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World News
TURKS AND CAICOS WEEKLY NEWS
February 9 - 15, 2013
Argentina ‘will control Falklands within 20 years’ THE Falkland Islands will be back under Argentine control within “20 years”, the country’s foreign minister Hector Timerman has said. On a visit to London, he claimed “not one” other nation supported UK sovereignty of the Falklands. Speaking to the Guardian and Independent, Mr Timerman said Britain had “occupied” the islands for “access to oil and natural resources”. A referendum on the Falkland Islands political status will be held in March. Mr Timerman was meanwhile confronted by elected representatives of the Falkland Islands in the House of Commons Lobby on Tuesday. The foreign minister refused to accept a letter about the future of the Islands or to talk to the representatives. He was in the Commons to address the All Party Group on Argentina. ‘MISSED OPPORTUNITY’ Mr Timerman, who spoke to reporters at the Argentine embassy in London, said the UK “never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity to find a solution for the Malvinas”, the Argentine name for the islands. Relations between the British and Argentine government have soured in recent months. Last year marked 30 years since the Falklands War, when the islands were occupied by Argentine forces for 74 days. On the subject of re-gaining sovereignty, Mr Timerman said: “I don’t think it will take another 20 years. I think that the world is going through a process of understanding more and more that this is a colonial issue, an issue of colonialism, and that the people living there were transferred to the islands. “We have been trying to find a peaceful solution for 180 years. I think the fanatics are not in Buenos
Somali journalists protest against the arrest of Abdiaziz Abdinor Ibrahim, January, 27, 2013, Mogadishu.
Alleged Somali rape victim jailed Mr Timerman denied the Argentines were ‘fanatical’ about the Falklands
Aires [but] maybe in the United Kingdom because they are 14,000km (8,700 miles) away from the islands. “I think they are using the people living in the islands for political [reasons] and to have access to oil and natural resources which belong to the Argentine people. I think we are not fanatical at all,” he insisted Mr Timerman rejected an invitation to discuss the issue with Foreign Secretary William Hague last week, after Mr Hague invited members of the Falkland Islands government to the meeting. “According to the United Nations, there are only two parties to the conflict - the United Kingdom and the Republic of Argentina. It is an issue that has to be resolved by Argentina and the United Kingdom. “By introducing a third party [the Falklanders], the United Kingdom is changing more than 40 resolutions by the United Nations, which call the two countries to negotiate.” ‘FACE TO FACE’ The Argentine ruled out a “military
solution” to the dispute, but claimed “not one single country in the world” supports the British right to sovereignty over the Falklands. He refused to discuss whether Argentina would be prepared to thrash out a joint-sovereignty agreement or propose such a solution, saying: “When we sit down we will discuss everything that has to be discussed, not before. You don’t discuss through the media. You discuss face to face. “That is why I ask for a meeting with William Hague and he refused. If I can sit down with him, he will know what we think, but he refuses to sit down with us.” He also dismissed the forthcoming referendum - on whether the Islanders want to remain part of the British Overseas Territories - as meaningless. “If you ask the colonial people who came with a colonial power and replaced the people who were living in the islands, it is like asking the British citizens of the Malvinas Islands if they want to remain British,” he said. (BBC)
Report: Numerous countries involved in CIA interrogation programmes AS many as 54 countries participated in the overseas detention and rendition programmes overseen by the CIA in the years following the September 11 attacks, according to a new report from a human rights watchdog group. The report from the Open Society Justice Initiative is an extensive look at a programme that has remained largely unreported in its size and scale despite official acknowledgement from former President George W. Bush and other U.S. officials. According to the report, 136 people have been subjected to the process of rendition - the transfer of a terrorism suspect by the United States to a third
country for interrogation - or have been held in one of the so-called “black site” prisons in third countries run by the CIA. “The consequence of having so many partners engaged in these operations is that the United States is exposed to continuing embarrassment, liability and censure in multiple jurisdictions outside the United States,” Amrit Singh, the report’s author told CNN. The findings were derived from public sources, including documents from U.S. and foreign governments, inquiries from the European Parliament and Council of Europe, findings from human rights
investigations and news reports. The CIA secretly held detainees at detention facilities in Lithuania, Morocco, Poland, Romania and Thailand in addition to Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba according to the report. The report said that countries as varied as Azerbaijan, Canada, Denmark, Malawi, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Malaysia and Sri Lanka also participated through their interrogation, torture or role in capturing terror suspects. Cooperation could also include permitting the use of airspace for overflight rights of planes carrying terror suspects, the report said. (CNN)
A SOMALI court has sentenced a woman to a year in prison after she accused security forces of raping her. A journalist who interviewed her was also sentenced. The Mogadishu court ruled that the 27-year-old woman made false rape accusations against security forces during an interview last month, and in so doing insulted the government, according to rights groups. “A midwife testified ... that the woman was not raped after conducting a finger test, an unscientific and degrading practice that has long been discredited because it is not a credible test,” Human Rights Watch said in a statement. Though journalist Abdiaziz Ibrahim interviewed the woman but never filed a story, authorities also found him guilty of fabricating a false claim, according to rights groups. Both were sentenced to one year each Tuesday.
The court deferred the rape victim’s sentence for one year because she is breastfeeding, and ordered the release of her husband and two others who had helped her meet the journalist, according to rights groups. The alleged rape took place in August. “This case has been flawed by serious violations of due process from the start,” said Daniel Bekele, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “The long pre-trial detention without charge, official smears of the defendants in the media, and the abusive police efforts to discredit and intimidate a woman who alleged rape, point to a government more concerned with deflecting criticism than protecting ordinary citizens.” The case has sparked international condemnation, prompting Somalia to launch an Independent human rights commission. Prime Minister Abdi Farah Shirdon said the commission will investigate the case. (CNN)
Body of missing 13-yearold girl found naked in Northern California
THE naked body of a 13-yearold girl who went missing in Northern California last week has been found dumped in a park near her home. Seventh-grader Genelle Conway-Allen was last seen by surveillance cameras getting off a bus after a day at Green Valley Middle School on Thursday afternoon. A homeless man found her naked body in Fairfield, about five miles away from the bus stop, the following day. Police are now issuing an appeal for information. Conway-Allen’s aunt Natalie Paasch, 20, told the San Francisco Chronicle her niece was a ‘troubled child.” She had a hard life, and this is how it ends.
It’s tragic,” she said. “She was always the one looking out for her family, even when her family wasn’t looking out for her.” The homeless man who found the teen, 54-year-old Eric May, said “She looked like a mannequin. It hurts my soul to think someone could do that to a little girl. I’m haunted by the image of her laying there without a stitch of clothing.” May said he had been questioned by police but not detained. Relatives told the Chronicle that the victim and her brother were abandoned by their father and had moved around foster homes for much of their childhoods. (NYdailynews.com)