German Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung will next week announce plans for the future strength of German troops in Afghanistan, a spokesman said on Saturday, June 21. It's thought another 1,000 troops could be deployed.

Jung wants to increase German deployment in the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) from the current upper limit of 3,500.

 

Media reports have said the figure could rise to 4,500. A defense ministry spokesman said Jung would make clear the exact number at the end of next week.

 

Jung said in a radio interview Saturday that any increase in troop strength would be used for training and civil reconstruction projects.

 

"We want to increase training three-fold. Next year we want to train 7,500 Afghan troops. To achieve this we need to formulate a new upper limit for our mandate which will give German troops greater flexibility," he told German public radio.

A solar power plant described by its operators as the biggest in the world began generating electricity at the site of a former East German air base on Sunday, June 22.

The Waldpolenz Solar Park is built on a surface area equivalent to 200 soccer fields, the solar park will be capable of feeding 40 megawatts into the power grid when fully operational in 2009.

 

In the start-up phase, the 130-million-euro ($201 million) plant it will have a capacity of 24 megawatts, according to the Juwi group, which operates the installation.

 

The facility, located east of Leipzig, uses state-of-the-art, thin-film technology. Some 550,000 thin-film modules will be used, of which 350,000 have already been installed. The direct current produced in the photovoltaic solar modules will be converted into alternating current and fed completely into the power grid.

 

After just a year the solar power station will have produced the energy needed to build it, according to the Juwi group.

ISTANBUL: As Turkey's governing party braces for a high court ruling that could close it down and bar many of its members from politics, party officials like to talk about what they did that caused so much trouble.

"Watch out, you're talking to a sinner," said Sadullah Ergin, an official in the party, Justice and Development, whose founders, some of them former Islamists, now want Turkey to be a more open society for practicing Muslims.

Ergin's offense, detailed in a more than 160-page indictment of the party and its officials that has paralyzed Turkish politics since it was filed in March, was saying that a ban on women wearing head scarves in universities violated human rights, adding his signature to a draft law that helped cancel it and talking about it on a television talk show.

Most of all, his crime lay in his association with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the leader of the party, known as AK, the initials of its Turkish name. With its control of the presidency, the Parliament and the government, the party has come further than any other in modern Turkey in breaking the grip of the secular establishment on power.

June 20 (Bloomberg) -- Starting July 1, marijuana will be the only leaf that can be smoked in public places in the Netherlands. Cannabis devotees aren't celebrating.

Local pot smokers, who usually cut joints with tobacco, and owners of the ``coffee shops'' where they are allowed to light up will have to change their habits when the nation implements the indoor tobacco ban. Puffing a pure marijuana cigarette in public will still be permitted; smoking one with tobacco will merit coffee shop owners a 300-euro ($466) fine for the first offense and 2,400 euros for a fourth.

``Every customer will have to learn how to smoke pure,'' said Robert Kempen, co-owner of The NooN and Mellow Yellow in Amsterdam, which sell marijuana and hashish. The rule makes him ``sick to death,'' he said, rolling himself a joint.

Optimism was the name of the game at the European Summit in Brussels on Thursday and Friday. Still it was clear: After the Irish rejection of the Lisbon Treaty, the European Union doesn't know what to do next. And more hurdles are just over the horizon.

Everything was supposed to look just as it always had. The 27 European Union leaders smiled broadly and slapped each other on the back; optimism was on full display when they stepped to the microphones. The EU summit in Brussels even came to an end just when it was supposed to on Friday evening. No delays and, most importantly, not a hint of crisis.

 Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen didn't have any more answers than the rest of Europe at the EU summit in Brussels. There was even progress made, if one believes the list of successes read out by Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Jansa, who holds the EU's rotating presidency until the end of the month. There were new employment measures to announce, visa policy for the Balkans had been improved and Slovakia's adoption of the common European currency, the euro, was discussed. All of it, said Jansa, was "a clear sign that the EU works." His foreign minister, Dimitrij Rupel, echoed Jansa by saying that the summit had been "encouraging."

And as for "our Irish friends," as European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso put it, "they have asked for more time and they will get more time."

Yet despite all of the forced bonhomie, it was difficult to conceal the truth about the Brussels gathering: It was a summit of paralysis. It was so short because there was nothing to discuss or negotiate. In answer to the central question -- what to do now that the Irish have rejected the Lisbon Treaty in a referendum a week and a half ago -- there was silence. The EU decided to wait until the next summit in October to talk about it.

Britain's high court has ruled that Abu Hamza al-Masri, a Muslim preacher, should be extradited to face terrorism charges in the United States.

Al-Masri, who is currently serving a seven-year sentence in Britain for inciting his followers to murder non Muslims, has been indicted in the US on 11 charges.

Justice Igor Judge and Justice Jeremy Sullivan, who heard al-Masri's appeal at a lower court ruling, gave his lawyers two weeks to apply to the House of Lords for a further appeal.

Al-Masri, 51, who says he lost his hands and the sight of one eye in Afghanistan, once led Finsbury Park mosque in London.

A Sunday newspaper has added a new twist to the controversy over the Swiss government's shredding of nuclear documents.

The NZZ am Sonntag carries an interview with Abdul Qadeer Khan, "the father of Pakistan's atom bomb", in which he denies supplying the Swiss Tinner family with the plans for a nuclear weapon which the government destroyed at the end of 2007.

The Tinners - father Friedrich and sons Marco and Urs - are accused of helping to supply parts for Libya's nuclear weapons programme through a trafficking ring run by Khan. The weapon plans were seized as part of the investigation into the Tinners' activities.

Khan told the Zurich-based newspaper that neither Pakistan nor he himself "had anything to do with what Tinner or his sons had on their computers."

Iranian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi has criticised Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey over her recent controversial trip to Iran.

The lawyer and human rights campaigner was in Geneva on Monday taking part in a panel discussion on human rights abuses in Iran.

Shirin Ebadi, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 for her work on human rights and democracy, said she disagreed with Calmy-Rey's conduct during her visit. She has spoken out on human rights issues in Iran and has defended clients in a number of high profile rights cases.

During a one-day trip to Tehran in March, Calmy-Rey held talks on Iran's nuclear policy and on human rights, and attended the signing of an agreement on gas supply between Tehran and a private Swiss energy company, EGL

Iraqi energy experts have told Al Jazeera that oil and gas fields in the western Anbar province may soon begin pumping gas to European markets.

Mukhtar al-Ani, an Iraqi oil consultant, said: "In early January, the Ministry of Oil held talks with a number of potential companies regarding development of the huge Akkas gas field in the north-western desert of Anbar province."

According to the ministry, Akkas, which lies 40km from the Syrian border, is believed to contain up to seven trillion cubic feet of gas, which accounts for six per cent of Iraq's estimated total of 112 trillion cubic feet. The field is capable of producing up to 500 million cubic feet per day if fully developed.

Akkas is also close to existing Syrian gas facilities.

"Iraq earlier signed a preliminary agreement with Syria to supply it with 50 million cubic feet of gas a day from the existing five wells in Akkas ... The Syrians are eager to revive this agreement," al- Ani said.

BRUSSELS: Faced with congested skies, airport delays and growing carbon emissions from aircraft, the European Union will this week seek to overhaul its aviation management system in a move that could save €2 billion to €3 billion in fuel costs and cut carbon dioxide output by up to 16 million tons a year.

With air traffic likely to double by 2020, the European Commission, the EU's executive arm, says it believes that changes to Europe's complex and unwieldy air traffic control structure are vital if the bloc is to manage the growth in aviation and keep to its ambitious climate change targets.

The plan for a "single European sky" proposes a big shake-up of air traffic control in Europe, which is currently divided into 650 units administered from 60 air traffic control centers in the 27 nations. By contrast the United States manages double the number of flights for a similar cost from 20 control centers, according to the commission.

Under the proposals, scheduled to be released Wednesday, European countries would agree to accelerate the creation of a network of larger air traffic control units, made up of adjacent nations, known as functional airspace blocks, probably by 2012.

Some 300 people gathered Sunday evening at the Beth Haya Mouchka Lubavitch synagogue in Paris's 19^th district  to pray for the recovery of the Jewish teenager savaged Saturday evening by a gang of youths of Black African origin.

The synagogue is located on 49 Rue Petit, near the place where the 17-year-old Rudy Haddad, a member of the local Lubavitch community, was attacked by the youths who beat him with metal bars and smashed his skull.

The victim, who suffered several broken ribs and a fractured skull, was placed in intensive care at Cochin hospital in central Paris. ...

The multi-ethnic area, which is harbouring several synagogues, has been the stage of several anti-Jewish incidents in the last months, Raphael Haddad, had of the union of French Jewish students (UEJF), said.

Speaking on French tv, the new chief rabbi of France, Gilles Bernheim, who was elected on Sunday, mentioned the fact that young Jewish girls fear to walk in a neighborhood park on Sabbath."

Around 50 non-EU nationals without visas or work permits escaped Sunday from a Paris immigrant detention centre following a fire that police said was started deliberately.
   
"Some 50-odd detainees have yet to be accounted for," an official from the police headquarters covering the Vincennes district south-east of the French capital told AFP.
   
A fresh roll-call was being conducted Sunday evening at France's biggest clandestine immigrant processing centre.

News | Africa - Reuters.com

A 41-year-old Tunisian immigrant died in the Vincennes centre on Saturday, and police said he died from a heart attack while alone in his bedroom.

An investigation into his death has been opened, but the MRAP organisation against racism said the death showed that detention conditions in French deportation centres were poor.

Sarkozy's applying Le Pen's program, expelling illegal immigrants very harshly. For example, see the story of an elderly Algerian who has all his children and grandchildren in France being illegally expelled because he didn't appeal fast enough .

Auferre, trucidare, rapere, falsis nominibus imperium; atque, ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.

Up to 70 African would-be immigrants to Europe on Sunday tried to push through a border post of the Spanish enclave of Melilla in Morocco, but most of them were repulsed, Spanish authorities said.

The Africans were seeking to start news lives in Europe and tried to force their way past border guards on the North African coast on Sunday.

 

"Between 60 and 70 people from sub-Saharan Africa tried to force their way into Melilla at dawn through the Beni-Enzar border post," the local Melilla authorities said in a statement.

 

"The majority of them were pushed back by security forces," it said, adding that "the situation is normal on the border."

 

But several border guards suffered injuries, the statement said.

After a week of what European leaders call reflection, another Irish referendum beckons, to be held early next year. Without it, there might well be an attempt to oust the Irish from the European Union.

A Yes vote in a second referendum is not certain, even if the Irish government were to succeed in securing another rent-extracting, treaty-amending protocol. At a time when the Irish economy is about to fall off a cliff, enthusiasm for the EU and its treaties will not increase. In other words, holding a referendum would be as risky as not holding a referendum. A fine mess.

So within a couple of weeks, the chances of Ireland ending up outside the EU have turned from zero to a distinct possibility. The same goes for the Czech Republic, another potential non-ratifier. I do not want to get into the legal details of how a country's departure from the EU could be accomplished. Suffice it to say that it can be done within European law as long as there is political will.

What strikes me the most about this extraordinary turn of events is the perception in Ireland that a break with the EU would be no big deal. I received a large number of letters from Ireland last week from readers who steadfastly maintain that the country's economic success had nothing to do with the EU and everything to do with domestic policy - in particular with low corporate taxes and skilled labour.

Leading British banks have been accused of operating a covert embargo of Cuba out of deference to the US. The accusation comes after revelations that Lloyds TSB and Barclays Bank have been telling clients who trade with Cuba to take their accounts elsewhere.

Although none of the major banks are prepared to go on record over their policy towards Cuba, the Guardian has learned that Lloyds TSB, Barclays Bank, the Royal Bank of Scotland and HSBC are all complying with the US blockade of the island that was condemned in the UN earlier this year by a vote of 184 to four. The US has taken legal action in the courts against multinational companies that deal with Cuba and have offices in the US.

Last week a London cigar importer and a Somerset natural food company, which imported Cuban sugar, were told by Lloyds TSB that the bank could no longer carry out transactions involving Cuba. Phil Markey, relationship director at Lloyds TSB, told one client in a letter: "I would like to find a way to continue to make these payments for you - the decision, however, is down to a full risk assessment process within Lloyds TSB."

WASHINGTON (AFP) - White House hopeful Barack Obama pushed Sunday for a clampdown on energy speculation with new proposals that his campaign argued would more than halve the record-high price of oil.

The Democrat attacked the so-called Enron loophole, a 2000 deregulation of oversight by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission that critics say opened the way to a speculative free-for-all in the oil markets.

"For the past years, our energy policy in this country has been simply to let the special interests have their way -- opening up loopholes for the oil companies and speculators so that they could reap record profits while the rest of us pay four dollars a gallon," Obama said in a statement.

"My plan fully closes the Enron loophole and restores common-sense regulation as part of my broader plan to ease the burden for struggling families today while investing in a better future," the Illinois senator said.

The British expedition to Afghanistan is on the brink of something worse than defeat: a long, low-intensity war from which no government will dare to extricate itself. With the death toll mounting, battle is reportedly joined with the Taliban at the very gates of the second city, Kandahar. There is no justification for ministerial bombast that "we are winning the war, really".

What is to be done? In 2001 the West waged a punitive retaliatory strike against the hosts of the perpetrators of 9/11. The strike has since followed every law of mission creep, now reduced in London to a great war of despair, in which the cabinet can do nothing but send even more men to their deaths.

In seven years in Afghanistan, America, Britain and their Nato allies have made every mistake in the intervention book. They sent too few troops to assert an emphatic presence. They failed to "hit hard and get out", as advocated by Donald Rumsfeld, the American defence secretary. They tried to destroy the staple crop, poppies, and then let it go to warlords who now use it to finance suicide bombers, among others.

They allowed a corrupt regime to establish itself in the capital, Kabul, while failing to promote honest administration in the provinces.

Zimbabwe's opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai says he is pulling out of Friday's presidential run-off, handing victory to President Robert Mugabe.

Mr Tsvangirai said there was no point running when elections would not be free and fair and "the outcome is determined by... Mugabe himself".

He called on the global community to step in to prevent "genocide".

But the ruling Zanu-PF said Mr Tsvangirai had taken the decision to avoid "humiliation" in the poll.

International Criminal Court to hold hearing this week to consider the release of Thomas Lubanga

Victim number A105 was 10 years old when he was kidnapped from his village near the gold fields of central Africa and conscripted into the militia. Like thousands of others, the child - his name has been replaced with a number to keep him safe - was forced to fight in the armed wing of the UPC movement in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), under orders to slaughter all their enemies: men, women and children. Friends and comrades who tried to escape the horror were shot.

On Tuesday, Thomas Lubanga, the man allegedly responsible for that horror, should have been facing justice at the start of the first trial by the International Criminal Court (ICC). Instead, with the proceedings lying in ruins, the court will hold a hearing to consider his release.

Judges have ruled that the former warlord cannot get a fair trial because the prosecution has failed to hand over documents to the defence or court which could potentially prove his innocence or mitigate any sentence. A105 and the other child soldiers involved in this case are unlikely to see justice done.

TEL AVIV (Reuters) - French President Nicolas Sarkozy arrived in Israel on Sunday for a three-day visit aimed at reinforcing his image as an ally of the Jewish state and reversing a trend of difficult trips there by French leaders.

After taking office last year, Sarkozy announced a "break" with the policies of his predecessor Jacques Chirac, seeking to mend ties with Washington damaged by the war in Iraq and repeatedly proclaiming himself a friend of Israel.

His statements of support for the Jewish state contrasted with those of previous presidents from Charles de Gaulle to Francois Mitterrand and Chirac, who were widely viewed as more pro-Arab.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in his welcome speech the visit was a gesture of friendship by a man who understood the challenges faced by Israel and was personally committed to the "security of Israel and to maintaining its qualitative advantage in the region".

Saudi oil boost fails to alleviate concerns

Saudi Arabia's decision to pump more oil than it has in nearly 30 years risks being completely negated by the sharp drop in output caused by attacks on production facilities in Nigeria.

Nigeria now pumps less than 1.5m barrels a day, its lowest level in 25 years, rather than the 2.5m b/d it has the ability to produce, according to officials attending Sunday's high-level meeting in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

Oil markets are in a bubble driven by speculation. While peak oil is a real concern, it does not explain recent short term price moves. People drive less now in the U.S., China has increased its subsidized oil prices by 17.5% and airlines have stopped flying certain routes. Supply has stayed fairly constant. Still prices are going up.

The speculation is driven largely by U.S. financial entities that trade in unregulated commodities with over the counter derivative contracts. F. William Engdahl has explained how the mechanisms works and Pam Martens points to the massive involvement of Citibank and other big players.

The OPEC folks are pissed. They know the prices they are selling their oil for are far below the top prices in the commodity markets and they know that some of the barrels they offer find no buyers. They do know that it is speculation that drives this. The current too high prices will make people develop other energy sources and will destruct the long term demand for their product. They learned that lesson in the 1970s and do not want to repeat it.

At the same time there is a serious systematic attack on OPEC underway in U.S. politics. A year ago Ed Koch, the former mayor of New York, called for more legislative and presidential action to take on OPEC in the Jewish World Review. In May Hillary Clinton said OPEC 'can no longer be a cartel'. This week saw calls for action against OPEC from mainly Democratic legislators and op-eds on the issue in two major papers. On the same day the LA Times and the  NY Times headlined these Sue OPEC.