Minister Thakur, 3 MPs resign over Madhes crisis

KATHMANDU, Dec 10 - Minister of Science and Technology Mahantha Thakur, who is also a senior Nepali Congress leader, and three parliamentarians representing constituencies in the Terai resigned Monday, stating that the state has continued to act indifferent to the problems prevailing in the region.

They said that they would launch a bold but peaceful agitation in Madhes.
Hridayesh Tripathi of Nepal Sadbhavana Party-Ananda Devi (NSP-A), Mahendra Yadav of the CPN-UML and Ram Chandra Rai of the Rastriya Prajantantra Party were the lawmakers who submitted their resignation letters to Speaker Subash Nemwang this morning saying that they were setting up a Madhes Regional Party.

They said that they were resigning as the seven-party, the interim government and even the interim parliament have not paid required attention to the demands of the Madhes people.
“We cordially appeal to participate in the campaign to establish an extensive Terai-Madhes force for the determining peaceful agitation against inequality,” they said.
The Madhesi lawmakers are striving to unite to give a ‘democratic’ outlet to the Madhes crisis, Tripathi said. He also claimed that other Madhesi MPs were also preparing to step down.
The resignations come at a time when the NSP-A and Madhesi People’s Rights Forum are launching a joint agitation for Madhesi rights.

Rastriya Janashakti Party spokesman Sarbendranath Sukla, Nepali Congress leader Anish Ansari, Brishesh Chandra Lal, Ram Chandra Kushwaha and UML leader Shri Krishna Yadav of UML have also resigned from the party.

Iraq hostage families make appeal

Searches have been going on for the five missing menThe families of five British men taken prisoner in Iraq more than 100 days ago have appealed to their captors: "please send them home to us".

The men were seized on 29 May from Baghdad's Finance Ministry by gunmen believed to be in the Mehdi Army.
Coalition troops have been searching for the men - four bodyguards and a computer expert - in Sadr City.
The relatives have urged the captors to end their "torment" of being separated from "ordinary family men".

'Send them home'

The statement continues: "They are sons, fathers and brothers who were working to support us - their families. We miss them so much and want them to come home to us so that our families can be complete again and our children no longer have to endure the pain of missing their fathers.
The five men should be released immediately and returned to their loved ones
David MilibandForeign Secretary
"These are not men with political views or any authority, they are ordinary family men who have parents, wives and children that love and cherish them - please send them home to us."
US commanders said earlier this week that they believed the Britons were still alive.
Foreign Secretary David Miliband promised the government would "do all it can" to secure the hostages' release.
He said: "Taking hostages is never justified, no matter what cause it may claim to serve. The five men should be released immediately and returned to their loved ones."

Six dead in Swat suicide attack

The government offensive has reportedly involved 20,000 troopsSix people including a policeman and two children have died in a suicide attack on a
checkpoint in north-west Pakistan, security officials say.





The Swat valley attack comes a day after the army said it had almost cleared the area of militants loyal to pro-Taleban cleric Maulana Fazlullah.
Troops were chasing a few hundred militants in the mountains, it said.
Nearly 300 Islamists are reported to have been killed since the offensive was launched two weeks ago.

Officials said Sunday's attack saw a car crash into the police post.
"The bomber hit the check post barricades with the car and then blew himself up," provincial government spokesman Amjad Iqbal told AFP.
The fighting in Swat is the first serious insurgent threat from pro-Taleban forces in what is considered a settled area of Pakistan.
Until now the army has focused on fighting militants mainly on the largely autonomous Waziristan tribal areas along the Afghan border.
Forces loyal to Maulana Fazlullah, including some foreign fighters, had taken control of a series of small towns and villages, and tried to implement strict Islamic law.
Previously, only five troops and six civilians have been reported killed and 20 civilians wounded.

Africans wary of Europe's trade offer

As African and European leaders meet in Portugal, one of the most important issues on the agenda is trade

But a new trade agreement being offered by the European leaders has proved controversial and few countries have agreed to sign up.
An hour and a half by road from the Ghanaian capital Accra, Billy Gameti is inspecting his pineapple crop.
He leases 75 acres (30 hectares) of land and employs 25 workers. Starting early in the morning to avoid the intense heat, one of the workers, Moses, bends over to pick the pineapples and tells me how this job has helped him.
"I can pay school fees for my two children, pay the electricity bills, my rent and also borrow some money if I need to from the boss."
A 20-minute drive away, 1,500 men and women work in shifts at the Blue Skies factory which buys the produce from 130 farmers like Billy Gameti.
They are preparing pre-packed fruit salads and juices for the European supermarkets - about 20 metric tons of pineapples, papaya, mango and coconut leave by truck for Ghana's international airport every day.

Export challenges
These fruit salads may be healthy but this kind of business is criticised by some because of the impact on global warming. With some fruit currently out of season in Ghana, the mangoes are flown in on a charter flight from Brazil and the pomegranates come from Egypt.

Exporting food from Ghana is fraught with problemsThe business is booming. Turnover was around $50m (£25m) last year and it is growing by 25% a year.
The challenges of exporting perishable goods, especially in Ghana's climate, are great - the European supermarkets are unbelievably fussy customers, Ghana's electricity supply is far from guaranteed, the road to Accra is currently appalling and there have been problems with the supply of aviation fuel at Ghana's airport.
But once these challenges have been overcome, at least Blue Skies has been able to sell to Europe tariff-free.
But for how long?
The current preferential trade agreement between the European Union and almost 80 countries has been declared illegal by the World Trade Organisation, so a new deal has to be found or else companies like Blue Skies will suddenly be faced with tariffs at the end of this month.
"Our juice products to UK supermarket Marks and Spencer would immediately become unviable and the remainder of our products would take a significant hit," says Blue Skies chairman and founder Anthony Pile.
He says the company would try to re-negotiate prices with European supermarkets.
"But a price increase is extremely difficult and if no solution was found the possibility of relocating the company elsewhere would be looked at."

Divide-and-rule strategy
There is an offer on the table from Europe - the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA).
You can play the piano with the white keys only or you can play it with only the black keys - but for harmony you must use the black and the white keys
Ernest DebrahGhanaian agricultural minister
If countries sign they can continue to get their products into Europe duty-free but this agreement - which the Europeans are pushing hard - would also mean allowing most European goods into countries like Ghana duty-free. There are fears local industry in Ghana would struggle to compete.
"What the Europeans are putting in place is aimed more or less at undermining the attempt by African economies to move away from the dependence on exporting raw materials towards industrial processing," says Tetteh Homeku of the research and advocacy group Third World Network.
Tetteh Homeku says the Europeans are also interfering with the Ghanaian government's attempts to nurture its industry, and sidelining other trade agreements which would serve poor countries like Ghana better.
He points to the Generalised System of Preferences, or GSP Plus, which is a European trade deal for countries whose economies are poorly diversified and therefore dependent and vulnerable.
Countries in the regional grouping Ecowas have failed to adopt a common position on the European offer and Ivory Coast is so far the only West African nation to have signed an interim deal.
Some analysts suggest that, by negotiating agreements with separate countries, European leaders have adopted a divide and rule strategy aimed at weakening any possible regional clout.
With the threat of: "Accept this EPA deal now or pay tariffs from the start of next month," it is not surprising that the likes of the fruit exporters are getting nervous and are pushing the government here to sign.

'Lack of harmony'

The Ghanaian government now has to appease both the exporters like Blue Skies and those who fear the impact of the EPA on local industry.

Many remain unconvinced that Europe really wants to help Africa
Agriculture Minister Ernest Debrah says the time for "winner takes all" is over and, as leaders from Africa and Europe meet in Lisbon, he calls for a more harmonious relationship between Africa and Europe.
"You can play the piano with the white keys only or you can play it with only the black keys. But for harmony you must use the black and the white keys," he says.
"If you continue to take too much of the advantage then you create a situation where you've got a stronger and a very weak side and we don't get the harmony we deserve.
"We must look at balancing the global issues so that we can live on this globe very peacefully."
While there is talk at the Lisbon summit of a new better relationship between Africa and Europe, this controversial trade agreement has done little to convince the sceptics that European leaders are really determined to help Africa develop.