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China aircraft carrier confirmed by general
The 300m (990ft) carrier, under construction in Dalian, is thought to be nearly finishedThe head of China’s General Staff of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has confirmed that China’s first aircraft carrier is under construction.
Gen Chen Bingde refused to say when the carrier – a remodelled Soviet-era vessel, the Varyag – would be ready.
A member of his staff said the carrier would pose no threat to other nations.
The 300m (990ft) carrier, which is being built in the north-east port of Dalian, has been one of China’s worst-kept secrets, analysts say.
Gen Chen made his comments to the Chinese-language Hong Kong Commercial Daily newspaper.
The PLA – the largest army in the world – is hugely secretive about its defence programme.
The carrier was constructed in the 1980s for the Soviet navy but was Read more…
China defends naval actions
General Liang Guanglie, China’s defence minister, has rejected criticism that his country was acting belligerently in the South China Sea, saying China was pursuing a “peaceful rise”.
“You say our actions do not match our words. I certainly do not agree,” Gen Liang replied to critics at the Shangri-La Dialogue, a high-profile Asia defence forum in Singapore.
Speaking days after Vietnam and the Philippines accused China of aggressive behaviour in the South China Sea, Gen Liang denied that China was threatening security in the strategically important and energy-rich disputed waters, saying “freedom of navigation has never been impeded”.
He was the first Chinese defence minister to participate in the forum, which was attended by Robert Gates, US defence secretary, and other Asian defence ministers. It was Gen Liang’s first big international speech.
Mr Gates expressed “increasing concerns” about China’s recent maritime behaviour. But when asked if Beijing was undermining its “peaceful rise” claim, he replied: Read more…
115 quakes recorded at Taal volcano in 24 hours
MANILA, Philippines— (UPDATE) Taal Volcano was rocked by 115 earthquakes in the past 24 hours, the highest number of tremors recorded in the area since the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology placed the restive volcano under Alert Level 2 last April.
It was the highest number in a day, a jump from the average of 10 mild quakes daily since alert level 2 (increasing restiveness) was hoisted over Taal on April 9, said Jaime Sincioco, officer-in-charge of the Volcano Monitoring and Eruption Prediction Division of Phivolcs, in a phone interview.
He said that in the series of the 115 volcanic quakes recorded up to 3 a.m. Monday, 12 were of intensity 1 to 4 and “were felt by the residents” on the volcano island.
The strongest quake, also since April 9, was felt at intensity 4 at around 1:05 a.m.
Phivolcs said residents around the volcano in Taal, Batangas heard rumbling Read more…
House approves biometrics listing bill -MANILA, PHILIPPINES
MANILA, PHILIPPINES
THE HOUSE of Representatives approved on second reading on Tuesday a bill that seeks to clean the voter record in preparation for the midterm elections in 2013.
The Web site of the Bills and Index service stated that House Bill 3469 requires all voters to have their biometrics data — photographs, fingerprints and signature — taken by an election officer.
The bill, aside from ensuring that the Automated Fingerprint Identification System will identify double registrants and other irregularities, is seen to also discourage cheating.
Data from the Commission on Elections (Comelec) showed that there were 704,542 voters with double or multiple registration in May 2010 general elections.
The bill defines such voters as those registered in more than one city or municipality.
Only half of the 50.8 million voters have biometrics data, the Comelec said.
The bill seeks to prohibit those without biometrics data from voting. Read more…
After the ecstasy of revolution, the Bankers quietly begin carving up Egypt and North Africa
By Richard Eastman
21st Century Wire
Feb 25, 2011
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is ready to lend one billion EUROS a year to Egypt for reconstruction and “free-market reform”- even as Egypt’s Minister of Finance Samir Radwan has gone begging to the City of London bankers and the British Ministry of Trade and Investment for relief on debt payments that are about to throw Egypt into bankruptcy.
All this, as Egypt has been such a good boy with regards to privatization and austerity, measures which awarded Egypt its celebrated 7 percent growth rate- mostly in investments that will end up in international hands as ventures fail to pay out with ever diminishing Egyptian domestic purchasing power.
FRESH CYCLES OF DEBT
First EBRD will lend at interest and build what they want backed by Egyptian collateral and the value of the projects themselves. Then when it turns out they can’t make the debt payments because of all the interest we have sucked from them, we take over all of the assets we have developed. That’s freedom and EBRD is really going to give it to them. After all EBRD is experienced at this. In 1991 the EBRD was organized to financially lead Russia and Eastern Europe in their transition from paternalistic socialism to sustainable free-market economies open to international Read more…
Hundreds of villagers flee as Philippine volcano belches ash and smoke
MANILA, Philippines – Hundreds of villagers fled to safety Monday after a restive volcano belched ash and smoke into the sky after a monthlong lull, officials said.
Despite Mount Bulusan’s ash explosion, its 13th since November, there were no signs of an imminent eruption involving magma pushing out of the cone, said government chief volcanologist Renato Solidum.
The huge plume of greyish smoke shot up to more than a mile (2 kilometres) toward the blue sky, with the ash drifting southwest toward four farming towns in Sorsogon province, where about 1,200 villagers fled to emergency shelters and houses of relatives, said Benito Ramos, who heads the government’s disaster-response agency.
Army trucks helped villagers move from communities hit by the ashfall and emergency teams handed out protective masks, Ramos said.
There have not been any government orders to evacuate communities near the mountain. While many scrambled to safety, residents streamed out of houses in Irosin town to gaze or take pictures of the mid-morning spectacle using their cellphones.
Still-hot debris at the peak of Bulusan, one of the country’s 23 active volcanoes, came into contact with water, sparking the explosion. Such steam-driven blasts have happened since November and could continue in coming weeks, Solidum said.
Bulusan lies about 240 miles (380 kilometres) southeast of Manila.
South Africa: Floods kill 120 and destroy crops
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — South Africa is reeling from unusually heavy rainfall that has caused flooding in many parts of the country, wiping out crops in what is the continent’s main breadbasket.
More than 120 people have been killed in the thunderstorms and flooding since mid-December, and some 20,000 people are in need of assistance. The South African government has declared disaster areas in eight of its nine provinces.
And it’s not over yet. Above-average rainfall is forecast for South Africa and neighboring countries for the next few months.
Much of southern Africa is now on flood alert, including Mozambique, where at least 13 people have died from floods and thousands have fled their homes for higher ground. Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Zambia are also on alert for flooding.
While this is the annual rainy season in southern Africa, the heavier than usual rainfall has been blamed on La Nina, the weather pattern behind the severe flooding in other southern hemisphere countries including Australia, Brazil and the Philippines.
In South Africa, the government has put the flood damage at $211 million, but this is an early estimate and expected to rise. At least Read more…
Birds vanishing in the Philippines
By Cecil Morella (AFP)
CANDABA, Philippines — The number of birds flying south to important wintering grounds in the Philippines has fallen sharply this year, with experts saying the dramatic demise of wetlands and hunting are to blame.
Despite some harsh, cold weather across the Eurasian landmass, some waterbirds that usually migrate in huge flocks to the tropical islands have been completely absent, said Philippine-based Danish ornithologist Arne Jensen.
“The flyway populations of several waterbird species are in constant and dramatic decline,” Jensen, who advises the Philippine government on species conservation, told AFP.
“Hence the urgent need to establish real and well-managed, hunting-free waterbird sanctuaries along the migratory flyways.”
Candaba, a swamp two hours’ drive north of Manila that has long been used as a pit stop by hundreds of species as they fly staggering distances between the Arctic Circle and Australia, appears emblematic of the downfall.
Jensen said that bird watchers routinely counted 100,000 ducks at Candaba in the 1980s as they stopped there for a rest while traversing the East Asian-Australasian flyway.
But volunteers recorded just Read more…
Tectonic Plates Collapsing under Pakistan and Indonesia – 20 Foot Drop in Shoreline on Java confirmed by Google Satellite
This Picture is Soon to Come Again but this Time it will be with Volcanoes and Earthquakes!
On January 17, 2011, it was reported that the 17,500 Islands Nation of Indonesia was flooding. Here on the Islands of Java, the largest regions of the world’s fourth most populous country, and the largest population of Muslims in the world. This flooding would not seem unusual but experts there reported that there was no reason for the flooding that would account for the submergence of such a large populous area along the sea coastline.
It is true that there had been two weeks of raining in the mountainous regions of Mount Mandiri. Yet, the Chief Social Service NTT Piter Manuk admitted something was unusual. As he reported:
Piter Manuk – “Residents panic was triggered by the arrival of the flood that is considered not reasonable because there are no tributaries that pass through residential areas and for the first time this has happened in the history of Read more…
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