The New Nation - Internet Edition

Pak tribesmen vow to fight to death against US incursions on their soil

AFP, Raghagan

Toting rocket launchers and Kalashnikovs, the bearded tribesmen say they back the Pakistani government-yet pledge they will fight to the death against US incursions on their soil.

The Pakistani military took reporters to the Pashtun tribal fighters in the tribal region bordering Afghanistan in a bid to show they have the support of locals for a month-long operation in the area, an Al-Qaeda and Taliban hotspot.

But there was also a strong message for US forces over the border, who have caused anger in Pakistan with a string of alleged territorial violations, including a raid by US ground troops on September 3 that left 15 people dead.

"We will fight against America until the last soul if they come to our country," said Malik Manasib Khan, the leader of a "lashkar", or tribal force, called up to help Pakistan's army expel the militants-and anyone else.

"For us, the Taliban, NATO and the United States are all equals," the burly tribal chief told journalists in the bazaar at Raghagan, about 12 kilometres (eight miles) northeast of Khar, the main town in Bajaur region.

Fiercely independent, religiously conservative and obsessed by revenge, the tribes along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border have repelled all invaders for centuries and still hold the key to stability in the region.

When thousands of Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants fled the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, the tribes sheltered them, viewing them as successors of the "mujahedeen" who fought the Soviet occupiers of Afghanistan in the 1980s.

In 2003, Islamabad launched army operations at Washington's behest in the tribal belt, especially the notorious Waziristan area, but civilian deaths helped to radicalise and fire up many more tribesmen against the government.

Pakistani authorities have in recent years made major efforts to win the support of leading tribesmen in a bid to drive out foreign Al-Qaeda militants and isolate the most hardcore Taliban commanders.

Yet that policy-combined with US and Afghan suspicions that elements in Pakistan's intelligence agencies still back the Taliban-has caused tensions with Washington, which wants Islamabad to launch an all-out offensive.

Pakistan complied and in August launched a military push in Bajaur, the smallest but increasingly the most dangerous of the country's seven tribal regions. The army said Friday the operation had left 1,000 militants dead. But the deaths of 11 Pakistani soldiers in a US air strike in June, a series of missile strikes and, on Thursday, an exchange of gunfire after Pakistani troops fired at US helicopters, have raised tensions to boiling point. Members of a local jirga, or traditional tribal council, warned NATO and US forces in Afghanistan to stay away from their territory.

"They should abstain from interfering in our area, otherwise we will take action against them," tribal elder Masood Jan said.

Another tribal elder, Omar Wahid, said foreign troops "will not return alive from Pakistan if they try to enter our territory."

25 killed in Vietnam floods

AFP, Hanoi

The death toll from floods in northern Vietnam triggered by Typhoon Hagupit has risen to at least 25 while four others are missing, disaster officials said Saturday.

The victims came from five different provinces, 10 of them from mountainous Son La, said an online report from the national flood and storm control department. State media had reported 16 dead on Friday.

Another three bodies have been recovered in Lang Son province which borders China, bringing the death toll there to seven, said Bui Thanh, a provincial disaster official.

"These people were swept away during floods," he told AFP, adding that little rain had been reported since Saturday morning. In Bac Giang province, two boys aged four and 10 and a mobile phone company technician were among the latest victims of the floods.

"The man, from Viettel company, fell into the strong currents while he was trying to prevent flood water from entering a telecom station," said Bui Lien Son, deputy head of the province's flood and storm office.

A total of 27 people have been reported injured. Thousands of houses were inundated or destroyed while more than 97,700 hectares (241,000 acres) of crops had been damaged since floods and heavy rains ravaged the region on Wednesday night.

State-run television VTV showed people in Bac Giang and Quang Ninh provinces taking refuge on the roofs of houses flooded to the eaves or on hills.

"This is the second time we were hit by floods in this province this year," La Van Nam, a local resident in Bac Giang province told VTV. "We are in real difficulties as the floods damaged our rice crop," he added. According to Vietnam News Agency, several remote communes in Quang Ninh and Son La provinces were cut off. Disaster officials have warned of possible landslides in the mountainous regions, it said.

Nearly 5,300 soldiers have been mobilised for search and rescue operations and to help people recover in the aftermath of the floods, said the online report from Hanoi.

Vietnam suffers from frequent floods and storms, which claim hundreds of lives every year between July and November.

Iran escapes new sanctions in next UN resolution

Reuters, United Nations

Six world powers handed the U.N. Security Council a toothless draft resolution on Iran's nuclear program on Friday after the United States, facing stiff Russian opposition, failed to secure agreement for new sanctions.

Ambassador Alejandro Wolff of the United States, which like European powers favors more sanctions, said the draft, calling on Iran to comply with previous resolutions demanding it suspend uranium enrichment, was an important "show of unity."

Russia said it was not a time to consider new sanctions.

The proposal comes less than two weeks after the U.N. atomic watchdog reported that Iran was not cooperating enough with its inspectors.

Diplomats said members of the 15-nation council, which has already passed three rounds of travel bans and asset freezes on Iranian individuals and companies, would consult their governments and the resolution could come to a vote early next week.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, whose country has veto power on the Security Council, appeared to shut the door firmly on new sanctions in the near future.

"(We) continue to believe that it is not timely to consider at the ministerial, or at any other level, this proposal of new sanctions," Lavrov told a news conference.

The 10-line draft resolution would call on Iran to "fully comply, without delay" with previous council resolutions, which demand it halt enrichment. It also urges Iran to meet the requirements of the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice stressed the need to heal East-West rifts over Russia's invasion of Georgia.

"It's also especially important that the Iranians recognize that the P5 plus 1 process is intact," Rice told Reuters in an interview.

The five permanent Security Council members-Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States-plus Germany are seeking to persuade Iran to halt suspect nuclear activities.

Western countries fear Iran is pursuing an atomic bomb but Tehran says it seeks merely civil nuclear power and that uranium enrichment is its right.

Ministers of the six powers were originally due to meet on Thursday to discuss new sanctions but that was postponed after an increasingly assertive Russia withdrew to protest U.S. criticism of its invasion of Georgia. Western officials feared that would send a signal of disarray to Tehran.

Although the draft resolution has no new penalties, German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told reporters that the text "does not rule them out either."

63 dead in Sri Lankan airstrikes, battles

AP, Colombo

A wave of gunbattles, artillery attacks and air strikes across northern Sri Lanka killed 60 Tamil Tiger rebels and three soldiers, the military said Saturday.

The fighting came during a major escalation of the nation's quarter-century civil war, with military forces pushing toward the rebels' administrative capital in the town of Kilinochchi and government officials promising to destroy the rebel group by the end of the year.

The fiercest battles Friday erupted in Kilinochchi district, deep in the rebels' heartland, where troops and guerrilla fighters waged at least a dozen separate battles that killed 46 rebels and one soldier, military spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara said.

Air force jets also pounded the area, hitting a rebel gathering point, logistics centers and a vehicle storage yard, the military said.

Much of the fighting occurred as the troops, who were only three miles from the town of Kilinochchi, pushed forward with their offensive, he said.

Nanayakkara said the rebels were also trying to attack areas that government forces had recently captured.

Other battles in the Welioya and Vavuniya districts killed 14 rebels, while two soldiers were killed in a rebel artillery attack on the Jaffna peninsula, he said.

With nearly all communications to the north severed, rebel spokesman Rasiah Ilanthirayan could not be contacted for comment.

It was not possible to verify the military's reports because most journalists and other independent observers are barred from the war zone. Both sides often exaggerate the damage inflicted on the other and underreport their own losses.

The Tamil Tigers have fought since 1982 to create an independent state for Sri Lanka's minority Tamils following decades of marginalization by governments dominated by the Sinhalese majority. More than 70,000 people have been killed in the fighting.

Iraq hopes economic crisis won't affect US troops

AP, United Nations

Iraq's foreign minister says "there is a new world now" because of the global financial crisis and he hopes it won't lead to an immediate withdrawal of the 146,000 American troops in his country.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said a precipitous withdrawal could have consequences for the country and the region that everyone would regret afterward. Zebari is due to meet Saturday with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in New York, where he was attending the U.N. General Assembly's annual ministerial meeting.

He said he didn't have any indications that the U.S. administration was thinking about pushing for a speedier exit from Iraq, where it has spent more than $550 billion, because of the financial meltdown. "But this is the logic of the dance," Zebari told the AP on Friday. "Nobody anticipated this major crisis, and still there are ongoing efforts to overcome it, to contain its impact, bail out some of these companies with a huge infusion of cash. But the crisis is evident everywhere."

"This has nothing to do with liking this administration or that administration, or this president or that president, something has landed uninvited," he said.

"I think there is a new world now after this crisis, and one has to be realistic about changes in attitudes and policies due to this huge crisis that has affected the world economy."

President Bush's administration is seeking a $700 billion bailout - the largest in U.S. history - which has raised widespread concern in Congress and fears that the United States is on the verge of a major recession.

Asked whether he was concerned that the current financial crisis might lead the U.S. government to push for a speedier exit than Iraq might want, as a cost-saving measure, Zebari said: "I don't know."

"We hope it would not have a dramatic impact to cause t drastic and calculated decisions that everybody would regret afterwards," he said.

India joins Japan in renewed push for UN reform

AFP, United Nations

India joined Japan on Friday in calling for more determined efforts to reform the United Nations as the two Asian powers pitched for permanent seats in the Security Council.

Speaking at the UN General Assembly, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh criticized scant progress made since world leaders decided three years ago to forge an "agenda for early and meaningful reform" of the world body.

"The composition of the Security Council needs to change to reflect contemporary realities of the 21st century," he said.

"We must acknowledge frankly that there has been little progress on the core elements of the reform agenda," Singh said.

He then called for "more determined efforts to revitalize the General Assembly to enable it to fulfill its rightful role as the principal deliberative organ of the United Nations," he said.

On Thursday, Japan's new prime minister Taro Aso emphasized "the absolute imperative" of council reform, in his address to the General Assembly. "We must bring about the early reform of the Security Council through an expansion of both the permanent and non-permanent memberships," he said.

Aso, who replaced Yasuo Fukuda, was the first Japanese prime minister to speak at the General Assembly since Koizumi came in 2005 to pitch for a Security Council seat as part of a push for global reform.

The UN General Assembly decided last week to begin inter-governmental talks on expanding the powerful Security Council by February 28.

Japan and India joined Germany and Brazil in 2005 in a strong push to be in the council as permanent members, along with two African countries, but without veto rights.

But their bid failed after it ran into strong opposition from China and the United States as well as from regional rivals such as Italy, Pakistan and Argentina.

Japan is bidding for a non-permanent seat in the council next month.

The thorny issue of how to enlarge the 15-member Security Council to make it more representative and reflective of today's global realities has for years divided the UN membership.

The council currently has 10 rotating, non-permanent members and five veto-wielding permanent ones (China, United States, France, Britain and Russia).

Its makeup has remained largely unchanged since the establishment of the United Nations in 1945.

Russia orders upgrade of its nuclear deterrent

Reuters, Donguz Testing Range

Russia said on Friday it would build a space defense system and a new fleet of nuclear submarines by 2020, beefing up its nuclear deterrent at a time of heightened tensions with Washington.

Announcing the biggest defense initiative in Russia for at least a decade, President Dmitry Medvedev said this summer's war with Georgia-which opened up new rifts between Moscow and the West-showed the need for Russia to have a strong military. The plan for a stronger deterrent also comes against the backdrop of fierce Russian opposition to the United States' plans for a missile defense shield in eastern Europe, a project the Kremlin says is a threat to its national security. "A guaranteed nuclear deterrent system for various military and political circumstances must be provided by 2020," Medvedev said after viewing a military exercise in the southern Urals.

"Large-scale construction of new types of warships is planned, primarily of nuclear submarines armed with cruise missiles, and multi-purpose submarines. A system of air and space defense will be created," he said.

"Just recently we have had to rebuff an aggression unleashed by the Georgian regime and, as we found, a war can flare up suddenly and can be absolutely real," said Medvedev.

Medvedev was speaking at what one military commander said were Russia's largest combined arms live fire exercises in 20 years. The war games involved 40,000 soldiers, 7,000 vehicles and artillery pieces as well as jets and helicopter gunships.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, an ardent foe of Washington who has aligned himself with Moscow, met Medvedev 75 km (45 miles) from the site of the exercises earlier on Friday.

Russia this month sent two bomber jets on a mission to Venezuela, a sortie Moscow said was routine but which some analysts have interpreted as saber-rattling directed at Washington.

One Western analyst said in military terms it made little sense for Russia to spend huge sums on its nuclear deterrent when its biggest deficiencies were in its conventional capability.

"I would say this is a power play against the West, just as strategic bomber flights to Venezuela are," said Lieutenant-Colonel Dr. Marcel de Haas, a Russia and security expert at the Netherlands Institute of International Relations, Clingendael.

Car bomb kills 17 in Syrian capital

AP, Damascus

A car bomb on a street in the Syrian capital of Damascus killed 17 people and injured more than a dozen others Saturday, Syrian television reported.

The TV said a car packed with 440 pounds of explosives blew up on Mahlak Street, located in a southern neighborhood of the capital near the junction to the city's international airport. Anti-terror units were investigating, it said. It occurred at the intersection leading to Saydah Zeinab, a holy shrine for Shiite Muslims that is frequently visited by Iranian and Iraqi pilgrims. Al-Jazeera TV reported that car bomb exploded near a Syrian intelligence post in the Sidi Kadad area.

Such bombings are rare in Syria, but over the last year, the country has witnessed two major assassinations. Several explosions blamed on Sunni Muslim militants opposed to Syria's secular government have also taken place over the last few years.

But Saturday's bombing was by far the largest and tested weaknesses of the government's traditionally tight security grip.

Police sealed off the area, blocking motorists and pedestrians from approaching from where the blast occurred around 8:45 a.m.