MFS - The Other News

                        Afternoon Posting.

• Live broadcast info from Japan directly ! Here.

• Libya Live Blog - March 20. Here .(AlJazeera)And here (BBC). Latest here.

• Updated !Earthquakes in the last 24 hours in the world ,lots of seismic activity globally today! More info here.

• Updated : The wind directions over Japan. Here.

• Latest official Situation Update No.52.On 21.03.2011 at 12:45 GMT+2.
  Efforts to restore electricity for the cooling systems of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant continued Monday as power at the No. 5 reactor was restored, while firefighters continued spraying tons of water to cool the spent fuel rod pools at reactors No. 3 and No. 4. But gray smoke rose from reactor No. 3 at around 3:55 p.m. Monday, prompting Tepco workers to temporarily evacuate the site as a precaution. The amount of smoke had decreased by around 5 p.m. and Tepco was trying to determine its cause. The focus of the on-site work is to restart the separate cooling systems at each reactor to keep their cores and spent fuel rod pools from melting down. The entire plant lost power after it was doused by the tsunami on March 11. Tokyo Electric Power Co. has been checking out the electrical system at the No. 2 reactor, which was the first of the six to be re-connected to the power center Sunday from cables Tepco laid outside the plant.
  
  According to the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, power to the air conditioning and monitoring equipment at reactor No. 2 may be recovered by the end of Monday. The power cables have already been connected to reactor No. 4. Workers were busy checking whether cooling pumps and other key safety equipment were damaged by the quake and tsunami. After the gray smoke spewed from reactor No. 3, NISA said no particular change was observed in radiation levels at the compound on Monday afternoon, and that the temperature and pressure within the reactor also remained unchanged. The cause of the smoke was not immediately known. The spent fuel pool at No. 3 contains highly dangerous MOX, earlier reports said. On Monday afternoon, Prime Minister Naoto Kan said slow but steady progress was being made to contain the crisis at the plant. "Thanks to the desperate efforts of related parties, progress is being made, although the pace is slow," Kan told the emergency headquarters at the prime minister's office. "Now we have started seeing some hope of getting out of this crisis situation," he said.
  
  Two 74-type tanks from the Ground Self-Defense Force arrived at the plant shortly after 6 a.m. Monday tasked with clearing away contaminated debris blocking access to key installations. The tanks' heavy armor can block some radiation. NISA also said one worker at the plant had been exposed to more than 150 millisieverts of radiation in total but was not in need of medical attention.Source .

• Japan: WHO warns of 'serious' food radiation.World Health organization says detection of radiation in food more serious problem than expected. Israeli clinic likely to be set up in quake-stricken country.China and South Korea announced on Monday they will toughen checks of Japanese food for radioactivity, hours after the World Health Organization said the detection of radiation in some food in Japan was a more serious problem than it had expected.China will monitor food imported from Japan for signs of radiation, state news agency Xinhua reported, citing the national quality watchdog, while South Korea will widen radiation inspections to dried agricultural and processed food from fresh agricultural produce. The WHO said it had no evidence of contaminated food spreading internationally, but officials in Japan's Ibaraki and Fukushima prefectures, the areas closest to the earthquake-damaged Daiichi nuclear plant, found higher than usual levels of iodine in samples of spinach and milk. "Quite clearly it's a serious situation," Peter Cordingley, Manila-based spokesman for WHO's regional office for the Western Pacific, told Reuters in a telephone interview on Monday."It's a lot more serious than anybody thought in the early days when we thought that this kind of problem can be limited to 20 to 30 kilometers," he said.Meanwhile, Israeli doctors sent by the Foreign Ministry and Home Front Command have reached the city of Kurihara where some of the Tsunami victims are concentrated. The doctors came to review the situation in order to decide how many doctors and medical equipment should be sent.It is estimated that an Israeli clinic will be set up in Japan in the coming week.Read the full story here.

• US Army 'kill team' in Afghanistan posed for photos of murdered civilians.Commanders brace for backlash of anti-US sentiment that could be more damaging than after the Abu Ghraib scandal.Commanders in Afghanistan are bracing themselves for possible riots and public fury triggered by the publication of "trophy" photographs of US soldiers posing with the dead bodies of defenceless Afghan civilians they killed.Senior officials at Nato's International Security Assistance Force in Kabul have compared the pictures published by the German news weekly Der Spiegel to the images of US soldiers abusing prisoners in Abu Ghraib in Iraq which sparked waves of anti-US protests around the world.They fear that the pictures could be even more damaging as they show the aftermath of the deliberate murders of Afghan civilians by a rogue US Stryker tank unit that operated in the southern province of Kandahar last year.Some of the activities of the self-styled "kill team" are already public, with 12 men currently on trial in Seattle for their role in the killing of three civilians.Five of the soldiers are on trial for pre-meditated murder, after they staged killings to make it look like they were defending themselves from Taliban attacks.Other charges include the mutilation of corpses, the possession of images of human casualties and drug abuse.All of the soldiers have denied the charges. They face the death penalty or life in prison if convicted.The case has already created shock around the world, particularly with the revelations that the men cut "trophies" from the bodies of the people they killed.An investigation by Der Spiegel has unearthed approximately 4,000 photos and videos taken by the men.The magazine, which is planning to publish only three images, said that in addition to the crimes the men were on trial for there are "also entire collections of pictures of other victims that some of the defendants were keeping".The US military has strived to keep the pictures out of the public domain fearing it could inflame feelings at a time when anti-Americanism in Afghanistan is already running high.In a statement, the army said it apologised for the distress caused by photographs "depicting actions repugnant to us as human beings and contrary to the standards and values of the United States".The lengthy Spiegel article that accompanies the photographs contains new details about the sadistic behaviour of the men.Hmmmmm.......Wonder what the Vacationer-in-chief will say about this 'human rights' abuse?Read the full story here.The 'Kill Team' Images here (Der Spiegel).

• You can't blame it on Rio.Japan is still reeling from the effects of a monster earthquake, a giant tsunami and the ongoing crisis at the Fukushima nuclear plant; over the weekend, America attacked Libya, firing cruise missiles at the armed forces of strongman Moammar Khadafy. And where was the president? Why, in Rio, of course, with his wife, two children, their godmother and his mother-in-law in tow, to take in the sights and deliver -- what else? -- a speech. Having filled out his March Madness brackets on ESPN and, on the way back to the White House from a St. Patrick's Day lunch at the Capitol, signed the condolence book at the Japanese Embassy ("My heart goes out to the people of Japan during this enormous tragedy"), it was time for spring break. The comic-opera presidency of Barack Obama continues apace. Alas, it's no laughing matter. The double standard for assessing presidents may be old news, but this is a new low. Had this been George Bush -- just finishing his 61st round of golf; enmeshed in not one, not two, but three wars in Muslim countries, and clearly more comfortable being the nation's toastmaster general than the commander in chief -- the media would be howling for his head. Yet Obama continues to receive the kind of fawning press coverage that only kings and potentates enjoy.Not drill for our own oil, in the Gulf or in Alaska. Not extract it, via a method called "fracking" from the Bakken shale fields in the upper Midwest, which hold an estimated 3.65 billion barrels of oil -- one of the reasons the economy of North Dakota is booming while the rest of the country continues to suffer. Obama's partisans often praise what they call his "restraint" and "caution," especially when dealing with foreign affairs. But one man's caution is another man's passivity and inaction, especially when the political calculus of making the wrong decision is factored in. Having stamped his foot weeks ago and demanded that Khadafy step down, Obama did absolutely nothing to back up his ultimatum, instead waiting for a UN resolution authorizing air strikes and then piggybacking on the British and the French.Unfortunately, neither America nor the world can afford a "President Present" -- a man who, it seems, would rather be on the beach at Ipanema as a grand tourist than in the Oval Office as the leader of the free world.Hmmmm...... "We can feel your pain,Japan's pain and the libyan people their pain,while partying in south America."Read the full story here.

• Koran verdict : guilty as charged.Koran burnt in Florida church.Gainesville, Florida — A controversial US evangelical preacher oversaw the burning of a copy of the Koran in a small Florida church after finding the Muslim holy book "guilty" of crimes.The burning was carried out by pastor Wayne Sapp under the supervision of Terry Jones, who last September drew sweeping condemnation over his plan to ignite a pile of Korans on the anniversary of September 11, 2001 attacks.Sunday's event was presented as a trial of the book in which the Koran was found "guilty" and "executed."The jury deliberated for about eight minutes. The book, which had been soaking for an hour in kerosene, was put in a metal tray in the center of the church, and Sapp started the fire with a barbecue lighter.The book burned for around 10 minutes while some onlookers posed for photos.Jones had drawn trenchant condemnation from many people, including US President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, over his plan to burn the Muslim holy book in September.He did not carry out his plan then and vowed he never would, saying he had made his point.But this time, he said he had been "trying to give the Muslim world an opportunity to defend their book," but did not receive any answer.He said he felt that he couldn't have a real trial without a real punishment.The event was open to the public, but fewer than 30 people attended.Jones said he considered this event a success."This is a once-in-a-lifetime experience," he said.Hmmmm...........Read the full story here.Video report of the trial here.

• Turkey the NATO member that is not a part of the team!Turkey irked by strikes, seeks clarification.Turkey on Monday criticised the Western-led coalition air strikes on Libya and said it was awaiting clarification on a possible role for Nato in the operation. Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, whose country is Nato's sole Muslim-majority member, criticised the way the coalition force that began bombing Libya at the weekend was formed following the UN Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire and authorising a no-fly zone. "There is a certain procedure under international law for the formation of such coalitions. We do not believe that this procedure was sufficiently observed," he told reporters. He stressed the international community's objective in Libya should be "not to launch of a large-scale war" similar to those in Afghanistan and Iraq but "to provide humanitarian aid, stop the escalation of fighting through an arms embargo and prevent clashes through a no-fly zone." At a meeting in Brussels Sunday, Turkey effectively delayed a Natto decision on possible action in Libya as it called for a review of existing plans and stressed that civilians must be protected.The minister stressed that any contribution that Turkey might offer would be aimed "at laying the ground for peace, stability (in Libya) and lasting Turkish-Libyan friendship." Earlier, Defence Minister Vecdi Gonul said Ankara was perplexed by France's leadership in the air strikes, Anatolia news agency reported. "It does not seem quite possible for us to understand France's being so much at the forefront in this action. "Military intervention by NATO in Libya or any other country would be totally counterproductive," Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said, according to the Anatolia news agency on Monday. "In addition to being counterproductive, such an operation could have dangerous consequences." Turkey appears to be concerned about its standing in the Muslim world. We have difficulties in understanding (its action) as if it is the implementer of the UN resolution," Gonul was quoted as saying. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was to discuss the situation with US President Barack Obama in a telephone call later Monday when he returns from a visit to Saudi Arabia, Davutoglu said. Erdogan has voiced hope the ongoing military operations will be over "as quickly as possible".Hmmmm.....Once again it seems that Turkey's role in NATO is limited to behind the scenes phone calls Obama and Erdogan,GET Turkey out of NATO NOW!Turkey has become a rogue player in NATO!Read the full story here. More here.

• Report: Obama Regime Considering Reaching out to Hezbollah.The administration of U.S. President Barack Obama is considering reaching out to the political elements in Hezbollah, the Washington Post reported on Friday, stressing that the at this stage it was an intelligence effort, not a policymaking one.In an opinion piece appearing on the newspaper’s online edition, columnist David Ignatius indicated that Washington was considering an effort similar to the one the U.K, implemented “during the 1990s with Sinn Fein, the legal political wing of the terrorist Irish Republican Army.”“That outreach led to breakthrough peace talks and settlement of a conflict that had been raging for more than a century,” Ignatius wrote, adding that several U.S. officials were expected to endorse dialogue with political elements of both Hezbollah and the Taliban in an upcoming intelligence report.Writing of the effect recent Mideast turmoil may have had on Obama’s decision to accept these recommendations, the Washington Post writer said that the “political time bomb ticking away in the [intelligence report] is the question of whether the United States should seek some kind of direct or indirect engagement with Hezbollah — at least with its political wing.”“Officials who support this course argue that the organization is like the IRA or the PLO — with nonmilitary components that can be drawn into a dialogue,” Ignatius added.Ignatius quotes in his article one intelligence official, John Brennan, known for supporting a move toward dialogue with the Lebanese militant group, as saying that while “Hezbollah started out as purely a terrorist organization back in the early ’80s,” it has “evolved significantly over time.”Hmmmm..."They don't trust me because of my middle name"?The most Anti-Israel leader, not counting  Ahmadinejad and Erdogan?Read the full story here.

• Obama 'administration' Promises U.N. America Will Improve Its Human Rights Record.The United States on Friday disavowed torture and pledged to treat terror suspects humanely, but set aside calls to drop the death penalty, as the United Nations carried out its first review of Washington’s human rights record.As part a groundbreaking commitment to improvement under the Obama administration, the U.S. joined the 47-nation Human Rights Council in 2009. And in doing so, submitted to more international scrutiny.He said the U.S. would agree to improvements in areas ranging from civil rights to national security to immigration, including intolerance of torture and the humane treatment of suspects at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba.Hmmmm.......Now we know why they received last week POW status from Hussein.Read the full story here.

• UN Does Nothing to Stop Vile Anti-Semitic Propaganda From Being Distributed at UNHRC Meeting.The Council is poised to adopt six resolutions this week condemning just Israel – the highest number of resolutions dedicated to bashing the Jewish state at a single session. The meeting on Monday at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva helps explain how it is possible for the horrifying murder of the Fogel family by Palestinian terrorists on March 11 to have been so easily minimized by the “civilized” world. Slashing the throat of a three-month old baby and stabbing a three-year old twice in the heart has sickened and anguished Jews everywhere, but the steady pounding of anti-Semitism at the United Nations has not skipped a beat.At this session of the Human Rights Council a UN-accredited NGO distributed a publication containing the following picture:The demonic Jew, with the swastika substituted for the star of David on the Israeli flag, is depicted as an octopus strangling freedom-loving innocents.The Jews as a vile life-threatening octopus was also a feature of Nazi propaganda. Today, it is how the Turkish NGO, the International Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH), is permitted to portray its attempt last May to defy a legal Israeli naval blockade.An appeal made to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, to take action against the IHH and to object to the distribution of this material on the UN “designated NGO tables outside the plenary room” was ignored.The UN-accredited IHH “humanitarians” also delivered a statement at this Council’s session in which they said: “we consider the unlawful activities of Israel to be the most serious threat, one that is even more dangerous than that of a nuclear attack.”Being fanatical hatemongers is evidently no barrier to being UN-accredited.Furthermore, the flotilla resolution is just one of many. There is another resolution on settlements. It condemns only Israel, references the Road Map only to allege Israeli violations, and demands Israel end “all settlement activity, including “natural growth.”This is not just verbiage. Such UN settlement resolutions intimate that the three young Fogel children, while living and breathing, were criminals.And still it does not end. Incredibly, at this Council session there will be a total of six resolutions adopted condemning Israel alone – on the flotilla, settlements, the Goldstone Report and its successors, the “Syrian Golan,” other “grave human rights violations by Israel,” and Palestinian self-determination.Consider the absurdity of the resolution entitled “human rights in the occupied Syrian Golan.” The Council claims to be “deeply concerned at the suffering of Syrian citizens” and then demands that Israel “desist from…practices that obstruct the enjoyment of their fundamental rights.” There is no mention whatsoever of the Syrian government, its murderous rampages at this very moment in time, and its “obstruction” of the fundamental right of Syrians to live.On the contrary, Syria is currently running for a seat on the Council and is widely expected to be elected in May.In sum, the Council is poised to adopt this week six resolutions condemning just Israel, one resolution for each of four other countries, and nothing for the other 187 UN member states. This is the highest number of resolutions dedicated to the demonization of Israel at a single session of the Council since it began in 2006 as the crown jewel of Kofi Annan’s UN reform.A great many in the Western world believe either that discrimination against the Jewish people is an acceptable price to pay for progress on other fronts, or that the United Nations serves at worst as an incompetent but necessary escape valve for hot air and play-acting by weak countries with inferiority complexes. The atrocity committed against the Fogel family puts the lie to this reprehensible and deadly exploitation. The world should have learned long ago that demonizing Jews is not a human right.Hmmmm.........We're back to square one ,how long before the UN members  start building the Gas chambers for the 'final solution'?Read the full story here

• Federal Director of Regulating Offshore Drilling ‘Not Thoroughly Familiar’ with Billions in Lost Royalties from Offshore Drilling.At an appropriations hearing to consider a $358.4 million budget request for the Department of Interior’s newly created Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE), Director Michael Bromwich could not directly answer questions posed by Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.) about billions of dollars of lost revenue from offshore gas and natural gas wells that are not paying royalties to the federal government for operating in U.S. waters.“I am not thoroughly familiar with these issues, but hearing you describe it and hearing the magnitude of the dollars, it’s a serious problem, and I will learn more about it and get back to you with fuller answers,” Bromwich said at the March 17 hearing.The report estimated that the error could cost the government $10 billion in lost revenues, but Gould put the estimate at $15.21 billion, a figure he said his staff reached “working closely” with Bromwich.“The estimate that we’re getting – working closely with Director Bromwich and his staff – we have estimates of $15.21 billion,” Gould said, adding that there was “no legal mechanism” at present to change those 1998-99 lease contracts.“So this is going to continue,” Moran said, adding that because oil prices are now over $100 a barrel, taxpayers and not oil companies should reap the benefits.Shortly thereafter, Moran turned to Bromwich, saying, “All right, earn your pay, such as it is, Mr. Bromwich,” and asked him about the royalties. As noted, Bromwich said he was “not thoroughly familiar with these issues.”The amount of unpaid oil and gas lease royalties stemmed from what the CRS report described as an “error” by the Department of the Interior’s Minerals Management Service – the agency that was replaced by BOEMRE and which President Barack Obama appointed Bromwich to direct.Moran called that $15.2 billion error “an expensive mistake.”Hmmmm.....If you wanted to destroy America would you do anything different?Read the full story here.

• Iranian Website Signs Up Volunteer Suicide Bombers For Dispatch To Bahrain.An Iranian website has been set up to register volunteer suicide bombers who are willing to go to Bahrain to join the protests against the Gulf forces that are helping the Bahrain authorities. The registrants warn the leaders of the Gulf countries that their aid to Bahrain will undermine their own regimes and will hasten the coming of the Hidden Iman, who will destroy them. As of this writing, 1,949 volunteers have registered.Hmmm......The Iranian  People that Obama just congratulated"Happy Nowruz".Source.

• Israeli students leave their mark on UN.Nine Ramat Gan high school students succeed where best of Israel's diplomats have failed – conquering General Assembly. Short film on world in 2030 wins Model UN competition.No world hunger, peace in the Middle East, Africa no longer part of the third world and cars flying in the sky. This is the utopian vision that awarded seniors from the Ohel Shem high school in Ramat Gan first place in the UN's futuristic project.Around 3,000 teens from around the world took part in the Model UN conference in New York – an annual project which sees teens taking part in a special UN Assembly meeting where they learn about diplomacy, international relations and the UN's activity. It took the nine participating Israeli students four months to prepare for the special occasion: They ran debate simulations, memorized information about other participating countries, researched and wrote position papers on various current events. Incidentally, during the event's main simulation the Israelis took on the role of the Algerian delegation.The crown prince of Norway presented the Israeli high school students with the award for the clip to the sounds of applause from the Assembly.Read the full story here.

• HT:CreepingSharia.Turkish Islamist charter schools in US being investigated by FBI.Fethullah Gulen is a major Islamic political figure in Turkey, but he lives in self-imposed exile in a Poconos enclave and gained his green card by convincing a federal judge in Philadelphia that he was an influential educational figure in the United States.As evidence, his lawyer pointed to the charter schools, now more than 120 in 25 states, that his followers – Turkish scientists, engineers, and businessmen – have opened, including Truebright Science Academy in North Philadelphia and another charter in State College, Pa.The schools are funded with millions of taxpayer dollars. Truebright alone receives more than $3 million from the Philadelphia School District for its 348 pupils. Tansu Cidav, the acting chief executive officer, described it as a regular public school.“Charter schools are public schools,” he said. “We follow the state curriculum.”But federal agencies – including the FBI and the Departments of Labor and Education – are investigating whether some charter school employees are kicking back part of their salaries to a Muslim movement founded by Gulen known as Hizmet, or Service, according to knowledgeable sources.Unlike in Turkey, where Gulen’s followers have been accused of pushing for an authoritarian Islamic state, there is no indication the American charter network has a religious agenda in the classroom.Religious scholars consider the Gulen strain of Islam moderate, and the investigation has no link to terrorism. Rather, it is focused on whether hundreds of Turkish teachers, administrators, and other staffers employed under the H1B visa program are misusing taxpayer money.Another aim of the Gulen schools, a federal official said, is fostering goodwill toward Turkey, which is led by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the pro-Islamic prime minister, whose government recently detained journalists after they alleged that Gulen followers were infiltrating security agencies.Gulen schools are among the nation’s largest users of the H1B visas. In 2009, the schools received government approvals for 684 visas – more than Google Inc. (440) but fewer than a technology powerhouse such as Intel Corp. (1,203).The visas are used to attract foreign workers with math, science, and technology skills to jobs for which there are shortages of qualified American workers. Officials at some of the charter schools, which specialize in math and science, have said they needed to fill teaching spots with Turks, according to parents and former staffers.Ruth Hocker, former president of the parents’ group at the Young Scholars of Central Pennsylvania Charter School in State College, began asking questions when popular, certified American teachers were replaced by uncertified Turkish men who often spoke limited English and were paid higher salaries. Most were placed in math and science classes.“They would tell us they couldn’t find qualified American teachers,” Hocker said.That made no sense in Pennsylvania State University’s hometown, she said: “They graduate here every year."State auditors in Ohio found that a number of schools had “illegally expended” public funding to pay legal, immigration, and air-travel fees for nonemployees and retained teachers who lacked proper licenses. Audited records from the Horizon Science Academy in Cincinnati in May 2009 also say that “for the period of time under audit, 47 percent (nine of 19) of the school’s teachers were not properly licensed.”The same records show that the founder of Horizon Cincinnati was listed as the CEO of the school’s management firm and as president of the school’s property owner.Hmmmm......Reminds me of Is Turkey training a religious teachers ‘army’ to indoctrinate European Muslims even at ‘kindergarten’ level?Read the full story here.