Daily Archives: November 24, 2014

Members of Iraqi Shiite militia al-Abbas brigades, who are fighting with Iraqi forces against Islamic state group, at Kitba village near Tikrit in northern Iraq. Photograph: Ali Mohammed/EPA

 

Iraqi prime minister Haidar al-Abadi has capitulated to US pressure by agreeing to arm Sunni tribesmen fighting against Islamic State (IS), in spite of strong objections from his Shia fundamentalist Dawa party and fellow Shia ministers.

Washington argues that the battle could be lost without Sunni tribesmen, who can deprive IS of tribal recruits and provide non-sectarian, nationalist boots-on-the-ground in the battle against Sunni IS.

Since US forces managed to contain and crush al-Qaeda, the parent of IS, during the 2007-2008 “surge” to pacify Iraq only after Sunni tribesmen joined the campaign, Washington is seeking to recreate the coalition of forces and recommit Sunni tribesmen to the defence of Baghdad.

Abadi appears to have taken this step after Washington declared its intention to arm anti-IS tribesmen with $18 million-$24 million worth of armaments – 5,000 AK-47s, 50 rocket-propelled grenade launchers and 50 82mm mortars.

A Pentagon document prepared for Congress said failure to arm tribal fighters would leave anti-IS tribesmen “reluctant” to oppose IS. At least 200 men, women and children of the Sunni al-bu Nimr tribe have been murdered by IS, which has also killed men from the al-bu Fahd tribe.

Fraction of promised funds

The sum to be allocated to Iraqi tribesmen is a fraction of the $1.6 billion proposed by the administration for training and arming the Iraqi national army and Kurdish forces, which are struggling to hold and roll back IS units occupying Falluja and parts of Ramadi in the western Anbar province as well as Mosul, Iraq’s second city, in Nineveh province.

IS fighters are currently fighting troops and pro-government tribesmen in Ramadi.

Early this month, US experts visited a former military base in Anbar with a view to set up training camps for tribal fighters. Kurdish peshmerga commanders have also called for urgent arms deliveries to Kurdish units fighting IS in the Kobani enclave on the Syrian- Turkish border and along the Iraq-Iran border where IS has launched attacks on peshmerga.

The positive spin among Sunnis created by the decision to arm tribesmen may have been partially countered, however, by the sentencing to death of former Sunni legislator Ahmad al-Alwani for the 2013 slaying of two Iraqi soldiers during an army operation to arrest him in his home in Ramadi.

Alwani belongs to the powerful Alwan tribe and was a leader of Sunni protests against the Shia fundamentalist-dominated government headed by Nuri al-Maliki. During the past three years, al- Maliki was accused of persecuting Sunnis and levelling false charges of terrorism against former vice-president Tareq al-Hashemi and former finance minister Rafie al-Essawi, both senior Sunni figures.

Under pressure to join the US-led anti-IS coalition, Turkey has begun training Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga militiamen and will provide similar aid to national guard units due to be formed in the provinces.

The Observer in London reports that two British mercenaries– James Hughes, who served with the British army in Afghanistan, and Jamie Read, who trained with French forces – have joined anti-IS fighters. A 17-year old girl of Kurdish parentage from north London may be on her way to enter Kurdish women’s units defending Kobani.

Meanwhile, German interior minister Thomas Maiziere said 550 Germans had joined jihadists to fight in Syria and Iraq. “Just a few days ago, we had 450,” he said, suggesting the recruitment rate is rising rapidly.

He expressed alarm that recruits had been “radicalised in Germany, within this society” and recommended that “prevention must be accompanied by repression”. He revealed that the authorities are monitoring another 230 people who could mount attacks on German soil.

Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has slammed the anti-IS campaign in Syria as a “cover” for “surreptitiously” ousting President Bashar al-Assad. Mr Lavrov argued: “The Americans say that Assad’s regime . . . brings terrorists to the region to try to topple him” and called this charge “absolutely perverted logic”.

Peace plan

Nevertheless, in a potentially significant political move, Russia, which supports Damascus, and Saudi Arabia, which seeks Assad’s overthrow, have called for a revival of the 2012 “Geneva One” peace plan proposing an end to the conflict and the creation of a transitional government that would prepare the way for democratic elections in Syria.

source: irishtimes.com

Greece is among the high-risk areas that could possibly face a 9 Richter earthquake within 2015, according to reports.

A rather disturbing article in Le Monde entitled ‘Des Seismes Sans Precedent Historique Sont Possibles En Europe’ (‘Facing the possibility of unprecedented earthquakes in Europe’) is rapidly taking over the internet, receiving thousands of shares, while it causes great anxiety and fear to Greeks.

The scientific article is based on surveys carried out by 50 research scientists, seismologists and engineers, who monitored seismic activity throughout the years, updating the maps of the seismic regions throughout Europe, as part of the SHARE (Seismic Hazard Harmonization in Europe) international platform.

According to Le Monde’s article, the areas most likely to be affected by future large scale seismic activity – possibly of a magnitude that could reach 9 on the Richer scale – are Greece, Turkey and Italy. Crete, Rhodes, Samos, Mytilene, Patras, Cephalonia, Zante and Epirus, as well as a large part of the Corinthian Gulf, are depicted on the map in deep red. This report stresses that these areas fall in the high-risk category, indicating that it’s not at all impossible for Greeks to experience earthquakes of similar magnitude to those which occurred in March 2011 in Fukushima, Japan (Tohoku earthquake/tsunami).

Renowned seismologist Efthimios Lekkas said that he fully agrees with Le Monde’s report but wanted to make clear that in any case, with or without this survey, the possibility of a large earthquake can never be ruled out.

“This is a serious scientific approach course we cannot overlook, nor can we fully embrace it,” he explained.

“Personally, I do not believe that it is possible to have an earthquake of around 9 on the Richter scale in our country. In Japan, where the catastrophic earthquake of Fukushima took place, the crack size was 300km deep, while in Greece the tectonic structures are much smaller. Nevertheless, nobody can say with complete certainty what might happen in the future. Time will tell.”

It is worth mentioning, though, that this is the first time science has been presented with such detailed charts and maps recording seismic regions in Europe. The SHARE team has been recording earthquakes over the last thirty years, while the project is said to have cost 4.1 million euros, 80 per cent of which was funded by the European Union.

source: Neos Kosmos

JOSS supercar JP1.

Tycoon Alex Hatzimihail has given Australia’s automotive industry a much needed boost with an investment that ensures cars will continue to be built on Australian shores beyond 2017.

With announcements over the past 18 months that locally built Ford, Holden and Toyota vehicles will cease production by 2017, the venture into JOSS supercar has kept the local flame burning, with its sole model, the JP1, due for release that same year.

Founded by Melburnian Matthew Thomas, JOSS was bound for overseas investment before 39-year-old Hatzimihail made it one of his many multi-million dollar assets, he told Neos Kosmos.

“Matthew raised a million bucks to make his first race car and then he tried to raise another half a million dollars, but he didn’t succeed and in the past four years I wanted to open my own automobile company. One of my investigators called me a few months ago and said ‘Alex, there’s a company in Melbourne called JOSS supercar’. So I contacted Matthew immediately and he said he had an overseas buyer for $35 million. Walk in, walk out.”

But Hatzimihail pledged the $35 million and took a 60 per cent stake in the company, leaving 40 per cent to Thomas along with the design responsibilities.

“We can’t let the last automobile manufacturer in Australia leave. And over a week I convinced him, I’m a person who makes offers people can’t refuse.”

The supercar will be designed in Melbourne, manufactured in Brisbane, with its interior design and seating produced in Hatzimihail’s native Alice Springs.

With his eyes on the international market, he says his car will “do zero to 100 in 2.6 seconds”, be built completely from carbon fibre, weighing 950 kilograms, and powered by a V8 twin-turbo 5.5 litre engine purchased “from one of the biggest automobile companies in Germany”, to be disclosed next month.

Despite the rising cost of manufacturing which has led most Australian and international companies away from local production lines, he says this type of investment pays for itself.

“Manufacturing is very expensive if it was just a normal vehicle, but because it is a luxury vehicle and because most of our clientele comes from overseas, when it comes to luxury vehicles it doesn’t matter what the labour cost is because we’re only building 30 to 50 vehicles a year.”

His company, the Hatzimihail Group, has stakes in a number of technological portfolios, including EFL Tech, American based Oryon Technologies, as well as companies in the Netherlands, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

His parents herald from Kos and he says he is actively training his three children George (8), Eva (5), and Sophia (3) to follow in the family entrepreneurial tradition.

John Paraskevopoulos, pictured here directly behind Barack Obama.

Prime Minister Tony Abbot’s first point of call with the world leaders at the G20 summit was thanks to John Paraskevopoulos.

Dubbed the ‘official greeter’ of the summit, John was the middle man in formally introducing the prime minister to the world’s most prominent leaders.

Already having worked on the G20 summit for close to 18 months, the role was thrust upon the 47-year-old thanks to his foreign affairs experience.

Currently working as a senior adviser in the prime minister’s department for five and a half years, John was previously a director in the national security and intelligence branch of the department of foreign affairs.

As an official greeter, he had to quickly learn more than 30 correct titles and pronunciations for all the world leaders, a job that could easily end in national embarrassment.

“Every time a leader arrived I had to rehearse the correct title so you don’t cause offence,” John says.

“You can’t call a prime minister ‘Your Excellency’, that’s only for a head of state, usually like a president.

“But someone like the Crown Prince of Arabia, you can’t call them ‘Your Excellency’ [either] because you’ll offend them, they have to be ‘Your Royal Highness’.”

Over a couple of days, John was able to see first hand the personality traits that distinguished the leaders. Those that stood out were the ones that shattered stereotypes but also exuded a certain aura.

One of the most impressive world leaders John met was US President Barack Obama.

“People always talk about the star quality of someone like Obama,” he says.

“What impressed me about him was that he was warm and engaging, and he was the only leader of those that I met that asked for my name, and he was genuinely interested in me. It was a shock, because I was there to do all the introductions but he introduced himself to me first before I had a chance to speak.”

Amazingly, President Obama extended pleasantries to almost every staff member at the G20, whether they were big players or to a young girl controlling the lift.

“He broke away from the group and made a bee line for her and said “I just want to thank you for all your help today, you’ve done a great job”,” John says.

“She was just shaking, she didn’t expect it. She didn’t expect that sort of reception.”

While Obama carried the star power, no one made John more nervous than Russia’s president Vladimir Putin.

“I was very apprehensive about meeting Putin, he probably didn’t feel very welcome here given what’s happened, but he was actually somewhat understated in his demeanour – almost shy,” John reveals.

“I expected a tough guy persona which one often hears about but I was surprised to see quite the opposite on that occasion.”

John was also able to see how many of the politicians exuded high levels of charisma.

“The president of Mexico (Enrique Peña Nieto) is very very charismatic and charming. He’s the suavest man I’ve ever met,” John says.

“Then you had the very young Italian prime minster (Matteo Renzi), he’s only 39 but again he was quite casual and ‘Latin’ in his body language – winking at me and saying Buongiorno in Italian as we shook hands.”

Away from the leaders at the summit, the past 18 months have been undeniably a challenge for John.

Taking on the role as a member of the G20 taskforce and working alongside 160 people, the past week has been the culmination of more than two years’ work for his team.

Returning back to Canberra mid week, John is still in recovery mode from the G20.

“What’s next? I don’t know, I’m just relieved that there weren’t any major calamities,” he says with a laugh.

“When you try and bring that many people and that many leaders in such a short period of time the logistics are a nightmare but there was a lot of very good preparation for it and it went quite smoothly.”

Always connected to the government of the day, John has been an advisor on complex issues for more than 25 years.

Before his role in the prime minister’s office, he spent three years at Parliament House as the parliamentary liaison officer for the Senate, where he handled complex relationships to help facilitate the passage of important government legislation.

He was privy to sensitive negotiations at a very high level and had the job of providing accurate advice to the prime minister’s office, federal senators and senior officials on parliamentary procedures.

John’s contributions to the country haven’t gone unnoticed, as he received the National Australia Day Achievement Award for his contribution to the establishment of a new national heritage regime for Australia.

source: Neos Kosmos

Ο τεχνικός της Λίβερπουλ, Μπρένταν Ρότζερς, ανέλαβε την ευθύνη για την κάκιστη πορεία της Λίβερπουλ, παραδεχόμενος ότι η θέση του είναι επισφαλής.

Tην απόλυτη ευθύνη για την ήττα από την Κρίσταλ Πάλας και την εν γένει κακή πορεία της Λίβερπουλ εξέφρασε ο τεχνικός της ομάδας, Μπρένταν Ρότζερς, μετά τη λήξη της αναμέτρησης.

A group of people — Greeks, Afghans, Iraqis, Syrians, Bulgarians, Iranians, Turks — gather around a steaming pot outside a dilapidated building complex from the 1930s set in the heart of Athens.

Dubbed the Ta Prosfygika, meaning “The Refugees”, the once stately complex was erected on what is now plum real estate in downtown Athens to house some of the hundreds of thousands of Greeks chased from Turkey between the two world wars.

Under the international 1923 Lausanne Treaty closing one of the last chapters of the Great War, Greece and Turkey exchanged each other’s migrant populations — 385,000 Turks living in Greece and 1.3 million Greek settlers in Turkey.

Some of their descendants still live in the decaying complex, others around the pot are recently-arrived refugees eking out a living in economically-crippled Greece.

“It’s our Sunday get-together, the proof we can help each other in these difficult times, struggle against alienation,” said Lucas P. as he poured tomato sauce over noodles.

Lucas, a bank employee, works as a volunteer every Sunday, helping to cook for about 100 people here, immigrants as well as homeless Greeks.

For the past several years these people have been squatting in around half of the 228 small housing units initially built for an earlier generation of refugees.

“We all live together, cheek by jowl,” said Aras Hosien. “The Greeks help the foreign children to learn the language, they throw parties, show movies. It’s like a family.

Hosien, 34, is an Iraqi Kurd who shares his apartment with an Iranian from the southern city of Shiraz.

The lobby of one of the buildings has been turned into a sort of activity centre for children — there are around 30 of them aged between five and 15. The walls are adorned with paintings and the letters of the Greek alphabet.

“The children have difficulties at school, and we try to help them,” said Vaguelis, 31, who was a squatter here three years ago and still serves on the residents’ coordination team.

Prime real estate

The complex stretches for eight blocks along a central artery of the Greek capital, its crumbling facades an eyesore near the Supreme Court, police headquarters, and major hospitals.

Across the way is the stadium of Athens’ premier football club Panathinaïkos.

It stands on 1.5 hectares (nearly four acres) of prime real estate.

For now the wastelands between each block serve as car-parks during the working week.

“These stone buildings, with characteristics of the Bauhaus style, were the Greek idea of public housing at the time,” said Yannis Polyzos, a professor of urban planning at the Athens Polytechnic.

The German modernist Bauhaus art school deeply influenced design and architecture across Europe between the two wars, and the decaying complex, which has been declared a “national heritage”, cannot be demolished, said Polyzos.

The cash-strapped government that owns the major part of the building is avid to sell at a profit to help balance its books rather than invest in restoration work.

The remaining 30-odd private owners, descendants of the original refugees of whom only a few still reside in the complex, too would like to sell.

“Living conditions are abysmal in these derelict buildings that offer very little sanitation,” said one of the private owners, who asked to remain anonymous.

“I’m not a racist, I understand that these people have to live somewhere, but the authorities need to force them out because the complex is worth a lot of money,” he added.

Some of the squatters would agree. “It’s not a good life for our children here,” said Mohanomo Kezari, an Afghan refugee who fled to Greece with his family to escape the Taliban, but who, like many others dreams of moving on elsewhere in Europe.

“I’d rather go live somewhere else, in Sweden, Germany or Austria,” he said.

But many of the Prosfygika squatters are content with life within this multicultural community, defending it as a “social self-management and cohabitation project for people of different origins.”

source:ekathimerini.com