NightBlogger

The United States has asked four oil-rich Gulf states for close to 300 billion dollars to help it curb the global financial meltdown, Kuwait’s daily Al-Seyassah reported Thursday. Quoting “highly informed” sources, the daily said Washington has asked Saudi Arabia for 120 billion dollars, the United Arab Emirates for 70 billion dollars, Qatar for 60 billion dollars and was seeking 40 billion dollars from Kuwait. Al-Seyassah said Washington sought the amount as “financial aid” to face the fallout of the financial crisis and help prevent its economy from sliding into a painful recession. The daily said the United States plans to use the funds to help the ailing automobile industry, banks and other companies suffering from the global financial turmoil. More

J. R. Nyquist says,
These were the words of a Soviet diplomat, speaking anonymously to Pravda in late July. A few days prior to this statement, at a meeting of Russian ambassadors convened by President Dmitry Medvedev, Moscow launched a new diplomatic offensive to push the United States out of Europe. A war between Russia and Georgia would provide the catalyst. Europe’s attention would be galvanized. Special negotiations between Moscow and Berlin, Moscow and Paris, Moscow and Rome, could move forward, and new security arrangements announced for the whole of Europe. The United States would be depicted as an irritant in otherwise good relations between Russia and Berlin. In the process, Washington would be gradually isolated.

In his November 5 address to the Federal Assembly, President Medvedev spoke of “long-term economic” plans, including the modernization of Russia’s armed forces. “Events of great significance for each one of us in this country, I am sure, have taken place,” he underscored, “events that have also been a serious test for all of Russia.” He was referring to Russia’s military incursion into Georgia, prepared over a period of many months. Russia’s disinformation campaign has now succeeded in obscuring the fact that Russia planned to invade Georgia for many months. Russian agents in South Ossetia goaded a Georgian over-reaction that would justify a Russian “counter-reaction.

This last sentence is the key phrase in Medvedev’s Address to the Russian Federal Assembly. The destabilization of the foundations of the world order is Moscow’s objective. It is not the result of the war in Georgia, but the reason for initiating it. Since the Kremlin planned the war months in advance, since it was not a spontaneous reaction to Tbilisi’s “aggression,” since the South Ossetians were the ones who provoked the Georgians into action for the sake of justifying a Russian “reaction,” the destabilization of the world order was in view from the outset. Such is the Russian strategic plan. Destabilization opens a pathway to a Russian-dominated world, where American power is neutralized once and for all. Listen carefully to the words of the Russian president: “The global financial crisis also began as a ‘local crisis’ on the U.S. domestic market. As the biggest developed economy, tightly linked to the markets in all the developed countries, when the U.S. economy began to slide it pulled financial markets all around the globe with it in its fall. This crisis has now become global in scale.” More

Radio Free Europe
The secretary-general of the CIS Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), Nikolai Bordyuzha, recently announced the planned formation of an international force in Central Asia that “should be prepared to repel any threat.” On November 9, after Russian President Dmitry Medvedev submitted an agreement on the expected 5,000-strong force to the State Duma for approval, Bordyuzha said that the force is to be formed immediately upon the agreement’s ratification by all participating states. On November 11, he began a working visit to Kazakhstan to discuss the security situation in the CSTO’s zone of responsibility. The CSTO comprises Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.

But experts argue that, as Moscow touts its efforts to strengthen military cooperation under the umbrella of the CIS and the CSTO, Russia is really pursuing its own goal of expanding its military presence and influence in Central Asia. Under the working title “Creeping Expansion Of Mysterious And Unpredictable China” on one side, and “Concerns About the Aggressive Policies of the United States in the Region” on the other, Russia is strengthening its cooperation in the military-political and military-technical spheres in the framework of such alliances as the CIS and CSTO, especially with the countries of Central Asia. More

This guy’s a joke. Who does he think he’s kidding? A few days ago he was begging the Arabs and Chinese for money and now he’s pontificating that Britain, the United States and Europe are key to forging a new world order. The Russians, Arabs and Chinese must be laughing their heads off. There will be a new world order alright but the US and Britain won’t be calling the shots.

This from Jim Willie:

“I got word in the last 24 hours that the Europeans, Russians, Chinese and Arabs, have agreed to a new world currency. It’s going to be based on a basket and the dollar and British Pound are not included. Those currencies are going to be largely tethered to gold. There’s going to be a new Russian gold-backed Rubel and a new Arab-Gulf Dinar. You cannot have a global finance system with a world reserve currency based on a debt system or an indebted economy…you have to ask yourself who is calling the shots, who is forcing decisions? The answer is the Bank for International Settlements which has had enough of the United States.”

Brown says time to build global society
(Reuters) - The financial crisis has given world leaders a unique opportunity to create a truly global society, Prime Minister Gordon Brown said on Monday. Brown, who has spearheaded calls for the reform of international financial institutions, said that Britain, the United States and Europe are key to forging a new world order. “The alliance between Britain and the U.S. — and more broadly between Europe and the U.S. — can and must provide leadership, not in order to make the rules ourselves, but to lead the global effort to build a stronger and more just international order,” Brown said in a speech in London. More

Decline and Fall of Western Civilization.blogspot.com
Dick Bove via dealbreaker (pdf) on the funding of the “new new deal”
One reason that the New Deal could put into effect the programs that it had initiated was because the United States government had a solid financial structure. From 1919 to 1930, the Federal government had been paying down its outstanding debt while the economy expanded. Debt had fallen by 36.4% in this period while real GNP fell by 8.7% (it declined by 13.3% in 1930). Thus, the capacity for increasing the debt was substantial. Clearly the problem today is that the United States is broke. From mid 2000 to mid 2008 the nation’s debt has grown by 66.9% while real GNP is up by 19.6%. The deficit was rising before the reintroduction of the New Deal and today the country does not have the money to pay its bills.

Therefore, if the Obama team wants to continue the Bush team policies of recreating the New Deal, some entity must lend the country the money to do so. Americans do not like buying Treasury debt so foreigners are being relied upon to fund this program. Thus, one must watch the dollar. If it drops in value, it will force the Americans to buy the new debt (higher interest rates will be necessary) or the Federal Reserve to further debase the currency to pay for the new programs. In the next six months, the government must raise $915 billion. It will be very important to monitor this fund raising process to determine if New Deal redux will be put in place.

Ilargi
The Automatic Earth
“There ain’t no cure”
I know that whatever hope a new administration may evoke in the hearts and minds of Americans and people across the globe, one thing still stands. There is an untold number of trillions of dollars that needs to be sucked and wiped out of the global economic systems. These are toxic trillions. Toxic, as in: the longer they are permitted to remain within the body ‘financic’ and the body ‘politic’, the more damage they will cause.

Millions upon millions of jobs will be lost in the US alone within the next 12 months. Obama’s task will not, because it can not, be to lead his nation back into prosperous times. Certainly not before 2012, but in all likelihood not even within our lifetimes. If he wishes to prove himself to be a true leader, his mission will be to soothe the pain, to stem the bleeding, to minimize the suffering of the herd, and most of all to stop the lying and cheating that has come to define the nation, at the latest ever since Greenspan took over the Fed in 1987.

That is a role which is 1000 times harder than leading a people into prosperity. But there are no alternatives available: no-one can turn this economy around, not before it’s run its course, not until all the losses have been absorbed and many souls have perished as a result.

There will be enormous pressure on the new president to follow the path set by the IMF and the World Bank, whose solution has always been to live off the misery of people in far away corners of the planet. We can but hope that Obama has the guts to shut off access to that path. But I’m not sure of that by any means: it has been the American modus operandi for far too many years.

I see a bank merger in England, between Lloyd’s and HBOS, in which $27 billion needs to be raised in order to cut 20.000 jobs. Is that crazy or what? Moreover, the numbers pertaining to the US deficits are starting to boggle even my feeble brain. I saw yesterday how the Bush administration is being complimented on its preparations for the transition to a new government come January. And I’m thinking how I can totally imagine why they would want to transfer responsibility for all that’s in the pipeline before January 20, as soon as they can.

As soon as there’s a new president, they’ll wash their hands. However, not before they’ve run the deficit into the stratosphere. I doubt that many people still have the stomach, in the face of all the losses so far recorded, to think about what it means for the US government to borrow $2-$3 trillion in one single year, 2009. Until now, there’s never been a deficit larger than $1 trillion, not even close actually.

The new president will be left with a legacy of last-minute, legally binding, Bush, DIck and Colon commitments that will not only cause immeasurable grief on the streets of America, it will simultaneously hammer, pound and pulverize the status and value of US Treasury bonds, making it exponentially increasingly hard to finance what is needed just to keep day-to-day operations running. Treasuries are the last game left, and they too are a game that is over.

The markets will be up for a bit, hard to say for how long, but after that they will plunge in a way not seen since the 1720 South Sea Bubble. And Obama won’t be able to do anything, provided he would want to, except hold the hands of those who are drawing their last breath. He won’t be able to heal his people, or cure what is ailing the nation’s economy.

There ain’t no cure. More

(CNN) — Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said Thursday he is recalling his own ambassador from Washington and expelling the U.S. ambassador from Venezuela. “He has 72 hours, from this moment, the Yankee ambassador in Caracas, to leave Venezuela,” Chavez told a crowd of supporters. The president said he was making the moves “in solidarity with Bolivia and the people of Bolivia.” Bolivia’s Evo Morales accused the United States Thursday of fomenting a coup d’etat by rich eastern department landowners against him, the country’s first Indian president. “We have seen reports about President Chavez’s remarks but have not received any official diplomatic communication,” said Gordon Duguid, a State Department spokesman. “Our embassy in Caracas is looking into these reports.”

Also Thursday, Chavez accused the United States of having backed a coup plot against him. “When there’s a new government in the United States, we’ll send an ambassador,” he said. “A government that respects Latin America.” Earlier Thursday, Chavez said he has uncovered a U.S.-backed plot to remove him from power. “It’s the empire that’s behind this,” he told supporters in a nationally televised address. “They go around looking for a way to stop our revolution and, with it, to strike all the processes of change that are occurring in our Americas, in the Caribbean, in Central America.”

Chavez then played a four-minute tape of what he said were conversations among current and retired members of the Venezuelan military discussing whom they could count on to support a movement against the presidential palace. Chavez, who was briefly detained in a failed 2002 coup attempt, said the former plotters “are the same people involved in this coup attempt. Behind them is the American empire.” But he said the presence of two Russian warplanes on Venezuelan soil for a training exercise “is a warning” to the rest of the world that Venezuela’s allies include Russia and other countries. More
Also Read: Russia sending navy to Venezuela

Barry Grey
WSWS
The US government takeover of the mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac has dealt a shattering blow to the ideology of market capitalism, which has been used for decades to justify a relentless assault on the working class and a vast transfer of wealth to the American ruling elite. The endless invocations of the virtues of private enterprise, individual entrepreneurship and self-reliance, used to demonize socialism and defend a system that exploits the vast majority for the benefit of a financial elite, have been exposed as frauds. When it comes to big capital, losses are socialized. Only profits remain private.

The same forces who year after year have inveighed against “big government” in order to justify the removal of all legal impediments to the accumulation of corporate profits and private fortunes, and carry out the destruction of social safeguards for the working class, have engineered a massive expansion of government power to safeguard the interests of the financial elite. The bailout has as well exposed the real relations of political power and influence behind the façade of American democracy. The largest government bailout of private companies in world history—whose ultimate cost to taxpayers is likely to reach hundreds of billions—was sanctioned in advance by the Democratic Congress and given instant approval by the leadership of both parties and both of their presidential candidates.

There have been no investigations into the greatest financial scandal in world history. Neither party has any interest in bringing to light the swindling and skullduggery of the Wall Street moguls, because they are both bound hand and foot to those responsible for the financial debacle. What has been revealed is the existence in the United States, behind the increasingly tattered veneer of democratic institutions, of a plutocracy—the political rule of the rich. When it comes to the basic interests of the financial aristocracy, both parties and all of the official institutions of society snap to attention and do the bidding of their Wall Street masters.

The bailout of the two mortgage giants—which account for 80 percent of new home mortgages in the US—is a demonstration of the historic failure of American capitalism and the profit system on a global scale. It was precipitated by the deepest economic crisis since the Depression of the 1930s, whose epicenter is the United States. The Bush administration moved to take over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac under conditions of a rapid erosion of international confidence in the solvency of not only these two companies, but of the United States government itself. Over the past several months, global investors, including central banks and government investment funds, primarily in Asia and Russia, have been dumping their vast holdings in mortgage-backed securities issued by the US government-sponsored firms. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have a combined liability of $5.3 trillion in mortgage-backed securities which they own or guarantee. The run on their assets has not only intensified the crisis of the two companies, which are massively leveraged and have suffered billions of dollars in losses as a result of the collapse of the US housing market, it has thrown into question the status of all US government debt, including US Treasury bonds.

The US, by far the world’s largest debtor nation, with a current account deficit of nearly $800 billion, is sustained by the inflow of hundreds of billions of dollars from abroad. It currently imports $1 trillion in foreign capital every year, or over $4 billion every working day. But the assumption by the US government of the debts of the two mortgage companies, while averting an immediate financial meltdown, only compounds the crisis of American capitalism. As Martin Wolf, the financial correspondent of the Financial Times, wrote on Tuesday, “As a result, US housing finance has been brought under direct government control and, in the process, the gross liabilities of the US government, properly measured, have increased by $5,400 billion, a sum equal to the entire publicly held debt and 40 percent of gross domestic product.”

At a stroke, US sovereign debt has doubled and is now roughly equal to America’s gross domestic product. On July 14, one day after US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson called for legislation to give him unilateral and unlimited powers to use public funds to rescue Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Wall Street Journal editorialized on the implications of a government bailout of the two companies. It wrote: “But with financial woes mounting, some investors are betting they may profit from weighing the unthinkable question: Could the US government default?” This immense increase in US government indebtedness can only further undermine international confidence in the credit-worthiness of US Treasury bonds, resulting in a further decline in the dollar and a sharp increase in the interest paid by the US to borrow from its international creditors. More

John Little
Opednews.com
There are good reasons why there is seldom more than one dominant currency. Reserve currencies have the attributes of a natural monopoly, or, in more modern parlance, a network. If it costs extra to trade with someone who uses a different currency than you, it makes sense for you to use the currency that most other people use. This makes that currency yet bigger and cheaper to use. There is a good analogy with a computer operating system. In that world, Windows is the dollar.

This networking power is why central banks store dollars in their reserves in a far greater proportion than the proportion of trade with the United States. While 30% of international trade is with the United States, 70% of central bank reserves are in dollars. It is why most commodities, like oil, copper, and coffee, are priced in dollars, wherever they are found and to whomever they are sold.

A closer look at the history of Great Britain’s demise as the world’s reserve currency in the beginning decades of the 20th Century reveals a country that was severely crippled after WWI. While Great Britain had tried its best to not get involved in the wars raging out of control on the European continent, it was nevertheless, thrust right into the First World War. This proved to be too costly for the British Empire. Although the Pound Sterling was still considered the main world currency, Britain, along with France and other allies of the war, owed millions of dollars to the United States. Great Britain found itself horribly in debt and unable to continue on the gold standard.

According to the Federal Reserve Bulletin of June, 1989, from the spring of 1925, when the gold standard was restored, to the fall of 1931, when it was abandoned, the Bank of England resisted forays on the exchange value of the pound sterling. In May 1931, a run on the Kreditanstalt, the largest Austrian bank, initiated the final defense of the gold exchange standard in Britain. From March to September 1931, the National Bank of Austria lost 55 percent of its large foreign exchange reserves as it tried to fight back capital flight. In June 1931, panic spread from Austria to Germany, and German banks scrambled to exchange sterling deposits for gold in London. From May 30 to June 30, the Reichsbank lost 34 percent of its gold and foreign exchange reserves. In July, with foreigners storming its gold reserve, the Bank of England shielded the domestic credit system by purchasing securities on the open market, by arranging a 50 million pounds credit with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the Bank of France, and by transferring securities from the Banking to the Issue Department to provide for new fiduciary issue. With the exchange rate below the gold export point, the Bank of England barricaded its gold reserves by raising the Bank rate from 2.5 percent to 3.5 percent on July 23 and to 4.5 percent on July 30. In spite of these protective efforts, gold reserves in the Issue Department shrank 30.9 million pounds–29 percent–from June 24 to July 29. Late in August, the Bank of England secured an additional 80 million pounds in emergency credits, but the continental and American demand for gold continued to assault the London bullion market. More

The United States is in a huge foreign policy muddle in the Middle East. It wants to dominate and control Iran but requires the support of the world community to accomplish its aims. Diplomacy and sanctions require only a low level of support. On the other hand, to launch a military attack or green-light one by Israel, the United States needs far more backing. This support does not appear to exist, and recent U.S. foreign policy actions are eroding that support even further. The Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported on August 13 that the United States refused to give the go-ahead to Israeli attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities in talks between Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak. Could it be that the Bush administration finally knows when it is licked?

Israeli officials acknowledge that it would be difficult to launch such an attack without approval from Russia, China, and India, something that the United States would have to lobby those nations to achieve. The chances at present are extremely slim that any of the three will acquiesce. U.S. condemnation of Russia’s military action to defend the breakaway region of South Ossetia, combined with the determination of the Bush administration to install missile systems in Poland and the Czech Republic, virtually guarantee that Russia will not do anything to help the United States foment more violence in its neighborhood.

Beijing owns much of the U.S. debt, continues to be one of Tehran’s largest trade partners, and is not about to be dictated to by Washington. India has defied the United States by entering into a pipeline deal with Iran. Exhaustive three-year nuclear treaty negotiations between the United States and India are utterly stalled. If the treaty is not presented to Congress in September, it will be dead. More

Dr. George Friedman
The Russian invasion of Georgia has not changed the balance of power in Eurasia. It simply announced that the balance of power had already shifted. The United States has been absorbed in its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as potential conflict with Iran and a destabilizing situation in Pakistan. It has no strategic ground forces in reserve and is in no position to intervene on the Russian periphery. This, as we have argued, has opened a window of opportunity for the Russians to reassert their influence in the former Soviet sphere. Moscow did not have to concern itself with the potential response of the United States or Europe; hence, the invasion did not shift the balance of power. The balance of power had already shifted, and it was up to the Russians when to make this public. They did that Aug. 8.

The United States is Georgia’s closest ally. It maintained about 130 military advisers in Georgia, along with civilian advisers, contractors involved in all aspects of the Georgian government and people doing business in Georgia. It is inconceivable that the Americans were unaware of Georgia’s mobilization and intentions. It is also inconceivable that the Americans were unaware that the Russians had deployed substantial forces on the South Ossetian frontier. U.S. technical intelligence, from satellite imagery and signals intelligence to unmanned aerial vehicles, could not miss the fact that thousands of Russian troops were moving to forward positions. The Russians clearly knew the Georgians were ready to move. How could the United States not be aware of the Russians? Indeed, given the posture of Russian troops, how could intelligence analysts have missed the possibility that the Russians had laid a trap, hoping for a Georgian invasion to justify its own counterattack? It is very difficult to imagine that the Georgians launched their attack against U.S. wishes. More

CONfederates under the guise of “United States” soldiers held a military exercise with Georgian troops training them for a cowardly sneak attack on Russian peacekeepers in South Ossetia. The CONfederate MADMEN in the Pentagon are about to start WORLD WAR III with Russia….They are FEVERESHLY setting up bases in Eastern Europe, the Balkans, Ukraine, Georgia, and Afghanistan etc., etc….Of course they hope to avoid an all out war by checkmating Russia and rendering her nuclear deterrent ineffectual. These MADMEN dream of succeeding where Napoleon and Hitler failed. More

The ongoing process in the United States of the transfer of military and intelligence functions (and much of a US$66 billion budget) to private, often anonymous operatives, has made it easier for enemies to penetrate American intelligence. This has greased the slippery slope to the loss of professionalism within the community of intelligence analysts, in turn heightening the risks of war by accident, or by presidential whim. More

This Dobbs clip discusses the new North American common currency called the “Amero”. The NAU progress report claims everything is ontrack for the Union to go into effect in 2010. Dobbs reports that the North American union will be an Orwellian Brave New World. The fall of dollar will pave the way for the implementation of the Amero, resulting in the loss of sovereignty for three countries, and economic control and enslavement over its populations.

Market Oracle
Those of you who do not believe Peak Oil Theory should first make sure you fully understand it. According to this theory, after a reservoir has been depleted by half of its total volume, the output begins to plateau or remain constant for some unknown period. At some later time (which is unpredictable) the output begins a permanent decline of variable duration (which is also unpredictable) until the remaining quantity of oil is no longer economically feasible to extract with current technology. Therefore, Peak Oil Theory does not state that the earth is running out of oil per say. It states that the earth is running out of inexpensive oil, otherwise known as conventional oil – the high-grade oil that comes out by drilling on land and requires minimal refinement costs.

What this means is that we could have enough total oil (conventional plus non-conventional) say for the next 100 years, but that does not matter. What really matters is how much conventional oil reservoirs remain because this is the lowest cost oil to produce. In other words, Peak Oil is concerned with how much crude we can produce and refine per given day per dollar.

The United States reached its peak oil period in the early 1970s. Ever since that time, we have relied more and more on foreign oil imports. Interestingly, since that time we have also relied more and more on imported goods, while both consumer and federal debt have ballooned. According to many independent (and unbiased) oil experts, the world will soon have reached this peak oil period, causing even more dependence on exploration for non-convention oil.

Over the past two decades, new conventional oil finds around the world have been far and few. And what was once thought as large finds have turned out to yield much less than first thought. Throughout this period oil demand has continued to increase. It has especially strengthened over the past few years due to the rapid expansion of Asia.

As demand has increased and new finds have diminished, OPEC has fudged oil reserves data for many years, causing concerns about Peak Oil to remain hidden up until recently. As a result, oil prices have soared. And this has made exploration for non-conventional oil not only more feasible, but mandatory. Consequently, over the past few years, we have become increasingly reliant on more non-conventional oil sources, such as tar and oil sands and deep water drilling. These are considered non-conventional sources because they require large expenditures of money to produce finished petroleum products. These two variables – increased demand and decreased supplies of conventional oil have been the main forces responsible for record oil prices. Over the past year, oil has also risen due to the inflationary effects from the Federal Reserve, which has weakened the dollar. The dollar-oil link explains many things which you were probably unaware of. More

Silently, stealthily, unseen by cameras, the war on Iran has already begun. Many sources confirm that the United States, bent on destabilizing the Islamic Republic, has increased its aid to armed movements among the Azeri, Baluchi, Arab and Kurdish ethnic minorities that make up about 40% of the Iranian population. ABC News reported in April that the US had secretly assisted the Baluchi group Jund al-Islam (Soldiers of Islam), responsible for a recent attack in which some 20 members of the Revolutionary Guard were killed. According to an American Foundation report (1), US commandos have operated inside Iran since 2004. More

Photo Savannah Grandfather
Warmongering on the planet isn’t good enough for mankind. Let’s extend our warring nature to outerspace. There’s no hope for our species.

The United States and other Western nations have criticised China’s efforts to build a presence in space, especially a test in January 2007 when it shot down one of its own aged satellites.

But in a book issued by the state-run China Arms Control and Disarmament Association, two People’s Liberation Army (PLA) experts said Washington’s bid for enduring security domination in outer space was pressing Beijing and other powers into competition, even confrontation.

“Strategic confrontation in outer space is difficult to avoid. The development of outer space forces shows signs that a space arms race to seize the commanding heights is emerging,” wrote Wu Tianfu of the Second Artillery Corps Command College. The Corps controls China’s nuclear arsenal. “We can say that weaponisation of outer space… is already unstoppable.” More

This is another excuse to justify expanding U.S. military operations in the region. Remember, according to Carter, Israel has 150 nuclear weapons they’re don’t admit they have.

Irish Sun
The United States has identified three sites in Syria as possible locations of secret nuclear facilities, the Washington Post reported Thursday. Unidentified US officials told the Post that the US wanted to know if the sites served as support facilities for the alleged al-Kibar nuclear reactor that was destroyed by an Israeli air attack in September. The report said the US was pushing the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), to expand its inspections to the three sites. More

current.com
“Iran’s chief prosecutor said bombers who caused a deadly blast at a mosque in Shiraz had confessed of links to Israel and the United States, the ISNA student news agency reported on Friday.

“Those responsible for the attack against the Shiraz mosque have confessed to having links to worldwide oppression, in particular the United States and Israel,” Ghorbanali Dorri-Najafabadi was quoted by the agency as saying”.

North Asia correspondent Shane McLeod
ABC News
In Japan, a US marine has been sentenced to four years jail over a sex abuse case that sparked diplomatic protests. There was uproar in Japan in February when a teenaged girl accused a 38-year-old marine staff sergeant of raping her in a car in Okinawa. The girl later withdrew her accusation, and Japanese police dropped rape charges.

But an investigation by the US military has led to a court martial, which has found the sergeant guilty of “abusive sexual contact”. He has been sentenced to four years jail, with one year suspended as part of a plea bargain. The case led to diplomatic tensions between Japan and the United States.
At the time Japan’s Prime Minister described the incident as “unforgivable”.