WORLD STANDS BY AS ISRAEL ATTACKS GAZA AGAIN

Israel soldiers backed by tanks enter Gaza Strip http://www.presstv.ir/detail/234707.html

Israeli forces backed by tanks have launched a ground incursion into the Gaza strip, shelling agricultural lands,Press TV reports.

The tanks accompanied by a group of troops entered eastern Gaza on Thursday, shelling agricultural lands in east and north side of the Palestinian territory, a Press TV correspondent reported. 

No casualties have been reported. 

Gaza residents still live in what is known to be the “world's largest open-air prison” as Israel remains in full control of the airspace, territorial waters and border crossings of Gaza. 

Although residents in Gaza still suffer from a long Israeli siege, they have expressed their determination to “struggle to liberate the occupied land.” 

In addition to farmland, Israel also destroys Palestinian homes in the occupied territories in line with its policy of expanding illegal settlement units. 

According to a number of human rights groups including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, Israel has torn down “twice as many Palestinian homes in the occupied territories in 2011 as it did in 2010 in order to build Jewish settlements.” 

US plans to deploy combat ships to Singapore: Panettahttp://www.presstv.ir/detail/234795.html

The USS Independence, a Littoral Combat Ship (file photo)

The United States has announced that it will deploy four littoral warships to Singapore for joint military exercises in a move to expand bilateral military cooperation with the Asian country.

The announcement was made by US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta on Thursday, a day after his meeting with Singaporean Defense Minister Ng Eng at the Pentagon.

"The Defense Department's move to deploy US combat ships to Singapore and raise the level of joint exercises will deepen the bilateral military relationship… The deployment signals US commitment to the (Asia-Pacific) region and enhances the ability to train and engage with regional partners," said a joint statement from the defense chiefs.

The statement stressed that “a strong US presence in the Asia-Pacific region enhances regional stability and security.”

It added that the combat ships would be deployed on a rotational basis rather than being based in Singapore.

Pentagon spokeswoman Commander Leslie Hull-Ryde, described the plan as a “significant movement” in their military cooperation and said that "the specific details related to this unprecedented engagement are still being discussed.”

Since 1990, Singapore has consistently supported a strong US military presence in the Asia-Pacific region. In 2005, the two countries expanded defense and security cooperation by signing a Strategic Framework Agreement. 

ICC declines to probe into Israel’s war on Gaza

Israeli Army using white phosphorus on the Gaza Strip (file photo)

Wed Apr 4, 2012 10:52

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has announced that it has declined to investigate the Israeli regime’s war crimes in the Gaza Strip during Tel Aviv’s December 2008-January 2009 offensives against the populated enclave,Press TV reports.

UN looks for ‘broader mandate’ to monitor Syrian ceasefirehttp://rt.com/news/un-observers-syria-ceasefire-annan-389/

The ICC announced on Tuesday that it had rejected a longstanding request by the Palestinian Authority (PA) for a war crimes tribunal as Palestine was not an official state and because the ICC had no jurisdiction over the Palestinian territories.

The Gaza War killed more than 1,400 Palestinians and inflicted a damage of more than USD 1.6 billon on the already impoverished coastal sliver’s economy.

Human rights groups, such as Amnesty International, have accused Israel of committing war crimes during the invasion. 

The violence in Syria cannot be averted by means of traditional observers, believes UN and Arab League envoy Kofi Annan. Therefore the UN is preparing a peace-keeping mission with a “broad and flexible mandate” to ensure the conflict ends April 12.

“What we would need on the ground is a small nimble United Nations presence,” Annan announced during a video-conference briefing from Geneva. 

He further told the UN General Assembly that this force would need to be deployed quickly with a broad and flexible mandate, with its freedom of movement throughout the country and security assured. Annan said it should engage all relevant parties and “constantly and rapidly observe, establish and assess facts and conditions on the ground in an objective manner.”

“We need to keep the unique character of the Syrian crisis in mind,” Kofi Annan stressed, adding that the violence in Syria “cannot be averted through the means of the traditional observer mission interposed between two armies.”

The idea of sending an effective UN supervision mission to keep the peace was supported in full by the UNSC and both sides of the conflict in Syria, Annan said.

Syria’s government welcomed the arrival of an advance UN team led by Norwegian Major-General Robert Mood on Thursday. Their mission is to prepare the potential deployment of observers.

A spokesman for Kofi Annan, Ahmad Fawzi, confirmed the arrival and said the UN is already asking members to contribute some 250 soldiers to monitor a ceasefire.

Compliance with six-point peace plan

Annan said he is aware that the Syrian government is partially withdrawing troops from populated areas, particularly the cities of Deraa, Idlib und Sabadani, in order to comply with his six-point peace plan. 

If the April 10 deadline earlier adopted by the Syrian government is met, then all opposition fighters should stop their operations within 48 hours of the deadline – by 6 am local time on April 12.

“All interlocutors with whom we have spoken have committed to call for the cessation of violence once the Syrian government has demonstrably fulfilled its commitments,” Annan said.

The Syrian government is also taking certain steps towards implementing other points of the peace plan, besides the ceasefire. Over the last few weeks, some 21 European, Russian, Korean, and US journalists have been granted visas to Syria. The government is also planning to release detainees within a few weeks of the ceasefire and, according to the ICRC head, provide access to detention facilities throughout the country. 

The Syrian government has indicated that it is going to update the peace envoy on the situation, but Annan said that it is not enough and “more far reaching action is urgently required.”

Situation on the ground

Meanwhile, reports of casualties keep coming from Syria. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon expressed anxiety over the ongoing violence, saying that the attacks on areas inhabited by civilians have not stopped, despite the“acceptance of Annan’s peace plan on the part of the Syrian government.”

Activists claim that on Thursday Syrian troops launched heavy assaults on populated areas across the country.

“We are increasing our efforts to have an objective understanding of what is happening on the ground and who is doing what,” Kofi Annan said. “And I would welcome support in this endeavor from those with the influence and capacity.”

Violence has forced thousands to flee the country over the last year. Just over the last few days, more than 1,600 refugees have arrived in neighboring Turkey, according to the country's disaster management agency.

Reaching a truce is the keystone of the Annan’s peace plan to stop the bloodshed that has claimed over 9,000 lives since last March.

Ex-employee: Al Jazeera provided Syrian rebels with satphones

http://rt.com/news/al-jazeera-rebels-phones-lebanon-281/

Al Jazeera has supplied Syrian rebels with satellite communication tools to ensure telephone and Internet connection, claims Ali Hashim, a former correspondent of the Qatar-funded channel. The equipment was smuggled from Lebanon, he told RT.

The channel paid $50,000 for smuggling phones and other tools across the Syrian border to ensure they would get an inside picture, claims Ali Hashim. 

A month ago, Hashim and two other correspondents working for Al Jazeera in Lebanon, stepped down from their jobs over a dispute over how the Arab Spring should be covered. Reporting popular unrest in Bahrain and Syria revealed the acutest differences between the men and their employer.

“The channel was taking a certain stance. It was meddling with each and every detail of reports on the Syrian revolution. At the same time it was almost covering up what was going on in Bahrain,” recalls Hashim.

The journalist says Qatar authorities actually decided the channel’s agenda and created their own version of the Syrian crisis. 

“We went to the border between Lebanon and Syria. There it became obvious that militants entered Syria from Lebanon to clash with the Syrian regular army, which was 3 kilometers away from the border,” Hashim told RT.

“We took photos of those people, but the channel declined them. I was asked to forget about the militants and to return to Beirut,” he says.

In an earlier interview with the Lebanese newspaper As-Safir, Hashim called Al Jazeera’s policy “informational suicide.” 

The Syrian government has repeatedly slammed the unbalanced coverage of the uprising by some Arab news channels. But Hashim remarks that both sides of this conflict are playing dirty: while some media are siding with the rebels, omitting reports of the militants’ atrocities against civilians, the Syrian regime’s media behave as if there were no calls for freedoms and reforms in the country.

Syria has been engulfed by a popular uprising against President Bashar Al-Assad for over a year now. Opposition forces submit daily claims of people killed in fights with regular forces. The reports are hard to verify as the state remains closed to most foreign journalists. Nonetheless, the UN estimates over 9,000 people have died in the conflict. The Syrian authorities maintain they are fighting foreign insurgency, which has taken lives of over 2,000 troops.

Britain seeking to ignite ‘civil war’ in Syria

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/234779.html

Britain and its allies have been seeking to topple the government of president Bashar al-Assad irrespective of the fact that the London's ill intention can plunge Syria into a bitter civil war.

The UK government, its western allies and some Arab stooges in the Middle East region have imposed sanctions on Syria one year after the country was faced with an internal rebellion. 

The UK is also providing military and financial support to armed terror groups inside the Arab country, who are engaged in a battle to overthrow the popular government of Bashar al-Assad. 

This comes as Russia has said that the West was undermining the work of international peace envoy Kofi Annan, warning Britain and her allies not to arm Syria's rebels as a deadline for implementing an international peace plan approaches. 

The warning came as President Assad began to abide by the terms of the former UN Secretary General’s peace initiative and withdraw his tanks and troops from besieged towns. 

However, the British government and its allies are beating the drums of war to topple president al-Assad’s government. 

But within the UK itself there’s little appetite for another foreign intervention, especially at a time of economic crisis at home. 

The anti-war movement in Britain has stressed its opposition to any outside intervention in Syria, saying that outside intervention would only plunge Syria into a civil war. 

At a meeting of anti-war activists in London, speakers stressed that they support reforms in Syria, but they said that foreign intervention is already driving Syria into civil war and viscous sectarianism, with the voices of genuine reformers being drowned out. 

Speakers at the conference stressed that change must come to Syria and the political system must become more accountable and democratic, but they warned that destroying the country will not achieve that.

UK repeats anti-Iran nuclear accusations

British Prime Minister David Cameron has once more accused Iran of posing a “threat” to international security during a meeting with visiting Saudi defense minister Salman bin Abdul Aziz.

Cameron’s office announced the two have called for “concerted” international efforts against Iran’s peaceful nuclear program.

“On Iran, they agreed that the international community needed a concerted response to the threat posed by Iran's nuclear program to the security of both the region and wider world,” a Downing Street spokeswoman said.

Their talk of Iran’s peaceful nuclear activities posing a threat to international and regional security came as in the same meeting they exposed the double standards being applied to the country after they examined ways to provide security to the nuclear-armed Israeli regime.

"On the Middle East Peace Process, they agreed on the importance of negotiating peace between the Israelis and Palestinians as the best chance for securing security for [the Zionist regime of] Israel,” the spokeswoman said.

Indeed, the Downing Street struck bitter irony by describing Iran’s civilian nuclear activities as posing a threat to global security while claiming the nuke-armed Israeli regime not only does not pose a security threat to the world but also needs to be secured against outside threats.

Iran, which is a signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) has repeatedly and categorically denied any military side to its nuclear program.

Iran says it is a committed signatory to the NPT, its nuclear facilities are under full inspection of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and that it has the right to use nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.

Neither Britain nor the IAEA has ever raised any concerns about the Israeli regime’s nuclear arsenal, which is estimated to hold 200 deployable warheads. 

Syria begins troops pull out as part of cease-fire plan

The UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan says Syria has started pulling troops out of several cities in accordance with a peace plan proposed by the former UN chief.

Annan told the UN General Assembly on Thursday that the Syrian government told him it had started a "partial withdrawal" from cities of Idlib, Zabadani and Daraa. 

Annan said that he would call for a complete cessation of hostilities by 6:00 am Damascus time on April 12, after the withdrawal by the Syrian government. 

"I urge the government and the opposition commanders to issue clear instructions so that the message reaches across the country down to the fighter and soldier at the local level," he said. 

Meanwhile, the International Committee of the Red Cross says Damascus has agreed to give the organization access to prison facilities across Syria. 

An advance team led by the Norwegian general Robert Mood arrived in Damascus today to discuss the deployment of UN observers to monitor the ceasefire plan in Syria. 

On Monday, Syrian President Bashar Assad agreed to an April 10 deadline to implement international envoy Kofi Annan's six-point peace plan, which calls for the withdrawal of Syrian troops from population centers and a cease-fire. 

Syria has been experiencing unrest since mid-March 2011 and many people, including security forces, have been killed in the violence. 

Syria has blamed outlaws, saboteurs, and armed terrorist gangs for the unrest in the country, asserting that it is being orchestrated from abroad. The West and the Syrian opposition, however, accuse the Syrian government of killing protesters. 

Thu Apr 5, 2012 6:37PM GMT

Britain and its allies have been seeking to topple the government of president Bashar al-Assad irrespective of the fact that the London's ill intention can plunge Syria into a bitter civil war.

The UK government, its western allies and some Arab stooges in the Middle East region have imposed sanctions on Syria one year after the country was faced with an internal rebellion.

The UK is also providing military and financial support to armed terror groups inside the Arab country, who are engaged in a battle to overthrow the popular government of Bashar al-Assad.

This comes as Russia has said that the West was undermining the work of international peace envoy Kofi Annan, warning Britain and her allies not to arm Syria's rebels as a deadline for implementing an international peace plan approaches.

The warning came as President Assad began to abide by the terms of the former UN Secretary General’s peace initiative and withdraw his tanks and troops from besieged towns.

However, the British government and its allies are beating the drums of war to topple president al-Assad’s government.

But within the UK itself there’s little appetite for another foreign intervention, especially at a time of economic crisis at home.

The anti-war movement in Britain has stressed its opposition to any outside intervention in Syria, saying that outside intervention would only plunge Syria into a civil war.

At a meeting of anti-war activists in London, speakers stressed that they support reforms in Syria, but they said that foreign intervention is already driving Syria into civil war and viscous sectarianism, with the voices of genuine reformers being drowned out.

Speakers at the conference stressed that change must come to Syria and the political system must become more accountable and democratic, but they warned that destroying the country will not achieve that.