 RFE/RL Headlines 9/22/2009 A daily digest of the English-language news and analysis written by the staff of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty |
| News  Climate Change Tops Talks At UN Meeting UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has made climate change a centerpiece of his agenda since taking the helm of the world body in 2007, and he's using this second week of the 64th session of the General Assembly to try and galvanize global action on the issue. More  Vast Agenda Greets Leaders At UN General Assembly The United Nations' General Assembly formally begins its 64th session on September 23, with seven days of general debate. The new session brings together more than 120 heads of state and government, among them many faces new to the UN, including U.S. President Barack Obama. Afghanistan, the Arab-Israeli conflict, and the future of Azerbaijan's Nagorno-Karabakh enclave are items in the session's huge agenda. More  French Break Up 'Jungle' Refugee Camp Gendarmes have shut down a makeshift tent city called "The Jungle" near Calais after officials said it had become a magnet for crime and a base for human traffickers. Most of the 300 people detained were Afghans trying to cross the English Channel into Britain. More  Court Rejects Former Yukos Vice President's Appeal A Moscow court has declined an appeal by former Yukos Vice President Vasily Aleksanyan, who is seriously ill, to postpone a hearing in a lawsuit against him, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports. More  OSCE Reps Visit Jailed Kazakh Rights Activist Officials from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) have met with jailed Kazakh rights activist Yevgeny Zhovtis, RFE/RL Kazakh Service reports. More  World Bank Says Russia Might Join In Moldova Bailout A World Bank official says Russia might work with the International Monetary Fund, the European Union, and other international donors to help Moldova out of its economic crisis, RFE/RL's Moldovan Service reports. More  Armenian Police Curb Travel To Yerevan Ahead Of Rally Armenia officials again restricted transportation between Yerevan and its surrounding regions before a major opposition rally in the capital on September 18, RFE/RL's Armenian Service reports. More  Hard-Line Iranian Daily Criticizes Twitter Campaign For 'Obi Wan Karrubi' Iran's hard-line daily "Kayhan" has reacted to a campaign on Twitter to nominate reformist cleric Mehdi Karrubi for the Nobel Peace Prize by saying that experience shows that only those who do their best to serve “the West and particularly the Zionists” receive the honor. More Handlers at an end-of-Ramadan (Eid al-Fitr) ceremony tried to usher Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani -- an influential supporter of Green Movement leader Mir Hossein Musavi and critic of the June 12 election -- toward a spot next to President Mahmud Ahmadinejad. They failed. More  'Fortress Europe' Buckles Under Immigrant Siege Each summer, European Union countries are overwhelmed by hundreds of thousands of migrants struggling to their shores in search of a better life. It's a problem that first hit European headlines a decade ago. So it may seem surprising just how little the EU has done to create an effective policy on immigration, asylum, or repatriation. More  Obama Weighing All His Options In Afghanistan The Obama administration is at a crossroads in its strategy for Afghanistan. The top U.S. commander there has called for more troops, warning that the war in Afghanistan could be lost to the Taliban without them. But U.S. President Barack Obama says he wants more time to consider all the variables in the Afghan problem before making an immediate decision. More  Student: 'I Didn't Want To Make The Rape Issue Public' As two human rights organizations have appealed to the UN to investigate alleged abuses by security forces in Iran's postelection crackdown, one student talks with RFE/RL about his ordeal while in custody. More  Taliban Death Underscores Rights Concerns In Swat The Pakistani military says a feared Taliban commander has died from injuries sustained during a military operation in which he was arrested last week. The announcement comes amid concerns over an ongoing human rights crisis, including allegations of summary executions of suspected militants, in Pakistan's northwestern areas. More |
