The New Nation - Internet Edition

3,000 passengers stranded at protest-hit Bangkok airport

AFP, Bangkok

At least 3,000 passengers remained stranded at Bangkok's international airport early Wednesday as anti-government protesters kept control of the building, the airport chief said.

"There are 78 outbound and incoming flights affected. I have been informed by Thai Airways that 3,000 passengers are stranded at the terminal now," airport director Saereerat Prasutanont told AFP.

"Operations at Suvarnabhumi Airport have been totally shut down since 4am (2100 GMT Tuesday) both outbound and inbound after protesters refused to negotiate with anyone except the prime minister," said Saereerat.

The Bangkok Post in a text messages to subscribers said masked members of the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) invaded the control tower at Suvarnabhumi airport.

The leader of a pro-government group in Thailand urged supporters to march in Bangkok, raising the prospect of street clashes with anti-government protesters.

"I will hold a press conference today to urge our people to come out and declare our stance against a coup," Jatuporn Prompan, a ruling party politician and leader of a major pro-government group, told Reuters on Wednesday.

A series of small bomb blasts wounded several anti-government protesters blockading the airport on Wednesday, protest leaders said, as chaos ruled inside the terminal.

One bomb wounded four members of the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), a spokesman said, hours after the PAD stormed the airport late on Tuesday in a dramatic escalation of its six-month campaign to oust Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat.

The Nation newspaper said on its website three explosions had been heard outside the $4 billion terminal, the gateway for nearly 15 million tourists to Thailand last year.

The Nation said a fourth blast appeared to target PAD supporters in another part of Bangkok. It said 12 people were wounded in the overnight attacks, but police have not confirmed the casualties.

Markets were under some pressure after the latest eruption in a political deadlock that is entering its fourth year. Stocks were down nearly 2 percent at 0600 GMT and the baht was trading at 35.29, after hitting a 21-month low of 35.36 earlier in the day.

Thailand's finance minister has said the protests could have a damaging effect on the economy, which depends on tourism as a key sector and is already vulnerable to global financial turmoil.

Somchai was due to return from an Asia-Pacific summit in Peru on Wednesday afternoon, amid rumours he may declare a state of emergency. A government spokesman said he would not land at Suvarnabhumi.

"I will get off the plane wherever it lands," the Bangkok Post quoted him as saying from Peru.

Thousands of passengers slept overnight on benches and luggage carousels, many annoyed that airport staff fled when the PAD demonstrators, dressed in their movement's yellow shirts, invaded the terminal, forcing officials to cancel flights.

"We came here and we saw all these people in yellow. We thought they were football fans. Now we're just waiting," said a Dutchman who gave his name as Mark.

Thai Airways, the national carrier, said 16 inbound flights had been diverted to Bangkok's old airport Don Muang, 45 kms from Suvarnabhumi, and another three flights to a Vietnam War-era airbase 150 kms southeast of Bangkok.

Budget carrier Air Asia, Singapore Airlines and Cathay Pacific halted service to the Thai capital, a major regional hub with 125,000 passengers passing through Suvarnabhumi daily.

Singapore has advised its citizens not to visit Thailand.

American Kevin Harris said he had arrived for an early morning flight only to find people sleeping wherever they could, all around the terminal. "I just want to get home for Thanksgiving, but it's not going to happen. We have no idea what's happening here."

Half the flights on information boards had 'cancelled' beside them. Others were not leaving at their scheduled time.

Hundreds of protesters slept in the terminal overnight after easily pushing past lines of riot police on Tuesday night. They resumed their protests outside at dawn as police looked on.

Police have gone out of their way to avoid a fight since the PAD began its "final push" on Monday to unseat the government it accuses of being a pawn of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a 2006 coup and lives in exile.

Gunfire broke out on the streets of the capital on Tuesday as armed PAD members opened fire on government supporters.

At least 11 people were hurt, officials said, in violent scenes shown on Thai television.

Bloodshed could provoke another coup, a stated goal of the PAD, but army chief General Anupong Paochinda has said another putsch would not heal Thailand's deep political rifts.

A Bangkok Post editorial said the airport blockade "will only further erode the rapidly dwindling public support t that the protesters badly need at this critical juncture of its campaign".

The PAD claims the backing of Bangkok's urban middle classes and elite, while Thaksin and the government have the support of rural voters and the urban poor.

Iraqi lawmakers set to endorse US pact

AFP, Baghdad

Iraqi MPs are expected Wednesday to endorse a wide-ranging accord that will allow US troops to remain another three years, despite reservations by Sunnis and fierce opposition by Shiite hardliners.

The 275-member assembly is due to vote by a show of hands on the wide-ranging accord, which would require US troops to withdraw from Iraqi cities by the end of June and from the rest of the country by the end of 2011.

The measure enjoys the support of the Shiite United Iraqi Alliance (UIA), the Kurdish alliance, and a number of independent MPs-enough for it to pass with slightly more than the requisite simple majority of 138 votes.

But deputy parliamentary speaker Khaled al-Attiya said the government and the UIA were making a last-minute push to assemble a broader coalition.

"We do not want to pass this agreement with a difference of two or three or four votes," Attiya told AFP on the eve of the vote. "For this reason there are continuing efforts to achieve a vast majority."

On Wednesday, Attiya said the assembly would convene at 3:00 pm (1200 GMT) instead of 11:00 am as originally planned, without providing further details.

The agreement-the product of nearly a year of hard-nosed negotiations-was approved by Iraq's cabinet over a week ago with support from the major blocs representing the country's Shiite, Sunni, and Kurdish communities.

Iraq won a number of concessions in the deal, including a hard timeline for withdrawal, the right to search US military cargo and the right to try US soldiers for crimes committed while they are off their bases and off-duty.

The agreement also requires that US troops obtain Iraqi permission for all military operations, and that they hand over the files of all detainees in US custody to the Iraqi authorities, who will decide their fate.

The pact also forbids US troops from using Iraq as a launch-pad or transit point for attacking another country, which may reassure Syria and Iran.

But the accord has drawn fire from certain quarters, including followers of the hardline Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, who reject any agreement with the United States and who protested at the accord in Baghdad on Friday.

Attiya, who is close to Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, said the government hoped to win over those who merely have "reservations" about the pact.

"(Some political blocs) have officially announced that they have reservations, but the reservations do not touch on the agreement. They are related to other things," Attiya said.

The National Concord Front-the main Sunni bloc with 39 seats-said Tuesday it would not approve the pact unless it is put to a national referendum and parliament agrees to pass a national reconciliation bill.

"If our two requests are accepted, we will vote for the agreement. But for the moment we are waiting," the bloc's spokesman Salim Abdullah told AFP.

US troops kill 10 militants in Afghanistan

Reuters, Kabul

U.S.-led coalition forces killed 10 militants in two separate operations aimed at wanted Taliban commanders in southeastern Afghanistan, the U.S. military said on Wednesday.

Violence has sharply escalated in Afghanistan this year, the bloodiest period since the Taliban's removal in 2001, and has raised doubts about the prospects of security in the country despite the increasing number of foreign troops.

One of Tuesday's raids targeted a senior Taliban commander in Paktia's Zormat district believed to act as a liaison between the al Qaeda and Taliban networks and who had assisted with the movement of foreign fighters into Afghanistan, the U.S. military said.

Five armed militants were killed during the operation, it said in a statement, but did not name the commander and did not say whether he was among the casualties.

In neighboring Paktika province, coalition forces killed five armed militants and detained four more in another operation that targeted a pro-Taliban sub-commander, it said.

Coalition forces had received small arms fire in both engagements, it said, but did not say whether they or civilians had suffered any casualties.

The Taliban could not be reached for comment immediately and Reuters had no independent verification of the U.S. military's accounts.

More than 4,000 people, over a quarter of them civilians, have been killed in Afghanistan this year alone.

Separately, the Taliban kidnapped three engineers of a foreign funded construction company in the northwestern province of Badghis overnight, a provincial official said.

Russian mayor killed near Georgia rebel region

AFP, Vladikavkaz

The mayor of the capital of Russia's North Ossetia province was shot dead Wednesday, said officials in the region, which neighbours the Georgian separatist enclave of South Ossetia.

"The mayor has died," a hospital source told AFP, after Vladikavkaz Mayor Vitaly Karayev was delivered to an emergency room following the incident.

"It happened around 9 a.m. (0600 GMT) in the courtyard of his home as he was going out. He received several bullet wounds as he stepped outside. Evidently it was a sniper," a regional interior ministry source told AFP.

North Ossetian President Taimuraz Mamsurov confirmed that the mayor had been killed and said he was about to hold an emergency meeting of regional security officials to discuss the situation, the Interfax news agency reported.

North Ossetia shares a border and close ethnic ties to South Ossetia, the separatist Georgian region at the heart of August's brief war between Russia and Georgia.

The region also has a history of attacks carried out by Chechen rebels, including the 2004 school hostage crisis in the North Ossetian town of Beslan, which led to the deaths of over 330 hostages, many of them children.

Indian IT firms unfazed by Obama's tax plans

Reuters, Bangalore

Indian IT and IT-services companies seem undaunted by the potential impact from U.S. President-elect Barack Obama's proposal to repeal tax breaks for companies that outsource certain operations to offshore centers.

"I don't see Obama doing anything terribly drastic. I think he has enough on his plate; he has got a trillion-dollar bailout and probably got another trillion dollars coming on top of that which he has to finance," Genpact Ltd's Chief Executive Pramod Bhasin said at the Reuters India Investment Summit.

Obama's tax plans are unlikely to affect the outsourcing industry because of the scarcity of IT talent in the United States, Suresh Senapaty, chief financial officer of Wipro Ltd , told the summit, held at Reuters Bangalore office.

Over the past few years, IT-services firms armed with competitive, English-speaking professionals working for relatively cheap wages have cashed in on an outsourcing boom.

But they are now experiencing a lull in growth as the U.S. economy faces one of the worst crises in history.

Obama's plans to encourage U.S. firms to keep jobs in the country have raised concerns that Indian IT-services firms could lose out as more services are retained in the United States.

"Barack Obama will repeal tax breaks that reward corporations that retain their earnings overseas, and will use those savings to lower corporate tax rates for companies that expand or start operations in the United States," according to Obama's website, www.barackobama.com .

Philippine Congress throws out impeachment bid against Arroyo

AFP, Manila

Philippine lawmakers allied to President Gloria Arroyo on Wednesday voted to throw out the latest impeachment bid against her for alleged large-scale corruption.

Voting 42-8, members of the House of Representatives Justice Committee said the complaint was "insufficient in substance" to impeach the president, committee chair Matias Defensor said.

It was the fourth impeachment attempt against the president in the past four years. Arroyo is to end her six-year term in 2010 having also survived two coup attempts.

"The committee on justice, by virtue of the vote just taken, has declared to dismiss the complaint against President Gloria Arroyo," Defensor said, as he declared the proceedings over.

The complaint stemmed from allegations that Arroyo and her husband were directly involved in a 329-million-dollar national Internet broadband deal with Chinese firm ZTE Corp. in 2006.

The deal has since been scrapped by Arroyo amid allegations of massive corruption.

The complaint also accused her of diverting millions of dollars in agricultural funds to her election campaign in 2004 and of tacitly backing hundreds of unsolved political killings blamed on the military.

Congressman Jose de Venecia, the main endorser of the nearly 400-page complaint, said the political opposition would file an appeal with the Supreme Court.

"We suffered a temporary defeat for truth and justice, but the fight will carry on," a haggard-looking de Venecia told reporters after the vote.

De Venecia, a former Arroyo ally, was ousted from his post as speaker of the House of Representatives earlier this year-analysts believe that stemmed from his son's allegations of corruption over the ZTE deal.

De Venecia's businessman son, Joey, lost the bid for the ZTE project despite offering a better package in which the government would have spent less for a the broadband network.

Brazil flood death toll rises to 65, 17 missing

AP, Sao Paulo

The death toll from rain-spawned floods and mudslides in southern Brazil has risen to 65 people, with 17 still missing, civil defense authorities said Tuesday.

Most died in mudslides that swept away homes and businesses, and officials from Santa Catarina state say they fear more mudslides because the earth is still saturated with water. Eight cities remained isolated because of weekend rains that caused rivers to overflow their banks, civil defense officials said in a statement.

A pipeline rupture cut off the state's sole source of natural gas from Bolivia, prompting shortages of cooking gas and fuel for cars.

Six large textile mills also shut down because they had no natural gas to generate electricity, Brazil's Valor Economico business newspaper reported.

Seventeen highways are blocked by mudslides. Authorities say that more than 52,000 people were forced to leave their homes.

The death toll was most severe in the town of Ilhota along the banks of the Itajai River, where 15 people died after waters rose 9 meters (30 feet) above normal.

Also hard hit was the city of Blumenau, where 13 people died when they were buried by mudslides. Another 15 people suffered serious injuries, according to the civil defense statement.

More than 150,000 people in the city of nearly 300,000 had no electricity. Blumenau is a renowned tourist destination founded by German immigrants and is known for its Oktoberfest celebration.