Somalia Fighting Forces More to Flee Capital

A Somali woman and her child sit in front of a makeshift home after they fled fighting in Mogadishu, 09 Jun 2009

VOA, Nairobi, Derek Kilner, June 26 - The United Nations refugee agency says nearly 170,000 people have now been displaced from their homes in Somalia's capital since Islamist insurgents launched a renewed offensive in early May.

According to the U.N. refugee agency hospital records indicate that more than 250 people have been killed since May 7, and nearly 169,000 displaced. The UNHCR says the bulk of those fleeing their homes have headed to settlements for internally displaced people in Afgooye, south of Mogadishu, or have moved to safer areas of the capital and its outskirts. According to the agency, 33,000 people have been displaced in the last week alone.

In early May, the al-Shabab and Hizbul Islam militias launched a new offensive in Mogadishu in an effort to topple the internationally-backed transitional government of President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed. The insurgents reject the government's brand of Islamism as too moderate and want African Union peacekeepers to leave the country.

About 4,300 Ugandan and Burundian peacekeepers are deployed in the capital. Their presence has prevented key landmarks, including the president's residence, the port, and the airport, from falling under insurgent control, but they have had little success in stemming the overall fighting.

In a letter to the African Union ahead of a summit meeting in Libya early next month, the organization Human Rights Watch called on the AU to ensure that its peacekeepers respect human rights. While noting the extensive challenges faced by the mission, the group raised concern with reports that AU peacekeepers have fired indiscriminately at civilians, including an incident in February in which peacekeepers allegedly killed 13 civilians after their convoy came under attack.

The AU has appealed to the U.N. to take over responsibility for peacekeeping, but the Security Council has said the security situation remains too precarious.

Al-Shabab militiamen fire on Somali government troops in the streets of Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, 22 May 2009

Human Rights Watch is also urging African leaders to press the United Nations to establish a commission of experts to investigate rights abuses in the Somali conflict, saying it would be the first step towards providing accountability. The Africa director at Human Rights Watch, Georgette Gagnon, says much of the relevant information is already available through existing reports.

"There really isn't a lack of information per se about what's going on," said Gagnon. "The information is getting out. The real issue is what's being done about it which is very little, both at the Security Council in New York and to some extent by the African Union."

Meanwhile, the United States government has acknowledged sending arms to the Somali government. State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said the transitional government represents Somalia's best chance in 18 years to return to peace and stability.

"At the request of that government, the State Department has helped to provide weapons and ammunition on an urgent basis," said Kelly. "This is to support the Transitional Federal Government's efforts to repel the onslaught of extremist forces which are intent on destroying the Djibouti peace process and spoiling efforts to bring peace and stability to Somalia through political reconciliation."

Human Rights Watch's Georgette Gagnon says it has not yet received any information about the arms transfers. The group has been highly critical of Somalia policy under the Bush administration, including its support for Ethiopian forces who occupied the country from late 2006 to early this year, and its policy of launching air strikes against suspected terrorists. Gagnon.

"We've also been very concerned about U.S. policy in Somalia which frankly has not been good and has in our view to some extent increased the bad human rights situation there. So we've been calling on the new Obama administration to change its policy in Somalia," said Gagnon.

The United States has also said it believes that Eritrea is providing support to al-Shabab, which is on the U.S. list of terrorist organizations, suspected of links to al-Qaida.

Some Professors Losing Their Twitter Jitters

By Susan Kinzie
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 26, 2009

Mary Knudson requires students in her medical writing class to Twitter from a scientific conference and to write narratives in no more than 140 characters -- academia in disposable snippets.

Not only does Twitter teach students to write concisely with its strict limit on the length of posts, she said, but it also enables them to share valuable information -- links to stories about scientific discoveries, Web sites with new research and other material she never would have come across on her own.

Before she adopted Twitter, Knudson had to overcome her own reservations about the technology. It destroys the ability to spell, she said, as vowels are dropped or numerals used in place of words. She doesn't want her students to write online from conferences about medical discoveries, preferring they take time to consider the studies and discuss them with other researchers.

Adapting their teaching to take advantage of new technology, a small but growing number of college professors are using Twitter to keep discussions going long after class is over, share research, pose questions and gather information. Some use it to keep students engaged in large lecture halls by fostering a running online dialogue during class.

Some employ it to show students how technology is changing their field or changing history. Some, like Knudson, who teaches writing to graduate students at Johns Hopkins University, are using it as a writing tool -- encouraging students to write concisely and in a way that's engaging enough to retain readers.

Although many professors initially dismissed Twitter as another contributor to information overload, the site has gradually gained credibility as academics recognize how it can cultivate ideas and help gain knowledge from the crowd.

But the effort still baffles some, who know the site best for its cramped syntax and constant babble of thoughts posted by users ("stale bagel this morning," "2 tired 2 mow lawn"). They see it as the antithesis of intellectual discourse.

"Twitter is really about instantaneous notification. Class is supposed to be about deliberation and depth," said Siva Vaidhyanathan, associate professor of media studies and law at the University of Virginia. "It's beyond me to imagine a valuable use for it in the classroom."

Some have privacy concerns, saying that students should be able to explore ideas in college without a public digital record. Such services as Blackboard allow professors to communicate privately online with a class of students.

Others believe that the experimentation with Twitter is the latest sign of a real shift in education, away from a professor lecturing students to a more democratic and wide-ranging exchange of information.

"It changes the dynamic of the way people teach and the way people learn," said Monte Lutz, a visiting professor at Hopkins. "It encourages people to connect with each other. It can be almost a Socratic dialogue, in real time, in the class."

The effort comes as the technology has gained enough users to become a force for change. Just look at the way things are unfolding in Iran, Lutz said, where people around the world have been using Twitter to protest the recent election results. "People realize how quickly this has changed the way people communicate," he said.

At its best, professors said, Twitter creates a virtual collective stream of consciousness, a real-time flow of sometimes funny, sometimes newsy, sometimes thought-provoking observations, photos, conversations, documents, questions, videos and links. Because Twitter is public and searchable, people can find information and share it with others, spreading it virally.

Twitter makes it easy for a chemist at Johns Hopkins to share ideas, for Harvard University to broadcast updates about research and for scores of people to tweet their way through academic conferences. Those online conversations are often more interesting than the forums, several professors said, and continue long afterward.

Danna Walker, who teaches at American University, wants to use Twitter next semester to let students ask questions or give feedback during class. "I thought, 'I'll hit 'em where they live.' They're used to communicating this way -- via text-message and Facebook -- so this would be a great way to get them engaged in class. At least, that's my theory."

Students at Duke University were required to tweet and upload clips of movies they watched over a weekend after reading books about film theory, said Negar Mottahedeh, an associate professor. "They were constantly engaged in the work of the class," she said.

In a large introductory class, it is difficult to give each student individual attention, but online comments meant they could challenge and support one another, too, making learning less top-down, more collaborative. Mottahedeh was thrilled with the result, concluding that because their class work was public, they were much more conscious of what they were writing, more serious and more engaged than previous classes.

Twitter has reached into elementary school classrooms as well. Students at the British School of Washington have been sending out tweets at the end of many of their classes, giving them a chance to reflect on what they just learned and creating a concise archive of their lessons.

"Romeo and Juliet meet and kiss for the first time -- do we believe in love at first sight?" a recent tweet asked.

At Hopkins, Knudson uses Twitter as an extension of the classroom, asking students to raise questions, hold discussions online, keep up with breaking news and share links to interesting stories. She believes the limited number of characters allowed is a useful way to remember to choose words carefully, cut clutter and realize how much can be said in a small space, like a haiku.

There are people known for their writing on Twitter. As one example, she pointed to Arjun Basu, who has thousands of followers for his short-story tweets: "The marriage ended somewhere on a two lane road south of Cleveland. The kids in the backseat sensed it too. The kid in the trunk had no idea."

"As a child he delivered newspapers. As an adult he delivered bad news daily. Because he was a negative person. And the world's worst surgeon."

Matt Dozier, a graduate student of Knudson's, was surprised by her assignment but likes that his classmates then talk about class even after it's over. He tweeted updates from a symposium on ocean science and conservation on Capitol Hill recently, finding it intimidating at first to write about complex topics within the length constraints. And without the luxury of listening to an entire presentation, it was hard to decide what to highlight.

"It was good practice to pick out interesting things that are happening live and try to get them across as quickly -- with the most impact -- as you possibly could."

He enjoys watching Twitter evolve as people keep finding new uses for it and is surprised it has taken hold. "It's not something that would have occurred to anybody that this would be useful at all," he said.

U.S. Troops, Civilians to Become Less Protected on July 1

By Ernesto Londoño

Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, June 26, 2009

BAGHDAD, June 25 -- U.S. military officials fear that the closure of inner-city bases and restrictive guidelines that go into effect next week will leave American troops and civilians in Iraq more vulnerable.

Of particular concern is a new rule that bars U.S. troops from using mine-resistant armored vehicles in urban areas during the day, officials said.

Also worrisome, they said, is the recent closure of a small outpost in eastern Baghdad that is adjacent to a site militiamen have used to launch deadly rocket attacks on the Green Zone.

Thousands of U.S. combat troops will remain at a handful of bases in Baghdad and on the outskirts of other restive cities, such as Mosul and Kirkuk, in northern Iraq, past the June 30 deadline. But U.S. troops say their ability to respond quickly to thwart attacks could erode significantly because Iraqi officials will have unprecedented authority over their mobility and missions in urban areas.

"We won't be providing the same level of security for ourselves and Iraqis," said 2nd Lt. Jason Henke, a military police platoon leader who will remain at one of the few inner-city bases in Baghdad. "With only a small window of time that we are allowed to operate in, it's going to be easier to target U.S. forces when we are outside the wire."

Henke's concerns were heightened this week by a string of powerful roadside bombings near his base, Joint Security Station Loyalty, in central Baghdad.

On Tuesday, one of his squadrons was attacked with an armor-piercing bomb that struck the passenger side of a mine-resistant armored vehicle, igniting the fuel line. His platoon lost another truck Thursday in a similar attack.

As other soldiers rushed to help their comrades out of the burning vehicle, insurgents opened fire with AK-47 assault rifles in the densely populated area.

The soldiers returned fire and escaped without injuries, said Henke, 29, of Newbury Park, Calif. But had they been in a Humvee, a smaller, less-fortified vehicle soldiers will use during daytime as of next month, "they would have all been killed -- all of them," Henke said.

Two other powerful roadside bombs that day were placed on the same route, not far from Iraqi National Police checkpoints, Henke said. One seriously wounded a soldier. Another that detonated nearby on Wednesday night killed an Iraqi police commander. The Pentagon spent billions of dollars in 2007 on the mine-resistant, ambush-protected vehicles. They are believed to have contributed significantly to the decrease in American deaths in Iraq.

Ten U.S. soldiers were wounded in an ambush Thursday in Baghdad. A military spokesman provided no details about the incident. Nevertheless, attacks on U.S. troops remain low compared to other periods of the six-year war, but American commanders say they anticipate an increase in coming weeks as insurgents seek to make a statement after the first deadline of a security agreement that charts the withdrawal of U.S. soldiers.

In the past few days, several attacks in urban areas, including two that each killed more than 75 Iraqis, have heightened concern about the readiness of Iraq's security forces to operate with limited American assistance.

Brig. Gen. Stephen R. Lanza, the top U.S. military spokesman in Iraq, said U.S. troops would depend on their Iraqi counterparts more than ever to detect and respond to threats.

"We'll be relying a lot on the Iraqis for situational awareness," he told reporters Wednesday.

Several soldiers and officers said they doubt that Iraqi security forces will be willing or even able to stop the types of attacks faced primarily by U.S. soldiers. Those include strikes with armor-piercing grenades and armor-piercing roadside bombs.

"The vulnerability of our soldiers will increase when the Iraqi police and the Iraqi army come to the realization that they don't need to take suggestions from our soldiers," a top U.S. military official said on the condition of anonymity so as to speak candidly. "The only reason they listen to us is we give them equipment and money. Once we pull out, much of that stops."

The security agreement gives U.S. soldiers the right to self-defense. But U.S. commanders have struggled in recent months to clearly define how they will exercise that right after June 30. Any perceived overreaction or violation of the security agreement is bound to anger Iraqi leaders, many of whom have tied their political futures to the U.S. pullout and their ability to handle security with minimal help from the Americans.

Lanza declined to say how many soldiers will remain in urban areas or at how many facilities they will remain, saying the final details are still being worked out.

At least 10 facilities that house U.S. troops in Baghdad will remain open past the deadline, including two bases in the Green Zone, according to officials familiar with the list that the Iraqis agreed to.

In recent days, the Iraqi government declined to allow the Americans to keep a small outpost called Comanche on the edge of Sadr City, in eastern Baghdad, that was instrumental in stopping the barrage of rocket and mortar attacks that terrorized residents of the Green Zone in 2007 and 2008.

Kadhum Irboee al-Quraishi, a leader in Sadr City who has worked closely with the Americans, said residents are bracing for violence in coming days. A bombing Wednesday at a bird market that killed more than 75 people was the deadliest attack in the vast Shiite slum in more than a year.

"Sadr City is huge," Quraishi said. "It's not easy to control it. I'm pretty sure that roadside bombs and mortar attacks will be back just like before."

Human Rights Lawyers 'Disbarred' by Paperwork

By Ariana Eunjung Cha
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, June 26, 2009

BEIJING -- In the five years since it was founded, the Yitong Law Firm has established itself as one of the country's fiercest human rights advocates. It represented Hu Jia, the dissident who spoke out against the Tiananmen Square crackdown and on behalf of HIV/AIDS patients; Chen Guangcheng, the blind activist who exposed forced abortions; and hundreds of others its lawyers felt had been wrongly imprisoned.

Its success rate isn't stellar -- it has won at most 60 percent of its cases. But in a country where rule of law is still a work in progress and calling for democracy is often treated as a crime against the state, Yitong and other human rights firms have spoken out for people who otherwise would have been silenced.

Those days may be over.

Since the beginning of 2009 -- a sensitive year filled with anniversaries of uprisings -- the Chinese government has been forcing human rights law firms such as Yitong to shut down.

Formally, there is no crackdown; no police are swooping in to seize files or send attorneys en masse to labor camps. Instead, Beijing is simply using its administrative procedures for licensing lawyers and law firms, declining to renew the annual registrations, which expired May 31, of those it deems troublemakers. Human rights groups say dozens of China's best defense attorneys have effectively been disbarred.

"It's a collective strike," said Cheung Yiuleung, a leader of the China Human Rights Lawyers Concern Group, an advocacy organization based in Hong Kong. "Compared with individual warnings, the annual check of licenses is more effective. . . . It has had a frightening effect on all lawyers on the mainland."

A few prominent lawyers have met with even harsher treatment. One has gone missing: Gao Zhisheng -- who defended religious minorities such as members of Falun Gong and underground Christians, was a nominee for last year's Nobel Peace Prize and whose family fled China and sought asylum in the United States in March -- was taken by security agents from his home in Shaanxi province Feb. 4 and has not been heard from since.

Several lawyers say they have been beaten en route to meetings with clients in human rights cases. Others have been detained, questioned, put under house arrest for days or weeks and told they must be accompanied by police escorts whenever they leave their homes.

In late May, 17 human rights attorneys whose licenses have been suspended signed an open letter saying authorities are engaging in the "full-scale repression of rights" of defense lawyers "to an unprecedented degree."

With high unemployment from factory closings due to the global economic crisis, China's leaders have expressed concern that the sporadic outbreaks of social unrest in recent months might spread, and they have sought to keep those who might stir up dissent, such as human rights lawyers, under tight rein.

Their concerns are compounded by this year's significant dates: the 50th anniversary of the Tibetan uprising that led to the Dalai Lama's flight to India, the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, and the first anniversary of protests over the shoddy construction that caused many deaths in last year's Sichuan province earthquake.

Attorneys whose licenses have not been renewed as of this month include Li Xiongbing, who represented victims of contaminated infant formula against the manufacturer Sanlu; Li Chunfu, who has been working on two cases involving wrongful death while in custody; and Wang Yaiun, who fought for the rights of migrant workers who left the countryside to work in urban factories.

Jiang Tianyong, an attorney with the firm Beijing Globe-Law who represents the parent of a child who died during the Sichuan earthquake and Tibetan monks arrested during last year's riots, said he had been warned last year not to take those cases. Representatives of the government's legal affairs bureau came "to talk to me and try to persuade me not to do it. I said, 'Since the law doesn't forbid me, why can't I do that?' "

Because "I don't listen to them and am not controlled," Jiang said, he was not entirely surprised when he learned this month that the renewal of his annual license, typically a formality, had been denied. He said he has been talking to other lawyers in his situation about starting a new, nongovernmental organization or advocacy group so they can continue to help those in need.

Not everyone is as unwavering under government pressure.

Wei Liangyue, head of the Jiaodian Law Firm in the northeastern city of Harbin, said this year was the first time in 21 years his license has not been renewed. In addition, he said, he was detained by police from March 1 to 30, and although he was not given any explanation in writing, he was told he was being punished for taking on Falun Gong clients.

"When I accepted these cases, I already expected the risks. I made my decision for intuitive knowledge and fairness. My decision is right," Wei said. However, he continued, "in the future, I might not touch sensitive cases like this."

Tang Jitian of the Beijing Anhui Law Firm said that the license issue has caused a rift in his office, where some of the lawyers handle human rights cases and others work on less sensitive issues.

"Some lawyers understand us and support us. But some lawyers told the head of the law firm that either we leave or they leave," said Tang, whose license was not renewed and who was detained by police from June 3 to 7 in the basement of a Beijing hotel.

In Yitong's case, managing partner Li Jinsong said authorities ordered the law firm to close for six months starting in mid-March because it employed a lawyer who was not properly licensed. Li called the charge absurd, saying the lawyer held a valid license to practice in another Chinese city and had filed an application to transfer it to Beijing, where the firm is based. Moreover, the penalty -- shutting down the entire firm -- is "100 percent illegal," Li said.

Yitong has appealed the ruling, but it has already had a devastating effect. The firm once attracted some of China's top legal talent -- idealistic men and women in their 30s and 40s, many of whom followed other legal career paths but switched to human rights advocacy because they wanted to make a difference in Chinese society. But now, of the more than 20 attorneys who once worked at its offices, only five are left. The others, concerned about their ability to support their families, took jobs at less controversial firms.

"As a law firm, we must make money. But since we have closed for more than three months, I don't even know if Yitong will still exist," Li said. "I am not sure if we will still have enough money to pay the rent."

Still, Li said he remains determined to take on human rights cases and is hopeful that in the future, lawyers will be able to operate more freely.

"There has to be someone who continues walking on this road. The more people walk, the wider the road will become," he said. "I will fight until I'm beaten to death."

Researchers Zhang Jie and Liu Liu contributed to this report.

Le Sandwich Takes a Bite Out of French Tradition

FranceBy Edward Cody
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, June 26, 2009

PARIS, June 25 -- Ah, France, bastion of the three-hour lunch. First comes the appetizer, followed by the main course, then cheese and dessert, washed down with red wine and, along with an espresso at the finale, maybe a little cognac to enhance digestion back at the office.

Well, yes and no.

While they have not abandoned their love of food, French people increasingly are resorting to a humble sandwich for the noon meal. Some even gulp it down with a soft drink while sitting at their desks. So much so that the consumption of sandwiches in France has grown by more than a quarter over the past six years, to 1.8 billion annually, and climbed by 10 percent last year, according to market researchers.

Moreover, the change has often come at the expense of neighborhood cafes, where lunch still means a hot dish like grandma used to make and sitting around the table for an hour of conversation with friends or colleagues. The number of bars and cafes in France has fallen from 200,000 half a century ago to 38,600, according to industry associations. More than 2,000 went out of business last year alone as an indoor smoking ban took effect and the world economic crisis bit into budgets.

The shifting lunchtime habits, which are more pronounced in large cities such as Paris, are part of a social tug of war in France between the imperatives of a modern industrial economy and a long-cherished tradition of fine food produced and prepared by artisans devoted to their crafts. The increasingly common sight of a young French office worker walking down the street munching on a sandwich suggests tradition is more and more on the losing side as the years go by.

"If they were home, or near home, maybe they would have a real meal," explained Jean Rossi, a market researcher at the Gira Food Service consulting company who has investigated the sandwich phenomenon. "But their offices are one hour or more from their homes, and with their limited buying power, the sandwich is an obvious solution."

For instance, McDonald's has enjoyed rising business in France for the past five years, taking full advantage of the evolution. Income at its more than 1,100 French outlets rose by 11 percent in 2008 despite the economic crisis, the company reported.

Most French people still prefer to eat a full lunch when they can, following age-old custom in the country and its Latin neighbors, such as Spain and Italy, industry officials said. As a result, sandwich consumption per capita is still lower than in other countries. Britons, for instance, eat several times as many as Frenchmen.

"The function of a meal in France is not just to take on energy, and it never will be," cautioned Nawfal Trabelsi, vice president for marketing and communications at McDonald's in France.

But the change, Rossi and others pointed out, is that French people increasingly are willing to forgo their tradition of a sit-down lunch if they face time constraints or are low on funds. The younger they are, the more easily they make the decision, he added.

Yannis Athenes, a 24-year-old computer engineer, is one of the people Rossi was talking about. Athenes handed over about $5 one recent day for a grilled salmon sandwich prepared at a little stand outside the Benjamin Cafe on Rivoli Street, in a busy shopping district just north of the Seine. Athenes said he sits down for a full lunch whenever he can but frequently resorts to sandwiches because of a lack of time.

"The truth is," he said, holding up his sandwich, "I'm going to eat this while driving. I have appointments set up that I have to get to, and I just don't have the time to sit down for a real meal."

Xavier Mazzoni, who operates the stand, said he left his job in a traditional restaurant a little over two years ago to open the sandwich stand, renting the space from the cafe owner. As clients lined up to be served, Mazzoni, 42, said he has to get up at 5 a.m. to make the sandwiches -- tuna, chicken, ham, cheese, salmon -- but is rewarded with enough business to bring in a good living and finance a planned beach vacation this summer for his two children.

A waiter circulating among the traditional cafe tables only a few feet away acknowledged that Mazzoni's sandwich stand drains away food business from the Benjamin, which advertises in gold letters painted on the wall that it offers "traditional cuisine."

"But we have to live with it," he said.

As he set down a cola for one 20-something woman with swept-back hair, she pulled a sandwich out of her bag and bit into it. Unmoved, the waiter shuffled off to tend to other customers.

The problem is, Mazzoni said, that about five other stands have opened up in the neighborhood since his arrival to try to take advantage of the sandwich boom. Across France, the number of shops and stands selling sandwiches has risen to more than 32,000, doing about $13 billion in business, industry research shows.

But the surge in the new sales pattern may slump a little in 2009; since the beginning of this year, Mazzoni noted, the economic crisis has produced a dip even in sandwich consumption, with some of his previously steady customers reverting to bringing a lunch pail to the office.

Part of the most recent sandwich boom, particularly last year's steep rise, can be attributed to the crisis, which has carved into food budgets even in a country where many businesses subsidize employee lunches. A sandwich and soft drink in Paris run between $4 and $6, while a sit-down lunch easily hits $18 to $20 even in a simple cafe.

But the increase in sandwich consumption also reflects a long-term generational change in the way French people, particularly the urban young, view their noontime meal. Although older people cling to the idea that a full meal is a necessary part of the day, those under 40 think nothing of grabbing a sandwich if it will save money or time. For an up-and-coming French businessman, lunch may not be for wimps, but it has become expendable.

First-class business travelers on the three-hour train between Paris and Brussels in the 1980s, for instance, used to enjoy long lunches served by waiters in crisp white tunics who, for a price, proposed four courses and poured good wine into crystal glasses. The same trip now takes a little over an hour; travelers have the choice in a bar car between club sandwiches or "wraps" that they can carry back to their seats with plastic cups for airline-style mini-bottles of wine or cans of beer.

For Palestinian Forces, a Growing Role in West Bank

By Howard Schneider
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, June 26, 2009

QALQILYAH, West Bank -- It began with the smell of smoke at the Ayyoub al-Ansari mosque and a routine call to the local fire department, but over the next six weeks, it developed into a full-fledged counterterrorism operation.

Palestinian security officials, who joined firefighters at the scene, noticed an oddly placed stairwell and found that it led to an underground room stocked with chemicals, guns and a ready-to-go explosives vest. Follow-up arrests and investigation helped uncover a militant safe house and led to a climactic gun battle in late May in which two men from the Islamist Hamas movement -- who had long eluded Israeli capture -- died in a hail of Palestinian fire, according to Palestinian, U.S. and Israeli officials. Three police officers and another resident of the house were also killed.

The fight last month in this northern West Bank town has emerged as a potential turning point in cooperation between Israeli and Palestinian security officials, a relationship central to the future emergence of a Palestinian state. Palestinian police and security forces have assumed increasing control over towns in the occupied West Bank, a process that took a significant step forward Thursday when Israel agreed to limit military incursions in four major Palestinian cities.

Amid a marked decline in violence in and emanating from the West Bank, the Israel Defense Forces said its troops would no longer enter Ramallah, Bethlehem, Jericho and Qalqilyah unless there are "urgent security needs." The agreement, struck at a Palestinian command center outside Bethlehem where commanders from the two sides gathered on Wednesday night, authorizes Palestinian police and security troops to remain in control of the four cities 24 hours a day. They had previously pulled back between midnight and 5 a.m. to avoid "friendly fire" encounters with IDF patrols.

The agreement stops short of recent demands by Palestinian officials that the IDF pull back fully from "area A" -- the mostly urban territory that, under the 1993 Oslo accords, was put under the authority of Palestinian forces. The Oslo arrangement unraveled beginning in 2000 when a violent intifada, or uprising, led the IDF to reestablish control over the entire West Bank and surround Palestinian cities with checkpoints and barriers.

Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said Israel should move more quickly to bolster Palestinian control in the West Bank -- and prove that cooperation will show results more effectively than the confrontational approach taken by the Hamas movement. Hamas, in control of the Gaza Strip, has criticized Palestinian security efforts in the West Bank for helping Israel, and said that its members have borne the brunt of policing efforts.

"We have a domestic constituency, too," Fayyad said in an interview last week. "We need to carry people with us in this process."

The changes announced Thursday reinforce a step-by-step approach that Israeli military officials say will minimize the risk of a major attack that could set back progress. Israeli military and political officials say their intelligence and other operations laid a foundation that Palestinian forces have built on but are not yet ready to assume full control over.

In recent months, Israel has lifted some of the central checkpoints it had established around West Bank cities. At Wednesday's meeting, the Israelis agreed to curtail inspections at others and begin removing some of the concrete blocks and other barriers to movement in the West Bank, according to a Palestinian commander who was present.

IDF raids are still common, particularly in flash-point cities such as Hebron and Nablus -- a fact Fayyad said undermines Palestinian credibility more than it helps Israel's security. But Israeli commanders say they are now trying to reduce the IDF presence in the West Bank as Palestinian forces increase theirs.

"We've started to see change. Less terror. More law and order," said a senior Israeli military source. Palestinian Authority forces "fought Hamas terrorists in Qalqilyah, terrorists that we were looking for. They killed them, and they lost some people. They have the will to win. To protect their country."

The assessment stands in contrast to the situation in the Gaza Strip, where rocket and mortar fire by Hamas and other militant groups into Israel triggered a three-week war in December and January, and a tightened Israeli blockade of the area.

In the West Bank, European officials have been training Palestinian municipal police. A separate U.S.-funded effort has shipped hundreds of recruits to Jordan for a four-month program designed to improve the Palestinian National Security Forces. Partly about security and partly about nation-building, the program is meant to break down clan and political ties by drawing troops from across the West Bank and molding them into geographically diverse units.

Four battalions of about 500 people each have been deployed to Palestinian cities in the last two years, with six more battalions planned. The muscle behind operations like the one in Qalqilyah, they have helped curb overall crime in the West Bank, allowed nightlife to return in some cities, and have been credited by Israeli officials, at least partially, with causing a drop in attacks inside Israel proper.

In addition, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Fayyad have restructured the chaotic quilt of security and paramilitary forces maintained by the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat under a unified command that is gaining Israeli trust. Top Palestinian commanders meet biweekly with Israeli brigade leaders under Israel's chief West Bank officer, Brig. Gen. Noam Tibon -- a level of interplay not seen since the intifada, and the peak of Israeli-Palestinian cooperation in the years after Oslo.

In some cases, veteran commanders from Arafat's years have emerged as what the U.S. and Israelis regard as streetwise and seasoned leaders, now given more of the tools, the authority and the political backing to do their jobs.

When Israel began military operations in Gaza in late December, there was concern about the potential for violence in the West Bank. In the offices of Palestinian commanders such as Col. Suleiman Omran, a veteran of Arafat's Fatah party, the fax machine began humming early on the day of the invasion -- with clear orders to allow peaceful protest, but nothing more.

Omran, in charge of Palestinian security forces in the Bethlehem governate, said emotions ran high among the security chiefs he gathered in an operations room on the first day of the war. But all agreed that a collapse of order in the West Bank would only damage the ultimate goal of Palestinian statehood.

The plans were set: boost the guard near Rachel's Tomb and other sites Israelis visit, guard against possible snipers shooting at the Jewish settlement of Gilo, put Palestinian intelligence agents on overtime to keep in touch with sources, and call in political party leaders to discourage incitement.

"As a security service, we were issued clear instructions: Any expression of opposition according to the law is allowed, anything else goes to court," Omran said. "We are not working on behalf of the Israelis, or on behalf of the Americans or the Arabs. Our work is clear: There is Palestinian law."

Arab Activists Watch Iran And Wonder: 'Why Not Us?'

By Sudarsan Raghavan
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, June 26, 2009

CAIRO, June 25 -- Mohamed Sharkawy bears the scars of his devotion to Egypt's democracy movement. He has endured beatings in a Cairo police station, he said, and last year spent more than two weeks in an insect-ridden jail for organizing a protest.

But watching tens of thousands of Iranians take to the streets of Tehran this month, the 27-year-old pro-democracy activist has grown disillusioned. In 10 days, he said, the Iranians have achieved far more than his movement has ever accomplished in Egypt.

"We sacrificed a lot, but we have gotten nowhere," Sharkawy said.

Across the Arab world, Iran's massive opposition protests have triggered a wave of soul-searching and conflicting emotions. Many question why their own reform movements are unable to rally people to rise up against unpopular authoritarian regimes. In Egypt, the cradle of what was once the Arab world's most ambitious push for democracy, Iran's protests have served as a reminder of how much the notion has unraveled under President Hosni Mubarak, who has ruled the country for 30 years.

"I am extremely jealous," said Nayra El Sheikh, 28, a blogger and Sharkawy's wife. "I can't help but think: Why not us? What do they have that we don't have? Do they have more guts?"

The frustration comes against a backdrop of deep-rooted skepticism among pro-democracy activists that U.S. policies under President Obama will help transform the region, despite his vow to engage the Muslim world in a highly publicized speech here last month. Some view Obama's response to Iran's protests, muted until Tuesday, as a harbinger of U.S. attitudes toward their own efforts to reform their political systems. The Egyptian government, they note, is a key American ally, and U.S. pressure on Egypt for reforms began subsiding in the last years of the Bush administration.

"When Obama does not take a stance, the very next day these oppressive regimes will regard this as a signal. This is a test for his government," said Ayman Nour, a noted Egyptian opposition politician who was recently released from jail. "If they can turn a blind eye to their enemy, they can turn a blind eye to any action here in Egypt."

When the Iranian protests erupted, Ahmed Abd el-Fatah wrote on his blog, "We Egyptians are like youth watching pornography because they can't practice sex. Congratulations to Iran for its democracy."

"I was very happy about what was happening. But I was also very sad. I know I can never do this here," the thin, 22-year-old activist said. "You need a far greater movement than in Iran to achieve any change in Egypt."

For years, Egypt's democracy movement has used Internet technology, banners and slogans to galvanize its supporters, rallying often against U.S. policies and taking the lead in championing core Arab causes such as the plight of Palestinians or opposition to war in Iraq. Today, the movement is facing a crisis of leadership and vision and is torn by internal disputes, activists said.

Meanwhile, the government has taken advantage of the void to crush the opposition through arrests, beatings and round-the-clock surveillance. Dissent, even online, is not tolerated. Egyptian security officials routinely monitor cellphones and social networking sites such as Facebook and hack into the e-mails of anyone they deem suspicious, activists said.

"We have a very weak opposition. We don't have a civil society. The police are very powerful," said Fahmy Howeidy, a columnist for Ahram, an independent newspaper. "In Iran, at least there are real elections. We've never had any real elections here in 50 years. Our society has been weakened. We have not allowed political groups to grow."

Many believe Nour is one leader capable of capturing the imagination of Egyptians. But the government keeps a close watch. He's not allowed to work. He can't have a bank account, and his travel is restricted.

Fatah noted that many of the Iranian protesters appear to be from the social elite. In Egypt, most people are more concerned about food and other basic necessities than politics. More than a quarter of Egypt's 80 million people are illiterate, and only 8 percent have access to the Internet.

"The elite here are limited, and most are working in hand with the regime," Fatah said. "And the only reason the Egyptian street has risen up is over money, salaries or prices. The minute the police arrive, there is silence."

"We're too passive," El Sheikh said. "Protesters go downtown, perhaps 20 or 30 at a time. The security forces come. They beat them senseless. They detain them. And that's as good as it gets."

Ali el din Hilal, chief spokesman for the ruling National Democratic Party, noted that opposition newspapers and parties are allowed to operate in Egypt. "It isn't true that the government cracks down on every movement or demonstration," he said. "Egyptians have many freedoms."

On Wednesday, Fatah said he received a Facebook message announcing a protest in downtown Cairo the next day to support "democracy" in Iran and to mourn the death of Neda Agha Soltan, the young woman whose killing, captured on video, has become a global symbol of the Iranian uprising.

On Thursday, 10 large green trucks filled with riot police arrived at the meeting place. Not a single protester showed up.

"It's a demonstration. It doesn't matter what it is about. They will stop it," Fatah said.

Arab activists on the street have not been inspired by the Iranian protesters as they have been by Palestinians or Iraqis in recent years. In part, this reflects the religious and ideological fissure between the mostly Sunni Arab world and an ascendant Shiite Iran that has deepened across the region since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

"There are some religious groups who stress that they are Shiites and that they are different than Sunnis," said Mohamed Mustafa, 35, a lawyer who has participated in anti-government demonstrations. "It is easy to manipulate the feelings of Egyptians through religious beliefs."

"Shiites are more disciplined and organized. It's a part of their culture and religion," said Anwar Ahmed, 62, another lawyer, offering his explanation for why predominantly Sunni Egypt has not risen up against Mubarak.

The two sat with other lawyers in a courtyard of the lawyers' syndicate building, a hot spot for demonstrations in downtown Cairo.

Most of the group said they admired Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and wanted him to remain in power -- chiefly because he was America's foe. "Anyone who can stand up to the United States and force his nation's interest forward, we'll support him," said Ahmed Mattar, 29.

In the blogosphere, too, activists are divided into two camps, further explaining the subdued Arab response to Iran's clashes. One side views Iran's disputed June 12 election as fair and argues that the protests were orchestrated by the West. The other side views the protests as a mass movement that needs to be supported. Many question whether opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi is actually a reformist.

"I am somewhere in the middle," Fatah said. "But I support Ahmadinejad."

Resentment is also growing among Arabs over the condemnations by European nations and by Obama on Tuesday of the state-sponsored violence against Iranian protesters. Many say they see a double standard.

"Here, in the last presidential election, the police used live ammunition," Sharkawy said. "Why didn't the West speak out against what was happening to us, when we had much smaller numbers? You become skeptical. We understand the United States and the West will pursue their own interests. They don't want a strong Egyptian government that will have separate opinions from the West."

Egypt and other Sunni Arab governments have also been silent on Iran, despite their wariness of the Iranian regime's influence on Shiite militant groups in Lebanon and Iraq and on Palestinian Islamist groups. Some analysts say the governments worry about triggering similar popular upheavals at home. Hilal, the ruling party spokesman, acknowledged that Egypt did not want to interfere because it expects other nations not to interfere in its domestic affairs.

"We may face a similar situation in the future," he said.

That's precisely what 28-year-old blogger Ahmed Maher wants. He said he was arrested and beaten last year for organizing a Facebook protest. Today, he keeps a low profile, changing his online passwords and cellphone numbers frequently.

But the Iranian protests have inspired him to think of new ways to organize people and raise political awareness in Egypt. He said he has two years to figure it out.

"It makes me think of 2011 -- our next presidential election," Maher said. "I think we will become like the people they are beating up in Iran now."

Special correspondent Sherine al-Bayoumi contributed to this report.

Iran's Ahmadinejad Demands Apology From Obama

By Thomas Erdbrink and William Branigin
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, June 26, 2009

TEHRAN, June 25 -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad lashed out at President Obama on Thursday, warning him against "interfering" in Iranian affairs and demanding an apology for criticism of a government crackdown on demonstrators protesting alleged electoral fraud.

Despite an increasingly harsh response to the protests, opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi pledged to continue challenging official results that showed a landslide victory for Ahmadinejad in Iran's June 12 presidential election. He vowed to resist growing pressure to end his campaign and said he remains determined to prove that those who rigged the election are also responsible for the violence unleashed on opposition protesters.

The two rivals issued their dueling statements -- neither mentioning the other by name -- a day after security forces broke up the latest demonstrations, then temporarily detained university professors who had met with Mousavi.

Two grand ayatollahs, leading figures in Iran's predominant Shiite Muslim faith, also waded into the fray, as did European foreign ministers from the Group of Eight world powers at a meeting in Italy.

In a speech at a petrochemical plant in southern Iran, Ahmadinejad said Obama was behaving like his predecessor, George W. Bush, and suggested that talks with the United States on Iran's nuclear program would be pointless if Obama kept up his criticism. Obama, who has expressed interest in talking to the Iranian leadership about the nuclear issue, said at a news conference Tuesday that he was "appalled and outraged" by recent violence against demonstrators, and he accused the Iranian government of trying to "distract people" by blaming the unrest on the United States and other Western nations.

"Do you want to speak with this tone?" Ahmadinejad responded Thursday, addressing Obama. "If that is your stance, then what is left to talk about?"

He added: "I hope you avoid interfering in Iran's affairs and express your regret in a way that the Iranian nation is informed of it." He asked why Obama "has fallen into this trap and repeated the comments that Bush used to make" and told the U.S. president that such an attitude "will only make you another Bush in the eyes of the people."

Ahmadinejad also praised Iran's election as demonstrating "the great capabilities and grandeur of the Iranian nation" and declared that his country is practicing true "freedom," as opposed to "this unpopular democracy which is governing America and Europe." Americans and Europeans "have no right to choose and are restricted to . . . two or three parties" in voting for their leaders, he said.

In Washington, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs dismissed Ahmadinejad's criticism. Obama has said "that there are people in Iran who want to make this not about a debate among Iranians in Iran, but about the West and the United States," Gibbs said. "And I would add President Ahmadinejad to that list of people trying to make this about the United States."

Iran's government has declared that Ahmadinejad decisively won the election with nearly 63 percent of the vote, while Mousavi received less than 34 percent and two other candidates trailed far behind. Mousavi immediately challenged the results, charging that massive fraud "reversed" the outcome and cheated him of victory.

The 67-year-old former prime minister posted a statement on his Web site Thursday saying he was being pressed to withdraw his challenge and had been severely restricted in his ability to communicate with supporters.

"However, I am not prepared to give up under the pressure of threats or personal interest," he said.

"The truth . . . is that a major fraud has taken place in these elections, and the people who tried to show their dismay with this event were attacked, killed and arrested," Mousavi said. "Not only am I not scared of responding to their false accusations, but I'm ready to show how the people responsible for the presidential fraud" are also to blame for having "spilled the blood of the people." Mousavi asked his followers to "continue your legal and responsible protest, which is born out of the Islamic revolution, with calm and by avoiding trouble."

His Web site also said 70 academics were arrested Wednesday night and early Thursday after meeting with him. It said that authorities released all but four and that those still detained included Mousavi's former campaign manager.

The pro-government Fars News Agency denied the account. Quoting an "informed source," it said that prosecutors questioned "certain participants" after Mousavi's meeting with members of the Islamic Association of University Lecturers but that "none of the said people were arrested."

A senior Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Nasser Makarem Shirazi, called for the election dispute to be settled through "national reconciliation," saying in a statement Thursday that recent events "have caused deep regret and sorrow in all Iranians loyal to the Islamic establishment and revolution . . . and have gladdened the enemy," state-run Press TV reported. "Definitively, something must be done to ensure that there are no embers burning under the ashes" and to turn "hostilities, antagonism and rivalries . . . into amity and cooperation" he said.

But a leading dissident cleric, Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, said an "impartial" committee should resolve the election dispute, which he warned could ultimately undermine the government if it is not addressed. "If Iranians cannot talk about their legitimate rights at peaceful gatherings and are instead suppressed, complexities will build up which could possibly uproot the foundations of the government, no matter how powerful," Agence France-Presse quoted him as saying.

At a G-8 meeting in Trieste, Italy, foreign ministers sought to forge a united stand against the Iranian crackdown but ran into opposition from Russia. Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said Iran "must now choose whether or not it wants to keep the door open to dialogue with the international community, because the open hand from the United States, that we supported, must not be greeted with a hand covered in blood."

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband deplored a "profound clampdown" in Iran and said a "crisis of credibility" is dividing Iran's government from its people.

But Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov opposed any condemnation of Tehran, saying after talks with Frattini that "isolating Iran is the wrong approach."

The streets of Tehran were largely quiet Thursday after another opposition presidential candidate, Mehdi Karroubi, postponed plans for a demonstration to mourn protesters killed by security forces. Karroubi said he has not "succeeded in booking a particular location" for a mourning ceremony, apparently because the government has banned demonstrations. He said he still wants to organize a gathering that would "match the dignity of the martyrs of the past few days."

Karroubi also charged that the government has acted illegally in banning demonstrations and arresting political activists. He called for the immediate release of political detainees, and he challenged the Interior Ministry to allow separate but simultaneous demonstrations by Ahmadinejad supporters and the opposition to see which side would draw more people.

At least 17 people have been reported killed in violence after the presidential election, state-run media have reported. But Press TV, an English-language version of state television, put the death toll at 20 and quoted "informed sources" as saying that eight of the dead were members of the pro-government Basij militia. There was no independent confirmation of the claim, which marked the first mention in official media of deaths among security forces in the recent violence.

Branigin reported from Washington.

Politicians' Scandals Elevate the Profile of a Spiritual Haven on C Street SE

By Manuel Roig-Franzia
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 26, 2009

No sign explains the prim and proper red brick house on C Street SE.

Nothing hints at its secrets.

It blends into the streetscape, tucked behind the Library of Congress, a few steps from the Cannon House Office Building, a few more steps to the Capitol. This is just the way its residents want it to be. Almost invisible.

But through one week's events, this stately old pad -- a pile of sturdy brick that once housed a convent -- has become the very nexus of American scandal, a curious marker in the gallery of capital shame. Mark Sanford, South Carolina's disgraced Republican governor and a former congressman, looked here for answers -- for support, for the word of God -- as his marriage crumbled over his affair with an Argentine woman. John Ensign, the senator from Nevada who just seven days earlier also was forced to admit a career-shattering affair, lives there.

"C Street," Sanford said Wednesday during his diffuse, cryptic, utterly arresting confessional news conference, is where congressmen faced "hard questions."

On any given day, the rowhouse at 133 C St. SE -- well appointed, with American flag flying, white-and-green-trimmed windows and a pleasant garden -- fills with talk of power and the Lord. At least five congressmen live there, quietly renting upstairs rooms from an organization affiliated with "the Fellowship," the obsessively secretive Arlington spiritual group that organizes the National Day of Prayer breakfast, an event routinely attended by legions of top government officials. Other politicians come to the house for group spirituality sessions, prayer meetings or to simply share their troubles.

The house pulsed with backstage intrigue, in the days and months before the Sanford and Ensign scandals -- dubbed "two lightning strikes" by a high-ranking congressional source. First, at least one resident learned of both the Sanford and Ensign affairs and tried to talk each politician into ending his philandering, a source close to the congressman said. Then the house drama escalated. It was then that Doug Hampton, the husband of Ensign's mistress, endured an emotional meeting with Sen. Tom Coburn, who lives there, according to the source. The topic was forgiveness.

"He was trying to be a peacemaker," the source said of Coburn, a Republican from Oklahoma.

Although Sanford visited the house, there is no indication that he was ever a resident; when he was in Congress from 1995 to 2000, the parsimonious lawmaker was famous for forgoing his housing allowance and bunking in his Capitol Hill office. But it is not uncommon for residents to invite fellow congressmen to the home for spiritual bonding. There, Sanford enjoyed a kind of alumnus status. Richard Carver, president of the Fellowship Foundation, said, "I don't think it's intended to have someone from South Carolina get counseling there." But he posited that Sanford turned to C Street "because he built a relationship with people who live in the house."

People familiar with the house say the downstairs is generally used for meals and prayer meetings. Volunteers help facilitate prayer meetings, they said. Residents include Reps. Mike Doyle (D-Pa.), Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) and Zach Wamp (R-Tenn.), Ensign and Coburn. None of the congressmen agreed to be interviewed for this article. But associates of some of Ensign's housemates privately worried that the other residents would be tarred by the scandals.

"That two fell doesn't prove that the house -- which has seen many members of Congress pass through and engage in Bible studies -- doesn't mean that the house has failed," said conservative columnist Cal Thomas, who once spoke to a group of interns at the house. "If that was the standard, the whole Congress would be corrupt."

The house's residents mostly adhere to a code of silence about the place, seldom discussing it publicly, lending an aura of mystery to what happens inside and a hint of conspiratorial speculation. In a town where everyone talks about everything, the residents have managed largely to keep such a refuge to themselves and their friends. On a street mostly occupied by Hill staffers and professionals in their 20s and early 30s, some of the Democratic staffers nicknamed it "the Prayer House." On summer evenings, the congressmen would sometimes sit out front smoking cigars and chatting, but what went on inside stayed inside.

The house, which is assessed at $1.84 million, is registered to a little-known organization called Youth With a Mission of Washington DC. Carver, who said his Fellowship group is affiliated with the house, said that he has never heard of Youth With a Mission of Washington DC and that he did not have a phone number for it. Later, he said, he spoke with someone who "at one time was involved with the house" and had "heard secondhand" that the organization that runs the house is "subscribing to the no-comment."

"They've done a very good job of creating an atmosphere as separated as it can possibly be from the tensions of the city . . . a spiritual retreat from the cacophony and distraction of Capitol Hill," said the Rev. Rob Schenck, who has attended prayer meetings at the house. "But I've questioned in the past the highly secretive nature of it. The secretive nature of it has come off as a bit too clever. It places them at risk of suspicion about their motives. It hasn't served them well."

All of which made Sanford's nationally televised mention of "what we called C Street" the more enticing.

"It was a, believe it or not, a Christian Bible study," he said, departing from the tight-lipped ways of the house's denizens.

Schenck's group, Faith and Action, operates a less-shrouded Capitol Hill home used for Bible study -- but not as a residence for congressmen -- a haven he says was inspired by the house on C Street. He wonders whether the C Street house might have been too "accommodating" about the foibles, the sins, of its residents and friends. All in the name of attracting the famous and the powerful to its ministries.

"We're tempted," Schenck said, "to make room for their weaknesses."

Researcher Alice Crites contributed to this report.

Republicans Focus on Guest Workers in Immigration Debate

By JEFF ZELENY and GINGER THOMPSON

New York Times, Washington, June 26 — President Obama told a bipartisan group of lawmakers on Thursday that Congress should begin debating a comprehensive immigration plan by year’s end or early next year, but Republicans said they would support a measure only if it included an expansion of guest worker programs.

Leading the call for that provision was Senator John McCain of Arizona, who told Mr. Obama he would have to take his “political lumps” and stand up to labor unions that oppose the idea. The president praised Mr. McCain for paying “a significant political cost for doing the right thing.”

In the State Dining Room, Mr. Obama met with about 30 lawmakers for the first substantial discussion on immigration since he took office. Mr. Obama named a group to work with Congress that will be led by the homeland security secretary, Janet Napolitano, a former governor of Arizona.

“I think the American people are ready for us to do this,” Mr. Obama said, “but it’s going to require some heavy lifting. It’s going to require a victory of practicality, common sense and good policy making over short-term politics.”

The last time Congress considered sweeping immigration legislation, in 2007, Democrats and some Republicans pushed a three-part agreement that would have essentially provided legal status to the millions of people living here illegally, strengthened enforcement of immigration laws and expanded guest worker programs.

In April, the nation’s two largest labor unions, the A.F.L.-C.I.O. and its rival, Change to Win, joined together to promote a comprehensive plan but said they would oppose giving employers more power to bring in foreign workers. That agreement led business groups, a stronghold of Republican support, to leave the coalition.

Mr. McCain, speaking to reporters outside the White House on Thursday, said an immigration overhaul had a fresh urgency because of the surge in violence along the border with Mexico. But he said a guest worker program must be part of any immigration bill.

“I would expect the president of the United States to put his influence on the unions in order to change their position,” Mr. McCain said. As he left the White House, he said Mr. Obama needed to show leadership, saying, “That’s why he was elected president.”

Mr. Obama made no commitments in the meeting, administration officials said, but noted that all options were on the table, including a guest worker program. The White House chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, had told reporters earlier Thursday that there was not enough support for an immigration bill this year.

“If the votes were there,” Mr. Emanuel said, “you wouldn’t need to have the meeting.”

Beijing Adds Curbs on Access to Internet

By KEITH BRADSHER

HONG KONG, June 26 — The Chinese Health Ministry on Thursday ordered sharp restrictions on Internet access to medical research papers on sexual subjects. It is the latest move in what the ministry calls an antipornography campaign that many China experts see as a harbinger of a broader crackdown on freedom of expression and dissent.

In the past month, central government officials have cited a need to control pornography in ordering that filtering software be preinstalled on all new computers sold in China starting July 1.

They have also forced Google to disable a function that lets the search engine suggest terms and on Wednesday night even briefly blocked access nationwide to Google’s main search engine and other services like Gmail. Some users were still having problems accessing Google sites on Thursday night.

In addition, Chinese bloggers say they have detected evidence of a concerted effort to stain Google’s image. They say that someone in Beijing manipulated Google’s software to make it more likely to suggest a pornographic search term during a state television broadcast.

At the same time, the government seems to have stepped up harassment of human rights advocates.

Liu Xiaobo, one of China’s best-known dissidents, was formally arrested Tuesday on suspicion of subversion, six months after he was detained for joining other intellectuals in signing a document calling for democracy. This month, the authorities refused to renew the licenses of more than a dozen lawyers after they agreed to represent clients in human rights cases.

The same public security agencies charged with fighting pornography are responsible for suppressing illegal political activity, said Nicholas Bequelin, a researcher in Hong Kong for Human Rights Watch. The government’s statistics for seizures of illegal publications tend to include both pornographic and political documents, he noted.

“The two are closely associated,” Mr. Bequelin said. “These campaigns work hand in hand.”

The emphasis on pornography echoes a similar crackdown in late 2005 and early 2006, rights advocates say.

At the time, seeking to allay official Chinese concerns about pornography, Google designed a new search engine for Google.cn, its Chinese service, that would not pull up references to politically delicate subjects like Falun Gong, the banned spiritual movement, or the 1989 killings in and around Tiananmen Square.

While denouncing pornography, propaganda officials reined in publications that were challenging government policies. This included the closing of Freezing Point, a popular journal of news and opinion, and the replacement of top editors at three other publications.

The Health Ministry posted regulations this week requiring medical information providers to restrict access to articles on sexual subjects. The penalty for violations is up to $4,400, with the potential for criminal prosecution for a pattern of uncorrected offenses.

At a news conference on Thursday, a Foreign Ministry spokesman, Qin Gang, was quick to criticize Google for allowing too many links to unseemly sites, saying, “It is every government’s responsibility to protect their teenagers from porn and vulgar information on the Internet.”

On Wednesday, the American commerce secretary, Gary F. Locke, and Ron Kirk, the United States trade representative, sent a letter to Chinese officials protesting the country’s proposal that all computers sold in the country be equipped with filtering software.

“China is putting companies in an untenable position by requiring them, with virtually no public notice, to preinstall software that appears to have broad-based censorship implications and network security issues,” Mr. Locke said in a statement. The United States government did not release the text of the letter.

Asked about the complaint on Thursday, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman said only that he had previously defended the decision to require the software.

Google said Thursday that it was trying to limit access to pornography.

“Google has been working to remove pornography from our search results in China, in accordance with our operating license there,” the company said.

“This has been a major engineering effort,” the company said, “and we believe we have addressed many of the problems identified by the government.”

The government began stepping up pressure on Google last week. CCTV, the state-owned television monopoly, broadcast an interview in which the announcer typed the word “son” into a Google search engine and was dismayed that one of the search terms suggested in Chinese was an “abnormal relationship between son and mother.”

Google’s software makes it possible to analyze the frequency and source of search terms. In a check on Thursday, Google’s Web site showed that no one had entered the phrase “abnormal relationship between son and mother” in Chinese for months until it suddenly became a popular phrase entered only in Beijing in the days before the show, making it more likely that it would pop up as a suggested search term.

The same CCTV show included an interview with a young man, identified as a college student, who expressed horror at pornography on the Internet. Chinese bloggers have since identified the man as an intern for CCTV.

Many Chinese regulations ostensibly aimed at controlling illicit sexual activity could also be used to restrict political activity unacceptable to the authorities.

For example, Chinese law requires that karaoke bars, nightclubs and Internet cafes be monitored 24 hours a day by closed-circuit television cameras on the grounds that prostitutes may try to find clients at such locations. But according to security industry executives, China’s anti-prostitution surveillance regulations are stricter on the Internet cafes.

While nightclubs and karaoke bars are required to store their video records on their premises, Internet cafes must be wired to the nearest police station and provide a continuous, instantaneous record of who is using which computer. If an e-mail message from a cafe’s computer later catches the attention of investigators, the police can review the video records to see who was using the computer.

The last major crackdown on pornography and political expression lasted several months and began to ebb in February 2006, after a dozen former Communist Party officials and senior scholars issued a public letter denouncing the closing of a prominent news journal.

But by then, the government had won some major concessions. Not only had Google agreed to remove considerable political content from its Chinese service, but Microsoft had disabled some blogging activity critical of China, and Yahoo had handed over the identity of an e-mail user who had shared a propaganda directive; the user was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

Edward Wong contributed reporting from Beijing. Zhang Jing and Huang Yuanxi contributed research from Beijing, and Hilda Wang from Hong Kong.

Somalia's Shebab Militiamen Publicly Amputate Robbers

By Mustafa Haji Abdinur – 1 day ago

MOGADISHU (AFP), June 25 — Hooded Somali Islamist militiamen on Thursday chopped off the right hand and left foot of four thieves in front of a crowd of 200 people in Mogadishu.

An ad-hoc court set up by the hardline Islamist group Shebab had this week found the four young men guilty of stealing mobile phones and guns from residents in the Somali capital.

"The amputations have been carried out as scheduled," a Shebab official told AFP on condition of anonymity. "According to Islam, anybody who robs people will face a similar punishment."

Residents in the Sukahola neighbourhood gathered to watch the amputations, but no cameras nor mobile phones were allowed.

Two hooded men watched by masked Shebab gunmen carried out the amputations with a traditional Somali curved-blade knife known as a "torey" after applying tourniquets on the accused's forearms and legs.

"Before the sentence was carried out, medics checked their health, we wanted to avoid anything that could put their lives at risk," the Shebab official said.

Witnesses told AFP of the robbers' agony.

"The four were screaming when their limbs were hacked off," said Ali Mohamed Ibrahim, a local resident. "It did not take long, within three minutes I saw them without their right hand and left foot."

"Their faces were twisted in horror," he said.

"Some of the people in the crowd had to look away when the punishment was carried out. It looked really painful but I want this to put an end to robbery in the area," said Farah Mohamed, another witness.

The four suspected robbers' ages were not immediately clear but witnesses said they looked very young and that some of them were most likely teenagers.

While most of the political players in Somalia recognise Islam as the main source of legislation, the Shebab advocate a very strict interpretation of Sharia.

An alliance including the Shebab and other hardline Islamists already controls and administers large parts of southern Somalia, where courts impose tough sentences that have been condemned by rights groups.

Amnesty International issued a statement condemning the Shebab -- who are engaged in a deadly military offensive against the fledgling administration of President Sheikh Sharif -- over the sentences.

"These punishments amount to torture," said Tawanda Hondora, the London-based watchdog's Africa Deputy Director, in a statement.

"The horrific nature of such acts that were carried out in front of a crowd adds further injustice and dehumanises these teenagers," Amnesty added.

Thursday's public punishment, known as "cross-amputation", was the first such case in the capital in recent years.

In May, Amnesty condemned amputations and unlawful killings it said were being routinely carried out by the local authorities in and around the southern city of Kismayo.

In October, a 13-year-old girl was stoned to death in public by around 50 men on one of Kismayo's main squares. She was accused of adultery by local hardline Islamists after reporting that she had been raped by three men.

Climate Change Worsens Hunger Issues in Western Timor

Climate change is worsening the hunger problem in Indonesia's West Timor province (ed. - NTT), which is already rivalling Africa.

Years of poor harvests mean many children in the region, where the climate can feel more like parts of arid Australia than lush Indonesia, are underweight and malnourished.

A report last year by the Church World Service and other organisations found 91 per cent of West Timor's children suffered from “food insecurity”, meaning they don't have access to regular and affordable nutritious food.

About 50 per cent of infants and young children were either moderately or severely underweight, compared to African countries overall, where 21.9 per cent of children were underweight.

Oxfam's West Timor program manager Aloysius Suratin said there was evidence the problem was growing worse, as farmers were at the mercy of more unpredictable weather patterns.

Mr Suratin said a review of the area's rainfall records for the past 13 years – the limits of available data – showed only 46 per cent fell in the expected rainy season.

”Because this is a dry area, people need water,” he said.

”They ask for rain, but when the rain comes rain creates a disaster. For the farmer, it's difficult to anticipate. The risk in farming is higher now.”

Rice farmer Petronella Baro, whose family was working on this year's harvest, said it was only yielding one or two tonnes per hectare if they were lucky, compared to four tonnes last year.

The mother of six children, aged from 17 down to an infant, agreed the rainy season was getting harder to predict.

This year, the rain came to her village of Desain, about 40km from Atambua, but it was so intense it washed away a nearby bridge.

Adding to the problem is that this family, like many others, relies on traditional farming methods.

The farmers said they waited for a moon “with a rainbow around it” to judge the right time to plant, then waited about a month for the ground to become muddy before sowing the seed.

”We just follow the rain,” Mrs Baro said. “But if it's like this again, it will be a problem for our family.”

Hunger is so common in West Timor that November to March is known as the “hungry season”.

But Mrs Baro said her children had enough to eat, as she was able to grow corn, cassava and beans when the rice began to dwindle, and the children were given priority at meal time.

Oxfam last month studied the village of Tes, 20km from Kefamenanu, where 90 per cent of the population are subsistence farmers.

Mr Suratin said the study aimed to find out how many families were having to sell their assets – usually land, livestock, woven clothes and coconut and teak trees – to survive a failed harvest.

He found the declining crop yield had reduced the village's meagre assets by 58 per cent, and that the district government would have to boost its funding to the village five times over to return residents to their former levels of well being.

Mr Suratin said the situation was the most severe in families headed by women, as they usually gave a share of their harvest to labourers, and were more likely to resort to selling assets.

”This is a clear portrait of the food insecurity condition and why I say it has become worse – not meaning that more people are in hunger conditions – but in the future, the value of their assets is limited ... they have not many options to recover,'' he said.

Oxfam is helping farmers trial basic rain harvesting, but says farmers need practical meteorological advice and an early warning system to help them prepare for dry spells.

The Australian government, through AusAID, has a $6.5 million program to address nutrition in women and children in the Nusa Tenggara Timur area, and also contributes to food programs run by other organisations.

Singapore Confirms 26 New Flu A/H1N1 Cases

SINGAPORE, June 23 (Xinhua) -- Singapore confirmed 26 new cases of Influenza A/ H1N1 on Tuesday, bringing the total number of confirmed cases here to 194.

According to the country's Health Ministry, the newly confirmed cases comprise 10 local cases and 16 cases with travel history.

The ministry said that local pandemic preparedness clinics are gearing up to help manage and treat suspect Influenza A/H1N1 patients, adding that these clinics are located island-wide to ensure that Singaporeans have easy access to medical assessment and prompt treatment for influenza-like illness.

Singapore reported its first confirmed case of Influenza A/H1N1on May 27. So far, 68 patients have been discharged. The remaining126 patients are still in the hospital and their conditions remain stable.

Editor: Mu Xuequan

AFP: Indonesia Radio Becomes Voice for Tolerance

By Jerome Rivet

JAKARTA (AFP), June 26 — A young radio news agency in Indonesia is attracting fans and international recognition for programming that eschews "infotainment" and focuses on hard issues like human rights and corruption.

Founded 10 years ago after the fall of the Suharto dictatorship, KBR-68H is making the most of the liberalisation of Indonesia's media to spread values of free speech and religious tolerance across the huge archipelago.

The country's only independent national news agency now has a network of more than 600 local radio affiliates and an audience of more than 18 million people in almost all corners of the mainly Muslim country.

Co-founder and managing director Santoso said that in the era of Facebook and Twitter, old-fashioned radio was still the "cheapest and most flexible" way to reach a wide audience.

"Our goal is to expand our network to Indonesia's remote areas such as central Papua, Sumba island or Maluku. It will encourage citizen participation and strengthen democracy," he said.

As Indonesia is broken up into thousands of islands, the best way in KBR's view to reach listeners is to offer ready-made programming to community radio stations in each region.

"We send eight hours of programmes per day -- news bulletins, reports and a lot of interactive talk shows," production director Heri Hendratmoko said.

The subscription fee can be as low as 10 dollars a month. The subject matter is serious: human rights, corruption, economic development, deforestation, religious tolerance, women's health.

"These are the key themes for a country like Indonesia, which is in the process of democratisation," Santoso said.

And in a country where the airwaves are swamped every day with giddy celebrity stories, KBR stands apart.

"We refuse to do 'infotainment' -- light news -- like most of the commercial radio and television stations," Hendratmoko said.

"It is very important in today's Indonesia to make in-depth reports and discuss issues such as deforestation or local corruption."

Wanting to be faithful to the activist spirit in which KBR was founded, the station's journalists are not afraid to get their hands dirty in the pursuit of balanced news.

Eric Mahaley, owner of KBR-affiliate DMS Radio in Ambon, said the network won respect for its reporting of bloody fighting between Muslims and Christians in the area between 2002 and 2004.

"During the Muslim-Christian sectarian conflict, the radio owned by Christians and Muslims was a voice of tolerance and dialogue," he said.

"From 2002 to 2004, we broadcasted appeals launched by kids to stop the conflict. I think this played a significant role in raising awareness of the local people."

Sometimes its broadcasts upset vested interests such as illegal loggers or religious extremists, but KBR is able to fall back on its right to free speech which is well established in post-Suharto Indonesia.

It also works with government ministries on community service programming, for example to explain the latest economic reforms or to promote maternal health.

"In remote areas of Papua or Nusa Tenggara, radio is the only media available. There is no electricity, so almost no TV, and newspapers are not delivered," Hendratmoko said.

Where electricity is scarce, the radio network has worked with aid agencies to build solar-energy or microhydro generators to run community radios, he said.

Employing 100 people at its head office in Jakarta, KBR has diversified in recent years.

It has launched Green Radio, specialising in environmental issues, a video service with the Tempo Group for local television and an international service which is picked up by around 50 stations from Nepal to Australia.

In recognition of its hard work, KBR won the 2008-2009 King Baudouin International Development Prize in Belgium on May 19 this year, worth some 150,000 euros (209,000 dollars).

Presented every two years since 1980, the prize recognises contributions to the development of southern hemisphere countries or to links between developing and industrialised countries.

Concern at Secret Thailand Trial

By Jonathan Head
BBC News, Bangkok

The human rights group Amnesty International has condemned the secret trial in Thailand of a woman charged with insulting the royal family.

The woman was arrested a year ago after giving a speech in Bangkok in which she attacked the monarchy.

The start of her trial was delayed this week when her lawyer appealed against the decision to hold a closed trial.

Critics say strict laws against insulting the monarchy are being used to stifle discussion of its future.

Thailand concedes that the lese-majeste laws are imperfect, but says they protect the monarchy.

'Popular revolution'

People in Thailand who have listened to the speech say they have never heard anything like it.

Daranee Charncherngsilpakul took to the stage at a protest in central Bangkok in June last year and sharply criticised the monarchy.

“ The Thai government will have a very difficult time explaining why the trial of someone charged with making an insulting remark could compromise Thailand's national security ”
Sam Zarifi Amnesty International

She even made personal attacks on the country's revered King Bhumipol Adulyadej, warning him that the monarchy would be overthrown by a popular revolution.

Going by the nickname Dar Torpedo, she was already well known as an outspoken supporter of ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.

But the blunt language she used to criticise the King in a public arena, just a short distance from the palace, has shocked even those Thais who do not consider themselves ardent royalists.

'Risk of injustice'

Given the severe penalties for insulting the monarchy in Thailand, no-one was surprised when Ms Daranee was arrested shortly afterwards.

Her trial, however, which started this week, has alarmed human rights groups.

The presiding judge ordered hearings to be held in secret, citing national security concerns.

Her lawyer is appealing, on the grounds that Thailand's constitution guarantees defendants the right to a public trial.

Sam Zarifi from Amnesty International has warned that "when a judge closes the doors on a trial it significantly raises the risk of injustice taking place.

"The Thai government will have a very difficult time explaining why the trial of someone charged with making an insulting remark could compromise Thailand's national security," he said.

Ms Daranee faces between nine and 45 years in prison if she is convicted.

Until recently the lese majeste law was rarely invoked in Thailand - but the number of cases has risen sharply during the political turmoil of the past three years.

A colleague of Daranee Charncherngsilpakul was jailed for six years last November.

Earlier this year a 34-year-old engineer was jailed for 10 years for posting a video deemed insulting to the monarchy on the website YouTube.

Neither trial was mentioned in the mainstream Thai media.

Republican sympathisers

In January this year an Australian man, Harry Nicolaides, was also jailed for three years over a novel he wrote four years ago in which he referred briefly to the scandalous private life of a Thai crown prince. He was later pardoned.

Police say they are now preparing to arrest several more anti-government activists on the same charge.

The pro-Thaksin red shirt movement is known to have a number of republican sympathisers and former communists in its ranks.

Mr Thaksin himself has been accused by his critics of harbouring plans to abolish the monarchy, accusations he has strongly denied.

The government has acknowledged that the lese majeste law has flaws - but says it is necessary to protect the monarchy.

Critics of the law argue that it is being used to stifle discussion of the monarchy's future, at a time of heightened public anxiety over the succession, because of the King's age and frail health.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/asia-pacific/8120433.stm

Published: 2009/06/26 09:12:15 GMT

Second Presidential Debate Sees Candidates Come to Life - The Jakarta Globe

Presidential candidates Megawati Sukarnoputri, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Jusuf Kalla participate in a televised presidential debate in Jakarta on Thursday night. (Photo: Romeo Gacad, AFP)

June 26 - After a listless first debate more than a week ago, presidential candidates on Thursday gave a much livelier performance during their second nationally televised public debate, with criticism of their rivals finally making its way into the discussion.

The debate, focusing on the eradication of poverty and unemployment, saw the participants more comfortable with the format as they exchanged political barb s.

“Tonight’s debate was much better,” said Andrinof Chaniago, political analyst of the University of Indonesia.

Hendri Saparini, an economics analyst with Econit, a privately owned think tank, said, “The major thing here is that now people can see the differences between the candidates.”

Analysts and observers, however, agreed that Vice President Jusuf Kalla and President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono dominated the show, while the third candidate, former President Megawati Sukarnoputri, contributed little to the discussion.

Kalla was credited by many for instigating a more robust debate .

“He was the star tonight, making the debate much more lively,” said Effendi Gazali, a communications expert from the University of Indonesia.

Kalla also initiated an attack on policy, commenting on a recent campaign statement by Yudhoyono, who had warned that local entrepreneurs might endanger the country with their vested intere sts.

“I regret that local investors are considered bad, because without their existence, who would create jobs in this republic?” the vice president asked.

Kalla, who is vying for the presidency with Gen. (ret.) Wiranto as his running mate, also took a shot at Yudhoyono’s vice presidential choice, former central bank Governor Boediono, saying that he had allowed bank interest rates to reach high levels and had failed to support the development of a 10,000-megawatt power generation project by initially refusing, as the nation’s top economics official, to issue the necessary guarantees.

Coming to the rescue, Yudhoyono said the decision was later reversed and that the guarantees had been agreed upon.

Prompting laughter and applause from the audience, Kalla teased Yudhoyono for using a popular jingle for an instant noodle product as his campaign tune, saying that it would only lead to an increase in wheat imports.

Yudhoyono parried, saying, “Perhaps the noodle you eat is made from pure wheat, because my noodle is a mixture of wheat, sago and cassava.”

Although observers agreed that no new content was revealed during the debate, the moderator, economist Aviliani, was praised for delivering probing questions.

“As for the substance of the responses, Yudhoyono and Kalla had better answers compared to the previous debate,” Andrinof said. “But there were no innovative answers that we hadn’t already heard.”

“In the question-and-answer section, Megawati seemed not to have progressed at all. She lives in the past and gave no better insights than in the previous debate,” he added.

However, Hendri said that Megawati was consistent in her intentions to reduce state debt and emphasizing the need to revise the Labor Law.

“Megawati and Kalla stressed the importance of revising the Labor Law, but Yudhoyono was against it. It shows that he supports market liberalization. He claimed past government successes but lacks vision on how to reduce poverty and the unemployment problem,” Hendri said.

The three presidential candidates will meet for their third and final debate next Thursday.

Tabiat Buruk Prabowo Bencana Untuk Bangsa

SUARA INDONESIA RAYA (23 JUNI 2009) Prabowo Subianto, calon Wakil Presiden dari koalisi PDI Perjuangan dan Partai Gerindra dinyatakan lolos tes kesehatan oleh Tim Dokter Ikatan Dokter Indonesia (IDI) yang dipimpin dr Fahmi Idris.

Tes kesehatan ini ternyata tidak benar-benar mengecek kesehatan para calon, terutama menyangkut kesehatan jiwa mereka.

Prabowo Subianto diketahui menderita semacam kehilangan pengendalian diri dan sekarang dalam tahap penyembuhan. Ia sudah mengikuti terapi 'anger management' di Bali selama tiga tahun dan belum sembuh hingga kini.

Baru-baru ini Suryadharma Ali, Ketua Umum Partai Persatuan Pembangunan (PPP) menjadi korban peristiwa kehilangan kendali diri dari Prabowo.

Dalam sebuah rapat Koalisi Besar yang dipimpin Prabowo, di rumah Prabowo, Suryadharma menyatakan mundur dari Koalisi karena partainya memutuskan bergabung dengan Koalisi Partai Demokrat. Prabowo tiba-tiba marah dan melempar handphone ke arah Suryadharma. Lemparannya meleset.

Prabowo keluar dari ruangan, mencuci mukanya, dan kembali duduk di ruang pertemuan. Sambil menuding Suryadharma, Prabowo membentak, ''Saya paling benci pengkianat!''

Hal serupa tidak hanya dialami Suryadharma. Sekretaris pribadi Prabowo, seorang perwira TNI, pernah ditampar di depan para fungsionaris Partai Gerindra hanya karena salah menulis cek.

Ketika Prabowo masih aktif sebagai tentara, tongkat komandonya sering patah karena dipukulkan ke tubuh anak buahnya. Prabowo, ketika menjadi Komandan Jendral Kopassus, pernah memukul dan menantang duel seorang wartawan ekonomi karena menulis tentang Yayasan Kesejahteraan Korps Baret Merah.