India launches nuclear submarine

Mr Singh said 'we do not seek to threaten anyone'

India has launched its first nuclear-powered submarine, becoming only the sixth country in the world to do so.

The 6,000 tonne Arihant was launched by India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at a ceremony on the south-east coast.

It was built entirely in India with Russian assistance and a second one is due to be constructed shortly.

It will undergo trials over the next few years before being deployed and will be able to launch missiles at targets 700km (437 miles) away.

Until now, only the US, Russia, France, Britain and China had the capability to build nuclear submarines.

'China threat'

Launching the INS Arihant, Mr Singh said India had no aggressive designs on anyone.

India has relied mainly on Russian-built submarines until now

But the sea was becoming increasingly relevant to India's security concerns, he added.

"It is incumbent upon us to take all measures necessary to safeguard our country and to keep pace with technological advancements worldwide," he told the ceremony in the port city of Visakhapatnam.

The BBC's Sanjoy Majumder in Delhi says until now India has been able to launch ballistic missiles only from the air and from land.

Nuclear submarines will add a third dimension to its defence capability.

When it is eventually deployed, the top-secret Arihant will be able to carry 100 sailors on board.

It will be able to stay under water for long periods and thereby increase its chances of remaining undetected.

By contrast, India's ageing conventional diesel-powered submarines need to constantly surface to recharge their batteries.

Our correspondent says the launching of the Arihant is a clear sign that India is looking to blunt the threat from China which has a major naval presence in the region.

Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Clinton says North Korea has no friends left, credits Chinese with helping pressure the regime

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says that North Korea is isolated as never before and that China has been enormously helpful in pressuring the regime to abandon its nuclear program.

Clinton says that North Korea doesn't have any friends left.

The secretary of state recently returned from a tour of Asia and credits China with being "extremely positive and productive" in respect to North Korea.

The hardline regime has abandoned promises to dismantle its nuclear program and recently conducted a number of missile tests and an underground nuclear explosion.

Clinton spoke Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press."

Source: AP News

Obama: US-China relations to shape 21st century

President Barack Obama, opening two days of high-level talks with China, said the discussions could lay the groundwork for a new era of "sustained cooperation, not confrontation" in a relationship likely to shape the 21st century.

Obama said that Washington and Beijing needed to forge closer ties to address a host of challenges from lifting the global economy out of a deep recession to nuclear proliferation and global climate change.

"I believe that we are poised to make steady progress on some of the most important issues of our times," the president told diplomats from both countries assembled in the vast hall of the Ronald Reagan Building.

"The relationship between the United States and China will shape the 21st century, which makes it as important as any bilateral relationship in the world," Obama said.

The discussions in Washington represent the continuation of a dialogue begun by the Bush administration, which focused on economic tensions between the two nations. Obama chose to expand the talks to include foreign policy issues as well as economic disputes over trade and currency values.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, welcoming the Chinese, said the two nations were "laying brick by brick the foundation for a stronger relationship."

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Vice Premier Wang Qishan, China's top economic policymaker, both spoke of hopeful signs that the global economy was beginning to emerge from its worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

Geithner said that the so far successful efforts of the two economic superpowers to move quickly to deal with the downturns with massive stimulus programs marked a historic turning point in the relationship of the two nations.

Speaking through a translator, Wang said that "at present the world economy is at a critical moment of moving out of crisis and toward recovery."

State Councilor Dai Bingguo said that the two countries were trying to build better relations despite their very different social systems, cultures, ideologies and histories.

"We are actually all in the same big boat that has been hit by fierce wind and huge waves," Dai said of the global economic and other crises.

Obama said that the United States and China have a shared interest in clean and secure energy sources.

As the world's largest energy consumers, Obama said that neither country profits from a dependence on foreign oil. He also said neither country will be able to combat climate change unless they work together.

However, the discussions this week were not expected to bridge wide differences between the two nations on climate change and officials cautioned against expecting any major breakthroughs in other areas either. U.S. officials said they hoped the talks would set a positive framework for future talks.

The administration did praise China for the help it has provided in the nuclear standoff with North Korea.

With the global economy trying to emerge from a deep recession, the United States and China have enormous stakes in resolving tensions in such areas as America's huge trade deficit with China and the Chinese government's unease over America's soaring budget deficits.

Three years ago, then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson used the initial U.S.-China talks to press Beijing to let its currency, the yuan, rise in value against the dollar to make it cheaper for Chinese to buy U.S. goods. U.S. manufacturers blame an undervalued yuan for record U.S. trade deficits with China — and, in part, for a decline in U.S. jobs.

The U.S. efforts have yielded mixed results. The yuan, after rising in value about 22 percent since 2005, has scarcely budged in the past year. Beijing had begun to fear that a stronger yuan could threaten its exports. Chinese exports already were under pressure from the global recession.

But the Obama administration intends to remain focused on the trade gap, telling Beijing that it can't rely on U.S. consumers to pull the global economy out of recession this time. In part, that's because U.S. household savings rates are rising, shrinking consumer spending in this country.

For the United States, suffering from a 9.5 percent unemployment rate, the ultimate goal is to help put more Americans to work.

While the U.S. trade deficit with China has narrowed slightly this year, it is still the largest imbalance with any country. Critics in Congress say that unless China does much more in the currency area, they will seek to pass legislation to impose economic sanctions on Beijing, a move that could spark a trade war between the two nations.

For their part, Chinese officials are making clear they want further explanations of what the administration plans to do about the soaring U.S. budget deficits. China, the largest foreign holder of U.S. Treasury debt — $801.5 billion — wants to know that those holdings are safe and won't be jeopardized in case of future inflation.

Geithner said in his opening remarks that the United States was moving to repair its financial system and overhaul how financial companies are regulated. He said the administration was also determined to deal with a budget deficit projected to hit $1.84 trillion this year, more than four times the previous high.

"We are committed to taking the necessary steps to bringing our fiscal deficits down to a more sustainable level," he said.

___

Associated Press writers Foster Klug and Steven Hurst in Washington and Joe McDonald in Beijing contributed to this report.

Source: AP News

U.S. 'Money Weapon' Yields Mixed Results

Baghdad the city of news is again at the top with the army trying to save a hotel near the Baghdad's airport.

BAGHDAD, July 26 -- Shortly after the U.S. Army turned over control of the business center and a restaurant of a multimillion-dollar hotel it built near Baghdad's airport to the Iraqi government last year, flat-screen television sets, computers and furniture vanished.

The looting unwittingly kept the military in the hotel business because officers were concerned that the rest of the hotel would be stripped bare. As the U.S. government is ceding control of hundreds of projects and facilities to the Iraqi government, the conundrum raised questions about the sustainability of billions of dollars worth of projects funded through the Commander's Emergency Response Program (CERP) that encourages commanders to think of "money as a weapon."

U.S. lawmakers and the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, which has released a report about the Caravan Hotel, are increasingly scrutinizing the use of CERP and urging the Pentagon to be more vigilant in its selection and oversight of projects.

The success stories and cautionary tales of CERP initiatives in Iraq are shaping the way commanders in Afghanistan use the program as they place greater emphasis on counterinsurgency and keeping the civilian population safe.

Since 2003, the U.S. Congress has appropriated more than $10 billion in CERP funds for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"CERP was meant to be walking-around money for commanders to achieve a desired effect in their battle space," said the office's deputy inspector general, Ginger Cruz. "Slowly, it has become a de facto reconstruction pot of money."

Earlier this month, Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), chairman of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee, asked the Pentagon for a list of all pending projects worth more than $1 million. Murtha said the Pentagon has failed to fully explain how it is using CERP. He added that the military is taking on too many large-scale projects that should be handled by civilian agencies with reconstruction expertise.

"A fundamental review of CERP, its purpose, use and scope, is overdue," Murtha wrote in the July 15 letter to Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates. Murtha said he was disturbed by reports from Iraq suggesting commanders were in a "rush to spend" hundreds of millions of dollars by the end of the fiscal year. Murtha himself has come under scrutiny for backing projects important to constituents that critics call wasteful.

U.S. military officials say CERP has been invaluable in helping commanders get things done quickly, with little red tape. In recent years, they have used it to put insurgents on payroll, award micro-grants to business owners, compensate families of civilians killed in combat, and build schools and clinics.

"We think we've been pretty successful," said Brig. Gen. Peter Bayer, the chief of staff of the U.S. command that oversees CERP projects in Iraq. He said commanders in Iraq have approved few large CERP projects this year.

One of the most notable CERP-funded initiatives was the Sons of Iraq program started in 2006, under which the U.S. military put tens of thousands of insurgents on payroll and mobilized them to fight hard-line extremist groups. Last year the government spent $300 million on Sons of Iraq salaries, but it stopped paying them this year and turned over the program to the Iraqi government, which has often failed to pay the fighters on time.

As the U.S. military has withdrawn from the cities, several CERP-funded projects, such as neighborhood parks, civic centers and swimming pools, have not been successfully adopted by local or national government entities because they either don't have the capacity or interest to keep them running, U.S. and Iraqi officials say. For example, an outdoor performance hall built in Sadr City that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and was completed several months ago has never been used, according to U.S. officials.

As U.S. troops have largely left the cities, U.S. officials say they have been more judicious in the number and types of CERP projects they approve.

U.S. commanders in Iraq were given $747 million in CERP funds this year, down from $1 billion allocated in 2008. So far this year, the military has spent $235 million of its CERP allocation in Iraq. Realizing they couldn't spend the remaining funds responsibly by the end of September, when the fiscal year ends, U.S. commanders decided to return $247 million.

"Our application has been deliberate and judicious," Bayer said.

The Caravan Hotel, a $4.2 million project, was completed in August 2008. U.S. military officials deemed it a worthwhile investment because there are few hotels in Baghdad that foreign investors would consider safe enough.

After the equipment was looted shortly following the Caravan's inauguration, the military hired a contractor to operate the $225-a-night hotel, fearing that officials at the Ministry of Transportation, which is run by members of the Sadr political block, would shut it down and steal valuables, inspector general officials said.

A spokesman for the ministry said he was not familiar with the hotel project or the allegations of looting. Bayer said the military considers the project successful and is working on a plan to hand it over to the Iraqis.

"Ultimately when you transfer a property to someone, it's theirs and they use it for their purposes," Bayer said. "That's a decision the government of Iraq makes."

Source: By Ernesto Londoño
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, July 27, 2009

Financial adviser Earl Jones to appear in court

Another Business Man to scam the people of millions of dollars. Greed is a powerful thing in the world and many people get corrupt by it but to swindle millions of dollars is worse then anything because people worked hard for that money.

Financial adviser Earl Jones will appear in a Montreal court on Tuesday to face charges of fraud and theft.

Quebec's financial security regulator alleges Jones may have swindled at least 50 investors out of at least $30 million in a possible Ponzi scheme.

Jones, 67, turned himself in to provincial police on Monday after having disappeared for about three weeks. He was arrested at his lawyer's Montreal office.

"He was not very happy, nobody would be under the circumstances," said lawyer Jeffrey Boro, "and he was meeting this day with great trepidation."

Boro said his client faces multiple charges of fraud and theft and will be arraigned on Tuesday afternoon. The allegations against Jones have not been proved in court.

Montreal-resident Cherie Beluse told CBC News her mother lost hundreds of thousands of dollars while investing with Jones and doesn't hold out much hope that investors will see their money again.

If Jones' company is declared bankrupt, creditors would likely meet in mid-August when the value of any assets would be divulged.

source: cbc.ca/news/