Roberto Abraham Scaruffi

Monday 6 August 2012

Eurasia Review: News & Analysis

Link to Eurasia Review


Posted: 05 Aug 2012 10:17 PM PDT
By Michael Lipin China dominated day nine of the London games, capturing five golds and retaking the top spot in the medal standings, while Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt defended his 100-meter title with the second fastest time in history. Team China continued its dominance at the diving pool, with Wu Minxia winning the women’s three-meter [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 10:13 PM PDT
The U.S. authorities will provide the required support to officials investigating Sunday’s deadly shooting in the U.S. state of Wisconsin, President Barack Obama said. “Michelle and I were deeply saddened to learn of the shooting that tragically took so many lives in Wisconsin,” Obama said in a statement. An unknown assailant opened fire on Sunday [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 10:10 PM PDT
Spain has charged two Russian nationals of Chechen origin with links to al-Qaeda and possession of explosives, days after they were detained over allegations of involvement in a terror plot. ­The men have pleaded not guilty. They are currently under arrest until further court proceedings. The two are connected with Turk Cengiz Yalcin, who was [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 09:46 PM PDT
By Eric Stadius The June 15 clash between police and campesinos in the Paraguayan region of Curuguaty sparked a political crisis that resulted in Fernando Lugo’s impeachment, Paraguay’s removal from both the Mercosur trade bloc and the Unasur customs union, as well as international condemnation. That violent encounter, which left 11 campesinos and six policemen [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 09:37 PM PDT
If Arab leaders had any doubt about the direction Mitt Romney’s foreign policy will take if he is elected president in November, the presumptive Republican nominee’s trip to Israel last week ought to make things crystal clear. With about as much subtly as Rush Limbaugh discussing gender politics, Romney insisted to his Israeli hosts that [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 09:34 PM PDT
The head of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) yesterday proposed sending an OIC mission to probe the “massacres” of Rohingya Muslims in Buddhist-majority Myanmar. The OIC will try to persuade the government in Yangon to accept an OIC fact-finding mission, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu told an executive committee meeting of the OIC. He “expressed disappointment over [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 09:31 PM PDT
The few times I had a chance to visit Gore in his Hollywood Hills home, or chat with him on the phone were very special times for me of which I will treasure forever. Gore was the most interesting man alive and he was a true renaissance intellectual whose voice was desperately needed to counteract [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 09:26 PM PDT
By Adriano Marchese It’s going to take a lot more than just a bailout to fix what ails the Italian economy. Italy is the latest Eurozone country to be considered for a bailout in the deepening Euro debt crisis. However, debt is only one of several deeper issues that are eroding the core of Italy’s [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 09:24 PM PDT
The Iran Environment Organization announced that it is preparing a proposal for Parliament to deal with the problem of dust particles in Iranian cities. ISNA reports that Mohammad Javad Mohammadizadeh said on Sunday August 5 that the proposal to counter dust particles will soon be presented to Parliament. “There are action plans: one deals with [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 09:22 PM PDT
ran’s Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast has lashed out at the West for manipulating the concepts of human rights and democracy to achieve its political objectives. “The West talks of human rights, but has kept silent on the killing of the people of Palestine and Bahrain; and wherever there is a terrorist incident, the footprints [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 08:32 PM PDT
By Benjamin Mann The Virgin Mary will accompany the Church in the New Evangelization, just as she did during the first preaching of the Gospel in the Americas, Los Angeles Archbishop Jose H. Gomez told around 100,000 devotees at the Aug. 5 Guadalupe Celebration. “Our Lady of Guadalupe is calling us today, my brothers and [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 08:28 PM PDT
(RFE/RL) — Afghan President Hamid Karzai says he has accepted a vote by the country’s parliament to dismiss his two top security ministers, but ordered both to remain in their jobs pending replacement. Karzai’s statement came during a National Security Council meeting on August 5. Legislators voted on August 4 to remove Defense Minister Abdul [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 08:25 PM PDT
By Siham Ali Morocco plans to impose university tuition fees on certain families, Minister of Higher Education Lahcen Daoudi said recently. “Today we have a serious problem, which is a universally free higher education,” Daoudi said in an interview with l’Economiste published on July 23rd. “We cannot continue that logic. With its budgetary constraints, the [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 08:23 PM PDT
By Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan Former Japanese defence minister Shigeru Ishiba’s recent statement that “having nuclear plants shows to other nations that Japan can make nuclear weapons,” has raised fresh questions on Tokoyo’s nuclear intentions. However, the statement is to be seen in the backdrop of opposition to nuclear energy power plants after the 2011 Fukushima [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 08:20 PM PDT
According to the Obama Presidential campaign issues staff, temporarily operating out of the Democratic National Committee HQ at 430 South Capitol Street, SE in Washington DC, Team Obama scored an electoral coup again rival Mitt Romney this week by moving fast to pull the rug from Romney’s hoped for advantage from his obsequious Israel trip. [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 07:45 PM PDT
By Klaudija Lutovska In an effort to increase the quality and competitiveness of companies in Macedonia, small- and medium-sized enterprises now have the opportunity to solicit advice from senior experts from the German Senior Expert Service. The service is comprised of 9,000 experts from 50 different sectors — including trade, chemistry, wood industry, textiles, energy, [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 07:40 PM PDT
By Natalia Yefimova-Trilling and David Trilling Ask an ethnic Kyrgyz in the cramped village of Tash-Tumshuk what country he lives in and he will reply confidently, “Kyrgyzstan.” Shout over the mud-brick fence to the ethnic Tajik next door and he will, with equal conviction, say he lives in Tajikistan, in a village called Hojа Alo. [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 07:09 PM PDT
By Rafiga Gurbanzade Lobbying is generally defined as the process of seeking to influence a government and its institutions to execute policies that serve interests of a group of individuals. The Woodstock Theological Center defines lobbying as a “deliberate attempt to influence political decision through various forms of advocacy directed at policymakers on behalf of [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 07:01 PM PDT
The increasingly networked nature of the world has given rise to concerns over the use of cyberspace for global conflict. More and more countries are shoring up their cyber defenses against would-be aggressors. But with modern international relations largely defined by Westphalian rules of engagement, negotiating cyber frontiers will prove challenging. By Benjamin Ho and [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 06:56 PM PDT
The United States authorities are holding up resolution of a tax dispute with Switzerland by making new demands, according to Swiss Finance Minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf. The minister told Saturday’s Zürcher Regionalzeitungen newspaper, that since the two countries had agreed on an overall approach to a global settlement “new demands are constantly being made that we [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 04:11 PM PDT
Mr.Tomas Ojea Quintana, a UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights, completed on August 4,2012, a six-day visit to Myanmar to study allegations of violations of the human rights of its ethnic minorities and Rohingya Muslims by the military regime that was in power for nearly five decades. He has called for the establishment of a [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 04:08 PM PDT
A shooting during Sunday services at a Sikh temple left at least seven people dead, including a gunman, and at least three critically wounded, police and hospital officials said. Obama was informed of Shooting at Sikh temple in Wisconsin US President Barack Obama was informed of the deadly shooting spree at a Sikh temple in [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 04:06 PM PDT
Colum Lynch writes: The resignation of Kofi Annan as the U.N.-Arab League joint envoy to Syria on Aug. 2 effectively marks the end of U.N.-led diplomatic efforts to persuade President Bashar al-Assad to leave office peacefully, setting the stage for a new and deadlier phase of the Syrian crisis and heightening pressure on the United [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 04:03 PM PDT
The Syrian army, which concluded Sunday, the deployment around Aleppo, heavily bombed the city amid fighting with insurgents ahead of launching the decisive offensive to re-take control of Syria’s second largest city. Early Sunday, the artillery resumed bombing Salaheddin area, which is besieged by the army, according to Syrian Observatory of Human Rights (SOHR). Fighting [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 04:02 PM PDT
At least 15 Egyptian border guards were killed Sunday in an attack against a post located in the Sinai near the border between Egypt and Israel, medical and security sources said. Gunmen dressed as Sinai Bedouins arrived in two vehicles and opened fire on the post, according to a security official. The attack left 13 [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 03:57 PM PDT
Hindus have asked the major international art institutions to re-examine the procurement of their Hindu art acquisitions and return these to Hindu temples where these belonged in case these were proved to be stolen. Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA) today, said that devotees had been worshipping these images of Hindu [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 03:55 PM PDT
By Natalia Viktorova and Tatiana Zavyalova Madonna is arriving in Russia to perform two concerts in Moscow and Saint Petersburg (August 7 and 9) as part of her world M.D.N.A. tour. While fans are anticipating the show, others say scandals are likely. Madonna urges the world to love and peace and appears armed on stage. [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 03:49 PM PDT
At least seven people have been killed and twenty injured as a gunman took over a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. The number includes the gunman, who was killed by police. Officials are treating it as a “domestic terrorist-type incident.” Four of those shot died inside the temple, while the three others (two victims [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 03:42 PM PDT
China’s Foreign Ministry has called on an American diplomat to protest State Department accusations that Beijing is hindering diplomatic efforts in the South China Sea. It’s just the latest controversy in the countries’ already tense relationship. ­The ministry said on its website that Assistant Foreign Minister Zhang Kunsheng had summoned the US Embassy’s Deputy Chief [...]

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Posted: 05 Aug 2012 03:40 PM PDT
By Kane Farabaugh Police officials in the northern state of Wisconsin say at least seven people were killed in a shooting at a Sikh temple in a suburb of Milwaukee. A police officer responding to the shooting was wounded in an exchange with the gunman, who is among the dead. The shooting occurred Sunday morning [...]

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