TUESDAY, JANUARY 29, 2013
Islamists torch priceless manuscripts
France fears Islamist rise in Syria Page 8
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Iran sends monkey into space Iran denies report of explosion at key nuclear site DUBAI: Iran said yesterday it had launched a live monkey into space, seeking to show off missile delivery systems that are alarming the West which fears the technology could be used to deliver a nuclear warhead. The Defence Ministry announced the launch as world powers sought to agree a date and venue with Iran for resuming talks to resolve a standoff with the West over Tehran’s nuclear programme before it degenerates into a new Middle East war. Efforts to nail down a new meeting have failed repeatedly and the powers fear Iran is exploiting the diplomatic vacuum to hone the means to produce nuclear weapons. The Islamic Republic denies seeking weapons capability and says it seeks only electricity from its uranium enrichment so it can export more of its considerable oil wealth. The powers have proposed new talks in February, a spokesman for the European Union’s foreign policy chief said yesterday, hours after Russia urged all concerned to “stop behaving like children” and commit to a meeting. Iran earlier in the day denied media reports of a major explosion at one of its most sensitive, underground enrichment plants, describing them as Western propaganda designed to influence the nuclear talks. The Defence Ministry said the space launch of the monkey coincided “with the days of ” the Prophet Mohammad’s (PBUH) birthday, which was last week, but gave no date, according to a statement carried by the official news agency IRNA. The launch was “another giant step” in space technology and biological research “which is the monopoly of a few countries”, the statement said. The small grey monkey was pictured strapped into a padded seat and being loaded into the Kavoshgar rocket dubbed “Pishgam” (Pioneer) which on state media said reached a height of more than 120 km (75 miles), IRNA said. “This shipment returned safely to Earth with the anticipated speed along with the live organism,” Defence Minister Ahmad Vahidi told the semi-official Fars news agency. “The launch of Kavoshgar and its retrieval is the first step towards sending humans into space in the next phase.” There was no independent confirmation of the launch.
An image grab taken from Iran’s Al-Alam TV yesterday, shows an Iranian scientists at an unknown location holding a live monkey which the Tehran-based Arab-language channel said they sent up into space in a capsule and later retrieved intact. — AFP
Significant The West worries that long-range ballistic technology used to propel Iranian satellites into orbit could be put to use delivering nuclear warheads. Bruno Gruselle of France’s
Foundation for Strategic Research said that if the monkey launch report were true it would suggest a “quite significant” engineering feat by Iran. “If you can show that you are able to protect a vehicle of this sort from re-entry, then you can probably protect a military warhead and make it survive the high temperatures and high pressures of re-entering,” Gruselle said. The monkey launch would be similar to sending up a satellite weighing some 2,000 kg (4,400 pounds), he said. Success would suggest a capacity to deploy a surface-to-surface missile with a range of a few thousand kilometres (miles). But Michael Elleman, a missile expert at the International Institute for Strategic Studies think-tank, said Iran had demonstrated “no new military or strategic capability” with the launch. “Nonetheless, Iran has an ambitious space exploration programme that includes the goal of placing a human in space in the next five or so years and a human-inhabited orbital capsule by the end of the decade,” Elleman said. “Today’s achievement is one step toward the goal, albeit a small one.” The Islamic Republic announced plans in 2011 to send a monkey into space, but that attempt was reported to have failed. Nuclear-weapons capability requires three components - enough fissile material such as highly enriched uranium, a reliable weapons device miniaturised to fit into a missile cone, and an effective delivery system, such as a ballistic missile that can grow out of a space launch programme. Iran’s efforts to develop and test ballistic missiles and build a space launch capability have contributed to Israeli calls for pre-emptive strikes on Iranian nuclear sites and billions of dollars of US ballistic missile defence spending. Manoeuvring over next talks A spokesman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said the powers had offered a February meeting to Iran, after a proposal to meet at the end of January was refused. “Iran did not accept our offer to go to Istanbul on Jan. 28 and 29 and so we have offered new dates in February. We have continued to offer dates since December. We are disappointed the Iranians have not yet agreed,” Michael Mann reporters. He said Iranian negotiators had imposed new conditions for resuming talks and that EU powers were concerned this might be a stalling tactic. The last in a sporadic series of fruitless talks was held last June. Iranian officials deny blame for the delays
India rape case teen to be tried as minor NEW DELHI: An Indian teenager accused of taking part in the Dec 16 gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old student in New Delhi will be tried as a juvenile, facing a maximum of three years in prison if convicted, a special panel ruled yesterday. The ruling shocked the victim’s father, who watched the news flash across his television screen. “A sudden current ran through my body in disbelief. I can’t believe this,” the father told Reuters. “How can they declare him a minor? Do they not see what they did?” The teenager has not yet been formally charged because police were hoping he would be declared an adult so they could include him in the main trial of his five co-accused. He does not have a lawyer and his account of what happened on Dec 16 is not known. Lawyers for the five accused men said they would plead not guilty and one has accused police of torturing him, his lawyer said. The panel’s decision on the youth is likely to infuriate many people, including protesters, some police and political leaders, who have called for the age at which people can be tried as adults to be lowered to 16 from 18. A gov-
NEW DELHI: An Indian protestor holds a balloon with a slogan during a protest against last month’s gang rape and murder of a student. —AFP
ernment committee examining changes to sexual crime laws, however, last week ruled out such a move. Police allege that the 17-year-old and five men gang-raped and severely beat the student on a moving bus in the capital before dumping her and a male friend in the road. The woman was so badly injured that she died of massive organ failure in a Singapore hospital two weeks later. The case has sparked national debate about rampant crime against women, and President Pranab Mukherjee, made an unusual call in a television state-ofthe nation address on Friday for the country to “reset its moral compass”. A juvenile board, comprising a magistrate and two child welfare activists, said it accepted school records showing the juvenile, who may not be identified, as having been born on June 4, 1995. It said a bone density test to determine his age was not necessary. Police, who suspect that he is older than 17, said they could appeal the board’s ruling, although there was no immediate plan to do so. “This is wrong. We need the bone test to determine the accused real age, certificates can be forged,” the victim’s younger brother told Reuters by telephone. The teenager attended yesterday’s hearing but journalists waiting outside the building did not catch a glimpse of him. He will now stand trial before the juvenile board and if convicted will be sent to a juvenile detention centre. Across town, lawyers for his five fellow accused presented arguments for the first time yesterday in a pre-trial hearing that will determine what charges the five men will face when the case eventually goes to trial. Outside the wood-panelled courtroom dozens of policemen armed with bamboo canes or “lathis” jostled with reporters waiting to get a glimpse of the five accused. The men, wearing grey woollen caps and scarves to hide their faces, were hand-held by policemen as they were led inside. In India, all rape cases are held in closed court to protect the identity of the victim. This rule is being enforced in the New Delhi gang rape case even though the victim’s family has already said they are not opposed to her being identified. The judge hearing the case, Yogesh Khanna, has taken the additional steps of cautioning lawyers not to talk about the proceedings outside of court and warned the media not to repeat any information they glean from sources. The prosecutor had complained that defence lawyers were violating an earlier court order by briefing reporters. The scarcity of information about a case that shocked the world stands in stark contrast to the intense media coverage that preceded the start of the court proceedings. There is still simmering public outrage over police handling of the case and the slow response by the government, which was caught off guard by street protests that turned violent. Many Indians still have questions about what really happened on the night of Dec 16, what drove the women’s attackers to assault her so savagely, and how such a brutal crime could take place in an affluent and modern part of the capital. The government panel set up after the gangrape blamed police negligence for a climate of insecurity in New Delhi, known as India’s “rape capital”. — Reuters
and say Western countries squandered opportunities for meetings by waiting until after the US presidential election in November. “We have always said that we are ready to negotiate until a result is reached and we have never broken off discussions,” IRNA quoted Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi as saying. Salehi has suggested holding the next round in Cairo but said the powers wanted another venue. He also said that Sweden, Kazakhstan and Switzerland had offered to host the talks. In Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told a news conference: “We are ready to meet at any location as soon as possible. We believe the essence of our talks is far more important (than the site), and we hope that common sense will prevail and we will stop behaving like little children.” Ashton is overseeing diplomatic contacts on behalf of the powers hoping to persuade Tehran to stop higher-grade uranium enrichment and accept stricter UN inspections in return for civilian nuclear cooperation and relief from UN sanctions. Iran denies Fordow blast Reuters has been unable to verify reports since Friday of an explosion early last week at the underground Fordow bunker that some Israeli and Western media said wrought heavy damage. “The false news of an explosion at Fordow is Western propaganda ahead of nuclear negotiations to influence their process and outcome,” IRNA quoted deputy Iranian nuclear energy agency chief Saeed Shamseddin Bar Broudi as saying. In late 2011 the plant at Fordow began producing uranium enriched to 20 percent fissile purity, well above the 3.5 percent level normally needed for nuclear power stations. Western governments say the highergrade enrichment marks a notable step towards weapons-grade uranium, even though it is below the 90 percent level suitable for nuclear bombs. Iran says its enhanced enrichment is to make fuel for a Tehran research reactor that produces isotopes for medical care. Diplomats in Vienna, where the UN nuclear watchdog agency is based, said yesterday they had no knowledge of any incident at Fordow but were looking into the reports. One Western diplomat said he did not believe them to be correct. The UN International Atomic Energy Agency, which regularly inspects Iranian nuclear sites including Fordow, had no immediate comment. — Reuters