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Iran, climate change to feature at Merkel's White House visit |
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Written by Harpreet Verma
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Wednesday, 24 June 2009 16:28 |
 Berlin - Talks between German Chancellor Angela Merkel and US President Barack Obama this week are to focus on recent events in Iran at a visit to Washington, German government sources said Wednesday.
Merkel is scheduled to arrive in Washington Thursday for a 40-hour stay that would include roughly three hours of face-to-face talks with Obama and a meeting with Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
The visit is her first to the White House since Obama's inauguration. The US president has visited Germany twice in recent months and Berlin, as presidential candidate, last July.
German government sources said there was a "close correlation" with the US position relating to Iran's post-election protests, adding that Germany shared Obama's recent call for Iran to recognise civil rights.
Millions of Iranians accuse the government of fraud in the June 12 election which gave President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad an overwhelming landslide victory, prompting protest demonstrations in Tehran and other cities in which at least 17 people were killed.
During her meeting with Obama on Friday, Merkel will also hope to win greater US commitments on climate change.
A series of international talks is under way to draw up a new climate change agreement replacing the Kyoto Protocol, to be signed in Copenhagen at the end of the year.
Obama's presidency has moved forward the climate change debate in the US, where an ambitious bill tackling greenhouse gas emissions is going through Congress.
Nevertheless, there were still discrepancies between Obama's position and that of Merkel, German government sources said.
Other items on the agenda are NATO's mission to Afghanistan, the aftermath of Obama's June 4 speech in Cairo, as well as relations with Russia.
Obama is scheduled visit to Moscow in July, when German-Russian consultations are also due in Munich.
Merkel and Obama are expected to discuss the global economic crisis, addressing the issue of managing the return to sustainable economic policies once the crisis has passed.
Upon her arrival in Washington, the chancellor is to receive the Eric Warburg prize for fostering good relations between Germany and the US.
Former recipients of the prize include former US president George HW Bush and the US statesman Henry Kissinger. (dpa) |
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Last Updated on Wednesday, 24 June 2009 16:31 |
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Production of cocaine, heroin dropped in 2008 |
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Written by Deepak Joshi
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Wednesday, 24 June 2009 16:26 |
 Washington - Worldwide production of cocaine and heroin dropped in 2008, with the sharpest reductions in Colombia and Afghanistan, the United Nations said in a report Wednesday.
Cultivation of opium poppies - from which heroin is derived - fell by 19 per cent in Afghanistan, which is the largest producer of the drug. In Colombia, the largest exporter of cocaine, coca production declined by 18 per cent, the report said.
Antonio Maria Costa, director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, said that increases in seizure levels combined with higher prices and unstable consumption markets have contributed to the drop in cocaine supplies.
"The 50-billion-dollar global cocaine market is undergoing seismic shifts," Costa said, noting that the trend has likely contributed to the "gruesome upsurge" of violence as cartels compete in shrinking markets.
The Vienna-based Office on Drugs and Crime released its report at a press conference in Washington. The UN report comes as US and NATO forces have intensified work with Afghan authorities to crack down on poppy production. Afghanistan produces 93 per cent of the world's opiates, with Europe serving as the largest destination for the drug.
The report cited a decrease in demand for cocaine in the United States, which is the largest importer of the illicit drug.
While noting the markets for cannabis, cocaine and heroin remained largely flat or declined, the United Nations noted an increase, mostly in developing countries, in the production and consumption of synthetic drugs like amphetamines, methamphetamines and ecstasy.
In the Middle East, the use of the amphetamine Captagon "sky- rocketed." Seizures of amphetamines in Saudi Arabia accounted for nearly one third of global seizures for these drugs.
In South-East Asia, industrial-scale laboratories continued to turn out methamphetamines, with increasing manufacture in Malaysia and Indonesia, the report said.(dpa) |
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Last Updated on Wednesday, 24 June 2009 16:28 |
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Beckenbauer gives backing to Lucio staying at Bayern |
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Written by Samrat Khanna
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Wednesday, 24 June 2009 16:08 |
 Munich - Bayern Munich president Franz Beckenbauer has spoken out in favour of defender Lucio staying on at the Bundesliga club this season.
"Lucio is captain of Brazil and our best defender. We should keep him," Beckenbauer told Wednesday's Bild newspaper.
Doubts have been cast over Lucio's future at the club with speculation rampant that new Munich coach Louis van Gaal prefers new signing Edson Braafheid over the
31-year-old in central defence.
Lucio, who has been in Munich since 2004, is currently at the Confederations Cup in South Africa and reacted angrily earlier this week to the reports that he might be second choice at the club.
"I want to stay. But if the coach thinks that others are better then I will not play for another second in Munich," Lucio said.
"Bayern was not my first club and won't be my last."
However, Beckenbauer looked to diffuse the issue with the defender, whose contract runs until the end of the 2010 season, calling the situation a misunderstanding.
"I think the whole affair is based on a misunderstanding. This has to be cleared up when all the parties are back in Munich."(dpa) |
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Last Updated on Wednesday, 24 June 2009 16:13 |
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Seventeen dead in US air crash |
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Written by Administrator
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Monday, 15 June 2009 16:46 |
Washington - A small passenger plane crashed Sunday in the western state Montana, killing at least 17 people including many children, media reports said.
A reporter from the Montana Standard, quoting firemen at the scene, told CNN there were apparently no survivors. The children were coming from California and were believed to be headed to a ski vacation in Montana. (dpa) |
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Space station rotates to dodge another piece of space junk |
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Written by Administrator
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Monday, 15 June 2009 16:34 |
Washington - The International Space Station did an about- face rotation on Sunday in order to dodge another piece of space junk, NASA officials said.
But it was not as close a call as more than a week ago, when three station astronauts prepared to evacuate as a piece of debris approached.
In the current situation, the station was headed to a close encounter on Monday with a 10-centimetre-broad bit of debris from the upper stage of a Chinese rocket, NASA spokesman Kyle Herring told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa. |
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