NEWS,23.09.2013

Obama unlikely to name new Fed head soon

President Barack Obama is unlikely to unveil his pick to succeed Ben Bernanke as chairperson of the Federal Reserve this week, and the current Fed No. 2, Janet Yellen, remains the leading contender, a source familiar with the process said on Monday.
Bernanke's second four-year term at the helm of the US central bank comes to a close in January, and speculation has swirled around Obama's plans for the replacement.
Former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, considered the president's preference, withdrew his name from consideration a week ago, saying his confirmation would incite acrimony.
Besides Summers, Yellen and former vice chairperson Donald Kohn are among those Obama said he has been considering for the job. Yellen is still the top prospect, the source said.
The Senate needs to hold hearings and confirm the nominee, and with a compressed legislative schedule before the end of the year, time is growing tighter.
Lawmakers are currently preoccupied with measures to keep government funding going beyond Oct. 1 to keep the government from shutting down and to raise the nation's debt ceiling ahead of a mid-October date, or face the risk of default.
Yellen had been scheduled to speak to the Economic Club of New York on Oct. 1, but her speech has been postponed.

Lithuania urges push on EU farm reform

Lithuania, which currently holds the rotating EU presidency, on Monday urged a final push on a major reform of the bloc's generous farm subsidy programme that is held up in talks with European lawmakers.
A reform of EU farm subsidies agreed by member states in June after three months of marathon talks favours young farmers and smallholders over big business and has been called a "paradigm shift" for Europe.
"This is the challenge we must meet," said Lithuanian Agriculture Minister Vigilijus Juknawho as he met fellow European Union ministers in Brussels.
The ministers are locked in a row with European lawmakers, who want the reforms to go further.
If a compromise is not found before the end of the month, the European Commission could choose to suspend payments to farmers.
The main sticking point is how the reform affects large-scale farmers, with lawmakers pushing for more redistribution of farm aid to small holdings and ministers maintaining the reform has gone far enough.
EU ministers were to discuss the matter further Monday with another session of talks with the Commission and lawmakers set for the evening.
Irish Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney, who spearheaded the reform during the Irish EU presidency earlier this year, said there remained little room for more compromise from states.
But he said he was confident the Lithuanian presidency could find a deal in the coming weeks.
If approved, the CAP reform is due to be implemented starting in 2014.
Under the current rules, 80 percent of CAP payments go to the top 20 percent of intensive farm businesses since several countries still link the subsidies to production levels.
As the reform stands, member states would have to ensure that by 2019 each farmer receives at least 60 percent of the average national or regional subsidy per hectare. This would remove the advantage written into the current system for the more productive industrial farms.
The deal also states that 30 percent of EU members' farm payments will also be spent on "green" measures such as crop diversification.
The CAP accounts for about 38 percent of the EU's budget.

Spain heads for record tourism year

Sunseekers spurning unrest in Egypt and Turkey flocked to Spain in record numbers last month, setting the country up for its best-ever year for visitors and giving a boost to the ailing economy.
"It is very likely that 2013 will be the best year historically for tourism," Industry Minister Jose Manuel Soria told a news conference on Monday, adding that estimates for the fourth quarter were positive.
Tourism contributed over 5% of Spain's economy or GDP in 2012 and provided around 900 000 jobs, according to Euromonitor, in a country where one in four is out of work, meaning a boost to tourist figures should be good news as other sectors flag.
The number of international tourist arrivals in August rose to 8.3 million, figures from the tourism ministry showed, lifting the total for January through August by 4.5% on the year before to 42.3 million.
Those visitors spent a total of €40.4bn ($54.6bn), up 7% from 2012.
Political upheaval in other destinations has also benefited other Mediterranean countries, such as Greece.
But not everyone in Spain is celebrating the increase. Domestic travel fell by 6.9% between January and July, hitting destinations off the main tourist trail, so businesses and hotels reliant on city tourism suffered.
Two ends of the travel spectrum in particular are cashing in on the influx of international visitors - homeowners taking advantage of a growing preference for low-cost rents, and luxury stores whose clients are shielded from the worst of the economy's woes.
Many tourists have been choosing to rent private homes advertised on the Internet. And despite government efforts to tighten regulation around private renting, the trend is becoming more ingrained, with the number of rentals by tourists up 15% in August year-on-year to 1.3 million properties.
The unregulated rental industry has its risks since landlords and renters have little recourse if things go wrong, but it is worth it for homeowners who rent out year-round.
"What's happening ... because of the economic crisis is that people are preferring smaller airlines, smaller hotels and they are paying less," said Dimitrios Buhalis, a professor and director of the e-tourism lab at Bournemouth University.
Kept afloat
Spain's economy has been highly dependent on tourism since beach destinations took off in the 1960s. While Britain, France and Germany continue to send the most visitors, there has been a huge leap in the number of Russian visitors.
Some of the main beneficiaries are luxury retailers, as big spenders splash out at high-end accessory and jewellery stores. Department store El Corte Ingles for instance has offered a 10% discount to foreign shoppers since 2012 and has employed Chinese-speaking personal shoppers in a nod towards an important group of rich clients.
Value Retail, which has luxury outlets in Madrid and Barcelona, reported an increase in non-European visitors, especially Russian and Chinese, last year.
"Without a doubt, Spain's luxury sector is being kept afloat thanks to tourism," said Ana Franco, editor of Spanish luxury portal Deluxes.
Boosted by luxury, average spending by tourists rose by 2% in the first seven months of the year, from the same period of 2012, to 103 euros per day.
Regions attracting the most visitors are coastal Catalonia, the Balearic islands and southern Andalusia, home to the Costa del Sol. But Madrid saw a 22% fall in foreign visitors in August to 290 494, hit by a collapse in business travel and a decline in Italian and Latin American travelers.
There is little respite in sight for hotels operating in cities unless the domestic economy picks up, according to Ramon Estalella, secretary general of the Spanish Hotels Association (CEHAT).
NH Hoteles, which is focused mainly on city hotels, said in half-year results that Spain was its worst performing market. And Melia Hotels International reported a decline in prices and occupancy in Spanish cities in the first half, even though revenue from resort locations rose.
"There has been a strong fall in demand in Madrid because Iberia has cut flights and low-cost airlines have disappeared because of an increase in airport taxes," a Melia spokesperson said.
Spain's loss-making flag carrier Iberia, part of International Airlines Group (IAG), is undergoing a major restructuring, with dozens of routes canceled and thousands of staff being laid off.

Sudan almost doubles fuel, gas prices

Sudan almost doubled prices for fuel and cooking gas on Monday, struggling to bring its budget under control in an economic crisis that is stirring widespread discontent.

President Omar Hassan al-Bashir went on television for two hours to announce the plan. He has avoided an "Arab spring" uprising of the sort that has unseated other rulers in the region, but many in Sudan complain about soaring food prices, corruption, violent conflicts and high unemployment.

"We've been just notified of the prices increases," said a petrol station worker, asking not to be named "It's huge leap and we worry that people will be angry."

The Arab African country lost three-quarters of its oil reserves - its main source of revenues and of dollars for food imports - when South Sudan became independent in 2011.

Petrol stations in the capital Khartoum raised the price of a gallon (3.8 litres) of petrol on Monday to almost $3 based on black market prices.

"The government...has no idea of what people are going through. I am ready to join any protest against the lifting," said 41-year old Ahmed Iassan, an unemployed worker.

The government started reducing some fuel subsidies in July 2012. Several weeks of small protests ended with a security crackdown.

It had hoped to sustain the remaining support by boosting gold exports to replace oil revenues, but was thwarted by the recent fall in global gold prices.

A gallon of gasoline now costs £14, up from £8.5, petrol station staff said. The prices for a cylinder of cooking gas rose to £25 from £15.

In a televised news conference, Bashir said late on Sunday Sudan was no longer able to afford the subsidies which he said cost the treasury $15.5bn every year based on the official exchange rate.

Sudan produces too little to feed its 32 million people. Even basic food imports arrive by ship in Port Sudan, before they get trucked for days across the vast country, spurring food price inflation.

The Sudanese pound is worth barely a third of its value against the dollar on the black market at the time of the south's succession.

Opposition activists have criticised the move to cut fuel subsidies but the weak opposition has yet to stir mass protest.

Singapore tightens rules for hiring foreigners

Singapore will require many companies operating in the city-state to consider Singaporeans for skilled job vacancies before turning to candidates from abroad, bowing to public pressure over a surge in foreigners over the past decade.

"The measures might mean more hassle and paperwork for companies, and it might even lower the long-term economic growth rate," said Michael Wan, an economist with Credit Suisse in Singapore.

"But I don't think this will necessarily lower Singapore's attractiveness to companies because there are other factors that they take into account -- such as tax incentives, political stability and access to the Asean region."

Starting next August, firms with more than 25 employees must advertise a vacancy for professional or managerial jobs paying less than S$12 000 ($9 600) a month on a new jobs bank administered by the Singapore Workforce Development Agency for at least 14 days, the Ministry of Manpower said in a statement.

Only after that period can the company apply for an employment pass to bring in a foreign national.

Singapore will also raise the qualifying salaries for employment pass holders to at least S$3 300 a month, up from the current S$3 000, starting in January 2014, reducing the competition for entry-level jobs that typically require tertiary education.

Singapore, a global financial centre and the Asian base for many banks and multinationals, is one of the world's most open economies. Foreigners account for about 40% of the island's 5.3 million population and take up many senior and mid-level positions as well as most of the low-paying jobs that locals shun.

The Association of Banks in Singapore, which represents financial institutions operating in the city-state, said banks will need to adjust their hiring processes to comply with the new rules.

"We need to assess the impact these rules will have," a spokesman for the association added.

Discrimination

Singapore, Asia's main centre for private banking as well as commodities trading, has seen a sharp increase in foreigners over the past decade, triggering a backlash from Singaporeans unhappy about congestion on roads and trains as well as competition for jobs.

There have also been complaints about foreign managers who prefer to hire their fellow countrymen rather than employ Singaporeans.

Earlier this year, several banks admitted to "hot spots" within their organisations "where clusters of employees from the same country appeared to have developed over time", according to advertisements taken up by an organisation backed by the manpower ministry.

The ministry said it will scrutinise all companies, including smaller firms, for signs of discriminatory hiring practices. Firms that fall into this category include those that "have a disproportionately low concentration of Singaporeans" in professional or management positions compared with others in the industry.

"Even as we remain open to foreign manpower to complement our local workforce, all firms must make an effort to consider Singaporeans fairly," Acting Manpower Minister Tan Chuan Jin said in a statement.

"Singaporeans must still prove themselves able and competitive to take on the higher jobs that they aspire to," Tan added, as officials took pains to stress that the new framework is not aimed at forcing firms to hire Singaporeans first.

Singapore has already been making it harder for employers to recruit cheap workers from abroad in a bid to push up the pay of low-income Singaporeans. The measures include lowering the ratio of foreigners a firm can hire relative to the number of local employees and raising the levy firms must pay to hire lesser-skilled foreigners.

Bangladesh pay protests force factory closures

More than 100 Bangladeshi garment factories were forced to shut on Monday as thousands of workers protested to demand a $100 a month minimum wage and about 50 people were injured in clashes, police and witnesses said.
Garments are a vital sector for Bangladesh and its low wages and duty-free access to Western markets have helped make it the world's second-largest apparel exporter after China.
But the $20bn industry, which supplies many Western brands, has been under a spotlight after a series of deadly incidents including the collapse of a building housing factories in April that killed more than 1 130 people.
Workers took to the streets for a third day on Monday, blocking major roads and attacking some vehicles in the Gazipur and Savar industrial zones on the outskirts of the capital, Dhaka.
At least 50 people - including some policemen - were injured, witnesses and police said, as police fired teargas and rubber bullets, and workers responded by throwing broken bricks.
Some workers also vandalised factories, witnesses said.
"We had to take harsh actions to restore order as the defiant workers would not stop the violence," an Gazipur police officer said.
The monthly minimum wage in Bangladesh is $38, half what Cambodian garment workers earn.
The government is in talks with unions and factory owners on a new minimum wage.
Bangladesh last increased its minimum garment-worker pay in late 2010 in response to months of street protests, almost doubling the lowest pay.
Recently, factory owners offered a 20% pay rise which workers refused, calling it "inhuman and humiliating".
"We work to survive but we can't even cover our basic needs," said a protesting woman worker.
The recent string of accidents has put the government, industrialists and the global brands that use the factories under pressure to reform an industry that employs 4 million and generates 80% of Bangladesh's export earnings.
The April 24 collapse of Rana Plaza, a factory built on swampy ground outside Dhaka with several illegal floors, ranks among the world's worst industrial accidents and has galvanised brands to look more closely at their suppliers.
This month, a group of retailers and clothing brands failed to establish compensation funds for the victims of Bangladesh factory disasters, as many companies that sourced clothes from the buildings decided not to take part in the process.
Very low labour costs and, critics say, shortcuts on safety, makes the country of 160 million the cheapest place to make large quantities of clothing, with 60% of clothes going to Europe and 23% to the United States.

UK wants to ease sanctions on gas field

Britain could be close to agreeing a deal to ease sanctions that have stopped gas production from the North Sea's Rhum field, jointly owned by BP and the National Iranian Oil Company, the Mail on Sunday newspaper said.

Production from the field, which once supplied 5 percent of Britain's gas output, has been suspended since 2010 as a result of international sanctions against Iran.

But with signs of a thaw in relations between Iran and the West, the government now hopes to win agreement from the European Union and the United States for a sanctions waiver in the near future, the newspaper said, citing people close to the talks.

One stumbling block to a deal, however, could be concerns from companies involved in financing and servicing the field that any exemption for the producers would not fully protect them from legal action, it added.

A Department of Energy and Climate Change spokesman said: "We are working to ensure the long-term security of the Rhum gas field but no decision has been made at this time on a solution."

A spokesman for BP declined to comment on the possibility of a waiver being granted.

"As operator of the field our priorities are two-fold - to ensure the field remains safe and that we remain compliant with the law," he said. "It is up to the government to decide on the longer-term options."

Sudan to host German business conference

Sudan will host a business conference with German firms to boost economic ties with Europe's largest economy, state media said on Sunday, the second such event between Berlin and the isolated African country this year.

Sudan is trying to attract more investment to overcome an economic crisis after losing most oil reserves with South Sudan's secession in 2011. Most Western firms shun the country due to a U.S. trade embargo over Sudan's human rights record.

The Khartoum conference, from October 28 to 31, is likely to irk human rights activists who criticized Berlin for inviting top Sudanese officials to a similar forum in January.

The Berlin event had been open to South Sudan, but Juba only sent its ambassador in Berlin to avoid contact with arch foe Sudan at time of bilateral tensions, diplomats said. Sudan had sent a high-level delegation to Berlin.

The conference is organized by German and Sudanese business groups with support from both governments, according to the German-African Business Association.

While foreign investors in Sudan often complain of a massive dollar scarcity and shrinking state infrastructure projects, the Berlin-based association painted a much brighter picture.

"Sudan's economic perspectives have developed positively recently. ... The economy has been recovering since southern secession," the German-African Business Association said on its website. It cited opportunities for German firms as Sudan planned to expand its oil, gas and mining sectors.

Most Western countries have only limited ties to Sudan. President Omar Hassan al-Bashir faces charges of war crimes in Darfur at the International Criminal Court.

NEWS, 08., 09. AND 10.08.2013

Obama pledges greater transparency

President  announced plans on Friday to limit sweeping US government surveillance programmes that have come under criticism since leaks by a former spy agency contractor, saying the United States "can and must be more transparent".
"Given the history of abuse by governments, it's right to ask questions about surveillance, particularly as technology is reshaping every aspect of our lives," Obama told a news conference at the White House.
Saying that it was important to strike the right balance between security and civil rights, Obama said he was unveiling specific steps to improve oversight of surveillance and restore public trust in the government's programmes.
"It's not enough for me as president to have confidence in these programmes. The American people need to have confidence in them, as well," Obama said.
The announcement  made just before Obama heads for summer vacation on Martha's Vineyard may be greeted as at least a partial victory for supporters of ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden who is now in Russia, where he was granted asylum last week.
Despite the announcement, the Obama administration has vigorously pursued Snowden to bring him back to the United States to face espionage charges for leaking details of the surveillance programmes to the media.
"I don't think Mr Snowden was a patriot," Obama said at the news conference.
Obama said he plans to overhaul Section 215 of the anti-terrorism Patriot Act that governs the collection of so-called "metadata" such as phone records, insisting that the government had no interest in spying on ordinary Americans.
Obama will also pursue with Congress a reform of the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which considers requests from law enforcement authorities to target an individual for intelligence gathering.
Obama said he wants to let a civil liberties representative weigh in on the court's deliberations to ensure an adversarial voice is heard.
Public trust
The secretive court, authorised under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, has been criticized for essentially rubber stamping the US government's requests to search through Americans' electronic records.
Currently, the FISA court makes its decisions on government surveillance requests without hearing from anyone but US Justice Department lawyers in its behind-closed-doors proceedings.
Obama also said he wants to provide more details about the NSA programmes to try to restore any public trust damaged by the Snowden disclosures.
The administration will also form a high-level group of outside experts to review the US surveillance effort.
The NSA declined to comment on Obama's proposals. It is also not clear if Congress will take up the initiatives. A number of influential lawmakers have vigorously defended the spying programs as critical tools needed to detect terrorist threats.
The Patriot Act, launched by then-President George W Bush after the 11 September 2001, attacks, was initiated as a terrorism-fighting tool to prevent a similar attack from ever happening again.
But frequent questions have been raised about the scope of the law and whether its sweeping tactics allows unwarranted intelligence gathering on innocent Americans.
The Snowden disclosures generated concerns about whether people were being forced to sacrifice their constitutionally guaranteed civil liberties in the open-ended search for terrorism links.
Obama met with the CEOs of technology and telecoms companies such Apple and AT&T on Thursday to discuss government surveillance. A Google computer scientist and transparency advocates also participated in the meeting, according to the White House.
The search for Snowden has upset US relations with some Latin American countries, China and, above all, Russia. Obama this week canceled a planned summit in Moscow with President Vladimir Putin.
The revelation of the sweeping US electronic spying programmes has also alienated countries such as Germany, which fiercely defends its citizens' privacy rights.

Juan Manuel Santos, President Of Colombia, Seeks Clarification On U.S. Spying Operations

President Juan Manuel Santos said Thursday that he is seeking clarification from Washington on whether its intelligence-gathering in Colombia has overstepped the countries' joint operations against drug traffickers and illegal armed groups.
Santos said in an interview with The Associated Press that U.S. Vice President Joe Biden called him about the issue following revelations by former U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden that massive U.S digital snooping has targeted allies as well as foes.
He said Biden offered a series of technical explanations. Asked if he was satisfied with them, Santos replied curtly, "We are in that process."
Colombia has long been Washington's closest ally in South America with Washington supplying it with eavesdropping equipment, technicians and aerial surveillance.
Santos said "in that alliance we have had joint intelligence operations, using technical intelligence to fight common enemies, including drug-trafficking (and) terrorism."
He said during the 20-minute interview in a salon of the presidential palace that officials of both nations "are at this time in conversations to see if that was everything that was done or if some other type of espionage occurred."
Santos said a delegation examining the question includes deputy defense minister Jorge Bedoya.
Santos, 61, will host U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry during a visit that begins Sunday night. On Monday evening, Kerry travels to Brazil.
Santos said he did not expect the issue to come up with Kerry as he was already dealing with Biden on it.
Last month, the Brazilian newspaper O Globo reported based on documents provided by Snowden that Brazil was a principal target of data collection by the U.S. National Security Agency, for which he worked as a contractor. The report said other countries in the region targeted by the NSA included Argentina, Ecuador, Mexico, Colombia and Venezuela.
It said the NSA collected information about topics including energy, oil and military purchases.
Colombia said in a brief July 10 communique that it would seek explanations from the United States on the subject.
U.S. Ambassador Michael McKinley has repeatedly declined to respond to questions about whether his country has engaged in unauthorized espionage in Colombia.
Among the NSA programs exposed by Snowden in leaks to the Guardian newspaper was one called XKeyscore that supports his claim the United States has the ability to spy on "the vast majority of human communications."
A series of training slides published by the paper indicates that analysts can use the tool to selectively search digital communications. The slides show Colombia as one of four South American countries hosting an XKeyscore server. The others are Venezuela, Ecuador and Brazil.
Before his 2010 election, Santos was defense minister for three years and was among Colombian officials who sought and welcomed U.S. technical support in electronic eavesdropping.
The country is currently holding peace talks to end a half century-old conflict with the Western Hemisphere's most potent rebel army, a rebel force diminished in strength thanks in considerable measure to U.S. military and intelligence support.
U.S. counterdrug agents employing sophisticated technology have also helped Colombia lock up major drug traffickers.

US to reopen 18 diplomatic missions

Eighteen of the 19 US embassies and consulates that were closed in the Middle East and Africa because of a terrorist threat will reopen on Sunday, the State Department said.

The US Embassy in Sanaa, Yemen, will remain closed. The US Consulate in Lahore, Pakistan, which was closed on Thursday because of what officials say was a separate credible threat, also was not scheduled to reopen.

In the statement, State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki did not cite a reason for the decision to reopen the 18 missions. She cited "ongoing concerns about a threat stream indicating the potential for terrorist attacks emanating from al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula," or AQAP, for keeping the embassy in Sanaa closed.

"We will continue to evaluate the threats to Sanaa and Lahore and make subsequent decisions about the reopening of those facilities based on that information," Psaki said.

The 19 outposts were closed to the public beginning last Sunday. Most American employees at the US Embassy in Yemen were ordered to leave the country on Tuesday because of threat information.

An intercepted message between al-Qaeda officials about plans for a major terror attack triggered the 19 closures.

Thorny issue of security

The State Department issued a travel warning on Thursday night regarding Pakistan, saying the presence of several foreign and indigenous terrorist groups posed a potential danger to US citizens throughout the country. At the same time officials ordered nonessential government personnel to leave the US Consulate in Lahore.

In an appearance on Tuesday on NBC's The Tonight Show, Obama said the terror threat was "significant enough that we're taking every precaution".

However, closing embassies and consulates called into question Obama's assertion last spring that al-Qaeda's headquarters was "a shadow of its former self" and his administration's characterisation of the terror network's leadership as "severely diminished" and "decimated". On Friday, the president noted that he was referring to "core al-Qaeda" and that "what I also said was that al-Qaeda and other extremists have metastasised into regional groups that can pose significant dangers".

"So it's entirely consistent to say that this tightly organised and relatively centralised al-Qaeda that attacked us on 9/11 has been broken apart and is very weak and does not have a lot of operational capacity, and to say we still have these regional organisations like AQAP that can pose a threat, that can drive potentially a truck bomb into an embassy wall and can kill some people," he said.

Shutting down so many US missions also raised the thorny issue of security, a political problem for the administration since the deadly assault last September on the US mission in Benghazi, Libya. The deaths of the American ambassador to Libya and three other Americans brought criticism over the lack of security and whether the administration had been forthright about the perpetrators.

The closings covered embassies and other posts stretching 7 725km from Tripoli, Libya, to Port Louis, Mauritius, and were not limited to Muslim or Muslim-majority nations.

 

US pulls staff from Lahore consulate

The United States has evacuated all non-emergency staff from its consulate in the Pakistani city of Lahore, citing "specific threats" amid a worldwide alert over al-Qaeda intercepts.

The travel warning issued by the State Department also reiterated longstanding advice to US citizens to avoid all non-essential travel to Pakistan.
The closure comes as Pakistan celebrates the festival of Eid al-Fitr, marking the end of the holy month of Ramadan, and a day after a suicide bomber killed 38 people at a police funeral in the southwestern city of Quetta.
"On August 8, 2013, the Department of State ordered the departure of non-emergency US government personnel from the US Consulate General in Lahore, Pakistan," a State department statement said.
"The Department of State ordered this drawdown due to specific threats concerning the US Consulate in Lahore.
"The presence of several foreign and indigenous terrorist groups poses a potential danger to US citizens throughout Pakistan."
Not linked to terror threat
Meghan Gregoris, spokesperson for the US embassy in Islamabad, said the evacuation was not linked to a terror threat that prompted the closure of 19 diplomatic missions in the Middle East and Africa.
"We received information regarding a threat to our consulate in Lahore. As a precautionary measure we have undertaken a drawdown for all but emergency personnel in Lahore," she told AFP.
The US embassy and consulates in Karachi and Peshawar were closed on Friday for the Eid al-Fitr public holiday but are expected to open again on Monday, she said. But the Lahore mission was likely to remain closed and there was currently "no indication" of when it might reopen.
"We will continue to evaluate threat reporting and take decisions as appropriate," she said.
Despite Pakistan's fractious alliance with the United States in the "war on terror", anti-American sentiment runs deep in the restive country, fuelled in part by the CIA's campaign of drone strikes against militants in the tribal northwest.
A suicide car bomber rammed a US diplomatic vehicle in the northwestern city of Peshawar last September, wounding around 20 people at least the third time the consulate and its staff had been attacked by Taliban and al-Qaeda-linked militants since April 2010.
Intercepted messages
This week's closure of US missions mainly in the Arab world was reportedly ordered because of intercepted messages from al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri to the terror network's Yemeni franchise.
The alert focused on al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, a Yemen-based group which has made several attempts to attack the United States in recent years and is widely seen as the group's most sophisticated offshoot.
On Tuesday the US and other Western nations withdrew diplomatic staff from Yemen, where the Americans are fighting a drone war against the al-Qaeda regional affiliate.
US officials have said al-Qaeda's core leadership in Afghanistan and Pakistan has been decimated in recent years. They cite the 2011 killing of Osama bin Laden and the killing of several senior operatives in US drone strikes.

Snowden lies low in Russia

Somewhere on Russia's vast territory, reading books and awaiting the arrival of his father, lurks the US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden, one of the most wanted individuals on the planet.
But over a week after Moscow granted him asylum, his hiding place is still unknown, adding to the aura of mystery that has surrounded the fugitive ex-intelligence contractor since he arrived in Russia on 23 June.
The concrete facts about Snowden's stay in Russia, after he was allowed on 1 August to leave the Moscow airport transit zone where he had been holed up for five weeks, are at best scanty.
The 30-year-old is in a "safe place", according to his Russian lawyer Anatoly Kucherena. Yes, he is on Russian territory. He may be in Moscow, or outside. And no, his whereabouts will not be disclosed for security reasons.
Snowden has been registered a legal obligation for any foreigner in Russia - but it is not clear where. He is running out of money and sympathetic Russian senator Ruslan Gattarov is organising an appeal to raise funds.
Like the Abominable Snowman or aliens from outer space, there are occasional rumours of Snowden sightings but they never stand up to serious scrutiny.
The United States, which wants to put Snowden on trial for leaking details of a vast surveillance programme, only found out about his obtaining asylum in Russia from the local media and has no idea where he is, according to people familiar with the situation.
He has joined a select but colourful list of notorious figures who have found refuge in Russia over the last decades, including the brother of Serbian dictator Slobodan Milosevic and the British double agents who passed secrets to the USSR.
Snowden is now waiting for the arrival of his father Lon, who has applied for a visa to visit Russia and may be able to travel in the next weeks.
"Edward is waiting for the arrival of his parents and friends to take decisions on a range of important questions," Kucherena said in an interview with the Voice of Russia radio station on 6 August.
Spokesperson on holiday
"He has been on a difficult road. I would say a nightmarish one. He needs to go through a period of adaptation."
Kucherena, who has been the sole source of public information about Snowden, has now gone on holiday for a month, assistants at his office who took a call transferred through his mobile told AFP.
"You want to talk to Kucherena about Snowden? Why talk to us? Kucherena is on holiday until September. He has not left a replacement," said one assistant.
Kucherena has said that Snowden spends his time learning Russian and reading translations of Russian novels. He also wants to try out Russian food and travel in the country.
"But the level of security he needs does not allow him to take a stroll on Red Square or go fishing somewhere," the lawyer added.
According to the federal migration service, with his one-year temporary asylum Snowden has the right to go anywhere on Russian territory and take any work outside of the civil service.
Whether Snowden will ever be able to lead anything resembling a normal life in Russia remains unclear and it is possible he could still go back to his original plan of travelling on to asylum in Latin America.
Snowden's enemies might point to comments made by President Vladimir Putin himself in July 2010 in the wake of a major spy swap with the United States that the lives of "traitors" always end badly.
"They finish up as drunks, addicts, on the street," said Putin.
The British double agents who fled to Moscow in Soviet times enjoyed wildly different fates.
George Blake, who was sprung to freedom from Wormwood Scrubs prison in 1966, lives at the ripe age of 90 a quiet life in Moscow, where he is known as Georgy Ivanovich and enjoys receiving family visits from Britain.
However, Kim Philby's life in the Soviet Union from his flight in 1963 up until his death in 1988 was blighted by loneliness, depression and drink problems.

$1 bn stolen in China housing programme

China's affordable housing programme lost nearly $1bn to embezzlement last year, the national auditor reported on Friday, underscoring the obstacles to official efforts to fight graft.
About 5.8 billion yuan ($950m) went towards "loan repayment, foreign investment, land requisition and house demolitions, office cash flow and other expenses not related to affordable-housing projects", the National Audit Office said on its website.
A total of 360 projects or organisations "embezzled" the funds, it said.
Sensitive issue
Housing costs - which have spiralled in recent years despite government controls - have become a sensitive issue as ordinary Chinese find themselves struggling to afford a home.
China plans to build 36 million affordable-housing units from 2011 to 2015 and the programme received almost 880 billion yuan last year, the audit office said, constructing 5.9 million units and assisting 9.5 million families.
But 110 000 families produced false documents to qualify for assistance unfairly, it added.
The state news agency Xinhua warned at the start of the year that tackling corruption in the affordable housing programme was "increasingly urgent".
"Many Chinese have become extremely sensitive to skyrocketing housing prices and any mishandling of housing resources," it said in an editorial.
China's new leadership took office in March pledging to work harder to root out graft and improve people's livelihoods.
Among the spate of scandals exposed in their anti-corruption campaign in recent months, several low-ranking officials have been reported to own multiple homes, sometimes in the dozens.

Israel Wants To Reject EU Deal Over Settlement Clause

Europe's tough new stance against Jewish settlements could cost Israel hundreds of millions of dollars in EU research grants, putting a hefty price tag on its refusal to stop building on lands Palestinians want for a state.
Deputy Foreign Minister Zeev Elkin suggested Friday that Israel would forgo the money rather than accept a new European Union-mandated caveat that any partnership deals with Israel do not apply to the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem, lands Israel captured in 1967.
The "territorial clause," to be written into future agreements, is part of new EU guidelines and an expression of growing dismay in Europe over continued Israeli settlement expansion.
Israel is particularly concerned about losing access to Horizon 2020, a seven-year, Europe-wide research grant program that starts in 2014 and has an estimated budget of 80 billion euros ($107 billion).
On Thursday, less than a week before Israel-EU talks on Horizon 2020 are to begin, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked for more EU clarifications after consulting with Cabinet colleagues about the potential funding cut. It's not clear how much room there is for compromise.
The EU has insisted that new agreements must be "unequivocal and explicit" in their territorial limitations. At the same time, Europe might want to avoid a showdown with Israel when Israeli-Palestinian peace talks are finally underway following a five-year freeze. Negotiations resumed last month in Washington. Teams are to meet in Jerusalem on Wednesday.
Elkin said Israel is eager to join Horizon 2020, but won't do so under the current terms. "We want to sign and we are ready to negotiate, but if the conditions are as they are today, which are unprecedented, ... we can't sign," Elkin told Israel Radio.
The Palestinians welcomed Europe's stance.
"For the first time, Israel finds itself face to face with a minimum level of accountability," said Hanan Ashrawi, a senior PLO official. "I would say it's been a long time in the making. We have been discussing this for more than 20 years with the Europeans."
In Israel, a nation proud of its thriving high-tech and research sector, the threat of losing vital EU funding has shifted the domestic debate on settlements.
Traditionally, opponents have argued that the dozens of settlements Israel has built since 1967 in the West Bank and east Jerusalem are an obstacle to peace and divert money from Israel's poor. Some critics warned Friday that a pro-settlement policy could hurt Israel's innovative edge.
The confrontation with the EU "reveals the price of the continued normalization of construction in the settlements," Israeli columnist Nahum Barnea wrote in the Yediot Ahronot daily. "It is not just `settlements instead of (disadvantaged) neighborhoods.' It is settlements instead of research, instead of high-tech, instead of industry."
Israel did well under Europe's research grant program FP7, which ran from 2007-2013 with a budget of 55 billion euros ($73 billion). Israel paid 535 million euros ($714 million) into the fund and received 634 million euros ($846 million) in grants. It was Israel's second-largest source of research funding in recent years.
Under Horizon 2020, Israel likely would contribute about 600 million euros ($800 million), but could expect a payout of more than 1 billion euros ($1.33 billion), according to Israel's Science Ministry.
The loss of the funding worries scientists.
"I can't image that there will be a time that we won't get funding from the EU," said Yoram Reich, a professor of mechanical engineering at Tel Aviv University who receives European funding. "It's almost the death penalty for many people."
Isaiah Arkin, vice president for research at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, argues that Europe benefits from Israeli participation as much as the other way around. He said that "there is nothing to be gained by assigning political preconditions that would prevent us from being successful together in the future."
Under the new guidelines, funded research must be conducted entirely in Israel's pre-1967 lines. For loans, also offered by Horizon 2020, rules are even stricter; companies doing any business in the occupied lands, even if that activity is not linked to EU funding, are not eligible.
Israel would not be able to sign off on Europe's terms on legal grounds, particularly when it comes to east Jerusalem, annexed by Israel after the 1967 war, said an Israeli government official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not permitted to discuss internal deliberations with the media. With Israel considering east Jerusalem as part of its territory, it would violate its own anti-boycott regulations if it accepts the EU rules, the official said.
The annexation was not recognized by most countries in the world, and the Palestinians want east Jerusalem as the capital of their state.
The EU has said it will recognize any changes to Israel's border that come as a result of negotiations with the Palestinians. Netanyahu has said he's willing to cede land to a Palestinian state, but has refused to recognize the 1967 lines as a starting point or consider a partition of Jerusalem.
Alon Liel, a dovish former Israeli diplomat, said Europe is helping prod Israel toward a moment of truth.
"Israel needs to understand that if it is really going for an agreement (with the Palestinians), it needs to make a dramatic, drastic change in its attitude toward the territories," he said. "And that is what Europe is demanding."

Israeli Drone Strike In Egypt's Sinai Kills 5

An Israeli drone strike killed five suspected Islamic militants and destroyed a rocket launcher in Egypt's largely lawless Sinai Peninsula on Friday, two senior Egyptian security officials said, describing a rare Israeli operation carried out in its Arab neighbor's territory.
The attack came a day after Israel briefly closed its airport in the Red Sea resort of Eilat, close to the Sinai, in response to unspecified security warnings. Eilat was previously targeted by rocket fire from the Sinai.
Israel maintained official silence about the strike, suggesting that if the Jewish state was involved, it might be trying to avoid embarrassing the Egyptian military. An Egyptian military spokesman later denied the report but did not provide another cause for the explosion.
Egypt's official MENA news agency said an explosion destroyed a rocket launcher set up near the border to launch attacks against Israel, and at least five Islamic militants were killed. But it did not elaborate.
Bodies of the slain militants were charred from the blast, an Egyptian official said. He said four of the dead appeared to belong to a family called el-Menaie whose members are wanted for several terrorism-related charges.
"Next to the bodies, there were rockets and a motorcycle that turned into pieces," the official said. He spoke on condition of anonymity as he wasn't authorized to speak to journalists.
A tribal leader in the area said that an Egyptian helicopter flew over the site a few minutes after the drone strike. The Egyptian security officials told The Associated Press that the drone had been flying near the site of the attack since early Friday on the Israeli side of the border and fired from there. Those on the Egyptian side of the border could hear the drone buzzing overhead for hours, they said.
The site of the strike sits some five kilometers (three miles) from the Israeli border.
An Israeli drone attack in the Sinai could signal a significant new level of security cooperation between the two former foes following a military coup that ousted Egypt's president, Mohammed Morsi, last month. The military has alleged that Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood movement had turned a blind eye to Islamic militants in the Sinai.
Meanwhile, Morsi's ouster, which came after mass protests demanding he step down, has triggered a rise in attacks against security forces on the peninsula, raising fears that extremists could exploit Islamist anger to spread their insurgency.
The Egyptian security officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the information, said the Israeli attack was launched in cooperation with Egyptian authorities despite past insistence that the government would not allow anyone to use its territories to launch attacks against jihadi groups.
Israel has increased surveillance along the Egyptian border over the past two years, and is building a barrier along the 230-kilometer (150-mile) frontier to keep out militants and African migrants.
The Israeli military said only that it was looking into the report after being contacted by the AP.
Egyptian military spokesman Col. Ahmed Mohammed Ali initially said on his official Facebook page that security forces were investigating two explosions in el-Agra. He later issued a statement denying "in form and substance any attacks from the Israeli side inside Egyptian territories" and saying the claim of cooperation was "baseless."
Egypt's military and security forces have long been engaged in a battle against Islamic militants in the northern half of the peninsula. Militants and tribesmen also have been engaged in smuggling and other criminal activity in the area for years.
Under Morsi, Egypt's military tried to launch a major military operation in the Sinai after suspected Islamic militants carried out a surprise ambush of Egyptian troops on the border with Israel and Gaza on last year, killing 16 soldiers. The militants drove into Israel in an apparent attempt to launch an attack there, though they were killed by Israeli airstrikes.
After the ambush, thousands of Egyptian troops backed by tanks and heavy equipment deployed to northern Sinai near the Israeli border. But not long, Egypt started to withdraw its forces – which were barred under its peace treaty with Israel. No reason was given at the time, though after Morsi's ouster, several military officials said Morsi wanted to use former jihadis to negotiate for peace with those in Sinai.
Amid the political turmoil facing the nation in the more than two years since longtime autocratic leader Hosni Mubarak was ousted, Egypt has adhered to a 1979 peace deal with Israel.
But militants have fired rockets toward Eilat, a major destination for domestic and international tourists on Israel's southern tip.
Israel briefly closed its airport there on Thursday, citing unspecified security concerns. An Egyptian security official told the AP that officials warned Israel about the possibility of rocket strikes. The official said Egyptian authorities received intelligence suggesting terrorist groups planned to fire missiles Friday at Israel, as well as at locations in northern Sinai and the Suez Canal.

Mugabe's Election Win Challenged By Opposition Party In Court, MDC Seeks New Vote

Zimbabwe's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) challenged President Robert Mugabe's landslide re-election in the country's top court on Friday, calling for a re-run of the July 31 vote the MDC says was rigged.

Lawyers for the MDC, which is led by Morgan Tsvangirai, filed papers with the Constitutional Court in Harare arguing the election should be annulled because of widespread alleged illegalities and intimidation of voters by Mugabe's ZANU-PF.

"We want a fresh election within 60 days. The prayer that we also seek is to declare the election null and void," MDC spokesman Douglas Mwonzora told journalists outside the court.

Zimbabwe's constitution says the court must rule on the case within 14 days. Most analysts believe the MDC's legal challenge to Mugabe's victory will not prosper given ZANU-PF's dominance over the judiciary and state institutions in the country.

Mugabe will be sworn in only after the case is decided.

ZANU-PF has denied any vote-rigging in the election, which Tsvangirai, who had served as Mugabe's prime minister in a fractious unity government, has called a "coup by ballot".

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission announced on Saturday Mugabe had beaten Tsvangirai with just over 61 percent of the votes, against nearly 34 percent for Tsvangirai.

While election observers from the African Union and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) broadly approved the presidential and parliamentary elections as orderly and free, the vote has met serious questioning from the West.

The United States, which maintains sanctions against Mugabe, has said it does not believe his re-election was credible. The European Union, which has been looking at easing sanctions, has also expressed concerns over alleged serious flaws in the vote.

"The person on trial here is not the MDC but Mr. Mugabe. Zimbabweans expect nothing but justice," Mwonzora said.

Nigeria's Police Corruption Problem Highlighted By YouTube Clip Of Cop Soliciting Bribe

A Nigerian police officer caught soliciting a $155 bribe from a driver on a video viewed widely on YouTube has been sacked and taken into custody, authorities said Friday.
The arrest and dismissal of the police sergeant was a rare example of justice linked to the common practice of officers soliciting bribes from drivers on the roads of Africa's most populous nation.
Drivers are regularly stopped by police, told they have committed an offence -- whether one has been committed or not and told to pay.
Rights groups say the officers are then required to pay a portion of what they collect up the chain of command, but police deny the claims and say they are working to clean up graft in the force.
"He has been dismissed" after an internal trial, police spokesman Frank Mba said of Sergeant Chris Omeleze, who is being held in custody until the police legal department decides whether there is sufficient evidence to press charges,
Mba said that current police management was working to end such behaviour through enforcement and by improving working conditions for the more than 350,000-strong force.
"There are still some positives," he noted, saying police responded immediately upon learning of the incident.
He added: "The fact that Nigerians are beginning to rise up, the fact that we are beginning to have whistleblowers ..."
The video secretly recorded by the driver in the economic capital Lagos and which spread through social media prompted police to take action. It had been viewed more than 150,000 times on YouTube as of Friday morning.
In it, the police officer who has entered the vehicle and is seated in the passenger seat demands 25,000 naira ($155, 115 euros), claiming the driver has committed an offence.
When the driver protests and says he can only afford to pay 2,000 naira, the officer then says he should pay 13,000 naira.
The driver continues to plead with the officer, who says he is not working alone and threatens to bring the driver to the station. The officer then appears to make a phone call to discuss the matter with his colleagues.
According to Mba, the officer did not actually make a phone call and was only trying to threaten the driver.
It is a familiar scene for drivers in Nigeria and one that would usually go unnoticed if not for the video that prompted social media outrage.
A 2010 report by Human Rights Watch described a deeply corrupt police force in Nigeria, where extortion and bribery had become institutionalised and junior officers paid up the chain of command to their superiors.
The current police administration, which was not in charge at the time of the 2010 report, argues that it is working to end such practices.

John Kerry, Chuck Hagel Meeting With Russian Officials In Washington

President Barack Obama said Friday he was reassessing the U.S. relationship with Russia because of a growing number of issues on which the two countries differ, and he lamented what he called his mixed success in trying to persuade Russian leader Vladimir Putin to abandon a Cold War mentality.
Obama's comments at a White House news conference just two days after cancelling a planned summit with Putin next month came as senior U.S. and Russian officials met at the State Department to look at areas in which cooperation is possible. Those officials put a brave face on the badly strained ties and said the meeting produced some tangible results on the military front and on the push to forge a political solution to the crisis in Syria, among other issues.
Obama said Putin's return to the Kremlin last year had brought about "more rhetoric on the Russian side that was anti-American, that played into some of the old stereotypes about the Cold War contest between the United States and Russia."
"I've encouraged Mr. Putin to think forward as opposed to backward on those issues, with mixed success," he told reporters. He said he decided not to attend the summit because "Russia has not moved" on a range of issues where the U.S. would like to see progress. He said his unhappiness with Russia granting asylum to NSA leaker Edward Snowden was one reason, but not the only one, for his decision.
"I think the latest episode is just one more in a number of emerging differences that we've seen over the last several months around Syria, around human rights issues where, you know, it is probably appropriate for us to take a pause, reassess where it is that Russia's going, what our core interests are, and calibrate the relationship so that we're doing things that are good for the United States and, hopefully, good for Russia," Obama said.
He added that no one could hope for 100 percent agreement and that differences could not be completely disguised. But he said U.S.-Russian cooperation is important.
"We're going to assess where the relationship can advance U.S. interests and increase peace and stability and prosperity around the world," Obama said. "Where it can, we're going to keep on working with them. Where we have differences, we're going to say so clearly."
Obama praised trade and arms control successes that the U.S. and Russia were able to seal when he was dealing with former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev. Obama played down suggestions that he and Putin do not get along.
"I don't have a bad personal relationship with Putin. When we have conversations, they're candid. They're blunt. Oftentimes, they're constructive," he said.
But, he took a shot at the often dour-looking Russian leader for his demeanor in meetings and appearances before reporters.
"He's got that kind of slouch, looking like the bored kid in the back of the classroom," Obama said. "But the truth is, is that when we're in conversations together, oftentimes it's very productive."
He urged Putin to think in broad terms and not view the United States as an enemy.
"If issues are framed as if the U.S. is for it, then Russia should be against it, or we're going to be finding ways where we can poke each other at every opportunity, then probably we don't get as much stuff done," Obama said.
Obama's comments came shortly after Secretary of State John Kerry and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel wrapped up talks with their Russian counterparts that were intended to try to repair some of the damage caused by the differences over Syria, Russia's domestic crackdown on civil rights and anti-gay legislation, a U.S. missile defense plan for Europe, trade, global security, human rights and American adoptions of Russian children.
Officials from both countries said after the talks that the atmosphere had been positive and productive and that they had agreed to renew efforts to bring about a political resolution to the deteriorating situation in Syria at an international conference. On the military side, the officials said Russia had invited the U.S. to observe a joint Russian-Belarussian training exercise next year involving 13,000 troops as well as establish a video link between the defense chiefs.
Kerry allowed that U.S.-Russia ties had been complicated by "colliding and conflicting interests." Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also acknowledged the fractious state of the relationship but called on both sides to act like "grown-ups," saying that's how Moscow wants to handle the differences.
Noting that he and Lavrov are former ice hockey players, Kerry said that they understood "that diplomacy, like hockey, can sometimes result in the occasional collision, so we're candid, very candid, about the areas in which we agree but also the areas in which we disagree."
He added: "It's no secret that we have experienced some challenging moments and obviously not just over the Snowden case."
Both men maintained that U.S-Russian cooperation on even limited areas of shared concern is important.
Russia has minced no words in expressing its disappointment that Obama cancelled the summit, and Lavrov made it clear that Moscow had been prepared to sign agreements on trade and nuclear research and security had it gone ahead.
"At least we in Russia were prepared to table our proposals to the two presidents," Lavrov said.
"Of course, we have disagreements. We'll continue discussing matters on which we disagree calmly and candidly," he said. "We need to work as grown-ups. And this is what we do. And we hope that this will be reciprocal.