Chinese Premier hails cooperation with Iran

Chinese Premier hails cooperation with Iran

Thu Oct 15, 2009 4:01am EDT

By Chris Buckley

BEIJING (Reuters) - China, reluctant to isolate Iran in its standoff with the West over its nuclear program, will maintain cooperation with Tehran and foster "close coordination in international affairs," Premier Wen Jiabao said on Thursday.

Wen made the comments to the visiting First Vice President of Iran, Mohammad Reza Rahimi, in Beijing for a forum of Central Asian states, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

While the United States and European powers call for greater pressure behind demands that Tehran be transparent about its nuclear plans, Wen's comments suggested Beijing remained unwilling to risk its oil and investment ties with Iran by backing such demands.

Wen, quoted by Xinhua, said China was willing "to maintain high-level contacts with Iran, encourage mutual understanding and confidence, promote practical cooperation between the two sides and close coordination in international affairs."

Wen also said: "China is willing to continue playing a constructive role in promoting peaceful resolution of the Iranian nuclear issue."

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu, speaking at a later news conference, gave no further details of any discussion between Wen and Rahimi about the nuclear dispute.

But Rahimi said Iran hoped to keep expanding economic and energy ties with China, Ma told reporters.

PUTIN'S WARNING

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, also in Beijing for the meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, warned on Wednesday against intimidating Iran and said talk of sanctions over its nuclear program was "premature.

Putin was speaking after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton failed to secure any specific assurances from Russia on Iran during talks in Moscow.

Wen's comments left little doubt that China wanted to keep at arm's length possible Western demands for stiffer sanctions.

"The Sino-Iran relationship has witnessed rapid development ...and cooperation in trade and energy has widened and deepened," Wen told Rahimi, according to Xinhua.

Last month, Iran said it was building a hitherto undisclosed second uranium enrichment facility, drawing warnings from the West that Tehran had to come clean about its activities, which critics say could give it the means to assemble atomic weapons.

Iran says its nuclear activities are for peaceful ends and that it complies with international nuclear rules.

China has voiced concern about the enrichment plant, but urged nations to solve the latest flare-up through negotiations.

Growing energy ties bind China, the world's No. 2 crude oil consumer, and Iran, which has the world's second-largest crude oil reserves but needs investment to develop them. Iranian oil made up nearly 12 percent of China's crude imports last year.

Beijing's distaste for sanctions and appetite for Iran's oil mean it could use its power as a permanent member of the Security Council to soften any proposed resolution on the dispute.

(Editing by Ken Wills and Ron Popeski)


© Thomson Reuters 2009. All rights reserved.

Foreign Investment in China Up 19% in September

October 15, 2009

Foreign Investment in China Up 19% in September

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 12:24 a.m. ET

SHANGHAI (AP) -- Foreign direct investment in China rose by nearly a fifth in September, suggesting the country's economic recovery is attracting investment after a lull earlier in the year.

FDI was worth $7.9 billion for the month, up 19 percent from a year earlier, the Commerce Ministry said Thursday.

But actual foreign direct investment for the first nine months of the year totaled $63.8 billion, a 14 percent decline from the same period of 2008.

China is a top investment destination but double-digit growth rates plunged in late 2007 as foreign companies were hit by the global downturn and cut spending. Many are continuing to invest in China to take advantage of its stronger economic growth compared with other countries.

There was a nearly 11 percent increase in the number of newly approved foreign invested companies in September.

The September rise in foreign direct investment compared with a 7 percent year-on-year increase in August, and declines of 35.7 percent in July and 6.8 percent in June.

"The two months' rebound shows the confidence of foreign investors in the Chinese economy. With the strong rebound in the domestic economy, I believe more foreign investors will participate in China's economic development," ministry spokesman Yao Jian told reporters in Beijing.

The foreign direct investment figure does not include stocks and other financial assets, which also appear to be attracting strong investment inflows: China's foreign reserves, already the world's largest, hit a record high $2.273 trillion by the end of September, the central bank reported Wednesday.

China's economic growth rose to 7.9 percent over a year earlier in the quarter ending June 30, up from 6.1 percent the previous quarter, and analysts say the recovery is gathering strength. Retail spending and industrial investment are rising.

On the Net:

Chinese Commerce Ministry: http://www.mofcom.gov.cn

Associated Press researcher Bonnie Cao contributed to this report from Beijing.

EBRD forecasts Russian economy to grow 3.1% in 2010

EBRD forecasts Russian economy to grow 3.1% in 2010

14:3715/10/2009
LONDON, October 15 (RIA Novosti) - Russia's GDP may grow 3.1% year-on-year in 2010 as the economy picks up after the problems of 2009, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) said in an updated forecast on Thursday.

The Russian government has been less optimistic expecting a mere 1.6% GDP growth next year.

However, both the EBRD and the Russian authorities are unanimous in predicting an 8.5% decrease in Russia's GDP for 2009.

For EBRD members as a whole, the bank expects GDP to fall 6.3% this year and increase 2.5% in 2010.

The worst performers this year are expected to be Lithuania, Latvia and Armenia, with GDP falls of 18.4%, 16.0% and 14.3% respectively.

N Korea 'regrets' causing deadly flood in S Korea

N Korea 'regrets' causing deadly flood in S Korea
by The Associated Press

South Korea October 14, 2009, 09:11 am ET

North Korea offered a rare apology Wednesday for unleashing dam water causing floods downstream blamed for six South Korean deaths and promised to alert Seoul to such measures in the future, an official said.

The release of dam water into the Imjin River last month without advance notice triggered floods that swept away six South Koreans who were camping and fishing. Seoul demanded an apology, but Pyongyang said at the time only that it "urgently" had to release the water because the dam's level was too high and that it would warn Seoul of similar releases in the future.

At 80-minute talks Wednesday suggested by South Korea and convened in the North Korean border town of Kaesong, the North expressed its regret, Unification Ministry spokesman Lee Jong-joo said. The North also said it had to discharge the waters to avoid a bigger catastrophe.

"It was regrettable that unintended human casualties occurred," the North Korean chief delegate told South Korean officials, Lee said.

The North also offered condolences to the bereaved South Korean families, Lee said.

The sides held a 15-minute session in the afternoon to wrap up Wednesday's talks.

Chief South Korean delegate Kim Nam-shik told reporters later in the day that the North again assured it would notify Seoul of similar releases and that the two sides agreed to meet again at an early date to discuss setting up a flood warning system.

Presidential spokesman Park Sun-kyoo welcomed the North's comments, saying they sent a "fairly positive signal" that it wants to improve relations with the South.

The discussions Wednesday took place amid reports that the North Korea may be preparing to test-fire more missiles following a barrage of missile launches off its east coast on Monday — the regime's first since early July.

The latest launches appeared to be meant to improve the accuracy of North Korea's missiles, a senior South Korean presidential official told reporters. He asked not to be identified because of the issue's sensitivity.

South Korea has detected indications that North Korea is also preparing to fire short-range missiles off its west coast, Dong-a Ilbo newspaper reported, citing an unidentified military official. The newspaper said the North has announced a no-sail zone in areas off the country's east and west coasts for Oct. 10-20 — an apparent signal the country could carry out more missile tests.

The Yonhap news agency carried a similar report.

South Korea's Defense Ministry declined to comment on the intelligence issue.

North Korea has recently reached out to the U.S. and South Korea following months of tension over its nuclear and missile tests earlier this year. Leader Kim Jong Il told visiting Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao last week that his government might return to stalled six-nation negotiations on its nuclear program depending on the outcome of direct talks it seeks with the U.S.

In Beijing, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell said Wednesday that Washington will not meet directly with North Korea until Pyongyang commits to rejoining six-nation disarmament talks and abides by commitments to dismantle its nuclear programs.

"The Chinese indicated that they think they heard from North Korea that they are prepared to accept that framework. But again, we will have to test that, explore that and see if that is indeed the case," he said. Campbell was in Beijing for talks likely aimed at President Barack Obama's visit next month.

Former President George W. Bush expressed confidence Wednesday that the North Korean nuclear issue can be resolved through diplomacy, but he cautioned Kim is likely to continue to prove a formidable negotiator who "will no doubt test the system, no doubt try to find weaknesses."

Bush told the World Knowledge Forum, an annual conference sponsored by a South Korean business newspaper, that the best way to bring peace to the Korean peninsula is through the six-nation talks.

The disarmament talks involving the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Russia and Japan were last held in Beijing in December.

The 1950-53 Korean War ended in a cease-fire, not a peace treaty, which means the two Koreas are still technically at war.

Associated Press Writer Christopher Bodeen in Beijing contributed to this report

S Korea wants more family reunions

S Korea wants more family reunions

Seoul - South Korea said on Thursday it would press North Korea at upcoming talks to hold more reunions of families separated for decades by barbed wire and minefields.

Red Cross officials from the two Koreas will on Friday hold one-day talks in the town of Kaesong, just north of the border, to discuss the issue.

"When it comes to the family reunions, the government has said many times that it will make utmost efforts to arrange a next round of family reunions at an early date," said unification ministry spokeswoman Lee Jong-Joo.

"We will engage in the talks from such a standpoint."

As part of recent peace overtures to the South, the communist North last month resumed the reunion programme after a lapse of two years.

Hundreds of people held tearful meetings at the North's Mount Kumgang resort for the first time since the 1950-1953 war.

The programme began in earnest after the first cross-border summit in 2000 eased tensions between the historical enemies.

More than 16,000 Koreans from both sides have held face-to-face meetings since then, while 3,200 others have communicated through video links.

But tens of thousands are still waiting for a chance to meet long-lost loved ones, and many die of old age before they get the opportunity.

Seoul wants family reunions to be held on a regular, not a one-off, basis.

Friday's talks will be watched to see whether the North is seeking food aid in return for reunions. Seoul's Red Cross chief Yoo Chong-Ha has said such a request was implicitly made during the previous programme from September 26-October 1.

South Korea's position is that the two issues should not be linked. - Sapa-AFP

Published on the Web by IOL on 2009-10-15 06:46:42

© 1999 - 2009 Independent Online.

North Korea accuses South of entering its waters

North Korea accuses South of entering its waters

Thu Oct 15, 2009 1:20am EDT

SEOUL, Oct 15 (Reuters) - North Korea accused the South on Thursday of intruding into its territorial waters, further raising tension on the peninsula already heightened by the North's launch this week of a barrage of short-range missiles.

The reclusive state made the allegations as it appeared ready to end its boycott of international nuclear discussions and agreed to hold talks with its capitalist neighbour this week on inter-Korean issues.

"The reckless military provocations by warships of the South Korean navy have created such a serious situation that a naval clash may break out between the two sides in these waters," the North's KCNA news agency quoted a military official as saying.

Analysts said the North may be trying to show that it is willing to raise the stakes to increase its bargaining leverage with Seoul and regional powers.

South Korean military officials were looking into the North's charges. (Reporting by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Ron Popeski)

Released, American father still faces uphill child custody battle in Japan

Released, American father still faces uphill child custody battle in Japan
American Christopher Savoie was arrested Sept. 28 in Japan after trying to get his children back from his ex-wife. The case has underscored widely different views in the US and Japan of parental rights and child-rearing.

By Takehiko Kambayashi | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
from the October 15, 2009 edition

Tokyo - Japanese police have released an American father who was imprisoned for allegedly kidnapping his own children despite his sole legal custody of them.

Prosecutors have not pressed charges against the American, Christopher Savoie, but they haven't yet dropped the case. Officials said they decided to release him on grounds that he was not a flight risk.

The case, which is among a growing number of international custody disputes in Japan, highlights widely varying views of divorce and child-rearing.

After Christopher and Noriko Savoie divorced in the United States, Mrs. Savoie defied a court order and took their two children to Japan. Mr. Savoie then came to Japan to get the children back. On Sept. 28, he forcefully took them and tried to get them into the American Consulate in Fukuoka. He was arrested for kidnapping them, the police say.

Tadashi Yoshino, Mr. Savoie's Japanese lawyer, said before his client's release that the American should not be indicted. "All he did was to exercise his legitimate right," Mr. Yoshino said, "though technically he may have committed a crime according to Japanese law."

US critical of Japan

US officials have long criticized Japan for its failure to sign a 1980 international agreement governing child abductions, known as the Hague Convention on Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction.

"Until now, this issue received scant media attention [in Japan]. However, with the Savoie case, Japan has earned a worldwide reputation as a safe haven for abductions," writes Debito Arudou, a columnist for the Japan Times.

In Japan, women usually gain custody of the children after a divorce. The number of cases where mothers have parental authority increased from about 50 percent in 1970 to 80 percent in 2005, according to government reports.

"In Japan, divorce means that one side [usually the father] can lose all contact with the kids," says Mr. Arudou, a naturalized Japanese citizen who himself is divorced and has no contact with his children. He says he has seen one of his daughters only once over the past five years.

"After divorce, dual custody of children is not allowed here," says Reichi Miyahara, the leader of fathers' rights group, who supports single-parent families in Fukuoka. He adds that the nation's family registry system, known as koseki, does not allow placement of a child on two people's registry.

In the Savoie case, the issue is further tangled by the fact that the couple, who had lived in Japan, never divorced in Japan, though they did in the US. Japanese officials also say that the children hold Japanese passports.

Japan more open to revising law?

Some lawmakers in the ruling Democratic Party lawmakers are now in favor of abolishing the controversial system. In a July interview with the Japan Times Herald, Yukio Hatoyama, then-opposition leader and now prime minister, said that "We support ratifying and enforcing the Hague Convention, and involved in this is a sweeping change to allow divorced fathers visitation of their children. That issue affects not just foreign national fathers, but Japanese fathers as well. I believe in this change."

According to the major daily Yomiuri, the Fukuoka District Prosecutor's Office says Savoie has pledged to resolve the issue of custody and rearing through dialogue between agents.

No aid for motherless families

Still, many hurdles remain in terms of society's view of child-rearing. Mr. Miyahara, who divorced his wife two years ago and now lives with his three children, says motherless families like his do not receive public assistance such as child-care allowances, even as there are government programs that support fatherless families.

"It is taken for granted that fathers have a certain amount of income," he says. "The system dates back to the wartime period."

Miyahara came to Tokyo last year to meet Health Ministry officials and DPJ lawmakers to ask for help. Since the DPJ won a landslide victory in the elections and is now in power, the change is expected to come, he says.

"Many single fathers also tend to hide [the fact that] they are motherless families. But I tell them to talk openly about it," he says. "In fact, more people are becoming interested in our situations."

Russia and China to build super-shipyard

Russia and China to build super-shipyard 14.10.2009

Today Russia and China are set to sign an agreement on building a super-shipyard in the city of Vladivostok. The two countries plan to discuss the joint investment issue implying $200 million of investments.

In May 2009 the united shipbuilding corporation of Russia was reported prepared to sign a memorandum on construction of a modern shipyard with one of Singapore's leading shipbuilding corporations. Today's Far East of Russia lacks shipyards being up-to-date.

It is expected that the share of foreign companies in the project will make up about 25%, though it may increase to a half.

source:
www.rosbalt.ru

China, Russia sign deal on high-speed train

China, Russia sign deal on high-speed train

2009-10-14 10:29 BJT

The Sino-Russian agreements include an outline agreement on a high-speed train in the far east of Russia.

According to Russian media, the railway line from Vladivostok to Khabarovsk could use China's high-speed train technology. The cost of building the line will be billions to hundreds of billions of US dollars.

Construction of China's first high-speed railway began in 2005 and took three years. Its high quality and low price has impressed foreign experts. As well as Russia, the United States, Brazil and India have also shown an interest in China's high-speed railway technology.

Market insiders say that cooperation in the high-speed train project benefits both sides.

Editor: Xiong Qu | Source: CCTV.com

Foreign Labourers to Be Hired for APEC-2012 Projects on a Simplified Basis

Foreign Labourers to Be Hired for APEC-2012 Projects on a Simplified Basis

09:10, 14.10.2009 | Приморский край

RF Government has simplified the procedure for issuance of permission to stay to those foreign nationals engaged in construction projects in the preparation for APEC-2012 Summit.

VLADIVOSTOK. October 14. VOSTOK-MEDIA – RF Government has simplified the procedure for issuance of permission to stay to those foreign nationals engaged in construction projects in the preparation for APEC-2012 Summit.

According to the PRIME-TASS news agency, the Government Contractors for the project “Development of Vladivostok as a Center for International Co-operation in the Asia-Pacific Region”, the federal target-oriented programme “Economic and Social Development of the Russian Far East and Trans-Baikal” will provide information on conclusion, extension and dissolution of civil law construction contracts to the RF Ministry of Regional Development. Based on the data provided the Ministry will form a list of those persons or entities concluded the civil law construction contracts.

The Russian Ministry of Regional Development will submit the list to the Federal Migration Service and inform persons or entities about inclusion in or exclusion from the list bimonthly, on the 5th and the 20th of every month.

При использовании информационных материалов ссылка на РИА «Восток-Медиа» обязательна.

Top news Vladivostok, Far East: WWF, Igor Shuvalov

14 Октября 2009 (среда)

Top news Vladivostok, Far East: WWF, Igor Shuvalov

October 5 – October 11

The Far East still counts on getting federal budget support to carry out all construction projects necessary to prepare Vladivostok for the APEC Summit 2012. Vladimir Putin will soon arrive to the region to inspect this situation. Ecology issues attract more and more attention. Last week an ecological forum took place in Vladivostok, next week there will be an international conference. Amur Leopards, one of the most endangered species of Russia, are losing their range due to wood poachers and forest fires. Learn more in the weekly report by FederalPress.

APEC Summit

Igor Shuvalov, vice prime minister of Russia, declared at a Council of the Federation meeting that the government was going to fulfill its financial obligations in regard to construction of objects and infrastructure in Vladivostok for the APEC Summit 2012. The federal budget is prepared to spend 202.2 billion rubles for various preparation projects. Also, last week Minister of Regional Development of Russia Viktor Basargin visited Vladivostok and inspected airport reconstruction works under the renovation project for the summit.

Russian sailors need help

Four ships in different parts of the world carrying crews from Vladivostok are stuck in ports due to financial troubles. Southern Pearl in Bulgaria, Piruit in Panama, Magdalena in UAE, and Madero in South Korea have all been literary left to sink or swim. The crews haven’t been paid for many months in a row. Reserves of water and food on board are quickly reducing.

Pyotr Osichansky, inspector of the International Transport Workers Federation, follows the situations up and tries to help the crew members.

Ecological Forum

The 4th EcoForum “Nature without Limits” took place in Vladivostok last week. Marine ecology issues were discussed by the scientists, power officials, business community and ecological organizations representatives from Asian-Pacific Region. The event was also attended by the UN International Environmental Technology Center representatives.

Ecology professionals discussed the problems of waste, marine environment protection and complex ocean research.

Amur Leopard

Amur Leopard, one of the world’s rarest feline species, which now is represented by only about 30 animals, might soon actually become extinct in wild nature. WWF Russia sees two main reasons why this is happening. First, leopard’s range is getting smaller and smaller due to poachers cutting wood even in the restricted nature reserves. Second, forest fires add considerably to damaging leopard’s native environment. This year forest fires destroyed nearly one third of the region’s woods, including 11% of wood in the leopard’s reserve.

Andrey Fereferov, project coordinator at WWF Russia Far East, believes that only way out is enforcing responsibility over the gamekeepers, wood cutters, land owners and land renters for taking care of the fires on their territory and appointing responsible commissioners for monitoring fires on the governmental land.

USA and Russia unite against poachers

Vladivostok Center for organized crime studies will house an international conference devoted to environmental crimes on October 20-21, 2009. USA is going to be Russia’s partner in this event. Four experts from America will arrive to deliver reports. The conference will dwell on such topics as illegal fishing, illegal wood cutting and environment pollution.

Opinion poll

Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) conducted a poll to study people’s attitude to the new scheme of governor elections. Currently governors in Russian regions are appointed by the President, instead of being directly elected by people as they used be.

Citizens of the Far East and Siberia consider that the quality of work of governors appointed by the President increased. Generally, every fifth Russian citizen shares this opinion. However 51 percent of Russian people don’t see any considerable changes in the efficiency of work of the regional governance bodies.

23% of respondents reported that the level of social responsibility of the appointed governors increased. But one the whole 49% don’t find any significant changes in social responsibility of the governors.

1600 people in 140 locations of Russia have participated in this poll.

Crisis in Khabarovsk

Statistics indicates that the industrial production in Khabarovsk Region continues to slide down. Companies’ turnover this year makes 143.6 billion rubles, which accounts for only 84.6 percent of the level of 2008. The volume of investments makes 17.6 billion rubles, or 66% of the last year’s.

Defense industry, processing and machine building are the most troubled sectors of the production. These industries experience reduction of orders from the customers, decrease in sales, debts to banks and business partners.

Back pay is another serious problem in the region. As of beginning of October back pay estimated 290 million rubles, which is 2.7 times more than in January 2009.


Тэги: Amur Leopard, Igor Shuvalov, Pyotr Osichansky, Vladivostok, Khabarovsk
© Экспертный канал «ФедералПресс» / Expert news agency FederalPress

China sentences 3 more to death over July riots

China sentences 3 more to death over July riots

BEIJING (AP) — China sentenced three more people to death Thursday for murders committed during riots in the far western Xinjiang region in July, bringing to nine the number of people facing execution for the unrest.

Nearly 200 people were killed when Muslim Uighurs and members of China's dominant Han ethnicity turned on one another in the streets of the regional capital, Urumqi. First, Uighurs assaulted random people in the overwhelmingly Han city. Days later, Han vigilantes retaliated in Uighur neighborhoods. It was the country's worst communal violence in decades.

The official Xinhua News Agency said three new defendants were sentenced to death by the Urumqi Intermediate People's Court and three others were sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve — a penalty usually commuted to life in prison.

The condemned men were all Uighur except for one Han Chinese man who was convicted of beating a Uighur man to death with a steel bar during the revenge attacks, Xinhua said.

The Uighurs sentenced to death were convicted of murder for the beating deaths of two people on July 5. One of those given a two-year reprieve was found guilty of a beating death and the other an arson attack on an auto dealership that destroyed 40 cars and resulted in heavy financial losses.

In all, 14 people were sentenced Thursday, including three who received life sentences for attacking people, setting fires and destroying private property. Of those, five were jailed for between five to 18 years for arson or assault, Xinhua said. A spokeswoman for the Xinjiang regional government, Hou Hanmin, said all those given jail terms were Uighur except for one.

The report did not say what pleas the defendants entered or if they would appeal.

Dilxat Raxit, a Uighur rights activist and spokesman for the Germany-based World Uyghur Congress, condemned the rulings. He said local sources in Xinjiang told him the defendants were not allowed to pick their own lawyers and spent just 10 minutes with the lawyers before the trial began.

"China does not have an independent justice system," he said in an e-mailed statement. "Judgments like these for the July 5 cases are mostly political and symbolic in nature. They are done for show and reported as lofty propaganda in order to serve a political purpose."

On Monday, six Uighur defendants were sentenced to death by the same court. Those sentences were the first to be handed down in the trials of scores of suspects arrested during and after the riots.

The violence flared on July 5 after a protest by Uighur youths demanding an investigation into a deadly brawl between Han and Uighur workers at a toy factory hundreds of miles away in southern China.

The government has blamed the rioting on overseas-based groups agitating for more Uighur rights in Xinjiang. Beijing has presented no direct evidence, and overseas Uighur activists have denied supporting violence.

Swift punishment of those arrested over the rioting was among the demands of Han protesters who swarmed Urumqi's streets early last month calling for the firing of Xinjiang's powerful Communist Party boss Wang Lequan. Five people died in those protests under circumstances that remain unclear.

Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

U.S. man charged of snatching own kids freed in Japan

U.S. man charged of snatching own kids freed in Japan

TOKYO (AP) — Japanese police said Thursday that they have released an American man 18 days after his arrest on accusations he snatched his children from his ex-wife.
The case is among a growing number of international custody disputes in Japan, which allows only one parent to be a custodian — almost always the mother. That leaves many divorced fathers without access to their children until they are grown.

While prosecutors have not pressed charges against Christopher Savoie, they haven't yet dropped the case either and an investagation is continuing, said police official Kiyonori Tanaka in the southern Japanese city of Yanagawa. They decided to release him on grounds that he was not a flight risk, he said.

Savoie, 38, of Franklin, Tennessee, was arrested Sept. 28 after his Japanese ex-wife accused him of grabbing his two children, ages 8 and 6, from her as she walked them to school in southern Japan.

Savoie's current wife, Amy, was awakened by a telephone call at her Franklin, Tenn., home early Thursday and answered to hear her husband's voice.

"'Hello, my love, I'm out,"' were his first words, Amy Savoie told The Associated Press.

She said the couple had only a few minutes to talk and it isn't yet clear when her husband could be coming home.

"We've been able to speak, but there's so much to talk about," she said. "This is all about him coming home."

The Fukuoka District Prosecutors Office refused to comment on the Savoie case. But a suspect with a pending indictment is released on the condition he or she accepts further questioning. No bail is involved in a pre-indictment release.

Savoie's Japanese lawyer Tadashi Yoshino was not immediately available for comment.

U.S. Consulate spokeswoman Tracy Taylor declined to comment on details of his release, but added that her understanding was that he would not be indicted.

"We are pleased to hear that he was released, and we are hopeful that we can work with the Japanese government to come to a long term solution on this problem," Taylor said. "This problem meaning the issue of international child abduction."

Japan's custody policy has begun to raise concern abroad, following a recent spate of incidents involving Japanese mothers bringing their children back to their native land and refusing to let their foreign ex-husbands visit them.

The United States, Canada, Britain and France have urged Japan to sign the 1980 Hague Convention on International Child Abduction. The convention, signed by 81 countries, seeks to ensure that custody decisions are made by the courts of a country of abducted children's original residence and that the rights of access of both parents are protected.

Tokyo has argued that signing the convention may not protect Japanese women and their children from abusive foreign husbands, but Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada recently said officials were reviewing the matter.

Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Jake Adelstein’s Tokyo Vice

Jake Adelstein’s Tokyo Vice

October 15th, 2009 by James

Tokyo Vice: An American Reporter on the Police Beat in Japan, a tell-all book by former Yomuiri Shimbun crime reporter Jake Adelstein, is finally out in stores. Reuters has an article up about him:

A 12-year stint covering crime for Japan’s biggest daily newspaper, the Yomiuri Shimbun, brought Adelstein into contact with the seamy side of Tokyo that most Westerners never see, from loan sharking to murders to trafficking in sex workers.

His mission to pull off a scoop about the yakuza turned personal after the disappearance of a prostitute friend who had been trying to help him find out about what he suspected was a human trafficking ring.

Adelstein, who wrote in Japanese, left the newspaper in 2005. In his English-language memoir, “Tokyo Vice,” which will be published in the United States this week, he tells the story of how he got to grips with the unique Japanese way of journalism, becoming such a serious irritant to the yakuza that he faced death threats and was placed under police protection in 2008.

Not being an expert on organized crime in Japan, I cannot speak for the accuracy of what he is writing, but I am always suspicious of authors who hype up their tell-all books by advertising the fact that gangsters are supposedly trying to kill them for knowing too much. That being said, however, I downloaded the Kindle edition of his book yesterday, and what I’ve read so far is pretty interesting and not too outlandish or paranoid. Unlike other authors of English language books about the dark side of Japan, Adelstein at least has a resume that gives him some authority to speak about organized crime.

For more information on Adelstein and his book, check out the following links

•WNYC radio interview about Tokyo Vice
•Japansubculture interview with Jake Adelstein.
•Random House Q&A with the author.
•“Yakuza Wars,” a JapanFocus article by David McNeill & Jake Adelstein

Incheon Bridge to Open Friday

Incheon Bridge to Open Friday The Incheon Bridge is to be officially opened on Friday, four years and four months after construction began. The bridge connects the Songdo International Business District in the Incheon Free Economic Zone and Yeongjongdo, where Incheon International Airport is located.

To celebrate the opening of the bridge, Incheon city and the Chosun Ilbo co-host a walking tour on Saturday. Vehicles are allowed from Monday.

The bridge at 21.38 km is the country's longest and the world's seventh longest. Among cable-stayed bridges, it is the world's fifth longest bridge.

Narita airport undiminished

Oct 14, 2009
Narita airport undiminished


TOKYO - JAPAN'S transport minister said Wednesday his plan to upgrade Tokyo's portside Haneda airport into a 24-hour international hub will in no way diminish the role of the outlying Narita airport.

Seiji Maehara, the minister of land, infrastrucure, transport and tourism, also said the plan was aimed at replacing South Korea's Incheon airport as a hub for international flights using Japan's local airports.

Under a government policy, Haneda handles domestic flights, except for those to and from the East Asian cities of Shanghai, Seoul and Hong Kong, at present while Narita serves international and connecting domestic trips.

The prefecture of Chiba, which includes the city of Narita, has been angered by the Haneda plan after it was made public on Monday and Tuesday by Maehara.

The minister said he had told Chiba governor Kensaku Morita in a meeting Wednesday that both Haneda and Narita should be 'incorporated in handling domestic and international flights.'

'Even if Haneda and Narita are combined, it cannot meet demand in future,' Maehara told reporters. 'If we don't divide flights between Haneda and Narita, we won't be able to cope.' A fourth runway is due to be completed at Haneda in October next year. -- AFP

Olympic Newsdesk: Japanese Joint Bid for 2020 Against IOC Rules

Olympic Newsdesk: Japanese Joint Bid for 2020 Against IOC Rules
10/13/2009

The joint bid proposal by Hiroshima and Nagasaki for the 2020 Olympic is impossible under IOC rules.

Gilbert Felli, the IOC's director for Olympic Games, told the Kyodo News Agency on Tuesday that only one city can make a bid for the games.

"The Olympic Charter clearly states only one city can host the Olympics. It does not allow two cities to co-host the games. At the moment, the answer is no," he said.

Felli did leave open the possibility that one city could host the games and the other could host the first stage of a sport such as football.

There is proposal to review bid policies but Felli said it is unlikely any change would happen before the official bid process for the 2020 Games starts in 2011. The IOC will select a host city for 2020 in 2013.

Hiroshima mayor Tadatoshi Akiba and Nagasaki mayor Tomihisa Taue announced the bid on Sunday, eight days after Tokyo's failed bid for the 2016 games. The mayors said they hope to use the Olympics to promote a nuclear free world and peace.

The mayors established a joint committee to study the game's feasibility.

The joint-bid proposal might have other obstacles besides the IOC's current rules. Distance is another factor with about 300 km separating Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The Mainichi talks with new U.S. Ambassador to Japan John Roos

The Mainichi talks with new U.S. Ambassador to Japan John Roos

U.S. Ambassador to Japan John Roos poses during an interview with the Mainichi in Tokyo. (Mainichi)The Mainichi speaks with new U.S. Ambassador to Japan John Roos about the Japan-U.S. alliance, cooperation on issues such as Japanese involvement in Afghanistan and global warming, and his visit to Hiroshima.

Mainichi: Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has said his government wishes to reassess key U.S.-Japanese agreements, including the realignment of U.S. forces in Okinawa and the Status of Forces Agreement. How far will the U.S. be willing to go in making changes to these agreements?

Roos: One thing that was critical from the president's point of view (when he came into office) was reaffirming in every way possible the commitment to the alliance and the bilateral relationship with Japan. After taking a look at the different policies that were in place, President Obama and Secretary Clinton recommitted to the realignment roadmap with Japan, something that the president and the secretary and the United States government feel is critically important to deterrence and sustainability of the alliance.

With respect to the process that the Japanese government is going through, (it's) going through its analysis of the agreements that are in place. ... It's our belief, hope and expectation that the (Hatoyama) government, just as the Obama government reconfirmed the realignment roadmap, (will reach) a similar conclusion.

Mainichi: Is there a time limit?

Roos: I think that the (Japanese) government is new. It's going through a diligent process ... analyzing past history and the agreements. These agreements took over a dozen years to negotiate. So, in fairness ... while (the government) continues to move diligently, I don't think it's appropriate to talk about any time limit.

M: With regard to the Japan-U.S. alliance, more than 20 years ago, former U.S. Ambassador Mike Mansfield said that the U.S.-Japan relationship is the most important bilateral relationship in the world. With the changes in the security environment since, how do you think the relationship should evolve?

R: (Ambassador Mansfield's words) are equally true today. ... The (Japan-U.S.) relationship has evolved into an equal partnership that will and has been addressing global issues. So, the United States looks forward to working with Japan both in a bilateral context and a multilateral context on a whole range of issues. ... (In particular), two issues are critically important to both president of the United States and the prime minister of Japan: the elimination of nuclear weapons and non-proliferation, as well as global climate change and renewable energy.

M: Prime Minister Hatoyama stated in his New York Times essay that he would like to see an East Asian Community established. What do you think about that?

R: The relationships between Japan and its neighbors ... (are) not a zero-sum game. The United States encourages enhanced good relations between Japan and its neighbors. It's important to say that the United States, being a Pacific-Asian nation, play a critical role with respect to the formation of a regional architecture.

M: On his recent visit to Afghanistan, Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada pledged Japanese support for the Afghan government in areas such as job retraining programs for former Taliban insurgents. Would that be an alternative to the MSDF (Maritime Self-Defense Force) refueling mission in the Indian Ocean?

R: First of all, it's important to say that the United States and the other nations ... involved in the coalition are deeply appreciative of the significant role that Japan has played in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan ... including the refueling. ... Hopefully, (Japan's future) contributions will continue to build on the contributions Japan has made thus far.

M: In light of President Obama's Prague anti-nuclear speech, and his recent Nobel award, it seems likely there will be increasing calls on the president to visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Would you advise the president to pay such a visit?

R: I had the opportunity to visit Hiroshima a week ago. ... It was a deeply moving experience. ... I look forward to having the opportunity to share my experience with the president. I think the decision (to visit) is a deeply personal decision that the president is going to have to make himself.

M: A U.S. ambassador to Japan has never attended the August memorial services in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Do you think you will attend next year?

R: Given the fact that I have just visited Hiroshima and was deeply moved by the experience, I will give it serious thought.

M: As a former Silicon Valley lawyer, will you be a catalyst in promoting U.S.-Japanese cooperation in such fields as new technology and new energy?

R: (In my 25 years in Silicon Valley), one thing that I learned is that the United States and Japan are two of the most innovative countries in the world, if not the two. An area I feel strongly about is the whole area of climate change and renewable energy. It's also an area of primary importance to Prime Minister Hatoyama and President Obama. So I hope to use my expertise and my background in that area to promote collaboration.

M: How do you feel, starting in your new job as ambassador, and working with a new Japanese government?

R: It is a fascinating time to be here in Japan. I have had the opportunity not only to get to know the new government leaders -- most of whom have already had deep ties to the United States. ... To contribute in even a small way to the strengthening of not only the strategic alliance but the bilateral relationship as a whole is truly a once in a lifetime opportunity, and I'm excited to have the honor of being here. (Interviewed by Naoya Sugio, Foreign News Department)

(Mainichi Japan) October 14, 2009

Roos to brief Obama on Hiroshima

Thursday, Oct. 15, 2009

Roos to brief Obama on Hiroshima

Kyodo News

U.S. Ambassador to Japan John Roos said Tuesday he intends to speak with President Barack Obama about a possible visit to Hiroshima and to convey his impressions from his own visit to the city, which was devastated by an atomic bomb dropped by the United States in World War II.

While noting that any decision to visit is ultimately "up to the president," Roos said in an interview that Obama, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize after calling for a nuclear-free world in a speech in Prague in April, is deeply committed to disarmament and ending nuclear proliferation, leaving open the possibility of a presidential visit to the symbolic city.

Roos said repeatedly that his visit to Hiroshima on Sunday was "deeply moving" and added that his parents and son went with him.

"I felt that in order to provide him (Obama) my feelings with respect to Hiroshima, it was important that I see the peace memorial, peace park and the museum and witness it myself. It's a powerful statement. I get emotional talking about it. It was a moving experience for my entire family," he said.

Hiroshima appeals court order for 'Ponyo' scenery preservation

Hiroshima appeals court order for 'Ponyo' scenery preservation

HIROSHIMA, Oct. 15 KYODO

Hiroshima Gov. Yuzan Fujita on Thursday appealed a court order to preserve Seto Inland Sea scenery -- blocking a public works project -- that inspired the creation of the animated film ''Gake no ue no Ponyo (Ponyo on the Cliff).''

Man gets life in prison for Tokyo's Hachioji Station stabbing spree

Man gets life in prison for Tokyo's Hachioji Station stabbing spree

Oct 14 09:40 PM US/Eastern

TACHIKAWA, Japan, Oct. 15 (AP) - (Kyodo)—The Tokyo District Court's Tachikawa branch sentenced a man Thursday to life in prison for a stabbing spree in July last year at the Keio Line's Hachioji Station building in western Tokyo, killing a woman and seriously injuring another.

Shoichi Kanno, a 34-year-old company employee, has pleaded guilty to the murder and attempted murder charges.

A psychological evaluation has found that he has an intellectual disability but that his ability to tell right from wrong has been maintained to a certain extent.

Prosecutors have demanded he receive a life sentence, saying Kanno was mentally competent.

Kanno is charged with fatally stabbing Mana Saiki, 22, a part-time bookstore worker, with a kitchen knife and seriously injuring a 21- year-old female customer of a bookshop in the building on July 22, 2008.

The prosecutors have said that Kanno aimed to disturb his parents by mimicking a previous rampage in the Akihabara electronics district in Tokyo.

In the June 8 Akihabara rampage, a man drove a truck into a crowd and stabbed people indiscriminately, killing seven and injuring 10 others.

Japan official tells U.S. it will halt refueling mission in Jan.

REFILING: LEAD: Japan official tells U.S. it will halt refueling mission in Jan.+

Oct 14 09:12 PM US/Eastern

Japanese Parliamentary Defense Secretary Akihisa Nagashima said Wednesday he has notified the White House and Defense Department that Tokyo will halt, in January, its refueling mission in the Indian Ocean in support of U.S.-led antiterrorism operations in and around Afghanistan.

Nagashima told reporters this after meeting with U.S. National Security Adviser Gen. James Jones and Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michele Flournoy in Washington.

The Japanese defense official quoted the White House and Pentagon officials as replying the United States views it as a matter to be decided by Japan in principle.

Japanese Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada and Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa had made it plain that Tokyo will end the refueling mission after the law for the mission expires in January.

The refueling mission, in place since 2001, was briefly halted in November 2007 after a temporary law authorizing it expired. The operations resumed after a new law was enacted in January 2008 and were extended to January 2010 after an amendment last December.

Also Wednesday, the Pentagon said Defense Secretary Robert Gates will urge Japan during his planned visit to Tokyo next Tuesday to implement a bilateral accord to relocate the U.S. Marine Corps' Futemma Air Station within Japan's Okinawa Prefecture.

At a news briefing, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said the defense chief will meet with Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, Foreign Minister Okada and Defense Minister Kitazawa, respectively.

The talks will be "an opportunity to reiterate our strong commitment to this alliance, and also to the agreements that have been reached between our two governments -- not political parties, but between our two governments," Morrell said.

Hatoyama, who took office in mid-September, has said his government will seek to move the heliport functions of the Futemma air station outside Okinawa, or even outside Japan.

That goes against a Japan-U.S. accord in 2006 to transfer the air station to an area off the coast of Henoko in the city of Nago near the U.S. Marine Corps' Camp Schwab by 2014.

The Japanese government led by Hatoyama's Democratic Party of Japan, which was the largest opposition party when the agreement was concluded, has been studying how the accord was reached, including the choice of the relocation site.

Billy Graham's son visits North Korea

Billy Graham's son visits North Korea

updated 12:31 p.m. EDT, Wed October 14, 2009

(CNN) -- The Rev. Franklin Graham has arrived in North Korea bearing a gift for North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, the country's official news agency reported Wednesday.

The Rev. Franklin Graham reportedly will oversee the delivery of $190,000 in equipment for a dental school.

Graham handed the present, which was not identified, to a high-ranking official Wednesday to give to Kim, the Korean Central News Agency reported.

Graham, the son of the Rev. Billy Graham and the president of Samaritan's Purse, arrived Tuesday in North Korea's capital, Pyongyang, KCNA said.

On its Web site, Samaritan's Purse said Franklin Graham was to meet with high-level government officials and to inspect medical facilities that the organization has installed.

"I believe it is important to make visits like this to help improve relations and to have a better understanding with each other," Graham said, according to the Samaritan's Purse Web site.

The group said Graham will visit a hospital and also will oversee the delivery of $190,000 in equipment to outfit a dental school that can train up to 70 dentists per year.

KCNA reported that Graham said he hoped he could act as a bridge for better relations between the United States and North Korea.

The visit marks Graham's third trip to North Korea. His father visited the country in 1992 and 1994 and met with President Kim Il Sung, Samaritan's Purse said.

His mother, the late Ruth Bell Graham, attended a mission school in Pyongyang in 1934, the organization said.

Later this week, Graham is scheduled to travel to China, where he'll dedicate a clinic that Samaritan's Purse built, visit a city destroyed by last year's earthquake and speak at churches, the organization said.

Roberts Gates to visit Japan, S. Korea, Slovakia

Roberts Gates to visit Japan, S. Korea, Slovakia

www.chinaview.cn 2009-10-15 03:30:58

WASHINGTON, Oct. 14 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates will visit Japan, South Korea and Slovakia next week, the Pentagon said on Wednesday.

In Tokyo, Secretary Gates will meet with senior Japanese officials on the "transformation of the alliance" between the United States and Japan, said Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell.

According to the spokesman, Gates will "reinforce America's commitment" to South Korea in his trip to Seoul, and then he will attend meetings of NATO defense ministers in Bratislava on Oct. 22and 23.

Korean Peninsula's nuclear crisis is expected to top agenda of Gates' visits to Japan and South Korea, while the war in Afghanistan is to be discussed at the NATO defense meetings.


Editor: Mu Xuequan

Korea is tapping into huge oil reserves in Iraq

Korea is tapping into huge oil reserves in Iraq

October 15, 2009

Korea is tapping into the world’s third largest oil reserves of Iraq. State-run Korea Gas Corp. is teaming up with Italy’s Eni Group, U.S. Occidental Petroleum Corp. and Iraq’s Southern Oil Co. for the 20-year production management rights of an oil field in Zubair, located 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) west of Basra, the Ministry of Knowledge Economy said yesterday.

The Korea Gas Corp.’s stake in the consortium is 20 percent. Eni has the largest stake at 35 percent followed by Occidental at 25 percent. However, the share within the consortium could change in the final stage of the contract, the Korean government said. Those final arrangements are to be reached within the next two weeks.

Korea, heavily dependent on the import of crude oil, has been trying to increase its security by developing Iraqi oil. Iraq lags only behind Iran and Saudi Arabia in proven reserves.

However, due to close ties with the independence-minded Kurdish region, the central Iraqi government has denied Korea’s participation in the bidding on oil field projects.

In the first half of this year, Iraq excluded the Korea National Oil Corp. and SK Energy from bids on developments as it stemmed from a contract signed between the Korean companies and the Kurdish regional government. The Iraqi government called the agreement illegal. The new deal not only is the first for Korea but has opened the window for possible further ventures.

Although the Iraqi government estimates the Zubair oil field holds a reserve of 3.7 billion barrels based on a study from the 1980s, the consortium estimates the field to hold more than 6.6 billion barrels. Currently 195,000 barrels of crude are produced from the field daily. The Korean gas agency and Eni are planning to raise the daily production to a maximum of 1.12 million barrels within seven years through investment in production facilities.

From the daily production, Korea’s share would be 20,000 barrels of crude until 2030. That gives Korea a total of 145 million barrels of crude for the next 20 years. This is roughly the same as two months’ worth of consumption in Korea. The contract also has an option to extend development rights for an additional five years.

“Although Korea’s volume of crude oil is relatively small compared to the total reserve, it is significant that a Korean company is fully participating in a large-scale oil field in Iraq,” said a ministry official.

The Korean gas company will also participate in the bidding on 10 other oil fields in Iraq, including fields in Majnoon, Qurna and Halfaya scheduled for early December.


By Lee Ho-jeong [ojlee82@joongang.co.kr]

Copyright by Joins.com, Inc.

S.Korea c.bank: to watch asset prices, fund flows

Thomson Reuters

S.Korea c.bank: to watch asset prices, fund flows

10.14.09, 10:18 PM EDT

SEOUL, Oct 15 (Reuters) - South Korea's central bank said on Thursday it would work to prevent the current expansionary policy from undermining economic and financial stability while monitoring asset prices and fund flows.

It also said mortgage loan growth, the biggest concern for the central bank since the middle of this year, paused in September due to government lending controls adopted in recent weeks and increased market interest rates.

The remarks, contained in the Bank of Korea's report to parliament, were in line with its policy statement issued last Friday after it held interest rates steady at a record-low 2.0 percent for an eighth consecutive month.

The central bank said Asia's fourth-largest economy was pulling out of the slump faster than initially thought but faced uncertainty due to a possible delay in advanced economies' recovery.

Regarding foreign exchange policy, it affirmed the country's official stance that authorities would let the market decide the won's value but would take action when the exchange rate moved excessively.

(Reporting by Yoo Choonsik; Editing by Jonathan Hopfner)

At Time of Change for Rev. Moon Church, a Return to Tradition

October 15, 2009

At Time of Change for Rev. Moon Church, a Return to Tradition

By CHOE SANG-HUN

SEOUL, South Korea — Thousands of couples from more than 100 countries traveled here to tie the knot Wednesday in what was seen as the last mass wedding officiated by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, the controversial and enigmatic founder of the Unification Church.

The mass wedding — often involving the exchange of vows between partners selected by Mr. Moon himself — is perhaps the best-known and most controversial feature of Mr. Moon’s church. But for members of his flock, the weddings symbolize his teachings of “trans-religion, trans-national and trans-racial" love.

The confetti-filled 90-minute spectacle, broadcast live on the Internet in three languages, was the largest Mr. Moon had organized since 1999, when 21,000 couples filled Seoul’s Olympic Stadium. It came as the church has been struggling to revamp its image and increase its stagnant membership under Mr. Moon’s three sons, who have begun taking over day-to-day responsibilities for his religious and business empire.

The three sons, all U.S.-educated, are more media savvy than their reclusive father and have given a series of interviews in recent months. The church has also revamped its Web sites, which are filled with video clips of Mr. Moon and his sons.

Mr. Moon, who is 89, and his wife, Han Hak-ja, are known among his followers as the “true parents of all humankind.” Seated at an altar festooned with flowers and shaped like an ancient Korean royal throne, they smiled and nodded when 10,000 couples gathered at a lawn of the church’s Sun Moon University south of Seoul bowed to them on Wednesday.

Row after row of brides in white gowns or traditional wedding costumes of their countries stood holding hands with grooms mostly clad in black suits.

Half of them were married for the first time, with the rest renewing their wedding vows.

When Mr. Moon led three rounds of “Hurray” at the end of the ceremony, firecrackers exploded and confetti rained down from above.

Similar mass weddings, smaller but hooked up to the South Korean event via Web links, took place around the world — in Norway, Sweden, Japan, Venezuela, Honduras and the United States.

“The blessing you are receiving today is the most precious thing, one cannot exchange anything in the world,” the Rev. Moon Hyung-jin, the 30-year-old son of Mr. Moon, said as he opened the ceremony.

Mr. Moon began the group weddings in the 1960s, marrying a few dozen couples at a time. But they grabbed world attention when they grew in size.

Some 2,500 church couples exchanged or affirmed their vows in November 1997 in a ceremony at RFK Stadium in Washington. A crowd of nearly 40,000 turned out for that event.

The global mass weddings on Wednesday were to celebrate Mr. Moon’s upcoming 90th birthday in January, church officials say. In recent years, the ceremonies became smaller as Mr. Moon came under pressure amid accusations at home and abroad that he was brainwashing his followers into donating their life savings to his church and marrying partners selected by him.

Previously, most couples met their spouses for the first time at the wedding. He also arranged for South Korean church members, including some of his own grandchildren, to marry followers from Japan, the former colonial ruler of Korea, saying that the two nations could build love through marriages.

In recent media interviews, Moon Hyung-jin, who married a bride chosen by his father when he was 17, said that the church had modified the practice and that couples now met and dated well before their weddings.

He was designated last year to take over religious leadership of the church. Another son, Moon Kook-jin, 39, was put in charge of the church’s business ventures in South Korea, which include construction, newspapers, hospitals, schools, tourism, ski resorts, beverages and a professional soccer team. A third son, Moon Hyun-jin, 40, oversees international operations.

The church owns the Washington Times newspaper and the New Yorker Hotel in Manhattan, as well as the New York-based gun manufacturer Kahr Arms. The senior Mr. Moon served 13 months in a U.S. prison on tax evasion charges in the 1980s.

Moon Hyung-jin studied theology at Harvard University, where he went about campus with a shaved head and dressed in a Buddhist robe. Today, with slicked-back hair, he leads a congregation in Seoul, where he plays rock-like gospel music and has vowed to undertake reforms like increasing transparency in fund-raising. But he said he “could never replace my father,” who church officials say will remain forever as the “Messiah.”

The elder Mr. Moon, born in what is now North Korea, said that when he was 15, Jesus appeared to him while he was praying on a mountaintop and asked him to complete his unfinished work. According to his official biography, he was persecuted by the Communists and fled to South Korea during the 1950-3 Korean War. He founded his church, officially named the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, in 1954.

In 1991, he traveled to North Korea to meet Kim Il-sung, the North Korean founder and president. His church now runs an auto company and a hotel in Pyongyang.

Mr. Moon claims his church has a presence in 193 countries. But it was never recognized by orthodox Christian churches in South Korea, which dominate religious life here, along with Buddhist sects.

Indeed, the mass wedding on Wednesday drew little attention here. South Korean media only carried brief dispatches on the event, but many of them focused on the fact that a daughter of the late military strongman Park Chung-hee renewed her wedding vows during the event, although she said she was not a church member.

Park Geun-ryeong, 55, a Roman Catholic, told the mass-circulation Dong-A daily: “I join in a trans-religious spirit. I like the Unification Church way of interpreting the Bible, incorporating the Koran and Buddhist scripts.”

Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

What's Gotten Into N. Korea?

What's Gotten Into N. Korea?
A Recent Spate of Friendly Gestures May Signal New Priorities

By Blaine Harden
Washington Post Foreign Service

Thursday, October 15, 2009

SEOUL, Oct. 14 -- There have been hiccups, such as the five missiles it fired into the sea on Monday, but North Korea seems unusually focused this fall on smoothing feathers that it ruffled earlier in the year.

The government of Kim Jong Il has made an unexpected effort this week to be conciliatory with South Korea, a U.S. donor and families split between the two Koreas.

A North Korean delegation expressed "regrets" Wednesday that a discharge of water from a northern dam created a downstream flood that last month killed six South Koreans.

The statement of "deep condolences" to the families of the dead, which the South Korean government regarded as an apology, came during a meeting near the border to discuss improved management of river flows between the two countries.

South Korea welcomed the statement, saying that it sends a "fairly positive signal" that North Korea wants to improve relations, a government spokesman said.

Meanwhile, in Pyongyang, North Korea's foreign minister met with the son of evangelist Billy Graham in what the state's official news agency described as an "amicable atmosphere."

The Rev. Franklin Graham, head of a private relief agency, said he traveled to Pyongyang this week in an attempt to build "a bridge for better relations" between the United States and North Korea. In the spring, the North kicked U.S. relief organizations out of the country and stopped accepting shipments of U.S. government food aid.

Also in the spring, North Korea launched a long-range ballistic missile, detonated a nuclear device and declared that it would never again participate in six-nation nuclear disarmament talks. Its behavior triggered tough U.N. sanctions that several South Korean experts said are squeezing the North's ability to profit from the sale of missiles and other weapons.

The North's cycle of provocation seemed to end in August, when it released two imprisoned American journalists and reopened its border with the South. Pyongyang's propaganda machine has stopped making regular threats of "all-out war" against its neighbors.

Instead, Kim suggested last week that his country would be willing to resume international arms talks, if it could first hold discussions with the United States.

In another signal of changed priorities, North Korea's largest newspaper called Wednesday for better ties with South Korea.

Those ties have been severely strained since the 2007 election of South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, who stopped aid and economic development programs for the North, until it agrees to get rid of its nuclear weapons.

In a commentary, the newspaper said, "It is the unwavering will of our republic to proactively realize reconciliation, unity, cooperation and exchanges according to the joint declarations" between North and South Korea.

Nearly two years ago, Pyongyang cut off reunions for families separated by the Korean War. But in September it allowed them to resume. Officials from the two countries plan to meet Friday to schedule more reunions.

Call Stalin a murderer? Russian judge says an opposition weekly can.

Call Stalin a murderer? Russian judge says an opposition weekly can.

Stalin's grandson tried to sue Novaya Gazeta over its characterization of the Russian leader. A judge ruled against him Tuesday, giving human rights advocates a boost.

By Fred Weir | Correspondent 10.14.09

A small courtroom victory has Russian liberals breathing a tiny and momentary sigh of relief.

A Moscow judge on Tuesday ruled against Yevgeny Dzhugashvili, the grandson of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, who had attempted to sue the opposition weekly Novaya Gazeta for $320,000 in damages over an article that accused Mr. Stalin of being a “murderer” who ordered the execution of his political foes.

Though the trial received little coverage in Russia’s state-dominated media, it has been breathlessly watched by liberals and human rights advocates, who fear that Russian history is being reshaped in order to whitewash Soviet-era crimes and curb criticism of latter-day Kremlin authoritarianism.

The judge at Moscow’s Basmanny District Court refused to consider any testimony or evidence concerning Stalin’s historical role, and made the narrow ruling that historian Anatoly Yablokov had the right to characterize Stalin as a “bloodthirsty cannibal” amid a discussion of recently declassified documents that show the dictator personally signed death orders for thousands of political opponents during the 1930s.

Both sides say they’re disappointed that the court refused to consider any wider historical evidence.

“We had hoped to turn this trial into a larger examination of Stalin, but the judge just ruled on my article,” says Mr. Yablokov. “Still, that’s a necessary outcome. I’m prepared to fight this to the bitter end.”

Mr. Dzhugashvili’s lawyer, Leonid Zhura, insists that the trial was fixed by Russian authorities who fear a public discussion about the “greatness” the country achieved under Stalin, and says he has already filed an appeal.

“It was an awful trial, a travesty, and we were not allowed to speak,” Mr. Zhura says. “We don’t understand how a person [Stalin] can be declared a criminal without any evidence?”

Russia’s beleaguered liberals have been appalled by what they see as an effort by today’s Kremlin leaders to downplay Stalin-era crimes while using the reflected glory of Soviet past achievements to burnish their own images.

“A very large section of Russian society views Stalin with respect, because he’s a symbol of glorious history, particularly the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany in World War II,” says Nikolai Petrov, an expert with the Carnegie Center in Moscow.

“Some mid-level officials make use of this, because it’s a unifying theme in a very disunited country. In any case, no Russian leader today is in a position to denounce Stalin for his crimes. That would be very unpopular,” he says.

The editors of Novaya Gazeta, one of Russia’s few remaining critical news outlets, have argued that Russia needs an equivalent of the “Nuremburg trials,” where Germany’s former Nazi leaders were judged, before Russia’s legal climate and political culture can be changed.

“We don’t believe Russia can move forward, even economically, until we have cleared Stalinism out of our system,” says Oleg Klebnikov, deputy editor of Novaya Gazeta. “This was a fair judgment, but we want to see Stalinism condemned.”

But amid economic crisis and growing Kremlin authoritarianism under Vladimir Putin and his successor, Dmitri Medvedev, that seems a distant prospect, say experts.

“There was a window of opportunity to deal with the baggage of the past in the early 1990s,” after the USSR collapsed, says Mr. Petrov. “But now it’s practically impossible.”

Russia not against being paid for gas in roubles

Russia not against being paid for gas in roubles

Wed Oct 14, 2009 11:14am EDT

BEIJING, Oct 14 (Reuters) - Russia is not against the idea of selling its gas for roubles, and would be happy to pay in yuan for Chinese goods, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday.

Putin, speaking to reporters during a visit to Beijing, added that China has proposed discussion on launching international electronic foreign currency payments in a supranational currency.

Currently the dollar is the main currency in international trade. Big oil producing nations denied a British newspaper report earlier this month that Gulf Arab states were in secret talks with Russia, China, Japan and France to replace the dollar with a basket of currencies in trading oil. [ID:nSYD421795] (Reporting by Daria Korsunskaya; Writing by Toni Vorobyova, Editing by John Bowker)

© Thomson Reuters 2009. All rights reserved.