The New Nation - Internet Edition

Polls continue to place Obama ahead of McCain: White House rivals bicker over experience, national security

Reuters, Washington

Democrat Barack Obama's lead over Republican rival John McCain has grown to 12 points in the U.S. presidential race, with crucial independent and women voters increasingly moving to his side, according to a Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll released on Thursday.

With less than two weeks before the November 4 election, Obama leads McCain 52 percent to 40 percent among likely voters in the latest three-day tracking poll, which had a margin of error of 2.9 points.

Obama has made steady gains over the last four days and has tripled his lead on McCain in the past week of polling.

"Obama's expansion is really across the board," pollster John Zogby said. "It seems to be among almost every demographic group."

The Illinois senator saw his lead among women-who are expected to play a decisive role in this election-increase to 18 points from 16 points on Wednesday.

And independent voters, who have been the target of intense campaign efforts by both sides, have now swung behind Obama by a 30-point margin, 59 percent to 29 percent.

Zogby said McCain, 72, appeared to have lost the traction he won after the third and final presidential debate last week.

"McCain can still try to turn it around, but he has to find focus," Zogby said, adding that economic issues, which dominated the campaign amid turmoil in the credit, housing and financial markets, still seem to be working in Obama's favor.

"At some point there are some issues that just overwhelm, and McCain has been particularly weak on the economy," Zogby said in a statement.

Other recent national polls have given Obama a narrower lead, but Zogby said he was confident in his sampling methods.

The latest poll showed a continued erosion of McCain's support even among his "base" voters.

While Obama wins the backing of 86 percent of Democrats, only 81 percent of Republicans back the Arizona senator-down from figures in the low 90s immediately after the Republican national convention in early September.

Obama holds a 6-point lead among men, 48 percent to 42 percent, while white voters-who had been among McCain's core support groups-now only back McCain by a 2-point margin.

Independent Ralph Nader and Libertarian Bob Barr held relatively steady at 2 percent and 1 percent respectively. Three percent of voters said they remained undecided, unchanged from Wednesday.

The rolling tracking poll surveyed 1,208 likely voters in the presidential election. In a tracking poll, the most recent day's results are added while the oldest day's results are dropped to monitor changing momentum.

The U.S. president is determined by who wins the Electoral College, which has 538 members apportioned by population in each state and the District of Columbia. Electoral votes are allotted on a winner-take-all basis in all but two states, which divide them by congressional district.

Meanwhile, White House rivals squared off over experience as Barack Obama played up his foreign policy chops and struggling John McCain highlighted national security in a bid to pick up lost ground.

Obama, flanked by top veteran military officials in Virginia on Wednesday, portrayed McCain as "out of touch and running out of time," after rejecting new Republican jibes on his plans for taxes and national security.

But just 13 days before the presidential election, McCain warned the Democratic Illinois senator not to take victory for granted, despite his mammoth financial edge and solid lead in a slew of opinion polls.

McCain also returned to his attack on recent comments by Democratic vice presidential pick Joe Biden that, just like former president John F. Kennedy, Obama would be "tested" by a crisis on the international stage within six months of taking office.

The military veteran noted he had some "personal experience" with crises, citing his role in the United States' 1962 showdown with the Soviet Union over its missiles in Cuba-known as the Cuban Missile Crisis. At that time, the Republican nominee was as a fighter pilot assigned Cuban targets.

Suicide car bomber hits Iraq convoy, 13 killed

AP, Baghdad

A suicide car bomber targeted an Iraqi minister during rush hour Thursday morning in Baghdad, killing at least 13 people and wounding more than 20, officials said.

The blast underscored the continued dangers facing Iraqis despite a sharp decline in violence over the past year as insurgents defy security improvements. Militants have frequently targeted Iraqi government officials.

The attacker rammed the car into the Labor and Social Affairs Ministry convoy as it passed through the central Bab al-Sharji area, a ministry spokesman said.

The Shiite minister, Mahmoud Mohammed al-Radhi, escaped unharmed but three of his guards were killed, spokesman Abdullah al-Lami told the al-Arabiya TV station.

"It is the latest in a series of criminal acts that are targeting development process in Iraq," al-Lami said.

At least 10 civilians were killed in addition to the guards, and 21 people were wounded, according to police and hospital officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to release the information.

Smoke and the smell of gunpowder filled the air. Drivers at a nearby intersection sought shelter behind their cars until Iraqi security forces ordered them to evacuate the area.

AP Television News video showed a burned SUV and the charred hulk of the apparent car bomb surrounded by Iraqi security forces. The windows of a nearby camera store were shattered, with torn pictures left among the glass.

Youssef Qassim, the 40-year-old owner of a nearby clothing store, said he peered through a hole in the concrete wall surrounding the market and saw at least two cars on fire with burning bodies inside.

"The guards of the government convoy opened fire into the air but stopped when U.S. forces arrived at the scene," he said.

Suspected US strike kills 11 in Pakistan

AFP, Miranshah

Suspected US spy drones fired missiles early Thursday into a school set up by a top Taliban commander in a tribal area bordering Afghanistan, killing 11 people, security officials said.

The air strike apparently targeting veteran militant Jalaluddin Haqqani, a major target for US forces, was the latest in a string of attacks on Pakistani soil that have raised tensions between Islamabad and Washington.

It came hours after parliament passed a special resolution calling for an urgent review of Pakistan's anti-terror policy , including more talks with militants and a vow to defend Pakistan's territorial sovereignty.

Security officials said that the madrassa, or religious school, near Miranshah, the main town in troubled North Waziristan region, was set up by Haqqani during the 1980s "jihad" against Soviet forces in Afghanistan.

It was currently run by one of Haqqani's own commanders, Mullah Mansoor, and was recently used as a guest house for "international and local students traveling from other areas".

"At 2:25 am, two spy drones fired three missiles at the madrassa of Mullah Mansoor. Eleven people have been killed in the missile strike," a security official told AFP.

"Locals are still looking for more people in the rubble," he said.

A similar missile strike targeting another house owned by Haqqani on September 8 killed 23 people, including members of Haqqani's extended family, security officials said.

Haqqani was one of the most prominent Afghan commanders who fought the Red Army between 1978 and 1989. He subsequently became close to Mullah Omar, the leader of the 1996-2001 Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

Since the fall of the Taliban, Haqqani has become one of the most active Taliban commanders launching attacks on international forces in Afghanistan from safe havens in Pakistan, security officials said.

Pakistan parliament calls for dialogue to end militancy

AFP, Islamabad

Pakistan's lawmakers have called for a review of its role in the US-led "war on terror" and a resumption of dialogue with militants amid a wave of violence by Al-Qaeda and the Taliban.

Parliament passed a special resolution late on Wednesday after a 15-day closed-door session focusing on the insurgency in Pakistan's tribal regions near the Afghan border.

"We need an urgent review of our national security strategy," a copy of the resolution seen by AFP said.

"The challenge of militancy and extremism must be met through developing a consensus and dialogue with all genuine stakeholders," it said.

Pakistan's new civilian government has responded to massive US pressure to finally tackle insurgent safe havens in the tribal belt by launching a huge military operation in the troubled Bajaur tribal district.

But public anger is mounting over continuing US missile strikes and military incursions on Pakistani soil, as well as the government's failure to stop attacks such as the bombing of the Islamabad Marriott hotel in September.

With a fresh US missile strike in the tribal belt on Thursday killing 11 people, the lawmakers asked the government to move to end such attacks.

"Pakistan's sovereignty and territorial integrity shall be safeguarded. The nation stands united against any incursions and invasions of the homeland, and calls upon the government to deal with it effectively," it said.

The most effective solution to the problem of extremism remained a political approach, the resolution added.

"Dialogue must now be the highest priority, as a principal instrument of conflict management and resolution," it said.

The United States has been critical of earlier peace deals with militants, saying they were not implemented effectively and allowed Al-Qaeda to rebuild its capability in tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.

Lawmakers called for social and economic development of insurgency-hit areas, which mostly lack basic facilities including clean drinking water, healthcare and schools.

They asked the government to replace the military as the lead agency in the fight against militancy as early as possible, using by civilian law enforcement groups and engaging tribal councils to build confidence among local people.

3 US coalition troops killed in Afghanistan

AP, Kabul

A roadside bomb killed three U.S. coalition members in western Afghanistan, while 18 Taliban fighters died in clashes elsewhere in the country, officials said Thursday.

The bomb that struck the U.S. coalition vehicle Wednesday also wounded another coalition member, the U.S. military said in a statement. It did not provide the exact location of the attack or the nationalities of the victims. Most coalition members are American.

Taliban militants regularly target Afghan, U.S. and other foreign soldiers in their campaign to weaken the government of President Hamid Karzai and its Western backers. The number of insurgent attacks has risen 30 percent this year compared to 2007.

In the southern Uruzgan province, meanwhile, a U.S. coalition airstrike killed 15 militants Wednesday, including a Taliban commander, another coalition statement said.

The militants were killed near a riverbed in Deh Rawood district, away from the local villages, the statement said.

Another three militants were killed inside a cave in the western Farah province's Bala Buluk district during a raid by American and Afghan troops Wednesday, the U.S. military said.

The same day, a coalition airstrike hit an Afghan army checkpoint in Khost province in eastern Afghanistan, killing nine soldiers, Afghan officials said. The U.S. military acknowledged that its forces "may have mistakenly killed and injured" Afghan soldiers in what may have been a case of mistaken identity "on both sides." The deaths came as Karzai presses international forces to avoid airstrikes in civilian areas.

UN warns of millions could starve in North Korea

AP, Seoul

The U.N. food agency has warned that millions of North Koreans could face starvation, but a South Korean official said Thursday that Seoul has not decided whether to respond to a request for food aid to the communist country.

Around 2.7 million people on North Korea's west coast will run out of food in October, the World Food Program said in a report released on Tuesday.

North Korea has relied on aid to help feed its 23 million people since natural disasters and mismanagement devastated its centrally controlled economy in the mid-1990s. Famine is believed to have killed 2 million people. The country's food shortage has worsened this year following devastating floods in 2007.

The WFP also said the food shortages have especially affected urban households in areas with low industrial activity due to higher food prices, reductions in public food rations and lower employment.

The food shortage warning comes as the North has ratcheted up its hostile rhetoric against South Korea and its president amid fraying ties.

In August, the WFP asked South Korea to provide emergency aid to North Korea to help it avert a food crisis, but Seoul has not yet responded.

The South Korean government said it would not tie food aid to North Korea's nuclear disarmament, but it also said public opinion was a consideration in deciding whether to send aid.

On Thursday, Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Ho-nyeon said no decision had yet been made.

Sri Lanka battle rages despite heavy rains

AFP, Colombo

Government forces captured several bunkers from Tamil Tiger rebels as heavy fighting raged despite torrential monsoon rains in northern Sri Lanka, the defence ministry said Thursday.

Security forces battling to capture the rebels' political capital of Kilinochchi overcame resistance from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) near the village of Akkarayankulam, the ministry said.

"The counter terrorist offensive continues with the military battling through stiff LTTE resistance and inter monsoon rains," the ministry said in a statement.

"Troops claimed seizing control over several LTTE bunkers and trenches during Wednesday's fighting," the statement added.

It did not give details of casualties in the latest fighting but said troops recovered two decomposed bodies of Tiger rebels. Defence ministry maps show that troops are about 10 to 15 kilometres (six to 10 miles) southwest of Kilinochchi.

The military claims came a day after the Tigers attacked two merchant vessels off the island's northern peninsula of Jaffna using three boats packed with explosives.

Defence officials said the two merchant vessels were salvaged but it was not clear if the cargo was damaged. The Tigers said Wednesday the ships were carrying, among other things, supplies for the military.

Official sources said a pro-government Tamil political party on Thursday staged a shutdown in Jaffna to protest Wednesday's Tiger attacks against the cargo vessels.

Tens of thousands of people have died on both sides since 1972 when the LTTE launched its campaign to carve out an independent state in the Sinhalese-majority island of 20 million people.

23 killed in Indian fireworks explosion

AFP, New Delhi

An explosion at an illegal fireworks factory in northern India killed at least 23 people, 10 of them children, police said Thursday.

"There was a house in which fireworks were being made illegally," said police official Rohit Mahajan. "An explosion went off in one man's house and it collapsed."

Five other houses also collapsed and 18 people were injured in the explosion late Wednesday, he said.

The explosion occurred in the village of Deeg in Rajasthan state, around 160 kilometres (100 miles) from the Indian capital.

"Rescue operations are on and we fear more recovery of bodies from the debris," Deeg police officer Prem Shankar Meena added.

Rajasthan's home secretary S.N. Thanvi said an inquiry had been ordered.

Many families produce fireworks in their homes in hazardous conditions ahead of Diwali-the festival of lights that will be celebrated on Tuesday.

A national ban on engaging children in hazardous sectors such as the fireworks industry is largely ignored in India.

Nepal's ex-king to be forced to pay electric bills

AP, Katmandu

In the last year, Nepal's deposed king has lost his throne, his royal palace and annual allowance. Now, he's set to lose his free electricity.

The chief of the state-owned utility company said Thursday that former King Gyanendra and his relatives will be forced to pay outstanding electricity bills totaling more than $1 million.

Gyanendra and his relatives have not paid the state-owned Nepal Electricity Authority since he seized absolute power in 2005.

Arjun Karki, chief of the company, said 22 buildings and compounds are covered by the bills.

Many are private residences of the ex-king and homes belonging to his daughter, sisters and cousins. Some of the buildings on the list, like the royal palaces, have since been nationalized by the government.

The company has given a 15-day deadline for the bills to be paid, Karki said. If they remain unpaid, the electricity will be cut off, he said.

Karki said the electric company has asked the government for help clearing the bills.

Gyanendra was forced to give up his authoritarian rule in April 2005 by weeks of pro-democracy demonstrations.

Soon after elections in May this year, the new Maoist-dominated Constituent Assembly voted to abolish the monarchy and forced Gyanendra to move out of the royal palace.

Thailand, Cambodia meet on border dispute

AFP, Siem Reap

Thai and Cambodian military officials met Thursday in an attempt to defuse tensions over a border dispute that briefly erupted into deadly clashes last week.

The meeting between the mid-level officials in Cambodia's northwestern tourist hub Siem Reap is meant to pave the way for talks between senior military commanders on Friday. The talks are aimed at calming a simmering territorial dispute over land near the ancient Preah Vihear temple, which broke into a firefight that killed one Thai and three Cambodian soldiers on October 15.

General Neang Phat, secretary of state at Cambodia's defence ministry, told reporters that he thought commanders would reach an agreement to reduce the number of soldiers deployed in disputed territory.

"We will also talk about how to avoid military confrontation and to continue redeploying the troops," he said.

5 dead as fishing boat sinks off Alaska

AP, Anchorage

Four crew members of a fishing boat were plucked alive from a life raft in frigid, stormy seas Wednesday, hours after their vessel was reported in distress, a Coast Guard spokesman says. Five crew members died, and two remained missing.

A search continued for the remaining two crew members of the Katmai, a 93-foot fish processor based on Alaska's Kodiak island, Coast Guard Petty Officer Levi Read said.

Read said two more deceased crew members were located Wednesday night by a fishing vessel assisting the Coast Guard in the search. Three bodies were recovered earlier.

The water was 43 degrees when rescuers hauled the survivors out of the raft, Read said. He couldn't speculate on how long they were in the raft because it was not known exactly when they abandoned their boat. Still, he said, several factors helped them survive.

"That takes a lot of fortitude and a lot of heart," Read said. Their survival suits, their physical condition, and an effort to keep one another semi-warm and awake all could have helped them endure, he said.

The four survivors were discovered in the raft near the Amchitka Pass, which links the Bering Sea to the Pacific Ocean about 1,400 miles southwest of Anchorage.

The survivors were able to tell rescuers that all 11 crew members had been able to get into their survival suits before the Katmai sank, Read said.

Since no oil sheen typically seen from sunken vessels had been spotted, the Coast Guard had earlier been reluctant to say with certainty that the vessel had sunk.

"They said the boat did go down," Read confirmed.

Kashmir separatist’s detention sparks fresh protests

AFP, Srinagar

Indian police clashed with Muslim protesters in revolt-hit Kashmir Thursday after a senior separatist was detained. Yasin Malik, the head of pro-independence Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), was detained in a raid on his residence in summer capital Srinagar late Wednesday, a police officer told AFP.

He gave no reasons for the detention, which came a day after Malik launched a campaign for a boycott of upcoming state elections. The elections in the scenic Himalayan region will be held in seven phases between November 17 and December 24. Separatist politicians have boycotted all the elections held by India in Kashmir since the eruption of an insurgency in 1989. They argue that taking part in elections legitimises India's hold over the disputed region. News of Malik's detention brought angry youths onto the streets of Srinagar. They raised blockades by burning tyres and hurled stones at police, who retaliated with baton charges.

Japan, India expand defence ties

Reuters, Tokyo

Japan and India agreed on Wednesday to expand defence cooperation but said the move, along with a push to boost economic ties, was not aimed at counterbalancing China.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, on a three-day visit to Tokyo, also said he hoped to strengthen cooperation in nuclear energy with Japan after his country signed a civil nuclear technology deal with the United States earlier this month.

"Economic partnership and security cooperation between India and Japan are not at the cost of any third country, least upon China," Singh told a joint news conference with his Japanese counterpart, Taro Aso.

"I sincerely believe that there is no competition between India and China. The world offers enormous hope for both our countries to realise their development ambitions." In a joint statement, both sides agreed on a framework to strengthen security ties, with cooperation to include exchanging information on regional affairs, fighting terrorism and managing disasters. Specific measures would be worked out at an early date.

India and Japan carried out military exercises last year along with Australia and the United States, and Tokyo has been eager to boost diplomatic ties with democracies in the region in a move some analysts see as aiming to isolate China.

Japan signed a ground-breaking defence pact with Australia last year, the first such agreement with a country other than the United States.

Russia modernises missiles in response to US plans

AP, Moscow

Russia's efforts to upgrade its missile arsenals will help counter the planned U.S. missile defense sites in Europe, a top general said Wednesday. Russia's Strategic Missile Force chief, Col.-Gen. Nikolai Solovtsov, said the military will commission a new type of intercontinental ballistic missile and modify the existing missiles.

Solovtsov said that the new RS-24 missile equipped with multiple nuclear warheads will enter service next year.

"Its deployment will increase the Strategic Missile Forces' capability to penetrate missile defense systems, thus strengthening the nuclear deterrent potential of Russian strategic forces," he said in a statement carried by Russian news agencies. Solovtsov said the military conducted two test launches of the RS-24 last year and will make another one before the year's end. Russian officials have said it would gradually replace Soviet-built ballistic missiles.

Solovtsov added that the military will also upgrade the existing types of missiles to fit them with decoys intended to counter the prospective U.S. missile shield.

Russia has denounced a U.S. plan to deploy a battery of 10 missile interceptors in Poland and a related missile defense radar in the Czech Republic, saying it threatened Russian security. It has dismissed the U.S. claim that the sites were intended to counter a prospective missile threat from Iran and was not aimed against Russia.

Russian officials have threatened to point nuclear missiles at the countries that will allow U.S. missile defense sites on their territory.

Financial crisis divides EU on greenhouse gas cuts

AP, Vienna

What price clean air, sparkling streams, stately chestnut trees along busy avenues? In some ways it depends on whether you are a citizen of Old or New Europe.

A debate on whether to stick to an ambitious European Union timetable meant to slash greenhouse gas emissions at a time of economic turmoil is dividing the continent. Most governments within the 27-nation bloc insist on going ahead with a December timetable for legislation requiring a 20 percent cut in EU emissions by 2020. They say that will send a strong signal to the U.S., China and other big industrial states to embrace a new global deal on reducing emissions after the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012. "The European Union must keep its leadership role" on the environment, French Environment Minister Jean-Louis Borloo told his EU counterparts this week. But eight former Soviet bloc countries argue the EU's envisioned pace could hurt them more than the prosperous members of "Old Europe" - the 15 west European nations that have not had to play catch-up to compensate for decades of ruinous communist economic policies.

Voicing the easterners' concerns last week, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk told an EU summit that the bloc's environmental and energy initiatives must also "be tolerable for the poorer member states."

Poland, Bulgaria, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Slovakia all called for special consideration on the emissions cut timetable. Italy also complained about the plan.

China says over 3,600 babies still in hospital from tainted milk

AFP, Beijing

More than 3,600 babies remain in hospital in China after drinking tainted milk products that have sickened over 53,000 children, the government said Thursday.

Of the 3,654 infants still in hospital, three remain in serious condition, while over 46,700 children have recovered and been released from medical clinics as of October 22, the health ministry said in a short statement.

On Tuesday, 105 young children were admitted to hospitals around China with kidney ailments stemming from drinking the tainted milk products, while 370 infants were released, it added.

The ministry did not report any new fatalities, but said that the four infant deaths so far attributed to drinking the contaminated milk all occurred between May and August before the scandal was made public. The government had previously reported that more than 53,000 children had fallen ill after drinking tainted milk.

The scandal erupted when melamine , an industrial chemical normally used to make plastic, was discovered in Chinese-made dairy products, including milk powder, liquid milk and yoghurt.

The chemical was added to watered-down milk to make it appear higher in protein, but led to kidney stones developing in the infants.

The scandal has hit China's dairy industry hard, and continues to escalate around the world as multinationals and countries recall made-in-China milk products.

On Wednesday, the United Nations urged China to modernise its food safety system arguing that an outdated and disjointed approach may have worsened the crisis.

Although at least one Chinese dairy firm knew of the scam for months, it did not immediately report it to local government officials, who in turn delayed passing on the news for nearly a month until after the August Beijing Olympics.