RTC Director

Britain's Cameron Visits Afghanistan to Spur Taliban Peace Talks

British Prime Minister David Cameron made an unannounced visit to Afghanistan on Saturday to reinvigorate peace talks with the Taliban and reassure the Kabul government of the international community's continued support.

After a meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, Cameron told reporters in Kabul that Britain and the United States want peace and stability in the country and have no other agenda. He expressed hope that peace talks with the Taliban will begin soon.

''We want peace and stability in Afghanistan, we want the return of the Taliban back to their country; we want them to be part of this society and this policy and to work for their own country. That is our desire and we hope the peace talks will begin as soon as possible as to what the Taliban want we will hear from them once the peace talks start.``

Cameron's visit comes just days after a brazen Taliban attack in central Kabul shattered hopes that the war is over. Sporadic attacks on government and international forces throughout the country have been blamed on the Taliban.

Afghan President Karzai vowed that those attacks will not deter his government from seeking peace.

''The attack that was organized near the presidential palace will not deter us from seeking peace. Already we have had them killing the Afghan people, but we still ask for peace. This was peanuts, comparatively speaking. Quite and irrelevant attack, we are more concerned when they attack the Afghan civilians; we are more concerned when they attack Afghan schools and children. I wish they spent all their time attacking the presidential palace and leave the rest of the country alone."

Cameron visited British military bases in southern Afghanistan before flying to the capital for talks with President Karzai.

A meeting between U.S. and Taliban representatives scheduled to take place in Qatar earlier this month was cancelled after protests by the Afghan government that the Taliban was styling itself as an Afghan government in exile.

President Karzai broke off security talks with the United States in mid-June and threatened to boycott the peace process altogether.
 
From Kabul, Prime Minister Cameron is traveling on to Islamabad for talks with Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

Meanwhile, the deputy commander of NATO-led forces in Afghanistan says that an opportunity to bring peace to Afghanistan was missed when the Taliban were on the defensive in 2002. British General Nick Carter, told Saturday's Guardian newspaper that the country will need western military support beyond next year when U.S. troops are scheduled to leave.

Afghanistan is in the process of preparing for presidential elections in April of 2014.

by RTC Director

Obama pays tribute to ailing Mandela, but tries to focus on economic message

Paying tribute to his personal hero, President Barack Obama met privately Saturday with Nelson Mandela's family as the world anxiously awaited news on the condition of the ailing 94-year-old anti-apartheid leader.

Obama, who has spoken movingly about Mandela throughout his trip to Africa, praised the former South African president's "moral courage" during remarks from the grand Union Buildings where Mandela was inaugurated as his nation's first black president.

The U.S. president also called on the continent's leaders, including in neighboring Zimbabwe, to take stock of Mandela's willingness to put country before self and step down after one term despite his immense popularity.

"We as leaders occupy these spaces temporarily and we don't get so deluded that we think the fate of our country doesn't depend on how long we stay in office," Obama said during a news conference with South African President Jacob Zuma.

Obama's stop in South Africa marked the midway point of a weeklong trip to Africa, his most significant engagement with the continent since taking office in 2009.

His lack of personal attention on the region has frustrated some Africans who had high expectations for the first black American president and son of a Kenyan man.

Even with Mandela's health casting a shadow over his visit, Obama tried to keep focus on an agenda that includes deeper U.S. economic ties with Africa. The president dismissed suggestions that he was only investing personal capital on Africa's economy now as a response to the increased focus on the continent by China, India, Brazil and others.

"I want everybody playing in Africa," he said. "The more, the merrier."

But the president pointedly called on Africans to make sure that countries seeking an economic foothold on the continent are making a "good deal for Africa."

"If somebody says they want to come build something here, are they hiring African workers?" Obama said. "If somebody says that they want to help you develop your natural resources, how much of the money is staying in Africa? If they say that they're very interested in a certain industry, is the manufacturing and value-added done in Africa? "

The president did not specifically single out China, but some African leaders have criticized Beijing for such behaviors.

Obama's focus on trade and business appeared to be well received in Africa, home to six of the world's 10 fastest-growing economies. The majority of the questions he received from the South African press and later at a town hall meeting with young African leaders focused on U.S. economic interests in the region.

Between his two events, Obama spent about 30 minutes meeting privately with two of Mandela's daughters and several of his grandchildren at the former leader's foundation offices in Johannesburg. He also spoke by phone with Mandela's wife, Graça Machel, who remained by her husband's side at the Pretoria hospital where he has battled a lung infection for three weeks.

In a statement following the call, Machel said she drew strength from the Obama and his "touch of personal warmth."

Obama, who has met Mandela in person only once before, did not visit the former leader in the hospital out of respect for his family's wishes, the White House said. Ahead of his arrival in South Africa, the president had told reporters that he did not need "a photo-op" and didn't want to be obtrusive.

Obama ascent to the White House has drawn inevitable comparisons to Mandela. Both are their nations' first black presidents, symbols of racial barrier breaking and winners of the Nobel Peace Prize.

Zuma said Obama and Mandela "both carry the dreams of millions of people in Africa and in the diaspora who were previously oppressed." Zuma said Mandela's condition remained the same as it had in recent days — critical yet stable — though he expressed hope that Mandela soon would leave the hospital.

Obama, Zuma and other dignitaries held a moment of silence for Mandela during a dinner Saturday night.

Source-AP

by RTC Director

Biden asks Ecuador's president to reject NSA leaker Edward Snowden's asylum

Vice President Joe Biden has asked Ecuador to turn down an asylum request from National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden, the country's president said Saturday.

Rafael Correa, in a weekly television address, offered little sympathy for the Obama administration's view that Snowden is a criminal who should be swiftly returned to the U.S. At the same time, he vowed to seek American input on any asylum request and suggested Snowden will have to answer for his actions.

The Friday phone call between Correa and Biden — it's the highest-level conversation between the U.S. and Ecuador to be disclosed since Snowden began seeking asylum — added to the confusion about Snowden's status. Facing espionage charges in the U.S., Snowden is believed to be holed up in a Moscow airport's transit zone and seeking safe passage to Ecuador, the country seen as likeliest to shelter America's most wanted fugitive.

Julian Assange, founder of the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks, has been given asylum in Ecuador's embassy in London.

Correa said he had a "friendly and very cordial" conversation with Biden, and told the vice president that Ecuador hadn't sought to be put in the situation of deciding whether to harbor an American justice-dodger. He said Ecuador can't consider the asylum request until Snowden is on Ecuadorean soil.

"The moment that he arrives, if he arrives, the first thing is we'll ask the opinion of the United States, as we did in the Assange case with England," Correa said. "But the decision is ours to make."

White House spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan confirmed that the two leaders spoke by phone Friday and discussed Snowden, but she wouldn't disclose any details about the conversation.

A staunch critic of the U.S., Correa rebuked the Obama administration for hypocrisy, invoking the case of brothers Roberto and William Isaias, bankers whose extradition from the U.S. Correa said Ecuador has been seeking. "Let's be consistent. Have rules for everyone, because that is a clear double-standard here," he said.

The leftist leader sought to direct attention away from Snowden's actions and back to the U.S. spying secrets he exposed, summoning a theme he's invoked to the delight of his strongest backers since Snowden, a former NSA contractor, revealed the agency's massive Internet and phone surveillance to two newspapers, fleeing all the while from Hong Kong to Moscow in evasion of U.S. authorities.

"The really grave thing is what Snowden has reported," Correa said. "He will have to assume his responsibilities, but the grave thing is his reporting of the biggest massive spy operation in the history of humanity, inside and outside the United States."

Ecuadorean officials have acknowledged its embassy in London issued Snowden a letter of safe passage that calls on other countries to allow him to travel to asylum in Ecuador. But Ecuador's secretary of political management, Betty Tola, said the letter was invalid because it was issued without central government approval in Quito, the capital.

Obama and his aides have tempered their rhetoric about Snowden in recent days after more heated attempts to pressure China and Russia over his extradition raised tensions with those nations, threatening to undercut cooperation with the two major powers on other issues.

But Ecuador has seemed to delight in tweaking the U.S. over the issue, accusing America of human rights violations and blowing off warnings about how the U.S. might respond if Ecuador doesn't cooperate.

After the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., on Wednesday threatened an effort to block renewal of Ecuador's tariff benefits on hundreds of millions of dollars in trade, Ecuador preemptively renounced the benefits themselves, claiming the trade deal had become "a new instrument of blackmail."

As for Biden, Correa suggested it wasn't personal. He praised the vice president for being more courteous than "those badly behaved and confused ones in the Senate who threaten our country."

Source-AP

by RTC Director

Tension rises ahead of Egypt protest calling for Morsi's ouster

Organizers of a mass protest against Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi claimed Saturday that more than 22 million people have signed their petition demanding the Islamist leader step down, asserting that the tally was a reflection of how much the public has turned against his rule.

The announcement adds to a sense of foreboding on the eve of opposition-led mass demonstrations that many fear could turn deadly and quickly spin out of control, dragging the country into a dangerous round of political violence.

The demonstrations planned for Sunday reflect the growing polarization of the nation since Morsi took power, with the president and his Islamist allies in one camp and seculars, liberals, moderate Muslims and Christians on the other.

There is a sense among opponents and supporters of Morsi that Sunday's rally is a make or break day. The opposition feels empowered by the petition, known as Tamarod, or Rebel, but it offered no proof regarding the figures. If verified, it would mean that nearly double the number of people who voted for Morsi a year ago are now calling for him to step down.

"Honestly, if (Sunday) is not a game changer, we might all just pack up our bags and leave," said Mahmoud Salem, a prominent blogger known by his blog's name Sandmonkey and a vocal critic of the Muslim Brotherhood, from which Morsi hails.

While violence is likely in such a tense atmosphere, Salem said it would not play out in favor of Morsi supporters because they will be outnumbered.

"They have alienated everybody," he said. Even if no violence breaks out, Salem said civil disobedience is expected in a movement designed now to "save the country."

Morsi's supporters, on the other hand, question the petitions, saying his opponents are led by members of the ousted regime of Hosni Mubarak who are trying to orchestrate a comeback and are instigating violence.

"Today and tomorrow will be the real birth of this nation," said Hani Salaheddin, a presenter on the Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated TV station Misr 25, predicting that Sunday will bring an end to the questioning of Morsi's mandate.

"Tomorrow is the end of every corrupt person," he said, as the slogan "legitimacy (of the ballot box) is a red line," appeared on the screen.

Already, clashes across a string of cities north of Cairo over the past week have left eight people dead, including an American and a 14-year old, and hundreds injured. Clashes broke out outside offices of the Muslim Brotherhood and its party in at least five different governorates, and rival protests turned into violent confrontations.

Thousands are still taking part in rival sit-ins, in place since Friday in Tahrir Square for opponents and in an east Cairo suburb, Nasr City, for supporters of Morsi.

Source-AP

by RTC Director

Thousands gather in Istanbul's to demand justice

Thousands of protesters returned to Istanbul's Taksim Square on Saturday, demanding justice for a demonstrator slain by police fire during demonstrations that have swept Turkey this month. Police later forced the protesters out of the square, pushing them back using their shields.

In the capital, Ankara, police fired tear gas and pressurized water to break up a similar protest by a group of about 200 people, the Dogan news agency reported.

Turkey has been hit by a wave of protests this month that were ignited by a brutal police crackdown on a peaceful environmental sit-in at a park near Taksim. The demonstrations soon turned into a wide outpouring of discontent with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government. Four people — three demonstrators and one police officer — have been killed and thousands injured.

The demonstrations have largely subsided in recent days, but thousands converged back on the square on Saturday, angry over a court decision this week that released a police officer from custody pending his trial for the killing of a protester in Ankara.

The protesters also denounced the killing of a Kurdish demonstrator by paramilitary police in a mainly Kurdish town on Friday.

Police allowed protesters to chant slogans for some two hours before issuing a warning for them to disperse. They then moved in, pushing the crowd away from the square. They arrested several people in the process, including some foreign nationals, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported.

Earlier Saturday, hundreds in southeast Turkey attended the funeral of the Kurdish youth, who was shot while protesting the construction of a military post. Eight other people were injured in the same protest when security forces fired on them in the mainly Kurdish town of Lice.

The government said it had launched an investigation into the incident, which came as autonomy-seeking Kurdish rebels are withdrawing from Turkey as part of peace talks with the Turkish government.

A rebel commander last week criticized Turkish government efforts to build new military posts amid the peace efforts.

by RTC Director