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14 EUROPE Former Polish President Lech Walesa (L), Jaroslaw Wlodarczyk (2nd R), chairman of International Association of Press Clubs and Gerard Sapey President of Reporters without Borders listen to Christophe Deloire, Secretary General of Reporters without Borders, organization which was awarded Freedom of Speech Award at the Royal Castle in Warsaw. — AFP Minister says aides hid drone project failure BERLIN — German Defence Minister Thomas de Maiziere, who is facing calls to resign over a failed multimillion-euro drone project, yesterday put the blame on his subordinates. The Euro Hawk project to develop an own version of a US intelligence drone cost hundreds of millions of euros and yielded nothing. De Maiziere pulled the plug on May 15. He told parliament's defence committee that two of his aides — state secretaries Stephane Beemelmans and Ruediger Wolf — knew in February that the project was on the rocks but irst informed him on May 10. An estimated 660 million euros ($860 million) had by then been poured into efforts to modify the Global Hawk surveillance craft with German sensors. The Euro Hawk version made its maiden light in 2010, but oficials found they lacked the modi- ications and documents needed if it was to be declared airworthy by European aviation safety authorities. Government auditors submitted a 67-page report to the defence committee. "In the light of the overall audit indings, I reserve the right to take disciplinary action," de Maiziere said in notes submitted at the Former Slovenian PM gets 2 years for bribery LJUBLJANA — Former Slovenian premier Janez Jansa was yesterday sentenced to two years in prison after being found guilty of giving and receiving backhanders in the euro zone country's biggest-ever defence deal. Jansa, prime minister until February, was found "guilty on the charges of giving or receiving bribery or bribery promises in the acquisition of armoured vehicles" from Finnish defence irm Patria, judge Barbara Klajnsek ruled. Jansa, who has protested his innocence and has slammed the lengthy trial as a political witch-hunt, has said he would appeal the verdict, meaning the 54-year-old will not be put behind bars for now. Several hundred of his supporters held a demonstration outside the Ljubljana courthouse after the verdict. The centre-right Jansa lost a conidence vote in February after only a year in ofice after allegations of tax irregularities by the national corruption watchdog prompted three parties to quit his coalition. The accusation added to public anger about a corrupt political elite just as the country of two million people struggles with recession and ights to avoid becoming the sixth euro zone member to need a bailout. Jansa's successor Alenka Bratusek has launched an action plan of privatisations and structural reforms and has secured two more years from Brussels to bring Slovenia's budget deicit under the euro zone limit Jansa was also ined 37,000 euros ($48,350) at the end of the 21-month trial together with two other defendants, defence ministry oficial Tone Krkovic and middle man Ivan Crnkovic, who were given 22 months. The 278-million-euro deal with Patria signed in 2006 for 135 armoured vehicles was part of Slovenian efforts to modernise its military after joining the Nato alliance in 2004, the same year it became a member of the European Union. Weeks before 2008 parliamentary elections, a Finnish television report alleged that several high-ranking Slovenian oficials, including Jansa, had had their palms greased by Patria. — AFP US Commander of the US Air Force in Europe, General Philip Breedlove (L), talks with North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato) Supreme Allied Commander Transformation (SACT), French General Jean-Paul Palomeros, yesterday during a Nato defence ministers meeting at organization headquarters in Brussels. — AFP closed session. Through a spokesman Chancellor Angela Merkel declared her "full conidence" on May 22 in de Maiziere, her former chief of staff and interior minister, who gained the defence portfolio in 2011. The drone debacle comes ahead of a general election in September. The waste of taxpayers' money has been seized upon by opposition parties seeking to unseat Merkel. They have demanded de Maiziere's resignation and called on the country to abandon all drone plans. But the auditor's report simply said the Defence Ministry should exercise greater care in purchasing other drone types. The army is eager to also buy smaller ground-attack drones armed with missiles, while NATO is counting on German cash contributions to buy a later version of the Global Hawk to be lown under direct Nato command. A German change of heart would imperil that project. The eavesdropping Global Hawk, as big as an executive jet, is lown remotely by operators on the ground. Meanwhile, Germany’s economy minister called yesterday for negotiations on a widening dispute between the EU and China to avoid an all-out trade war that could hit further sectors. — dpa/AFP Immunity given up: wiretap allegations SOFIA — Bulgaria's former interior minister Tsvetan Tsvetaeva signed away his parliamentary immunity yesterday to ight charges over a major scandal involving the alleged wiretapping of his party's political opponents. "I know that I am not guilty... I have never, on any occasion ordered or even thought I could order illegal wiretapping," Tsvetanov told journalists. "I have never used the interior ministry for political purposes." Tsvetanov was minister in the right-wing government of premier Boyko Borisov that resigned in February after mass anti-poverty protests, losing power to the Socialists in elections on May 12. Prosecutors opened legal proceedings over the scandal in April, initially indicting four interior ministry oficials for having bugged politicians, businessmen and journalists since 2009. With Tsvetanov an MP but no longer a minister, prosecutors last week called for his immunity to be lifted, saying they have evidence he knew what his subordinates were doing. Witness reports said he had even personally ordered them. The charges against Tsvetanov will be for "inaction that allowed his subordinates to commit a crime," chief prosecutor Sotir Tsatsarov said last week. If found guilty, he faces between one and eight years in prison. The wiretapping scandal became a major issue in the election campaign, taking attention away from falling standards of living in the European Union's poorest member state and further angering voters. — AFP ‘Wasting food is like stealing from poor’ VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis denounced yesterday what he called a "culture of waste" in an increasingly consumerist world and said throwing away good food was like stealing from poor people. "Our grandparents used to make a point of not throwing away leftover food. Consumerism has made us accustomed to wasting food daily and we are unable to see its real value," Francis said at his weekly audience in St Peter's Square. "Throwing away food is like stealing from the table of those who are poor and hungry," he said. Since taking ofice in March, Pope Francis has said he wants the 1.2-billion-strong Roman Catho- lic Church to defend the poor and to practise greater austerity itself. He has also made several calls for global inancial reform. Around 1.3 billion tonnes of food, or one third of what is produced for human consumption, gets lost or wasted every year, according to the United Nations' food agency. In the industrialised world the majority of waste is by consumers, often because they buy too much and have to throw away what they do not manage to eat. A UN-backed study released on yesterday said simple measures such as better storage and reducing over-sized portions would sharply reduce the vast amount of food going to waste. — Reuters THURSDAY, JUNE 6, 2013 Berlusconi backers threaten tax boycott ROME — Supporters of Silvio Berlusconi are threatening to stop paying taxes if Italy's former premier is found guilty in a series of upcoming court verdicts, a top lawmaker from his conservative party warned yesterday. A judgement is due on June 24 on the so-called "bunga bunga" affair, which sees the 76-year-old Berlusconi accused of soliciting undue favours with a minor and abuse of power. Prosecutors are seeking a six-year jail term and a lifetime ban on public ofice. "Our people could respond by deciding to no longer pay taxes," People of Freedom (PDL) deputy Daniela Santanche was quoted as saying by Il Giornale, a newspaper owned by Berlusconi's brother. Santanche, the girlfriend of Il Giornale's editor and a junior minister in Berlusconi's last government, is said to be a member of the politician's inner circle of advisors. Berlusconi is also battling against a tax fraud conviction that was conirmed on appeal last month. Italy's Constitutional Court is due to rule on June 19 on point of technicality raised by the politician's lawyers. If their arguments are taken up, judges may invalidate previous rulings and demand a retrial. Otherwise the Constitutional Court could let the case proceed before Italy's top appeals body, the Court of Cassation, which would be expected to deliver its inal judgement by November. If found guilty again by the Cassation, Berlusconi would be forced to step down from parliament. PDL hardliners are advising him to defy judges by forcing a snap election in October, which he would ight on a me-or-the-courts ticket, several Italian newspapers reported yesterday. According to reports, Berlusconi hosted a crisis meeting in Rome late on Tuesday with Santanche and other leading PDL igures to discuss party strategies in view of possible early elections. The PDL is a key member of Italy's grand coalition government, headed by Prime Minister Enrico Letta.— dpa Over 40 pc blame euro for crisis ROME — More than 40 per cent of Italians think their country is in trouble because of its eurozone membership, while a further 20 per cent want to leave the European Union, a survey revealed yesterday. Italy is undergoing the longest recession in its postwar history, but cannot spend or devalue its way out of the slump — as it so often did in the past — because it is locked into a common monetary policy and has to comply with strict rules on deicits. Censis, the country's leading research institute, said it found that 41.6 per cent of Italians agree with the following statement: "The euro is the true cause of our economic and social ills." It also found that 21.5 per cent of the population is convinced that "Italy will be stronger if it Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy (L) is greeted by European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso on arrival for a working session at the EU headquarters in Brussels yesterday. — AFP Majority of French want more reform: survey PARIS — Nearly three-quarters of French want President Francois Hollande to push further ahead with economic reforms and are ready to make personal sacriices as long the pain is fairly distributed, a survey by pollster BVA found yesterday. No fewer than 67 per cent of respondents agreed with the statement "if we carry on like this, we are headed for catastrophe" according to results of the telephone and Internet survey of nearly 1,000 people conducted between May 29-30. The indings cast doubt on a common international perception that the French are unreceptive to change and highlighted what BVA concluded was a "real calling into question" of decades of French political leadership. A full 80 per cent of respondents concurred with the statement that "our leaders have never had the courage to undertake the dificult reforms which our country needs". The poll found 74 per cent were in fa- leaves the European Union and returns to the lira," its old national currency. Anti-euro and anti-EU feelings were stronger among supporters of former premier Silvio Berlusconi — a populist conservative — and those backing the protest Five Star Movement of satirist Beppe Grillo, Censis said. Its survey also found that 80 per cent of those interviewed criticized the EU as a club dominated by "strong countries like Germany," where Italy had "little clout." Traditionally, Italians have been strongly pro-European, but attitudes have shifted in recent years, as Brussels-mandated austerity policies have been blamed for aggravating the country's recession. Italy's elites, however, remain strongly pro-EU. — dpa vour of deeper reforms in the labour market, pensions and unemployment beneits. The survey was conducted last week just as the European Commission urged France to rein in public spending, cut labour costs and reform its pension system in return for winning two extra years to bring its budget deicit within EU targets. Hollande, who was elected in May last year, has already implemented some moves to reduce high labour costs and has promised laws setting out a major overhaul of the pension system by the end of this year. He has argued that his reform record can be judged only over the full course of his ive-year term, while critics — notably in Brussels and Germany — want him to step up the pace. Meanwhile, France called on its European Union partners to quickly agree a united response to China’s decision to open an anti-dumping probe into wine imports from Europe. — Reuters/AFP
THURSDAY, JUNE 6, 2013 The highway crossing of the A92 and the A3 (R) is looded near the Bavarian city of Deggendorf yesterday, after one of Europe’s most frequented highways was looded by the nearby river Danube . — Reuters Russia braces for trial of anti-Putin rally MOSCOW — Twelve Russians go on trial in Moscow today accused of crowd violence at a mass protest against President Vladimir Putin last year in what critics say is a political show trial aimed at destroying the nascent opposition movement. Going on trial are participants in what the Kremlin has called "mass riots" on Bolotnaya square in central Moscow during an opposition rally on May 6, 2012, one day before Putin was inaugurated into his third presidential term. The trial comes as the most charismatic protest leader Alexei Navalny is in court accused of causing a loss to a regional government in an obscure timber deal. After declaring his de- Compensation deal agreed for Kenya torture victims NAIROBI — Britain has agreed on a multi-million dollar compensation settlement for thousands of Kenyans tortured by colonial forces during an uprising at the tail end of the British Empire, a lawyer and expert witness said yesterday. Negotiations began after a London court ruled in October that three elderly Kenyans, who suffered castration, rape and beatings while in detention during a crackdown by British forces and their Kenyan allies in the 1950s, could sue Britain. The torture took place during the so-called Kenyan "Emergency" of 1952-60, when ighters from the Mau Mau movement attacked British targets, causing panic among white settlers and alarming the government in London. "We have agreed on an out-ofcourt settlement," Kenyan lawyer Paul Muite, an adviser to the Mau Mau veterans seeking compensation, said. "(The negotiations) have included everybody with suficient sire to stand for president, he will be unable to stand for ofice if he is convicted. The Bolotnaya case involves 27 people. Two have confessed and have been sentenced to 4½ years and 2½ years in prison. Most of the others have languished in pre-trial detention for nearly a year. The rally saw tens of thousands march towards Bolotnaya square with small children, homemade posters and balloons and seemed similar to a string of peaceful demonstrations during the winter of 2011-2012 following parliamentary elections where observers reported massive fraud. However upon reaching the square, the crowd encountered evidence of torture. And that number is about 5,200," he said, declining to comment on the size of the payout. Britain's foreign ofice declined to comment on reports that the settlement would total £14 million. This would work out at about £2,600 — or 339,560 Kenyan shillings — per claimant in a country where average national income per capita is around 70,000 shillings. The Mau Mau nationalist movement originated in the 1950s among the Kikuyu people of Kenya. Its loyalists advocated violent resistance to British domination of the country. The Kenya Human Rights Commission has estimated 90,000 Kenyans were killed or maimed and 160,000 detained during the uprising. London tried for three years to block the Mau Mau veterans' legal action in the courts, drawing condemnation from the elderly torture victims who accused Kenya's former colonial master of using legal technicalities to ight the case. — Reuters Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych (L) welcomes FBI Director Robert Mueller during their meeting in Kiev yesterday. — Reuters a massive police presence. Most of those marching never reached the stage and many panicked after spending hours in the sun and inding themselves unable to follow the agreed route. Though it is disputed who struck the irst blow, clashes between protesters and police led to dozens of injuries, overturned portable toilets, the use of pepper spray and hundreds of arrests. Investigators have described what happened as premeditated mass riots that aimed to stoke unrest in the country, but an independent report by Russian human rights groups in April concluded that the clashes were provoked by the authorities. — AFP Candidacies conirmed ANTANANARIVO — The electoral court in Madagascar yesterday conirmed three controversial candidacies for presidential polls slated to end a four-year political deadlock on the island. The court rejected pleas by the prime minister and the armed forces to exclude current strongman Andry Rajoelina, his top rival's wife and a former president from the race, as demanded by the international community. "The requests are declared inadmissible," the court said in a statement, adding its "judgements, opinions and decisions... are not subject to any appeal." Prime Minister Omer Beriziky made the appeal on Monday along with the armed forces and other commissions tasked with supervising the country's planned return to democracy. Polls scheduled for July 24 look set for delay over a paucity of funding and lack of consensus over the candidates list. — AFP Call for probe into Litvinenko murder LONDON — The coroner tasked with overseeing an inquest into the murder of former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko called for the British government to hold a public inquiry into the death after he concluded evidence would be kept secret from his own hearing. Litvinenko, 43, died after drinking polonium-210, a radioactive isotope, that had been slipped into his tea at a London hotel in 2006. Last month, Robert Owen, a senior judge acting as coroner, decided that some crucial evidence relating to the possible involvement of the Russian state in Litvinenko's death and whether it could have been prevented would be kept secret from his pending inquest. His ruling followed a request from British Foreign Secretary William Hague to withhold information that could undermine trust in the British government or "cause real harm to the UK's international relations". Litvinenko's death plunged relations between London and Moscow to a post-Cold War low. — Reuters THE WORLD 15 Germans, Czechs on alert as floods spread north DRESDEN, Germany/LITOMERICE, Czech Republic — Tens of thousands of Germans, Hungarians and Czechs were evacuated from their homes yesterday as soldiers raced to pile up sandbags to hold back rising waters in the region's worst loods in a decade. The deluge has killed at least 12 people in central Europe since the weekend. Water started subsiding in Prague and Passau, but fears grew for Bratislava, Budapest and parts of Germany which forecasters say will be hit in the next few days. About 1,000 people had to leave their homes in the baroque German city of Dresden, which was devastated by loods in 2002 when the Elbe burst its banks. Residents paddled up streets in boats as soldiers drove past in tanks. Further north, authorities in the town of Halle on the Saale told hundreds of residents to leave their homes. Television pictures showed a bare-legged man wading to work through grey water in a suit jacket, clutching his trousers and briefcase in one hand. "We are shocked by the pictures from the lood areas," said German Economy Minister Philipp Roesler before a meeting with heads of industry groups to assess the damage. Roesler announced a ten-point plan to help reconstruction work and to help irms get credit from the KfW state development bank. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, facing an election in September, has promised 100 million euros ($130 million) in aid. Nikolaus von Bomhard, chairman of the world's biggest reinsurer Munich Re, said it was too early to estimate the scale of the loss, but businesses and households would bear the brunt of the cost as many did not have adequate lood insurance. His company put the cost of the so-called "once in a century" loods of Thousands evacuated after metro ire MOSCOW — Fifteen commuters were hospitalised and thousands evacuated from the Moscow metro yesterday after a high-voltage electric cable caught ire, illing station platforms with smoke at the height of the rush hour, emergency oficials said. The ire was extinguished, but the cable again short-circuited when the power was switched back on, adding to the transport chaos and raising fears about the state of the ageing network whose chandeliered Stalinera stations are one of the city's top sights. The emergencies ministry said around 4,500 people were evacuated after the ire broke out in a tunnel between the Okhotny Ryad and Biblioteka Imeni Lenina (Lenin Library) stations close to the Kremlin at around 8:20 am. Metro spokesman Pavel Sukharnikov said it was not the irst such incident in the system, which is used by about seven million people every day and is one of the world's busiest. "Cables have smoked before, but simply this time the consequences are more serious," he said. A total of 59 people sought medical attention, while 15 were hospitalised including three who are in intensive care, health authorities said. The health ministry said those hospitalised were suffering from smoke inhalation, while some of those who asked for medical help were suffering Scientists tell Australia to save Great Barrier Reef SYDNEY — Leading marine scientists warned the Australian government yesterday of the growing threat to the Great Barrier Reef from unchecked industrial development. More than 150 scientists from 33 institutions signed a statement saying that the mining and gas boom along the Queensland state coast was hastening the decline of the World Heritage area. The UN's educational, scientiic and cultural body meets later this month to discuss proposals to list the giant reef as a site "in danger". A Unesco report in March found 43 development proposals in the vicinity of the huge reef were under assessment and that the federal and state governments had failed to improve water quality in the area. In the declaration, the scientists voiced concern about "the additional pressures that will be exerted by expansion of coastal ports and industrial development accompanied by a projected near-doubling in shipping, major coastal reclamation works, large-scale seabed dredging and dredge spoil disposal all either immediately adjacent to, or within the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area". "We are calling on the Queensland and Australian governments to ensure that the outstanding universal value... of the... World Heritage property is protected." Ecologist Hugh Possingham said that over the last 27 years half of the reef's coral has been degraded. "This is just going to accelerate that, so we should really be doing the reverse," he told state broadcaster ABC. "This just feels like a further insult, particularly the dredge and the sediments that are going to be dug up in making these ports." Such development was "likely to be the straw that breaks the camel's back," he added. — AFP 2002 at 16.5 billion euros and insurance claims to the industry at 3.5 billion euros. Water receded in Prague, although the medieval Charles Bridge remained closed. Floods spread to low-lying northern areas of the Czech Republic near the industrial city of Usti nad Labem. About 3,700 people were rescued after some water barriers broke. Czech emergency services said they had rescued 19,000 people and the government freed up 5.3 billion crowns ($270 million) from this year's budget for lood repairs. In the Slovak capital Bratislava, low-lying parks and a waterfront Danube cafe were looded but barriers were expected to hold back the worst. The water level was expected to break through 10 metres today, an all-time high. In Budapest, 1,200 people piled up sandbags and roads were closed near the Danube. — Reuters "from a serious reaction to stress." Russian television showed footage shot by witnesses of dense smoke illing the Okhotny Ryad station, one of the system's oldest, which has exits close to the Kremlin and the Bolshoi Theatre. Crowds built up on the platforms as loudspeakers told passengers the station was closed for a "technical reason", with many ilming the smoke on their cell phones and showing little sign of panic. Passengers exiting the station washed soot from their faces using ire hydrants. The Moscow Investigative Committee said it was looking into the incident. — AFP Fireighters walk near the Okhotny Ryad station after a line on the city's metro was closed due to a ire yesterday. At least 45 people had to seek medical help and seven people were hospitalised following the closure, local media reported. — Reuters Anti-poverty steps okayed SOFIA — Bulgaria's new Socialistbacked government yesterday announced a series of measures, including subsidies for heating bills and child allowances, to help the needy in the European Union's poorest country. In a sign of solidarity, lawmakers also agreed to freeze their salaries. Prime Minister Plamen Oresharski, who took ofice last week after massive protests led to the ouster of the previous government, said more people would be eligible next winter for vouchers to help pay rising electricity bills and the monthly allowance for women on maternity leave would be increased. On taking ofice, Oresharski, a non-partisan former inance minister, pledged to tackle the economy of the country where about 22 per cent of the population lives below the oficial poverty line and unemployment stands at nearly 12 per cent. According to a recent World Bank report, 61 per cent of households in Bulgaria are energy poor. — AFP
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