US Republican hopeful Cain’s wife: He would not harass women

Herman Cain at a Republican party presidential debate in Spartanburg, South Carolina on November 12, 2011.

Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain is not the type of person who would sexually harass women, his wife Gloria Cain said in excerpts of a Fox News interview released yesterday.

Cain’s wife of 43 years has remained hidden from public eye as her husband seeks the party’s nomination to run against President Barack Obama in 2012. She addressed the allegations that have roiled her husband’s campaign in a rare interview.

“You hear the graphic allegations and we know that would have been something that’s totally disrespectful of her as a woman. And I know the type of person he is. He totally respects women,” Gloria Cain said.

Monti named to head new Italy government

Monti looks on following a talk with Napolitano at the Quirinale palace in Rome November 13, 2011.


Italy’s president appointed former European Commissioner Mario Monti yesterday to head a new government charged with implementing urgent reforms to end a crisis that has endangered the whole euro zone.

After a frenetic weekend during which parliament passed the reforms and Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi stepped down to the jeers of hostile crowds, President Giorgio Napolitano asked Monti to form a government, expected to be composed largely of technocrats.

The respected economist, made a life Senator last week, said he would work urgently to form a government and is likely to name around 12 ministers within days.

“I intend to fulfil this task with a great sense of responsibility in the service of our country. In a moment of particular difficulty for Italy, in a turbulent situation for Europe and the world, the country needs to meet the challenge,” Monti said after his nomination.

“We owe it to our children to offer them a future with dignity and hope,” he added.

US Republican hopeful Cain under new pressure

Congressional Health Care Caucus on Capitol Hill in Washington in this November 2, 2011 file photo.

Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain faced possibly damaging allegations yesterday from the former boyfriend of a woman who has accused Cain of sexually inappropriate behaviour.

The ex-boyfriend of accuser Sharon Bialek, speaking at a news conference in Louisiana, corroborated Bialek’s claim that Cain made improper advances to her when she sought help finding a job.

Cain, who leads some Republican polls for the 2012 nomination, has denied even knowing Bialek, who held a news conference live on television to accuse the candidate of groping her in 1997.

China protests Mongolia visit by Dalai Lama

China said today that it had lodged a complaint with the Mongolian government about a visit to the vast and remote country by exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, who Beijing considers a dangerous separatist.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said China had made “stern representations” to the government in Ulan Bator about the Dalai Lama, who fled Tibet in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule.

“We have always opposed any country providing a platform for the Dalai Lama to engage in activities to split China in any form,” he told a daily news briefing.



“The Dalai Lama always uses the opportunity of furtive visits to publicise Tibetan independence, smear the Chinese government and play up issues related to Tibet.”

The Dalai Lama, fresh from a visit to Japan, arrived in the Mongolian capital yesterday for a short lecture tour at a invitation of a Buddhist group.

Ulan Bator has restricted the Dalai Lama to one lecture today in the city’s new 4,000-seat Buyant-Ukhaa sports complex, which was built using Chinese aid.

Further lectures due to be delivered tomorrow and Thursday will be relocated to a less controversial location, Mongolian Transportation Minister Battulga Khaltmaa told reporters following a cabinet meeting.

The Nobel Peace Prize-winning Dalai Lama denies being a separatist, saying he only seeks autonomy for his homeland through peaceful means.

Buddhist monastic life, which took hold in Mongolia in the 1500s, was nearly wiped out within 15 years of communist rule, mostly during Stalinist purges in the 1930s when an estimated 17,000 lamas were executed.

But since the country emerged from decades of Soviet dominance in 1991, the Yellow Hat sect of Buddhism ― also practised in Tibet ― is making a comeback, and the Dalai Lama is recognised as one of the country’s spiritual leaders.

China has been accused by human rights groups of using its growing economic clout to pressure trading partners into refusing visits by the Dalai Lama. His plans to visit South Africa earlier this year were cancelled amid accusations that the government had refused to process his visa.

Mongolia won its political independence from China in 1912, but Beijing did not recognise its sovereignty until 1946, and many in Mongolia are concerned about Beijing’s growing economic hegemony.

Mongolia’s booming, mining-dependent economy is almost completely reliant on its southern neighbour, with 90 per cent of its exports going to China in the first half of this year.

During a previous tour by the Dalai Lama of Mongolia in 2002, China retaliated by closing the border rail crossing for two days, leaving 500 passengers stranded and severing one of the country’s few links with the outside world.

Mining companies based near the Chinese border said they were not aware of any disruptions to border transport so far.

Woman accuses US presidential candidate Cain of groping

Radio talk show host and former chief executive officer of Godfather's Pizza Herman Cain, speaks during the Reagan Centennial GOP presidential primary debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California September 7, 2011.


A woman accused US Republican presidential hopeful Herman Cain yesterday of reaching under her skirt in 1997, adding to sexual harassment allegations that are threatening to derail his campaign.

Cain, a former pizza company executive, has led many opinion polls in the race to be the Republican nominee to face President Barack Obama, a Democrat, in next year’s election.

Sharon Bialek said Cain made the unwanted advance after dinner in Washington when she asked for help finding a job after she was laid off by the National Restaurant Association, which he then headed.

Bialek, who identified herself as a registered Republican and single mother from Chicago, put a public face on a growing problem for Cain’s campaign. The 65-year-old candidate quickly denied her account, saying all allegations of sexual harassment against him were “completely false.”

Bialek, looking composed and confident before a phalanx of television cameras, said she had not filed a complaint against Cain but was now coming forward to “give a face and a voice to those women” who did not wish to go public.



Two other women lodged formal complaints against Cain when he headed the restaurant association. One said through her lawyer last week she received a series of unwanted advances.

“I want you, Mr Cain, to come clean, to admit what you did, admit you were inappropriate to people and then move forward,” Bialek said. “Mr Cain, I am for you. Make this right.”

Bialek, appearing with celebrity lawyer Gloria Allred, said that after the dinner in July 1997, Cain drove her toward the restaurant association offices, parked nearby and offered what Allred called his version of a “stimulus package.”

“Instead of going into the offices, he suddenly reached over and he put his hand on my leg, under my skirt and reached for my genitals. He also grabbed my head and brought it toward his crotch. I was very, very surprised and very, very shocked,” Bialek said.

“I said: ‘What are you doing? You know I have a boyfriend. This isn’t what I came here for.’ Mr Cain said: ‘You want a job, right?’ I asked him to stop and he did. I asked him to take me back to my hotel, which he did right away.”

Allred said she had signed declarations from Bialek’s boyfriend at the time, a paediatrician, and a businessman whom Bialek viewed as a mentor. Both said Bialek told them about the incident shortly after it happened.

“She told the businessman that Mr Cain had been aggressive with her,” Allred said.

Allred said Bialek does not want to file a lawsuit against Cain and is not seeking any money.

CAIN DENIAL

Cain never harassed anyone, spokesman J.D. Gordon said, and the candidate attacked the news media for its focus on “gaffes, gotcha questions and time devoted to trivial nonsense.”

Cain said, as an executive, he had turned around Burger King and Godfather’s Pizza.

“At some point during a career like this, someone will not like things you do or how you do it. Someone will complain,” he said. “That is just the nature of things if you’ve ever done much in your life.”

A Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Sunday showed the percentage of Republicans who viewed Cain favourably dropped 9 points, to 57 per cent from 66 per cent a week earlier.

A majority of Republican voters, and nearly six in 10 Tea Party supporters, say they are not concerned about the allegations against Cain, according to an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released yesterday.

“It’s attempted sexual assault if it happened,” Bernie Grimm, a criminal defense lawyer in Washington, said of Bialek’s accusation.

He said there is a statute of limitations of five years but, even when an accusation is timely, prosecutors rarely bring a case if the only evidence is the accuser’s word.

Merle Black, a political science professor at Emory University in Atlanta, said the latest accusations “can’t be good for Cain’s campaign.

“He’s now going to be asked about those questions again and, whatever the truth is, the more there are, the more they create doubt among people who might be inclined to support him,” Black said.

Bialek said she last saw Cain at a Tea Party event in Chicago a month ago and asked him: ‘Do you remember me?’“

“I guess I wanted to see if he was going to be man enough to own up to what he had done 14 years ago,” she said.

Bialek said Cain replied that he remembered her from the restaurant association’s education foundation and “looked uncomfortable” before being whisked away by handlers.

One of Cain’s Republican presidential adversaries called on Sunday for more information on the allegations.

“It has got to come out in total,” Jon Huntsman told NBC’s “Meet the Press” programme. “Legitimate questions have been raised and that information has to come forward.

Obama shows longer birth certificate born by Kenya Father in Hawaii.

 The birth certificate that the White House released.

President Obama: “We do not have time for this silliness.”

President Barack Obama yesterday released a longer version of his birth certificate to answer some Republicans who claim he was not US born, and blasted “carnival barkers” who refuse to let the issue die.

Obama took the unusual step of making a statement in the White House press briefing room to comment on the controversy, which has been raised most recently by real estate tycoon Donald Trump as he tests the waters for a possible 2012 run for the Republican presidential nomination.

“We do not have time for this silliness,” Obama said in an easy-going appearance that turned serious when he addressed what he called a distraction from the real issues.

US television networks broke into their regular programming for Obama’s statement, giving him valuable air time just as the 2012 campaign is beginning to stir.



“I can’t get the networks to break in on all kinds of other discussions,” the president said with a smile as he stepped onto the podium.

Obama in his two years in office has had to deal with charges that he does not meet the constitutional requirement that a president must be US born, and separately, some have said he was a Muslim, when in fact he is a Christian.

The cable news chatter over whether Obama’s birthplace has had consequences: A CBS News/New York Times poll last week said a quarter of all Americans — and 45 per cent of Republicans — believed Obama was not born in the United States.

The new document confirms what a shorter version released in 2008 has said, that Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, on August 4, 1961, the son of a father from Kenya and a mother from Kansas.

Trump, speaking in New Hampshire, told reporters that he was “really happy” that Obama addressed the issue and was ready to debate other issues.

“I feel I’ve accomplished something really, really important and I’m honoured by it,” Trump said in remarks shown live on CNN.




Some conspiracy theorists have tried to make the case that the “Certificate of Live Birth” released in the 2008 campaign was insufficient and that Obama was in fact born in Kenya, even though the short form issued by the Hawaiian state government was all that was necessary for official business such as obtaining a driver’s licence.

The longer version provides a little more information, such as that he was born at Kapiolani Maternity and Gynaecological Hospital in Honolulu to father Barack Hussein Obama, a 25-year-old Kenyan, and 18-year-old mother, Ann Dunham Obama of Wichita, Kansas. It is dated August 8, 1961.

Why now?

Obama said he recognised that this document still would not satisfy “a segment of people for which, no matter what we put out, this issue will not be put to rest”.

Obama said he decided to address the issue now because in recent weeks during a budget debate with Republicans he saw that some news outlets were instead focused on the so-called birther issue.

He said he was confident US politicians could reach agreement on serious disputes, “but we’re not going to be able to do it if we are distracted”.

“We’re not going to be able to do it if we just make stuff up and pretend that facts are not facts. We’re not going to be able to solve our problems if we get distracted by sideshows and carnival barkers,” he said.

The objective for Obama, who is seeking re-election in 2012, was to appear as the adult in American politics, eager to discuss real issues, and American voters may give him some credit for the move.

Obama’s appearance came as he is struggling with a variety of issues, including trying to bring down petrol prices that in many areas have surged past US$4 a gallon.

Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus tried to turn the tables on Obama, saying: “Unfortunately, his campaign politics and talk about birth certificates is distracting him from our number one priority — our economy.”

Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, who is raising money to run for the Republican nomination to challenge Obama, said on Twitter: “What President Obama should really be releasing is a jobs plan.”

Berlusconi refuses to resign, dismisses protest

Protesters gather in Rome’s Piazza del Popolo to demonstrate against Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi on February 13, 2011


Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said today he had no intention of stepping down and dismissed a weekend demonstration by thousands of women across Italy over his involvement in a sex scandal.

Hundreds of thousands of women took part in rallies yesterday to defend their dignity and protest over the underage prostitution scandal that has rocked the 74 year-old prime minister’s centre-right government.

The billionaire media entrepreneur told his Canale 5 network the protests were the work of his political opponents and denied that he disrespects women.

“I saw the usual factional forces mobilised against me by a certain section of the left which uses any pretext to beat an adversary whom they can’t manage to beat at the polls,” he told a morning programme.

“All women who have had the opportunity to get to know me, know how much I respect them. I have always behaved and I always behave with great care and great respect, both in my companies and in my government.”

“I have always tried to act in such a way that every woman feels special,” he said.

Sunday’s protests included several leading figures from the opposition centre-left and many conservative middle-aged women, a group which has traditionally supported him.

Berlusconi said the government would not resign over the affair, potentially opening the way for new elections.



“There is a lot of confusion but I have very clear ideas. The interest of the country is to have a stable government which carries on with its programme with determination,” he said.

Milan prosecutors have requested that Berlusconi face trial over accusations that he paid for sex with a girl below the age of 18 — an offence in Italy — and that he improperly pressured police to release her from custody over theft allegations.

A decision on whether to accept the request is expected early this week.

Using material obtained from investigators’ wiretaps, newspapers have splashed lurid accounts of “bunga bunga” sex parties involving dozens of young women at Berlusconi’s private villa near Milan.

Berlusconi has never hidden his fondness for the company of young women but denies doing anything illegal and his lawyers have produced witness statements saying that the events at his villa were no more than convivial dinner parties.

“The Milan prosecutors’ office and the media in contrast has trampled on the dignity of my guests, exposing them to public scorn without any reason or regard for them and trampling on the truth,” Berlusconi said.

“It’s really a disgrace, a big disgrace.”

Egypt unrest rages; web shut ahead of big protest

An anti-government protester throws objects at a riot police car in Suez, yesterday January 27, 2011

Egyptian demonstrators fought security forces into the early hours of today in the city of Suez, and the Internet was blocked ahead of the biggest protests yet planned against President Hosni Mubarak’s 30-year rule.

Emboldened by this month’s revolt that toppled the authoritarian leader of Tunisia, Egyptians have staged mass protests since Tuesday. The biggest demonstrations yet are planned for this afternoon after weekly prayers.

“This is a revolution,” one 16-year-old protester said in Suez late yesterday. “Every day we’re coming back here.”

Nobel Peace Prize winner Mohamed ElBaradei, who returned to Egypt from Vienna yesterday, has called for Mubarak to resign and said he would join the protests today.

Internet access was shut down across the country shortly after midnight. Mobile phone text messaging services also appeared to be partially disabled, working only sporadically.

Activists have relied on the Internet, especially social media services such as Twitter and Facebook, to organise.






US State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said in a “tweet” message: “We are concerned that communications services, including the Internet, social media, and even this tweet are being blocked in Egypt.”

A page on Facebook listed more than 30 mosques and churches where protesters were expected gather.

“Egypt’s Muslims and Christians will go out to fight against corruption, unemployment and oppression and absence of freedom,” it said.

In Suez, which has been ground zero for some of the most violent demonstrations, police fired tear gas at protesters, who hurled stones and petrol bombs into the early hours of today. Fires burned in the street, filling the air with smoke.

The city fire station was ablaze. Waves of protesters charged towards a police station deep into the night. Demonstrators dragged away their wounded comrades into alleys.

Security forces shot dead a protester in the north of the Sinai region yesterday, bringing the death toll to five.

Video images obtained by Reuters showed the man among a small group of protesters some distance from the security forces when he suddenly collapsed with a gunshot wound and was dragged away by other demonstrators. The video circulated widely on the Internet, galvanising anger.

Members of the Muslim Brotherhood, including at least eight senior officials of the opposition group and its main spokesmen, were rounded up overnight. A security source said authorities had ordered a crackdown on the group.

“Wiped from Internet map”

US-based Internet monitoring firm Renesys said the total shutdown of the Internet that it recorded early today was “unprecedented in Internet history”, going far beyond measures taken during Tunisia’s protests or a 2009 uprising in Iran.

“Renesys observed the virtually simultaneous withdrawal of all routes to Egyptian networks in the Internet’s global routing table,” it said. “The Egyptian government’s actions tonight have essentially wiped their country from the global map.”

The United States is Egypt’s close ally and major donor, and has tread carefully over unrest in a country that it considers a bulwark of Middle East stability.

In his first comments on the unrest, President Barack Obama avoided signs of abandoning Mubarak but made clear he sympathised with demonstrators.

“. . . I’ve always said to him that making sure that they are moving forward on reform — political reform, economic reform — is absolutely critical to the long-term well-being of Egypt,” Obama said in comments broadcast on the YouTube website.

“You can see these pent-up frustrations that are being displayed on the streets.”

ElBaradei and other opposition figures say the government exploits the Islamist opposition to justify authoritarianism.

The Muslim Brotherhood has kept a low profile during the protests, although its supporters were expected to join demonstrations today. The government has accused it of planning to exploit the youth protests for its “hidden agendas”, while the Brotherhood says it is being used as a scapegoat.

Frustrations

As in many other countries across the Middle East, Egyptians are frustrated over surging prices, unemployment and an authoritarian government that tolerates little dissent.

Many of them are young. Two-thirds of Egypt’s 80 million people are below the age of 30, and many of them have no jobs. About 40 per cent of Egyptians live on less than a US$2 (RM6) a day.

The government has urged Egyptians to act with restraint today. Safwat Sherif, secretary-general of the ruling National Democratic Party, told reporters:

“We hope that tomorrow’s Friday prayers and its rituals happen in a quiet way that upholds the value of such rituals . . . and that no one jeopardises the safety of citizens or subjects them to something they do not want.”

ElBaradei, 68, a former head of the UN nuclear watchdog who has campaigned for change in his native country since last year, told reporters at Cairo’s airport he would take part in today’s protests. He added: “I wish we did not have to go out on the streets to press the regime to act.”

Egypt wakes to devastation, Mubarak refuses to quit

Mubarak addresses the nation on Egyptian state TV in Cairo yesterday, January 28, 2011 where he called for dialogue and said he would name a new government today.





President Hosni Mubarak clung to power in Egypt today after days of popular protests against his 30-year-old rule in which at least 24 people were killed and more than 1,000 wounded.

Mubarak refused to bow to protesters’ demands that he quit and ordered troops and tanks into cities overnight in an attempt to quell demonstrations that left a trail wreckage across Cairo.

The ruling party’s headquarters were still burning this morning and demonstrators were still out in the streets in the early hours in defiance of a curfew. Daybreak revealed ransacked shops and burnt-out buildings.

Mubarak promised to appoint a new Cabinet today and called for dialogue to avert chaos.

Medical sources said at least 24 people had been killed and more than 1,000 wounded in yesterday’s clashes in Cairo, Suez and Alexandria.

“It is not by setting fire and by attacking private and public property that we achieve the aspirations of Egypt and its sons, but they will be achieved through dialogue, awareness and effort,” the president said in a midnight TV address, his first public appearance since the protests began four days ago.



The unprecedented unrest has sent shock waves through the Middle East, where other autocratic rulers may face similar challenges, and unsettled global financial markets yesterday.

US President Barack Obama said he spoke to Mubarak and urged “concrete steps that advance the rights of the Egyptian people”.

The protests bore many hallmarks of the unrest that toppled the leader of Tunisia two weeks ago, although the arrival of army troops to back up the police showed that Mubarak still has support of the military, the country’s most powerful force.

Protesters mocked his decision to sack his Cabinet as an empty gesture.

“It was never about the government, by God. It is you (Mubarak) who has to go! What you have done to the people is enough!” said one.

“The people want the president to fall,” dozens of youths chanted to a Reuters TV camera in the early morning in Tahrir square in central Cairo.

Some youths held up empty shotgun cartridges, teargas canisters and unused live rounds.

Tanks stood on roads leading into the square. One army armoured personnel carrier was gutted by fire. The square was strewn with rubble, burned tyres and charred wood that had been used as barricades overnight.

The army’s arrival had initially been welcomed by crowds, frustrated by heavy-handed police. But the damage to army vehicles showed that this swiftly wore off and protesters overnight accused the army of taking the same police line.

“What happened was a betrayal of the people... We were celebrating the army’s presence when they got to Tahrir, we let them through to take over from the dirty riot police and then we got fired at again,” Marzouq, a protester, in his 20s, said.

Cars began returning to the streets and there were other signs of normal life resuming but the wreckage was widespread.

In central Cairo, a petrol station was smashed and the burnt-out shells of three cars lay on the street nearby. Elsewhere, police trucks and pick-ups still smouldered in the acrid air, filled with the smell of smoke and teargas.

The ruling party headquarters in Cairo, set ablaze yesterday, was still burning.

In Cairo’s Mohandiseen district, jewellery shops were ransacked and emptied. A Reuters team saw a gang of looters storm into a bank and carry out the safe overnight.

More than half of the dead in yesterday’s clashes were reported in Suez, the eastern city which was a focus of the most violent protests over the past four days.

Some Egyptians expressed fear that more unrest would leave their country in ruins, and hoped Mubarak would go quickly.

“We don’t want this regime to leave this country in a state of destruction. We want it to go away. We need to give them a safe haven to leave this nation. Leave us, enough,” Salah Abdel Maqsoud, a senior official in the Journalists Union close to the opposition Muslim Brotherhood, told Al Jazeera television.

Mubarak, 82, has been a close ally of Washington and beneficiary of US aid for decades, justifying his autocratic rule in part by citing a danger of Islamist militancy.

The Muslim Brotherhood opposition, however, appears to have played a backseat role in the unrest.

His government has largely shut Egypt off from the Internet, which protesters used to organise. The mobile phone network in Cairo was still out of action. Obama called for an end to interference with communications networks.

“I want to be very clear in calling upon the Egyptian authorities to refrain from any violence against peaceful protesters,” Obama said.

Anthony Skinner, associate director of political risk consultancy Maplecroft, said Mubarak’s conduct was reminiscent of that of Tunisia’s ousted leader Zine al-Abedine Ben Ali, who also fired his Cabinet hours before he was forced to flee.

“Mubarak is showing he is still there for now and he is trying to deflect some of the force of the process away from himself by sacking the Cabinet. We will have to see how people react but I don’t think it will be enough at all.”

Markets were hit by the uncertainty. US stocks suffered their biggest one-day loss in nearly six months, crude oil prices surged and the dollar and US Treasury debt gained as investors looked to safe havens.

New clashes erupt as Egyptians spurn Mubarak speech

A man walks by the burning building of the ruling National Democratic party in Cairo today, January 29, 2011.

Thousands of anti-government protesters clashed with police in the northern Egyptian city of Alexandria today after President Hosni Mubarak spurned demands that he end his 30-year authoritarian rule.

A Reuters witness said police used teargas and live ammunition against demonstrators in Alexandria. Protesters also gathered on a main square in the capital Cairo in defiance of military orders for them to disperse.

The fresh unrest broke out as Mubarak clung to power, replacing his Cabinet in an effort to appease angry Egyptians, complaining about poverty, corruption and unemployment.

The president ordered troops and tanks into Cairo and other cities overnight and imposed a curfew in an attempt to quell the protests that have shaken the Arab world’s most populous nation, a key US ally, to the core.






Despite dozens of deaths in clashes yesterday, Egyptians said they would press on with protests until Mubarak quits.

“We are not demanding a change of Cabinet, we want them all to leave, Mubarak before anyone else,” said Saad Mohammed, a 45-year-old welder who was among about 2,000 people gathered in Cairo’s central Tahrir Square.

The unrest, which follows the overthrow of Tunisian strongman Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali two weeks ago in a popular uprising, has sent shock waves through the Middle East, where other autocratic rulers may face similar challenges.

The capital was strewn with wreckage from a day of protests yesterday when protesters fought running battles with police firing rubber bullets, teargas and wielding batons — an unprecedented turn of events in the tightly-controlled country.

Government buildings, including the ruling party headquarters, still blazed this morning after being set alight by demonstrators who targeted symbols of Mubarak’s rule.

According to a Reuters tally, at least 74 people have been killed in the unrest. There was no official figure. Medical sources said at least 1,030 people were injured in Cairo, but with more protests starting throughout the country, the number was bound to rise.

As well as Cairo and Alexandria, clashes have also occurred in Suez, site of the strategically important canal.

The demonstrators, many of them young urban poor and students, complain of repression, corruption, and economic despair under Mubarak, who has held power since the 1981 assassination of President Anwar Sadat by Islamist soldiers.

Mubarak, whose government still rules with emergency laws, promised to address Egyptians’ grievances in a television address last night. He sacked the Cabinet but made clear he intended to stay in power and he condemned the violence.

The Cabinet was meeting today to formalise the move.

So far, the protest movement seems to have no clear leader or organisation even if Mubarak did wish to open a dialogue.

Prominent activist Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace Laureate for his work with the UN nuclear agency, returned to Egypt from Europe to join the protests. But many Egyptians feel he has not spent enough time in the country.

In an interview with France 24 television, El Baradei said Mubarak should step down and begin a transition of power.

“There is a consensus in Egypt in every part of society that this is a regime that is a dictatorship, that has failed to deliver on economic, social, and political fronts,” he said. “We need a new beginning.”

The Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist opposition group, has also stayed in the background, although several of its senior officials have been rounded up. The government has accused it of planning to exploit the protests.

The deployment of army troops to back up the police showed that Mubarak still has the support of the military, the country’s most powerful force. But any change of sentiment among the generals could seal his fate.

The army told Egyptians today not to gather in groups and to observe the curfew, which was extended by two hours to begin at 4pm (1400 GMT).

Tanks were parked on roads leading into Tahrir Square, which was strewn with rubble, burned tyres and charred wood that had been used as barricades overnight.

The number of protesters was fewer than in previous days but they were nonetheless defiant.

“This is unacceptable, Mubarak must step down. Public unrest will not stop until this is achieved,” said Mohammed Essawy, a 26-year-old graduate student.

Protesters mocked Mubarak’s sacking of his Cabinet as an empty gesture.

Mahmoud Mohammed Imam, a 26-year-old taxi-driver, said: “All he said was empty promises and lies. He appointed a new government of thieves, one thief goes and one thief comes to loot the country.”

“This is the revolution of the people who are hungry, this is the revolution of the people who have no money against those with a lot of money.”

The final straw appeared to be the prospect of elections due to be held in September. Until now few had doubted that Mubarak would remain in control or bring in a successor in the shape of his 47-year-old son Gamal.

It also poses a dilemma for the United States. Mubarak, 82, has been a close ally of Washington and beneficiary of US aid for decades, justifying his autocratic rule in part by citing a danger of Islamist militancy.

Egypt plays an important role in Middle East peacemaking and was the first Arab nation to sign a peace treaty with Israel.

US President Barack Obama said he had spoken to Mubarak shortly after his speech yesterday and urged him to make good on his promises of reform.

“I want to be very clear in calling upon the Egyptian authorities to refrain from any violence against peaceful protesters,” Obama said. US officials made clear that US$1.5 billion (RM4.6 billion) in aid was at stake.

Anthony Skinner of political risk consultancy Maplecroft said Mubarak’s conduct was reminiscent of that of Tunisia’s Ben Ali, who fired his Cabinet hours before he was forced to flee.

“Mubarak is showing he is still there for now and he is trying to deflect some of the force of the process away from himself by sacking the Cabinet. We will have to see how people react but I don’t think it will be enough at all.”

Brazil Swears In Its First Female President

Jimmy Carter believes U.S. is ready for a gay president 'in the near future'

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter believes America is ready for a gay president 'in the near future'

Former President Jimmy Carter believes the U.S. is ready to elect a gay president 'in the near future.'

'I think the entire population has come tremendous strides forward in dealing with the issue of gays,' Carter said in an interview with the website Big Think.

'I don't know about the next election, but I think in the near future, because step by step we have realized that this issue of homosexuality has the same adverse and progressive elements as when we dealt with the race issue.'




Carter served one term as commander-in-chief and then lost his bid for re-election to Ronald Reagan in 1980.

He went on, 'I would say that the country is getting acclimated to a president who might be female, who might, obviously, now, be black, and who might be as well a gay person.'

President Obama is the first black president.

Former Bill Clinton adviser and interviewer James Carville then wondered, 'How do we know we haven't had one?'

America has had one bachelor president, James Buchanan, from 1857-61.

Japan PM wants China to ensure citizens’ safety

Japan’s prime minister on Monday urged China to ensure the safety of Japanese citizens and firms and called for calm after Chinese protesters took to the streets over a territorial feud straining ties between Asia’s top economies.

Sino-Japanese relations deteriorated sharply last month after Japan detained a Chinese trawler captain whose boat collided with Japanese patrol ships near the disputed islands -- called Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China.

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan’s comments to parliament were followed by remarks from Foreign Minister Seiji Maehara that China’s actions in the dispute were “extremely hysterical,” underlining the difficulty of putting a quick end to the spat.

Kan has come under fire domestically for appearing to cave in to Chinese demands to release the captain. On Saturday, thousands marched in Tokyo to assert Japan’s claim to the rocky isles, which re near potentially huge oil and gas reserves in the East China Sea.

“Regarding the Chinese protests against Japan on the 16th and 17th, we will tell the Chinese authorities that it is regrettable and ask them to ensure the safety of Japanese nationals and Japanese companies in China,” Kan told a parliamentary panel.

“Both sides need to work hard (on the matter) in a calm manner,” Kan added. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshito Sengoku said Japan had already conveyed its message to Beijing.

The feud has raised concerns about fallout for business given deep economic ties between the two Asian giants. China replaced the United States as Japan’s biggest trade partner last year.

China cancelled diplomatic meetings in protest over the trawler captain’s detention, and concerns have been simmering that Beijing is holding back shipments of rare earth minerals that are vital for electronics goods and auto parts.

“The countersteps that China has taken are extremely hysterical,” Maehara said.

“When it comes to rare earth (export stoppages), while China’s commerce ministry is denying any such steps, things have not really returned to normal yet, creating a situation that does not fit well with the spirit of the WTO (World Trade Organisation).”

Yesterday, China called on its people to stay within the law in their “understandable” anger at Japan.

An estimated crowd of 2,000 gathered in downtown Chengdu, capital of China’s southwestern Sichuan Province, from early afternoon on Saturday, unfurling banners and shouting: “Defend the Diaoyu Islands,” “Fight Japan” and other slogans.

In Tokyo on the same day, more than 2,000 protesters marched to the Chinese Embassy, waving flags and chanting in opposition to China’s claim to the uninhabited islands.

Sino-Japan ties have long been plagued by China’s bitter memories of Tokyo’s past military aggression, rivalry over resources and mutual mistrust about military intentions.

But relations had until recently been improving after deep strains sparked major anti-Japan protests in China in 2005.

Japan and China are trying to arrange a formal summit meeting between the two countries’ leaders at the end of October on the sidelines of a regional summit in Vietnam.

Kan and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao both called for better ties at an informal meeting in Brussels earlier this month, but they also stressed their claims to the uninhabited islands.

Britain is losing its battle against Islamic extremists says French MP who banned the burqa

Britain is 'losing the battle against Islamic extremism' by failing to outlaw burqas, the architect of the French ban said today.

Jacques Myard, a senior member of President Nicolas Sarkozy’s ruling UMP party, said relaxed UK policies had ‘opened the door to terrorism’.

He added: ‘Allowing women to exclude themselves from society by wearing the full Islamic veil makes radicals extremely comfortable, and Britain should realise this.’

Man behind the burqa ban: Jacques Myard, a member of Nicolas Sarkozy's ruling UMP party, said relaxed UK policies have 'opened the door to terrorism'

Mr Myard made his outspoken comments to British journalists in Qatar, where he was defending his country’s recent banning of the veil at the prestigious Qatar Foundation Doha Debates, which will be broadcast by the BBC this weekend.

His comments will inflame tensions between London and Paris five years after the 7/7 London bombings, which the French have regularly blamed on lax policing.

Referring to the 2005 atrocity, which left 52 dead and hundreds injured, Mr Myard added: ‘Britain has suffered a number of high-profile failures in its fight against extremism in recent years.

‘These could have been prevented if all signs of extremism were curbed, as they are in France.’

Asked if Britain should introduce its own burqa ban, Mr Myard replied: ‘Of course - it is fundamental to ensuring that extremism is kept in check.

'There’s a good reason why London was nicknamed Londonistan - it was full of Islamic extremists. People should be learning from these mistakes.’

As chairman of the cross-party commission which spent two years investigating burqas and niqabs in France, Mr Myard’s recommendations led to a full ban being passed by Parliament earlier this month.

It has already led to terrorist groups like Al-Qaeda issuing threats against France, but the country has largely escaped the kind of atrocities which have blighted countries including Britain and the U.S. over the past decade.

In a more light-hearted snipe at his neighbours across the Channel, Mr Myard said: ‘The French have been standing up for gender equality since Joan Of Arc fought the English barbarians six hundred years ago.

‘Women should not have to wear the burqa, which by its very nature excludes them from France’s secular Republic.’

Despite his strong defence of the burqa ban in Qatar, Mr Myard lost the Doha Debate entitled ‘This House believes France is right to ban the face veil’.

He was defeated by a team of London journalists, made up of Mehdi Hassan and Nabila Ramdani, as 78 per cent of voters rejected the motion.

Some 350million people across 200 countries are expected to watch the debate when it is broadcast by channels including BBC World on Saturday and Sunday.

India is back into the UN Security Council after 19 years

India's return to the United Nations Security Council is both a laudatory and a cautionary tale of diplomacy. The former because it has always been an embarrassment that a country that publicly aspires for a permanent seat to the council has not been ...

North Korea confirms for the first time that Kim Jong Un will succeed his father as leader

A North Korean official has confirmed today for the first time that Kim Jong Il's youngest son will succeed him as the communist nation's next leader.

Yang Hyong Sop, a top official in North Korea's ruling party, referred to Kim Jong Un as 'the young general' during an interview with APTN.

He said the nation's people would be honoured to serve him as their leader.

Kim Jong Un would be the third successive generation of his family to lead North Korea, which has a population of 24 million.

His grandfather Kim Il Sung founded the nation in 1948 on a policy of self-reliance called 'juche'.

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Family tradition: Grandfather Kim Il Sung founded North Korea in 1948 and was succeeded by his son Kim Jong Il in 1994. Right, Kim Jong Un will be the next leader

On ceremony: Kim Jong Un standing with other North Korean Army figures. He was promoted to a four-star general last month

Yang said: 'Our people take pride in the fact that they are blessed with great leaders from generation to generation.

'Our people are honoured to serve the great President Kim Il Sung and the great leader Kim Jong Il.

'Now we also have the honour of serving young General Kim Jong Un.'

Yang is a member of the political bureau of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea and vice president of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly, - the equivalent of the country's parliament.

Kim Jong Un had been virtually unknown outside the secretive nation before he made his public debut last week, when he was promoted to four-star general and vice chairman of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea's central military commission.

That backed up analyst speculation that he had been chosen to succeed his ailing father as eventual ruler of the impoverished authoritarian regime, which pursues active nuclear and missile programs.

The world got its first real glimpse of Kim Jong Un last week when his photo was published in state media and he was shown on television at a Workers' Party convention, the country's most significant political gathering in 30 years.

Yang's comments are the first public confirmation that Kim Jong Un will eventually take over as leader.

Kim Jong Il took over as leader after his father died in 1994 in what was the communist world's first hereditary transfer of power.

Leader in waiting: North Korea has today officially announced that Kim Jong Un will succeed his father as leader

Jailed Chinese dissident Liu wins Nobel Peace Prize

Jailed Chinese pro-democracy activist Liu Xiaobo won the Nobel Peace Prize today for decades of non-violent struggle for human rights, an award that Beijing had anticipated and bitterly criticised.

The prize puts China’s human rights record in the spotlight at a time when it is starting to play a bigger role on the global stage as a result of its growing economic might.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee praised Liu for his “long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China”.

Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo smokes a cigarette in this undated photo released by his family



“The ... Committee has long believed that there is a close connection between human rights and peace,” it said.

Committee chairman Thorbjoern Jagland said China, the world’s second biggest economy, should expect to be under greater scrutiny as it becomes more powerful, just as the United States was after World War Two.

“We have to speak when others cannot speak,” Jagland told reporters. “As China is rising, we should have the right to criticise ... We want to advance those forces that want China to become more democratic.”

Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao did not take questions from journalists at a news conference in Turkey after the award was announced.

Earlier this year, Deputy Foreign Minister Fu Ying had warned the head of the Nobel Institute against granting the prize to Liu, saying it would damage ties between China and Norway as they negotiate a bilateral trade deal.

China also strongly criticised Norway after the 1989 prize went to Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama.

The last dissident to win the Nobel Peace Prize was Iranian lawyer and human rights campaigner Shirin Ebadi, in 2003.

JAILED FOR SUBVERSION

Liu was jailed for 11 years last December for subversion of state power, a year after being arrested as lead author of Charter 08, a manifesto issued by Chinese intellectuals and activists calling for free speech and multi-party elections.

The former literature professor rose to prominence as a strike leader during protests on Tiananmen Square in 1989.

He was later jailed for 20 months and then spent three years in a “labour re-education” camp during the 1990s, as well as months under virtual house arrest.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said last month that Liu’s actions were “diametrically opposed to the aims of the Nobel Prize”.

Norway says the Nobel committee, picked by parliament and comprising former politicians, is fully independent.

The prize is worth 10 million Swedish crowns (RM4.63 million) and will be awarded in Oslo on Dec. 10. It was not immediately known who would collect the prize if Liu could not do so

Nobel euphoria fails to mask tough reality in China

The euphoria overseas and in some domestic circles at dissident Liu Xiaobo’s winning of the Nobel Peace Prize has failed to mask deeper unease that his victory will likely bring little change in Communist Party-ruled China.

Liu, 54, has been a thorn in the government’s side since 1989 when he joined student protesters on a hunger strike days before the army crushed the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy movement and has been in and out of jail ever since.

Protesters demonstrate outside the Chinese Foreign Ministry in Hong Kong October 8, 2010 demanding the release of jailed Chinese pro-democracy activist Liu Xiaobo. Liu won the Nobel Peace Prize for 2010





Yet in today’s booming and bustling Beijing – with its luxury boutiques, well-dressed residents and sleek new subway lines – the heady days of 1989 are a distant memory and public discussion is taboo. Few people know who Liu is.

“I’ve never heard of him,” said one Beijing businessman waving his hand dismissively, who gave his family name as Han, in comments typical of those heard on the street when Liu’s name is mentioned. “I’m too busy to watch television.”

The award was largely ignored by Chinese media, apart from a few brief newspaper articles carrying the Foreign Ministry’s condemnation of the decision as an “obscenity”.

The popular tabloid the Global Times, however, published an angry commentary saying the Nobel Peace Prize was in danger of becoming “a political tool of the West”.

“It is disrespectful to the majority of Chinese and another arrogant display of Western ideology,” it wrote of the award.

The government’s grip on power is as tight as ever, and it has shown no signs of relaxing its stance towards the small band of Chinese “rights defenders” who continue to mount seemingly futile legal challenges against the Party.

Many signers of the “Charter 08” petition which called for sweeping political reforms have either been locked away, put under house arrest or otherwise harassed. Perhaps the most famous of whom is Liu, jailed last Christmas Day for 11 years.

“Is China going to bow to international opprobrium? I think it very unlikely,” said Nicholas Bequelin, a researcher on China with Human Rights Watch, a New York-based advocacy group.

“But the prize will add fuel to continued pressure on the Party to adapt further to respond to social demands, which now include a functioning legal system, rule of law, greater freedom of expression and freer media.”

Where once human rights were a hot topic of discussion during meetings between Chinese leaders and their counterparts in the West, these days the lure of China’s red hot economy amid a global downturn has muted criticism.

“Liu’s winning will put more of an international spotlight on the situation in China which has been lacking and that’s good,” Xinna, the wife of imprisoned ethnic Mongolian rights activist Hada, said from the northwestern city of Hohhot.

“But controls on us are tougher than even a few years ago. Things I could once read on the Internet are no longer accessible,” she added, speaking by telephone.

“The restriction on the flow of information means that some activists I know had never heard of Liu until yesterday. This does not give me much hope going forward,” said Xinna, whose husband is one of China’s longest-serving political prisoners.

The mobile telephone of Liu’s wife, Liu Xia, was turned off on Saturday. She said yesterday that the police were forcing her out of town to prevent her from talking to reporters, and that she was being taken to see her husband in jail.

There was a heavy security presence outside Liu’s jail in the northeastern city of Jinzhou, some 350km from Beijing, with police searching passing cars and preventing people getting close to the drab detention buildings.

Still, some long-time activists see a glimmer of hope, pointing to comments by Premier Wen Jiabao in the southern boomtown of Shenzhen in August calling for political reform to safeguard the country’s economic health.

“If Wen is clever, he should use Liu’s winning of the peace prize to exert pressure on the conservative faction in the Party,” human rights lawyer Mo Shaoping said.

“There are those who think that the leadership does not speak with one voice on this issue. Liu’s prize could act as a starting point for reform.”

I could be Republican candidate to take on Obama in race for the White House, says Trump

When billionaire mogul Donald Trump looks in the mirror, he is starting to see the possibility of a U.S. president staring back at him.

Trump did a round of TV interviews to talk about the possibility of making a presidential run in 2012.

He declared himself a Republican and told the Fox News Channel: 'For the first time in my life, I'm actually thinking about it (running for president).'

Asked by MSNBC when will he make his decision, Trump gave little away, but added: 'Well, I'll make it over a period of time.'

The 64-year-old, three-times married property tycoon is a larger-than-life figure in the U.S. whose company operates a string of resorts and casinos.

Ambition: Tycoon Donald Trump may run for the Presidency in 2012

Trump, sometimes known simply as 'The Donald,' nurtures his celebrity status by hosting a popular reality show, The Apprentice, as well as The Fabulous World of Golf.

Trump told MSNBC: 'I'd love not do it, (run for president), but the country has so many problems, such as the erosion of the manufacturing base to foreign competitors.

'The United States doesn't really make things anymore.'

The Republican Party is looking at a dozen or so potential candidates for the right to challenge Democratic President Barack Obama in 2012, such as Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney and former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

Trump did not rule out the possibility of running under the banner of the Tea Party, the conservative movement that so far is seen as a sub-group of the Republican Party but which some experts believe could emerge as a third party.

He said: 'I am a Republican but have great respect for what the Tea Party has done because they have brought to light what's going on. I mean, we have trillion-dollar deficits... the country is going bankrupt, let's face it.'