Geagea Urges Suleiman, Salam to End Their 'Harmful, Unjustified' Wait
Naharnet/Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea on Monday voiced dismay that President Michel Suleiman and Prime Minister-designate Tammam Salam have not formed a new cabinet until the moment, revealing that he is not a candidate for the presidency – “for now.”“I don't know what President Suleiman and PM-designate Salam are waiting for (concerning the formation of the cabinet), especially recently, since the stances of all parties have become well-known,” Geagea said during an interview on MTV. “The hesitation of Suleiman and Salam has become harmful,” he added. Asked whether their wait had to do with regional developments, Geagea said: “We cannot wait for the outcome of the rapprochement between the U.S. and Iran.” “Even if the United States and Iran reach an agreement, what would that change in Lebanon? It will not change anything,” he noted.
“Suleiman is the country's president and Salam is the PM-designate ... and they must shoulder their responsibilities,” Geagea urged. He called on Suleiman and Salam to “form the cabinet they want,” noting that the parties would decide later whether to grant it their vote of confidence or not. “I believe that a neutral cabinet would win a vote of confidence,” added Geagea. Asked about Hizbullah's response should Suleiman and Salam form a cabinet not enjoying its approval, Geagea said: “We must not always contemplate over Hizbullah's possible reaction before making any move, as that would bestow legitimacy on its behavior. The president has the constitutional right to form a cabinet.” “Suleiman and Salam are giving so much importance to (Progressive Socialist Party chief MP Walid) Jumblat's stance and they must meet and decide what they want, and accordingly, Jumblat and others would build their stances,” Geagea pointed out. He added: “We have agreed in the March 14 coalition to approach President Suleiman and PM-designate Salam with the aim of forming a cabinet as soon as possible, and if they don't respond, they would be impeding the democratic system.”“In my opinion, which is not binding, a cabinet that can work at the moment is neither a March 8 cabinet nor a March 14 cabinet, but rather a neutral cabinet,” said Geagea.Separately, the LF leader said that “extending the mandate of the president is an exception and this exception happened during the hegemony era.” “President Suleiman has personally told me that he does not intend to extend his mandate ... On May 25, a new president must be in the Baabda Palace,” Geagea stressed.“Every parliamentary bloc has the duty of going to the session of electing the president or else it would be committing high treason,” he added.“For now, I don't consider myself to be a candidate for the presidency, but I might become a candidate at any certain time and I will not shy away if I find it necessary to be a candidate,” Geagea said.

Who is funding Syria’s hardliners?
By: Tariq Alhomayed/Asharq Alawsat/The expression of regret and revulsion at what some hardline groups are doing in Syria is not enough. Also, continually quoting Western news agencies on the activities of these groups is not enough. This serves Assad’s media machine, especially since it has been pushing the line that it is fighting “extremists” from the first day of the revolution. Therefore, the question that must be raised is: Who is funding these groups?Someone may argue that asking this is to be sucked into the realm of conspiracy theories, which is untrue. It would be naïve to content ourselves only with what the Western media is publishing about those hardliners, particularly given that the majority of these stories reach the Western media through either Assad’s media machine or that of his allies. Let us act in good faith and suppose that the Western media is provoked by the horrible and repulsive videos being leaked, some of which were proven to be inaccurate, such as the one posted by the New York Times recently. Thus, we must inquire about who is funding these groups: we must, as they say, ‘follow the money.’ What is suspicious about the story of the rise of hardline extremist groups is that they do not target the Assad regime. Rather, they target the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which is already preoccupied with fighting Assad and with resisting the advance of Iran’s Hezbollah fighters into Syria. How, then, can we understand the Islamist hardliners being involved in fighting the FSA, which is simultaneously preoccupied with fighting Assad and the Iranians? Here, we must remember the story of Iraq under the American occupation. While militant groups were targeting the Americans and whomever sought political participation to ensure stability for Iraq, the groups that acted as Iranian proxies and Iranian troops in Iraq, which have been at large since the ouster of Saddam Hussein, were not seriously or clearly targeted. The claims that hard-line groups in Syria are benefiting from individual funding from the Gulf, whether from Kuwait or Saudi Arabia—according to Western press—is illogical. No matter how much the individual support of some Kuwaitis may be, it remains ineffective because there are Kuwaiti people who champion Assad for sectarian reasons. As for Saudi Arabia, the dullest observer must know that government control and supervision over money transfer is strict—not only today, but for years now, thanks to the war on terrorism. Furthermore, the view that Qatari ambitions are a factor in funding hardliner groups is also inaccurate, as the recent changes in Qatar are noticeable and will decide numerous issues in the region, most prominently Syria.

Saqr Orders Detention of Seven over Roumieh 'Explosive Sandwich'
Naharnet/State Commissioner to the Military Court Judge Saqr Saqr on Monday ordered the detention of seven people in connection with a recent attempt to smuggle a sandwich containing an explosive material into the Roumieh prison, state-run National News Agency reported. The suspects are six inmates and the security guard who tried to smuggle the sandwich, NNA said. The Internal Security Forces' Intelligence Bureau had questioned the seven and held a joint interrogation involving Charbel Shalita and the other five inmates, “but they denied all the charges,” the agency added. The Intelligence Bureau will refer the dossier to Saqr on Tuesday for further proceedings. The Bureau interrogated on Saturday two Islamist inmates over the smuggling of explosives into Roumieh's bloc B facility. On Thursday, the ISF thwarted an attempt by a prison guard to smuggle 150 grams of an explosive material inside a sandwich that was being delivered to the inmate Charbel Shalita, the murderer of Roland Chbeir.

Phalange Party leader Amin Gemayel Opposes Amending the Constitution, Calls for Timely Presidential Election
Naharnet/Phalange Party leader Amin Gemayel called on Monday for holding the presidential election on time, rejecting any attempt to amend the constitution. "We support holding the presidential election on time and we are against amending the constitution,” Gemayel stressed at a press conference after the Phalange political bureau's weekly meeting. He continued: “We cannot afford the postponing of the presidential election and we cannot go through this amid the absence of a cabinet.” “We will do everything we can in collaboration with other factions to form a cabinet and secure the presidential election.”The former president considered that forming a cabinet has become an “urgent” matter. "We call on President Michel Suleiman and premier-designate Tammam Salam to form a cabinet that answers people's demands,” he said. Gemayel pointed out that the Phalange party, from the beginning, has demanded a rescue cabinet. "But we are not against any other proposal submitted by Salam,” he noted, rejecting all preconditions to the cabinet's formation. He added: “The Baabda Declaration is the basis for the cabinet's formation and everything else is debatable with the premier-designate.” The political bureau also tackled the Indonesian boat tragedy, lamenting the “misery” that forces the Lebanese to migrate.  But the Phalange leader remarked that while there is misery on one side, on the other, however, “Lebanon is proud that its national Dr. Gabriel Gharib was chosen as the best cardiologist in France.” “Lebanon's is losing the great potentials of its people and migration is the indication,” Gemayel expressed. Capital, a French magazine, chose Gharib as the best cardiologist in France among 200,000 doctors in the country. What made Gharib, who hails from the Beirut neighborhood of Rmeil, stand out in medicine was his achievement of being able to conduct a coronary artery bypass operation without resorting to medical hypnosis.  Gemayel lashed out at the current caretaker cabinet, counting various problems Lebanon is suffering from. “The cabinet is not functioning and we have a parliament's whose mandate has been extended. The security situation is deteriorating and all of this is at the expense of the Lebanese's interests and of the economic situation. Security affects the economy and we are not dealing with this problem from its roots but trying to temporarily calm the symptoms.” He continued: “Another problem is that of the new wage scale, in addition to the refugees' crisis. We care about doing all required efforts towards refugees but we have duties towards the Lebanese as well.”“This situation is intolerable.”

Jumblat Warns 'Our Oil Is at Risk' as Political Foes Support Extraordinary Cabinet Session
Naharnet/Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat announced that the Lebanese oil is “at risk” because of the stalling in completing the necessary procedures. "I was never against holding a cabinet session on the issue of oil and now after this delay I support holding a session,” Jumblat said in a telephone call with al-Manar television. "We were overran by everyone else and our oil is at risk.” Al-Manar revealed that caretaker Prime Minister Najib Miqati is communicating with caretaker Health Minister Ali Hassan Khali and caretaker Social Affairs Minister Wael Abou Faour to reach an accord on a cabinet session on petroleum. "Miqati also received a phone call from the political aide of the Hizbullah chief Hussein Khalil to express the party's support of a session on oil,” the same sourced added. Caretaker Energy Minister Jebran Bassil urged President Michel Suleiman and Miqati to hold an extraordinary governmental session to issue two decrees that call for demarcating 10 maritime oil exploration blocs and setting up a revenue-sharing model.  Bassil explained that his step aims at “preserving the oil and protecting it against any local obstruction and any foreign exploitation.”"Especially against any Israeli exploitation.” Regarding the maritime oil blocs, Jumblat considered that the petroleum authority is the party concerned in resolving this matter. Meanwhile, Khalil stressed during a visit to Miqati on the importance of contracting out the maritime oil blocks. "This is a point of disagreement with Bassil,” Khalil pointed out. "But discussion over this issue was not and will not be interrupted.”Bassil had told MTV that contracting out the maritime oil blocs as one batch would prevent transparent tenders. Earlier in October, Bassil issued a decision to postpone to January 2014 the bid to license the candidate companies to explorate the oil and gas in Lebanese waters.

Govt. Formation Efforts at Heart of Talks at Hbeish-Hosted Dinner Attended by Suleiman, Salam
Naharnet /Mustaqbal bloc MP Hadi Hbeish hosted on Friday a dinner banquet that brought together a number of key figures in Lebanon, including President Michel Suleiman and Premier-designate Tammam Salam, reported the daily An Nahar on Monday. It said that the formation of a new government was at the heart of discussions. The banquet also included the head of the Mustaqbal bloc MP Fouad Saniora, Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi, Mustaqbal MPs Ahmed Fatfat and Nohad al-Mashnouq, Army Commander General Jean Qahwaji, and General Security chief Abbas Ibrahim. One of the participants said that the banquet was a simple social event that should not be over-analyzed, said An Nahar. The daily did note however that Saniora headed to Hbeish's residence to attend the dinner immediately from Rafik Hariri International Airport upon his return to Lebanon from a trip to Paris.

Israeli Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz : Iranian economy 18 months away from collapse
http://www.jpost.com/Diplomacy-and-Politics/Steinitz-Iranian-economy-18-months-away-from-collapse-328108

By HERB KEINON 10/07/2013/The Iranian economy is 18 months away from collapse, Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz said Monday. Steinitz, speaking at a conference at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, said that over the last 18-24 months the international sanctions have caused about $100 billion in damage to the country’s economy, which has an annual $450 billion GDP. In addition, he said, inflation in Iran is currently running at 40 percent a year, and the unemployment rate is between 25%-30%, with the rate among youth at about 40%. The rial, Iran’s currency, has been devalued by 180%, and the country has a negative economic growth of 5.4%.
He said that the sanctions have effectively cut Iran off from the world’s financial system, making it very difficult to do business. At this rate, he predicted the Iranian economy will collapse in another year-and-a-half, something that led to the rise of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. “The pressure works, it is effective,” Steinitz said. “If we add to this pressure a credible military threat, the chances will be greatly improved.”Steinitz said the combination of a credible military threat and diplomacy that succeeded in getting Syria to begin dismantling its chemical weapons stockpiles will work against Iran as well. Syria, he said, showed that there was truth in the slogan “the greater the pressure, the greater the chances for diplomacy to succeed.”According to Steinitz, “the constellations came together” in the right way and led Syrian President Bashar Assad to do something no one dreamed even six months ago that he would do: begin ridding Syria of chemical weapons. This came about, Steinitz said, because of Assad’s interest in survival; the US determination to set a redline and stand firmly behind it; a Russian desire to prevent an attack on Syria that could endanger the Assad regime; and a joint US-Russian desire to finally gain a diplomatic achievement after two years of doing little regarding the bloody Syrian Civil War.
While the agreement to dismantle Syria’s chemical weapons was not done for Israel, “this is an example of how – despite our own instincts – that geopolitical events sometimes redound in Israel’s favor.”
Steinitz said that the Syrian agreement would “not have been possible without a credible US military threat.” He repeated what Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has made clear over the last few days, that Israel was not opposed to a diplomatic solution to the Iranian crisis as long as Iran was left without the capacity to build a nuclear bomb.

By Top Lebanese officials commit to STL funding
Kareem Shaheen/The Daily Star
BEIRUT: Top Lebanese officials said the government would pay its share of the budget of the court trying the alleged assassins of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, but would do so over three installments, highlighting the country’s precarious finances and posing a novel challenge to the tribunal as it gears up for trial. “I remain one of the greatest enthusiasts about the issue of funding the international tribunal, and I funded it twice in the most difficult of circumstances,” caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati told The Daily Star during a memorial service in Sidon. “We are very keen about the international tribunal.” Mikati’s comments signaled his support for funding the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, which is preparing to try in absentia four Hezbollah members accused of responsibility for the February 14, 2005, attack that killed Hariri and 22 others.
They came a day after caretaker Finance Minister Mohammad Safadi asked Mikati to approve the payment of Lebanon’s 49 percent share of the STL budget. A statement by the Finance Ministry Saturday said Safadi sent a letter to Mikati urging him to give special approval for securing funds to pay Lebanon’s annual contribution in three installments. The ministry said the outstanding payments amounted to LL58 billion.
The funding of the STL is a contentious issue. Hezbollah refuses to hand over the men accused by the court and opposes funding it. Lebanon is required by U.N. Security Council resolution to pay its share of the tribunal’s budget every year. Mikati threatened to resign in late 2011 if Hezbollah blocked the payments. The funding was soon approved amid recriminations in the ruling coalition and then again in 2012.
Mikati stepped down in March, leading observers to question whether a caretaker government could approve a measure as contentious as funding the STL. Critics of the tribunal say Lebanon cannot afford to pay while grappling with a massive refugee influx from neighboring Syria that is testing the limits of its economy and health care system, particularly after what many see as unnecessary delays to the start of proceedings.
Trial was scheduled to begin in March this year, but was pushed back to January 2014. The installments plan appears to offer a compromise that spreads out the financial burden on Lebanon, now months overdue. “At this time, we do not have a position on the issue of installments so long as Lebanon honors its financial commitment to the tribunal,” court spokesman Marten Youssef told The Daily Star, in the STL’s first official statement on the proposal. The funding plan comes just weeks after a visit by STL registrar Daryl Mundis in which he met with officials and brought up the funding issue. The STL’s position has long been that Lebanon is obliged to pay its contribution, but that it would be inappropriate for it to interfere in how exactly the funding is procured. The installments plan is a novel position for the court. The Security Council resolution establishing the STL merely states that Lebanon ought to pay its obligations without detailing exactly how. Shafik Masri, professor of international law at Lebanese University, said the STL dues could be considered the equivalent of a regular debt that the state has to pay, and which can therefore be approved without referring back to the Cabinet. “This obligation was not created under the caretaker government, it was created as a result of a treaty obligation between the state and the U.N.,” he said. “Therefore, it is part of the recurring costs incurred by the government, just like an external debt.”But if Mikati decides to seek Cabinet approval for such a special request, he would have to declare that Lebanon is unable to pay its dues until leaders agree to form a new government. “It would not be a refusal to pay, but would await a new government,” Masri said. The STL’s founding document allows the U.N. Secretary-General to seek a new source of funds if Lebanon fails to fulfill its obligations. Masri said the installments proposal indicates that there may have been an agreement between Lebanon and the U.N. already on dividing the payments.
“The finance minister knows this is a contractual obligation on the state,” he said. “Therefore it can be divided, but cannot be avoided.” Masri said that no government has the right to refuse to pay the STL contribution due to financial difficulties, and it cannot be tied to delays in the work of the court. He cited the example of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, which is prosecuting war crimes in the Balkans and is still in operation 10 years after its creation, adding that it was more challenging for the court to prepare for a trial in the absence of the accused. Youssef said the funding was instrumental to the work of the STL, but would not stop it from carrying out its work. He added that there was no reason to expect Lebanon to renege on its obligations. “There is really no point to entertain the thought that Lebanon is not going to contribute,” Youssef said. “We’ve received every indication from them that they’re committed to the tribunal, so it’s just a matter of finding the available channels for them to do this.”The STL maintains that the presence of a caretaker government should not inhibit Lebanon from paying its dues. “The responsibility to fund the 49 percent falls on the state,” Youssef said. “It does not fall on a particular government.” – additional reporting by Mohammed Zaatari

Hizballah is secretly pulling its fighting men out of Syria, elated by victory
http://www.debka.com/article/23337/Hizballah-is-secretly-pulling-its-fighting-men-out-of-Syria-elated-by-victory

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report October 7, 2013/Just as the Iran-backed Lebanese Hizballah sent thousands of fighting men into Syria on the sly to fight for the Assad regime in the winter of 2012, so it is now pulling them back in the same furtive fashion in small, inconspicuous bands. DEBKAfile’s Middle East sources report that 1,500 Hizballah fighters are home out of 3,500 still awaiting repatriation last month. By early November, they are all expected to be out of Syria. Hizballah’s leaders and backers rate the operation a major success: It gave President Bashar Assad a valuable boost for his regime’s survival against a major uprising. Hizballah’s military involvement in the Syrian civil war went through unopposed by the US or any regional power, such as Turkey, Israel, Saudi Arabia or Qatar. And, finally, Tehran for the first time fielded a surrogate force for a winning role to determine the outcome of a conflict in one of its most important strategic arenas.
Hizballah’s rapid exit from Syria is the outcome of five developments in the region and beyond:
1. It signifies the close interdependence of the US-Russian understanding for Syria’s chemical disarmament and the deal unfolding between the US, Russia and Iran on Tehran’s nuclear program.
Progress in negotiations with Iran is clearly interlocked with progress on Syria.
2. Assad and his regime are now firm enough in the saddle to dispense with Hizballah’s military assistance.
3. Hizballah needs to whisk its militiamen out of Syria before the inspectors of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons-OPCW, the first of whom arrived in Damascus Tuesday, Oct. 1, fan out across the country and get down to work. The Lebanese Shiite group is anxious to keep its expeditionary force in Syria out of sight so as to preserve the closely guarded secrets of its makeup and modes of operation.
4. The Hizballah militia comes out of the Syrian war toughened by combat experience and well-trained in the running of regular military units in battle conditions under combined Iranian-Syrian command.
In comparison, Israel’s armed forces, the IDF, have not faced combat conditions in the field since the Second Lebanon War of 2006, while Hizballah, which is dedicated to destroying Israel, despite its heavy war losses, has just survived the test of fire on the Syrian battlefield.
5. At Tehran’s behest, Hizballah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah is turning his attention inward to Beirut. His assignment is to promote a political set-up that will support future accords on Syria between the US, Russia and Iran. He is therefore abandoning his strong opposition to a national unity government in Beirut and helping to get one installed.
In his latest speech Sunday, Oct. 6, at the Begin-Sadat Center of Bar Ilan University, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu declared: “The goal of Iran today is to control the Middle East and beyond, and to destroy the State of Israel. That is not speculation; that is the goal.”
But he had no word to offer on what Israel was going to do to stop Tehran achieving its goal or disarm Iran’s faithful operational arm to prevent it pursuing its master’s Middle East objectives.
 

Assad’s forces on offensive to retake Syrian Golan and re-control border with Israel
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report October 7, 2013/Two Syrian armored brigades set out from Damascus Monday night, Oct. 7, to link up with forces already fighting in southern Syria to reach Quneitra opposite the Israeli Golan border. debkafile’s military and intelligence sources report long convoys of around 200 tanks, APCs, armored vehicles and self-propelled artillery are heading for an assembly-point south of the Daraa in the south. Monday night, the Syrian air force bombarded rebel-held border villages to soften them up ahead of the offensive. The size and movements of the advancing Syrian forces indicate that the regime in Damascus has determined to root out the rebel presence in all parts of Syrian border with Israel - from the Hermon Mts. in the north, down to the Syrian-Israel-Jordanian border junction opposite the southern Israeli Golan.
The main body is presently on the move in the area between the Yarmuk River which marks the Syrian Jordanian border and Quneitra. The Syrian rebel forces clinging to small locations along the Israeli border are small and not expected to last long under a sizeable Syria military assault, one of whose objectives is undoubtedly to sever the links between rebel positions on the Golan and the IDF. The only outward sign of those links is the regular transfer of injured rebels to Israeli hospitals for medical treatment - an estimated 200 have so far been treated. Until now, the Syrian high command held back from a military operation in this region for fear of drawing forth an Israeli or Jordanian counter-attack. However, after consenting to the disabling of its chemical weapons, the Assad regime feels confident that neither Israel nor Jordan will dare fight back.
Syrian leaders gained an even greater sense of immunity from the rare words they head from US Secretary of State John Kerry Monday, commending them for allowing UN experts to dismantle the chemical production equipment and stocks, even though it suddenly turned out Sunday, Oct. 6 that the international OPCW experts had relegated the work to the Syrian army. Jordan has responded to the heavy Syrian military movements in close proximity to its territory by putting on a state of preparedness the two army divisions, Nos. 60 and 40, which stand guard on its border with Syria.
 

Pointing fingers
The Daily Star/The executive branch of Lebanon’s government has been in limbo for half a year, so it’s not surprising to encounter the latest “achievement” of the caretaker government’s ministers: trading accusations of misbehavior. The caretaker minister of state, Nicolas Fattoush, set off the commotion late last week when he held a news conference and blasted a number of officials from the Finance Ministry and the judiciary, while saving his greatest ire for his colleague in the Cabinet, Mohammad Safadi, the caretaker finance minister. Fattoush lashed out at what he described as “scandals and corrupt acts” by ministry officials and Army officers who enjoy political clout, determined to reveal a long list of threats and extortion, and obstruction of justice. However, the “bombshell revelations” appear to stem from nothing that involves a matter of the nation’s higher interest or widespread public concern. Instead, the commotion stems from a personal matter, involving accusations of tax evasion by the minister’s brother, a prominent quarry owner. Media reports suggest that the case is several years old and predates Safadi’s tenure at the Finance Ministry, but Fattoush apparently had nothing better to do than lash out in all directions, and especially at Safadi, using rude, derisive and abusive language that has unfortunately become the norm in political discourse. Safadi responded, making things worse, and contented himself by speaking about “quarries being the opposite of civilization.” In fact, the opposite of civilization is to allow a state of legal and administrative chaos to become the norm of government activity. No one in Lebanon believes that corruption and mismanagement are anything but endemic to the political system; there are scandals and illegal activities that take place every day. The only concern should be when the public hears about such things and why. Moreover, they usually hear about these issues from politicians who should have little interest in revealing such “scandals,” and not from the judiciary, which is often sidelined and unable to take a strong stand against official corruption. Politicians should remember that the public has become extremely jaded by such corruption scandals. Some people might be momentarily entertained by the spectacles, but in the end they only end up confirming public knowledge: sweeping such cases under the rug is the inevitable final chapter to these sagas, with no one found guilty or punished.
The people who vote for the politicians every time an election rolls around should take a stand and demand that they come clean, and for once, submit to a proper judicial process instead of trying to influence the course of justice. Otherwise, they have only themselves to blame for allowing the continuation of this rotten state of affairs, in which people are obliged to hear about wrongdoing and outrageous scandals, but never see anyone held accountable.
 

After Shipwreck, Lebanese Survivors Return to Poverty
Naharnet /Assaad Assaad sold everything to escape poverty in Lebanon, but now he is back, after watching his wife and three children, and his dreams of a better life, perish at sea. The 36-year-old, who could now pass for 50, was among 18 shell-shocked Lebanese who returned on Sunday after surviving a shipwreck off Indonesia that killed dozens of impoverished migrants from the Middle East. The Lebanese aboard the Australia-bound boat mainly hailed from the northern Akkar region, where an influx of refugees from neighboring Syria has compounded the endemic poverty of one of the country's poorest areas. "We were desperate to leave, and we had hope for a better life, because there is nothing for us here," Assaad said as he stared ahead blankly, still reliving the tragedy. "I lost everything -- my wife, my children, my home," he says, sitting in his parents' modest house where the crushing silence is only occasionally broken by neighbors calling in to quietly offer their condolences. In Kabiit, a village nestled beneath verdant mountains, Assaad supported his family on $13 a day before deciding to sell everything -- his house, his car, his land and his cow -- to pay for passage to Australia, the "Eden" to which many of his fellow villagers had gone. "I don't want to be rich. I just want to live decently. Here we live in humiliation," he said. Criminal networks have descended on the region to take advantage of Syrians fleeing the civil war, offering cut-rate passage to Australia via Indonesia that has encouraged poor Lebanese to try their luck as well.
"Many of those who left lead good lives now. We were not so lucky," said Assaad, who paid $70,000 to smugglers.
He describes the moment when he lost everything. "It was like an explosion. The boat just disintegrated. It was indescribable," he said. "I would have preferred to die with my family." Between 80 and 120 people, most of them from the Middle East, were on board the boat. Twenty-eight bodies, many of them women and children, were recovered but 22 others are still missing. Assaad wants the state to "open its eyes" to the situation in Akkar, where residents are forced to work the land or, in his case, fell trees for charcoal. In Kabiit -- three hours north of Beirut -- pot-holed streets run past shuttered shops and children fill plastic bottles with water from a public tap before hauling them back to homes without plumbing. The closest hospital is 20 kilometers (12 miles) away. Even after the tragedy off Indonesia, many locals say they are still willing to try their luck on the ocean passage, fearing that if they remain they could lose even their limited livelihoods to Syrian refugees. Fahed Kassem, 36, says he struggles to make ends meet with the $800 a month he earns at a metallurgical plant in Beirut.
"Now my boss tells me he could have four Syrians in my place," he said. "If the opportunity presents itself, I would emigrate too." Hussein Khodr gave similar reasons for leaving before he set off on the "ship of death" with his eight children and pregnant wife, all of whom died. "He was overwhelmed, he wanted to leave everything. He said 'I want to live well or I want to die'," his father Ahmad said.
Lebanon is home to 770,000 refugees, and has been without a government for six months after a political crisis caused in part by its ever-feuding political factions' support for rival sides in Syria. The conflict has spilled over into Lebanon in the form of clashes between armed groups, rocket attacks and bombings that have raised fears of a return to civil war. Afrah Hassan, a 22-year-old who survived the shipwreck, was studying law at a university in the northern city of Tripoli, where fighting has repeatedly broken out between supporters and opponents of Syria's President Bashar Assad. "There was shooting all the time, and sometimes we had to hide under our chairs in the classroom," she said. "It was too much. I wanted to leave everything." She remembers the cockroaches in the boat, five days in which she saw only sky and sea, and then the 10-meter-high (30-foot) waves that crashed into the ship, the small children floating lifeless in the churning waters. "There is no horizon in Lebanon, it's true," she said. "But now I tell myself I never should have left."Source/Agence France Presse

Govt. Formation Efforts at Heart of Talks at Hbeish-Hosted Dinner Attended by Suleiman, Salam
Naharnet/Mustaqbal bloc MP Hadi Hbeish hosted on Friday a dinner banquet that brought together a number of key figures in Lebanon, including President Michel Suleiman and Premier-designate Tammam Salam, reported the daily An Nahar on Monday. It said that the formation of a new government was at the heart of discussions. The banquet also included the head of the Mustaqbal bloc MP Fouad Saniora, Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi, Mustaqbal MPs Ahmed Fatfat and Nohad al-Mashnouq, Army Commander General Jean Qahwaji, and General Security chief Abbas Ibrahim. One of the participants said that the banquet was a simple social event that should not be over-analyzed, said An Nahar. The daily did note however that Saniora headed to Hbeish's residence to attend the dinner immediately from Rafik Hariri International Airport upon his return to Lebanon from a trip to Paris.

Officials Refuse to Budge an Inch on Petroleum Debate
Naharnet /Sharp discord over the petroleum file reached a dead end on Monday as political foes are holding onto their stances regarding the necessity of holding an extraordinary session to tackle two decrees essential to award the oil blocks for the oil companies. Energy Minister Jebran Bassil revealed in comments published in As Safir newspaper that he will contact caretaker Prime Minister Najib Miqati soon to discuss the matter.
He denied that the two decrees were referred to the cabinet without the approval of the petroleum authority. Bassil accused some officials, without naming them, of blocking the two decrees that took their legal path to the government seven months ago. The decrees call for demarcating 10 maritime oil exploration blocks and setting up a revenue-sharing model. The country's oil and gas wealth attracted around 46 Arab and international companies in the second pre-qualification round of the tenders process. Sources close to Miqati said that the caretaker PM is holding on to his stance, rejecting to call for an extraordinary session to tackle the two decrees.
“Holding an extraordinary session specified to discuss the petroleum file is not possible amid the current circumstances,” the sources told al-Joumhouria newspaper. The sources reiterated that a caretaker cabinet tackle any “fundamental issue.” For his part, Speaker Nabih Berri considered that holding the session is a “priority” in order to confront “the continuous Israeli threats for the country's wealth.” He explained that he is “insisting on demarcating 10 maritime oil exploration blocks in a single stage” to block any attempts by Israel to exploit Lebanon's oil reserves and to provide the country with the necessary financial resources it needs. Lebanon has been slow to exploit its maritime resources compared with other eastern Mediterranean countries. Israel, Cyprus and Turkey are all much more advanced in drilling for oil and gas. Lebanon and Israel are bickering over a zone that consists of about 854 square kilometers and suspected energy reserves there could generate billions of dollars. Caretaker Economy and Trade Minister Nicolas Nahas told As Safir newspaper that there's a discord over the petroleum file, which is the mean reason for delaying the cabinet session over the matter. March 14 sources told the daily that the coalition “demanded that the cabinet don't hold a session to tackle the two decrees to avoid any unconstitutional actions.”

Iran envoy: Rouhani visit to Saudi Arabia possible after Hajj
The Daily Star/BEIRUT: Iranian Ambassador to Lebanon Ghazanfar Roknabadi played down in comments published Monday a possible visit by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani to Saudi Arabia during Hajj, saying the visit could occur following the Muslim religious pilgrimage. “Due to the positivity [in ties] between Saudi Arabia and Iran, it would be possible to specify a date for the visit later and after the pilgrimage period,” Roknabadi told As-Safir daily. “It is not necessary for the visit to take place during the pilgrimage period when there are a lot of visits by officials,” he added. There have been conflicting reports over the possible visit by Rouhani to Saudi Arabia. Some reports said Rouhani would visit Saudi Arabia to perform the Hajj and meet with King Abdullah for talks on regional issues and bilateral ties. Others have denied a scheduled meeting between the two leaders. Roknabadi said Rouhani’s visit to Saudi Arabia had not been decided or officially confirmed “to say that it had been canceled.” “The invitation was not even addressed as the protocol stipulates. There were only talks about a desire that Rouhani would visit [Saudi Arabia] and the visit did not happen due to his [Rouhani’s] busy schedule.” Mounting tensions in the ties between Riyadh and Tehran have long existed over the conflict in Syria, where the two regional heavyweights back opposing sides.

Village Council Upholds Expulsion of Christian Family in Egypt

http://www.aina.org/news/20131006190805.htm
Assyrian International News Agency
(AINA) -- The family of a 22-year-old Coptic man, Kirollos Sabet, from Zakaria village, Minia province, said today their son is innocent of all accusations of having had an illicit affair with a Muslim woman. They also rejected the ruling to expel six family members from the village. "We will leave only over our dead bodies," said Mr. Sabet, Kirollos's father. According to the father, the parents of the Muslim woman in question had nothing to do with the Muslim attacks nor did they report any incident to the police, and affirmed that Kirollos had no relationship with their daughter. "They actually had their daughter undergo a gynecological exam, Said Mr. Sabet, "which proved the woman is 'untouched' [a virgin]." The father said that Kirollos, who was arrested and imprisoned, was innocent of all allegations and "the whole story was fabricated by Muslim hard-liners from neighboring village to cause sectarian strife. It started when Kirillos was walking on the country lane, coincidently behind that Muslim woman, and he was followed by over ten young Muslim men who took him to an unknown location, beat him and warned him against having relationships with Muslim females. We kept quiet and did not want to make an issue out of it or report it to the police."
Violence in Zakaria village erupted when a rumor circulated in the village of an illicit relationship between Kirollos and a 22-year-old Muslim woman, when a mob of Muslims called for revenge, demonstrated against Copts and started attacking Coptic homes and businesses (AINA 9-29-2013).
Under the supervision of Major General Osama Metwally, director of Minya security, a customary "reconciliation" meeting was held on September 29. The meeting decided that Kirollos was to pay the amount of 300,000 Egyptian pounds and the Muslim woman 150,000 pounds, because she allegedly willingly met the man. But because the woman is poor and cannot pay the amount, it was decided to add her fine to the fine of Kirollos. When Kirollos and his family protested this decision the arbitrators decided to expel him and his five brothers from the village.
Mr. Sabet said that security had arrested five of Kirollos's young cousins without any reason and without charges. He said the family will not sit or talk with anyone before they are released.
After the failure of the first "reconciliation" meeting because of the refusal of the Coptic family to be expelled and the insistence of the village Muslims on their expulsion, a second "reconciliation" meeting was hold on October 2nd at Zakaria village. The meeting was again chaired by Major General Osama Metwally and was attended by senior Christian and Muslim families and some Muslim and Christian clerics, not including the Coptic church.
Rev. Khalil Ibrahim, pastor of Grace Apostolic Church, said the parties accepted the reconciliation terms, which upheld the expulsion of Kirollos and his father Sabet, as well as the Muslim woman, her mother and brother. The second "reconciliation" meeting decided that no compensation at all is to be paid to the Copts for the loss of their properties.
Questions are now being raised about whether there was an affair between the Muslim woman Kirollos. Muslims claim the woman was "psychologically unstable" and was exploited while the Copts say they can see again the "hands" of the security authorities in the matter, who want to expel the Copts, and the Muslim woman, who attended both meetings and who continued her denial of the affair, and her family were under pressured or given "financial incentives" to leave the village to give an excuse to expel the Copts as well. Copts also believe that the village Muslims want to get rid of affluent families like the Sabet family.
It is common in Egypt that after sectarian strife, the police arrest some of the Muslim perpetrators and innocent Copts as well, in order to use their release as a bargaining tool for the benefit of the Muslims.
By Mary Abdelmassih

US, Russia Set for First High-level Talks Since Syria Chemical Weapons Deal
BALI, Indonesia (AP) -- The U.S. and Russia are set to hold their first high-level talks since sealing a deal to secure and destroy Syria's chemical weapons and the onset of an apparent warming between Iran and the West.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov planned to meet Monday to discuss both issues on the sidelines of an economic summit in Indonesia. They will be comparing notes on progress made since they negotiated the Syria agreement last month. International disarmament inspectors began work Sunday to destroy Syria's estimated 1,000-ton stockpile of chemical weapons. They're working against a Nov. 1 deadline set by the U.N. last month to destroy the Assad government's capability to produce the weapons. Kerry and Lavrov will also be talking about Iran and its nuclear program. Officials from the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council -- the U.S., China, the Russian Federation, France and the United Kingdom -- and Germany will meet with representatives from Iran in Geneva on Oct. 15 in renewed talks on Iran's nuclear program.
Tehran insists its nuclear program is peaceful and that it is enriching uranium to levels needed for medical isotopes and reactor fuel. Western powers, including the U.S., fear Iran is trying to build a nuclear bomb and have imposed crippling economic sanctions to encourage Iran to curb its enrichment program. © 2013, Assyrian International News Agency. All Rights Reserved. Terms of Use.

Kerry Says Syrian Chemical Arms Drive is to Assad's 'Credit'
Naharnet/U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Monday that Syrian leader Bashar Assad could take "credit" for quickly starting the process of destroying his regime's chemical weapons arsenal and thanked Russia for its help. "The process has begun in record time and we are appreciative for the Russian cooperation and obviously for the Syrian compliance," he told reporters alongside Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov after talks in Indonesia. "I think it's extremely significant that yesterday, Sunday, within a week of the (U.N.) resolution being passed, some chemical weapons were being destroyed," Kerry said.
"I think it's also a credit to the Assad regime for complying, frankly, as they are supposed to. We hope that will continue. I am not going to vouch today for what happens months down the road. But it's a good beginning and we should welcome a good beginning." In less expansive comments on the latest developments, Lavrov said he was "satisfied", and promised Russia would continue to ensure Assad's government completed the dismantling process.
"The Russian side will do everything so Damascus will follow the co-operation without any changes," Lavrov told reporters in Russian, with his comments translated into English.
Experts destroyed missile warheads, aerial bombs and chemical mixing equipment Sunday on the first day of the campaign to eliminate Syria's chemical weapons, the U.N. said, after an alleged attack on civilians by pro-Assad forces brought the threat of U.S.-led intervention.The operation, performed by Syrian personnel under the supervision of international disarmament experts, took place under the terms of a U.N. Security Council resolution that will see Damascus relinquish the banned arms. Kerry emphasized the dismantling process had occurred in "record time", and hailed it as a model for international cooperation.
"I think that was a terrific example of global co-operation, of multilateral efforts, to accomplish an accepted goal," he said.
Russia pushed the U.N. disarmament drive as an alternative to U.S.-led strikes on Syria, whose civil war had been expected to feature in bilateral talks between presidents Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin on the margins of a regional summit in Indonesia. But Obama scrapped trips to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Bali and the subsequent East Asia summit in Brunei because of the federal budget crisis gripping the United States, sending Kerry in his stead. Source/Agence France Presse

Report: Canada Spied on Brazil Energy Ministry
Naharnet/Canada spied on communications at Brazil's Mining and Energy Ministry, according to Canadian intelligence documents revealed late Sunday by Globo television.
Documents leaked by former U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, purportedly from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, show a detailed outline of the Brazilian ministry's communications including phone calls, email and Internet traffic. Earlier disclosures by Snowden that the United States spied on the same ministry, as well as on President Dilma Rousseff and her aides, have strained U.S.-Brazilian ties.
According to Globo, Snowden obtained the documents at a June 2012 meeting of intelligence analysts from the United States, Canada, Britain, Australia and New Zealand, a group said to be called the "Five Eyes."
A Canadian software spying program named Olympia "mapped" the ministry's phone communications and computers with the goal of studying contacts "made with other groups, within and outside of Brazil, aside from PETROBRAS," Globo said. PETROBRAS is the country's state-run energy giant. One of the documents shows a registry of calls from the ministry to other countries, including to the Quito, Ecuador-based Latin American Energy Organization (OLADE) and the Brazilian embassy in Peru. Communications between the ministry and countries in the Middle East, as well as South Africa and Canada, also appear in the report.
Canada has mining interests in Brazil, Mining and Energy Minister Edilson Lobao told Globo. He described the development as "serious." "There are many Canadian businesses interested in doing business in our country. If that is where the interest in spying comes from, to help certain business interests, I cannot say," Lobao said. The documents Globo showed included instructions on the next steps the Canadian agency should pursue in Brazil, which included seeking help from a group code-named TAO, said to be an elite U.S. espionage unit. It also suggests a more detailed analysis of data, and pursuing tactics that include copying all of a computer's data without altering them. In a Twitter message on Sunday Rousseff said that Brazil will introduce a measure at the United Nations to establish an "international civilian framework" to protect the privacy of internet users.
Rousseff, who canceled a state visit to Washington over the espionage scandal, launched a blistering attack on the United States at the United Nations General Assembly meeting in September over the U.S. electronic surveillance. Snowden, a 30-year-old former National Security Agency contractor, is wanted by the United States after revealing details of a massive NSA electronic surveillance program.
Snowden spent more than a month in transit in Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport before slipping into Russia where he was granted asylum.
Source/Agence France Presse

Orthodox Leader Urges End to 'Persecution' of Christians, Especially in Mideast
Naharnet/The spiritual leader of the Orthodox Church called Sunday for an end to the persecution of Christians, especially in the Middle East. "Have we not been persecuted these days, our Christians in Syria, Egypt... and the Middle East, just for spreading God's words?" asked Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew. "They cherish everyone while being persecuted by everyone... They live in faith while being persecuted as villains," he said, marking the 1700th anniversary of the Edict of Milan -- a document that introduced tolerance for Christianity in the Roman empire. Thousands of people, along with the leaders of seven Orthodox churches, high-ranking clergy and Serbian state officials, attended the ceremony. The edict, adopted in 313, was agreed between Constantine I, the emperor of the western part of the Roman empire, and his rival Licinius, ruler of the eastern part, proclaiming to treat Christians with benevolence. The ceremony was held in Nis, 240 kilometers (145 miles) south of Belgrade, where Constantine I was born in 272. Most of Serbia's population of 7.2 million are Orthodox Christians. Since the fall of communism in the early 1990s, the Orthodox Church has increased its influence in the Balkan country. Representatives of the Catholic Church and the Islamic community, as well as other religious confessions, were in attendance. Although the two main Christian churches have made attempts towards overcoming centuries-old divisions, Roman Catholic Pope Francis did not attend. Patriarch Bartholomew and Russian Patriarch Kiril, Theopholis of Jerusalem and their counterparts from Serbia, the Czech Republic, Albania, Cyprus and Poland, held a joint liturgy to mark the end of nine months of observations. They called for the unity of Orthodox churches and closer ties with other churches and religious communities."The spirit of religious tolerance should prevail everywhere," Irinej said. Source/Agence France Presse

Egypt: Gunmen kill 5 soldiers near Suez Canal, 2 people die in blast
By Shadia Nasralla/Reuters
CAIRO: Gunmen killed five Egyptian soldiers near the Suez Canal city of Ismailia on Monday, security sources said, in a series of attacks that highlight growing insecurity since the army ousted Islamist President Mohammad Morsi.In an interview published on Monday, Egypt's army chief said he had told Morsi as long ago as February that the president had failed, about five months before the military removed him.
General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi made the remarks before dozens died on Sunday in clashes involving security forces, supporters of Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood and their opponents.
The security sources said the gunmen opened fire on the soldiers while they were sitting in a car at a checkpoint near Ismailia on the Canal, a vital global trade route.
In a separate incident, an explosion near a state security building in South Sinai killed two people and injured 48, medical sources said. A witness said the explosion was caused by a car bomb.
In the most brazen attack of the day, assailants fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a state-owned satellite station in the Maadi suburb of Cairo on Monday, wounding two people, security officials said.
Attacks by Sinai-based militants have risen sharply since the army toppled Morsi and promised a roadmap that would lead Egypt to free and fair elections.
Almost daily attacks by al Qaeda-inspired militants in the Sinai have killed more than 100 members of the security forces since early July, the army spokesman said on Sept. 15.
Militant violence elsewhere in Egypt has raised fears that an Islamist insurgency, like one eventually crushed in the 1990s by then president Hosni Mubarak, could take hold beyond Sinai.
The militant attacks, including a failed assassination attempt on the interior minister in Cairo in September, are deepening insecurity in Egypt along with the power struggle between the Brotherhood and the army-backed government. The death toll from clashes in Egypt rose to 53 on Monday, state media said, as calm returned to the streets after one of the bloodiest days since the military deposed Morsi.
Traffic flowed normally in central Cairo where thousands of Morsi supporters had battled security forces and army supporters on Sunday on the anniversary of the 1973 war with Israel.
State radio said security forces had regained full control of Egypt, which signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1979. In addition to the dead, state media said 271 people had been wounded in the clashes. Most of the casualties were Morsi supporters, security sources said.
Further confrontations may shake Egypt this week. An alliance that includes the Muslim Brotherhood has urged Egyptians to stage more protests against the army takeover from Tuesday and gather on Cairo's Tahrir Square on Friday. Political turmoil since the army unseated Morsi on July 3 has unnerved foreign investors and hammered tourism, a pillar of the economy, but there is no sign of reconciliation between the Brotherhood and the army-backed government. Security forces smashed pro-Morsi protest camps in Cairo on Aug. 14, killing hundreds of people. In an ensuing crackdown, many Muslim Brotherhood leaders were arrested in an attempt to decapitate Egypt's oldest Islamist movement. Authorities had warned that anyone protesting against the army during Sunday's 1973 war anniversary would be regarded as an agent of foreign powers, not an activist - a hardening of language that suggests authorities may crack down harder. The Brotherhood remains defiant, organising demonstrations, even if they are much smaller than ones staged weeks ago.
Army chief Sisi, in an interview published in a privately owned newspaper, al-Masry al-Youm, said Egypt's national interests differed from those of the Brotherhood as an organisation.
In the interview conducted before Sunday's violence, Sisi also spoke about his previous meetings with Morsi, whose time in office he said had driven Egypt in the direction of civil war.
"I told Morsi in February you failed and your project is finished," al-Masry al-Youm quoted Sisi as saying. Sisi denied Brotherhood allegations that the army had intended to remove Morsi through a coup, saying it had only responded to the will of the people. Before Morsi's overthrow, Egyptians disillusioned with his year-long rule had held huge rallies demanding that he quit.
Last month, a court banned the Brotherhood and froze its assets, pushing the group, which had dominated elections held in Egypt after Mubarak's fall in 2011, further into the cold.
 

Egypt death toll rises to 53, streets now calm
Cairo, Reuters—The death toll from clashes in Egypt rose to 53 on Monday as calm returned to the streets after one of the bloodiest days since the military toppled Islamist President Mohamed Mursi in July.
Traffic flowed normally in central Cairo where thousands of Mursi supporters had battled security forces and army supporters on Sunday on the anniversary of the 1973 war with Israel.
State radio said security forces had regained full control of Egypt, which signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1979. In addition to the dead, the Health Ministry said 271 people had been wounded in the clashes. Most of the casualties were Mursi supporters, security sources said. Further confrontations may shake Egypt this week. An alliance that includes Mursi’s Muslim Brotherhood has urged Egyptians to stage more protests against the army takeover from Tuesday and gather on Cairo’s Tahrir Square on Friday. Political tensions since the army unseated Mursi on July 3 have unnerved foreign investors and hammered tourism, a pillar of the economy, but there is no sign of reconciliation between the Brotherhood and the army-backed government. Security forces smashed pro-Mursi protest camps in Cairo on Aug. 14, killing hundreds of people. In an ensuing crackdown, many Muslim Brotherhood leaders were arrested in an attempt to decapitate Egypt’s oldest Islamist movement. Authorities had warned that anyone protesting against the army during Sunday’s 1973 war anniversary would be regarded as an agent of foreign powers, not an activist—a hardening of language that suggests authorities may crack down harder. The Brotherhood remains defiant, organizing demonstrations, even if they are much smaller than ones staged weeks ago. Army chief General Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, in an interview published on Monday in a privately owned Egyptian newspaper, Al-Masry Al-Youm, said Egypt’s national interests differed from those of the Brotherhood as an organisation. Sisi, in the interview conducted before Sunday’s violence, also spoke about his previous meetings with Mursi, whose time in office he said had driven Egypt in the direction of civil war.
“I told Mursi in February you failed and your project is finished,” Al-Masry Al-Youm quoted Sisi as saying. Sisi denied Brotherhood allegations that the army had intended to remove Mursi through a coup, saying it had only responded to the will of the people. Before Mursi’s overthrow, Egyptians disillusioned with his year-long rule had held huge rallies demanding that he quit. Last month, a court banned the Brotherhood and froze its assets, pushing the group, which had dominated elections held in Egypt after Hosni Mubarak’s fall in 2011, further into the cold.
 

US duo, German win Nobel Medicine Prize
By Niklas Pollard/Reuters/STOCKHOLM: Two Americans, James Rothman and Randy Schekman, and Germany's Thomas Suedhof won the 2013 Nobel prize for medicine or physiology for research into how cells organise their transport system, the award-giving body said on Monday. The Nobel committee said the research deepened understanding of how disruptions in the transport of cells contribute to neurological diseases, diabetes and immunological disorders. "Through their discoveries, Rothman, Schekman and Suedhof have revealed the exquisitely precise control system for the transport and delivery of cellular cargo," the Nobel Assembly at Sweden's Karolinska Institute said in a statement when awarding the prize of 8 million crowns ($1.2 million). For example, their research sheds light on how insulin is manufactured and released into the blood at the right place at the right time, the Nobel committee said in the statement. Rothman is professor at Yale University, Schekman is a professor at the University of California at Berkeley, while Suedhof is a professor at Stanford University.
"These beautiful discoveries have importance for the understanding of the human body and obviously implications for diseases in various organs such as the nervous system, diabetes and immune disorders," Jan-Inge Henter, professor of clinical child oncology at the Karolinska Institute, said at a news conference. Medicine is the first of the Nobel prizes awarded each year. Prizes for achievements in science, literature and peace were first awarded in 1901 in accordance with the will of dynamite inventor and businessman Alfred Nobel.
 

The Time is Right for Change
By: Tariq Al-Mubarak/Asharq Alawsat
Every part of the world has seen changes in women’s social status at different times in history. The authoritarian male-female relationship, which entails men viewing women as their property, also existed in Europe. Not long ago women in Europe gained the right to vote and we can say the same thing about China prior to the Cultural Revolution. In the Arab world we all know that women in general went through similar stages with regards to the right to education and work. Therefore, women in the Gulf are no different apart from the delay in giving them their rights and reforming the authoritarian male-female relationship. For decades, Gulf societies—and this varies from one Gulf state to another—have been fiercely fighting for women to receive no more than formal schooling.
Due to the mutual influence and mass communication, globalization has shifted us to a new lifestyle where it is no longer possible to prevent change. Therefore, it is no longer possible to use terms, such as “Westernization,” and “immunization” as they both belong to that period of history where it was possible to control the scale of mutual influence among people around the world. Hence, today we find ourselves face to face with a new generation of women that is open to the world and constantly draws comparisons between lifestyles in the Arab world and the West, thanks to the media and the experience of studying abroad.
Tens of thousands of female students are experiencing independent lives due to the several years they spend studying in the West. Both young men and women have become responsible for building their independent personalities and giving a special meaning to their lives. This new self-view is crucial for their future expectations, and cannot be ignored simply on the grounds of privacy, especially in an open world such as ours today.
Those monitoring the language of women at this point in time on social networks will notice a tone indicative of suppressed anger resulting from the difference between their own sense of self and their position in the current social system. Their anger largely wells up from the need to recognize the individuality of women in the modern world we live in today, whether we like it or not. This individuality is being violated in several ways, such as women viewed as a burden on men in many governmental transactions, the inability to move inside the city unaccompanied by a man due to lack of public transportation or restrictions on women driving cars, to the faulty marital relationship due to the way it was established and its authoritarianism nature. This is not to mention other issues such as divorce and child custody. Hence, we need to reconsider some concepts of Islamic jurisprudence in line with human dignity, which has been endorsed by all religions.
Some members of our societies have already objected to changes made in regards to this issue—such as women’s education and awarding them scholarships to study abroad—basing their argument on exaggerated assumption and fears aimed at undermining these key human rights. After adopting these changes, these assumptions have been shown to be mere exaggerations made at the expense of a large segment of citizens. Therefore, it is high time we moved forward with bringing about change in order to live up to the aspirations of this promising generation of Gulf women.

Iran still seeking settlement on Russian missiles
London, Asharq Al-Awsat—Iran says it is still negotiating with Russia for the delivery of S-300 air defense missiles, a contract suspended thanks to Western and Israeli pressure since 2007, despite reports it has been offered a substitute. “In line with the friendly ties between Iran and Russia, negotiations between officials and experts in charge are continuing, so that the international obligations of the Russian side will be fulfilled and a result will be reached on the S-300 system,” the website of Iran’s English language satellite channel, Press TV, quoted the country’s Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham as saying on Saturday.
Meanwhile, in an interview published on Sunday, Iran’s ambassador to Russia, Seyyed Mahmoud-Reza Sajjadi, said that his country has not yet entered serious negotiations with Russia over a replacement for the S-300 system.
The transfer of the S-300 system—a combination of advanced surface to air missiles and radars optimized to detect and shoot down aircraft and cruise missiles at long-range—has proven to be a controversial issue internationally, with both Western and Israeli governments lobbying Russia against completing the sale, which would represent a major upgrade of Iran’s air defense network.
The US and Israel have repeatedly warned that they will launch air attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities if Iran diverts any nuclear material to a military bomb program. Iran insists that as a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), it is entitled to develop nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.
More recently, Russian president Vladimir Putin hinted that Russia would reconsider its decision to halt the transfer of the system to Iran if the US and its allies intervened in the Syrian civil war.
The latest reports in the Iranian media follows reports in recent months on the possibility of the delivery of an alternative system to the S-300 to Iran, in order to settle the dispute between the two countries over the delivery of the system. According to a report published in June, Moscow has offered Iran the Tor anti-aircraft system as a replacement for the S-300. However, Iran’s ambassador to Russia said that month that the Tor—which has a shorter effective range—cannot be integrated into Iran’s air defenses. Ambassador Sajjadi said Iran had developed a national defense system “and within that system the proposed Tor system would be unable to fulfill the S-300’s functions.” In 2007, Russia signed a contract worth USD 800 million to deliver five batteries of S-300 air defense systems to Iran, but then halted the deal in September 2010, claiming the delivering the system would breach the fourth round of UN Security Council sanctions against Iran for its nuclear program. Russia’s refusal to deliver the systems prompted Iran to file a USD 4 billion lawsuit with the International Court of Arbitration in Geneva against the Russian arms firm Rosoboronexport. The complaint is currently pending. On July 18, Iran’s then-minister of defense Brigadier-General Ahmad Vahidi said the country was pursuing delivery of Russian missiles through legal channels. Earlier, Vahidi had denied rumors that Iran plans to purchase S-300 air defense missile systems from China or Venezuela. Meanwhile, some reports suggest that Iran might be willing to receive another state of the art air-defense system as a replacement to S-300. According to Iranian semi-official FRAS news agency, believed to be linked to the country’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a derivative of the S-300, the Antey-2500, may be a solution for the row as the system does not formally fall under the existing sanctions against Iran while still being useful for the Middle-Eastern country.
“While the S-300 was developed for the use by missile defense forces, the Antey-2500 was specifically tailored for the needs of ground forces, which could also be an advantage for Iran, known for its large land force,” Fars news agency said. Despite recent contacts between senior Iranian and American officials during the recent UN General Assembly meeting in New York, including a telephone conversation between the presidents Obama and Rouhani, Iran remains the target of many UN and American sanctions over its nuclear program. Iran’s Minister of Economic Affairs and Finance Ali Tayyeb-Nia dismissed on Saturday the likelihood of a quick removal of the sanctions against his country. “If we hope that the sanctions would be lifted in the near future and a breakthrough would occur, it would be wishful thinking, because the removal of the sanctions is a long-term process,” Press TV quoted Tayyeb-Nia as saying. Meanwhile, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organisation said the country has arrested four people suspected of trying to sabotage one of its nuclear sites.
“Some time ago, we uncovered sabotage activities by several people at a nuclear plant,” he said in comments carried by the Mehr news agency on Sunday. “We arrested them at the appropriate moment and their interrogation is ongoing,” he added. Salehi did not identify which nuclear site they were alleged to have targeted.