Tuesday, November 30, 2010

US high school hostage-taker

30 November 2010 Last updated at 22:44 GMT

US high school hostage-taker dies of wounds

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The 15-year-old boy who shot himself after taking 23 students and a teacher hostage at his school in Wisconsin has died of his wounds.

Marinette Police Chief Jeff Skorik said Samuel Hengel died on Tuesday morning at a hospital in Green Bay.

Hengel shot himself with a handgun as police stormed a classroom at Marinette High School on Monday night, after a stand-off lasting several hours.

Chief Skorik said police were still trying to ascertain his motives.

"As far as what caused this, it seems to be a mystery," he said. "We have not been able to identify anything that precipitated this incident."

'Most respectful kid'

He said the incident at Marinette High School began at about 1330 (1930 GMT) on Monday, sometime after which the first shots were fired.

“Start Quote

I don't think he intended to hurt anyone - if he wanted to, he probably would have done it”

Austin BiehlClassmate of Samuel Hengel

One of the hostages said Hengel left the classroom while a film was being shown and came back with a duffel bag, which police later said contained two semi-automatic handguns and ammunition.

He then reportedly shot at the film projector and a wall, before sitting down at the front of the class.

"He didn't say anything," Austin Biehl, 15, told reporters. "We were just scared and shocked he was doing this. My legs were shaking."

The authorities were first notified of the incident by the high school's principal at 1548, after he was told of the situation by a student whom Hengel had allowed to leave.

After a stand-off of four hours - during which the teacher, Valerie Burd, communicated with the hostage negotiation team and Hengel's classmates tried to keep him calm by chatting with him about hunting, fishing and movies - five students were released because they needed to go to the toilet.

Chief Skorik said that at 2003, officers outside the classroom heard three shots and "breached the door". At the front of the room was Hengel, who then shot himself in the head, he added. The remaining hostages were evacuated.

Hengel was transported to the nearby Bay Area Medical Center, and later to St Vincent Hospital in Green Bay, where he died.

Family friends of the Hengel family said he was "the most respectful kid you would ever meet" and that his actions were completely shocking.

"I don't think he intended to hurt anyone," Austin Biehl said. "If he wanted to, he probably would have done it."

Classes at Marinette High School will resume on Wednesday. (BBC)

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Russia News:

Russian president Medvedev sees new arms race if cooperation fails

By Kathy Lally

Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, November 30, 2010; 6:58 PM

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MOSCOW - In a state-of-the-nation speech Tuesday that dwelled on overcoming the persistent weaknesses sapping Russia, President Dmitry Medvedev suggested that failure to reach agreement on missile defense cooperation in Europe could set off a new arms race in the decade ahead.

Those dark remarks appeared aimed as much at his own generals as at the West. Medvedev has indicated that he wants to bend the nation's resources toward diversifying the economy rather than restoring the military-industrial complex of old, and the Kremlin has come to see arms control as in its own interests.

Medvedev did not mention the still-unratified nuclear arms agreement with the United States, but he spoke approvingly of a summit in Lisbon on Nov. 20 where he discussed the eventual goal of Russian cooperation with NATO on a European missile defense system.
"It goes without saying that was a positive development," he said. "But in this room, I would like to openly say that the choice for us in the coming decade is as follows: We will either come to terms on missile defense and form a full-fledged joint mechanism of cooperation or . . . we will plunge into a new arms race and have to think of deploying new strike means, and it's obvious that this scenario will be very hard."

Lack of agreement on arms issues would be the worst-case scenario for Russia, said Irina Kobrinskaya, a political analyst with the Institute of World Economy and International Relations at the Russian Academy of Sciences, pointing out that Medvedev devoted the bulk of his speech to plans for overcoming domestic debilities.

"For Russians, we all know that it was the arms race that led to the disintegration of the Soviet Union," Kobrinskaya said. "Russia is not ready financially for a new arms race."
As if to underscore the point, the commander of Russia's Strategic Rocket Forces told reporters Tuesday that about 20,000 jobs have been cut from those forces over the past

five years. And Nikolai Makarov, chief of the Russian General Staff, denied a Wall Street Journal report that Russia has been moving missiles near NATO countries.

"We did not deploy any missiles in the Kaliningrad region," Makarov told the Interfax news agency. Kaliningrad is a Russian enclave tucked between Poland and Lithuania, both of which are NATO members.

Medvedev was delivering his third state-of-the-nation address to the government, both houses of parliament and religious leaders, including the patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, who entered with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. He spoke in St. George Hall in the Grand Kremlin Palace, a 65-yard-long gleaming white testament to wealth, power and majesty, with its enormous bronze chandeliers and twisted columns supporting a vaulted ceiling.

Yet Medvedev described a country that is losing a trillion rubles - about $32 billion - annually to bribery, theft and corruption and remains weakened by the low birthrate of the 1990s, which caused a drop in the population.

Much of his 75-minute speech was devoted to the theme of protecting Russia's children and nurturing a generation capable of rebuilding the country. His audience clapped often, though not in the openly partisan manner of a U.S. State of the Union audience. Russia's is essentially a one-party system, despite the few Communists in the hall.

Even though the child mortality rate is dropping, Medvedev said, one-third of Russian children have health problems when they start school, as do two-thirds of teenagers. In addition, 100,000 children are victims of violence every year. "It breaks your heart," he said.
The president urged the European Union to help Russia enter the World Trade Organization and called for closer partnerships and economic ties with the United States.

"Foreign policy must manifest itself not only in missiles but also on concrete achievements, clear to our citizens, in setting up joint ventures in Russia, in the emergence of quality inexpensive goods, in job creation and in relaxed visa procedures," he said.
"We are renewing our country."

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Earth Quake:Japan.

6.6 magnitude quake near Japanese islands:

USGS

(AFP) – 21 hours ago

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TOKYO — A strong 6.6 magnitude quake struck off Japan's southern Bonin Islands on Tuesday, the US Geological Survey said, with tremors felt more than 800 kilometres away in Tokyo, but no tsunami was expected.

The quake hit at 12.24 pm local time (0324 GMT), 337 kilometres (210 miles) west northwest of Chichi-shima in Japan's remote Bonin island region at a depth of 478 kilometres. There were no immediate reports of damage or injury.

The USGS originally said the quake was magnitude 6.9, but later revised its figure.

Japan's meteorological agency also said the focus was off the west coast of the same chain of islands in the Pacific, known in Japan as the Ogasawara islands, 808 kilometres south of Tokyo.

Even so, the quake swayed buildings in the capital.

Around 20 percent of the world's most powerful earthquakes strike Japan, which sits on the "Ring of Fire" surrounding the Pacific Ocean.

But high building standards, regular drills and a sophisticated tsunami warning system mean that casualties are often minimal.

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Pakistan News: dying to kill.

Suicide bomber targets police in Bannu, 6 killed

* Policeman, eight-year-old girl, among those killed

* 16, including two policemen, injured in attack

Staff Report

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PESHAWAR: A suicide bomber targeted a police van in Bannu, killing six people including a policeman, on Tuesday.

“A suicide bomber attacked Saddar Police Station van near Milad Chowk,” police official Aurangzeb Khan said.

It was the fourth suicide attack in the country this month and the first in Bannu since February 11 this year when eights policemen and seven civilians were killed in twin strikes by terrorists. No group has so far claimed responsibility for the attack. However, Bannu police suspects it must be the work of Taliban or banned sectarian outfits trying to disrupt peace during Muharram.
“An eight-year-old girl and his father were among the fatalities,” the police official said. He did not confirm whether the bomber was targeting police van or simply trying to create terror before the start of Muharram. The attack left two policemen and 14 civilians injured, hospital sources said by phone. The police said the suicide attacker detonated the explosives when a police vehicle came near him at Milad Chowk.

Bannu has been under attack from terrorists as the district serves as gateway to North Waziristan where the United States believes al Qaeda and Taliban have safe heavens to stage attacks in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The attack comes a week before the start of Muharram for which Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government ordered elaborate arrangements for high security. Acting President Dr Fehmida Mirza has strongly condemned the bomb blast in Bannu and expressed grief and sorrow over the loss of lives.

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Nuclear fears over Pakistan

The Irish Times - Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Nuclear fears over Pakistan revealed
DAVID LEIGH
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AMERICAN AND British diplomats fear Pakistan’s nuclear weapons programme could lead to fissile material falling into the hands of terrorists or a devastating nuclear exchange with India.

The latest cache of US embassy cables released by WikiLeaks contains warnings that Pakistan is rapidly building its nuclear stockpile, despite the country’s growing instability and “pending economic catastrophe”.

Mariot Leslie, a senior British Foreign Office official, told US diplomats in September 2009: “The UK has deep concerns about the safety and security of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons,” according to one cable classified “secret/noforn [no foreign nationals]”.

Seven months earlier the US ambassador to Islamabad, Anne Patterson, cabled to Washington: “Our major concern is not having an Islamic militant steal an entire weapon but rather the chance someone working in government of Pakistan facilities could gradually smuggle enough material out to eventually make a weapon.” The leaks expose in detail the deep tensions between Washington and Islamabad over a broad range of issues, including counter-terrorism, Afghanistan and finance, as well as the nuclear question.

The cables also revealed that:

* Small teams of US special forces have been operating secretly inside Pakistan’s tribal areas, with Pakistani government approval, while senior ministers have privately supported US drone attacks.

* The ambassador starkly informed Washington that “no amount of money” from the US would stop the Pakistani army backing Islamist militants and the Afghan Taliban insurgency.

* The US concluded Pakistani troops were responsible for a spate of extrajudicial killings in the Swat Valley and tribal belt but did comment publicly to allow the army to take action on its own.

* Diplomats in Islamabad were asked by the Pentagon to survey refugee camps on the Afghan border, possibly for air strike targeting information.

* The president, Asif Ali Zardari – whose wife, Benazir Bhutto was assassinated – has made extensive preparations in case he too is killed, and once told US vice-president Joe Biden he feared the military “might take me out”.

– ( Guardian service)

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The Irish Times - Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Ashton plays down Tehran defiance ahead of nuclear talks

ARTHUR BEESLEY, European Correspondent

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EU FOREIGN policy chief Catherine Ashton played down defiant rhetoric from Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as talks loom next week on Tehran’s nuclear programme, the first for 14 months.

Ms Ashton’s talks with Iran’s nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili take place next Monday and Tuesday in Geneva. Senior diplomats from the US, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China will also participate.

The renewed engagement marks a big test for Ms Ashton, who is the envoy of the five permanent UN Security Council members and Germany on the Iranian nuclear programme. She took office one year ago when the Lisbon Treaty was enacted and her new diplomatic corps – the European External Action Service – is formally established today.

Mr Ahmadinejad told Iranian reporters on Monday that his uranium enrichment programme would not be negotiated away. He was willing, however, to discuss nuclear co-operation.

Ms Ashton’s spokesman said the talks were a “two-way street” but said Iran’s own nuclear project was central to the dialogue.

“We take note on a regular basis of the quoted remarks from Iran. Our policy is not to comment. [Ms] Ashton has been very clear that the core subject of these talks is Iran’s nuclear programme,” the spokesman said.

The western powers say they have evidence to show Iran is building a nuclear bomb, but Tehran has insisted the project is for exclusively peaceful purposes.

Iran has ruled out stopping its enrichment activity and has continued to defy calls for greater co-operation, stoking fear of a wider conflict in the Middle East.

While the hardening of UN, EU and American sanctions on Iran in recent months is widely held to be behind Mr Ahmadinejad’s return to the talks, there is little hope of a significant breakthrough, at least in the first instance.

Mr Ahmadinejad rubbished reports based on WikiLeaks disclosures that many of his country’s Arab neighbours had pushed for a US attack against its nuclear programme. “Regional countries are all friends with each other. Such mischief will have no impact on the relations of countries,” he said.

“We don’t think this information was leaked. We think it was organised to be released on a regular basis.”

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Sr.Lanka: Justice to Sri Lankan Tamils.

Carry forward efforts to ensure justice to Sri

Lankan Tamils, India urged

B. Muralidhar Reddy
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COLOMBO: The Tamil Parties Forum (TPF), the umbrella organisation of Tamil parties other than Tamil National Alliance (TNA), in a letter to External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna has said efforts by India to ensure ‘equality and justice' to Sri Lankan Tamils should be carried forward.

The TPF, which recently met Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa, has said that the Tamil political parties had come to an understanding and constituted a common forum to strive for a permanent political solution to the ethnic problem and also to work towards solving the immediate issues faced by the Tamil people.

“In this context, we have initiated discussions with the other concerned political parties, including the TNA, with a view to forging a consensus on the question of a political solution to the national question of Sri Lanka,” it said.

The TNA holds the majority of seats in Parliament from the Northern and Eastern provinces in the island nation.

Maintaining that the political solution should be found within the framework of a united Sri Lanka thus enabling the Tamils to participate fully in their ‘own governance in the North-East,' the Forum said that the implementation of the 13th amendment in full would be a positive beginning.

On civil administration, it said establishment of a full and complete civil administration without any involvement of the security forces in the Northern and Eastern provinces was the need of the hour.

“We are concerned that the proposal to establish settlements of the members of the security forces and their families numbering many thousands will drastically alter the demographic composition in the Northern and Eastern provinces that had been recognised as the areas of historical habitation in the Indo-Sri Lanka accord of 1987,” it said.

The letter said one of the main reasons for the discontent between the communities was the ‘state-sponsored colonisation' by successive governments in the past with the motive of altering the demographic composition in the North-East.

On resettlement of the war-displaced, it said that though a majority of them had been sent back to their former places of habitation, they had not been settled with adequate basic facilities.

Separately, the parliamentary group of the TNA said it chose to abstain from voting on the budget for 2011 as it had not made any allocation for the relief, resettlement and rehabilitation, particularly of the displaced Tamil people and the Tamil people in general.

In a statement, it said the government must engage in discussion the elected representatives of the Tamil people on resettlement, rehabilitation and resolution of the national problem.

“However, no meaningful steps have been taken by the government in this regard up till now. In this context, we would like to demonstrate our good faith in participating in the discussions concerning the extremely important issues of resettlement and political solution. Therefore, the TNA decided to abstain from voting against the budget 2011 at the second reading.”

(source:the hindu)

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Tuesday, November 30, 2010