Paresh Barua arrested in B'desh? Anisur Rahman Dhaka, Jun 14 (PTI) Top ULFA leader Paresh Barua, on the run for three decades, has been arrested here, a Bangladeshi newspaper reported today, but the police dismissed it as a "hoax".

The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) officials arrested a suspected Indian national at a house in central Dhaka's posh residential locality Dhanmondi late last night, said widely-circulated Bengali dailies 'Ittefaq' and 'Samakal'.

The police is ascertaining whether the arrested man, from whom a passport was recovered with the name Shamsul Alam on it, has any link with the separatist Indian group ULFA, the newspapers said.

Quoting an unnamed intelligence official, Samakal said the arrested man was Paresh Barua, the prime accused in the seizure of huge arms and ammunitions along the Chittagong coast in 2004. Police, however, did not confirm, it added.

However, a senior CID official dismissed the reports of Barua's arrest.

"Following the reports in the two newspapers about the arrest of Paresh Barua, we checked the matter and found it to be hoax... No such person was arrested by our men as reported," the official told PTI. PTI

41 candidates on ballot for Afghanistan president

KABUL: Afghanistan's electoral commission said on Saturday that President Hamid Karzai and 40 other candidates will appear on the ballot for president this August, but the head of the commission said he felt "ashamed" that so many unqualified candidates made the final cut.

Karzai is considered the clear front-runner to win Afghanistan's second presidential election since the 2001 US-led invasion toppled the Taliban regime. His strongest challengers in the August 20 vote include former finance minister Ashraf Ghani and former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah. Two women are also among the 41 candidates.

In announcing the final list of candidates, Azizullah Lodin, the head of Afghanistan's election commission, said he believed that many of the candidates were not qualified but said he had no power to remove them from the ballot.

"I personally feel ashamed that when I ask someone are you literate, and he says no. I ask if he has a professional background, and he says no. I ask if he was a mullah in a mosque, and he says no. And now he comes and registers himself and he wants to be president of Afghanistan. This is really shameful," Lodin told reporters.

During the country's first post-Taliban presidential election in 2004, 18 candidates ran for president. Karzai won in the first round with 55%, while the second placed finisher, Yunus Qanooni, the current speaker of the lower house of parliament, won 16 per cent. Qanooni is not running this year.

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Iran begins voting for new president

TEHRAN: Iran began voting on Friday for a new president after a fiery campaign which has seen moderate ex-premier Mir Hossein Mousavi emerge as the main challenger to incumbent hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

"Polling started nationwide at 8:00 am (0330GMT). It is on schedule. It is going to last until 6:00 pm (1330 GMT)," the interior ministry, which is in charge of organising the election, said in a statement.

"We are expecting our dear citizens to come foward and vote in the early hours."

Polls, however, may remain open until midnight depending on turnout among the 46-million-strong electorate. Results are expected within 24 hours after voting ends.

The country's 10th presidential election since the 1979 revolution is a close two-horse race with passions running high after three weeks of mass rallies, stormy television debates and vicious mudslinging.

While Ahmadinejad, 52, is battling for a second four-year term in office, Mousavi, 67, is seeking to make a comeback after two decades in the political wilderness.

The election campaign turned a spotlight on deep differences within the Islamic republic after four years under Ahmadinejad.

His hardline rhetoric on the nuclear standoff and against Israel has isolated the country from the West, and his expansionist economic policies have come under fire at home.

The campaign also highlighted the glaring internal divide, with towns and villages passionately backing Ahmadinejad and young men and women in big cities throwing their weight behind Mousavi.

Analysts have been reluctant to forecast a winner, suggesting the vote may mirror 2005 when the relatively unknown Ahmadinejad scored a stunning upset in a second-round runoff against heavyweight cleric Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.

The 2009 campaign has been marked by street demonstrations and unprecedented public animosity among the candidates who traded insults and allegations of lying and corruption on prime-time television, ratcheting up the tension.

At a final campaign rally on Wednesday, Ahmadinejad, who has frequently described the Holocaust as a myth, accused his rivals of using "tactics like Hitler" to whip up public opinion against him, the Fars news agency said.

On the streets, Iranians also used the occasion to turn political rallies into night-time parties in a country that has had little to offer in terms of nightlife during three decades of conservative clerical rule.

Standing for election alongside Ahmadinejad and Mousavi -- but also running far behind -- are reformist former parliament speaker Mehdi Karroubi and the ex-head of the elite Revolutionary Guards Corps, Mohsen Rezai.

Mousavi has pledged to work to improve relations with the outside world, although there are doubts nuclear policy would change as all strategic decisions are taken by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The election comes after new US President Barack Obama offered dialogue with Iran -- dubbed part of the "axis of evil" by his predecessor George W. Bush -- following three decades of severed ties.

Mousavi has complained that Ahmadinejad's foreign policy "undermined the dignity of Iran," and along with his fellow challengers accused the president of mismanaging the economy.

Iran, OPEC's second biggest oil exporter, is currently battling rampant inflation of 24 percent and a slump in earnings from crude oil as international prices have sunk from close to 147 dollars last year to around 72 dollars.

Ahmadinejad has left no stone unturned in seeking to bolster his image as a man of the people, accusing his rivals and their backers of dishonesty and receiving financial privileges.

The elite Revolutionary Guards -- seen to be backing Ahmadinejad -- even accused Mousavi supporters of trying to spark a "velvet revolution" by taking to the streets in their thousands dressed in green, his campaign colour.

"Such a scenario will never succeed in Iran due to the political structure of our Islamic nation. I believe that with the alertness of the people, any move for any velvet revolution will be nipped in the bud," Guards chief Yadollah Javani said in a media interview, referring to the non-violent overthrow in 1989 of the communist regime in then Czechoslovakia.

If blacksmith's son and former Tehran mayor Ahmadinejad is defeated, it will be the first time a sitting president has been ousted after a single term.

A runoff will be held on June 19 if no single candidate emerges with 50 percent plus one vote on Friday.

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Nepal's first woman deputy PM dead

KATHMANDU: Shailaja Acharya, the only woman politician in Nepal to have been a deputy prime minister, died here early on Friday after a long battle with Alzheimer's and pneumonia.

The 65-year-old, who came from one of the most politically active families of Nepal, had been admitted to the Teaching Hospital here on Wednesday after receiving treatment earlier in New Delhi and Bangkok.

The death of Acharya, niece of Nepal's first elected prime minister Bishweshwor Prasad Koirala and aunt of Bollywood star Manisha Koirala, would be mourned in Nepal as well as India where she spent nine years in exile and was close to veteran Indian Congress and Socialist leaders, especially former Indian premier Chandra Shekhar.

Acharya entered politics as a student when, inspired by her family's role in the pro-democracy movement, she showed a black flag to then king Mahendra, who held absolute power. She was jailed for three years for the offence.

A member of the Nepali Congress (NC) party, she won two elections from her home district in Morang in eastern Nepal and became the first woman in Nepal to head the water resources ministry as well as become deputy prime minister.

The soft-spoken, petite leader, however, started losing her position in the party after Mahendra's son Gyanendra seized power through a bloodless coup. She tried to vie for the leadership of her party but was pipped by her younger uncle, Girija Prasad Koirala, who still remains president of the NC.

She was also the subject of controversy after she supported constitutional monarchy and opposed joining forces with the Maoists to end Gyanendra's regime.

Acharya blamed her fall to the fact that she was a woman and not taken seriously in Nepal's male-dominated political arena despite her sacrifices.

During Nepal's pro-democracy struggles, she was also forced to live underground for two years in addition to spending nine years in exile in India.

But two years ago, it seemed her flagging political career would be revived after Koirala recommended her name as Nepal's ambassador to India despite opposition from his own party men and allies.

However, fate dealt a blow to Acharya when she was diagnosed with Alzheimer's and had to be hospitalised.

Since then, she had dropped out of the public eye, hitting the headlines only because of her deteriorating condition and the alleged negligence by her party to help with her treatment.

Source:TOI

Air France to replace speed sensors in planes

PARIS: Air France has said all its flights using long-haul Airbus jets will be equipped immediately with new speed sensors after last week’s disaster over the Atlantic, a pilots’ union said on Tuesday.

The pitot tubes that gauge speed have become the focus of an investigation into the crash after messages showed they provided “inconsistent” data to the pilots and might have played a role in the June 1crash.

The Air France A330 that crashed into the Atlantic last week, killing 228 on board, had sent 24 automated messages in its final minutes on June 1, detailing a rapid series of system failures.

The small Alter union, which claims to represent 15 Air France pilots, said in a statement that it had found that the first of these messages pointed to a problem with the pitot tubes.

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14 dead, 57 hurt as bomb goes off in Pak hotel

PESHAWAR: The death toll from a suicide blast at a luxury hotel in Pakistan's northwest Peshawar city has risen to 14, while 57 people were injured, a police official said Wednesday.

Early reports suggest at least two men shot their way through a security barrier and rammed a pick-up truck packed with explosives into the five-star Pearl Continental hotel late Tuesday, causing massive devastation.

"Three more dead bodies including the body of a police official were recovered from the debris this morning (Wednesday)," Abdul Ghafoor Afridi, a senor police official in Peshawar, said.

"Now the death toll has risen to 14 and there are 57 injured. The number of casualties could rise as we fear that some people are still trapped under the debris. One portion of the hotel was totally destroyed," he added.

"Three people including a manger of the hotel are missing and we fear they are under the debris."

Two foreign United Nations workers -- Serbian Aleksandar Vorkapic with the refugee agency and Filipina Perseveranda So with the children's agency -- were killed, the UN said, while many foreigners were among the injured.

It is the seventh deadly bombing to hit the troubled city in a month, as fears grow that Taliban militants are exacting revenge for a punishing six-week military offensive against them in three northwest districts.

"It was a suicide attack," city police chief Sefwat Ghayur said.

"Occupants of a double-cabin pick-up truck forced their way in, firing at the security guards. The attackers struck their vehicle into the hotel building, and it exploded on impact."

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack.

Senior police officer Abdul Ghafoor Afridi said there were at least two attackers, and they were wearing security guard uniforms.

Chaos enveloped the hotel popular with dignitaries, officials and foreign visitors, with smoke billowing around the building in the high-security Khyber Road area of Peshawar, capital of North West Frontier Province.

"The blast was so huge that I thought my ear drums were damaged forever. I fell from the chair and saw others also falling and the glass shards scattered in the meeting room," said charity worker and hotel client Zarshaid Khan.

"When I managed to get out of the room, I saw flames and security guards lead me to a safe side."

Sahib Gul, a doctor at Peshawar's main Lady Reading Hospital, said six foreigners were among the 52 injured.

Among them was a British citizen, the Foreign Office in London confirmed.

Rows of balconies appeared to have been ripped off the face of the hotel, where rescue workers struggled to help those trapped inside. A clutch of United Nations vehicles were among dozens of charred cars parked outside.

The injured and confused stumbled among twisted metal, with rubble strewn among the once-manicured lawns of the hotel, just opposite the historic Bala Hisar Fort and Peshawar's golf course.

"I was sitting in the eastern side of the hotel building and suddenly there was a huge blast which tumbled my chair and I fell on the ground. As I rose from the ground I saw flames and smoke," hotel employee Ghulam Ahmed said.

Senior police officer Shafqat Malik said more than 500 kilograms of explosives were used. Witnesses said the blast shattered windows of a provincial assembly and Peshawar High Court nearby.

Tuesday's attack echoes a suicide truck bomb attack on the luxury Marriott Hotel in Islamabad in September 2008 that killed 60 people.

Pakistan has been hit by a string of devastating attacks in recent weeks, with markets and security targets hit in Peshawar and police buildings targeted in Islamabad and the cultural capital Lahore.

On Friday, a suicide bomb ripped through a mosque packed with worshippers, also in the northwest of the country, killing 38 people and wounding dozens more in the deadliest such attack in more than two months.

The Taliban in Pakistan have warned of more "massive attacks" in retaliation for the military operations against them in Swat, Lower Dir and Buner.

Source:TOI

Air France plane's tail fin found, hunt for black boxes intensifies

FERNANDO DE NORONHA, BRAZIL: Brazil on Monday recovered the tail fin belonging to the Air France jet that plunged into the Atlantic a week ago killing 228 people, as well as more human remains from the doomed flight.

Twenty-four bodies so far have been fished out of the Atlantic, Brazilian officials said.

The tail fin discovery is the most important element to date in the quest to find out why the Airbus A330 went down June 1 as it flew from Rio de Janeiro to Paris. No distress call was received from the pilots.

The plane's black boxes were mounted in the tail section, and the fin's location could narrow the underwater search for those devices by a French submarine expected to arrive in the zone on Wednesday.

A Brazilian frigate was expected early Tuesday in the Fernando de Noronha archipelago carrying the first 16 bodies along with airplane debris, air force spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Henry Munhoz told reporters.

From there, the bodies and debris will be taken to the mainland coastal city of Recife, where investigators hope to identify the remains by checking dental records and DNA samples provided by relatives. In Recife French investigators will also pore over the plane's components.

The other bodies would follow "at an appropriate time," according to an air force statement.

Brazilian and French teams continued to scour the crash zone 1,100 kilometers (700 miles) off Brazil's northeast coast for more bodies and pieces of wreckage.

The clock is ticking for finding the black boxes, believed to lie on the sea floor at a depth of up to 6,000 meters (19,700 feet). Their homing beacons will cease to operate in three weeks.

The US Navy said on Sunday it would send two towable pinger locators and a crew of around 20 to the scene later this week to join the hunt for the devices.

If the voice and data recorders are found, a French research sub -- the same one that has explored the wreck of the Titanic -- will be deployed to recover them. That small sub, the Nautile, is also expected to arrive within days.

The disaster is the worst aviation accident since 2001, and unprecedented in Air France's 75-year history.

Early suspicions are focusing on the Airbus A330's airspeed sensors, which appear to have malfunctioned in the minutes before the catastrophe, according to some of the 24 automatic data warnings sent by the plane.

Investigators are looking at whether the sensors, known as pitots, could have iced over, possibly leading the Air France pilots to fly into a storm in the zone that day without knowing their airspeed.

France's transport minister Dominique Bussereau said on the weekend that could have led the pilots to set the plane at "too low a speed, which can cause it to stall, or too high a speed, which can lead to the plane ripping up as it approached the speed of sound, as the outer skin is not designed to resist such speed."

An internal Air France memo dated November 2008 and seen by AFP mentions "a significant number of incidents" related to the pitots.

A US airline, US Airways, said Monday it was replacing the pitots on its nine Airbus A330-300s.

Source:TOi

Obama admin to unveil its India agenda at USIBC on June 17

WASHINGTON: The Obama administration may unveil its India agenda at 'Synergies Summit' of the US India Business Council on June 17 when three of its top officials including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will be present.

Clinton and other officials are expected to spell out the new administration's policy for India, with whom the US President has favoured "deep" strategic relations.

India, on the other hand, would be represented by its commerce minister and some of its leading corporate leaders, including Azim Premji and Anil Ambani.

Besides Clinton, the United States Government would be represented by its Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke and US Trade Representatives Ambassador Ron Kirk at the day-long deliberations between the corporate leaders of the two countries at the 34th annual convention of the USIBC.

The US officials are expected to articulate the policies of the Obama administration towards India and set the ball rolling for the rest part of Obama's current tenure.

In the first five months of its governance, the Obama administration had to wait for the elections in India to be over. Now that the new government has occupied its seat in New Delhi the White House does not want to waste any time and it now seems to be all set to put the relationship on fast track.

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26 people killed in China landslide: Report

BEIJING: Rescuers searched for 78 missing people Saturday after a landslide buried an iron ore plant and several homes in a valley in southwestern China.

Seven people were rescued, three of which were seriously injured, said an official with the propaganda office in the city of Chongqing, who would only give her surname, Zhu.

More than 500 rescuers looked for the dozens of missing, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

The 78 included residents and 27 workers buried in a mine, Zhu said.

Chinese President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao ordered local authorities to ``spare no efforts'' to save those buried, it said.

The area where the accident occurred Friday in Wulong county lies deep in the hills about 90 miles (150 kilometre) from Chongqing's urban center. Densely populated Chongqing is rich in iron ore, natural gas and other mineral resources, and industrial accidents frequently strike the area.

An official with the Chongqing work safety supervision bureau, who would give only his surname Dong because he was not authorized to speak to media, said the landslide did not appear to be related to mining activities.

Similar landslides have been reported around China, including one last year where at least 277 people were killed when a shoddy holding reservoir burst and a three-story wave of mud and iron-mining waste inundated a valley in Shanxi province in northern China.

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Air France Rio-Paris flight missing with 228 aboard

PARIS: An Air France plane on its way from Brazil to Paris has gone missing with 228 people on board, the airline said on Monday.

Its last known location was unclear. Brazilian television said the Brazilian air force had started a search mission over the Atlantic Ocean for the plane.

Flight AF 447 has 216 passengers and 12 crew on board. It left Rio de Janeiro on Sunday at 7 p.m. local time and was expected in Paris on Monday at 11:15 a.m. (0915 GMT).

"Air France regrets to announce that it is without news from flight AF 447, which was flying on the Rio de Janeiro - Paris Charles de Gaulle route and was scheduled to arrive at 11.15 a.m. today (0915 GMT)," an Air France spokesman said.

An Air France-KLM spokeswoman in Amsterdam said there had been no radio contact with the missing plane "for a while".

The plane was an Airbus 330-200, according to the Paris airports authority website. Air France said relatives of people travelling on board flight AF 447 were being taken care of in a special area of Charles de Gaulle airport.

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