VOA News: Asia: Khmer Rouge Judge Spells Out Grievances

VOA News: Asia Asia Voice of America

Khmer Rouge Judge Spells Out Grievances Mar 21st 2012, 17:51 The Khmer Rouge tribunal judge who quit his post in protest earlier this week has released a statement spelling out what he describes as improper interference in his work. Laurent Kaspar-Ansermet said Monday he could not continue his duties because of repeated challenges to his authority by Cambodian counterpart on the tribunal, You Bunleng. Kaspar-Ansermet's predecessor, Swiss Judge Siegfried Blunt, quit the tribunal earlier this year after complaining of similar interference. Kaspar-Ansermet on Wednesday accused You Bunleng of failing in all but one instance to communicate directly on long-standing differences over who in the former regime should be probed and prosecuted for war crimes. In that instance late last year, Kaspar-Ansermet said You Bunleng "expressed his will not to communicate or collaborate in any way." The tribunal has already sentenced one former Khmer Rouge official to life in prison, and is currently hearing a second case against the group's three top surviving leaders.  The trio faces charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the deaths of some 1.7 million Cambodians who died under Khmer Rouge rule in the 1970s. Prime Minister Hun Sen, himself a former Khmer Rouge cadre, has repeatedly said there should be no further prosecutions.  He and other Cambodian officials have voiced fear that further cases could spark civil war in the tiny Southeast Asian nation. For his part, Kaspar-Ansermet has been probing evidence in two additional cases and says You Bunleng has actively opposed those probes, known as Cases 003 and 004. Many of the international staff on the court want to proceed with the new cases, as do many Khmer Rouge victims.  But other staffers on the U.N.-backed tribunal have sided with the government. Media files: reuters_cambodia_khmer_rouge_eng_480_2009.jpg (image/jpeg, 0 MB) reuters_cambodia_khmer_rouge_eng_23_2009.jpg

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VOA News: Africa: South Africa Maps Strategy for TB Fight

VOA News: Africa Africa Voice of America

South Africa Maps Strategy for TB Fight Mar 21st 2012, 17:07 A global strategy to develop safe and effective tuberculosis vaccines over the coming decade was unveiled in South Africa this week. The new plan establishes international worldwide research targets for the next 10 years, with the goal of having safe and effective vaccines ready for production by 2022. Each year there are about nine million new cases of TB and 1.4 million deaths. The disease often occurs in people who have HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, due to their compromised immune systems. And in recent years strains of TB have emerged that are increasingly multi-drug resistant. David Memetja, who is responsible for TB control and management at the South African Department of Health, told journalists the solution lies in finding a vaccine. "The solution is really in preventing TB, and in that regard the announced TB vaccine blueprint we believe is part of the important solution in terms of minimizing the risk of TB in the country," he said. Memetja says South Africa is at the epicenter of the global TB pandemic. "So in fact if you take our incidence rate, which currently stands at almost 1,000 [infections] per 100,000 people, so adjusting for our population size we actually rank first in the world among the 22 countries that account for 80 percent of the world's TB burden," said Memetja. Gavin Churcyard, chief executive of the Aurum Institute, an independent, public-benefit organization that focuses on TB and HIV, says the work going on in South Africa is an important part of the effort to control TB. "South Africa researchers are playing a leading role internationally in development and evaluation of new TB drugs, diagnostics, and vaccines," said Churcyard. "Recently a national plan for an HIV vaccine was launched, and there are plans to launch a national plan for TB based on the [TB vaccine] blueprint." Hassan Mahomed, team leader at the South Africa TB Vaccine Initative at the University of Cape Town, says most of the vaccine trials under way are being done in this country. "There are five research institutions around South Africa that are actively involved in clinical trials of new TB vaccines," he said. "Of the 12 TB vaccines that are being actively tested at the moment, six of them are being tested in South Africa." Mahomed says it also is important that local researchers are working together with nine institutions across the African continent in a collaborative effort to find new vaccines. Media files: AFP_south_africa_tuberculosis_mamedja_eng_480_20mar12.jpg (image/jpeg, 0 MB) AFP_south_africa_tuberculosis_mamedja_eng_230_20mar12.jpg

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VOA News: Africa: Mali Soldiers Demand Better Arms to Fight Rebels

VOA News: Africa Africa Voice of America

Mali Soldiers Demand Better Arms to Fight Rebels Mar 21st 2012, 17:23 Witnesses report unrest at an army camp near Mali's capital, where soldiers are demanding better weapons to fight Tuareg rebels. Soldiers at the Kati military camp outside the capital, Bamako, began firing into the air Wednesday, after a meeting with Mali's defense minister went badly.   VOA's French to Africa Service reports that two soldiers were wounded during the protest. The protesting soldiers complained that they lack proper weapons to battle the rebels, who have seized several towns in Mali's remote northern desert region.  Wives and mothers of the soldiers held a protest in Bamako on the same issue last month. Tuareg nomads have launched periodic uprisings for greater autonomy in both Mali and Niger. The latest rebellion began in January, after many Tuareg fighters returned from Libya, where they assisted ousted Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. Media files: apTuaregRebelsMali15Feb2012-resizedpx480q100dpi96shp8.jpg (image/jpeg, 0.3 MB) apTuaregRebelsMali15Feb2012-resizedpx480q100dpi96shp8Tease.jpg

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VOA News: Africa: MSF: Alarming Scope of Drug Resistant TB

VOA News: Africa Africa Voice of America

MSF: Alarming Scope of Drug Resistant TB Mar 21st 2012, 17:40 A medical aid group says the spread of multi-drug resistant tuberculosis is much greater than previously thought. Doctors Without Borders calls the situation alarming. MDR-TB is a form of tuberculosis that does not respond to standard treatment and can kill in a matter of months. <!--AV--> "Wherever we're looking for drug-resistant TB we're finding it in very alarming numbers. And that suggests to us that the current statistics that are being published about the prevalence of MDR-TB are really just scratching the surface of the problem," said Dr. Leslie Shanks, medical director for the group, also known as MSF. MSF has been collecting data from its clinics around the world. "We have evidence from Asia, Africa, central Asia. Wherever we are working we are finding this problem," she said. It's not just showing up in many places, it's showing up in large numbers. "In our program, for example, in the northern part of Uzbekistan we've started to test systematically all of our TB patients for drug resistance, whether or not they appear to be at risk for drug resistance. And we're finding that two-thirds of our patients are MDR, which is just an astounding number," she said. Going undetected The MSF medical director says MDR-TB can go unnoticed during a routine TB exam. Its symptoms are similar to the more common form of TB. Dr. Shanks explained why it's spread so quickly and so far. "We know that drug resistance is a man-made problem. It comes from incorrect treatment. It comes from the availability of over-the-counter tuberculosis medications. It comes from patients not taking their drugs properly or drug supplies running out. So they're not able to finish their treatment. And sometimes it comes from just doctors' prescribing patterns," she said. There's good reason why patients with MDR-TB would stop taking their medication. They have to swallow about 14 pills daily of highly toxic drugs. Treatment can last up to two years and there are many unpleasant side effects. Plus there are additional injections required. Regular TB treatment has few, if any, side effects and lasts about six months. There are also a lot fewer pills to take. Out with the old… Current drugs are many decades old. Shanks says there's little incentive to discover new TB drugs. "There's very little market for this. We're really pushing now that there is funding for new drug development for clinical trial; and that pharmaceutical companies are working on drug development to address this issue," she said. She says without new drugs it will be difficult to deal with the expanding scope of MDR-TB. She adds the disease knows no borders and that developed countries are not immune. Media files: msf_tb_480.jpg (image/jpeg, 0.1 MB) msf_tb_300.jpg De_Capua_report_on_MDR-TB.Mp3 (audio/mpeg)

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VOA News: USA: Romney Takes Major Step Toward Republican Nomination

VOA News: USA USA Voice of America

Romney Takes Major Step Toward Republican Nomination Mar 21st 2012, 17:28 Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney took another step toward clinching the Republican Party's presidential nomination Tuesday with a convincing win in the Illinois primary.  Romney defeated his main rival, former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum, by a 12 point margin and padded his lead in the all-important delegate count in his quest to be the Republican nominee. Mitt Romney continues to win the key primary battles with Rick Santorum as he moves ever closer to becoming the presumptive Republican candidate against President Barack Obama in the November election. Romney got another boost in the wake of his victory in Illinois when he won the endorsement of former Florida governor Jeb Bush.  Bush issued a written statement that said it was time Republicans unite behind Romney as their nominee. In his speeches, Romney mentions Santorum less and less and focuses most of his attention on drawing a contrast with President Obama. "The genius of America is that we nurture those dreams and the dreamers," said Romney.  "We honor them and yes, we reward them.  That is part of what is uniquely brilliant about America.  But day by day, job-killing regulation by job-killing regulation, bureaucrat by bureaucrat, this president is crushing the dream and the dreamers and I will make sure that finally ends!" Romney's base of support among Republican voters includes those who say their top priority is defeating Obama in November.  He also does well among Republicans who describe themselves as moderates. Rick Santorum continues to draw support from religious voters and from Republicans who consider themselves very conservative.  He argues that he would offer general election voters a bolder alternative to the president than would Romney. "They want someone who is not going to go to Washington, D.C. because they want to be the most powerful person in the world to manage Washington," said Santorum.  "They want someone who is going to take that power and give it back to the people of this country!" It takes the support of 1,144 delegates to secure the Republican nomination at the party's nominating convention in Tampa, Florida, in late August. The latest Associated Press unofficial tally gives Romney more than 560 delegates, more than twice as many as Santorum. Santorum is favored in the next primary in Louisiana on Saturday, but expert Henry Olsen of the American Enterprise Institute says Romney remains the strong favorite to eventually win the nomination. "I think right now the way things are going, Mitt Romney just needs to be patient and he's going to be the nominee," noted Olsen. Some analysts note that Republican voter turnout in the primaries and caucuses this year is down from four years ago.  Some party leaders have also expressed concern that the lengthy and divisive primary campaign could hurt Republican chances in November. But John Fortier of the Bipartisan Policy Center expects that the Republican Party will unify behind its nominee in time for the general election campaign in November. "I think there is a great likelihood at the end of the race that most Republican voters will come home, just as after the [Hillary] Clinton and [Barack] Obama race where there was bitterness and different types of voters, most Democratic voters ended up supporting the nominee," Fortier explained. The delegate math demonstrates how difficult it would be for Santorum to overtake Romney at this point.  Santorum would have to win about 70 percent of the remaining delegates at stake to win the nomination, while Romney only needs to win about 45 percent to emerge victorious. Media files: apRomneyIllinois21Mar2012-resizedpx480q100shp8.jpg (image/jpeg, 0.2 MB) apRomneyIllinois21Mar2012-resizedpx480q100shp8Tease.jpg MaloneRomneyIllinois21mar2012-st.mp3 (audio/mpeg)

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VOA News: Economy: Greek Health Workers Protest Government Austerity

VOA News: Economy Economy Voice of America

Greek Health Workers Protest Government Austerity Mar 21st 2012, 16:43 Greek health workers are disrupting state hospital services in a renewed protest against the government's austerity measures and delays in receiving their paychecks. <!--AV--> Doctors and staff walked off the job for several hours Wednesday and engaged in a work slowdown. They demanded that the government pay them for their overtime work from the last four months. The health care workers also protested spending cuts the government has imposed in order to secure a new $171 billion international bailout and debt relief from the country's private creditors. One physician, Fotis Vlastos, said the workers needed to protect their livelihood against the government plans. "So they want to close the wards. They want to close the clinics. They want to throw out the doctors and the rest of the personnel in the hospital. So we have to fight and remain as we were during the whole century," said Vlastos. A nurse, Vicki Tsitsi, said Greece's public health care system is deteriorating with the spending cuts. "I don't know where the patients are going to go," said Tsitsi.  "Are they going to go to the private hospitals? Do the people have money to pay for the private hospitals? Our health system is going from bad to worse." The renewed protest came as Greece is headed toward a national election, expected to be called for late April or early May. A new government would replace caretaker Prime Minister Lucas Papademos, the technocrat who oversaw months of Greece's negotiations with its international creditors to secure new financing so the Athens government could avoid defaulting on its obligations. His finance minister, Evangelos Venizelos, resigned his post earlier this week to lead the socialist party in the upcoming election, but Greek opinion surveys show voters widely favor a conservative party takeover of the government. Papademos on Wednesday promoted deputy finance minister Philippos Sachinidis to be the new finance chief. Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters. Media files: GreeceDoctorsAPTNProtests21Mar201204Tease.jpg

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VOA News: Europe: French Jews, Muslims Struggle to Understand Toulouse Shootings

VOA News: Europe Europe Voice of America

French Jews, Muslims Struggle to Understand Toulouse Shootings Mar 21st 2012, 15:51 As French police surround a suspect in a string of shootings in southern France, Jews and Muslims are grappling with the horrific events that have touched their communities. Children spill out of the Beth Hanna Jewish school in northeastern Paris under a spring sun and the watchful eyes of armed police. Parents, including men sporting the trademark black hat of Hasidic Jews, crowd the sidewalk to greet them. Lea Chicheportiche, a mother of five, is also here. Like many, Chicheportiche's thoughts are fixed hundreds of kilometers away - on the southern French city of Toulouse, where a motorcycle gunman killed three children and a rabbi at another Jewish school. Police believe the killer is also responsible for the shooting deaths of three French soldiers last week, including two Muslims. Chicheportiche says the events are distressing. She believes the killer is racist because he shot dead both Muslims and Jews. She spoke hours before police closed in on a suspect, a 24-year-old man who claims links to al-Qaida and had been training in southern Afghanistan. French authorities say he wanted to avenge the deaths of Palestinian children in the Middle East. The killings have shaken the nation. The French government has notched up the terrorism alert in the Toulouse region to its highest level. French President Nicolas Sarkozy briefly suspended his presidential campaign, as did several of his challengers. Security has been reinforced around religious institutions and schools like Beth Hanna. Both the soldiers and the Jewish victims were buried Wednesday, in separate ceremonies in France and Israel. Sarkozy also met with representatives of France's Muslim and Jewish communities, the largest in Western Europe. Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Sarkozy said the nation must be united, it cannot cede to violence or stereotyping. He said France cannot confront such an event unless the nation is united - it owes it to the victims. Like elsewhere across France, people in this Paris neighborhood are grappling to understand the horrific killings. Rabbi Mendel Azimov helps oversee Beth Hanna school, which his father founded. Eight of his children go to the establishment, which runs from nursery through high school. He knows the families of the Toulouse victims. "It's not only a community problem, it's not only a religious problem, it's a national problem - and even… an international problem," he said. "Every family, the kids, the population is very shocked about it. And we hope that justice will be done like the president [Sarkozy] promised." The shootings have cast a cloud over an election season already checkered by sharp exchanges on immigration and religion - notably controversy over Jewish and Muslim ritual animal slaughtering practices. Some believe the horrific events will draw the two communities closer. But Victor Levy, who owns an office supply store a block from Beth Hanna, is not so sure. Levy does not believe the shootings will help to unite French Muslims and Jews. He says it only increases doubts between the two communities, because each wonders if the other is racist. He says each can speak words that shock and create hatred between the two religions. Muslims and Jews have long been neighbors in this colorful, slightly grimy slice of Paris known as the 19th arrondissement. Halal butchers and kebab takeouts vie for customers alongside Kosher supermarkets and traditional French bakeries. Many Muslims and Jews here hail from the same region - North Africa. But there have been longstanding tensions over the years, often reflecting events in the far-off Middle East. Muslim youths in the neighborhood occasionally clash with their Jewish counterparts. Store owner Levy says that despite tensions, the two communities do get along. He is Jewish. A good friend is an Iraqi Muslim. But he fears the events in Toulouse might inflame things. But across the street, Muslim laundry store-owner Biguejda Driss mourns the Jewish deaths in Toulouse. Driss, who is of Moroccan origin, says it is not normal that someone should kill children. At Beth Hanna, Rabbi Azimov is focusing on healing. "We have a special tradition that says that when bad things happen, you have to add on kindness and goodness and prayer," he said, "we have a belief that when you have light, darkness disappears." Muslim and Jewish leaders are organizing a remembrance march for the Toulouse victims in Paris on Sunday. They say the march makes no sense unless it is done jointly. Media files: reuters_france_jews_eng_480_21mar12.jpg (image/jpeg, 0 MB) reuters_france_jews_eng_230_21mar12.jpg

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VOA News: Europe: Greek Health Workers Protest Government Austerity

VOA News: Europe Europe Voice of America

Greek Health Workers Protest Government Austerity Mar 21st 2012, 16:43 Greek health workers are disrupting state hospital services in a renewed protest against the government's austerity measures and delays in receiving their paychecks. <!--AV--> Doctors and staff walked off the job for several hours Wednesday and engaged in a work slowdown. They demanded that the government pay them for their overtime work from the last four months. The health care workers also protested spending cuts the government has imposed in order to secure a new $171 billion international bailout and debt relief from the country's private creditors. One physician, Fotis Vlastos, said the workers needed to protect their livelihood against the government plans. "So they want to close the wards. They want to close the clinics. They want to throw out the doctors and the rest of the personnel in the hospital. So we have to fight and remain as we were during the whole century," said Vlastos. A nurse, Vicki Tsitsi, said Greece's public health care system is deteriorating with the spending cuts. "I don't know where the patients are going to go," said Tsitsi.  "Are they going to go to the private hospitals? Do the people have money to pay for the private hospitals? Our health system is going from bad to worse." The renewed protest came as Greece is headed toward a national election, expected to be called for late April or early May. A new government would replace caretaker Prime Minister Lucas Papademos, the technocrat who oversaw months of Greece's negotiations with its international creditors to secure new financing so the Athens government could avoid defaulting on its obligations. His finance minister, Evangelos Venizelos, resigned his post earlier this week to lead the socialist party in the upcoming election, but Greek opinion surveys show voters widely favor a conservative party takeover of the government. Papademos on Wednesday promoted deputy finance minister Philippos Sachinidis to be the new finance chief. Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters. Media files: GreeceDoctorsAPTNProtests21Mar201204Tease.jpg

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VOA News: Africa: Guinea-Bissau Moves to Presidential Run-Off

VOA News: Africa Africa Voice of America

Guinea-Bissau Moves to Presidential Run-Off Mar 21st 2012, 16:39 Guinea-Bissau Elections Guinea-Bissau wins independence from Portugal in 1974. Luis Cabral becomes president in 1974 and is ousted in a 1980 coup led by armed forces chief Joao Bernardo Vieira. Vieira clings to power despite alleged coup attempts and is elected president in 1994 multi-party polls. Guinea-Bissau plunges into a bloody civil war in 1998 after an army uprising. Military junta ousts Vieira in 1999; opposition leader Kumba Yala is elected president in 2000. President Yala is ousted in bloody military coup in 2003; Businessman Henrique Rosa is sworn in as president. Joao Bernardo Vieira wins 2005 presidential vote and is killed by soldiers in the presidential palace in 2009. Malam Bacai Sanha is elected president and while hospitalized in 2011 a military struggle and attempted coup take place. President Sanha dies in January 2012 after a long illness; National Assembly Speaker Raimundo Pereira becomes acting president. Guinea-Bissau is headed toward a presidential run-off election after no candidate won a majority in Sunday's first-round voting. Official provisional results released Wednesday showed former prime minister Carlos Gomes Jr. barely missed an outright victory, taking just under 49 percent. Gomes, the ruling party candidate, will now face opposition leader and former president Kumba Yala, who came in second with 23 percent. Yala is one five candidates who on Tuesday called for the election to be annulled because of alleged fraud.  The candidates said the election lacks credibility because it was rife with irregularities. International election observers have said Sunday's poll appeared to be free and fair. The fraud claims have raised fears that trouble is looming in the coup-prone country, where former military intelligence chief Samba Diallo was killed hours after the polls closed. The winner of the run-off will replace the late president Malam Bacai Sanha, who died in January after a long illness. While Sanha was hospitalized in December, a struggle within the military and an apparent coup attempt took place. Since winning independence from Portugal in 1974, Guinea Bissau has struggled through a dictatorship, three coups and the 2009 assassination of a president.  The country has also become a transit point for cocaine smugglers. Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters. Media files: AP_Guinea-BissauElection_21mar12-resizedpx480q100shp8.jpg (image/jpeg, 0.3 MB) AP_Guinea-BissauElection_21mar12-300.jpg

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VOA News: Middle East: UN Security Council Endorses Syria Peace Plan

VOA News: Middle East Middle East Voice of America

UN Security Council Endorses Syria Peace Plan Mar 21st 2012, 14:50 The United Nations Security Council has adopted a statement supporting U.N.-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan's plan to try to end Syria's year-long unrest. The statement said Syria will face "further steps" if Mr. Annan's six-point peace proposal is rejected. The plan calls for a cease-fire, political dialogue between the government and opposition, and access for humanitarian aid agencies VOA's U.N. correspondent says the New York-based council's 15 members including Russia and China agreed on the statement by consensus at 10 a.m. local time, an hour after a deadline expired for potential objections to the language. The text of the French-drafted document, known as a presidential statement, was obtained earlier by VOA. It expresses "gravest concern" about the deteriorating situation in Syria and says it has resulted in a "serious human rights crisis and a deplorable humanitarian situation." It also gives "full support" to Mr. Annan's efforts to bring an "immediate end to all violence and human rights violations" in Syria. The Security Council statement calls for Mr. Annan to report back to the council in a "timely manner," after which member states will consider "further steps as appropriate." Russia and China previously had used their Security Council vetoes to block two Western and Arab-drafted resolutions that would have condemned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's deadly crackdown on an opposition uprising. Hours earlier, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the world has a responsibility to resolve what he called an "extremely dangerous situation" in Syria. Speaking on a visit to Jakarta, he said the crisis has "potentially massive repercussions for the region." Mr. Annan sent a five-member team of international experts to Syria on Sunday to try to secure a cease-fire between government and rebel forces leading an uprising against President Assad's 11-year autocratic rule.  Mr. Annan discussed his peace plan with Mr. Assad in Damascus earlier this month, but has said little about it since. Syrian activists said government troops shelled several opposition hubs across the country on Tuesday, killing at least 30 people in the central regions of Homs, Hama and elsewhere. The United Nations said at least 8,000 people have been killed in the Assad government's violent crackdown on the revolt, which began with peaceful protests and became increasingly militarized as army defectors attacked pro-Assad troops who assaulted civilians. Join the conversation on our social journalism site - Middle East Voices. Follow our Middle East reports on Twitter and discuss them on our Facebook page. Media files: 000_Par6951286_Annan_AL_21MAR12.jpg (image/jpeg, 0.1 MB) 000_Par6951286_TEASE_Annan_AL_21MAR12.jpg

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