Correo de Noticias al 16/6/07

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/16/index.php?section=opinion&article=a06a1culpr

Sergio Ramírez/ I

El regreso de la diosa

Dentro de dos días, este lunes 18, Carlos Fuentes presentará en la Sala Valle Inclán del Círculo de Bellas Artes de Madrid, España, el primer tomo de sus Obras Reunidas, que publica el Fondo de Cultura Económica. El proyecto consta de 12 volúmenes que reunirán las novelas, cuentos, ensayos y obras de teatro. El primer volumen, Fundaciones mexicanas, está integrado por las novelas La muerte de Artemio Cruz y Los años con Laura Díaz. Como una primicia de La Jornada, presentamos el prólogo de Sergio Ramírez para este volumen.

http://www.proceso.com.mx/noticia.html?sec=0&nta=51639

Niega Woldenberg un “fraude maquinado” en las elecciones de 2006

de la redacción

México, D.F., 15 de junio (apro).- Ante integrantes del Frente Amplio Progresista (FAP) del Partido de la Revolución Democrática, José Woldenberg, expresidente del Instituto Federal Electoral (IFE), aseguró que no se ha podido comprobar que haya habido un fraude en las elecciones presidenciales de 2006.

http://www.proceso.com.mx/analisis_int.html?an=51646

Ejército en la mira

jorge carrasco araizaga

México, D.F. (apro).- De nueva cuenta, en las próximas semanas el Ejército Mexicano se encontrará enmedio del escándalo al que lo ha sometido el propio gobierno de Felipe Calderón.

José Luis Soberanes, presidente de la Comisión Nacional de los Derechos Humanos (CNDH), está por dar a conocer el informe sobre la violación sexual sufrida por dos mujeres en Michoacán a manos de militares.

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/16/index.php?section=opinion&article=004o1pol

Desfiladero

Jaime Avilés

A la vuelta de la casa de Sabina: apuntes

Plan México: tropas y base de EU aquí

Pretextos: Al Qaeda y Mara Salvatrucha

Por eso les estorba la Ley de Neutralidad

Cuando hace poco los diputados del PAN trataron de acabar con la Ley de la Neutralidad, esta columna pensó lo peor: que la medida quería crear condiciones para que Felipe Calderón pudiese enviar tropas mexicanas a las guerras imperiales de George WC Bush. Ahora, tras la noticia del pasado 8 de junio -México negocia con Estados Unidos la aplicación de un plan contra la guerrilla y el narcotráfico, similar al que existe y no sirve para nada en Colombia-, Desfiladero comprendió que antes de pensar lo peor debió pensar lo obvio.

http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/431530.html

Balean a reportero de TV Azteca; lo reportan delicado

Dispara sujeto desconocido en dos ocasiones contra David Cuéllar, quien llegaba a su casa tras concluir su jornada laboral

Balean a reportero de TV Azteca; lo reportan delicadoBalean a reportero de TV Azteca; lo reportan delicado

Fernando Martínez

El Universal

Ciudad de México

Sábado 16 de junio de 2007

08:35 David Cuéllar Montero, reportero de TV Azteca, fue agredido por un sujeto desconocido, quien le dio dos balazos uno el el brazo y otro en la espalda y después huyó.

http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/graficos/confabulario/numero06-16-07.htm

Umberto Eco

Sobre lo políticamente correcto.

La tarea de buscar sustitutos eufemísticos para evitar la discriminación o el racismo llega a resultar ridícula, impositiva, a veces falta de sentido común. Así lo demuestra el semiólogo italiano Umberto Eco en el siguiente texto, adelanto editorial de A paso de cangrejo (Debate, 2007), volumen que recoge artículos, reflexiones y decepciones que el autor de El nombre de la rosa publicó en diversos medios durante los últimos seis años.

http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/articulos/40676.html

Un vaso de vino diario reduce colesterol y artritis

Aseguran expertos que contiene antioxidantes como los polifenoles, presentes sobre todo en la piel y las semillas de la uva, que son beneficiosos para el organismo

http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/16/81359/

Sospechan irregularidades en último año de gobierno de Vicente Fox

Legisladores dispuestos a llegar hasta las últimas consecuencias en los asuntos en que se detecten anomalías

México, DF.– El diputado Horacio Duarte Jacques, del Partido Revolucionario Institucional, aseguró que en la revisión de la Cuenta Pública 2006 se percibe un desorden en las finanzas del último año de la administración de Vicente Fox.

http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/16/81374/

Sarkozy quiere a Blair como presidente de la Unión Europea

La oficina del primer ministro indicó que Blair no desea ocupar la presidencia de la UE.

Londres.- El primer ministro británico Tony Blair ha sido propuesto como presidente de la Unión Europea por el mandatario francés Nicolas Sarkozy, dijo el sábado un diario británico.

http://news.independent.co.uk/fisk/article2663199.ece

Robert Fisk: Welcome to 'Palestine'

Published: 16 June 2007

How troublesome the Muslims of the Middle East are. First, we demand that the Palestinians embrace democracy and then they elect the wrong party - Hamas - and then Hamas wins a mini-civil war and presides over the Gaza Strip. And we Westerners still want to negotiate with the discredited President, Mahmoud Abbas. Today "Palestine" - and let's keep those quotation marks in place - has two prime ministers. Welcome to the Middle East.

Who can we negotiate with? To whom do we talk? Well of course, we should have talked to Hamas months ago. But we didn't like the democratically elected government of the Palestinian people. They were supposed to have voted for Fatah and its corrupt leadership. But they voted for Hamas, which declines to recognise Israel or abide by the totally discredited Oslo agreement.

No one asked - on our side - which particular Israel Hamas was supposed to recognise. The Israel of 1948? The Israel of the post-1967 borders? The Israel which builds - and goes on building - vast settlements for Jews and Jews only on Arab land, gobbling up even more of the 22 per cent of "Palestine" still left to negotiate over ?

And so today, we are supposed to talk to our faithful policeman, Mr Abbas, the "moderate" (as the BBC, CNN and Fox News refer to him) Palestinian leader, a man who wrote a 600-page book about Oslo without once mentioning the word "occupation", who always referred to Israeli "redeployment" rather than "withdrawal", a "leader" we can trust because he wears a tie and goes to the White House and says all the right things. The Palestinians didn't vote for Hamas because they wanted an Islamic republic - which is how Hamas's bloody victory will be represented - but because they were tired of the corruption of Mr Abbas's Fatah and the rotten nature of the "Palestinian Authority".

I recall years ago being summoned to the home of a PA official whose walls had just been punctured by an Israeli tank shell. All true. But what struck me were the gold-plated taps in his bathroom. Those taps - or variations of them - were what cost Fatah its election. Palestinians wanted an end to corruption - the cancer of the Arab world - and so they voted for Hamas and thus we, the all-wise, all-good West, decided to sanction them and starve them and bully them for exercising their free vote. Maybe we should offer "Palestine" EU membership if it would be gracious enough to vote for the right people?

All over the Middle East, it is the same. We support Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan, even though he keeps warlords and drug barons in his government (and, by the way, we really are sorry about all those innocent Afghan civilians we are killing in our "war on terror" in the wastelands of Helmand province).

We love Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, whose torturers have not yet finished with the Muslim Brotherhood politicians recently arrested outside Cairo, whose presidency received the warm support of Mrs - yes Mrs - George W Bush - and whose succession will almost certainly pass to his son, Gamal.

We adore Muammar Gaddafi, the crazed dictator of Libya whose werewolves have murdered his opponents abroad, whose plot to murder King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia preceded Tony Blair's recent visit to Tripoli - Colonel Gaddafi, it should be remembered, was called a "statesman" by Jack Straw for abandoning his non-existent nuclear ambitions - and whose "democracy" is perfectly acceptable to us because he is on our side in the "war on terror".

Yes, and we love King Abdullah's unconstitutional monarchy in Jordan, and all the princes and emirs of the Gulf, especially those who are paid such vast bribes by our arms companies that even Scotland Yard has to close down its investigations on the orders of our prime minister - and yes, I can indeed see why he doesn't like The Independent's coverage of what he quaintly calls "the Middle East". If only the Arabs - and the Iranians - would support our kings and shahs and princes whose sons and daughters are educated at Oxford and Harvard, how much easier the "Middle East" would be to control.

For that is what it is about - control - and that is why we hold out, and withdraw, favours from their leaders. Now Gaza belongs to Hamas, what will our own elected leaders do? Will our pontificators in the EU, the UN, Washington and Moscow now have to talk to these wretched, ungrateful people (fear not, for they will not be able to shake hands) or will they have to acknowledge the West Bank version of Palestine (Abbas, the safe pair of hands) while ignoring the elected, militarily successful Hamas in Gaza?

It's easy, of course, to call down a curse on both their houses. But that's what we say about the whole Middle East. If only Bashar al-Assad wasn't President of Syria (heaven knows what the alternative would be) or if the cracked President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad wasn't in control of Iran (even if he doesn't actually know one end of a nuclear missile from the other).

If only Lebanon was a home-grown democracy like our own little back-lawn countries - Belgium, for example, or Luxembourg. But no, those pesky Middle Easterners vote for the wrong people, support the wrong people, love the wrong people, don't behave like us civilised Westerners.

So what will we do? Support the reoccupation of Gaza perhaps? Certainly we will not criticise Israel. And we shall go on giving our affection to the kings and princes and unlovely presidents of the Middle East until the whole place blows up in our faces and then we shall say - as we are already saying of the Iraqis - that they don't deserve our sacrifice and our love.

How do we deal with a coup d'état by an elected government?

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/article2663163.ece

China shocked by footage of child slaves being beaten and whipped

By Clifford Coonan in Beijing

Published: 16 June 2007

It has made for horrifying viewing on Chinese state television - hundreds of child slaves beaten with shovels, whipped by thug overseers, guarded in concentration camp-like conditions by vicious dogs, sores festering on their bodies as they toiled without end in a brick factory in China's dusty heartland.

The TV footage shows hollow-eyed teenage boys, many of them kidnapped from their homes around China, sleeping on beds of brick in hellish dormitories, the doors tied shut with wire and the windows barred.

As evidence of official neglect accumulated, the fate of the children prompted President Hu Jintao to demand an investigation into what happened in the brick kilns of Shanxi province.

But for now, the sympathies are with the slave workers. "We wanted to run but we couldn't. I tried once and was beaten," said one inmate, clearly traumatised from his experience.

It is a familiar refrain, and an increasingly common one in central China. Recent days have seen a number of slave factories uncovered by police cracking down on slave labour, the dark underbelly of China's burgeoning economic growth. According to the official Xinhua news agency, around 35,000 police rescued 468 people after checking 7,500 kilns. They made up to 120 arrests.

Yang Aizhi, 46, has been looking for her 16-year-old son, who went missing on 8 March. After hearing he may have been kidnapped to work in the kilns, she went to more than 100 brick kilns in Shanxi and Henan and said that "most kilns were forcing children to do hard labour" and whipping them when they were too tired to work. Some of the child slaves were still wearing their school uniforms, she said. Ms Yang has yet to find her son.

Chinese viewers have been transfixed by the horrific images emerging from Shanxi and Henan provinces. Many of the workers were mentally disabled, but were still forced to work 16 hours a day and given just 15 minutes to eat their food.

"Our conservative estimate is that at least 1,000 minors from Henan have been trapped and cheated into back-breaking work in these Shanxi brick kilns," said one journalist who has been covering the scandal.

Significantly, the main official newspaper, the People's Daily, put at least part of the blame on corrupt local officials. "At present, some grassroots governments are grappling with huge debts, so they are sluggish in administration and even gain incomes illegally, causing instability in rural areas," the newspaper said.

Three weeks ago, 31 people were freed by police from slave labour at a brick kiln in Hongtong, a county about 240km (150 miles) south of Taiyuan, the provincial capital of Shanxi.

http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2663179.ece

Russia to investigate claims of British spying

By Anne Penketh, Diplomatic editor

Published: 16 June 2007

Moscow risked heightening tensions with Britain yesterday when the Russian security agency announced that it had launched an investigation into suspected British spying related to the Litvinenko case.

A statement from the Federal Security Service, the successor agency of the KGB, said the investigation was based on a statement by the chief murder suspect, Andrei Lugovoy, who made the accusations about British spying activities at a news conference in Moscow on 31 May. The security agency was also investigating "additional information from him about intelligence activity by the British special services on the territory of Russia".

Mr Lugovoy's extradition is being sought by the Crown Prosecution Service, who accuse him of deliberately poisoning another former KGB agent, Alexander Litvinenko, who died after drinking tea spiked with the radioactive isotope polonium-210 last November.

The murder triggered a diplomatic battle between the Kremlin and London at a time when relations have soured over the activities of prominent Russian exile Boris Berezovsky, whose extradition is wanted by Moscow. The Kremlin has suggested that it is Mr Berezovsky, and not Mr Lugovoy, who may be responsible for the murder of the Mr Litvinenko.

The British embassy in Moscow reacted to the statement from the Russian security service saying: "The Litvinenko affair is a criminal matter and not an issue of intelligence."

It added: "A British citizen was killed in London, and UK citizens and visitors were put at risk. We are seeking and expect full cooperation from the Russian authorities in bringing the perpetrator to face British justice."

The Foreign Office refused to comment further. But a western diplomat said that it looked like a new round in the Kremlin's strategy of "muddying the waters" in the case. Mr Lugovoy claimed that both Mr Litvinenko and Mr Berezovsky had contacts with British intelligence and that Mr Berezovsky had given Britain sensitive information about Russia. The UK-based exile vigorously denied the accusations.

Although the Russian authorities have not yet responded in writing to the extradition request from the Crown Prosecution Service, President Vladimir Putin has called the request "stupidity" on the ground that Russia is constitutionally barred from extraditing its citizens for trial.

But Britain is refusing to give ground. .

Yesterday, there was further dismay when arms talks in Vienna focusing on preserving a cornerstone of European security, the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty (CFE), ended in deadlock. Reiterating a threat to pull out of the 1990 pact, the Russian delegation chief Anatoly Antonov said: "This treaty is for all intents and purposes no longer viable."

The British arms control expert Dan Plesch warned yesterday that the CFE should not be allowed to become a bargaining chip in Russia's tense relationship with the West.

He pointed out that the treaty under discussion in Vienna had resulted in "the verified destruction of more than 60,000 combat aircraft and attack helicopters, battle tanks, armoured combat vehicles, and artillery since 1992, and permits ongoing intrusive inspections of military installations from the Caucasus to the Atlantic.

"This achievement should be the basis of an initiative from NATO and the EU to extend these peace-building agreements into the world's conflict zones. Sadly, the diplomats in Brussels and Vienna lack this vision and are allowing the foundations of European security to crumble.

"The CFE treaty must be seen not as a relic of the Cold War but as tangible proof of what arms control can achieve," he said.

http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2663181.ece

Murdered Mafia boss was a philosophy student

By Peter Popham in Rome

Published: 16 June 2007

When the man on the motorcycle pulled alongside the convicted gangster Niccolo Ingarao on a Palermo street and shot him four times in the chest and once in the head, he murdered the most studious Mafia boss of modern times.

It emerged yesterday that when Mr Ingarao, 46, was not barking orders at underlings, extorting protection money or counting the takings as the gang boss of the Porta Nuova neighbourhood, he was an avid student of philosophy.

Twenty-four hours before his execution-style killing, seen as a bloody move in the power struggle that followed the arrest of the capo di capi Bernardo Provenzano, Ingarao took an exam in the history of philosophy at Palermo University. His professor at the university, Pietro di Giovanni, said he did very well.

Ingarao was "a model student," Professor Di Giovanni told the Corriere della Sera newspaper. "He followed the lessons assiduously and was very conscientious and interested in the material. Like many mature students he was very committed.

"He had nice manners. One day he even came to the university with his wife. He said he owned a toy shop, and was interested in studying philosophy for his personal enrichment."

Well-read Sicilian gangsters are few and far between. The reading matter of Toto Riina, the bloodthirsty Corleone boss serving life in jail, is said to be restricted to La Gazzetta dello Sport, Italy's best-selling sports daily. When he was arrested, Provenzano had five copies of the Bible in his hideout, but no other reading material.

According to Ingarao's lawyer, Riccardo Russo, it was the Bible that first sparked his client's intellectual curiosity. "That's where it all started," he said. "He was particularly struck by the Book of the Wisdom of Solomon, in the Apocrypha. From the moment he read it he began to study, with ever-increasing interest."

Studying became a habit during the nine years he spent in Pagliarelli jail, from which he was freed with remission for good conduct. While serving his time, Ingarao devoured whatever reading matter he could lay his hands on. "Some time ago it was The Name of the Rose, more recently The Da Vinci Code," Mr Russo said.

http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/article2663197.ece

John Lichfield: A president drunk on his power

It is as if the mask of Sarko, the consummate politician, has slipped

Published: 16 June 2007

Nicolas Sarkozy probably was drunk at the G8 summit but he was not drunk on alcohol. He was drunk with excitement at being among the big boys (and the one big girl) at last. For the past four weeks the new French president has been drunk with excitement at his own success; intoxicated by his huge popularity; inebriated by the easy ride he has been given by the French media, even by a traditionally centre-left newspaper such as Le Monde.

The big questions remain. Is Nicolas Sarkozy genuinely something new in French politics? Answer: yes, up to a point. Are the French people truly ready for change, including painful change, as they and M. Sarkozy claim? Answer: it is too early to say.

"Sarko" will get a huge parliamentary majority in the second round of the legislative elections tomorrow. Nevertheless, there are straws swirling in the wind which could cluster into an anti-Sarko bonfire six or 12 months from now.

Belgian Francophone TV (often keen to tease the pompous big sister next door) showed a clip of President Sarkozy appearing late for a press conference at the G8 summit in Germany. In the clip, he looks breathless and flustered. He is late, the French president explains, with a vacant grin, because he spent "longer than expected" with President Vladimir Putin. He giggles; he smiles; his shoulders shake; he vaguely appeals for questions, as if he had never given a press conference before.

The Belgian TV presenter, rather cheekily, suggests that Sarkozy had "obviously not just drunk water" with Mr Putin. The short video clip has since become the subject of one of those unpleasant bouts of internet hysteria: an example of how the global village threatens to turn us all into global village idiots.

There have been two million "hits" on the "Sarko pissed" clip on YouTube and other internet video sites. Most of those people, presumably, accept unquestioningly the Belgian presenter's suggestion that Sarkozy was drunk. (The journalist has since apologised.)

In fact, Sarkozy never drinks. He went on to give a perfectly coherent press conference. If you look at the tape several times, he comes over not as drunk, but as overexcited, boyish, unprepared and unprofessional. It is as if, for a moment, the mask of Sarko, the consummate politician, has slipped. You see instead, an excited 52-year-old boy who suddenly finds himself President of France.

Some commentators, including myself, have compared Sarkozy to Tony Blair. There are interesting points of comparison but one could never imagine Blair being caught out unprepared in public like that. Blair's own opinion of Sarkozy is - according to my own reliable, non-feral source - that he is "strangely unformed". In other words, he has a tendency to make things up as he goes along; that the new French president does not have as clear a strategy and body of ideals as he likes to pretend.

All the same, you have to hand it to Sarkozy. His first four weeks in office have been a triumph. His approval ratings are in the stratosphere. His centre-right party, the Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (UMP), will scoop at least 70 per cent of the 577 seats in the national assembly tomorrow.

One of the principal limits to the president's popularity seems to be within his own marriage. Cécilia Sarkozy has been flitting in and out of official life as Première Dame. According to someone who knows her well, relations between the two remain severely strained. "Expect sparks," the source told me. "Sarkozy is more fragile than he seems and one of the main sources of his fragility is Cécilia."

The other main source of fragility may be M. Sarkozy's apparent chief strength: his extraordinary energy and determination to do everything himself (and be seen to do it). A cartoon by René Pétillon in the satirical weekly the Canard Enchainé showed President Sarkozy addressing a cabinet meeting. "I am going to make a broad statement of policy," the cartoon "Sarko" says. "And then I will hand over to myself for the details."

It has been clear from the beginning that President Sarkozy also intends to be Prime Minister Sarkozy... and Foreign Minister Sarkozy... and Finance Minister Sarkozy. This is dangerous in itself. The traditional political geography of the Fifth Republic placed the Prime Minister as a kind of wind-break to protect the President from the blasts of day-to-day public anger. Sarkozy seems to want to be his own wind-break.

There is more - and worse - than that.

President Sarkozy's ambition is not just to change the French welfare and tax system but to change the French collective psyche. He wants France to be a more can-do country, less instinctively dependent on the state, less hostile to the realities of the modern world, prepared to believe that all the old, invisible barriers to advancement in French society have been abolished.

The appointment of a woman of Arab origin, Rachida Dati, as justice minister was an important and welcome advance. And yet the man who wants to break down the old social and racial cronyism is also appointing his cronies to key positions. He has, Berlusconi-like, installed the former head of his private office, Laurent Solly, 36, as the head of the most watched French TV channel, TF1. Through his billionaire friends, he already has a grip on much of the written media, especially Paris-Match and the rest of the glossy magazine sector.

As if all this were not enough, Sarkozy seems determined, like some kind of African dictator, to control the opposition. Most of the sitting deputies of the old centrist party, the UDF, have been tempted to save their careers by joining a new, pro-Sarko, fake independent centre party. He is now talking of creating a new faction of "left-wingers for Sarkozy" in the National Assembly.

Officially, all this is intended to prepare the ramparts for the inevitable backlash against the Sarkozy programme of fiscal, social and economic reforms. Like Mrs Thatcher before him, M. Sarkozy wants to create a sense of inevitability. Il n'y a pas d'autre solution. There is no alternative. Already, however, one can trace the beginnings of a classic, French, political parabola. Enormous popularity turns into enormous unpopularity as the personal impact of the reform programme dawns on the French public.

What? We have to pay more towards the cost of our own medical care? No way. What? We have to pay higher VAT to relieve the burden of health and unemployment costs on the "social charges" on employers (ie on jobs)? No way.

M. Sarkozy may still be drunk on power and popularity but a hangover may not be far away.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/weather/Story/0,,2104362,00.html

Soldier missing and 40 factory staff trapped in floods

Alexandra Topping and Helen Pidd

Saturday June 16, 2007

The Guardian

A teenage soldier who fell into a swollen river was still missing and more than 40 workers remained trapped inside a factory yesterday after thunderstorms and torrential rain caused severe flooding across the UK. Train services were disrupted, homes flooded and motorists stranded after heavy rainfall which is expected to continue into the weekend.

http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,2103935,00.html

Futile, fraudulent or worse

Imperial Life in the Emerald City by Rajiv Chandrasekaran and The Occupation of Iraq by Ali A Allawi are two very different books on Iraq that point to the same grim conclusion, writes Oliver Miles

Saturday June 16, 2007

The Guardian

http://lifeandhealth.guardian.co.uk/family/story/0,,2103169,00.html

The paternal instinct

The number of men choosing to stay at home and raise the kids has doubled in the past 14 years. Blake Morrison asks them what it's like and why they do it

Saturday June 16, 2007

The Guardian

http://arts.guardian.co.uk/filmandmusic/story/0,,2071403,00.html

'Resist the temptation to ridicule this'

Has Quentin Tarantino made his first ever chick flick? Only if you ignore the guy who rams young girls with his car ... The director tells Damon Wise why Death Proof is his most 'real-life' film yet

Friday May 4, 2007

The Guardian

http://film.guardian.co.uk/features/featurepages/0,,2069286,00.html

For your entertainment

Mainstream movies are getting darker and more violent. And as Quentin Tarantino's latest project, Grindhouse, demonstrates, the worst of the violence is often directed at women. Kira Cochrane on the rise of 'torture porn'

Tuesday May 1, 2007

The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,,2069328,00.html

With the Brits in Helmand

What is life really like for British troops on tour in Afghanistan? Declan Walsh has just spent two weeks with them. Here, in a photo special, he describes his time on the front line

Tuesday May 1, 2007

The Guardian

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/16/washington/16immig.html?th&emc=th

Broad Effort to Resurrect Immigration Bill

By ROBERT PEAR

Published: June 16, 2007

WASHINGTON, June 15 — At 4:30 p.m. on June 7, the Roman Catholic Church defied the sponsors of a comprehensive immigration bill and urged the Senate not to move toward final passage of the measure without significant changes.

“Muy personal”

Entrevista con el cantautor cubano Silvio Rodríguez

Por: Amaury Pérez

(Junio de 1996)

Amaury Pérez: ¿Te consideras un hombre místico?

Silvio Rodríguez: No soy muy religioso en el sentido ortodoxo de lo que esto significa pero tanto la religión como lo místico tienen que ver entre sí pues no podemos prescindir de la mística, por que la vida está llena de deseos, de esperanzas, creo que la mística es inherente a todos los seres humanos aunque no me considero un hombre místico.

A.P.: ¿Cómo se siente una persona que ha iniciado, un estilo de cantar, una nueva manera de comunicarse, alguien que ha sabido dominar los duendes internos y los externos?

S.R.: Me maravilla que haya gente que pueda hacer esa interpretación, por que yo no me considero dominador de ningún tipo de duende, más bien me considero un objeto de los duendes porque no creo que inauguré nada. Las canciones que hice, me las susurraron, ellos estaban en el ambiente, en la época que vivíamos en esos momentos, en cierta forma fui un continuador.

A.P.: En tu casa hay muchos objetos curiosos, entre ellos un pequeño telescopio blanco, que incluso te llevas hasta cuando vas de vacaciones ¿es acaso que tu vida, de alguna manera, es regida por las estrellas?

S.R.: Realmente desde que era niño me interesaba la astronomía, pero también quería ser médico. Tuve un amigo fanático a la astrología y en una época me inculcó un poco aquellos conocimientos que he usado para comunicarme con los demás, porque son muchas la personas a las que les interesa el tema. Yo no puedo hacer una carta astral, ni soy un sagitario puro. Sin embargo cuando leí el horóscopo chino encontré mis afinidades, creo que soy más perro que Sagitario, pero te aclaro que jamás me he regido por las estrellas.

A.P.: ¿Cómo influyeron tus padres en tu futuro, en lo que actualmente eres?

S.R.: Considero que influyeron muchísimo, en general toda mi familia, mi padre me leyó a José Martí a Rubén Darío y de ahí creo que adquirí el hábito de lectura de mi madre y de su familia adquirí la musicalidad, no mucha por que yo no tengo la suficiente, y esa una de mis deficiencias, pues tengo un pésimo oído armónico. Sin embargo la familia de mi madre siempre fue cantadora, bailadora. Hay gente que se burla de mi, me dicen “patón”, sin embargo cuando era joven bailaba mucho, pero después que terminé el Servicio Militar que me metí de lleno en lo del canto, perdí el hábito del baile.

A.P.: ¿Disfrutas el haber sido profeta en tu tierra?

S.R.: No creo que haya sido profeta, he sido conocido, aceptado, querido y también ignorado, a veces hasta repudiado, pero yo creo que esto es un equilibrio. He tenido la oportunidad de conocer mi trabajo cosa que a veces muy poca gente consigue y eso es un privilegio y yo me siento muy agradecido.

A.P.: Se que eres buen hijo, buen padre. ¿de dónde sacas tu tiempo para combinar esto con tus proyectos culturales?

S.R.: En realidad cuando uno se empeña busca el tiempo y lo organiza para que le alcance y hacer todo lo que uno necesita. Hay una etapa en la vida que uno llega a ser el padre de todos y esto es una gran responsabilidad. Afortunadamente tengo una familia que es muy generosa conmigo, y siempre me ha consentido mucho.

A.P.: ¿Eres un experto en la ciencia ficción?

S.R.: No, yo sólo leo ciencia ficción desde que era joven, me gusta porque es una traspolación de la realidad lo que en otro ángulo. La ciencia ficción no es más que un género que se convirtió en una especie poética de la literatura.

A.P.: ¿Has escrito algo sobre ciencia ficción?

S.R.: Sí a veces he hecho algunas cosas.

A.P.: ¿Silvio la sala de tu casa la preside una inmensa foto del Che. Qué significa el Che en tu vida?

S.R.: El Che significó y significa aquella cosa que quisiéramos ser, la admiración extraordinaria por un hombre que supo poner la condición humana en el punto más alto. Como alguien ha dicho, el Che fue un hombre capaz de vivir como pensaba, yo creo fue especialmente atractivo para los jóvenes, porque un hombre así aunque haya muerto a los 40 años, no abandonó esa condición de joven, de buscador.

A.P.: ¿Te crees un hombre tímido?

S.R.: Lo soy para algunas cosas.

A.P.: ¿Qué queda del Silvio de San Antonio de los Baños?

S.R.: Pienso que unas cuantas cosas, queda por ejemplo el Silvio se ha ido abriendo paso en la medida de sus posibilidades, luchando, a veces tenazmente. Además una de las cosas que más disfruto hoy en día, es navegar por el río Ariguanabo y cuando tengo que hacer un regalo a un amigo, lo llevó a San Antonio y lo paseó por el río.

A.P.: ¿No te atemoriza la expectativa que pueda crear cada canción nueva?

S.R.: Casi no me entero de la expectativa que crea cada canción, eso es un problema de ustedes. Para mi, como para cualquiera que haya hecho muchas canciones, la expectativa consiste en tratar de buscar que una melodía no se parezca a la anterior, buscar nuevos temas, aunque ya no me torturo tanto con esto, pues hay épocas en que tengo más fluidez para hacer nuevas melodías.

A.P.: ¿Qué música te gusta escuchar?

S.R.: Me gusta mucho la música instrumental, los temas de películas, últimamente he hecho mucha música para cine. Curiosamente escucho pocas canciones y mucho menos las mías.

A.P.: ¿Tu crees que la nueva trova aún existe?

S.R.: Creo que existimos, los de aquella generación que dio lugar a esa etapa que fue denominada como nueva trova, pero creo que lo que existe es la canción inteligente, la canción que se comunica con el universo y eso crece también en otros países.

A.P.: ¿Por qué no te gustan los homenajes o los tributos?

S.R.: Realmente no me gustan porque me suenan a velorio, es como si le estuvieran poniendo velas a uno antes de morirse. Hay veces que uno no se puede negar, hay instituciones que quieren hacernos un reconocimiento y no hay más remedio que aceptarlo, pero pienso que los homenajes están para la gente que ya no están haciendo en activo, pero mientras uno esté creando, haciendo cosas no me parece bien.

A.P.: ¿La gente te ve con algo de misterio y quizás eso se deba al celo en que has mantenido tu vida privada?

S.R.: No sé, siempre he sido así, tengo un carácter reservado, pero no creo que haya misterios en mi vida privada, ni para mis amigos, ni para todos aquellos que me conocen.

A.P.: ¿Muchas personas consideran que hay hombres difíciles y hombres adorables, como tu ves esa dualidad?

S.R.: Me voy a remitir a una canción que escribí a los 21 años “yo sé que hay gente que me quiere.”

http://silvio.trovacub.net/entrevistas.html (Junio, 2007)

Correo de Noticias al 15/6/07

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=opinion&article=002a1edi

Editorial

La descomposición de la ANP

Mahmoud Abbas, presidente de la Autoridad Nacional Palestina (ANP) y máximo dirigente de Fatah, disolvió ayer el gobierno de unidad nacional encabezado por Ismail Haniyeh, jefe a su vez de Hamas; asimismo, el líder palestino declaró el estado de emergencia y aseguró que solicitará la intervención de una fuerza militar multinacional en la Franja de Gaza, donde desde hace una semana se vive una intensa confrontación armada. Hamas, por su parte, afirmó, por medio de su vocero Sami Abu Zuhri, que Haniyeh continuará al frente del gobierno palestino y rechazó la decisión de Abbas al considerar que ésta "no tiene ningún valor en la práctica". Esta declaración encierra un acertado y doloroso diagnóstico de la situación que se vive en esa región de Medio Oriente: dado el enorme grado de descomposición de la sociedad y la institucionalidad palestinas, resultan inútiles las medidas asumidas por Abbas, porque las instancias formales han perdido significado. En los territorios palestinos imperan hoy en día poderes fragmentados y fácticos, y la viabilidad de las instituciones creadas en el marco del proceso de paz de Oslo es por demás incierta. La ANP sólo puede mandar allí donde los milicianos de Fatah mantengan el control, y otro tanto ocurre con el gobierno de Haniyeh y los combatientes de Hamas.

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=politica&article=003n1pol

Plasmadas, ''entregas de dinero'' y regalos, favores varios, así como sus reuniones

Lista de ''favoritos'' de Ahumada, en agenda secretarial de 2003

Funcionarios, políticos, periodistas y árbitros, en sus páginas

Rosario Robles, muy citada

AGUSTIN SALGADO, GABRIELA ROMERO SANCHEZ

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=politica&article=012n2pol

Fueron atacadas luego de operativo en mayo pasado

Violaron militares a dos menores en Michoacán, confirma la CNDH

MARTIN DIEGO RODRIGUEZ

Guanajuato, Gto., 14 de junio. El presidente de la Comisión Nacional de los Derechos Humanos (CNDH), José Luis Soberanes Fernández, informó que han sido confirmados dos de los cuatro casos de violación denunciados por mujeres de Carácuaro, Michoacán, cometidos por miembros del Ejército durante un operativo antidrogas realizado el 2 de mayo pasado.

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=economia&article=025n2eco

Decae flujo de remesas: BdeM

ROBERTO GONZALEZ AMADOR

La desaceleración en el flujo de remesas es más que un hecho coyuntural. En un reporte emitido este jueves, el Banco de México confirmó el estancamiento en la captación de ese capital, el más importante después del petróleo. En el primer cuatrimestre del año, los emigrantes mexicanos enviaron 7 mil 310 millones de dólares, cantidad que representó un aumento de apenas 4 por ciento en comparación con el mismo periodo de 2006.

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=opinion&article=023a1pol

Luis Javier Garrido

La abdicación

El gobierno de facto de Felipe Calderón está aceptando en los hechos el fracaso que ha tenido durante seis meses en materia de seguridad y de empleo, y en diversos sectores de la derecha mexicana la preocupación es cada vez mayor por el destino del gobierno espurio que contra la razón y el derecho ayudaron a enquistarse y que hoy se halla a la deriva.

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=opinion&article=a06a1cul

John Berger

Borrar el pasado (algunas notas en torno a un dibujo)

Como las palabras, las apariencias pueden leerse también y, de entre las apariencias, el rostro humano constituye uno de los textos más largos.

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=estados&article=034n1est

Preside la Comisión de Medio Ambiente del Congreso estatal

Arrasa un diputado bosque en Jalapa para hacer residencias

Dice tener autorización

Desoye el gobierno protestas de ecologistas

ANDRES T. MORALES

Jalapa, Ver., 14 de junio. Justo Fernández Garibay, presidente de la Comisión del Medio Ambiente, Recursos Naturales y Aguas del Congreso local y ex dirigente estatal del Partido Verde Ecologista de México, inició la destrucción del predio La Joyita, uno de los últimos reductos de bosque de niebla en esta ciudad, para construir un fraccionamiento habitacional del lujo.

http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/columnas/65747.html

Bajo Reserva

Los periodistas de EL UNIVERSAL

15 de junio de 2007

Osiel Cárdenas da nervios

La ciudad de Monterrey y municipios aledaños se han convertido en un foco rojo para el gobierno federal en la batalla contra las mafias del narcotráfico. Ahora el tema de conversación en la Sultana del Norte está relacionado con las primeras declaraciones del capo del cártel del Golfo Osiel Cárdenas Guillén ante la justicia de Estados Unidos.

http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/431349.html

Arribarán a NL mil 600 federales

Se reúnen Ramírez Acuña y García Luna con el gobernador

Juan Cedillo

El Universal

Viernes 15 de junio de 2007

MONTERREY, NL.- Los secretarios de Gobernación y de Seguridad Pública federal, Francisco Ramírez Acuña y Genaro García Luna, acordaron con el gobernador Natividad González Parás, el arribo de mil 600 elementos de las fuerzas federales al estado, para reforzar la lucha en contra del crimen organizado.

http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/15/80876/

Rectifica la FIFA y margina sólo a La Paz y Cuzco

Con esta medida, quedan habilitados los estadios de Bogotá (2,640 metros), Quito (2,800 metros), Cochabamba (2,500 metros) y Arequipa (2,300 metros).

Asunción, Paraguay.- La Paz y Cuzco finalmente son las únicas ciudades vetadas por la nueva resolución de FIFA que prohibe la disputa de partidos internacionales en alturas superiores a los 3,000 metros sobre el nivel del mar.

http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/15/80879/

Preocupa a Monsiváis empobrecimiento del lenguaje

“No es que empobrezca solamente el vocabulario de los jóvenes, sino también el de niños y adultos, pero son los jóvenes quienes suelen marcar el rango de utilización de palabras”Â

México, DF.– Reconocido como uno de los mejores escritores de México, Carlos Monsiváis, manifestó su preocupación porque el culto a las imágenes produce, en forma constante, un creciente empobrecimiento del vocabulario oral entre la sociedad.

http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/15/80898/

El futbolista cubano que desertó, llegó a Miami

El delantero Lester Moré dijo que tomó la decisión de dejar el equipo porque “uno no ve el fruto de la profesión que hace. Yo ganaba 10 dólares al mes”.

Miami, Florida.- El delantero Lester Moré, quien desertó de la selección de Cuba durante la Copa Oro se encuentra en esta ciudad donde expresó su deseo de trabajar y jugar en el futbol en Estados Unidos.

http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/15/80887/

Apoya UNAM en reordenamiento ecológico en Michoacán

Posibilita su participación en acciones orientadas al mejoramiento del nivel de vida de los habitantes de las comunidades de alta marginación.Â

México, DF.– En el marco del programa de Servicio Social “La UNAM en tu comunidad”, 136 estudiantes contribuyeron al reordenamiento ecológico territorial en nueve municipios de Michoacán, mediante la estrategia de vinculación universidad-municipio.

http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/15/80908/

Mezcal, en la Cineteca Nacional

El realizador Ignacio Ortiz destacó la importancia de la función social del cineÂ

México, DF.– El realizador Ignacio Ortiz presentó su película “Mezcal” en la Cineteca Nacional, donde se le preguntó sobre algunos inconvenientes enfrentados durante el rodaje en el estado de Oaxaca, el filme se estrena este viernes con 10 copias.

http://www.proceso.com.mx/analisis_int.html?an=51535

Narcotienditas, proletarización de las drogas

josé gil olmos

México, D.F., 13 de junio (apro).- Se encuentran en la esquina de una calle, la casa de un vecino, el departamento contiguo, en el viejo callejón o en supuestas bodegas. Las narcotienditas son el fenómeno más claro de la proletarización de las drogas en México.

http://www.proceso.com.mx/noticia.html?sec=0&nta=51603

Virtual espaldarazo de Calderón a reclamo de Greenspan

carlos acosta córdova

México, D.F., 14 de junio (apro).- Las declaraciones vertidas ayer por el expresidente de la Reserva Federal estadunidense, Alan Greenspan, en torno a abrir Pemex a la inversión privada, generaron airadas reacciones –la mayoría de rechazo-- entre legisladores, exfuncionarios como José Angel Gurría y aun de la actual encargada del sector en el gobierno federal.

http://www.proceso.com.mx/noticia.html?sec=4&nta=51586&nsec=La+Capital

El GDF, listo para poner en marcha su canal de TV: Ebrard

de la redacción

México, D.F., 14 de junio (apro).- Tras destacar el anuncio de la Comisión Federal de Telecomunicaciones (Cofetel), el jefe de Gobierno del Distrito Federal, Marcelo Ebrard, se declaró listo para iniciar la programación en el Canal 21 digital que se le podría otorgar, para el que en su etapa inicial invertirá 35 millones de pesos.

http://www.proceso.com.mx/columna.html?col=8&nta=51349&ncol=Las+andanzas+de+Talia

Juan José Gurrola

roberto perea

México, D.F., 11 de junio (apro).- “Lo difícil no es llegar a la vanguardia, sino mantenerse en ella.” Así lo afirmó en alguna ocasión el enfant terrible, Juan José Gurrola, controvertido creador de una compleja obra que abarca expresiones tan diversas como dibujo, dramaturgia, traducción, dirección de escena, actuación, coreografía, arquitectura, diseño, música, cine, fotografía, pintura y performance, actividades a las que dedicó más de 50 años de su existencia.

http://www.proceso.com.mx/columna.html?col=5&nta=51347&ncol=Permanencia+Voluntaria

Zodiaco, desquiciante

fausto ponce

México, D.F., 11 de junio (apro).- A finales de los sesenta, un asesino serial que se hacía llamar Zodiac aterrorizó a la ciudad de San Francisco y algunos condados aledaños. Sus acciones acapararon la atención de los medios y tuvieron tal eco que Zodiac sirvió de inspiración para el maloso Scorpio, de la cinta Harry el Sucio (con Clint Eastwood).

http://www.elfinanciero.com.mx/ElFinanciero/Portal/cfpages/contentmgr.cfm?docId=63649&docTipo=1&orderby=docid&sortby=ASC

Al alza petroprecios

Finanzas - Viernes 15 de junio (15:38 hrs.)

* El WTI cerró en 68 dólares por barril

* El crudo Brent acabó en 71.47 dólares

El Financiero en línea

Nueva York, 15 de junio.- El precio del crudo de Texas siguió al alza hoy en Nueva York, donde cerró por encima de los 68 dólares, debido a la inquietud que generan las tensiones en Nigeria y Oriente Medio y las expectativas de que la demanda en EU seguirá fuerte.

http://www.elfinanciero.com.mx/ElFinanciero/Portal/cfpages/contentmgr.cfm?docId=63633&docTipo=1&orderby=docid&sortby=ASC

Cuba e Irán apuntalan su comercio

Economía - Viernes 15 de junio (14:35 hrs.)

* Ambos gobiernos firman acuerdos para impulsar su relación bilateral

* El arranque de los convenios cuenta con créditos por 200 mde

El Financiero en línea

México, 15 de junio.- Cuba e Irán, dos de los gobiernos más ardientes críticos de Estados Unidos, firmaron esta semana una serie de acuerdos que buscan hacer despegar su relación política también en el plano comercial.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6756431.stm

Drink headache plagues Russia

By James Rodgers

BBC News, Moscow

Heavy vodka-drinking has compounded many Russians' woes

"Drink up and shut up," was the way cynics summed up the Soviet "era of stagnation".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6755789.stm

Angry eBay pulls Google adverts

Auction website eBay has pulled its US advertising from search engine giant and adversary Google.

The move comes after Google angered eBay with a provocative decision to hold an event on the same evening as eBay's annual merchants' conference.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6755039.stm

Argentina vows Falklands return

The islands will return by "peaceful means", says Mr Kirchner

Argentine President Nestor Kirchner has said Britain won a "colonial victory" in the Falklands War that was unacceptable in the eyes of the world.

Mr Kirchner was speaking on the 25th anniversary of the end of the conflict over the islands in the south Atlantic, that Argentina calls the Malvinas.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6752853.stm

FBI tries to fight zombie hordes

The vast majority of hijacked computers are Windows PCs

The FBI is contacting more than one million PC owners who have had their computers hijacked by cyber criminals.

The initiative is part of an ongoing project to thwart the use of hijacked home computers, or zombies, as launch platforms for hi-tech crimes.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6757729.stm

Russia warns Nato on arms treaty

Russia says the CFE treaty has become "meaningless"

Russia has warned Nato it could freeze its participation in a key arms control treaty in Europe, after talks on the issue ended in deadlock.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6756357.stm

The politics of Russia's spy game

By Steven Eke

BBC Russia analyst

Andrei Lugovoi has denied the charges against him

The announcement by the FSB, Russia's security service, that it has opened "an espionage investigation" on the basis of Andrei Lugovoi's recent accusations, is an unexpected twist in an already highly convoluted story.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2659712.ece

A triumph for Hamas... but a tragedy for the Palestinians?

A war in Gaza threatening to redraw the map of the Middle East

By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem

Published: 15 June 2007

The Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas dissolved the "national unity government" last night and sacked its Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh after an especially savage day of internecine violence ended with Hamas in control of the Gaza Strip.

Mr Abbas's move, which Fatah hopes will underpin its dominance of the West Bank after the near-total defeat of its forces in Gaza, underlined the growing separation of the two Palestinian entities and prompted talk among some Israeli analysts of a "three state solution" ­ involving Israel, Gaza and the West Bank.

Hamas Radio underlined Mr Abbas's lack of control over Gaza when it said the faction had taken control of his presidential compound, a symbolic last redoubt of Fatah power in Gaza.

Hamas's internal grip on Gaza was consolidated yesterday after it captured the headquarters of the Fatah-dominated Preventative Security force and two other security bases and took effective control in the southern border town of Rafah, in a bloody day of fighting which cost 32 Palestinian lives. Three bodies were found under the rubble of a Fatah-controlled security building in Rafah which had been overrun by Hamas.

In a decree announced by one of his senior aides, Tayeb Abdel Rahim, in Ramallah ­ and swiftly dismissed by Hamas officials in Gaza ­ Mr Abbas declared a formal state of emergency, said he was dissolving the woefully ineffective Fatah-Hamas coalition brokered by Saudi Arabia three months ago and promised to form a new government in its place.

But it had been the battle for the headquarters of Preventative Security in Gaza City which was the bloodiest as well as the most decisive in Hamas's relentless four-day campaign to take control of Gaza. This was not least, according to witnesses, because of a murderous aftermath in which several Fatah activists were dragged from the building and executed in the street.

Television pictures had earlier shown some of Hamas's Fatah captives being marched along the street with their hands in the air. The Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri denied reports of executions and insisted: "Whoever was killed was killed in clashes."

He added the Islamic group had been forced to wrest control from Fatah because its security services were corrupt and generated chaos. But a Fatah official said that Hamas shot dead seven of its fighters outside the building and a doctor at Shifa Hospital said that he had examined two bodies shot in the head at close range.

Neither the official nor the medic were prepared to give their names for fear of reprisals. A witness, Amjad, also declined to give his full name when he told the Associated Press from his home: "They are executing them one by one. They are carrying one of them on their shoulders, putting him on a sand dune, turning him around and shooting."

The headquarters has a symbolic importance for Hamas beyond its role as a key military bastion and the bloody assault on the compound appeared to be in part a settling of scores more than a decade old. It was Preventative Security that spearheaded Yasser Arafat's famous crackdown on his Hamas opponents in the mid-1990s. It was also in this building that the interrogations took place in which Hamas figures of the time ­ like Mahmoud Zahar who until a few months ago was the Palestinian Foreign Minister ­ are alleged to have been humiliated and tortured by the Fatah forces.

Some of the masked Hamas gunmen kissed the ground after the building was captured amid thankful cries of "Allah Akbar". Hamas TV said the Preventive Security building would be turned into an Islamic college and displayed a room packed with what the station said was wire-tapping equipment.

The attack came after five days of fighting which have cost 90 Palestinian lives and seen both sides carrying out other summary executions, throwing opponents from the upper floors of high-rise buildings, hijacking ambulances to use as military vehicles, and engaging in gunfire inside the precincts of hospitals.

The dire impact of the conflict on Gaza's 1.5 million inhabitants was underlined when the European Commission suspended aid projects because of the escalating violence.

Mr Haniyeh reaffirmed his belief in the national unity government in a television broadcast early today and insisted it would continue to the " best of its abilities". He appealed once again for the release of Alan Johnston, the kidnapped BBC journalist. And he went out of his way to dismiss the idea that a separate Palestinian state could be created in Gaza.

Fatah leaders who were blamed by Mr Haniyeh for undermining the national unity government came under criticism from local commanders for absenting themselves from the Strip during the fighting.

In the West Bank Fatah militants rounded up nearly 90 Hamas fighters in the first such effort to reassert its authority since the Arafat crackdown in 1996. Issam Abu Bakr, a Fatah leader in the West Bank city of Nablus, said: " There was a decision by the leaders of the security forces to go after Hamas and to arrest them, before they think of bringing the war here."

The near-rout of Fatah in Gaza is a signal setback to the US-led policy of trying to bolster Fatah forces with money, training and equipment, while continuing the total isolation of Hamas despite increasing signs of strain between the political and the military wings.

While the former appeared ready to try to make the national unity government work, the latter argued that it had failed to achieve a lifting of the international boycott.

Israeli officials were quoted as saying that Ehud Olmert would tell President George Bush that Gaza and the West Bank will now have to be treated differently, and that the military would need to enforce a " separation policy" between the two Palestinian entities.

In fact, even in relatively peaceful times, Gaza has been almost totally separated from the West Bank. The comprehensive agreement which Condoleezza Rice thought she had brokered in November 2005, and which included provisions for "safe passage" from Gaza to the West Bank, has not been implemented. Israel retains control of Gaza's crossings, territorial waters, and airspace.

Nevertheless the Israeli hints suggested the possibility of a "West Bank first" policy of trying to reach agreements with Mr Abbas which ignore Gaza.

In terms of progress to a long-term settlement there are paradoxes in this approach, because there is little to negotiate about over Gaza, which is bounded by pre-1967 borders and where there are no longer any settlements. Negotiations about Jerusalem and the borders between Israel and the West Bank are much more fraught.

The forces behind this eruption of violence

Who and what are Fatah and Hamas?

Fatah, formed in the 1950s by Yasser Arafat, started as an armed liberation movement trying to take control of the whole of historic Palestine. But after finally recognising Israel it took part in the Oslo accords in the early 1990s in the hope of a two-state solution in which Israel would give up the territory it seized in 1967 to make way for a Palestinian state on the pre-1967 borders.

Fatah ran the Palestinian Authority set up under Oslo and lost the PA elections partly because it was seen as inefficient and corrupt, and arguably, partly because it had failed to fulfil its ambition of a Palestinian state. Hamas, formed in 1987 was a Palestinian offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, committed then - and by its charter now - to establishing an Islamic state in the whole of historic Palestine.

It gained popularity both through its commitment to armed actions against Israel, from the mid-1990s, including suicide bombings against civilians, with the result that it was labelled a terrorist organisation by most of the Western world, and for its administration of a social welfare network.

It has resolutely refused to recognise Israel but its political spokesmen have spoken of a long-term truce in return for a Palestinian state on 1967 borders. Elected to a parliamentary - and therefore cabinet - majority in January 2006.

How come they are fighting now if they are supposed to be in government together?

The bitter rivalry between the two groups, partly compounded by the refusal of elements in Fatah to accept the results of the 2006 elections, had spilled into serious violence, resulting in some 160 deaths, at the turn of the year, an outbreak supposed to have been stopped by the Saudi-brokered Mecca deal which formed the new "national unity" coalition. But it was a shotgun wedding, based on the deep desire of the Palestinian population for security and the allocation of ministerial posts rather than a joint political programme. And second, it looks as though neither Mahmoud Abbas the (Fatah) President or Ismail Haniyeh the (Hamas) Prime Minister have been able to exercise full control of their forces.

How did the latest round of fighting start?

Almost impossible to identify a single moment though there were a number of incidents on 8 June, including the violent kidnappings of two Hamas figures by Fatah gunmen, a bodyguard to Mr Haniyeh and a doctor, who were respectively beaten and shot and wounded.

A Fatah activist was also shot dead by Hamas gunmen after they complained he had been among gunmen who attacked Hamas supporters outside a mosque. But these incidents were triggers rather than causes.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article2660512.ece

Man guilty of 'Ku Klux Klan' kidnaps

AP

Published: 15 June 2007

A reputed member of white supremacist group the Ku Klux Klan has been found guilty in the US of kidnapping and conspiracy in the 1964 deaths of two black teenagers.

James Ford Seale, 71, had pleaded not guilty to charges related to the deaths of Charles Eddie Moore and Henry Hezekiah Dee in south-west Mississippi.

The 19-year-olds disappeared from Franklin County on May 2, 1964, and their bodies were found later in the Mississippi River.

The jury in Jackson, Mississippi, was told the victims were hitchhiking, stopped by Klansmen and taken to a forest where they were beaten. The Klansmen were trying to find out if blacks were bringing firearms into Franklin County, it is claimed.

Federal prosecutors indicted Seale in January almost 43 years after the murders. When he is sentenced on August 24, he faces life in prison on the two counts of kidnapping and one count of conspiracy.

Jurors deliberated just a few hours before convicting Seale last night.

The prosecution's star witness was Charles Marcus Edwards, a confessed Klansman. During closing arguments earlier yesterday, prosecutors acknowledged they made "a deal with the devil" but said that offering immunity to a Edwards to get his testimony against Seale was the only way to get justice.

Edwards testified that he and Seale belonged to the same Klan chapter, or "klavern," that was led by Seale's father. Seale has denied he belonged to the Klan.

Edwards testified that Dee and Moore were stuffed, alive, into the trunk of Seale's Volkswagen and driven to a farm. They were later tied up and driven across the Mississippi River into Louisiana, Edwards said, and Seale told him that Dee and Moore were attached to heavy weights and dumped alive into the river.

"Those two 19-year-old kids had to have been absolutely terrified," US barrister Dunn Lampton told jurors.

In its closing arguments, the defence asserted that Seale should be acquitted because the case was based on the word of an "admitted liar."

"This case all comes down to the word of one man, an admitted liar, a man out to save his own skin," federal public defence lawyer Kathy Nester said. "A case based on his word is no case at all."

In the final part of closing arguments, federal prosecutor Paige Fitzgerald rebutted Nester's claims that Edwards could not be trusted. Fitzgerald also suggested that Seale's own words incriminated him.

"Let me tell you about one man's word. 'Yes. But I'm not going to admit it. You're going to have to prove it,"' Fitzgerald said, repeating a statement that a retired FBI agent testified he heard Seale make after being arrested on a state murder charge in 1964. That charge was later dropped.

The defence claimed that the prosecution failed to prove key elements needed for conviction and did not establish that Seale had crossed state lines while committing a crime, which is vital because that's what gives the federal government jurisdiction.

http://news.independent.co.uk/fisk/article2659694.ece

Robert Fisk: Disgraced UN chief and Nazi war criminal Waldheim, dies aged 88

Published: 15 June 2007

So the old rogue is dead. That is all I could say when I heard yesterday that Kurt Waldheim had reached the end of his days at 88.I spent months, years, investigating his dark past in what we now call Bosnia, when he - let us not be coy about this - was part of the Bosnien-Kampfgruppen of Wehrmacht Army Group E of General Löhr, fighting "terroristen" (yes, indeed, the Nazis called them terrorists, just as they talked about the "RAF Terroristenfliegen") in the Balkans. Waldheim had been secretary general of the UN, had lectured UN officers in Lebanon on the lessons of "terrorism" and, well - as was later to ruminate - he knew about that, didn't he?

I remember, when Waldheim was President of Austria - stamps were issued, heaven spare us; no mention of course of 1943 or 1944 or 1945 - how he turned up in Jordan where the Plucky Little King Mark One (King Hussein, who liked to rule a British Jordan) met him on the apron. I was at Amman airport when this outrageous little man snapped to attention in front of the Jordanian guard of honour, clicked his heels just a little too quickly, I thought, much as he must have done when he saluted his masters in Yugoslavia during the Second World War.

Waldheim - how his friends would prefer that they didn't read these words this morning - was based at a town called Banja Luka, a market town where Serbs and Jews and communist Croatians were murdered en masse, hanged like thrushes from mass gallows or raped to death in the nearby Jasenovac extermination camp. Waldheim would have us believe that he knew nothing of all this, that he was a mere intelligence officer for Army Group E of the Wehrmacht, whose commander, Löhr, just happened to be tried for war crimes after the Second World War.

It was an Austrian journalist who alerted me to Waldheim, a reporter whose father had fought in the Wehrmacht, who had survived the evacuation of north Africa ("I do hope I didn't kill him," the "Enigma" cryptologist said to me when I told her of his attempt to escape by air - his plane got through the Allied net). "Look for the letter W," the Austrian journalist said, the letter W after each debriefing, each Allied commando captured by the Gestapo, each prisoner to be extinguished by "nacht und nebel" - by night and fog.

No, Waldheim didn't order their deaths. He didn't even interview the captured British commandoes, or so he said, but merely "collated" their reports. His junior officers did the interviewing (let us not contemplate what that meant). Then the British prisoners disappeared into night and fog.

I recall finding the German interrogation papers of a young Briton who had been caught trying to escape from Yugoslavia during the war. They lay in the files of the Public Record Office at Kew (now known as the National Archives) and they were pitiful proof of what the Nazis could do. Yes, he admitted he was a British agent, yes he was wearing British uniform, and yes - there it was, in all its symmetry, the "W" - he was interviewed by Waldheim. And then he was taken away and executed, and Waldheim - whose colleagues (no secretary generals, they) had saved the lives of British prisoners - didn't give a fig about their souls.

I remember how I visited Bosnia in 1990 to investigate Waldheim's past. He had written a PhD thesis, he told the world, in the last years of the war; he knew nothing of the Nazi subjugation of the Balkans. He had been wounded on the Russian front. But there was a certain manipulation of the truth. He had been sent to Yugoslavia. He was an intelligence officer for Army Group E. He was based at Banja Luka and - years before the town became the Bosnian Serb capital in the outrageous war between Muslims and Christians - I visited his former headquarters, where the Serbs showed me his files, still cloaked in the see-through parchment of the Wehrmacht.

I even visited his interrogation office, next to an execution pit wherein Serbs and Jews were massacred daily. Did the rifle shots not disturb Kurt Waldheim's concentration? Oh, what it must have been to have the peace and quiet of the UN headquarters on the East River.

Monty Woodhouse was the top man for SOE - Special Operations Executive - in Greece during the war, and he pursued Waldheim for years afterwards, along with an immensely brave Jewish academic. Waldheim published a "White Book" claiming to prove his innocence of war crimes (he was later based in the Hotel Angleterre in Athens). He didn't know, he said. And his friends noted quietly that it was his wife who was the Nazi party member in Austria in the 1930, not himself; that Waldheim was merely a civil servant, one who - in the damning words of the Jewish academic - "helped to give the wheel a push."

So what memories did Waldheim carry with him to the grave? During the war, Woodhouse's Greek partisans captured a Gypsy who was spying on his comrades for the Italians. Woodhouse decided that he should be hanged.

I asked him what it felt like to do such a thing - to commit what, I suppose, we would call a war crime, were it Waldheim whom it had been proved had done it. Woodhouse replied to me - and I have his words in my own handwriting as I write this: "It was terrible - I felt terrible. I still bring the scene back to me from time to time. He was a wretched youth. He didn't say anything really - he was so shaken. He was a sort of halfwit. I was at the hanging. He was hanged from a tree. They simply pulled a chair from beneath his feet. I don't think it took long for him to die. I don't know exactly how long. We were only a hundred men or so - it was the early days of the occupation. If we had let him go, he would have told the Italians... After that, I told Zervas not to take any prisoners."

When I left Bosnia in the summer of 1988 in the aftermath of my Waldheim investigations, I called my foreign news editor, Ivan Barnes of the The Times, to tell him that I saw so many parallels in modern-day Yugoslavia with Lebanon on the eve of conflict in 1975 that I believed a civil war would break out in Bosnia in the near future. The local Serbs even abused me for driving to Waldheim's ex-headquarters with a Croatian driver. "We'll report it if it happens," Barnes roared down the phone at me. In 1992, I did report the Bosnian war - for The Independent.

And what of Waldheim? The Austrian state defended him. He appeared on postage stamps. He went to the opera. He was forbidden entry to the United States - long after he ever needed to go there. He produced a "White Book", supposedly proving he knew nothing of war crimes.

His former United Nations colleagues clucked and re-clucked over his hypocrisy. And I well remember his number two at the UN telling me how he always knew that "KW" was a "crook" - this just three days before I came across a second-hand copy of Waldheim's memoirs in Waterstone's bookshop in Piccadilly with the very same man's warm appraisal of Waldheim as a "man of principle" in the frontispiece.

In 1987, King Hussein took Waldheim to the heights of Um Queiss to overlook the Israeli-occupied West Bank and awarded him the Hussein bin Ali medal - named after Hussein's grandfather. The Plucky Little King praised Waldheim for his patriotism, integrity, wisdom and "noble human values". General Löhr, I should add - Waldheim's superior officer in Yugoslavia - was hanged as a war criminal.

http://news.independent.co.uk/sci_tech/article2659713.ece

Giving money away makes you feel better - especially if you're a woman

By Steve Connor, Science Editor

Published: 15 June 2007

Economists have looked inside the heads of people prepared to give money to a good cause and found the warm glow of true altruism really does exist, at least in women.

People who volunteer to donate money to charity feel much better about giving it away in this way than they do when paying their taxes, shows a study in which a sophisticated brain-scanner analyses the biological basis of spending money.

Two economists and a cognitive psychologist studied how different regions of the brain reacted when female volunteers were given money to spend - or not to spend - on a food aid project and on government taxes.

They found that as the volunteers watched the financial transactions on a computer screen, deep-seated parts of the brain associated with the pleasure of eating began to be stimulated. Nerve cells in the caudate nucleus and the nucleus accumbens normally fire when someone eats a favourite food such as a chocolate or a sweet but this time they became excited when the money went to a food charity, but less so when it went to a government tax office.

"The surprising element for us was that in a situation in which your money is simply given to others - where you do not have a free choice - you still get reward-centre activity," said Professor Ulrich Mayr, a psychologist at the University of Oregon. "I don't think most economists would have suspected that. It reinforces the idea that there is true altruism, where it's all about how well the common good is doing. I've heard people claim they don't mind paying taxes, if it's for a good cause; here we showed that you can actually see this going on inside the brain, and even measure it."

The research, published in the journal Science, centred on 19 women who were each given $100 to "spend" on computer transactions while they were being scanned by a functional magnetic resonance imager, which measures brain activity in real time.

None of the women was aware of what the others were doing and everyone was given a degree of anonymity so that the act of giving was not constrained by the thought of what others may think of them.

Professor William Harbaugh, an economist at Oregon and a member of the US National Bureau of Economic Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts, said the study provided an unprecedented opportunity to see what people really thought about giving money to different causes.

"To economists, the surprising thing about this study is that we actually see people getting rewards as they give up money. Neural firing in this fundamental, primitive part of the brain is larger when your money goes to a non-profit charity to help other people," Professor Harbaugh said. "On top of that, people experience more brain activation when they give voluntarily, even though everything here is anonymous. That's a very surprising result, and an optimistic one."

The researchers warned that society could not rely on people to give voluntarily to good causes because some took a "free ride" on the charitable donations of others.

"Taxes aren't all bad," Professor Mayr said. "Paying taxes can make citizens happy. People are, to varying degrees, pure altruists. On top of that ,they like the warm glow they get from charitable giving. Until now we couldn't trace that in the brain," .

The women in the study whose brains responded the most when giving to charity rather than keeping it for themselves were called true altruists. "The others are egoists," the professor added. "Based on what we saw in the experiments, we can use this classification to predict how much people are willing to give when the choice is theirs."

Hollywood tales of altruism

About Schmidt

Retired middle-American Warren Schmidt (Jack Nicholson) gives belated meaning to his life by sponsoring a Tanzanian boy, Ndugu.

Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

Robin of Locksley (Kevin Costner) and his men rebel against the grasping King John and the Sheriff of Nottingham's tyrannical reign by robbing the rich and giving to the poor.

It's A Wonderful Life

An angel recounts the deeds of suicidal George Bailey (James Stewart), which include lending money to avert a financial crisis in his town.

Scrooge

The spirits of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come help miser Ebenezer Scrooge (Albert Finney) rediscover his generous side, and buy Christmas dinner for the Cratchits.

Brewster's Millions

Monty Brewster (Richard Pryor) splashes $30m on charities and pointless but well-paid jobs for his friends (among other things) so he can claim a $300m inheritance.

http://football.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/0,,2104130,00.html

Stevens names and shames 17 transfers in bungs inquiry

'Whoever he is, Lord Stevens, he is a liar. They will rue the day they were ever born,' fumes implicated agent

James Dart and agencies

Friday June 15, 2007

Guardian Unlimited

http://www.guardian.co.uk/weather/Story/0,,2103903,00.html

Further storms forecast as floods hit UK

James Sturcke and agencies

Friday June 15, 2007

Guardian Unlimited

Torrential overnight rain triggered floods and transport disruption today as forecasters warned the severe weather would continue into the weekend.

http://society.guardian.co.uk/health/story/0,,2103771,00.html

Study links drug use with crisis in sexual health

John Carvel, social affairs editor

Friday June 15, 2007

The Guardian

Increasing numbers of young people are using ecstasy, cannabis, amphetamines and cocaine to prolong sexual pleasure, government advisers said last night.

http://music.guardian.co.uk/rock/story/0,,2102991,00.html

Sgt Pepper must die!

Ever get the feeling you've been cheated? It's meant to be a classic album, but all you can hear is a load of boring tripe ... we've all felt that way. And so have the musicians we asked to nominate the supposedly great records they'd gladly never hear again

Interviews by Paul Lester

Friday June 15, 2007

The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,2103555,00.html

So bad it's good

The bestseller charts are groaning with real-life accounts of neglect, violence and sexual abuse. The worse your childhood, it seems, the more people want to read about it. Have we turned into a nation of ghouls? Esther Addley investigates the remarkable rise of 'misery lit'

Friday June 15, 2007

The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,2103557,00.html

If you are looking for God, try prison. Paris Hilton found Him there in no time, like others before her

Alexander Chancellor

Friday June 15, 2007

The Guardian

Those of us who have no religious faith have every reason to envy those who do. It must be wonderful to understand the meaning of life and to see death as a mere stepping-stone on the path to eternity. But if this state of grace eludes you, there is something you can do that might be of help: commit a crime and go to prison. For prison is the place in which people find God most easily.

http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/biography/story/0,,1991328,00.html

The monster I loved

When Boy George's mother announced that she was writing her memoirs, everyone expected a tale of a parent's support for her heroin-addicted son. In the event, she had a more shocking story to tell - of how she kept on loving her husband despite years of intimidation and brutality. Dinah O'Dowd talks to Chrissy Iley

Tuesday January 16, 2007

The Guardian

http://books.guardian.co.uk/extracts/story/0,,1984961,00.html

Power, corruption and lies

To the west, China is a waking economic giant, poised to dominate the world. But, argues Will Hutton in this extract from his new book, we have consistently exaggerated and misunderstood the threat - and the consequences could be grave

Monday January 8, 2007

The Guardian

http://film.guardian.co.uk/interview/interviewpages/0,,1985172,00.html

'I was just waiting for my time'

Alicia Keys grew up carrying a knife in Hell's Kitchen, New York, but music saved her. A piano and vocal prodigy, she wrote her first song at 13 and went on to win five Grammys with her debut album. Now she's making her film debut, as a lesbian assassin. She talks to Chrissy Iley about men, Bob Dylan and socialism

Monday January 8, 2007

The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1984847,00.html

My husband, the serial cheat

Until six weeks ago Sue Langley was enjoying the good life and looking forward to a happy middle-age with her partner of 30 years. Then she found a letter that revealed a shocking secret ...

Monday January 8, 2007

The Guardian

http://arts.guardian.co.uk/features/story/0,,1985049,00.html

Call yourself a critic?

Ever since our arts team began writing blogs, readers have responded with praise - but also scorn. Film critic Peter Bradshaw explains how this new world of rough and tumble keeps his wits sharp and his ego in check

Monday January 8, 2007

The Guardian

http://arts.guardian.co.uk/features/story/0,,1985066,00.html

Calling all my hecklers

Blogs will be a great place for debate - once all that anger dies down, says music critic Dorian Lynskey

Monday January 8, 2007

The Guardian

http://arts.guardian.co.uk/features/story/0,,1985075,00.html

Culture criticism

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Another view

Maya archaeologist Elizabeth Graham on Apocalypto

Monday January 8, 2007

The Guardian

The chases were terrific, and I cheered for the good guys. But if Apocalypto is supposed to bear some relation to Maya civilisation, then I have to hate it. It conflates 2,000 years of Maya history into a single period - the equivalent, in Britain, of setting one story in a time stretching from the Roman occupation to the death of Elizabeth I, disregarding changes in language, religion and culture.