Custom Search
As Barack Obama looks through papers, his eight-year-old daughter, Sasha, spies on him from behind a sofa.

The photograph, released by the White House, was taken by Peter Souza, whose brief is to document the Obama presidency.

Mr Obama has said that one of the greatest benefits of working in the White House is having his family living in the same building.

Despite its spontaneous feel, the image evokes obvious – and possibly intentional - comparisons with famous pictures of a three-year-old John F Kennedy Jr playing under the same desk as his father sat working at it.

The photographs were taken a month before President Kennedy's assassination in November 1963.

Earlier this year, the White House released pictures showing Mr Obama, watched on by Caroline Kennedy, peering into the same section of the desk from which her young brother looked out 46 years ago.

The boy would often play under the desk – presented by Queen Victoria to President Rutherford Hayes – and liked to pretend that its kneehole panel was a secret door.

Mr Obama has said that one of the greatest benefits of working in the White House is having his family living in the same building.

Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Deadly quake tsunamis strike in Pacific near American Samoa islands

Tsunamis triggered by a strong quake in the South Pacific have killed at least 90 people across a number of islands.

At least 65 people were reported dead in Samoa, more than 20 in American Samoa and at least six in Tonga.

Samoan officials say whole villages have been destroyed while thousands of people are reported to have been made homeless in American Samoa.

An 8.3-magnitude quake struck at 1748 GMT on Tuesday, generating 15ft (4.5m) waves in some areas of the islands.

The Samoa islands comprise two separate entities - the nation of Samoa and American Samoa, a US territory. The total population is about 250,000.

A general tsunami warning was issued for the wider South Pacific region but was cancelled a few hours later.

The general manager of Samoa's National Health Service told the BBC that 65 people had died and 145 people were injured.

US President Barack Obama has declared a major disaster in American Samoa, enabling federal funding to made available to help victims.
Samoan Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi said he was shocked at the devastation.

"So much has gone. So many people are gone," he told the AAP news agency.

False alarm

"Some of the areas are only a few feet above sea level, so you can imagine the devastation," said Eni Faleomavaega, who represents American Samoa in the US.

"It caused severe damage to property, there are cars floating everywhere."

Mr Faleomavaega told the BBC the waves had "literally wiped out all the low-lying areas in the Samoan islands".

He said the tsunami had hit within minutes of the quake, leaving people with no time to escape.

"There would have been no warning system capable of giving adequate warning to the people," he said.

Samoa's Deputy PM Misa Telefoni told Australia's AAP news agency that "the ocean went out within five minutes".

Tsunamis triggered by a strong quake in the South Pacific have killed at least 90 people across a number of islands.

At least 65 people were reported dead in Samoa, more than 20 in American Samoa and at least six in Tonga.

Samoan officials say whole villages have been destroyed while thousands of people are reported to have been made homeless in American Samoa.

An 8.3-magnitude quake struck at 1748 GMT on Tuesday, generating 15ft (4.5m) waves in some areas of the islands.

The Samoa islands comprise two separate entities - the nation of Samoa and American Samoa, a US territory. The total population is about 250,000.

"With the location and the intensity... I don't know if anything better could have been done."
Officials at the Samoa Meteorology Division said many of those who died were killed by a second wave after they went to gather fish that had been washed up after the first.

Sirens reportedly blared out across the Samoan capital, Apia, again late on Tuesday but the warning was thought to be a false alarm.

Dr Lemalu Fiu, at a hospital in Apia, said the number of casualties was expected to rise as people arrived from coastal areas.

Mr Telefoni said there were fears the major tourism areas on the west side of Upolu island had been badly hit.

"We've had a pretty grim picture painted of all that coast," he said.

Australia said one of its citizens was feared dead with six missing. Both Australia and New Zealand are preparing to send emergency aid.

Samoan officials say it could take a week before the full extent of the damage is known.

A government official in Tonga said at least six people had been killed and four more were missing.

(CNN News ) Deadly quake, tsunami strike Samoan islands --

A magnitude 8.0 earthquake struck the Pacific near American Samoa, triggering towering tsunami waves that gushed over the island and leaving at least 77 people dead.

American Samoa Gov. Togiola Tulafono, speaking from Hawaii, said Tuesday's quake ranked "right up there with some of the worst" disasters on the island. He said about 50 people had been treated for injuries so far but he expected that number to rise.

The quake hit the small cluster of South Pacific islands early Tuesday morning.

A series of aftershocks reverberated through the islands Tuesday and residents braced for more of nature's wrath. Entire villages lay flattened or submerged. The walls of water were so strong that they twisted concrete beams and mangled cars. Roads, buildings and private homes were heavily damaged.

By Tuesday evening, Laumoli, standing outside the LBJ Tropical Medican Center morgue in the capital of Pago Pago, confirmed 22 deaths.

"I thought it was the end of the world," said Dr. Salamo Laumoli, director of health services. "I have never felt an earthquake like that before."

In neighboring Samoa, the death toll climbed to 55, said Maulolo Tavita, a government minister. There, the fear was that the fatalities would continue to rise.

Laumoli also feared more fatalities would turn up in American Samoa as rescue workers were still trying to access parts of the island severed by damaged infrastructure.

Laumoli said people in outlying villages on one end of the main island have been cut off because the main bridge was washed away.

"Two or three villages have been badly damaged," he told CNN International.

Tulafono cited extensive damage to roads, buildings and homes, and said he had spoken to the military about mobilizing reserve forces for assistance.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Ewa Beach, Hawaii, canceled tsunami watches and warnings for American Samoa about four hours after the earthquake hit. However, a tsunami advisory is still in effect for for the coastal areas of California and Oregon.
The Japan Meteorological Agency also activated a tsunami advisory along its eastern coast. The precautionary alert means that the height of a possible tsunami wave would be less than a foot and a half.

President Barack Obama "declared a major disaster exists in the Territory of American Samoa" late Tuesday and ordered federal aid to supplement local efforts. The declaration makes federal funding available to affected individuals.

The tsunami waves hit right in the middle of the Pago Pago harbor, the capital, said Cinta Brown, an American Samoa homeland security official working at the island's emergency operations center. The water devastated the village of Leone.

Russia-Georgia war EU report due & Russia vows to protect S Ossetia

## Russia-Georgia war EU report due

An independent report into who started last year's Russia-Georgia conflict is set to be published by the European Union.

At the time both countries blamed each other for the outbreak of fighting.

The report is expected to say that while the Georgians fired the first shots, the Russians created and exploited conditions that led to war.

The death toll from the conflict is generally put in the hundreds. Tens of thousands fled their homes.

At the time, the Russians accused Georgia of shelling civilians and attacking their peacekeepers in the breakaway region of South Ossetia.

For their part the Georgians say they were targeting separatist forces - and repelling a Russian invasion that was already under way.

Given the European Union's relations with Russia have improved compared to a year ago, reaction in Brussels may be muted - welcoming the report itself, but distancing the EU from its content.

## Russia vows to protect S Ossetia

Russia's prime minister has vowed to protect the breakaway Georgian regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, a year after it recognised their independence.

Speaking at the opening of a direct gas pipeline to South Ossetia, Vladimir Putin said his country would not allow any "military escapades" by Georgia.

The two fought a war last year, during which Georgia's attempts to regain control of South Ossetia were repelled.

Earlier, Russia's military said it had halved its presence in the two regions.

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Iraq legacy for Afghan campaign

As the debate continues about increasing troops in Afghanistan, questions are being posed over whether an alternative strategy should be pursued to sever local support of the Taliban. Hugh Sykes in Baghdad reflects on the lessons that could be learned from the experience of British forces in Iraq.
On the day United Kingdom troops hauled down the Union flag in Basra earlier this year, a British brigadier burst out of his office and shouted at one of my BBC colleagues: "That Hugh Sykes - get him in line."

He then stormed off without explaining what he was upset about.

But I suspect he had heard a report of mine broadcast after I spent four days in Basra city itself, wandering about, asking people what the British had achieved there.

Most of them said not much had been achieved.

Everyone I spoke to complained that the infestation of competing militias in Basra was only really tackled after the British had retreated to their airbase out in the desert.

They told me they believed that the militias were only truly neutralised by an Iraqi military operation called the "Charge of the Knights".

One man told me the British presence at bases in the city had actually made the militia problem worse, by acting as a magnet to the men with guns, with numerous civilians caught in the crossfire.

When I was there earlier this year, the city certainly felt calm.

Market quest

Desperately seeking evidence of some positive legacy of nearly six years of British occupation, I asked the bookseller for directions to the fish market that had been reconstructed by British forces. It was one of the projects UK Ministry of Defence press officers had often told me about with pride.

"Fish market?" he pondered, "what fish market?"

I asked several customers in the bookshop the same question. No-one knew what I was talking about.

Well the fish market does exist, but it is a tiny detail in a broken city. And people do not seem to know about it.

Cash incentive

I spoke to some of the young men that he had employed as labourers. One told me that he had been in the main local Mehdi Army militia before getting this job.

"I needed the money," he said.

In Kabul, a young man started sobbing as he told me about his life.

"Why is my country so miserable?" he asked.

"What have you done for us over the past eight years? If the Taliban come to see me now, I'll join them."

Back in Basra, six years ago, walking around the city centre, British Captain Dan Guest told me that some of the young unemployed men there had to survive on a few dollars a month.

Then he told me that going rate for an insurgent to mortar a British base was $25 (£15.6).

"It's a no-brainer," he added.

Young Afghans see hopes crushed

"I want to be a doctor," says Nagina, six, wearing a small white headscarf.
"I want to be a pilot," says Hemat, eight, who adds that he is top of his class in maths.

There is optimism among the young children at the Bibi Mahro school on the outskirts of Kabul and a cast-iron certainty about the jobs they would like to do in the future.

With much going wrong in Afghanistan, education is seen as one of the rare success stories in the country.

Educated workforce

"If a person does not have any higher education he can lose his hope," he says.

"If I go to university, I will solve all my problems and I will serve my people and my country."

And that is the point. If you have a functioning, effective government - so the argument goes - Afghans will be willing to support it.

But Mushtaq warns that unless the government provides opportunities, then young people will be forced to find opportunities elsewhere.

"If our government doesn't pay attention to young people," he says, "the Taliban will be able to exploit them."

Ultimately, the West wants to put the running of the country firmly back into Afghan hands.

But there can be no long-term stability in the country without its own educated workforce.

Anders Fange, however, believes that there has not been enough focus on developing the education sector.

"It's too feeble," he says. "It's too little. And crucially, what's coming now, it might be too late."

Guinea protests 'will continue'

A leading Guinean opposition leader has said protests will continue in the country to get rid of what he called the "criminal" military regime.

Alpha Conde, head of the Rally of the People of Guinea party, said he would return there to "mobilise the people".

Rights groups say at least 157 people were shot dead by troops on Monday and that woman have been publically raped.

But the interior ministry said 57 people died in the protests. Officials denied knowledge of sexual assaults.

"We can't fight and then draw back, we fought for change so we can't retreat now," Mr Conde, speaking from New York, told the BBC.

"We want free and democratic elections, but considering what happened yesterday, we now want the government to go and for it to be replaced by a national government that can organise elections."

Mr Conde said the government had been "discredited" by the violence, which he said had been "planned and were directed by the president's own advisor".

Guinean soldiers used tear gas, baton charges and fired live ammunition on Monday to break up demonstrations in the capital, Conakry.

About 50,000 people were protesting over rumours that Junta head Capt Moussa Dadis Camara intends to run for president in an election scheduled for next January.

The Guinean Organisation for Defence of Human Rights put the toll at 157 people killed and more than 1,200 wounded.

Guinea's interior ministry told the BBC that a total of 57 people died during the violence.