Ariane launch delayed
A technical problem has delayed for at least 24-hours the launch of an Ariane rocket from the European Space Agency’s launch centre in French Guiana.
“Erroneous data” linked to the fuelling system is said to have been the culprit causing the countdown to be interrupted.
The modified Ariane-5 rocket is carrying supplies to the International Space Station.
Exodus to leave Libya
On Libya’s western border with Tunisia, thousands passed the checkpoints in a matter of hours, weighed down with as many of their belongings as they could carry.
One witness said Libyan police deliberately picked on Tunisians and Egyptians after successful revolutions there set a precedent for the anti-Gaddafi uprising.
One Tunisian man who made it onto home soil said: “The situation is bad. People died. They killed them. They took their money.”
It is estimated up to 80,000 ex-pat Tunisians live and work in Libya.
Authorities and aid organisations have set up special reception facilities to treat the wounded at the border.
There are many other nationalities taking flight too, among them many Libyans.
On the border with Egypt, which has 1.5 million citizens in Libya, Egyptian refugees told of the bloodshed and horror they had left behind.
One said: “The hospitals are saturated with the wounded and the dead. There’s a lack of medicine, and makeshift hospitals have been set up in the streets.”
Another man returning home said: “I saw mercenaries firing on people using large calibre machine-guns, like those fitted in fighter jets. They targeted the people.”
Another witness said the use of mercenaries had made it more dangerous for everyone. “The Libyan population stood together with us,” he said “but they took vengeance on all Africans armed or not, because Africans in military uniforms had been seen by the people killing Libyans.”
There is a tangible fear among those fleeing that they may died if they stay in Libya.
The scramble to get out is becoming an exodus.
Shi’ite opposition leader returns to Bahrain
A hardline Shi’ite dissident has returned home to Bahrain from exile to join the burgeoning opposition to the island kingdom’s Sunni royal family.
London-based Hassan Mushaimaa is the leader of the Haq movement. He was tried in his absence over an alleged coup plot but received a pardon as part of the ruling family’s concessions.
“The talk about change and reforms should not be just patchy,” he said on his arrival at Manama.
“We have to have real change or the people have to carry on (protesting). The demands are up to the people on the ground who died there and faced everything.”
Pearl Square remains the focus of opposition protests. But today thousands marched on the former prime minister’s residence to call for the removal of a man who has been in his post for 40 years.
This week, the government freed more than 300 people detained since a crackdown on Shi’ite unrest in August. The cabinet has also been reshuffled in another sop to the opposiition. But neither move appears likely to end widespread protests.
Action on Libya: “a complicated mix of good intentions”
Why are France and Britain leading the military operation to impose and maintain a no-fly zone in Libya?
Euronews asked Claude Moniquet, a strategic intelligence and security expert and founder of an Institute in Brussels which specialises in geo-strategic research.
Euronews: “Since the start of the coalition intervention in Libya, people have been asking how Libya has become a Franco/British concern? Why were these two countries so quick off the mark?”
Claude Moniquet: “Yes, it’s a complicated mix of good intentions: coming to the rescue of the Libyan people who are being bombarded and attacked by the Gaddafi regime. It is also – or so the rumours have it – because there are various embarrassing skeletons in the closet. Remember that France put out all the flags when Gaddafi visited the country two or three years ago – although let’s be clear they weren’t the only ones to do it. Then at the beginning of the year there was the episode with Tunisia, the embarassing affair of the trips taken by the French Foreign Affairs Minister of the time, Michelle Alliot Marie. So perhaps France is eager to bury all that business. And on the British side of course there was all the sorry business of the negotiated release of Ali Mohamed al-Megrahi. He was the Libyan agent who was sentenced to prison for life for blowing up a plane over the Scottish town of Lockerbie and who was released on compassionate grounds because he had terminal prostate cancer and then of course there are British oil interests.”
Euronews: “Gaddafi’s son Saif said last week on Euronews that he could prove the Libyan regime had financed Nicolas Sarkozy’s election campaign. They were potentially damaging allegations. Could that have hastened French intervention?”
Claude Moniquet: “No, I don’t believe that because I don’t believe that Gaddafi really financed Sarkozy’s campaign. After all, we’re talking about someone who has been a professional liar for the last 20 or 30 years. I think his son Saif Al Islam takes after his father in this respect so I think that this was pure propoganda as part of a media war aimed at discrediting France.”
Euronews: “So you think this is pure propaganda, a complete fantasy?”
Claude Moniquet: “Well, if this proof ever comes to light, then we shall see.”
Euronews: “Do you think there are other motives in play for France and Britain?”
Claude Moniquet: “The main point is to take a strong political position on the Arab world which has been in a state of flux for the last three months. There, I think there is a political interest, a noble one, which explains why they had to invervene. The second thing which explains why this was mainly a Franco-British initiative was the understandable American reluctance to be the first wave of intervention. The American involvement in Iraq isn’t finished and has left a very bad impression in the Arab world and a military operation which was too American-led would have, by its very nature, been problematic.”
Euronews: “Do you think that there is perhaps a Franco-British desire to make history, to win some credibilty points on the international stage, especially in the US?”
Claude Moniquet: “There is obviously a window of opportunity for Europe, and that’s quite rare. A chance for Europe to play a role on the international stage, and if there’s anywhere where Europe can be significant, it’s obviously in North Africa and Africa. North Africa and Libya, it’s just the other side of the street from us, like Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia…for us these are neighbouring countries, countries with which we have a common history, long-standing relationships, and I think that’s the right policy to show: that we are interested in these situations and that we are on the side of their people.”
Libyan city of Ajdabiya a ‘free city’
The main focus of the protests sweeping Libya remains in the east of the country, far from the capital Tripoli.
The city of Ajdabiya has seen some of the heaviest violence with reports suggesting government security forces have lost control.
Located some 160 kilometres south of Libya’s second city Benghazi, euronews spoke to
Abdel Bari Zouay, an eyewitness, who said Ajdabiya was now a free city.
‘‘On Thursday, February 17, there was a demonstration in Ajdabiya. The protesters burned the local headquarters of the revolutionary committee. The Revolutionary Guard have fired upon us killing four demonstrators. Since Friday the city has been completely controlled by the protesters, who have burned 14 buildings belonging to the government. They have also burned portraits of Gaddafi and have formed groups who are now running the city,” he said.
“We call on the United Nations and all those who have a conscience to help the city Ajdabiya. The regime has sent African forces into the city but we are here waiting in the square of the martyrs. Everyone here is ready to defend the city against the mercenaries. We’ve discovered that these African mercenaries are going to land at Zouitina airport. I can assure you that everybody here is ready to fight against these traitors and African mercenaries,” he added.’
Iranian opposition leaders Mousavi and Karroubi reportedly arrested
Iran’s main opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi have been arrested, according to the Kaleme website, which is close to Mousavi. The two are said to have been transferred to the Heshmatiyeh Prison in Tehran. The website says their wives have also been taken.
Kaleme cited “reliable sources” for its report. No information has been given on when the arrests took place.
The leaders have been under house arrest for weeks. They were candidates in the June 2009 presidential elections in which the incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won, drawing criticism that the vote was rigged. Ahmadinejad and his supporters denied fraud.
Mousavi was Iran’s premier for eight years in the 1980s, while Karroubi has been a speaker of parliament.
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Dozens more killed as Libyan violence hits Tripoli
More than 60 people are reported to have been killed in Libya’s capital Tripoli?�over the last few hours as Muammar Gaddafi’s regime clamps down on a growing anti-government revolution.?�If confirmed it would take the number of dead since the uprising began to well over 300.?�Demonstrators in Benghazi said an army unit swapped sides to join them, helping the protesters take control of much of the city. And the Libyan justice minister has resigned in protest at the “excessive use of violence” against demonstrators.?�Gaddafi’s?�son?�went on TV on Sunday night to warn that?�the government would fight the revolt to the ‘last man standing.’?�Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi said Libya is not like Egypt nor Tunisia. “Libya consists of tribes and clans,” he said.?�“It’s not?�a society?�with political parties and so on. It’s tribes and clans. Everyone knows their duties. This could cause civil war and we will repeat the civil war of 1936.”?�Despite a very visible show of support for Gaddafi, his hold on power appeared to be faltering in what is proving to be among the?�bloodiest of the current uprisings in north Africa and the Middle East.?�There are?�claims that a police station has been torched in Tripoli. And a Libyan newspaper is reporting that protests have broken out in Ras Lanuf, the site of an oil refinery and petrochemical complex.
A coalition of Libyan Islamic leaders has issued a fatwa, telling Muslims it is their ‘duty’ to rebel against the Libyan leadership and calling for the liberation of all jailed protesters.
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Italy’s EU immigration rescue call
What if Arab revolutions launched a thousand ships? Italy has not felt this vulnerable to illegal immigration since communism collapsed in Albania 20 years ago. Hundreds of thousands of Albanians back then caused a national crisis in Italy, welcomed at first but not for long. The material and political challenges were immense.
Events today in north Africa threaten to eclipse the Albanian crisis.
At a meeting in Rome, Italy’s Interior Minister Roberto Moroni and those of the five other European Union countries touching the Mediterranean have met to plan emergency strategy.
Moroni said: “We ask that a special European solidarity fund be created to ensure that the countries feeling primary impact from the humanitarian crises in progress will have the resources needed, provided by all the countries of Europe.”
Libya’s 2,000 kilometres of coastline are a launch pad for many illegal immigrants heading for the closest EU country – Italy.
Rome lavished attention on Colonel Gaddafi in recent years and in 2008 conceived a friendship treaty under which the Libyans agreed to patrol the sea to curtail clandestine migration, in exchange for money.
That arrangement has been outstripped by the current events.
Since Sunday, the ships and aircraft of the European border control agency Frontex have been deployed in the sensitive area.
Frontex has released an estimate saying that as many as one and a half million migrants are ready to risk anything to set foot on European soil.
EU in knots over Libya
The European Union’s foreign ministers have been grasping for a common strategy over Libya. They are grappling with a threat by its leader, Muammar Gaddafi, to end efforts to hold back illegal immigration to Europe from north African shores, if Europe supports the opposition surge in Libya.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague told journalists:
“You asked me earlier about whether Colonel Gaddafi is in Venezuela. I have no information that says he is, but I have seen some information that suggests he is on his way there.”
Venezuela has denied this.
With the Europeans struggling to form a united front, foreign policy high representative Catherine Ashton left the ministers’ meeting in Brussels to fly to Egypt.
Ashton said: “We are extremely concerned by the events which are unfolding in Libya. We condemn the on-going repression against demonstrators, and deplore the violence and the death of civilians.”
Ashton is scheduled to meet Egyptian officials, opposition leaders, youth groups and women’s groups. British Prime Minister David Cameron, at the start of a Middle East tour, got to Cairo before her, the first leader to visit Egypt since Hosni Mubarak was forced out as president.
Japan looks to limit economic fallout
Japan’s economy has suffered a series of aftershocks since the massive earthquake and tsunami struck the country.
The Nikkei, however, clawed back some recent losses on Tuesday buoyed by signs that the nuclear crisis at Fukishima was easing.
Much uncertainty remains, but some believe the disaster could make Japan more productive in the long-term while also having a positive effect in the wider Asia region.
Senior economist at JP Morgan Securities Japan, Masamichi Adachi said: “In the short term, probably some negative impact could be inevitable, but in the medium to longer term as you mentioned some companies probably feel it is better to locate their factories outside of Japan, so that’s probably positive for the emerging Asian countries.”
He went on to say, “I think and I hope Japanese companies will strengthen their productivity and that will probably boost the economic expansion here.’‘
165 billion euros is one figure being touted for the cost of reconstruction. Such a massive rebuild is also likely to spur growth.
In the short term, however, radiation concerns from the Fukishima power plant remain the major worry. No more so than for Tokyo’s vegetable wholesalers who returned to work on Tuesday after a long weekend. They are facing supply halts to spinach and other green leaf vegetables from four prefectures in and around the Fukishima complex after the government ordered a ban on shipments.
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