A brief world news roundup for 19 May 2010.

United States & the Americas

• FBI – Following a five-week trial, a federal jury in Massachusetts found two Chinese nationals, one of whom resided in the United States, guilty of illegally conspiring to violate U.S. export laws and illegally exporting electronic equipment from the United States to China. Several Chinese military entities were among those receiving the exported equipment.
• State Dept – It is a pleasure to testify along with Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen, because we share a strong belief that the new START Treaty will make our country more secure. This treaty also reflects our growing cooperation with Russia on matters of mutual interest and it will aid us in advancing our broader nonproliferation agenda. To that end, we have been working closely with our P-5+1 partners for several weeks on the draft of a new sanctions resolution on Iran. And today, I am pleased to announce to this committee we have reached agreement on a strong draft with the cooperation of both Russia and China. We plan to circulate that draft resolution to the entire Security Council today.
• canada.com – Operations at the Canadian Forces Base in Goose Bay, N.L., will be limited this summer, as much of the base staff is in Afghanistan helping with the Canadian mission
• Miami Herald – The head of Nicaragua’s navy says Mexico’s La Familia cartel is moving heavily into Central America and dominates much of the drug trade through the region
• NPR – Arrest records and interviews with law enforcement and organized crime experts suggest that federal forces in Ciudad Juarez — ground zero of Mexico’s war against drug mafias — appear to be favoring the Sinaloa Cartel. The U.S. Justice Department says it’s one of the largest organized crime syndicates in the world.
• ISN – With the FARC weakened, Colombia’s next president will face a more factionalized internal insurgency, requiring a different strategic approach, Eliot Brockner comments for ISN Security Watch
• IBD – Acting like Robert Mugabe on cocaine, Venezuela’s dictator went on a shopping spree over the weekend, confiscating one farm and industry after another. First, a flour factory run by Mexican multinational Gruma was plundered, followed by the nationalization of a bauxite unit of U.S.-based NorPro. After that, a steel subsidiary of Luxembourg-based Tenaris called Matesi was taken, along with a group of transport companies. Unsated, Chavez then announced — via Twitter — the takeover of the private University of Santa Ines in Barinas state. And for good measure, he launched new exchange controls, another form of expropriation.

Russia, Caucasus & Central Asia

• RIA Novosti – Russia and Namibia plan to sign an agreement on cooperation in the development of uranium deposits in Namibia on May 20, Russian Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources Yuri Trutnev said on Tuesday.
• Kremlin – Dmitry Medvedev signed the Executive Order Concerning the Federal Agency for Supplies of Arms, Military and Special Equipment and Material. The order establishes that the Federal Agency for Supplies of Arms, Military and Special Equipment and Material is subordinate to the Defence Ministry and also defines the agency’s personnel organisation
• NYT – In retrospect, the violence was an omen, beginning a wave of unsolved attacks and official harassment against journalists, human rights activists and opposition politicians around the region, which includes the Moscow suburbs, but not the city itself. Rarely, if ever, is anyone held responsible.
• Russia Today – Russia’s biggest bank, Sberbank, has removed limits for its subsidiaries financing projects in Ukraine. The bank is also planning some of its own investment into the country.
• UPI – Russia’s gas monopoly would fund upgrades to the Ukrainian natural gas transit network if a bilateral merger takes place, Gazprom officials said.
• RFERL – Russian officials say at least seven people have been killed in separate clashes between Russian-backed troops and militants across the North Caucasus
• Caucasian Knot – Vice-Premier Alexander Khloponin, Plenipotentiary of Russian President in the North-Caucasian Federal District (NCFD), believes that Russia should form its attitude to the Caucasus as to country’s strategic region. According to his version, there are four reasons why Northern Caucasus should be regarded as a strategic region
• EurasiaNet – Some believers in Kyrgyzstan think the political upheaval that brought down Kurmanbek Bakiyev’s administration has created a new opportunity to mix faith and politics. There’s even talk these days that Kyrgyzstan could become the second Central Asian state, after Tajikistan, to feature a legally operating Islamist political party.
• SRI – Kazakh mining group Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC) plans to sell a $3-billion Eurobond, according to a statement published on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) website.
• RFERL – A former commander of the Nagorno-Karabakh armed forces, Samvel Babayan, has confirmed that he recently visited Iran but rejected reports that he was tampering with Armenian politics
• Organization of the Islamic Conference – The Dushanbe meeting (of OIC foreign ministers in Dushanbe) is all the more important as it is the first CFM held in one of OIC Member States from Central Asia, which joined our ranks after achieving their independence. We warmly welcome them, and pin the hope that the five Muslim sister countries, given their glorious past in enriching Islamic civilization, will become a driving force to strengthen our organization and consolidate Islamic solidarity

Col. Mark R. Stammer, commander of 1st Brigade, 82nd Airborne Division (Advise and Assist Brigade), watches a dust storm blow toward the Euphrates River and his UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter May 10 (photo by Sgt. Mike MacLeod)

Middle East

• Al Sumaria – Baghdad Operations Command spokesman Brigadier Qassem Ata announced the arrest of two of the most dangerous Al Qaeda leaders responsible for the gory bombings that hit the capital of Baghdad last year and plotting to attack religious shrines in Karbala and Najaf
• AKI – Iraqi security forces are concerned that many of the prisoners released by US troops are becoming leaders in the Al-Qaeda terror network on their release. According to local news site, Al-Sumaria News, Baghdad security forces spokesman Major General Qassim Atta revealed the level of concern to reporters on a visit to Abu Ghraib prison
• Voices of Iraq – The house of a high-ranking Sahwa fighter south of Tikrit city was detonated on Tuesday. “The fighter was not at his house (70 km south of Tikrit) when the blast occurred,” a local police source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency. He noted that the fighter’s two daughters were killed in the blast.
• Haaretz – Israel offered to engage in direct peace talks with Syria, provided Damascus cut ties with Iran and Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, Syrian President Bashar Assad said Tuesday. President Shimon Peres had conveyed the proposal via his Russian counterpart Dimitry Medvedev, Assad told the Lebanese Daily Al-Safir
• Al Arabiya – Ten years after Israel pulled out, south Lebanon is solidly controlled by Hezbollah which is even organizing “jihadist tours” along one of the most tense borders in the Middle East.
• NOW Lebanon – In an interview with LBCI television on Tuesday, Loyalty to the Resistance bloc MP Hassan Fadlallah said that Hezbollah has no reservations about Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s upcoming visit to the US. Fadlallah’s remarks come days after some pro-Syrian Lebanese politicians cast doubts about Hariri’s US trip
• Asharq Al-Awsat – In an interview with Asharq Al-Awsat on the sidelines of the Arab-Chinese forum in Beijing, Libyan Foreign Minister Musa Kusa said the Arabs told the Chinese that they cannot talk about buying and selling without defending the Palestinian issue.
• Hurriyet – Lt. Gen. Yurdaer Olcan was arrested within the scope of the “Balyoz” (Sledgehammer) investigation Monday, becoming the first active military officer of his rank to be arrested as part of the recent coup allegations.
• Al Jazeera – Saudi Arabia’s intelligence forces, co-ordinating with neighbouring Yemen, have freed two German girls kidnapped nearly a year ago with their family in Yemen.
• Daily Star – Yemeni security forces have launched an operation to free two Chinese oil workers a day after they were kidnapped by tribesmen in an eastern province, the Shabwa governor said on Monday
• Armies of Liberation – South Arabian News service and many individuals are reporting the state is shelling the Alhabylyn area from the Alanad military base.

Iran

• Fars – The Iranian Army announced on Tuesday that it plans to unveil an upgraded version of its main battle tank, Zolfaqar, next month.
• IRIB – Islamic Republic of Iran and Brazil on Tuesday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in the field of oil and gas, Deputy Oil Minister for International Affairs Hossein Noghrehkar Shirazi told IRIB on Tuesday
• IRNA – Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said on Tuesday that Iran and Tajikistan have agreed to boost trade and remove the impediments on the way of Iranian enterprises’ activities in the Central Asian republic
• Zamaneh – Ahmad Yazdanfar, MirHosein Mousavi’s bodyguard was arrested Monday night by Iranian security forces. Kaleme website, news outlet for the Iranian opposition leader, announced the news, but the reason for the arrest remains unannounced
• Press TV – Two members of the terrorist Party for Free Life in Kurdistan (PJAK) organization have been killed in clashes with security forces near Iran’s western borders.

South Asia

• NATO – Six international servicemembers were killed and several wounded when a suicide vehicle-born improvised explosive device exploded near an ISAF convoy and civilian vehicles travelling on Darulaman Road in Kabul this morning.  Numerous Afghan civilians were also killed and injured in the indiscriminate attack
• UK MoD – RAF firefighters helped their American colleagues this weekend in tackling a massive blaze which broke out at Camp Leatherneck in Helmand province.
• Ward Carroll – A Tough Road Ahead for Afghan Governance
• McClatchy – Afghan military investigators have accused Ahmed Wali Karzai, U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai’s controversial half-brother, of intervening to protect powerful allies who are squatting illegally on government property in southern Afghanistan
• Geo – At least 12 people including the area DSP and his gunmen were killed and various others injured in a blast here in Kalachi area of DI Khan, Geo News reported Tuesday
• MEMRI – A number of schools, including at least two girls’ schools, have closed in Quetta, the capital of Pakistan’s Baluchistan province, after threatening letters were received by the schools’ administrations, according to a Pakistani daily
• Times Online – India faces a dilemma as it considers whether to deploy the air force against homegrown Maoist rebels after their latest bloody attack yesterday, this time on civilians as well as security forces.
• Times of India – Railways cancelled some trains in Bihar and Orissa and normal life was disrupted in some parts as a two-day bandh called by the Maoists to protest security operations against them began on Tuesday in five states. The bandh has been called in Jharkhand, Orissa, Bihar, Chhattisgarh and West Bengal.
• Times of India – Two army jawans were killed and 3 injured when unidentified militants, who sneaked into Indian territory, attacked an Army patrol party’s vehicle along the Line of Control (LoC) in Poonch district of Jammu and Kashmir
• Channel 4 – Exclusive: a senior Sri Lankan army commander and frontline soldier tell Channel 4 News that point-blank executions of Tamils at the end of the Sri Lankan civil war were carried out under orders.

Far East & Pacific

• Chosun Ilbo – Investigators have apparently discovered pieces of a propeller from a torpedo, which could provide valuable clues to exactly what caused the Navy corvette Cheonan to sink on March 26
• Yonhap – South Korea issued a safety warning for its citizens staying in North Korea while preparing to launch a diplomacy campaign to make its case in the March sinking of a naval ship, officials said Tuesday, apparently indicating that its probe has found Pyongyang responsible for the disaster
• Stars and Stripes – The U.S. military canceled this week’s dress rehearsal for the evacuation of American civilians from South Korea amid growing tensions on the peninsula. U.S. Forces Korea said in a statement Tuesday that the Courageous Channel exercise — which was to run Thursday through Monday — was canceled to avoid the appearance that it was scheduled in response to the March sinking of a South Korean warship or the subsequent investigation.
• Bangkok Post – Pichet Sukjindathong, the right-hand man of the late Maj-Gen Khattiya Sawasdipol, or Seh Daeng, has been arrested, the Centre for the Resolution of the Emergency Situation (CRES) announced on Tuesday. The CRES believes Mr Pichet is one of the people behind the many clashes between red-shirt guards and government forces
• news.com.au – A screaming toddler stands on a barricade of tyres, his upper body visible to the Thai soldiers looking through their gunsights as a protester reaches out to steady him
• China Daily – A delegation of the Chinese Ministry of Railways inked a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Tuesday, with the aim of pushing forward cooperation in railway construction between the two countries.
• Washington Times – Terrorists plotting to assassinate Indonesia’s president and other top officials during independence celebrations in August were considering carrying out their strike in June to coincide with President Obama’s visit, intelligence officials say. What’s more, the disruption of the plot on Friday has shone a spotlight on the influence of al Qaeda in the South Asian nation, which is home to the world’s largest Muslim population, just weeks before Mr. Obama’s visit
• Irrawaddy – Around 1,000 members of several small militia groups will become border guard forces under Burmese military command after militia leaders reached an agreement with Lt-Gen Ye Myint, the Burmese junta chief of Military Affairs Security, at a meeting on Tuesday morning, according to border sources

Europe

• Khaleej Times – A French court on Tuesday released Iranian agent Ali Vakili Rad on parole, his lawyer said, just days after a young French academic accused of spying in Tehran was allowed to return home.
• AP – Sweden’s security service on Tuesday arrested a man suspected of plotting a terrorist attack in Somalia, the latest in a string of Somali-linked terror cases in Scandinavia
• euronews – The first of the EU’s rescue money has arrived in Greece, a 14.5 billion euro slice of a loan worth 110 billion over the next three years. It will pay Greece’s immediate debt, and added to 5.5 billion from the IMF Greece can now pay off a 10 year bond which matures on Wednesday.
• David Marsh – The dream of monetary union across Europe has turned into a nightmare. Led by France and Germany, European countries have decided to spend colossal sums of taxpayers’ money they cannot afford to heal mounting internal disparities they cannot conceal to shore up an edifice many believe cannot stand. On Monday, that skepticism briefly pulled the value of the euro down to a four-year low against the dollar.
• EUCOM – The Marines and sailors of Black Sea Rotational Force 2010 officially kicked off their three-month engagement in the Black Sea region in a ceremony at Romania’s Mihail Kogalniceanu Airfield, May 17. The ceremony featured platoons of Marines and Romanian forces, and was attended by local politicians, U.S. and Romanian military representatives from across the services. Additionally, about 20 representatives from the Romanian press were on hand to witness U.S. Marines and Romanian troops officially begin the deployment, the first of its kind for United States Marines to the Black Sea region.

Africa

• Spiegel – Somalia, which has been without a functioning government for almost two decades, serves as a warning for what could happen to other failed states. Rival Islamic militias battle for control of the capital, where the president, Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, is in constant danger of his life. A visit to the worst place on the planet
• Shabelle – Sheik Ali Mohamud Raghe, the spokesman of Harakat Al-shabab Mujahideen has told reporters that the money printed by the transitional government recently will not be used in the areas under their control.
• BBC – Three aid workers, including a US woman and two Sudanese nationals, have been kidnapped in Sudan’s troubled Darfur region, officials say
• Sudan Tribune – Sudanese nationals were killed when their car was bushed by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebels in southern Sudan state of Western Equatoria,
• ISN – This month’s proposed change in the UN Mission in the Central African Republic and Chad’s peacekeeping mandate will have significant ramifications for the security situation in eastern Chad, Anna Dunin writes for ISN Security Watch
• The Citizen – Tanzania rejected insistence by Egypt and Sudan that the new agreement on the Nile River Basin Co-operative Framework should recognise the two countries’ current Nile water uses and rights. With the Nile’s total flow of 84 cubic metres, Egypt gets 55.5 billion cubic metres of the water annually and Sudan gets 18.5 billion cubic metres under uses and rights based on old colonial agreements which have long been rejected by seven Nile Basin member states as invalid.
• The National – The north and west African states of Nigeria, Angola, Algeria and Libya have long enjoyed the benefits of being the continent’s biggest oil producers. But in recent years, oil companies have turned their attention on east Africa, scouring the previously untapped region for more of the precious resource. Oil finds in Sudan and Uganda as well as natural gas deposits in Tanzania and Mozambique have oil companies excited about east Africa for the first time. As firms from around the world, including the Middle East and China, rush to prospect for oil in the region, experts have urged governments to astutely manage their newfound resources
• SW Radio Africa – Villagers in Makoni South constituency in Manicaland province are living in fear, after soldiers in uniform roamed the area ordering everyone to attend a ZANU PF meeting at Rukweza business centre on 6th June. ‘Their message has been clear, that if you don’t attend you will be in trouble. I haven’t seen the soldiers personally but villagers in the constituency have confirmed that they’re being instructed to attend the meeting without failure,’ MDC-T MP for the area Pishai Muchauraya said.

A military working dog wears Doggles to protect his eyes as a Chinook helicopter takes off, kicking up dust and debris, during an air assault operation by U.S. soldiers assigned to Alpha Troop, 1st Squadron, 172nd Cavalry Regiment, 86th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, Parwan province, Afghanistan, May 11, 2010. (photo by Sgt. Jason Brace)

The Global War

• PBS Frontline – FRONTLINE tells the dark tale of the men of 3rd Platoon, Charlie Company, 1st Battalion of the 506th Infantry, and how the war followed them home. It is a story of heroism, grief, vicious combat, depression, drugs, alcohol and brutal murder; an investigation into the Army’s mental health services; and a powerful portrait of what multiple tours and post-traumatic stress are doing to a generation of young American soldiers.
• IPS – The Western world is unloading some of its most sophisticated weapons – including state-of-the-art fighter planes and anti-missile defence systems – in the Gulf region, clinching multi-billion-dollar arms deals. According to an analysis by Forecast International Inc. (FI), a leading U.S. defence market research firm, the GCC countries will account for about 60 percent of all defence spending in the region in 2010
• Military.com – The Army is recalling 44,000 Advanced Composite Helmets after recent tests revealed that they fail to provide the required level of ballistics protection

Sights & Sounds

Cato – Europe’s Economic Crisis and the Future of the Euro

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Deutsche Welle – Following the wars of the 1990’s, reconciliation between Bosnian Serbs and Bosnian Muslims has been all but nonexistent. One small exception, though, is a railway line connecting Sarajevo with Belgrade

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CSM – Both the US Defense and NATO budgets could be trimmed in the near future

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