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16 Foreign News
Monday, 28 May, 2012
china ex-official held over rapes after online anger BEIJING AFP
Police arrested an ex-Communist Party official in central China on suspicion of raping at least 10 underage girls, authorities said Sunday, in a case that has sparked a storm of Internet anger. Li Xingong, the former deputy director of the party committee in Yongcheng city, Henan province, was arrested over the alleged sexual assaults on girls aged under 18, said a statement from the authorities. The case will be treated seriously “without leniency in accordance with the law”, the authorities said. “An investigation is under way and as soon as there is any progress, it will be announced.” The news prompted thousands of outraged comments from Chinese web users, who are increasingly confident in voicing anger about alleged wrongdoing by officials from China’s ruling Communist Party. “Fine party cadre. Good leader of the people,” said Wang Delong on Sina’s weibo, a microblog similar to Twitter. On the same site, Yawen posted: “An official again!”
Damascus denies role in houla massacre amid outcry DAMASCUS
Dubai: An aerial view shows Atlantis, The Palm on Palm Jumeirah in the Gulf emirate of Dubai on Sunday. Afp
AFP
Syrian army pounds rebel towns despite ‘massacre’ outcry DAMASCUS
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AFP
HE Syrian army kept up its bombardment of rebel strongholds on Sunday despite an international outcry over the killing of 92 people, a third of them children, in the shelling of a central town. Arab and Western governments expressed outrage at the “massacre” in the town of Houla on Friday and Saturday. But the rebel Free Syrian Army warned that unless the international community took concrete action it would no longer be bound by a UN-backed peace plan that was supposed to start with a ceasefire last month. Government troops raked rebel neighbourhoods of the central city of Hama with heavy machinegun fire, while the town of Rastan to its south came under artillery fire for a 14th straight day, a human rights watchdog said. Rebel fighters who pulled out of the flashpoint central city of Homs earlier this year in the face of a devastating assault by the army are holed up in Rastan, activists say. “The town is being hit at a rate of two shells a minute,” the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. Troops loyal to President Bashar alAssad also clashed with rebel fighters in the town of Harasta near Damascus.
The head of the UN military observer mission overseeing the ceasefire that was supposed to take effect on Apil 12 called what happened in Houla a “brutal tragedy.” “This morning UN military and civilian observers went to Houla and counted more than 32 children and over 60 adults killed,” Major General Robert Mood told reporters in Damascus on Saturday. “Whoever started, whoever responded and whoever carried out this deplorable act of violence should be held responsible,” Mood said. “Those using violence for their own agendas will create more instability, more unpredictability and may lead the country to civil war,” he added. UN chief Ban Kimoon and Kofi Annan, the international envoy who brokered the UN-backed peace plan, said the massacre was a “brutal” breach of international law. “This appalling and brutal crime, involving indiscriminate and disproportionate use of force, is a flagrant violation of international law,” a UN spokesman quoted Ban and Annan as saying. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also condemned the “atrocity” and said Washington would would work with its international allies to increase the pressure on President Bashar al-Assad and his “cronies” “Rule by murder and fear must come to an end,” she declared. Mood confirmed that artillery and
tanks had pounded Houla and called “on the Syrian government to cease the use of heavy weapons and to all parties to cease violence in all its forms.” Amateur videos posted on YouTube showed horrifying images of dead children, with at least one child’s head partly blown away. Angry residents voiced outrage over the killings as a UN team visited Houla on Saturday. “Some of the children were less than eight months old. What did they do? Did they also carry rocket-propelled grenades?” one man shouted at a visibly embarrassed UN observer. “We are human. Doesn’t the regime fear God?” he added. Another video posted on YouTube showed a mass grave filled with bodies wrapped in white sheets. “God curse you, Bashar al-Assad,” says the activist filming the video. “We get killed and the world watches. “Go to hell, you and your initiatives,” the man adds, in reference to the international community. Arab League foreign ministers are to hold an emergency meeting to discuss the killings, the bloc’s current president Kuwait said. “Kuwait will contact members of the Arab League to hold an emergency ministerial meeting to study the situation and take measures to put an end to the oppressive practices against the Syrian people,” a foreign ministry statement said. Kuwait has also made contacts at re-
gional and international levels “to urge the international community to assume its responsibility to stop the bloodshed,” the ministry said. ANNAN PEAcE PLAN gOINg tO ‘HELL’: A statement by the Free Syrian Army said it could no longer commit to the ceasefire and that unless the Security Council takes urgent steps to protect civilians, “Annan’s plan is going to go to hell.” Killings in Houla and elsewhere are taking place “under the eyes of the UN observers,” the rebel groups said, urging the international community to “announce the failure of the Annan plan.” The opposition Syrian National Council for its part demanded prompt action by the UN Security Council, which is to discuss the crisis on Wednesday. The Britain-based Observatory said the shelling of Houla began at around midday on Friday and continued until dawn on Saturday, and said 114 people were killed. State news agency SANA blamed “armed terrorist groups” for the killings, adding that “clashes led to the killing of several terrorists and the martyrdom of several members of the special forces.” The Observatory says more than 12,600 people have been killed since the uprising against Assad’s regime erupted in March last year, nearly 1,500 of them since the UN-backed ceasefire was supposed to take effect.
The Syrian government denied on Sunday its forces were responsible for killing 92 people, a third of them children, in the central city of Houla as Arab and Western states accused it of a massacre. The government was “not at all” responsible for the massacre in the central town of Houla that sparked an international outcry, foreign ministry spokesman Jihad al-Makdissi said. Blaming “terrorists” for the killings on Friday and Saturday, the spokesman said the government had opened an investigation. Makdissi added that UN-Arab envoy to Syria, Kofi Annan, was expected to arrive in Damascus on Monday, although there was no confirmation from the peace envoy’s spokesman. “We are under strict instructions not to disclose travel plans,” said Ahmad Fawzi in Geneva. Arab and Western governments have expressed outrage at the “massacre” in Houla. The rebel Free Syrian Army warned that unless the international community took concrete action it would no longer be bound by Annan’s UN-backed peace plan that was supposed to start with a ceasefire last month. Makdissi called for a return to “dialogue and the negotiation table” after people took to the streets in dozens of towns and cities across Syria on Saturday to denounce the Houla killings and call for the fall of the regime. The head of a UN observer mission, deployed under Annan’s plan, warned on Saturday of “civil war” in Syria after his observers counted more than 92 bodies, 32 of them children, in Houla. Amid mounting calls for world action to halt the bloodshed, UN Secretary General Ban Kimoon joined the chorus of international condemnation. “This appalling and brutal crime, involving indiscriminate and disproportionate use of force, is a flagrant violation of international law,” a UN spokesman quoted Ban and Annan as saying.
Nepal faces midnight deadline on new constitution KATHMANDU AFP
Nepal’s leaders held urgent talks Sunday to avoid a political crisis, with just hours remaining before a midnight deadline to agree a new post-war constitution or face the dissolution of parliament. The Constituent Assembly was elected in 2008 after a decade of civil war to write a new national constitution and oversee the peace process that began when the conflict ended in 2006. But the process has been deadlocked by demands for the country to be divided into states along ethnic lines and, after several deadline extensions, the 601-member assembly faces being disbanded to make way
for fresh elections. “If you go by the talks so far, the Constituent Assembly is headed for dissolution,” said Arjun Narsingh K.C., leader of the Nepali Congress, one of the nation’s four main parties. “We are not for the dissolution because this is the only elected body in Nepal.” Thousands of people from various ethnic and political groups gathered near the assembly, waving flags and chanting slogans as security forces prevented the crowd from getting too close. The police and army were on alert nationwide and ready to prevent any outbreak of violence, the Rajdhani daily newspaper said. The new constitution is intended to create a new secular, democratic republic following the abolition of Nepal’s centuries-old Hindu monarchy after the
Maoist rebels gave up arms and won the 2008 elections. It is also meant to bring stability to the impoverished Himalayan nation and unite its more than 100 ethnic minorities in a country traumatised by the death of 16,000 people in the civil war. But while the Maoists, who dominate the assembly, want the creation of up to 14 states named after ethnic groups, their rivals say dividing Nepal along ethnic lines will fuel unrest. Despite four extensions of the assembly’s mandate, it has been unable to complete the far-reaching document, and the Supreme Court has ruled that any further extensions would be illegal. Analysts predict three possible outcomes of Sunday’s talks, with the most likely being no agreement and the dissolution of
parliament. The other scenarios are agreement on a new constitution, or a compromise which passes a constitution with the contentious issues left out to be settled after the deadline. It is unclear what would happen if there is no agreement. Constituent Assembly chairman Subas Nembang has warned of a “political void”, with a caretaker government and president having no mandate, and no chamber in place to pass laws and rubber-stamp decisions. A group of leading public figures headed by Ratna Sansar Shrestha, a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nepal, released a statement urging the government not to rush a decision on new federal states. “Even in the final moments of the as-
sembly’s tenure, the voices of many marginalised and minority communities remain unheard,” it said. The widespread hope in Nepal that followed the end of the civil war and the abolition of the unpopular monarchy has been replaced by a growing sense of anger and frustration. Political instability has stifled economic growth, forcing many people to seek work overseas, and thousands of Nepalese have taken to the streets in recent weeks to protest at the lack of progress in their country. “No nation has drafted a constitution without turbulence. As we draw closer to writing the constitution, the atmosphere is getting charged,” political analyst Anand Jha wrote in the Republica English language daily.