CINA

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The following is the full text of “Initial Actions for the Implementation of the Joint

Statement” adopted at the latest round of six-nation negotiations over North Korea's

nuclear weapons program in Beijing on Feb. 13.

The third session of the fifth round of the Six-Party Talks was held in Beijing among

the People's Republic of China (PRC), the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Japan, the

Republic of Korea, the Russian Federation and the United States of America from 8 to

13 February 2007.

Wu Dawei, vice minister of foreign affairs of the PRC, Kim Gye-gwan, vice minister of

foreign affairs of the DPRK; Kenichiro Sasae, director-general for Asian and Oceanian

affairs, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan; Chun Yung-woo, special representative

for Korean Peninsula peace and security affairs of the ROK Ministry of Foreign Affairs

and Trade; Alexander Losyukov, deputy minister of foreign affairs of the Russian

Federation; and Christopher Hill, assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific

affairs of the Department of State of the United States attended the talks as heads of

their respective delegations.

Vice Foreign Minister Wu Dawei chaired the talks.

I. The parties held serious and productive discussions on the actions each party will

take in the initial phase for the implementation of the Joint Statement of 19

September 2005. The parties reaffirmed their common goal and will to achieve early

denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in a peaceful manner and reiterated that they

would earnestly fulfill their commitment in the Joint Statement. The parties agreed to

take coordinated steps to implement the Joint Statement in a phased manner in line

with the principle of action for action.

II. The parties agreed to take the following actions in parallel in the initial phase:

1. The DPRK will shut down and seal for the purpose of eventual abandonment the

Yongbyon nuclear facility, including the reprocessing facility and invite back IAEA

personnel to conduct all necessary monitoring and verifications as agreed between IAEA

and the DPRK.

2. The DPRK will discuss with other parties a list of all its nuclear program as

described in the Joint Statement, including plutonium extracted from used fuel rods,

that would be abandoned pursuant to the Joint Statement.

3. The DPRK and the U.S. will start bilateral talks aimed at resolving pending

bilateral issues and moving toward full diplomatic relations. The U.S. will begin the

process of removing the designation of the DPRK as a state-sponsor of terrorism and

advance the process of terminating the application of the Trading with the Enemy Act

with respect to the DPRK.

4. The DPRK and Japan will start bilateral talks aimed at taking steps to normalize

their relations in accordance with the Pyongyang Declaration, on the basis of the

settlement of unfortunate past and the outstanding issues of concern.

5. Recalling Section 1 and 3 of the Joint Statement of 19 September 2005, the parties

agreed to cooperate in economic, energy and humanitarian assistance to the DPRK. In

this regard, the parties agreed to the provision of emergency energy assistance to the

DPRK in the initial phase. The initial shipment of emergency energy assistance

equivalent to 50,000 tons of heavy fuel oil will commence within next 60 days.

The parties agreed that the above-mentioned initial actions will be implemented within

next 60 days and that they will take coordinated steps toward this goal.

III. The Parties agreed on the establishment of the following Working Groups (WG) in

order to carry out the initial actions and for the purpose of full implementation of

the Joint Statement:

   1. Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula

   2. Normalization of DPRK-U.S. relations

   3. Normalization of DPRK-Japan relations

   4. Economy and energy cooperation

   5. Northeast Asia peace and security mechanism

The WGs will discuss and formulate specific plans for the implementation of the Joint

Statement in their respective areas. The WGs shall report to the Six-Party Heads of

Delegation Meeting on the progress of their work. In principle, progress in one WG

shall not affect progress in other WGs. Plans made by the five WGs will be implemented

as a whole in a coordinated manner.

The Parties agreed that all WGs will meet within next 30 days.

IV. During the period of the Initial Actions phase and the next phase _ which includes

provision by the DPRK of a complete declaration of all nuclear programs and

disablement of all existing nuclear facilities, including graphite-moderated reactors

and reprocessing plant _ economic, energy and humanitarian assistance up to the

equivalent of 1 million tons of heavy fuel oil (HFO), including the initial shipment

equivalent to 50,000 tons of HFO, will be provided to the DPRK.

The detailed modalities of the said assistance will be determined through

consultations and appropriate assessments in the Working Group on Economic and Energy

Cooperation.

V. Once the initial actions are implemented, the Six Parties will promptly hold a

ministerial meeting to confirm implementation of the Joint Statement and explore ways

and means for promoting security cooperation in Northeast Asia.

VI. The Parties reaffirmed that they will take positive steps to increase mutual

trust, and will make joint efforts for lasting peace and stability in Northeast Asia.

The directly related parties will negotiate a permanent peace regime on the Korean

Peninsula at an appropriate separate forum.

VII. The Parties agreed to hold the sixth round of the Six-Party Talks on 19 March

2007 to hear reports of WGs and discuss on actions for the next phase.

***** 

Some related articles:

☞ North Korea agrees to nuclear deal (Guardian/UK)

☞ N Korea agrees nuclear shutdown (al-Jazeera)

☞ North Korea accord: Now for the hard part (Asia Times/HK)

☞ N. Korea tries different tack in nuclear facilities, weapons.. (Yonhap)

☞ Nuke Drama Opens ‘2nd Act’s 1st Scene’ (K. Times)

*****

BTW.. Last Friday's KCNA already wrote: "As a matter of fact, the DPRK's prestige has risen to its zenith and the public inside and outside Korea has become more vocal in supporting and praising its Songun policy since its access to nukes.."

And today's Spiegel Online (Germany) headlined: "US kowtow to Kim's nuclear course" ^^

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Six-Party Talks: The first two days.. actually without any real new developments..

So the int'l news agencies, like here al-Jazeera, had nothing really to report..

N. Korea talks mull China plan   
 
Envoys to the six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear programme are considering a proposal put forward by China for Pyongyang to suspend operations at its nuclear facilities within two months in exchange for energy aid.
  
The proposal was made by the Chinese after the first day of talks in Beijing, Japan's Kyodo news agency said.
  
The plan has raised hopes of progress at the current round of talks after the US and North Korean envoys held bilateral meetings in Berlin last month.
 
The meetings were seen as easing tensions that had increased after the North conducted its first nuclear test last October, drawing UN sanctions.
 
Envoys from South Korea, China, the US, Japan and Russia voiced hope that North Korea would accept measures to rein in its nuclear activities in return for aid and security assurances.

 
The reported Chinese plan largely reflects an outline agreement struck at six-party talks in September 2005 but never implemented.
  
The chief US negotiator admitted that the six-party process – begun more than three years ago – had so far made little headway.
 
"We've gone 18 months without anything, and so we have to pick up the pace," Christopher Hill told reporters on Friday before going into the second day of talks.

'First step'
 
Kim Kye-gwan, the chief North Korean envoy, told the delegates on Thursday that Pyongyang was "ready to make its first step" towards denuclearisation, Russia's Interfax new agency reported, quoting an unidentified source.
 
US officials, cited by NBC News, said North Korea was offering to suspend and eventually disable its nuclear programme and permit UN inspections of facilities.

 
In exchange the US would establish diplomatic relations with Pyongyang, UN sanctions would end and the North would receive hundreds of millions of dollars in fuel aid.

 
However, Kenichiro Sasae, Japan's chief negotiator said the six sides still had much ground to cover.
 
"It's too early to discuss whether the draft agreement is acceptable as each country is to present its ideas and I believe China has its own ideas," he said.
  
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/3D534BC9-38B8-464B-B4A2-D5BA7BD117B7.htm

Please read also the report by The Guardian (UK) 

☞ US to climbdown as Korea nuclear talks near deal
 

My comment/opinion about the issue will follow -likely(^^) - tomorrow..

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 6자회담..

Today the new round of the Six-Party Talks - DPRK vs. USA, China, S. Korea, Japan and Russia - started in Beijing. Well, it seems that many of the observers are expecting a kind of progress.. (Actually I don't expect nothing - no real progress! Why? I'll explain my opinion later - AS SOON AS POSSIBLE!!)

Anyway.. here's the latest about the issue:

☞ Nuclear talks resume amid U.S. calls on N. Korea to denuclearize (연합)

☞ 中, 8일 밤이나 9일 합의문서 초안 작성할 듯 (VoP)

☞ '이행조치-상응조치' 합의 가능할까? (DailyNK)

CNN - the day before the beginning of the talks:

Asia Times (HK/China) already published following article last week (2.03):

North Korea: Something might just happen
 

Raise the topic of the upcoming round of six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear weapons, and responses may range from "not again" to "what else is new?"
 

Forecasts of abject failure, while understandable in view of the prior record of rhetoric, disappointment and breakdown, may be premature. It's just possible - even probable, in the view of some but hardly all experts - that something substantive will emerge from all the yakking across the table and on the sidelines when
the protagonists cross swords yet again in Beijing beginning next Thursday.
 

No, that's not just because Christopher Hill, the US envoy to the talks, has been dropping upbeat remarks ever since he met his North Korean counterpart, Kim Kye-gwan, two weeks ago in Berlin. One might expect Hill, after all, to say, as he did in Washington before taking off for talks-before-talks in Seoul this weekend, "We believe we can make progress."
 

And Hill might also be expected to qualify that remark, as he carefully remembered to do, with the footnote that he was "very mindful of the fact that I expected progress in December, and it didn't happen".
 

But now things are different, really different, in the view of some of the experts. Now, they say, North Korea is going to Beijing to negotiate seriously, to drop a few bones for the Americans to chew on, to make an offer the US side just can't refuse - and then return to Pyongyang and await the next stage in the great bargaining game.
 

The logic here is that Kim Kye-gwan took the initiative in asking to see Hill, not the other way around, and specified that they should meet not in China but in Berlin, where Hill was scheduled to give a talk at a local college. Away from Chinese pressures, they engaged in intensive discussion for three days, after which North Korea came out with the extraordinary announcement that they had reached "a certain agreement" after talking in "a sincere atmosphere".
 

No one here is confusing "a certain agreement" with anything like final agreement on how the two sides are going to live up to the word of the joint statement of September 19, 2005, in which everyone - China, Japan, Russia, the US, and the two Koreas - agreed on providing huge amounts of aid to North Korea, and North Korea agreed to give up its nukes.
 

There is the sense, however, that Kim Kye-gwan, having returned to Pyongyang for final instructions, presumably handed down from North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, is not going to go back to Beijing with nothing to offer.
 

"It looks like there will be a piecemeal agreement," said Han Sung-joo, who was the South Korean foreign minister when the US engineered the 1994 Geneva Framework Agreement under which North Korea was promised twin light-water nuclear reactors in return for locking up its 5-megawatt reactor at its nuclear complex at Yongbyon and ceasing development of nuclear warheads.
 

"The United States needs a modicum of success after the debacle in Iraq," Han reasoned. "North Korea has a handful of piecemeal concessions to satisfy the political needs - without giving up [its] nuclear program."
 

No way, of course, does Han think North Korea is about to abandon its nuclear program until extracting much more from the US and others at the table. "They're keeping the weapons to the last stage," he said, playing "the good-boy role" all the while "weakening the rationale" for a strong alliance between the United States and South Korea.
 

Han offered this Machiavellian estimate of North Korea's strategy for negotiations at a conference staged in Seoul by the Korea Society and the Security Management Institute, a local think-tank, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Korea Society, a prestigious organization, led by retired senior US diplomats and funded in large part by Korean donations. Although Han believed North Korea would make an offer at the talks, he seemed to believe the purpose might well be to deepen fissures that are already evident in the US-South Korean relationship.
 

"We are at the point as to whether the alliance is pulled apart or stays together," said Han, who returned to public office as South Korea's ambassador to the US several years ago. "South Korean views on the alliance are quite polarized," he noted, with debate focusing on such issues as the extent of the North Korean threat, human rights in North Korea and, eventually, what kind of structure will emerge if North and South Korea move to reunification.
 

Don Oberdorfer, author of The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History and professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, offered more details on what he believed Kim Kye-gwan might bring to the table.
 

"The North Koreans are very likely to shut down Yongbyon and bring back [inspectors]," he said, an allusion to inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency whom North Korea expelled at the end of 2002 after the breakdown of the 1994 Geneva agreement.
 

The deal might depend, said Oberdorfer - for many years a diplomatic and foreign correspondent for the Washington Post - on the US acting "to modify the Treasury Department sanctions that seem so painful to them". The inference was that Hill might be ready to offer to remove some of the restraints imposed by the Treasury Department in September 2005, shortly before the Statement of Principles was issued, on financial institutions dealings with Banco Delta Asia, the Macau bank through which Treasury officials accuse North Korea of channeling counterfeit US$100 bills.
 

Oberdorfer seemed surprisingly optimistic about the talks. "It appears there's going to be new life breathed into diplomacy," he said. All the participants "will have more of an opportunity to work positively" as all sides weigh the alternative of North Korea "continuing to make nuclear materials" and moving "toward war".
 

Nor was Oberdorfer pessimistic about the outlook for US-South Korean relations. "South Korea is going to move closer to the center," he said, suggesting that the South would pull back from policies viewed by the White House, as well as South Korean conservatives, as too soft toward North Korea. At the same time, he predicted, "The US is going to move closer to the center" with "an opportunity for both governments to work together" - but "not with such discrepancies".

Others were not nearly so sanguine about the upcoming talks.
 

Kim Sung-han, professor at the Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security, affiliated with South Korea's Foreign Ministry, said only when the two allies, the US and South Korea, resolve their own differences "can we move closer to resolving the North Korea nuclear problem".
 

David Steinberg, director of the Asian studies program at Georgetown University, noted "an intensive rivalry as to which country", the US or South Korea, "will take the lead in dealing with North Korea". As for the alliance, he said it was in its present state "very tenuous indeed" with problems in the relationship "attributed to differences in policies toward North Korea".
 

Some observers believed the six-party talks were not likely to go anywhere until after the 2008 presidential election in the United States. A South Korean military officer was heard to murmur, "We're screwed," when asked what he thought of the six-party talks - and the likelihood of a serious deal emerging from them. The inference was that any agreement acceptable to North Korea would undermine the US-Korean alliance - and South Korea's determination to stand up against North Korea's demands.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/IB03Dg01.html

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THE CIVIL WAR IN PALESTINE

Since last Thursday evening at least 30 people - militants, but also little children, teenagers, old people - were killed in Gaza in heavy fights between Hamas and Fatah. In the same time even in the West Bank dozens of activists of both organizations were kidnapped by Fatah and Hamas militants.

Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades militants abducting

Fayyad al-Arba, a local Hamas leader,

in the West Bank town of Nablus on Sunday.

Allthough yesterday the Hamas leadership called for calm on the streets... the fights still are continuing.

☞ Gaza clashes claim 5 more lives; death toll approaches 30   (Haaretz)

Al Jazeera before yesterday published very interesting interviews with "activists" of Hamas and Fatah bout the reason why they're fighting and what for(^^):

☞ An eye for an eye in Gaza (READ IT! It's really interesting, believe me!)

Just one day later the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth wrote about the reason of the bloody struggle:

"It is a struggle over Palestinian identity – between Fatah(*) striving for a national secular identity, and Hamas seeking to establish an Islamic Palestinian identity. This is a war between the values of the West and Islam. It follows, therefore, that the fate of the Hamas government will not be determined in Gaza or Ramallah, but rather in Tehran and Washington.."
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3357742,00.html

..and Hamas' PIC "supplemented" inadvertently:

"Internal conflicts are a gift from heaven for the defenders of imperialism and Western cultural, religious and democratic supremacy and hence a gift on a platter for the governments of Israel and the United States, and likewise for the Zionist movement.."

Meanwhile today in the morning a Islamic Jihad suicide bomber, in cooperation with Fatah's(*) Al- Aqsa Brigades, killed in the south Israeli coastal town Eilat three people in a bakery..

* Yeah, right - it's the same organization!!!

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 Today in the early morning (CET) Ynet/AP reported:

N. Korea claims 'agreement' reached in talks with US nuclear envoy 

North Korea said Friday that it had reached an agreement with the US during talks with Washington's main nuclear envoy this week in Germany, but gave no further details.
 

North Korea's Foreign Ministry said the talks between US envoy Christopher Hill and North Korea's main nuclear negotiator Kim Kye Gwan had been held "in a positive and sincere atmosphere and a certain agreement was reached there."

♦ But just a short while later in al-Jazeera, for example, it was written that Chr. Hill said following:

"I'm sorry, I'm not really sure what he's referring to," after (his) arriving in South Korea..

(☞ Confusion over N Korea 'agreement')

♦ "Certainly the discussions with the DPRK were very useful," Hill said earlier at Incheon International Airport.. (Yonhap)

   But perhaps the meaning of this sentence was just: "..very useful to find a reason to f.. them (the DPRK) definitely!"??

   Because: only some hours later Korea Times reported about W. Perry's (a former U.S. secretary of "defense") latest "great idea":

BOMB THE DPRK!!
 

"..William Perry proposed Thursday that the United States should consider military action against North Korea if China and South Korea refuse to prod Pyongyang to end its nuclear weapons program, according to a report by Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Although the move is dangerous, there is no alternative left.."

(☞ Ex-US Defense Chief Suggests Military Action Against NK)

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A NEW CHAPTER IN NEPAL'S

STRUGGLE FOR DEMOCRACY (??)

Nepal's rebels ready to join establishment (IHT/Reuters, 1.16)

Nepal's Parliament opened Monday at the start of a historic day that was expected to see Maoist rebels take their seats in an interim legislature for the first time after a decade of civil war that killed thousands.

The sight of 83 rebel nominees sitting alongside those they opposed for so long may comfort even the most cynical Nepalis, whose country has been brutalized by killings by both the state and the rebels that have severely damaged its tourism-dependent economy.

The Parliament's speaker, Subhash Nemwang, said the existing House of Representatives would approve a new temporary constitution, prepared by the ruling seven-party alliance and the rebels.

It would then establish an interim legislature, in which the Maoists would be the second biggest group, perhaps the most significant step toward cementing a lasting peace since the rebels put down their guns in April.

"The House of Representatives will be dissolved after passing the constitution and declaring the composition of the interim legislature," Nemwang said of the parliament only reinstated in 2006 following weeks of bloody street protests against the king.

"This is the achievement of 10 years of people's war waged by the Nepali people," a Maoist leader, Khim Lal Devkota, said.

"We think the new interim legislature will give a new direction for the creation of a new Nepal," said Devkota, one of the nominees of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) to the proposed 330-member interim legislature.

The Maoists began fighting the monarchy in 1996, but they declared a ceasefire last year after mass street demonstrations forced King Gyanendra to give up direct rule.

In November, the multiparty government and the guerrillas struck a peace deal and declared an end to the conflict in which more than 13,000 people died in the Himalayan kingdom.

The pact called for the rebels to lock up their weapons under United Nations supervision in return for a promise by Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala to name them in an interim government.

That administration is meant to oversee elections for an assembly that is required to prepare a new constitution and decide the future of the monarchy, which the Maoists want abolished.

The Maoists will have to learn the politics of compromise, said Kunda Dixit, editor of the Nepali Times weekly.

The interim body will consist of 209 current members and the Maoists with 38 seats to be shared by constituents of the ruling alliance.

Critics say the draft interim constitution gives unlimited power to the prime minister, including the right to appoint the chief justice of the Supreme Court and has no provision for legislative control over the executive.

The Maoists, who have vowed not to return to war, were also set to start storing their arms in metal containers under UN supervision on Tuesday, but keep the keys as part of the deal.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/01/15/news/nepal.php

☞ Maoists enter parliament, first sitting of interim legislature begins, all MPs sworn in

Poor and powerless overnight (eKantipur, 1.16)

The Shah Kings, through royal decree, usurped power and amassed wealth umpteen times during the last 238 years. But today people have turned the tables on the monarchy: By proclaming a constitution invoking their sovereign rights the people have made the reigning king both poor and powerless overnight.

The king will no longer act as head of state - let alone exercise any political power. Significantly, the constitution has also snatched away a major chunk of the royal assets. According to the interim constitution, property belonging to the late King Birendra will go into a trust and the property inherited by King Gyanendra by virtue of ascending the throne will be nationalized. But the king will continue to enjoy his private property, including his businesses. How much does the king own in business? Contrary to popular perception, The Kathmandu Post investigation revealed that he owns "very little"

The common perception that the king is "super rich" comes from an assumption that he owns a majority share in the Soaltee Group, which does not exist any longer. However, the investigation also revealed that he owned only a "miniscule" share in the Group's businesses that expanded rapidly over last two decades. Before being dismantled in December 2005, the Group had nine business enterprises in its fold: Surya Nepal Pvt Ltd, Bhotekoshi Company Pvt Lt, Himal International Power Corporation, Sipradi Trading Pvt Ltd, Gorkha Lawrie Pvt Ltd, Himalaya Goodricke Pvt Ltd, Amaravati International Pvt Ltd, Maersk Nepal Pvt Ltd and Amaravati Travels Pvt Ltd. Out of these nine enterprises, Gorkha Lawrie was sold off in 2004.
 

Now a majority of these enterprises are owned and managed by Tara Management, which belongs to Prabhakar Sumsher Rana and his son, Siddhartha Rana. Records at the Office of the Company Registrar show that the king and his family own only 0.15 percent share in Himal International Power Corporation; 56 percent in Himal Goodricke, 40 percent in Soaltee Hotel and 10 percent in Surya Nepal Pvt Ltd.
 

But the king and his family have no share in Bhotekoshi Company Pvt Ltd, Sipradi Trading Pvt Ltd, Amaravati International Pvt Ltd, Amaravati Travels Pvt Ltd and Maersk Nepal Pvt Ltd.
 

Among the enterprises that the king has a share in, both Soaltee Hotel and Himal Goodricke are currently loss making ventures. While Soaltee Hotel, a public limited company, hasn't distributed any dividend for the last six years, Himal Goodricke has paid out about Rs 1.5 million as dividend during the last one decade. The only company that seems to be paying a significant dividend to the royal family is Surya Nepal. Last year it paid Rs 12.5 million to the family.
 

A source privy to King Gyanendra's financial situation said, "The income from his [king's] businesses is hardly enough to meet his expenses." The source also said the king often withdrew dividends from the companies in advance. This claim has a lot of credence since officials at the Kaushitosh Khana - the office that disburses state sanctioned funds to the royal palace - also said the palace used to withdraw all annual allocations within 48 hours of the budget announcement till last year.
 

The source also claimed that King Gyanendra was neck deep in debt by the time he ascended the throne in June 2001. "In 2002, he sold 10 percent of his stake in Surya Nepal to Indian Tobacco Company Ltd and used the proceeds to repay his huge debt."

In terms of share capital, the king and his family have Rs 80 million worth of share capital in Soaltee Hotel; Rs 6.5 million in Himal Goodrick; Rs 33.6 million in Surya Nepal and Rs 250 thousand in Himal International Power Corporation.

http://www.kantipuronline.com/kolnews.php?&nid=97660

The Historic Day, today we Nepali kick off new Journey collectively!

This day will be remembered as one of the historical days in Modern Nepal. Today, the House of Representatives popularly known as reinstated parliament by the Janaandolan–II has completed its historical task. Bringing Maoist in mainstream political process and paving way to hold election of Constituent Assembly for sustainable peace, the parliament has endorsed Interim Constitution of "New Nepal". Just after the endorsement, the House itself dissolved along with existing National Assembly (the upper House of the parliament) clearing way for New Interim Parliament, which is inducting 83 Maoists in the 330- member Interim Legislature as the new partner in the forth coming 8-party coalition interim government of the country.

The new Statute has ended any political role of Monarchy of Shah Dynasty, which was continued in Nepal since 238 years. Obviously, there is no room for King Gyanendra as the Head of the State. This is a landmark step taken by the parliament after May 18, 2006 historical proclamation to make Nepali a sovereign citizen.

Furthermore, GEFONT has as well, point to express its joy. Two senior leaders of GEFONT- one of the two vice-chairmen Comrade Lalit Basnet and One of the three regional coordinators Com. Chudamani Jungali became new law maker in the Interim Parliament.  Vice-chair Basnet was sitting parliamentarian in old Upper House where as Coordinator for western Region Chudamani has been nominated by CPN (UML) on the quotas designated for Dalit, Women, professional Organisation, ethnic-minority groups. Com. Chudamani also represents outcaste (Dalit) community.

Expressing its gratitude, GEFONT has today issued a press communiqué welcoming declaration of Interim Constitution and establishment of New Interim Parliament.

"Two ensure workers right, we call upon all concerned parties to establish parliamentary office for trade unions in the newly launch Interim Parliament", the communiqué says.

GEFONT, 1.15

www.gefont.org

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Welcome to Chávez-land, the new Latin mecca for the sandalistas (Guardian, UK, 1.15)

Tourists flock not to the beaches, but the slums to see '21st-century socialism'

Tourists now visit Caracas slums such as La Planicie to see the

Chávez revolution. Some praise progress such as Bach playing

in the streets, but others are wary of increasing one-party control.

To sceptics they are naive westerners seduced by hype who would not recognise communist tyranny if it expropriated their sandals. "Malodorous, leftwing, US and European peace creeps armed with mom's credit card and brand new Birkenstocks," according to American Thinker, a rightwing magazine.

To the Venezuelan government they are valued friends who witness firsthand the positive changes in the slums and countryside and who return home, a volunteer army of ambassadors, to spread the good news. To others they are simply curious souls drawn to this corner of South America to see what all the fuss is about.

Meet the revolutionary tourists, a wave of backpackers, artists, academics and politicians on a mission to discover if President Hugo Chávez really is forging a radical alternative to neoliberalism and capitalism.
From a trickle a few years ago there are now thousands, travelling individually and on package tours, exploring a leftwing mecca which promises to build social justice in the form of "21st century socialism".

Successors to the so-called "sandalistas" who flocked to Sandinista-ruled Nicaragua in the 1980s and to Cuba in earlier decades, their ranks are to swell further now that Mr Chávez is accelerating his self-styled revolution after last month's landslide re-election. "Socialism or death - I swear it," he said last week, and declared himself a communist.

Passion

"It's just amazing being here. There is so much vibe and passion, there is truly a sense of revolution," Lucy Dale, 20, a university student from Chicago on a 17-day trip, said last week. "I want to return to do volunteer work."

Global Exchange, a San Francisco-based group which doubles as a travel agent, organised trips for almost 500 Americans last year, five times the 2003 figure, said Jojo Farrell, its Venezuela liaison worker.

From Britain, the Wolverhampton-based Venezuela Solidarity Campaign is planning to send at least six delegations this year, mostly of trade union members. "Interest is growing significantly," said Andy Goodall, the coordinator.

The visitors tend to shun the Caribbean beaches in favour of tours to agricultural cooperatives, shantytown medical clinics and adult literacy programmes, part of the government's effort to spend petrodollars improving the lives of the poor majority.

"We saw healthy, happy well-dressed children taught by well-qualified teachers who get paid a decent salary. These are opportunities that did not exist for poor people before Chávez," said Kate Young, who travelled with the Rotary Foundation.

Others hail Caracas and its alliance with other leftwing governments for loosening Washington's traditional grip over the region. "We need checks and balances to US unilateralism and any good north American would laud Chávez for doing that," said Clif Roberts, a Californian writer who stayed on in Venezuela after attending a poetry festival.

Visiting celebrities such as the actor Danny Glover, the singer Harry Belafonte and the anti-Iraq war activist Cindy Sheehan have echoed the sentiment. London's mayor, Ken Livingstone, and the US doctor-turned political activist Hunter "Patch" Adams, are expected later this year.

"Given the history of gringo intervention in Latin American affairs, the Venezuelans have greeted us with an amazing degree of hospitality and openness," said Edward Ellis, an American anthropologist who coordinates tours.

Many enthusiasts set up solidarity groups when they return home and detail their impressions in blogs, amplifying the message sent out by Venezuela's embassies, information offices and Bolívarian Circles, an expatriate network named after the 19th-century Latin American independence fighter.

The aim is to correct alleged corporate media distortion which depicts the paratrooper-turned president as an autocratic megalomaniac and plays down the groundbreaking social progress.

"The UK media is very disappointing, always a negative slant," said Rod Finlayson, 62, a Ford Dagenham trade union official who was thrilled by the nationalisations and cultural events. "Bach in the slums. Stuff you could only dream about."

Dreaming, say some critics, is the problem: instead of investigating complexities - such as the corruption and mismanagement undermining some social programmes - visitors sleepwalk through government spin and never hear allegations that Venezuela's oil bonanza is being wasted or that democracy is being smothered.

Mr Finlayson said his TGWU delegation ignored such voices because the goal was to express solidarity, not investigate. However, the delegation did encounter some Chávez critics: when walking through an upmarket district of Caracas it was pelted with eggs.

Some groups, such as those travelling with Global Exchange, meet opposition figures and hear claims that Mr Chávez is hoarding power by fusing his movement into a single socialist party, not renewing the licence of an opposition-aligned TV station and plotting to abolish limits on terms of office

Beacon

"I was encouraged by much of what I saw in Venezuela but the focus on one person as the source of hope and improvement strikes me as unfortunate," said Sarah Gelder, an editor at Yes!, a magazine based near Seattle. Another leftwing journalist, Monica Vera, a documentary-maker, hailed the country as a progressive beacon but voiced unease: "I just hope it continues on that track."

On Saturday Mr Chávez welcomed his latest visitor, the Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and announced a plan to build new cities from scratch in the countryside. He also vowed to replace municipal governments with councils inspired by the Paris commune, France's shortlived experiment with radical socialism in 1871.

Socialist TV, by George:

George Galloway wants Venezuela to sponsor a web TV station which will broadcast political satire and speeches by President Hugo Chávez from the Respect MP's home in London.

The political firebrand, below, hopes to visit Caracas next month to request funding and technical support for the venture.

"I'm definitely headed that way," he told the Guardian. "I want to talk to the Veneuzuelans about television."

Mr Galloway, 52, also known as Gorgeous George for his suntan and cigars, said he would host his own version of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, the Emmy-winning US satirical programme.

The MP for Bethnal Green and Bow, who was expelled from the Labour party in 2003 after outspoken opposition to the Iraq war, knows Adán Chávez, Venezuela's education minister, and shares the rhetorical skill and leftwing radicalism of his brother, the president.

The South American leader has launched Telesur, a pan-regional TV station intended to rival CNN, and hosts his own TV show, Alo Presidente, in which he interviews guests and gives monologues which can last more than four hours.

Mr Galloway said his venture required modest resources but that it still needed technical support and content, such as tapes of Mr Chávez's speeches, to fill the time when he was not doing a Scottish socialist version of The Daily Show.

"The plan is pretty advanced but I need help to run the thing. It will probably be broadcast from my front room."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/venezuela/story/0,,1990414,00.html

For more about Venezuela's latest developments:

☞ Archived articles by the Guardian

PS:

Just a some days ago Chavez called, according to the German "left/marxist" daily newspaper Junge Welt, Jesus Christ(!!!) as the greatest socialist..^^(aeh~ actually it was just few days before he(Chavez, not Jesus..) had his "friendship meeting" with his "anti-imperialist brother" Ahmedinejad!!)

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오늘:

그리스

Activists of the Greek (anarchist) resistance movement..

Just today (CET), in a "heroic attack", militants of the Greek anti-imperialist movement - in this case the "Revulotionary Struggle" organisation - perforated the US embassy in Athens. With the help of a RPG(!!) they broke the window(!!) of one of the toilets in the building.^^

Shell hits US embassy in Athens (Guardian)

Rocket grenade attack hits U.S. Embassy in Athens (IHT)

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Following idiotic story - actually just the subject of the story is complete idiotic - was published in today's Yedioth Ahronoth (IL):

Iran: Hitler was a Jew

Advisor to President Ahmadinejad claims Nazi leader was Jew who conspired with USSR and Britain to establish Jewish state
 

Just when you thought the Iranian leadership could stoop no further: A top advisor to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad claimed in an interview with Iranian website Baztab that Nazi leader Adolf Hitler's parents were both Jewish and that Hitler himself was one of the founders of the State of Israel.

 
In the interview, translated by MEMRI (Middle East Media Research Institute) Mohammad-Ali Ramin, a chief aide to Ahmadinejad, told Baztab that Hitler's paternal grandmother was a Jewish prostitute and his father even kept his Jewish name until finally changing it to Hitler when he was 40.

Ramin also claimed that the reason Hitler developed such an aversion to Judaism was because his Jewish mother was a promiscuous woman. Hitler therefore, says Ramin, tried to escape his religion.

Ramin cites a 1974 book by Hennecke Kardel titled 'Adolf Hitler: Founder of Israel', which alleges that Hitler strived to create a Jewish state as a result of being influenced by his Jewish relatives and his cooperation with Britain – which also wanted to drive the Jews out of Europe.

Ramin claims in the interview that Hitler both identified with his Judaism and was disgusted by it. It is these ambivalent feelings, said Ramin, that formed the basis for his treatment of Jews.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3347309,00.html

Berlin 1940: the gang of Jewish German politicians on their final meeting

to prepare the Communist World Empire of Juda/Israel [harrharrharr~(*)]

* Sorry, of course I don't see this part of the human history not as a joke, not at all!!

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The S.K. semi-official news agency Yonhap was publishing 12.24 following report(based on an article by the magazine Oriental Economist):

China may decide to engineer coup in N.K. next year..

Participants in an unpublicized White House meeting, called by U.S. President George W. Bush himself, two months ago discussed the possibility that China may arrange a coup in Pyongyang to bring down the regime sometime late next year, the Oriental Economist reported in its December edition.

China was still oscillating between options, but participants generally agreed that Beijing's mood is changing toward the North's Kim Jong-il regime, "with Beijing gradually, somewhat grudgingly, concluding that some kind of 'regime change' may be needed," the monthly said.

There was also "explicit discussion in the meeting of the possibility that, sometime next year, after China's President Hu Jintao has further consolidated his power, that China may try to engineer a military coup in Pyongyang against Kim Jong-il," it said.

National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley arranged the meeting with Michael Green, the former Asia director at the National Security Council, on Oct. 25 with Vice President Dick Cheney also attending, according to the monthly.

White House chief of staff Josh Bolton and chief political adviser Karl Rove, who has special interest in East Asia, were also at the one-hour meeting.

Green took with him Bonnie Glaser, China specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and Nicholas Eberstadt, a North Korea expert at the American Enterprise Institute.

Former Assistant Secretary of State Jim Kelly was invited but declined, the monthly said.

President Bush wanted to hear the assessments of what China was likely to do about North Korea, particularly how far Beijing is willing to pressure its neighbor and close ally to give up its nuclear weapons and programs.

The monthly said the participants emphasized the importance of keeping China engaged on North Korea issues.

Beijing's three options, as described by the participants, are that it can stay close to North Korea and help strengthen it; turn aggressive and intensify pressure; or maintain the status quo and accept North Korea as a nuclear arms state.

The notion of a China-engineered coup was discussed as a possibility, one participant was quoted as telling the monthly, "but it was very academic and hypothetical and speculative, and hardly the basis for a new policy at this point."

China is one of the key players in the six-party denuclearization negotiations that also involve South and North Korea, the U.S., Japan and Russia. It hosts the multilateral forum and mediates talks between Pyongyang and Washington.

http://english.yna.co.kr/Engnews/20061225/610000000020061225092456E6.html

On the one side this kind of articles we might see as just ridiculous but on the other side this kind of reports are very dangerous. Especially for N.K. "activists"/cadres who are refering them self to the Communist Party of China/a kind of Chinese model of "socialist" development. Remember the early/middle 1950th when the WPK/Kim Il-sung launched a campaign against (N)Korean militants/cadres who fought with the (Chinese) PLA against the Japanese occupation: many of them, like members of the so-called "Yenan-Group", ended in NK's prison camps or were "simply " just executed.