BERLIN: Could you get elected German chancellor Sept. 27 next year if your opponents say your goals are "emancipating" Germany and Europe from the United States, and setting a policy course for a Europe "equidistant" between Russia and the Americans?

Could be.

The prospect is sufficiently real that Christian Democrats leaders are thinking over just how black (or red) they want to paint Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the Social Democratic foreign minister in the coalition government of Angela Merkel, who will run against the Christian Democratic chancellor in 2009.

A Germany described as ready to steer a middle-of-the-road route between Moscow and Washington would terrify much of Europe. If it became a fact, it would almost surely lead to a split in the European Union more profound than its pro- and anti-American divisions over Iraq in 2003.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - EU ministers will on Monday (15 September) gather in Brussels to decide the composition of the bloc's peace mission to Georgia, while a question mark remains over where exactly the EU force will be deployed.

France and Germany are expected to contribute the largest number of troops, with Berlin saying it would contribute "around one-fifth" of the 200-member mission and a French defence ministry source telling the AFP news agency that France could send around 70 people.

EU foreign ministers are today to adopt the mandate, composition and financing of the bloc's mission to Georgia.

The UK will on Monday announce "substantial numbers" to join the EU mission, reports the Telegraph. Poland has signaled it wants to play a large role. Romania plans to send 20 personnel, while most other EU states are expected to commit "between two and 20 people" each.

Some countries, on the other hand, have expressed less enthusiasm. Belgian foreign minister Karel De Gucht told daily La Libre Belgique that his country would like to delay its participation to "the first changeover, within six months" in order to first see where exactly the mission will be deployed.

The leader of the Green group in the European parliament, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, is pushing for a Norwegian to top his list in next summer's European elections.

Negotiations with Eva Joly are in full swing, he confirmed on RTL Radio on Sunday evening (13 September).

Eva Joly was born in Norway but has held duel Norwegian-French citizenship for the past 41 years.

Daniel Cohn-Bendit (centre) wants a Norwegian who also holds French citizenship to join the Greens

She made her name as a fierce anti-corruption investigating magistrate in France and more than anyone was responsible for exposing the scandal at state oil giant ELF-Aquitaine.

During the case, she faced regular death threats, her telephones were tapped and her home and offices burgled several times. As a result of her work, 30 people were convicted and it later emerged that senior members of President Mitterrand's government were implicated as participating in the illegal activities, including former French foreign minister Roland Dumas.

EU foreign ministers on Monday (15 September) are to make a formal offer to relax sanctions against Belarus in return for good conduct in upcoming parliamentary elections, as Europe takes a risk on President Alexander Lukashenko's regime.

The EU "will re-evaluate the situation in Belarus in the light of the legislative elections" and is "ready to re-examine the restrictive measures in place against Belarus officials" if OSCE monitors give a positive verdict on the 28 September vote, the foreign ministers' draft conclusions say, AFP reports.

Lukashenko - how serious is he about better ties with the West?

The EU may also take "positive and concrete measures" in terms of future trade and cultural projects and will dangle the prospect of including Belarus in its "neighbourhood policy," which could see a large increase in financial aid to the cash-strapped government.

The EU in 1997 imposed a freeze on meetings with Belarus officials above deputy-minister level and in 2006 put 41 leading figures - including President Lukashenko himself and the head of the current electoral commission, Lidziya Yarmoshyna - on a visa ban list.

The European Parliament may be backing away from its targets for crop-based biofuels, but the EU is still hoping that it can create a certification scheme that will ensure that biofuels are produced in a sustainable and environmentally friendly way.

 The fruits of the castor plant used to make biodiesel. It's not seldom that Jan Henke finds himself on a jet cruising at 10,000 meters above the Atlantic Ocean on yet another trip from Germany to Brazil. Or to Argentina. Sometimes he heads the other way to Malaysia or Indonesia. But once he arrives, his procedure is generally the same. He doesn't waste much time taking in the sights or hanging out in the cities. Rather, Henke heads out into the countryside to tromp through the mud in yet another isolated field on a farm far away from Europe.

Henke is a senior consultant with International Sustainability and Carbon Certification (ISCC). Since February, his group has been running a pilot program for the German Energy Agency to find out just how farmers around the world raise their crops. Particularly, Henke is interested in those plantations that grow crops like sugar cane, African palms and even corn. And, if the crop can be processed into fuel for European gas tanks, Henke wants to see how it is raised so his organization can create rules that ensure the methods used are environmentally sustainable.

The governing board of a new European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) is holding its inaugural meeting in the Hungarian capital Budapest.

The European Union is providing initial funding of more than 300m euros (£238m) for the institute, aimed at generating more European technological advances.

The EIT hopes to pool the expertise of universities, research bodies and businesses in new partnerships.

Renewable energy and new-generation IT projects are among the priority areas.

The EIT is part of an overall EU strategy to promote jobs, growth and competitiveness in the EU.

Silvio Berlusconi was today accused of helping to create a "climate of racial hatred" after an Italian man of African origin was beaten to death in Milan for stealing biscuits.

Abdul Salam Guibre, 19, originally from Burkina Faso, was murdered by a shopkeeper and his son after they caught him stealing packets of biscuits from their snack bar near Milan railway station.

Witnesses said that they hurled racial abuse at him and then shouted "we'll kill you" as they repeatedly struck Mr Guibre with iron bars, leaving him lying in blood.

The two men, Fausto Cristofoli, 51, and his son Daniele 31, are under arrest and are expected to be charged with murder. Police said that Mr Guibre, who was brought up at Cernusco sul Naviglio near Milan from the age of three and worked in a local engineering factory, went into the shop with two companions -- also of African orilgin -- whle the Cristofolis were unloading a van and stole the biscuits.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - On the eve of the release of the European Commission's first-ever communication on mulitlingualism, a Dutch academic has called multilingualism "a pain in the neck" at an EU debate on the topic in Brussels.

Abram De Swaan, emeritus research professor for social science at the University of Amsterdam, put a cat amongst the pigeons at a debate organised by the European Commission by attacking the need to employ multiple languages.

Commissioner Orban encouraging European citizens to speak other languages

"Language diversity is not of itself a wealth, treasure or richness. On the contrary: it's a damned pain in the neck," he said on Monday (15 September) at the debate exploring whether multilingualism is a bridge or a barrier to intercultural dialogue within the EU, jointly organised with the European Union of National Institutes of Culture - the group that brings together language promotion organisations such as the Goethe Institut and the Alliance Francaise.

Mr de Swaan said he believes that the complexity of European communication is leading to an impoverished political debate, and, curiously, it is the very usage of a multiplicity of languages that is leading to the dominance of English.

European Union finance ministers meeting in the south of France for informal discussions over the weekend on a unified response to the darkening economic clouds agreed to boost loans to small and medium-sized businesses but ruled out any US or Japan-style major stimulus package to ward off recession.

EU finance ministers disagree over the correct response to the global financial turmoil

Jean-Claude Juncker, Luxembourg's prime minister, finance minister and chair of the eurogroup - those member states that have adopted the euro as their currency - told reporters on Saturday (13 September) that such methods - increased spending, slashed interest rates and tax cuts - once tried by European countries in the 1970s only saddled economies with debt and otherwise had few positive effects.

"We had a small short-term impact and a bad long-term impact in terms of increased deficits and debts, which where then passed on to the next generations."

"I can only hope that [the US and Japan] will have more success in the medium term than when we tried it in the 1970s," said the eurogroup chair.

Not since the unveiling of Edouard Manet's scandalous painting "Le Déjeuner sur l'Herbe" in 1863 has a row over the humble picnic - or pique-nique - so convulsed France.

The French environment minister, Jean-Louis Borloo today confirmed dark, but seemingly preposterous rumours, that have circulated in France for several days. The government intends to levy a tax on picnics.

In a country devoted to both food and the outdoors, such an idea might seem outrageous, like placing a tax on smiling. M. Borloo was, however, unabashed. "We are doing it," he told a French radio interviewer.

A tax of 90 euro centimes per kilo will be placed on plastic and paper throwaway cups from next year as part of a government drive to protect the environment and reduce the 360 kilos of rubbish generated, on average, by each person in France each year. Similar "green" taxes on wasteful fridges, washing machines, televisions and batteries - and tax-breaks on their more eco-friendly equivalents - are also under consideration.

THE HAGUE: The Yugoslav war crimes tribunal convicted a former commander of the Bosnian Muslim army Monday of cruelty toward Bosnian Serb prisoners, who were forced to kiss the severed head of a fellow prisoner. But the court acquitted him of murder.

General Rasim Delic was sentenced to three years in prison for responsibility for Islamic volunteers under his command who abused captured Bosnian Serbs in the summer of 1995.

Delic, a former commander of the main staff of the Bosnian Army, is the most senior Bosnian Muslim officer convicted by the court in its 15-year history. The vast majority of the 161 indictments handed down by prosecutors have been against Serbs.

Both Croats and Serbs in Bosnia denounced the verdict.

"Doing Business 2009", the latest edition of an annual survey carried out by the World Bank and one of its subsidiaries, the International Finance Corporation, comes to a surprising conclusion: it is now easier to do business in eastern Europe than in East Asia.

...

On average, it takes 21 days to register a business in eastern Europe, which is 27 days faster than in East Asia. Setting up a company in Indonesia costs 77.9% of the average annual income per person; in Georgia it costs 4%--though there is the small matter of political risk to factor in. Firing a worker costs an average of 53 weeks' salary in East Asia, compared with 27 in eastern Europe. All this cutting of red tape has brought results: Poland now has as many registered businesses relative to its population as Hong Kong does.

Eastern Europe's rapid progress has been due, in part, to the accession requirements imposed by the European Union (EU). These include regulatory reforms that are often enacted by countries that aspire to membership, but have yet to be admitted. For instance, the EU requires new members to create a "one-stop shop"--a single point of contact at which entrepreneurs can register their businesses. Before Macedonia became a candidate for EU membership in 2005, it took 48 days to start a business there. After three years of reforms, it now takes nine days.

Anglo Disease at Fever Point?

Tectonic Turmoil

European Tribune - Lehman: more socialising the losses of the rich

Financial authorities tried to shore up confidence on Monday as world markets plummeted following "Black Sunday" on Wall Street where Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy protection and Bank of America took over Merrill Lynch.

 Stockmarkets in Europe tumbled following the news that Lehman Brothers was filing for bankruptcy protection. Europe's big central banks pumped liquidity into the financial system to calm investors as markets plummeted on Monday after Lehman Brothers, the fourth-largest investment bank in the US, filed for bankruptcy protection.

The European Central Bank conducted a one-day tender for €30 billion and declared in a statement that it "stands ready to contribute to orderly conditions in the euro money market." The Bank of England and Swiss National Bank also provided liquidity as Asian and European stock markets tumbled.

UK shares continued to tumble this afternoon after the credit crunch claimed one of the world's biggest investment banks - with Britain's biggest mortgage lender the worst affected.

Lehman Brothers, which has been hit by billions of dollars-worth of sub-prime mortgage losses, announced overnight that it was planning to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Rival Merrill Lynch - another casualty of the sub-prime crisis during the past year - also took shelter in a takeover by the Bank of America.

Some analysts were forecasting that today would go down as 'Black Monday' in the financial annals - with the credit crunch entering a new phase one year on from its start.

In London, the FTSE 100 Index was down nearly 5 per cent by 2pm amid the fresh turmoil, although it recovered to just over a 3 per cent fall on the day as the afternoon progressed.

Shares in HBOS, Britain's biggest mortgage lender and owner of the Halifax, had fallen 25 per cent, but also recovered a little over the afternoon. Friends Provident, Royal Bank of Scotland and Barclays also saw big falls.

In a SPIEGEL interview, Harvard academic and former International Monetary Fund chief economist Kenneth Rogoff, 55, discusses Wall Street's never-ending crisis.

The New York Stock Exchange: "You just can't make money out of think air like this." SPIEGEL: Last week, the United States government rescued mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and only a few days later investment bank Lehman Brothers was forced to file for bankruptcy protection. Is there any end to this debacle on Wall Street?

Kenneth Rogoff: It's the worst financial crisis since World War II -- there's really no hyperbole anymore. At the same time, it had to happen. The US financial system was bloated and overgrown and reckless to some extent. Now it is being reigned in.

SPIEGEL: What went wrong?

Rogoff: In 2006, the financial sector accounted for a third of corporate profits in the US, although it only represents 2 or 3 percent of total gross domestic product. Goldman Sachs alone distributed $16.5 billion in bonuses to its 26,000 employees. I'm sorry, I think it's unbelievable. You can't just make money out of thin air like this, and underlaying this there were enormous risks being taken.

US banking giant Lehman Brothers is filing for bankruptcy, the latest US lender to bow to the pressures of the subprime mortgage crisis. More losses are likely, a German economist told DW.

Dr. Michael Schroeder is the head of the department of International Finance and Financial Management at the Center for European Economic Research (ZEW), a non-profit economic research institute in Mannheim, Germany. 

 

Deutsche Welle: Dr. Schroeder, how will Lehman's collapse affect Europe?

 

Michael Schroeder: That question is difficult to answer. Lehman doesn't have much systemic risk, or risk with a high probability that it will pull down other banks in its wake. So I don't expect the direct counterparts in the banking sector will be hit very strongly.

 

But it is a signal that much greater-than-expected problems in the banking sector are yet to come. Some experts thought one or two months ago that the worse of the subprime crisis was over. But as we see in the news, this is not the case. It was very optimistic.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

Bernanke Violates Federal Reserve Act Section 23A

Allowing banks to extend funds to their brokerage affiliates is in violation of Federal Reserve Act Section 23A.

Section 23A of the Federal Reserve Act ( Act ), originally enacted as part of the Banking Act of 1933, is designed to prevent the misuse of a bank's resources through non-arm's-length transactions with its affiliates and to limit the ability of a bank to transfer its federal subsidy to its affiliates.

Bernanke's willingness to break the law is in strict accordance with Fed Uncertainty Principle Corollary Number Four.

The Fed simply does not care whether its actions are illegal or not. The Fed is operating under the principle that it's easier to get forgiveness than permission. And forgiveness is just another means to the desired power grab it is seeking.

Supposedly the Fed "will temporarily allow commercial banks to extend liquid funds to their brokerage affiliates for assets that would normally be accepted in tri-party repurchase agreements."

For starters I doubt it will be temporary. But the main point is the Fed is taking steps that it knows to be blatantly illegal.

Fed holds fresh AIG crisis talks

The New York Fed is hosting a fresh set of crisis talks to deal with the problems at AIG, the troubled insurer. JPMorgan Chase, representing AIG, and Goldman Sachs, representing potential principal investors, are in the building working to come up with some kind of funding facility for AIG.

The Fed has convened the parties and is facilitating their discussions. But it has not asked JPMorgan and Goldman to provide $70bn in funding for the company, and at this stage has not discussed itself lending indirectly to AIG via back-to-back transactions intermediated by the investment banks, one possible way of channeling liquidity to AIG.

US authorities earlier on Monday threw a $20bn lifeline to AIG, one of the world's largest insurers, just hours after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, and Bank of America's $50bn rescue takeover of Merrill Lynch.

The deal between AIG and New York State insurance regulators allows the company to access $20bn of capital from its own subsidiaries in a desperate attempt to stave off a liquidity crisis and credit downgrades.

The move came as fears over AIG's financial health sent its shares into a tail-spin on Monday. The stock fell as much as 70 per cent in morning trading in New York to an intra-day low of $3.50. By the close of trading it was 56 per cent lower at $5.15.

The move announced by the New York governor, David Paterson, is designed to give AIG, whose balance sheet has been savaged by billions of dollars in writedowns and credit losses, some time to clinch a deal to raise capital through a share sale and asset disposals.

AIG and its advisers spent the weekend hammering out plans to raise up to $40bn in capital, which the insurer needs to shore up its balance sheet and prevent crippling ratings downgrades.

At the same time, the Federal Reserve battled to contain a ferocious storm in the overnight borrowing market as financial institutions scrambled for cash, pushing up the actual Fed funds rate at one point to about 6 per cent - triple its target rate.

After 73 years: the last gasp of the broker-dealer

It seems to me that Goldman and Morgan Stanley have two options. One is to follow Merrill and sell out to a large commercial bank with a big capital and deposit base. That could provide them with sufficient backing for their capital markets divisions, which can be revenue and profit powerhouses in good times.

The second is to scale back heavily, or abandon, their broker-dealer arms and become more like big hedge funds or private equity funds. In Wall Street jargon, this would involve a switch from sell side to buy side, where most money is now made. In exchange for becoming much smaller, they might retain their high margins.

My guess is that Morgan Stanley will opt for the first and Goldman for the second. It is sad to witness 73 years of investment banking history end this way but there is no use in denying it. Goodbye to all that.

Leading Asian markets have plunged in the aftermath of the demise of top US investment bank Lehman Brothers.

Shares in Japan, South Korea, China and Taiwan are down by 4 to 6%, having been shut on Monday for a bank holiday.

The figures reflected earlier falls in Europe and the US, which on Monday had its worst day's trading since 9/11.

The fourth-largest US investment bank, Lehman filed for bankruptcy protection on Monday, becoming the latest victim of the global credit crunch.

A global banking crisis was last night threatening to spiral out of control, and frantic US officials were locked in talks to save one of the world's biggest insurance companies just a day after they let one of its most powerful investment banks go to the wall.

Emergency talks on the future of AIG, which has operations across the globe and is deeply enmeshed in the world's financial markets, continued all day with no resolution, causing panic selling on the stock market.

Investors were already reeling from the collapse of Lehman Brothers on Sunday night and the fire sale of its bigger rival, Merrill Lynch, events which will reshape the finance industry forever. Images of Lehman employees in New York and London leaving buildings yesterday with belongings packed in cardboard boxes may become a defining image of the credit crisis.

Lehman employs 4,500 people in London and 20,000 more around the world, and the human cost of its bankruptcy was the first and easiest to measure. Many employees have most of their wealth tied up in its shares, which are now worthless.

So I think that the longer question is, if it continues does it become the issue in the campaign? Because the necessary reforms are not going to be taken by the current lame duck government, but it'll be taken by the next president, whether it's Obama or McCain.

Will this now be the deciding factor, how these men respond? Two or three days ago, you wouldn't have said that. It would have been what do we think of governor Palin of Alaska?

Now suddenly, she's going to disappear. I think she thinks Lehman Brothers are two guys that might have visited Alaska. But, you know, now it's going to have to come down to the two candidates who have to respond, and they've made statements already.

Sept. 16 (Bloomberg) -- The cost of borrowing in dollars overnight more than doubled to the highest since 2001 amid speculation the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. may cause more financial institutions to fail.

The overnight dollar rate soared 3.33 percentage points to 6.44 percent today, its biggest jump, according to the British Bankers' Association. Lehman filed for bankruptcy yesterday after succumbing to mounting credit-market losses.

``It's all a mess out there, it's unbelievable, it's very tough,'' said Padhraic Garvey, head of investment-grade strategy in Amsterdam at ING Bank NV. ``There really is no sign of this going away. If the Fed were to cut rates, it's not necessarily going to solve anything.''

Demand for short-term cash is surging even as central banks seek to revive lending through emergency cash injections. The increase underscores how, far from improving, the credit squeeze that started in August last with the collapse of the U.S. subprime-mortgage market is worsening.

The difference between the London interbank offered rate for three-month dollar loans and the overnight indexed swap rate, the Libor-OIS spread that measures the availability of funds in the market, widened 15 basis points to 120 basis points, the most since at least December 2001. That compares with an average of 8 basis points in the 12 months to July 31, 2007, before the credit squeeze started.

Foreign Minister favourite to be first female leader since Golda Meir

It was just before the rowdy climax of her meeting with party activists packed into a stifling eighth-floor office on a hot and humid night here that Tzipi Livni displayed her political steel. Having infiltrated the meeting, the national students' leader, Netanel Izak, had grabbed the microphone to ask why she had not responded to his letter seeking her support against higher student fees.

Ms Livni first gave the student a brisk dressing down. "I absolve you from supporting me," she said to a laugh from her loyalists. "But if you try to push me into a corner, you won't get an answer. If you're polite, you will." Israel's Foreign Minister then explained that a solution for higher education funding was the subject of government consultations, but that yes, she did support a rise in tuition fees.

Her intervention was not enough to stop a shouting match between the students and her supporters which ended in the arrival of the police. But it was a pointed indication to the party activists that she is not prepared to make random concessions to every interest group that demands them in order to achieve her goal of being the first woman prime minister of Israel since Golda Meir.

As such it symbolised the break with the old wheeler-dealing tradition of Israeli politics that her campaign purports to mark. That could affect the kind of governing coalition she seeks to build if she wins the leadership of the governing party, Kadima, after 70,000 registered members choose a successor to Ehud Olmert on Wednesday. And that in turn could determine Israel's stances over the coming year on major issues of peace or war: Iran, Syria, and the Palestinians.

European foreign policy chief Javier Solana conferred with Jordan's King Abdullah II, who underscored the "importance of the European Union's role" in the establishment of peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

"The monarch underlined the importance of the EU role in the maintenance of security and stability in the Middle East and the establishment of peace between the Palestinians and Israel, particularly in the coming months," the royal court statement said after the meeting on Sunday, Sept. 14.

Abdullah also warned that Israel's continued building of settlements in the Palestinian Territories, particularly East Jerusalem, "will derail peace efforts."

Security officials say soldiers were trying to enter South Waziristan by helicopter

Pakistani forces have fired on US troops near the Afghan border, stopping them from entering a remote north-western region of the country, local security officials said today.

According to reports, US helicopters landed on the Afghan side of the border at about midnight. As the US troops disembarked and tried to cross into Pakistan, Pakistani soldiers at a checkpoint fired into the air, forcing them to turn back.

"The US choppers came into Pakistan by just 100 to 150 metres. Our troops did not spare them, opened fire on them, and they turned away," one security official told Reuters.

The Pakistani army denied involvement in the incident at Angor Adda in South Waziristan. Major Murad Khan, a military spokesman, confirmed there had been gunfire but denied Pakistani troops did the shooting or that US helicopters crossed into Pakistan.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says the idea of "Greater Israel"-- the main motto of the Zionist founders of the Israeli regime-- is dead.

"'Greater Israel' is finished. There is no such thing as that anymore. Whoever talks in those terms is only deluding himself," the prime minister admitted at a cabinet meeting.

"It doesn't help Israel. The international community has changed its perspective ahead of the possibility of Israel becoming a bi-national state," he said.

More than a week after a section of the Moqattam hills cracked and fell on parts of Manshiyet Nasser, Cairo's largest shantytown, experts are warning of further landslides and potential disasters.

The rockslide, which government geologists estimated spanned an area 60m wide and 15m long, destroyed over 50 homes, killing 82 and leaving hundreds of people homeless on September 6.

Eight days after the tragedy, workers have only now started to dig tunnels in search of missing people feared dead beneath the rocks.

Aboul-Ela Amin Mohammed, the head of the earthquake department at the National Research Institute for Astronomy and Geophysics, said that the entire limestone plateau remains in danger of further collapse.

"It is not the first time or the last time this will happen," he told Al Jazeera.

Seven years into George W. Bush's Global War on Terror, the Pentagon is embroiled in two big wars, a potentially explosive war of words with Tehran, and numerous smaller conflicts -- and it is leaning ever more heavily on private military contractors to get by.

Once upon a time, soldiers did more than pick up a gun. They picked up trash. They cut hair and delivered mail. They fixed airplanes and inflated truck tires.

Not anymore. All of those tasks are now the responsibility of private military corporations. In the service of the Pentagon, their employees also man computers, write software code, create integrating systems, train technicians, manufacture and service high-tech weapons, market munitions, and interpret satellite images.

People in ties or heels, not berets or fatigues, today translate documents, collect intelligence, interpret for soldiers and interrogators, approve contracts, draft reports to Congress, and provide oversight for other private contractors. They also fill prescriptions, fit prosthetics, and arrange for physical therapy and psychiatric care. Top to bottom, the Pentagon's war machine is no longer just driven by, but staffed by, corporations.

Cuba is beginning to slowly recover from the destruction caused by Hurricanes Ike and Gustav, which could rise to $10 billion, according to estimates by experts. The latest official data is frightening: more than 90,000 house totally destroyed, and another 430,000 severely damaged. In total, more than a half million homes have been affected, 15% of the nation's housing stock, leaving 2 million homeless.  Thousands of soldiers and tens of thousands of volunteers are working on the repair of houses, schools and factories while international aid begins to arrive to the country.

A Spanish plane with 24 tons of humanitarian aid will land in Havana tomorrow. Two thirds are food, and the rest are emergency supplies to confront the catastrophe, from tents to water purification equipment. On Sunday a plane sent by Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, with 14 tons of food.  According to  Brazilian sources others will arrive in the next day, including a boat with 100,000 kilos of rice to share between Cuba and Haiti, where the hurricanes caused more than 500 deaths.  

El Pais [Spain]: South American leaders lend unanimous support to Morales' government (about an UNASUR summit - did you know UNASUR existed? I didn't, shame on me)

And Lula takes the reins of the Bolivian crisis

Brazil wants no foreign meddling in the conflict or insults to the USA