In analyses to be made public on Wednesday, non-proliferation experts expressed grave concerns about a proposed "separation" plan that would open India's civil nuclear facilities to U.N. inspections, while permitting military facilities to remain off-limits.

The plan is central to whether the U.S.-India nuclear deal, agreed last July, goes forward. U.S. business leaders say the deal could open the door to billions of dollars in non-nuclear and civilian nuclear-related contracts while government officials say the agreement commits India to play a larger role in halting the spread of weapons of mass destruction.

But the two governments are at odds over details, and it is unclear if they can reach agreement before President George W. Bush visits New Delhi in early March.

But even if the Bush administration deemed the plan credible and all civilian facilities were placed under permanent international monitoring, the sale of U.S. and other foreign fuel to India "would still free-up India's existing capacity to produce plutonium and highly enriched uranium for weapons and allow for the rapid expansion of India's nuclear arsenal," the experts said in a memo to the U.S. Congress obtained by Reuters.

"A sober analysis reveals the non-proliferation benefits of the original proposal are overstated and the damage to the non-proliferation regime is potentially high," said the memo, prepared by Daryl Kimball of the Arms Control Association and five others.

For 30 years, the United States led the effort to deny India nuclear technology because it tested and developed nuclear weapons in contravention of international norms. Both India and its neighbor and nuclear-armed rival Pakistan have refused to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

But Bush now views India, a rising democratic and economic power on China's border, as an evolving U.S. ally and the new nuclear deal -- allowing India to purchase nuclear reactors and fuel -- is central to that vision.

Kimball told Reuters on Tuesday he believed the deal may "fall apart" over the separation plan because India wants to exclude a large number of civilian facilities and spent fuel from international inspections.

The plan aims to ensure U.S. nuclear technology is never used for military purposes and in theory would make civilian facilities less susceptible to proliferation.

But if India buys U.S. and other foreign nuclear fuel and continues to expand its nuclear arsenal, this would force Pakistan to increase its arsenal and encourage China to continue modernizing, Kimball said.

Leonard Weiss, a chief architect of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Act of 1978 when he was staff director of the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs from 1977 to 1999, said in his analysis that if the deal enables India to ramp up its weapons production, this was a violation of U.S. obligations under the NPT, the bedrock arms control pact.

Weiss, Kimball and other experts told Congress that 11 operating power reactors in India may have produced as much as 9,000 kilograms of plutonium, which could be processed to make 1,000 nuclear weapons.

India has an estimated 50 nuclear weapons now and a goal of 300-400 weapons in a decade, the experts said.

The administration has been worried about the nuclear deal's fate, but a senior official told Reuters late on Tuesday he is more optimistic than he was two weeks ago.

Aiming to move away from the controversy and set a positive tone for Bush's visit, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is expected to address Parliament on relations with the United States on February 20 and Bush two days later will make a speech to the Asia Society with a focus on India, U.S. and other sources said.

Copyright © 2006 Reuters Limited

Apparently the lights were being flashed at planes on their final approach into the Detroit area. The first instance reported was near the Home Depot in Dearborn Heights, then a short time after the light originated from a neighborhood near Telegraph Road and Lehigh Road, according to police.

Police say shining a laser pointer at a plane is a felony and could lead to a dangerous situation.

"Just be a small laser, when it goes up into the cockpit, then it really can blind the pilot," said Capt. Lee Gavin, Dearborn Heights Police Department.

The same incident occurred about six months ago, Local 4 reported.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the FAA are investigating, and local police have assigned additional patrol vehicles to the reported areas, according to the station's reports.

The recent Municipal elections proved to be a rebuff to the Nepalese King and have been denounced by the 7-Party Alliance, the Maoist, the UN and the International Community as un-democratic.

US Ambassador James Moriarty in a “Town Hall Meeting” for the American Community stressed, “the need for maps to everyone’s homes”, and promised GPS readings for all homes of US Citizens by February 20th.
“Things are going to get worse in the coming months so please have your “go-bag” ready so that you can evacuate in a minutes notice”, the Ambassador warned and described the situation in Nepal as , “a mess and getting worse”.
“The Maoist may take advantage of there being no government, and come in and take it over”, cautioned the US Ambassador.
The Ambassador said the Maoist are threatening Nepalese employees of the US Gov., as well as Nepalese in US funded projects.

On February-1, 2005, King Gyanendra suspended all civil and democratic rights in Nepal and has ruled with an Iron-Fist from the throne.
Journalist, peace and trade union activist, representatives of civil-society, and members and supporters of the 7-Party Alliance have been beaten, arrested, brutalized on a daily basis.

Human-Rights Organizations and the UN have condemned the Nepalese King and the
RNA ( Royal Nepalese Army) for Crimes Against Humanity and demanded a return to Constitutional Democracy .

The US, a major arms supplier, and trainer of the RNA has steadfastly condemned any peace-talks between the Maoist insurgents and the 7-Party Alliance, while paying lip-service to peace.
A Senior US Military advisor, retired Army Lieutenant General Edwin P. Smith, President of the Honolulu-based Asian Pacific Center for Security Studies was rushed to Kathmandu last month to access the deteriorating situation. Without US arms and aid the Kingdom would be bankrupt. Economist estimate that after June there will be no possibility of paying civil-servants and the 150,000 strong RNA and police.

The Maoist have threatened the King with execution for, “crimes against the Nepali people”.
It is not if, but when King Bir Bikhram Shah will leave the Himalayan Kingdom for exile. The major question is, will the Rana controlled RNA support the New Republic and allow the Maoist to lay down their arms and join the 7-Party Alliance in democratic elections, or will the RNA continue to suppress the democratic aspirations of the Napali people ?

D.MICHAEL VANDEVEER Freelance Journalist (SAJA), contributor to Pacifica’s Free Speech Radio News & United We Blog(Voice of Democratic Nepal)

Host OUT OF THE BOX KKCR-FM www.kkcr.org , P.O. Box:21218 Thamel,Kathmandu, Nepal

The Palestinians have disappeared from the valley, aside from a few thousand who live there plus some to whom Israel agrees to give daily entrance permits for various reasons. It is not even possible to include the approximately 35,000 residents of Jericho among those remaining, because the Israel Defense Forces forbids them to travel northward of Area A, where they live.

Thousands of residents of the neighboring towns and villages in the northern West Bank, which are sometimes only a few kilometers away, are absent from the valley, even though they have relatives and friends, privately owned land, houses, commercial ties and jobs there. Also missing are the Palestinian cars that in the not so distant past used to transport these absentees. Missing as well are the thousands of potential travelers to Jordan, the vacationing families and school students. These potential customers are absent from the colorful stalls at the crossroads.

Israeli soldiers control this absence via four principal checkpoints that divide the valley from the rest of the West Bank. They obey the orders of their commanders: It is forbidden for any Palestinian--in other words, some two million people (the 1.4 million residents of Gaza are already forbidden to come to the West Ba nk in any case)--to enter the valley, except for those whose official address, in their ID, is the Jordan Valley.

Some will say that these are security measures, whether legitimate or excessive, citing the attacks on settlers in the region over the last five years. But primarily, this is a direct continuation of a long-standing Israeli policy that intensified during the Oslo period. This policy has turned the Palestinian Jordan Valley, about one-third of the West Bank, into a story of lost opportunities from the point of view of its Palestinian potential: a potential for agricultural development and tourism, for improving and expanding existing communities or building new ones, for enabling a variety of lifestyles--urban, rural and semi-nomadic, modern and ancient, almost biblical.

The Israeli Oslo architects were careful to ensure that the Palestinian Authority would not be able to develop the valley during those fateful years when many believed that rehabilitating the economy was the proper basis both for a peaceful solution and for increasing support for such a solution.

The Oslo architects designated most of the eastern West Bank as Area C (full Israeli control), which is off-limits to Palestinian development. Only the settlements were allowed to develop, thanks primarily to the theft and exploitation of Palestinian water sources. A military training zone, where the IDF has conducted exercises ever since it conquered the West Bank, occupies 475 square kilometers of the valley and impairs the traditional lifestyle of thousands of semi-nomadic or Bedouin shepherds in the area. These shepherds are frequently turned out of their tents or forbidden to graze their sheep on these expanses or to raise a little wheat and produce for food.

At one time the explanation was that this is a firing range; once it was an issue of illegal construction. Just last Thursday, civil administration personnel demolished the tents, tin huts and sheepfolds of some 20 agricultural families in five different places in the valley. It is clear what scares the Israeli planners: A significant portion of the Palestinian communities in the valley turned from seasonal extensions of villages in the northern West Bank into permanent communities in the middle of the last century. Jews are encouraged to settle in the valley, but every conceivable method is used to deter Palestinians from doing so.

Preventing development and halting a long-standing natural process of construction and population expansion is a form of emptying out. But over the last few months, this effort expanded to include active measures: From time to time, soldiers come during the night and remove to the other side of the checkpoint those who live or work in the valley but whose official address is elsewhere. In the morning, these people return via the hills, evading the soldiers, taking the risk of stepping on a dud artillery shell.

And in October, people were given another reason to become fed up with life in the valley: Palestinian farmers were prevented from selling their produce to Israeli farmers at the nearest border crossing between the valley and Israel.

Instead of traveling five kilometers, they were forced to travel 50, to a distant cargo terminal (Jalameh), and to wait endlessly at the internal checkpoints, knowing that a large portion of their vegetables would be spoiled by the sun and the bumping around. Knowing that there would be no reward for their labor.

The army swears that these prohibitions bear no relation to the politicians' declarations that the valley will remain in Israel's hands forever. But in practice, they are helping to empty it of Palestinians, in preparation for its official annexation to Israel.

Amira Hass is the author of Drinking the Sea at Gaza.

Though U.S.-Venezuela relations were not at their best as the two countries were divided on some issues, Venezuela and the U.S. have cooperated in fields such as energy, trade, as well as anti-drug and anti-terrorism efforts, U.S. Ambassador to Venezuela William Brownfield told a local television channel.

The envoy hoped that through negotiation, the two countries could establish mature relations.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Tom Shannon, and Venezuela's ambassador in Washington, Bernardo Alvarez, met earlier for the possibility of establishing dialogue over the disputes between the two countries, said Brownfield.

The U.S. and Venezuela have already shown that they can cooperate in effective ways, said Brownfield. He hoped the two countries could meet again to make new progress in bilateral efforts.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who took office in 1999, has clashed frequently with the Bush administration, which he accuses of trying to topple his government.

U.S.-Venezuela relations hit a new low earlier this month after Venezuelan authorities accused a U.S. naval attache at the embassy in Caracas of spying and expelled him from the country. Washington responded by sending home a Venezuelan diplomat.

Zapatero started on the wrong foot with the Bush administration by announcing the immediate withdrawal of Spanish troops from Iraq within weeks of his election victory. In the view of observers, the relationship has never quite recovered. There have been a couple of perfunctory hand-shakes in public meetings such as the United Nations summit in September, but the fact that Zapatero, a NATO ally, has not visited Washington after nearly 24 months in office sticks out like a sore thumb.

An attempt earlier this year by the Bush administration to block Spain's $2 billion arms sale to Venezuela in 2005 because Washington thought it could harm regional stability didn't help matters. Last weekend, too, a fresh troop pullout has again bedeviled Washington-Madrid relations. Spanish Defense Minister Jose Bono announced that Spain would withdraw its 200 troops from the U.N. peacekeeping force in Haiti in March, complaining that other donor countries are not paying their share of the cost. Washington and the United Nations have both pressed Spain to reconsider its decision. But Bono says he had warned that the Spanish contingent, which had been in Haiti since Nov. 2004, would be withdrawn if foreign commitments did not increase, and was now doing so.

In April 2005, Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos assured reporters in Washington that "there will be a meeting between Zapatero and Bush, though there is no agenda, no date, no specific moment as of right now...I don't think it will be before the (feast of Rocio, which begins on May 9), but after it." But the meeting has yet to take place, and seems as far into the future now as it was a year ago. Bi-lateral trade contacts appear not to have been affected. Cooperation on international terrorism has also continued, and a bottleneck of student visa applications to study in the United States because of more stringent security requirements is being resolved, if very slowly.

But on the political and defense fronts bi-lateral dealings remain coolly formal, and generally limited to middle level contacts, European sources in Washington said Wednesday.

Aznar's conservative government had been a strong supporter of President Bush's Iraq war, and until April 2004 some 2,300 Spanish troops were deployed in post-war Iraq. Bush had also developed a personal relationship with Aznar. When Aznar's Popular Party lost decisively to the socialists in the March 2004 elections, the White House is said to have been behind Georgetown University's invitation to the former prime minister to give a series of lectures on current affairs. The arrangement enables Aznar to stay in touch with the Bush administration: The closeness that does not exactly delight the present government in Madrid but, of course, the White House makes the legitimate point that the president has a right to choose his own friends.

The Spanish arms deal signed with Venezuela in November consisted of 12 transport and surveillance planes, and a number of high-speed coastal patrol boats. But the prospective sale caused concern in Washington because, "it raises a lot of questions about their potential use and what effect that may have on the stability in the region," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said on Jan. 13. So the Bush administration refused to license the sale of the planes which have protected American technology, including optical system sensors, radar, and high tech cameras. The refusal reflects the Bush administration's difficult relationship with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, and Washington's disapproval of the rapprochement it has seen growing between Madrid and Caracas.

Without specifically mentioning Washington, Bono criticized its refusal as hypocritical, "There are countries that get alarmed when Spain sells certain products, not for moral reasons, but because they wanted to sell them themselves," he said.

Arguing that the planes and boats are purely intended for defensive use, Madrid has also announced that it will seek to replace the U.S.-made components with European-made parts so that it can go ahead with the sale. But the cost will be higher, some Spanish sources in Madrid say, wiping out the profit.

"The Chinese have a whole network of secret facilities that the U.S. government understands but cannot make public," said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "This is the first public revelation of China's secret buildup."

The photographs, taken from 2000 to 2004, show China's Xia-class ballistic missile submarine docked at the Jianggezhuang base, located on the Yellow Sea in Shandong province.

Nuclear warheads for the submarine's 12 JL-1 missiles are thought to be stored inside an underwater tunnel that was photographed about 450 meters to the northwest of the submarine. The high-resolution satellite photo shows a waterway leading to a ground-covered facility.

Other photographs show additional underground military facilities, including the Feidong air base in Anhui province with a runway built into a nearby hill.

The photographs were obtained by the nonprofit groups Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and Federation of American Scientists. The photos first appeared Friday in the winter edition of the quarterly newsletter Imaging Notes.

The photographs are sharp enough to identify objects on the ground about 3 feet in size. Such digital images were once the exclusive domain of U.S. technical intelligence agencies, but in recent years, commercial companies have deployed equally capable space-based cameras.

Disclosure of the underground bases supports analyses of Pentagon and intelligence officials who say China is engaged in a secret military buildup that threatens U.S. interests, while stating publicly that its forces pose no threat.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said during a trip to China in October that Beijing was sending "mixed signals" by building up forces in secret and without explaining their purpose.

Adm. Gary Roughead, commander of the Navy's Pacific Fleet, said he did not consider China "a threat." But he also said in a speech Tuesday that China's purpose behind its rapid military buildup is not fully known. "That's a little unclear," he said, noting that "increased transparency" is needed from China.

The photographs included several shots of Chinese H-6 strategic bombers and related aerial refueling tankers at Dangyang airfield in Hubei province. Also, 70 nuclear-capable Qian-5 aircraft were photographed parked at an airfield in Jianqiao, Zhejiang province, on the East China Sea coast.

The Pentagon's four-year strategy report made public earlier this month stated that China is emerging as a power with "the greatest potential to compete militarily with the United States." The report stated that Beijing is investing heavily in "strategic [nuclear] arsenal and capabilities to project power beyond its borders."

The report did not provide specifics. U.S. officials said, however, that the secrecy of the Chinese buildup has fueled a debate within the U.S. government over the threat posed by that country.

U.S. intelligence agencies recently produced a National Intelligence Estimate, or major interagency analysis, that concluded China is using strategic deception to fool the United States and other nations about its goals and programs, including its military buildup.

Pentagon officials have asked China to allow visits to underground facilities such as the submarine tunnel and a command center in Beijing, but either the requests were denied or the existence of the sites was denied.

"The Chinese have denied having any underground submarine facilities," the Pentagon official said, noting that the satellite photos indicate that China has misled the United States.

Underground submarine sites are one of 10 major types of facilities hidden by the Chinese military, U.S. officials said. The others include nuclear missile storage facilities, other weapons plants, command centers and political leadership offices.

In 2004, China revealed the first of a new class of submarines. The development of the Yuan-class submarines was kept secret through the use of an underground factory in south-central China, the officials said.

Since 2002, Beijing has deployed 14 submarines. And it is working on a new ballistic-missile submarine, known as the Jin class, and two new Shang-class attack submarines.

According to a classified Defense Intelligence Agency assessment, China's nuclear forces include about 45 long-range missiles, 12 submarine-launched missiles and about 100 short-range missiles -- each with a single warhead.

By 2020, China's arsenal will include up to 220 long-range missiles, up to 44 submarine-launched missiles and up to 200 short-range missiles, the DIA report stated.

Richard Fisher, a China military analyst at the International Assessment and Strategy Center, said that in addition to the northern submarine base, China also has a major submarine base at Yulin, on Hainan island in the South China Sea.

The southern base gives Chinese missile submarines easier access to firing areas than the Yellow Sea base, which is more vulnerable to attacks from U.S. anti-submarine warfare systems.

UN peacekeepers are stepping up security in the city to prevent any rioting by opponents of the winner, reports say.

The UN Security Council earlier this week renewed the mandate of its 9,500-strong mission in Haiti for at least another six months.

Crisis talks

Mr Preval was credited with 51.15% of the votes, based on 96% of voting stations counted, the electoral body chief announced.

"Rene Preval... is declared the winner," Max Mathurin said.

His comments came after officials agreed to subtract more than 80,000 blank votes - or just over 4% of the total tally - from the election, taking Mr Preval over the winning threshold.

The decision followed late-night talks between the electoral council, the interim government and the Organization of American States.

Correspondents say the authorities were keen to avoid further violence over the allegations of electoral fraud.

The agreement follows days of protests, fuelled by the apparent discovery of charred ballot papers at a dump near Port-au-Prince.

Fraud inquiry

Mr Preval had warned of more protests if partial results - which would require a run-off if confirmed - were published as final.

The politician insisted he had won the vote, but partial results suggested he was just short of the 50% needed to be elected outright.

Haiti's interim government had earlier blocked publication of results until an inquiry into the fraud allegations was complete.

The UN Security Council has called on the Haitian authorities "to fully investigate those charges".

Haiti - the poorest country in the Americas - was also choosing a 129-member parliament on 7 February.

Poor following

The candidate of the small L'Espwa (The Hope) party, Mr Preval was once an ally of ousted former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and has inherited his following among the poor.

An agronomist who studied in Belgium, Mr Preval was active in the movement to oust military ruler Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier during the 1970s.

Mr Preval was prime minister for a brief period in Mr Aristide's first administration in the early 1990s.

He replaced Mr Aristide as president between 1996 and 2001. The political situation began to deteriorate by the end of his term.

But because the body's natural ability to detect some frequency wave bands diminishes almost entirely after 20, adults are completely immune to the sounds.

The Sonic Teenager Deterrent, nicknamed the Mosquito because of its sound, has proved so successful in warding off gangs from trouble-spots that it has been endorsed by the police and local authorities.

The Sonic Teenager Deterrent sends out 80-decibel bursts
The Sonic Teenager Deterrent sends out 80-decibel bursts

The black box, which can be attached to the outside wall of shops, offices and homes, sends out 80-decibel bursts of pulsing sounds at up to 16khz. It sounds to youngsters like a demented insect or a very badly-played violin.

But for adults it is hardly detectable. What is more, shop owners can control the strength of the signal as the problem of loitering youths ebbs and flows - and it does not penetrate indoors.

The system was the brainchild of Howard Stapleton, a businessman and former electronics apprentice at British Aerospace, who was sick of youths hanging around outside his local shop and intimidating customers.

He remembered visiting a factory run by his father when he was 12 and finding the noise unbearable even though the adults with him were unmoved. He was told the high frequency was perceptible only to the ears of youngsters.

Working in his bedroom in Merthyr Tydfil, and using his four children as guinea pigs, he came up with a prototype of his device and asked the local shop to test it.

"I got it so that only my kids hated it and my fianceé and I were completely unperturbed," he said. "We put up the prototype outside the store and almost immediately people stopped congregating.

"The beauty of it is that the noise does not have to be loud, just pitched at the right level which affects teenagers.

"We didn't have any complaints from the other customers and it causes no physical damage. The 20-year-old mark is not absolute but 90 per cent of people under 20 can hear it and 90 per cent of people over 30 cannot."