The Associated Press reports that Iran is close to clinching a deal to clandestinely import 1,350 tons of purified uranium ore from Kazakhstan.
The report was prepared by a member nation of the International Atomic Energy Agency and given to AP on the condition that the country not be identified because of the confidential nature of the information.
The reports claims Teheran is willing to pay $450 million for the shipment and added that “the price is high because of the secret nature of the deal and due to Iran’s commitment to keep secret the elements supplying the material”.
Clandestine imports are banned by the UN Security Council, and Iran is currently under sanctions that ban the importat of all items, materials, equipment, goods, and technology that could contribute to its enrichment activities. Read the rest of this entry »
The wars may have ostensibly ended in Gaza and Sri Lanka, but the conflicts and hardships continue. As hundreds of thousands of residents languish in detention camps or endure a protracted siege, British medics trying to help also find themselves hindered — and worse — by Government officials.
In Sri Lanka, 26-year-old Damilvany Gnanakumar (pictured) is still held in an internment camp with civilians who have been told they cannot leave until the Government has “screened” for those who might be members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTEE). The British Foreign Office says it has been in contact with Sri Lankan Government, but Gnanakumar’s family, dissatisfied at the lack of progress, decided to publicise the case, working with journalists from The Guardian of London. Read the rest of this entry »
Now that the military conflict is over in Sri Lanka, the issue of internment camps with up to 300,000 Tamil refugees is getting a fair amount of attention. The BBC’s top radio news programme even led with the item, above and beyond the crisis of Members of Parliaments’ expenses, on Saturday morning.
And Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon has given the United Nations’ seal of concern with a visit to the camps. This does not mean, however, that the UN — in contrast to the Red Cross and other international aid organisations — sees access to the refugees as the major problem.
No, as Vijay Nambiar, the UN secretary general’s chief of staff, explained to the press, it’s just a question of everyone being very, very quiet:
As far as I can see, the government has told us that there is no restriction on access, there is perhaps a restriction on the number of vehicles, at any given time can go in, and I think this is a little more than just …. I’d like to make… they made it clear to us, that very often to have one NGO [non-government organisation] with ten vehicles going up and down, it causes a fair amount of disturbance to the local populations, the concept, the idea here is to be of a help to the IDPs [internally displaced persons], I think it is important if they can help if necessary by going on foot I think it would be useful to be a little more sensitive.”
UPDATE: The closing paragraphs of this piece were significantly rewritten after attention was drawn to errors in the original entry. Please see the readers’ comments for details.
The comment was fleeting, but significant. Steve Clemons, a prominent Washington journalist, posted on Twitter after an discussion with British Foreign Minister David Miliband yesterday: “Surprised AfPak [Afghanistan-Pakistan] wobbliness not the core topic in New America new media chat with UK For Minister Miliband. Steve Coll pushed Sri Lanka mess.”
It is estimated that the “Sri Lanka mess”, in which Government forces are fighting the insurgency of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam has killed an estimated 6500 civilians in recent weeks. Yet it has been effectively a non-story in US and British media. Both The Washington Post and The New York Times only noticed it on Monday, when a United Nations spokesman revealed a death toll of almost 400 from a weekend artillery barrage. Read the rest of this entry »
Today’s Guardian of London features this eyewitness account from Vany Kumar, who works in a temporary medical facility in a school in northeast Sri Lanka:
This is really a disaster. I don’t know really how to explain it. At the moment, it is like hell.
Most of the time we live in the shelter. There is not enough medical equipment, so it is really difficult to treat people. Food is a problem as well. There is no food at all here, there are no vegetables and no rice, they just eat whatever they can find, that’s all. The hospital is located in a primary school so there is only one room. We just try our best to achieve what we can. Read the rest of this entry »
Yesterday we brought you the second installment in our running series on the appointment of Dennis Ross to be Not an Envoy but a Special Advisor Advising on Something, Somewhere.
QUESTION: Have your ace geographers been able to determine what Southwest Asia is and thereby figure out what exactly Dennis Ross’s mandate is?
MR. WOOD: I’m so shocked that you asked that question. Let me give you my best – our best read of this. From our standpoint, the countries that make up areas of the Gulf and Southwest Asia include Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Yemen, and those are the countries. Read the rest of this entry »
In a blow to US military efforts in Afghanistan, the Kyrgyzstan Parliament has voted 78-1 to approve the Government’s termination of the US lease on Manas airbase. The US has 180 days to leave the base.
10:30 p.m. We’ve just posted a separate entry on the significance of President Obama’s announcement of additional US troops to Afghanistan.
Evening Update (7:30 p.m.): President Obama has spoken to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation about Afghanistan, promising, “Very soon we will be releasing some initial plans in terms of how we are going to approach the military side of the equation in Afghanistan.” He added, however, that he was “absolutely convinced that you cannot solve the problem of Afghanistan, the Taliban, the spread of extremism in that region, solely through military means” in a comprehensive strategy. “”We’re going to have use diplomacy, we’re going to have to use development.” Read the rest of this entry »
The Associated Press reports that Iran is close to clinching a deal to clandestinely import 1,350 tons of purified uranium ore from Kazakhstan.
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The wars may have ostensibly ended in Gaza and Sri Lanka, but the conflicts and hardships continue. As hundreds of thousands of residents languish in detention camps or endure a protracted siege, British medics trying to help also find themselves hindered — and worse — by Government officials.
The comment was fleeting, but significant. Steve Clemons, a prominent Washington journalist, 
Today’s Guardian of London 
Yesterday we brought you 
In a blow to US military efforts in Afghanistan, the 
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