Tunisian Revolution and the Middle East

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http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0112/71981.html

Ray LaHood's son barred from leaving Egypt

Egyptian authorities are barring several U.S. citizens — including Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood’s son — from leaving the country after Egyptian government forces raided the offices of Washington-backed groups monitoring recent parliamentary elections there.

Sam LaHood is director of the Egyptian program for the International Republican Institute, a nongovernmental organization with close ties to GOP congressional leadership. He attempted to board an airplane in Cairo on Saturday to leave the country but was told he was on a “no-fly list” and was refused permission to depart.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...01-25-19-47-02

Soldiers overthrow Papua New Guinea defense chief

PORT MORESBY, Papua New Guinea (AP) -- Rebel soldiers have staged an apparently bloodless mutiny in the Papua New Guinea capital on Thursday and installed a new military leader, a news agency and Australian officials reported.

The new crisis comes during a turbulent period in the South Pacific's most populous island nation, where two political leaders claim to be the rightful prime minister. Australian Broadcasting Corp. reported that the rebel troops are loyal to ousted prime minister Sir Michael Somare, but it is unclear whether the mutiny amounts to an attempted coup.

Between 12 and 20 soldiers overpowered guards at the Taurama Barracks in Port Moresby before dawn, ABC reported, citing an unnamed senior source in the Papua New Guinea defense force....

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-16931206

Two jailed activists released in Bahrain

The authorities in Bahrain have freed two imprisoned human rights activists.

They were imprisoned last year for supporting the pro-democracy movement in the tiny Gulf island kingdom.

Fadheela al-Mubarak was freed on Monday, nearly a year after she was arrested for listening to what was called "revolutionary music" in a car.

The other activist was Naser al-Raas, a Kuwait-born Canadian citizen who was serving a five-year term for breaking Bahrain's illegal-assembly laws.

The releases come as the government continues to struggle to quell the pro-democracy protests which erupted on 14 February 2011, despite a crackdown by security forces that human rights groups say has left at least 60 civilians dead. Four police officers have also been killed

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia/2...334806442.html

The president of the Maldives has resigned, after clashes in the capital, Male, between soldiers and police who sided with anti-government protesters.

Mohamed Nasheed confirmed his resignation on Tuesday in a nationwide broadcast after police defied orders to break up demonstrations and seized control of the state television station.

“I believe if I continue as the President of the Maldives, the people of the country would suffer more. I therefore have resigned as the President of Maldives,” Nasheed said.

“I wish the Maldives would have a consolidated democracy. I wish for justice to be established. My wish is for the progress and prosperity of the people,” he said.

Mohamed Waheed, Nasheed's vice president, was sworn in as the country's interim leader soon after.

Good blog post, definitely worth a read:
http://el-baghdadi.com/articles/48-a...ringq-now.html

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https://twitter.com/#!/NorthAndrew

US envoy Robert Blake due in Maldives tonight, UN also on way
11:49 PM

US spokesman: envoy Robert Blake due in Male Saturday #Maldives
2:14 AM

Small team of US diplomats already in Male fact-gathering #Maldives
2:15 AM

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http://blogs.aljazeera.com/liveblog/Egypt

2 hours 24 min ago

Hundreds of protesters have marched to the defence ministry today, demanding that Egypt's military rulers stand down.

The activists have planned further marches that will converge on the defence ministry, as a prelude to strikes and sit-ins on Saturday, exactly one year after former president Hosni Mubarak stepped down.

At the Fateh mosque in central Cairo, the protesters began chanting, "Down with military rule," at the end of the weekly Muslim prayer before setting off in the direction of the ministry. "We are marching to the defence ministry, we want to remove the military," said prominent activist Asmaa Mahfuz.

https://twitter.com/#!/Reem_Abdellatif

Everyone is here on the bridge! The scene is moving, people of all ages, backgrounds chanting against SCAF, some beat drums to the chants
9:32 AM

After other marches joined, at least 50,000 people here marching up the bridge after army blocked all roads to MOD
9:34 AM

March grew to at least 60,000-- Moment of silence & prayer for the martyrs, then rocking chants start again! http://ow.ly/i/saiA
10:03 AM

Tahrir is at the ministry of defense, thousands chant "freedom" as drums beat, high spirits
10:53 AM

Just passed fangary bridge, Military police & soldiers are marching on it. the foot of the bridge is blocked w/ metal chains & barbed wire
11:29 AM

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Some updates from Iran:


http://www.enduringamerica.com/home/...back.html#1745

The Latest from Iran (10 February): A Radio Debate Brings Back the 2009 Election

A poster calls for "Allahu Akbar (God is Great) on the night of 13 February for political prisoners such as Mehdi Karroubi, Mir Hossein Mousavi, and Zahra Rahnavard

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http://blogs.aljazeera.net/liveblog/Egypt

1 hour 39 min ago

The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) says that Egypt is facing conspiracies that seek to topple the state and spread chaos.

In a letter read on state television, SCAF says it will now [now or not?] bow to pressure to accelerate the transition to full civilian rule.

Thousands of activists were at demonstrations in Tahrir Square and the Defence Ministry in Cairo today, demanding that SCAF immediately hand over power.

A general strike call from activists for Saturday, the one-year anniversary of the day that Hosni Mubarak stood down as president, remains in effect.

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http://blogs.aljazeera.com/liveblog/Bahrain

4 hours 16 min ago

Two US citizens were reportedly arrested in Bahrain during protests on Saturday morning in Manama.

Huwaida Arraf and Radhika Sainath were arrested near the Standard Chartered Bank in the city centre after protesters marched into the area to re-establish their presence leading up to the one-year anniversary of the country's uprising, on February 14.

According to a press release, Arraf and Sainath were in the country with an international effort to provide an international civilian presence to report and monitor the situation on the ground, in an initiative called Witness Bahrain.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middle...203021295.html

Yemenis rally ahead of presidential vote

Thousands of Yemenis have rallied in the capital Sanaa to back a single-candidate presidential election planned for later this month, an AFP correspondent reported.

The demonstrators gathered in Sanaa's Change Square on Friday, chanting slogans in support of the election in which Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi, the vice president, will be the sole candidate.

The planned vote has sparked protests in the country's south.

"February 21 is the day on which Yemen will be reborn," read a slogan printed on a large picture of Hadi brandished by the demonstrators.

"We have all agreed that Hadi will rule for our country's independence," they chanted.

"Hadi, take the key, the slaughterer's rule has ended," they shouted, referring to the hundreds of people killed in clashes with the security forces since nationwide protests erupted in January last year opposing President Ali Abdullah Saleh's rule.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middle...529826459.html

Strikes mark anniversary of Mubarak's removal

Activists in Egypt have begun a day of civil disobedience to mark the first anniversary since the toppling Hosni Mubarak, the former president.

The call for strikes in universities and workplaces on Saturday comes after a series of protests aimed at pressuring the military to transfer power immediately to civilians.

The demonstrators say the military should hand power to parliament, which was elected over three rounds in November and December, or to a civilian council, ahead of presidential elections set to take place before the end of June.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middle...950683693.html

Second protester shot dead in Saudi Arabia

Saudi security forces shot one person dead and injured three others during what the country's state news agency described as "clashes" in the oil-producing Eastern Province.

Activists and witnesses said Friday's casualties came when security forces opened fire on an anti-government demonstration in the Qatif district.

"While security men were following up on an illegal gathering in the town of Awwamiya in Qatif on Friday they were attacked by gunfire," a police statement on the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said on Friday.

"They dealt with the situation by firing back, which resulted with the death of one."

The SPA also said a protester was killed and three others were wounded in clashes on Thursday.

Activists and witnesses said that security forces opened fire when a Shia procession marking the birthday of the Prophet Mohammad - a celebration forbidden in ultra-conservative Sunni Muslim Saudi Arabia - turned into a demonstration for reform and the release of detainees.

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http://www.boston.com/news/world/mid...ptian_capital/

UN consultant shot dead in Egyptian capital

A security official said the 41 year-old Egyptian woman, named Nermeen Gomaa Khalil, was shot in broad daylight while driving her SUV on one of Cairo's busiest streets in the neighborhood of Mohandiseen. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters.

https://twitter.com/#!/Repent11

Death toll for clashes following Portsaid massacre reach 16 after one hospitalized protester in Suez died suffering of his wounds.
1:30 pm

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia/2...838560639.html

Maldives president agrees to 'coup' probe

http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/12/world/...html?hpt=wo_c2

Venezuelan primary candidates aim to end Chavez rule

Venezuelan voters hoping for an end to Hugo Chavez's presidency head to the polls Sunday to pick a candidate to compete against him.

The five opposition candidates vying for a spot on the ballot have agreed on one thing: supporting whoever wins the primary.

The unified front could be a key weapon in the political battle leading up to October's presidential election, analysts say.

"The opposition realized that if they are not united, if they divide the vote, they can never beat Chavez," said Federico Welsch, a political science professor at the Simon Bolivar University in Caracas. "After Sunday, President Chavez will have an adversary with a face and a name. ... This time it seems like the opposition has a real possibility of winning. It's not a very high probability, but there's a chance."

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http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middle...441179977.html

Security forces in Bahrain have fired tear gas at protesters attempting to march to the landmark Pearl roundabout in the capital, Manama, on the one-year anniversary of the beginning of anti-government demonstrations at the site.

Activists reported on Tuesday that security forces had used stun grenades and shotguns to scatter hundreds of protesters attempting to occupy the roundabout which became the epicentre of weeks of protests last year by the Gulf island's Shia majority against the ruling Sunni dynasty.

Protesters marched from Sanabis, Deih and Jidhafs, which lie a few kilometres to the west of Manama, despite police warnings that protests would be dispersed, witnesses said.

"Down with (King) Hamad!" they chanted.

The Coalition of the Youth of February 14th Revolution, a group that operates separate from the main Shia bloc led by Al-Wefaq, declared on Tuesday that they planned to return to the central roundabout.

"All of us are returning", read a call for protest posted on its Facebook page, designating 6:40am local time (0340 GMT) as the starting time.

Bahrain News Agency quoted interior ministry’s appeal that cautioned against what it called "dubious TV channels that may attempt to mislead the public".

There's also been a huge crackdown on Shia villages in Bahrain the last few days with massive usages of teargas and lots of arrests.

http://blogs.aljazeera.net/liveblog/Bahrain


https://twitter.com/#!/reidarvisser

Bahrain solidarity demo among Saudi Shia today. Slogans on pic include "Qatif & Bahrain, one people, not two peoples". http://pic.twitter.com/eCHJsTjm

There's been a lot of protesting in Qatif lately and two people were killed there by security forces last week.



http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index...iles-of-arabia

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http://www.thenation.com/article/166...emen-backfires

Washington's War in Yemen Backfires

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-Ne...3061329332660/

Yemen intercepts Iranian ship with weapons

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http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/...medium=twitter

Independence Day Parade, Benghazi-Style

Stepping out of my hotel on Friday evening, I could see cars backed up for miles, stretching all the way around the Benghazi's biggest lake, not far from the shores of the Mediterranean.

Horns blared in every direction, but not just car horns: bull horns, oo-gahhorns, vuvuzelas, aerosol-powered horns, even a bagpipe or two. The air smelled of exhaust, gasoline and the occasional whiff of hash. It was a cacophonous mess, overwhelming, painful to the ears, joyful, extraordinary.

Stepping closer to the cars, I could see people of all ages stretching out the windows, waving Libyan independence flags that were sometimes larger than the person waving them. Boys and girls, men and women, the elderly, they'd all come out to celebrate.

As for the thousands of Libyan families in their cars, their goal was to reach Benghazi courthouse and its main square, the symbolic heart of the Libyan revolution. At this rate, though, there was no chance that most of these cars would ever find a place to park.

Since the road runs all the way around the lake, at least they had another option: to continue as a procession of hundreds of cars, cruising slower than a person walks, laughing, cheering, singing, waving Vs for victory to whomever made eye contact with them.

They may not have realized it, but these Libyans had just created Benghazi's first true Independence Day parade.

https://twitter.com/#!/acarvin
has been tweeting about his experiances in Libya during anniversary celebrations of the Libyan revolution.

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http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/...81E15420120215

Is an Arab Spring in the air for Algeria?

Alone among its neighbors in North Africa, Algeria has been largely untouched by the uprisings which last year ousted leaders in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen and touched off the revolt still raging in Syria.

Helped by revenues from energy exports that have bequeathed it the world's 14th biggest foreign exchange reserves, the Algerian authorities handed out pay rises, grants and subsidies that blunted a brief flare-up of protests demanding reform.

The country's rulers continue to run the country much as they have since independence from France 50 years ago: with a huge state apparatus backed by the powerful security forces and elections dominated by the ruling FLN party and its allies.

That is looking more and more out of step with the mood of the times, however, and a parliamentary election set for May 10 could be a watershed.

Pressure is building inside Algeria and abroad to ensure a fair election. As elsewhere in the Middle East, it is likely to give greater power to Islamists who for years have been pushed to the fringes by the strongly secularist state.

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http://uk.news.yahoo.com/hundreds-ga...034118198.html

'Hundreds gather' in China after self-immolation

Hundreds of Tibetans gathered in China's southwest to hold a vigil for a young Buddhist monk who set himself on fire, a rights group said, in the latest self-immolation to hit the country.

The 18-year-old monk, identified as Nangdrol, set himself alight Sunday in Sichuan province's Rangtang county, where one Tibetan was reportedly shot dead by security forces last month, the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) said on Monday.

Citing exiled Tibetan sources with contacts in the area, ICT said Nangdrol had died and his body was taken back to a local monastery. The information was confirmed by the London-based Free Tibet.

Monks did not comply with police orders to hand over the body and more than 1,000 people gathered to hold a vigil on Sunday evening, ICT said.

The group said the young Buddhist monk shouted "May HH (His Holiness) Dalai Lama live 10,000 years" and "Freedom for Tibet" when he set himself on fire.

An official surnamed Huang, who works for the finance department of the Rangtang government, denied the self-immolation and gathering had taken place.

"Everything is fine. The order is normal," he told AFP, adding there was a strong security presence.

https://twitter.com/#!/ska_kongshan

China sends combat troops to South Sudan UN peacekeeping
8:08 PM

This is the first time that China has actually deployed infantry on a PKO, although they offered them for the Lebanon peacekeeping operation
8:09 PM

[visionary]

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middle...749579234.html

Yemenis to vote for new president

Yemenis will be soon voting for a successor to President Ali Abdullah Saleh in an election with Vice President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi as the only candidate....

....The vote has also been denounced by youth activists who took to the streets to demand the end of Saleh's 33-year rule, and regard the transfer plan as a pact among an elite they regard as partners to the crimes of Saleh's tenure, including the killings of protesters in the uprising against him.

It leaves unresolved a military standoff between Saleh's relatives, a mutinous general and gunmen loyal to tribal notables. There is an armed revolt in the north of the country and Islamists accused of links to al-Qaeda have made advances in the south.

Abdullah al-Faqih, a Sanaa-based analyst, said the biggest challenge for Hadi will be to take control of the country's security forces, which remain under the control of Saleh's sons and nephews.

The sons were responsible for a bunch of massacres of protesters while Saleh was in Saudi Arabia.

Tuesday's vote is the result of a power-transition deal brokered by Yemen’s Gulf neighbours in November after months of protests calling for Saleh’s removal.

The Gulf-brokered deal gave Saleh and his closest aides immunity from prosecution and made him honorary president.

It also stipulated that Hadi become the next president of Yemen for an interim two-year period.

http://af.reuters.com/article/idAFTRE81J1C420120220

Libyans queue for first vote in battle-hit Misrata

MISRATA, Libya (Reuters) - People from Libya's battle-scarred city of Misrata queued up to vote in their first free election Monday, hoping to set a standard for the rest of the country as it prepares for national polls in June after the war that overthrew Muammar Gaddafi.

Months after Misrata saw the biggest and bloodiest battle in Libya's eight-month conflict, voters waited outside polling stations set up in schools, many of the buildings still marked with bullet holes from the fighting.

Residents were picking the new 28 members of the Misrata local council, who will have the tough job of rebuilding a city of around 300,000 people which was bombed beyond recognition.

"For the first time in our life we feel we are human. We can choose what we want, it's a joy for all Libyan people, and God willing, it will get better and better," teacher Basma Fortey said, showing her left index finger dipped in ink for the vote.

Security was tight in the coastal city, with armed men, sometimes near trucks mounted with anti-aircraft guns, standing guard at the schools.

Banners reading "Just as you were present on the front line, be there for the election" were posted around the destroyed city. The small town of Zwara last year held local elections but Misrata's polls are the first in a major settlement, its residents say.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/africa...257821201.html

Election anger mounts in Senegal

New round of protests called against Abdoulaye Wade's controversial move to seek third term of office in Sunday's vote.

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-afri...353#TWEET83058

Somalia al-Shabab militant base of Baidoa captured


Ethiopian and Somali troops have taken a strategic stronghold of Islamist militants in south-western Somalia.

Eyewitnesses told the BBC that about 50 vehicles, including some 20 tanks, had entered Baidoa, which was not defended.

After the southern port of Kismayo, the town was the most important al-Shabab base.

The news comes as the UN Security Council voted to increase the African Union force in Somalia from 12,000 to 17,731.

BBC Somali service analyst Abdullahi Sheikh says Baidoa is a big loss to al-Shabab, as the main road linking Mogadishu to the south-west and parts of Kenya and Ethiopia passes through the city.

It is also the business route for most commodities that are transported from Mogadishu to other towns in the region.

Baidoa also has an airport, which the Islamist group is thought to have used to bring in weapons.

https://twitter.com/#!/BBCAndrewH

Next stop Kismayo says African Union spokesman in Mogadishu following news that Al Shabab forced out of key town of Baidoa.
12:39 PM