Saturday 13 December 2014

News stories - 12/12/2014

San Francisco Bay bears brunt of powerful US storm







A powerful storm churned down the United States' West Coast yesterday, bringing strong gales and much-needed rain and snow that caused widespread blackouts in Northern California and whiteouts in the Sierra Nevada.

The brunt of the storm hit the San Francisco Bay area, flooding freeways, toppling trees and keeping thousands of people at home.

"It's a big storm, as we expected, and it's headed south with very powerful winds and heavy rainfall," said National Weather Service meteorologist Will Pi.

In Oregon, strong winds felled a tree, killing a homeless man who was sleeping on a trail, and a teenage boy died after a large tree fell on the vehicle in which he was riding, causing it to swerve and hit another tree.

A huge gust blew down a 25m fir tree at a Santa Cruz school, pinning a sixth-grader by the arm for 15 minutes until chainsaws cut him free.

"Unexpected, very unexpected," said Gateway Elementary head Zachary Roberts, who closed the school as the boy was treated and released from a hospital.

The storm carried warm air and vast amounts of water in a powerful current stretching from Hawaii to the mainland and up into the mountains, where gusts up to 225km/h blew through passes, damaging homes in the Lake Tahoe area.

Waves slammed on to waterfronts around the Bay Area, ferries were bound to their docks, airplanes were grounded and many schools and businesses told people to stay home.

The gusts made motorists tightly grip their steering wheels on the Golden Gate Bridge, where managers created a buffer zone to prevent head-on collisions by swerving cars.

The suspension bridge is engineered to swing in cross winds, so "the concern we have right now is more about vehicles", spokeswoman Priya David Clemens said.


Computer glitch causes UK airport chaos

Passengers line up in Terminal Three as they wait for delayed flights at Heathrow Airport on December 12, 2014 in London, England. Photo / Getty Images

Passengers line up in Terminal Three as they wait for delayed flights at Heathrow Airport on December 12, 2014 in London, England. Photo / Getty Images



Dozens of flights have been cancelled in Britain and many others delayed after a computer failure at the headquarters of air traffic control company Nats.

For a time there were no flights able to take off or land at some UK airports and although Nats were able to resolve the problem by around 4pm local time on Friday, delays and cancellations were expected to drag on into the evening.

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin said the disruption was unacceptable.

"Any disruption to our aviation system is a matter of the utmost concern, especially at this time of year in the run-up to the holiday season.

"Disruption on this scale is simply unacceptable and I have asked Nats for a full explanation of this evening's incident. I also want to know what steps will be taken to prevent this happening again."

Friday's problem at Nats' state-of-the-art STG700 million ($A1.28 billion) centre at Swanwick is by no means the first glitch at the Hampshire centre.


Having resolved the problem, which started around mid-afternoon, Nats said: "It will take time for operations across the UK to fully recover so passengers should contact their airline for the status of their flight.

"We apologise for any delays and the inconvenience this may have caused."

Heathrow said 50 flights had had to be cancelled at the west London airport and warned that this figure could rise and that delays could persist. A spokesman added that there could be delays lasting into tomorrow.


US Senate Passes Bill to Arm 

Ukraine, Impose Sanctions 

on Russia

According to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the USSenate has passed a bill, aimed at providing lethal and non-lethal aid to Ukraine and imposing additional sanctions against Russia.




US Senators have passed legislation to impose harsher sanctions on Russia over its alleged involvement in the Ukrainian conflict and provide lethal and non-lethal aid to Ukraine, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has announced.

"The hesitant US response to Russia's continued invasion of Ukraine threatens to escalate this conflict even further. Unanimous support for our bill demonstrates a firm commitment to Ukrainian sovereignty and to making sure [Russian President Vladimir] Putin pays for his assault on freedom and security in Europe," Republican Senator Bob Corker said, as quoted by the Foreign Relations Committee Thursday.

According to the Committee, the bill, which was coauthored by Corker and Senator Robert Menendez, would provide Ukraine with "lethal military and non-military assistance" as well as "energy, defense sector, and civil society assistance" and would expand sanctions against Russia.

Senate unanimously passes Corker legislation to support , expand sanctions against http://1.usa.gov/13dF8vr 
The bill, called "Ukraine Freedom Support Act", has yet to be passed by the US House of Representatives.

US President Barack Obama has urged Congress not to pass the legislation. Speaking at the White House Export Council on Thursday, Obama said the legislation would be counterproductive and create divisions with Washington's European allies.

Obama's administration has not yet approved the Ukrainian government's request for arms, voiced by Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko in September during his visit to Washington, DC.

Ukraine has been gripped by an internal conflict since April, when the country's new government, which came to power as a result of a coup in February, launched a military operation against residents of the southeastern regions, who want independence from Ukraine

The West has accused Russia of meddling in Ukraine's internal affairs and aiding Ukrainian independence supporters, but these allegations have not been supported by any proved factual evidence.

The United States, as well as the European Union and a number of their allies, have introduced several rounds of sanctions against Russia in recent months, targeting its banking, energy and defense sectors. The West says the measures are aimed at making Russia change its stance with regard to Ukraine.

Russia has repeatedly denied any involvement in the Ukrainian crisis, stressing that sanctions are counterproductive and threaten international stability.


Another war. More deaths, more torture. Not exactly headlines
Senate Panel Votes to Authorize U.S. War on Islamic State





A Senate panel voted to give President Barack Obama a three-year authorization to use military force against Islamic State, opening a debate unlikely to be settled until the new U.S. Congress convenes next month.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee acted today along party lines, with the 10 Democrats voting yes and the eight Republicans voting no.

It was the first congressional vote on granting Obama war-fighting authority against the Sunni extremist group and its affiliates. Chairman Robert Menendez, the New Jersey Democrat who offered it, said he’d like to see a Senate floor vote even if there isn’t time for action in the House.

The panel was holding its final meeting before Republicans take control of the Senate in January. Senator Bob Corker, the Tennessee Republican in line to become chairman next month, said the resolution “is going nowhere because we’re going to be out of here in two days.”

The debate underscored the tangled politics of the issue. Democrats led by Menendez sought to put more conditions on the war authorization than the Democratic Obama administration would like. The resolution would impose a three-year limit on authorization and bar the use of U.S. forces in ground combat in most cases, restrictions that Secretary of State John Kerry had urged Menendez to drop.

Military Restrictions

Most of the committee’s Republicans expressed concern about the restrictions on military operations, even as they criticized Obama’s approach to the fight as too imid.

Even if it doesn’t get to the president’s desk by the end of the year, I think we have sped up our ability to work in a bipartisan way next year, perhaps, to pass an authorization that fulfills our constitutional responsibility,” said Senator Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut.

Corker said the committee will revisit the issue early in the new year, which would give Republicans the chance to use the measure as leverage on Obama in matters such as fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Republicans have criticized Obama for not doing enough to remove Assad while focusing on Islamic State.

Corker said he has “no earthly idea” of how Obama intends to degrade and defeat Islamic State and “zero understanding” of his strategy against Assad. Corker said he wants to hear more from officials about the strategy before moving ahead with a new version of the measure, and said he may subpoena officials if the administration doesn’t cooperate.

Incrementalism Condemned

The administration’s approach “almost reeks of the incrementalism” of the Vietnam War era, said Corker, citing a view expressed by panel member John McCain of Arizona.

Obama has asserted that he already has adequate authority for military operations against Islamic State militants under the 2001 authorization for use of military force, or AUMF, from Congress following the Sept. 11 attacks, which authorized military force against al-Qaeda. Islamic State was previously known as al-Qaeda in Iraq.

Lawmakers from both parties have challenged that interpretation, and Obama agreed to seek a new AUMF that directly addresses the fight with Islamic State. Yet the White House was largely uncooperative with the committee, and never proposed language that the president would find acceptable.

In his testimony this week, Kerry said that the provision generally barring the use of U.S. forces “for the purpose of ground combat operations” would “bind the hands” of the president in case of unforeseen circumstances, even though Obama has vowed not to use Americans in such a role.

Paul Versus Rubio

The measure approved today would repeal the 2002 AUMF that authorized the war in Iraq, and would phase out the 2001 measure.

Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky broke with his Republican colleagues -- including potential presidential rival Marco Rubio of Florida -- with an amendment seeking to limit the authorization to operations in Iraq and Syria.

Paul said the language in the measure -- referring to Islamic State and “associated persons or forces” -- could give Obama authority to act in as many as 30 countries where groups have expressed solidarity with the militant group.

To limit it geographically would be a terrible mistake if we’re serious about the objective of this undertaking, which is to defeat them,” said Rubio. It’s important that the president have authority to target the Islamic State militants “wherever they emerge as a threat to the United States.”

That amendment was defeated on a bipartisan 13-5 vote, and Paul then joined the panel’s other Republicans in voting against the measure that was approved.
Retaking Mosul

In a sign that the fight against Islamic State will be long and difficult, the U.S. envoy to the international coalition fighting the extremists cautioned today against premature attacks by Iraq’s security forces to retake the city of Mosul.

The moment that the battle is joined at Mosul has to be one that is very carefully considered,” retired Army General John Allen told an audience at the Wilson Center, a Washington policy group.

Using an alternate name for Islamic State, Allen said that care had to be taken that “the forces arrayed are the right combination of forces with the right support so that when Daesh ultimately feels the weight of the counteroffensive, it is something it simply cannot resist.”

Some U.S. military and intelligence officials have said they’re worried that the Iraqis may attempt to recapture Mosul from Islamic State before their military is up to the task.

Mosul will be probably the climactic battle of the fight in Iraq,” Allen said.


Oil slump leads Wall Street to worst week in 2-1/2 years

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange December 10, 2014. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid
Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange December 10, 2014.

.
U.S. stocks fell sharply on Friday, leaving the benchmark S&P 500 with its worst weekly performance since May 2012, as investors pulled back from the markets in response to oil's free-fall and more weak data out of China.

Oil's declines have underscored concerns about global demand, and with the S&P 500 having hit a record high only last week, investors were loath to fight the downward pressure on stocks, which accelerated in the final minutes of trading. The S&P dropped 3.5 percent on the week after seven straight weeks of gains.

The S&P energy sector .SPNY was down 2.2 percent on the day. It is down 16.5 percent this year, the worst performing of 10 S&P sectors. Dow components Exxon Mobil (XOM.N) and Chevron Corp (CVX.N) both hit 52-week lows as U.S. crude oil fell below $58 a barrel, hitting five-year lows, on expectations of reduced worldwide energy demand......

Facists stick together.  Fascist Ukrainian leader Poroshenkпo on a tour to Australia to cuddle up to Tony Dumb Dumb and buy uranium
Australia looks to sell uranium to Ukraine

 Tony Abbott (L) believes his threat to shirt-front Vladimir Putin served a purpose.


Australia's improved ties with Ukraine could have an economic spin-off, with talks planned on supplying uranium to power stations in the war-torn eastern European nation.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko received a warm welcome in Melbourne on Thursday, having worked closely with Prime Minister Tony Abbott on the MH17 disaster investigation.

He declared Mr Abbott "one of the most popular foreign politicians" in his country, an image cultivated by his tough stance on Russia over the downing of the Malaysia Airlines flight.

"It's nice to be popular, even if only in Kiev," Mr Abbott quipped after the Poroshenko meeting.

President Poroshenko confirmed Australia is considering selling uranium to Ukraine, a move guaranteed to attract controversy given the deadly Chernobyl disaster there in 1986......


Lima climate summit extended as poor countries demand more from rich


lima

 Leaders of rich nations have been lampooned by environment activists at the Lima talks, but developing countries are also frustrated by their apparent lack of commitment. Photograph: Eitan Abramovich/AFP/Getty 


Climate talks in Lima ran into extra time amid rising frustration from developing countries at the “ridiculously low” commitments from rich countries to help pay for cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.

The talks – originally scheduled to wrap up at 12pm after 10 days – are now expected to run well into Saturday , as negotiators huddle over a new draft text many glimpsed for the first time only morning.

The Lima negotiations began on a buoyant note after the US, China and the EU came forward with new commitments to cut carbon pollution. But they were soon brought back down to earth over the perennial divide between rich and poor countries in the negotiations: how should countries share the burden for cutting greenhouse gas emissions, and who should pay?

The talks were designed to draft a blueprint for a global deal to fight climate change, due to be adopted in Paris late next year. But developing countries argued that before signing on they needed to see greater commitments that the industrialised countries would keep to their end of a bargain to provide the money needed to fight climate change. After 10 days of talks, developing countries argued that those assurances were not strong enough.

By midweek, a little over $10bn had been raised for a green climate fund, intended to help poor countries invest in clean energy technology. That was below the initial target of $15bn and many of those funds will be distributed over several years.

It was also unclear how industrialised countries could be held to an earlier promise to mobilise $100bn a year for climate finance by 2020, negotiators from developing countries said. “We are disappointed,” said India’s Prakash Javadekar. 

“It is ridiculous. It is ridiculously low.” Javadekar said the pledges to the green climate fund amounted to backsliding. “We are upset that 2011, 2012, 2013 – three consecutive years – the developed world provided $10bn each year for climate action support to the developing world, but now they have reduced it. Now they are saying $10bn is for four years, so it is $2.5bn,” he said.

The frustration – with the lack of climate finance as well as other aspects of the draft text – was widespread among developing countries, especially those in the gravest danger from climate change.

There have been more than 20 years of Conference of the Parties (CoP) meetings, such as those at Lima, with little in the way of concrete outcomes, said Ahmed Sareer, the Maldivian negotiator who is about to take over the leadership of the Alliance of Small Island States.

How many CoPs will it take for us to really see any tangible results? We have been going from CoP to CoP and every time we are given so many assurances, and expectations are raised, but the gaps are getting wider,” he said.

There has been a clear commitment of $100bn a year but how are we really being offered? Even when they make those pledges how do we know how much is going to materialise? There is no point of knowing that behind the wall there is a big source of funds available unless we can reach it,” he said.

We are told it is there in a nice show case, but we don’t get to meet it. We don’t get to access it. These are difficult issues for us.”

The seven-page draft text under discussion so far remains in a very raw state, with negotiators asked to choose between three options on virtually every major issue of contention.

But the multiple-choice format makes it evident that the old fault lines between rich and poor countries remain.

In addition to finance, one of the biggest areas of contentious is “differentiation” in UN parlance – which countries should bear the burden of cutting emissions that cause climate change.

The US and other industrialised countries require all countries to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

That would be a departure from the original UN classification of the 1990s – which absolved China, India and other developing countries which are now major carbon polluters – of cutting their emissions.

Developing countries are suspicious that the text being developed in Lima is an attempt to rewrite those old guidelines.

I am certain that developing countries the majority of them will have a problem with the way they framed responsibility. Most developing countries will be concerned about that,” said Tasneem Essop, head of strategy for WWF.

Countries are also divided over the initial commitments countries are expected to make on fighting climate change – known as “intended nationally determined contributions”.

Rich countries, including the US, only want to commit to carbon cuts. Developing countries want those commitments to include finance for climate adaptation.

The rich-poor divide also holds over the issue of monitoring the scale of those commitments – with China, India and other countries opposed to outside review

US tanks, APCs, Humvees roll through Latvia


Still from Ruptly video



A freight train carrying a whole column of American armored vehicles has been caught on camera in Latvia. Dalbe Railway Station, where the train was reportedly spotted several days ago, is less than 300km from the Russian border.

The train was carrying at least 38 vehicles and several semitrailers, including eight Bradley Fighting Vehicles, nine M113 Armored Personnel Carriers (APCs), four petrol tankers, Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical Trucks (HEMTTs), High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles (HMMWVs), an M88 Hercules Armory recovery vehicle, a couple of trucks, some tactical engineering and medical vehicles, at least four containers and a pair of railcars with ammunition.






Six released Guantanamo detainees ‘happy to be’ in Uruguay


Former Guantanamo detainees Ahmed Adnan Ahjam (C) and Omar Mahmoud Faraj (L) from Syria walk alongside an unidentified police officer (R) in a neighbourhood in Montevideo December 12, 2014 (Reuters / Andres Stapff)



Six former US detainees, who have never been charged, are beginning their new life as refugees in Uruguay. They arrived on Sunday and have given their first comments to the press to say they are happy to be there.

The six include four Syrians, a Palestinian and a Tunisian.

Although they were cleared for release in 2009, the US was not able to discharge them until Uruguayan President Jose Mujica offered to take them.

One of the Syrians, 32 year old Ali al-Shaaban, has been held for more than a decade in the Guantanamo prison in Cuba, after he was arrested in Pakistan following the 9/11 attacks.

We are happy to be here,” he has told the Guardian by phone in his first interview since arriving in Uruguay.

Snowden, nein! High court foils opposition attempt to bring whistleblower to Berlin


Edward Snowden (AFP Photo)



A German court has rejected a bid by opposition parties to bring ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden to Berlin to testify about the US agency’s intelligence activities in Germany before a parliamentary committee.

Members of Germany’s Green and left parties petitioned Berlin’s Federal Constitutional Court to grant Snowden temporary entry to Berlin in order to answer questions about the National Security Agency’s (NSA) alleged espionage on German nationals.

On Friday, the court threw the bid out, saying that it does not have jurisdiction in the matter and that the case should be decided by a different court, Germany’s BHG Federal Court of Justice. The panel labeled the petition “inadmissible,” the DPA news agency reports.

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s center-left ruling coalition government is wary of having Snowden enter the country, believing his presence might strain US-German relations, and that the country could be put under pressure to extradite the famous whistleblower.

For right now I can find ZILCH about this on Google although it has been on the news

A swarm of quakes in Christchurch, NZ

Intensity moderate
Region intensity weak
NZDTSat, Dec 13 2014, 9:30:01 am
Depth7 km
Magnitude3.3
Location25 km south of Te Kaha
Felt it?quake details...
2 hours ago
  • Map showing earthquake location.
Intensity weak
Region intensity weak
NZDTSat, Dec 13 2014, 4:16:49 am
Depth14 km
Magnitude2.3
Location5 km north-west of Mokau
Felt it?quake details...
7 hours ago
  • Map showing earthquake location.
Intensity strong
Region intensity moderate
NZDTSat, Dec 13 2014, 2:37:04 am
Depth9 km
Magnitude4.5
Location25 km south-west of Christchurch
Felt it?quake details...
9 hours ago
  • Map showing earthquake location.
Intensity light
Region intensity weak
NZDTSat, Dec 13 2014, 12:15:20 am
Depth8 km
Magnitude2.7
Location15 km west of Ohakune
Felt it?quake details...

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