 Despite recent setbacks, the Farc is not a spent force, correspondents say |
Seven Colombian soldiers have been killed and four wounded in an ambush by left-wing rebels in the south-west of the country.
Rebels from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc) launched the attack overnight between Saturday and Sunday, a regional official said.
It came just over a week after the Farc killed eight soldiers in the north-east, near the border with Venezuela.
The attacks are seen evidence that the group is not a spent force.
Fabio Trujillo, a top official in Narino region, confirmed the ambush in the rural district of Samaniego.
An explosive device was set off at almost the same time near the police quarters, wounding two officers, he said.
President Alvaro Uribe condemned the attack.
Safe havens
The Farc has suffered a series of reversals recently, including the death of leader and founder Manuel Marulanda last year.
But the BBC's Jeremy McDermott in Colombia says the rebels appear to be regrouping and retaking the initiative after six years on the back foot.
The new leader, Alfonso Cano, has given the Farc a new vision, he says, directing the rebels towards urban centres and launching more rural ambushes.
Both this weekend's attack and the one in the north-east late last month happened near Colombia's borders.
The rebels are using the border areas as safe havens from which to plan and execute attacks, out of reach of the security forces, our correspondent says.
Narino, near Colombia's border with Ecuador, is also home to the densest concentration of drug crops in the country.
The Farc and other armed groups have profited from the drug trade in Colombia, the world's largest producer of cocaine.
READ MORE - Colombian troops killed in ambush
A top US military commander has announced a review into the American use of air strikes in Afghanistan.
Gen David Petraeus, head of US Central Command, said "tactical actions" should not undermine strategic goals.
His comments came after Afghan President Hamid Karzai said US air strikes that kill civilians were damaging the fight against terrorism.
Washington again expressed regret over recent civilian deaths, but refused to rule out such strikes in the future.
On Sunday, hundreds of university students in the Afghan capital, Kabul, protested against air strikes last week targeting Taleban fighters in the western Farah province.
Afghan sources said nearly 150 had been killed, but that figure has been disputed by the US.
 |  The massacre of civilians by the American forces is a crime that our people will never forget  |
Afghanistan is a top foreign policy priority for US President Barack Obama's administration, with US forces fighting an increasingly violent insurgency by Taleban forces.
The US is sending 21,000 additional troops to the country, to join an existing force of 38,000.
Gen Petraeus, who is responsible for US operations in the region, told Fox News television that he had named a brigadier general "with extensive experience in conventional and special operations" to go to Afghanistan and look at the issue "more broadly".
He said the unnamed military officer would serve to ensure that "our tactical actions don't undermine our strategic goals and objectives".
"That's essentially the conversation that President Karzai and I had yesterday on this particular topic," he added.
Gen Petraeus also said the Taleban bore "enormous blame" for firing on US troops from the protection of houses, and said the militants appeared to have forced civilians to stay in the homes.
'Fed up'
Speaking after talks with the German chancellor in Berlin, Mr Karzai said civilian deaths had to be avoided.
"Civilian casualties, of course, is a very serious matter for the Afghan people, (it) also is a serious matter for our allies," Mr Karzai said at the news conference.
"It's something that the Afghan people want to be addressed effectively and sooner."
In the protest in Kabul, students held up banners including one that called America "the biggest terrorist in the world".
 Students in Kabul called for those responsible to be put on trial |
The protesters also called for those responsible for the deaths to be put on trial.
"Our people are fed up with Taleban beheadings and suicide bombings. On the other hand, the massacre of civilians by the American forces is a crime that our people will never forget," a statement quoted by AFP news agency said.
President Obama's National Security Adviser, Gen James Jones, said the US would "redouble" efforts to limit civilian deaths, but added that it could not hamper its forces in Afghanistan by banning air strikes.
"We can't fight with one hand tied behind our back," General he told ABC television.
Last week, Mr Karzai urged the US to stop the use of such strikes
The air strike in Farah province overshadowed a summit on Wednesday between the President Barack Obama, Mr Karzai, and his Pakistani counterpart Asif Ali Zardari.
Pakistani forces are currently engaged in fierce fighting with Taleban insurgents in the north-west of the country.
READ MORE - US to review Afghan air strikes
Where do you draw the line between helpful American assistance to Pakistan in fighting the Taliban insurgency and counter-productive American meddling? Obama administration officials are weighing that balance as they prepare for a crucial visit to Washington this week by Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari.
The administration is finalizing an ambitious package of aid measures, ranging from urgent financial assistance to counter-insurgency training for Pakistani troops at a U.S. base in Kuwait.
To relieve political pressure on Zardari, the administration has even discussed the possibility of joint U.S.-Pakistani oversight of the CIA's secret program of Predator strikes on Al Qaeda and Taliban targets in Pakistan's tribal areas. But administration officials appear to have decided against any changes in the current approach, in which the Pakistani government privately okays the attacks but publicly criticizes them. Explained one official familiar with the program: "'Jointness' has been tried and it hasn't worked. These operations are designed to save American lives, and who wants to gamble at that table?"
As Washington frets about Zardari's political weakness, and debates a greater role for the opposition, his allies are pushing back--warning that American attempts to meddle in their country's internal politics may backfire.
"The more Americans get in the weeds of Pakistani politics, the less they will accomplish," warned a senior Pakistani official who supports Zardari. He described the growing U.S. pressure against Zardari as an example of "the Diem phenomenon," a reference to the U.S.-supported coup in 1963 against its former darling, South Vietnam's President Ngo Dinh Diem. That coup began a series of ultimately disastrous American attempts to steer Saigon politics and suppress the communist insurgency.
Zardari became Pakistan's president last year, with strong U.S. support, after the assassination of his wife, Benazir Bhutto. Since then, despite Zardari's pro-American policies, U.S. enthusiasm for him has waned, to the point that administration officials have urged a greater role for his political rival, former prime minister Nawaz Sharif.
"There's too much discussion of who can fix the problem, rather than what should be done," complained the pro-Zardari senior Pakistani official.
The sensitivity in the Zardari camp to U.S. criticism illustrates a broader phenomenon in Pakistani politics. Politicians of every stripe are wary of offending Pakistani national pride by appearing too close to Washington--even when they know they need U.S. help. A cartoon on one anti-American website in Pakistan last week showed Zardari talking with Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai, another former American favorite who now gets low marks. The Afghan is telling his Pakistani counterpart: "The Americans used and ditched me. Now it's your turn to get screwed!"
To show that it's serious about supporting Pakistan, the administration is preparing a series of initiatives for this week's trilateral summit with Karzai and Zardari. According to knowledgeable sources, the list includes:
--quick delivery of $953 million in promised U.S. aid for Pakistan that has been delayed in the pipeline.
--a new Pakistani counter-terrorism strategy, drafted by Zardari's government and the Pakistani military after consultation with counter-insurgency experts on the staff of Centcom commander Gen. David Petraeus.
--training for two battalions of Pakistani soldiers a month at a U.S. base in Kuwait that was used to ready American forces for combat in Iraq.
--an expanding Pakistani offensive against the Taliban, including a joint U.S.-Pakistani effort to suppress Taliban radio stations that have been operating in the tribal areas.
--a new agreement on third-country trade that transits Pakistan to Afghanistan. This "transit-trade" agreement would open the way for more shipments to and from India.
--a new framework for sharing information between the Pakistani and Afghan militaries and intelligence services.
--additional joint border posts for monitoring the Afghan-Pakistan frontier.
"We have a plan. We have the will. We are negotiating on getting the means," said Husain Haqqani, Pakistan's ambassador here and one of the architects of the Islamabad-Washington alliance.
Haqqani argued that if Washington really wants the Pakistani army to move troops from the Indian border to the tribal areas, as U.S. officials often say, then it should get the Indians to reduce their military forces.
"It's time for Obama to put in a call to the Indians telling them, 'If you move some of your troops, they'll move theirs," Haqqani said. According to sources, Pakistani chief of staff Ashfaq Kiyani made just that promise in a recent meeting with U.S. special envoy Richard Holbrooke.
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By SELCAN HACAOGLU
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Masked assailants with grenades and automatic weapons attacked a wedding ceremony in southeast Turkey on Monday, killing 45 people and wounding 20 others. Two girls survived after the bodies of slain friends fell on top of them during the onslaught.
NTV television quoted Deputy Gov. Ferhat Ozen of Mardin province as saying the nighttime attack occurred in Bilge village near the city of Mardin. Some media outlets reported that a "blood feud" among families had led to the killings in a region where tribal ties and rivalries sometimes eclipse the power of the state.
Citing Ozen, NTV said the motive could be an old feud between rival groups of pro-government village guards who fight alongside Turkish troops against Kurdish rebels in the region. If that is the case, the government would come under renewed pressure to rein in the militiamen, some of whom have been linked to drug smuggling and other crimes.
Mehmet Besir Ayanoglu, the mayor of Mardin, told Turkey's Channel 24 that he spoke to two survivors, both girls, who said at least two masked men stormed a house where the wedding took place. Other reports put the number of assailants at four.
"'They raided the house, we were in two rooms, they opened fire on everyone, they were wearing masks,'" Ayanoglu quoted the girls as saying. The girls said they lay underneath the bodies of friends until the attack was over.
Interior Minister Besir Atalay said 45 people were killed and six others were wounded. Anatolia news agency said the lasted 15 minutes.
One survivor, a 19-year-old woman, said the assailants ordered people to huddle in one room and opened fire, NTV reported. Another report said the attack occurred when people were praying at the house. Some guards responded to the attack but the assailants fled, NTV said.
Ahmet Can, a relative who took the body of his nephew to a hospital, said the site of the attack was horrifying.
"You could not believe your eyes, it is unbelievable," he told Channel 24.
The attack occurred during the wedding of the daughter of Cemil Celebi, a former village official who was among the wounded.
An Islamic cleric who was presiding over the marriage died at a hospital, NTV said. The fate of the bride and groom was not immediately known. The attack killed an entire family, including the parents and their six children, aged between three and 12.
Ambulances took at least 17 bodies to the morgue of a hospital in Mardin, said Aytac Akgul, a local official. Hundreds of relatives of the victims gathered there, wailing. Several people offered to donate blood.
State television said soldiers surrounded the village and cut off all roads leading to it. It said there was no power there, and the village could not be reached by telephone. Journalists were barred from traveling to Bilge.
For years, Turkey has struggled over how to trim the 70,000-strong village guard force without releasing masses of trained fighters onto the streets of the southeast, where unemployment in some areas reaches 50 percent. The system is one of the few lucrative sources of employment in the region.
The military has purged thousands of village guards suspected of favoring Kurdish rebels fighting for autonomy in the southeast. Several hundred guards have also faced criminal charges that include drug and weapons smuggling.
Many rebels and guardsmen are from the same villages or clans. Most guardsmen are poor villagers, and local residents and activists say some were forced to join against their will. Others were signed up by politically powerful clan leaders allied with the state.
The conflict between Kurdish guerrillas and government forces has killed tens of thousands of people since 1984.
AKHMAJI, Georgia – At a military checkpoint between Georgia and its breakaway region of South Ossetia, the word "Russia" is hand-painted in pink on a concrete security barrier.
"It will be Russia," said a Russian army lieutenant as the Ossetian soldiers under his command nodded.
"And Georgia used to be Russian, too," said the young freckle-faced lieutenant, who would give only his first name, Sergei. Three armored personnel carriers and a tank were dug in around the checkpoint.
Russia has troops just 25 miles (40 kilometers) from the Georgian capital, in violation of the European Union-brokered cease-fire that ended last year's brief war. And in recent weeks, it has put even more soldiers and armored vehicles within striking distance of the city ahead of street protests against Georgia's president.
The protests, which began April 9, drew about 10,000 people Tuesday, and opposition leaders said they would continue daily until President Mikhail Saakashvili resigned.
The demonstrations have been fed by public anger over Georgia's humiliating defeat in the August war, which left Russian troops on previously Georgian-controlled territory and drove tens of thousands of Georgians from their homes.
By reinforcing its military presence at a time of potential political instability, Russia appears determined to maintain pressure on Saakashvili, whom Moscow has openly said must be replaced before relations can be repaired.
Georgia's Western-leaning government accuses the Kremlin of hoping to capitalize on political unrest to restore its influence over the former Soviet republic, which for almost 200 years was ruled by Moscow.
The presence of the Russian troops poses a dilemma for Washington as it aims to improve relations with Moscow. Georgia worries the Obama administration will be reluctant to pressure Russia to comply with the cease-fire while seeking its cooperation on priority issues like the war in Afghanistan and North Korea's nuclear weapons program.
Tensions over Georgia also complicate efforts to restore ties between Russia and NATO, which broke off contacts following the war. Russia has strongly objected to NATO military exercises scheduled to begin May 6 in Georgia and has warned the U.S. against helping Georgia rebuild its army.
The military checkpoint near Akhmaji enforces a new boundary between Georgia and South Ossetia, the Russian-supported region that was at the center of the fighting. After routing the Georgian army, Russian troops took over entire districts of South Ossetia that had long been under Georgian control.
Russian forces also occupied a new swath of territory in a second breakaway republic, Abkhazia, along the Black Sea coast.
The European Union and United States consider Russia in violation of the cease-fire signed by President Dmitry Medvedev, which called for troops to pull back to positions held before the war began.
Russia says the cease-fire has been superseded by separate agreements it signed with South Ossetia and Abkhazia, which Moscow now recognizes as independent states.
The actions by Russia reflect both its military strength and its willingness to challenge the West to reclaim a dominant role in Georgia and elsewhere in its former sphere of influence.
Georgia's government sees Russia as determined to prevent the West from considering Georgia a reliable transit country for oil and natural gas, contending that was Russia's main objective in the war.
The pipelines that cross Georgian territory are among the few that bypass Russia in supplying Europe with energy from the Caspian Sea and Central Asia. During the war, Russia bombed areas near the pipelines.
"Russia wants to be the monopoly supplier," said political analyst Shalva Pichkhadze.
Russia's Foreign Ministry confirmed the Kremlin has sent reinforcements to the boundary lines. It was responding to fears the Georgian government would provoke clashes to distract from the opposition protests, ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko said.
Georgia's Interior Ministry said Russia has 15,000 soldiers in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, which would be far more than in past months. Since the beginning of April, Russia has moved 130 armored vehicles toward the boundary line from elsewhere in South Ossetia and 70 more have entered South Ossetia from Russia, ministry spokesman Shota Utiashvili said.
Russia's Defense Ministry refused to comment on the composition of its forces, and Georgia's claims could not be independently verified. European monitors who patrol the boundary lines are not allowed into South Ossetia or Abkhazia, and journalists also are stopped at Russian checkpoints.
Peter Semneby, the EU special representative for the South Caucasus, said the Russian military presence is clearly "significantly larger" than it was.
From a Georgian police checkpoint just 100 yards (meters) from a Russian roadblock controlling access to the village of Akhmaji, a half dozen Russian tanks and other armored vehicles can be seen in the valley.
Local police chief Timur Burduli said the vehicles appeared during the first week of April and are the Russian forces closest to Tbilisi, the Georgian capital. "A tank needs only 40 minutes," he said.
Along the highway to Tbilisi, a freshly dug anti-tank trench stretches across a long field. Steve Bird, spokesman for the EU monitors, said the Georgians have been building such defenses in recent weeks.
WASHINGTON – Calling on Americans to volunteer, President Barack Obama signed a $5.7 billion national service bill Tuesday that triples the size of the AmeriCorps service program over the next eight years and expands ways for students to earn money for college. "What this legislation does, then, is to help harness this patriotism and connect deeds to needs," said Obama, a former community organizer in Chicago.
"It creates opportunities to serve for students, seniors and everyone in between," he said. "And it is just the beginning of a sustained, collaborative and focused effort to involve our greatest resource — our citizens — in the work of remaking this nation."
Joining Obama was Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, who has been battling brain cancer. Kennedy championed the legislation with Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and the bill was named in honor of the Massachusetts Democrat.
Kennedy told the audience that included former President Bill Clinton, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former first lady Rosalyn Carter that Obama's efforts echoed those of his late brother, President John F. Kennedy.
"Today, another young president has challenged another generation to give back to their nation," Kennedy said, citing his brother's advocacy for the Peace Corps.
The service law expands ways for students and seniors to earn money for college through their volunteer work. It aims to foster and fulfill people's desire to make a difference, such as by mentoring children, cleaning up parks or buildings and weatherizing homes for the poor.
"I'm asking you to help change history's course, put your shoulder up against the wheel," Obama said. "And if you do, I promise you your life will be richer, our country will be stronger, and someday, years from now, you may remember it as the moment when your own story and the American story converged, when they came together, and we met the challenges of our new century."
Bolstering voluntary public service programs has been a priority of Obama, who credits his work as a community organizer in his early 20s for giving him direction in life. The president cited his work in Chicago as an example of how one person can make a difference.
"All that's required on your part is a willingness to make a difference," Obama said. "And that is, after all, the beauty of service: Anybody can do it."
Obama visited the SEED School of Washington, a public boarding school that serves inner-city students facing problems in both the classroom and at home, for the signing ceremony.
Afterward, Obama and first lady Michelle Obama joined Clinton to plant trees at a national park site along the Anacostia River in northeast Washington. At the Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens, Obama rolled up his sleeves with volunteers from the Student Conservation Association and local public high schools.
"Somebody forgot my boots," Obama joked to the students.
Obama on Tuesday also nominated Nike Inc. vice president Maria Eitel to lead the federal agency that oversees the country's national service programs.
Eitel, who's also president of the Nike Foundation, would have to be confirmed by the Senate to become CEO of the Corporation for National and Community Service.
Congress passed the bill last month with largely bipartisan support and Obama is seeking $1.1 billion to fund it next year. Some Republicans complain it is too costly and is an unnecessary intrusion by government into something Americans already do eagerly and in great numbers — helping their neighbors and communities.
The legislation provides for gradually increasing the size of the Clinton-era AmeriCorps to 250,000 enrollees from its current 75,000. It outlines five broad categories where people can direct their service: helping the poor, improving education, encouraging energy efficiency, strengthening access to health care and assisting veterans.
AmeriCorps offers a range of volunteer opportunities including housing construction, youth outreach, disaster response and caring for the elderly. Most receive an annual stipend of slightly less than $12,000 for working 10 months to a year.
AmeriCorps has seen a recent surge in applications, according to the Corporation for National and Community Service, which oversees the program.
In March, the organization received 17,038 online AmeriCorps applications, nearly double those received in the previous month and nearly triple the 6,770 received last March.
Alan Solomont, who chairs AmeriCorps' board, said former President John F. Kennedy's call to service inspired more people to help others than just those who joined the Peace Corps. He said this national service legislation could produce the same effect.
"It is not unlike the moment in 1960 when President Kennedy asked Americans, you know, to serve, but it is certainly going to engage millions more today," Solomont said in a conference call arranged by the White House.
The bill also ties volunteer work to money for college.
People 55 and older could earn $1,000 education awards by getting involved in public service. Those awards can be transferred to a child, grandchild or even someone they mentored.
Students from sixth grade through senior year of high school could earn a $500 education award for helping in their neighborhoods during a new summer program.
LITTLETON, Colo. – The "boy in the window" — who fell bloodied and paralyzed into the arms of rescuers during the horrifying Columbine High shooting rampage — is doing just fine.
Now 27, Patrick Ireland has regained mobility with few lingering effects from gunshot wounds to his head and leg a decade ago. He is married and works in the financial services industry. His mantra: "I choose to be a victor rather than a victim."
Like Ireland, many survivors of the April 20, 1999, massacre have moved on to careers in education, medicine, ministry, retail.
But emotional scars still can trigger anxiety, nightmares and deeply etched recollections of gunfire, blood and bodies.
Some have written books; a few travel the world to share their experiences to help victims of violence.
"People have been able to have 10 years to reconcile what happened and see what fits in their life and who they are," said Kristi Mohrbacher of Littleton, who fled Columbine as the gunfire erupted. "It's kind of a part of who I am today. I think my priorities might be a little bit different if I hadn't had that experience."
Just after 11 a.m. on that day, Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, stormed the suburban school, killing 12 classmates and a teacher and wounding about two dozen. The massacre ended with the gunmen's suicides not quite an hour later.
Sean Graves saw the pair loading weapons in a parking lot and thought they were preparing a senior prank with paintball guns.
Graves, Lance Kirklin and Daniel Rohrbough were walking toward them for a better look when the gunmen opened fire, killing Rachel Scott and Rohrbough and critically wounding Anne Marie Hochhalter, Graves and Kirklin, among others.
In the second-floor library, Ireland was about to finish some homework when he heard pipe bombs exploding in the hallway. Debris fell from the ceiling and a teacher shouted for students to take cover.
Klebold and Harris strode in, shouted for students to stand up, laughing and ridiculing classmates as they sprayed bullets.
Ireland was under a table with Dan Steepleton and Makai Hall when they were shot in the knees. Ireland was shot twice in the head and once in a leg, and lost consciousness.
The killers shot out a library window. Graves, lying partially paralyzed on a sidewalk below, worried that they would return. He smeared blood from his neck wound on his face and the ground to make it appear he was dead.
Harris and Klebold killed 10 students in the library before they left to reload, which gave some survivors a chance to flee. Steepleton and Hall tried to pull Ireland but couldn't move him far before they fled for safety.
Shortly before noon, the gunmen returned to the library and committed suicide.
Ireland awoke some time later, his vision blurred. With fire alarms sounding and strobe lights flashing, the partially paralyzed teen began to push himself toward the bullet-shattered window.
Over the next three hours, he pulled his body along, lost and regained consciousness, then moved again through tables and chairs and past classmates' bodies. He figures he traveled about 50 feet to the window.
"I thought how much easier it would be just to give up, stay there and let somebody come get you or whatever would happen to you," Ireland said.
"But every time those thoughts came in my mind, I thought about all the people that I would be giving up on. ... It was really the friends and family I would be letting down that kept me going."
Ireland pushed himself up to the window and got the attention of SWAT teams below. He doesn't recall flopping over the sill and dropping into the arms of rescuers, the image that grabbed the attention of TV viewers nationwide.
Graves, now 25, moved into a suburb near the mountains, where he recently purchased a home with his fiancee, Kara DeHart, 22. He walks with a limp and still feels pain but keeps a positive attitude. He plans to return to college to pursue a career in forensics science, a path that began to interest him after Columbine.
On Monday's anniversary, Graves will go back to the spot where he was shot, smoke a cigar and leave another on the ground for Rohrbough, something he does every year.
With two children at Columbine, Ted Hochhalter watched the drama unfold on television while waiting in a Seattle airport for a flight back to Denver. He arrived to find his daughter, Anne Marie, paralyzed and in critical condition, and that his son Nathan had been trapped, but unhurt, in the science wing for four hours.
He took a leave of absence from his job as a government emergency management coordinator. Six months later his wife, Carla, who had a history of mental illness, walked into a pawn shop, picked up a gun and committed suicide.
Hochhalter believes the aftermath of the shootings exacerbated his wife's illness. "It got to a point where she made a choice," he said.
He moved the family into the mountain community of Bailey and married Katherine Zocco, a massage therapist specializing in neuromuscular, spinal cord and brain injuries who worked with Anne Marie and other Columbine survivors.
Anne Marie, now 27, graduated from Columbine in 2000 and lives in a Denver suburb where she works as a retail store manager and a child advocate. Her father retired with a medical disability for post traumatic stress disorder.
The elder Hochhalters are working with John-Michael and Ellen Keyes, whose daughter Emily was killed in a 2006 school shooting in Bailey, to get parents involved in school emergency management programs.
Patrick Ireland, the boy in the window, endured grueling therapy to regain the use of his legs, and he had to relearn how to read, write and talk.
With a control-your-destiny determination, he graduated as valedictorian from Columbine and magna cum laude from Colorado State University. Today, he is a field director for Northwestern Mutual Finance Network in the Denver area and has been married to Kacie for nearly four years.
Ireland recognizes he'll long be remembered as the face of Columbine because of his dramatic rescue. He accepts it as a way to emphasize that Columbine should be another word for "hope and courage."
And how does he want to be remembered?
"A triumphant recovery and success story."
PORT OF SPAIN (AFP) – A book accusing the United States of being a neo-colonial bully in the Americas has rocketed up the sales charts, after a copy was given as a gift by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to US leader Barack Obama.
The book, "The Open Veins of Latin America" was given by Chavez, a longtime US critic, to Obama Saturday at an Americas summit in Trinidad and Tobago.
The English version of the tome, a well-known in leftist political circles, catapulted from 734th place to second place in just 24 hours on the online bookseller Amazon.com.
The work in its original Spanish language had an even more spectacular ascent, from 47,468th place to 283th. It also showed substantial increased sales on the website of online bookseller Barnes and Noble.
The work by Uruguayan author Eduardo Galeano is about the region's colonial past and exploitation by the world's big powers -- themes hammered constantly by Chavez, who frequently accuses the United States of "imperialist" policies.
Chavez had inscribed the book to his US counterpart with the message "For Obama, with affection."
The Venezuelan leader told reporters Saturday that "this book is a monument in our Latin American history. It allows us to learn history, and we have to build on this history."
Obama on Sunday called the gift "a nice gesture."
"I think it was, it was a nice gesture to give me a book," he said at a press conference at the conclusion of the three day summit. "I'm a reader."
Obama added that recent harsh rhetoric did not mean that the two countries could not engage in civil dialogue.
"It's unlikely that as a consequence of me shaking hands or having a polite conversation with Mr. Chavez that we are endangering the strategic interest of the United States," Obama said.
Despite its theme, the gift might have been meant as another conciliatory gesture from Chavez, whose country is a major oil exporter to the United States.
Hours after giving Obama the book, the Venezuelan leader said he was naming Roy Chaderton, Venezuela's current representative to the Organization of American States (OAS), to be his new ambassador to Washington.
The job had been open since September, when Chavez kicked out the US ambassador to Venezuela and Washington responded in kind.
By Jonathan S. Landay, McClatchy Newspapers Jonathan S. Landay, Mcclatchy Newspapers
WASHINGTON — A growing number of U.S. intelligence, defense and diplomatic officials have concluded that there's little hope of preventing nuclear-armed Pakistan from disintegrating into fiefdoms controlled by Islamist warlords and terrorists, posing the a greater threat to the U.S. than Afghanistan's terrorist haven did before 9/11.
"It's a disaster in the making on the scale of the Iranian revolution," said a U.S. intelligence official with long experience in Pakistan who requested anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly.
Pakistan's fragmentation into warlord-run fiefdoms that host al Qaida and other terrorist groups would have grave implications for the security of its nuclear arsenal; for the U.S.-led effort to pacify Afghanistan ; and for the security of India , the nearby oil-rich Persian Gulf and Central Asia , the U.S. and its allies.
" Pakistan has 173 million people and 100 nuclear weapons, an army which is bigger than the American army, and the headquarters of al Qaida sitting in two-thirds of the country which the government does not control," said David Kilcullen , a retired Australian army officer, a former State Department adviser and a counterinsurgency consultant to the Obama administration.
" Pakistan isn't Afghanistan , a backward, isolated, landlocked place that outsiders get interested in about once a century," agreed the U.S. intelligence official. "It's a developed state . . . (with) a major Indian Ocean port and ties to the outside world, especially the (Persian) Gulf, that Afghanistan and the Taliban never had."
"The implications of this are disastrous for the U.S.," he added. "The supply lines (from Karachi to U.S. bases) in Kandahar and Kabul from the south and east will be cut, or at least they'll be less secure, and probably sooner rather than later, and that will jeopardize the mission in Afghanistan , especially now that it's getting bigger."
The experts McClatchy interviewed said their views aren't a worst case scenario but a realistic expectation based on the militants' gains and the failure of Pakistan's civilian and military leadership to respond.
"The place is beyond redemption," said a Pentagon adviser who asked not to be further identified so he could speak freely. "I don't see any plausible scenario under which the present government or its most likely successor will mobilize the economic, political and security resources to push back this rising tide of violence.
"I think Pakistan is moving toward a situation where the extremists control virtually all of the countryside and the government controls only the urban centers," he continued. "If you look out 10 years, I think the government will be overrun by Islamic militants."
That pessimistic view of Pakistan's future has been bolstered by Islamabad's surrender this week for the first time of areas outside the frontier tribal region to Pakistan's Taliban movement and by a growing militant infiltration of Karachi , the nation's financial center, and the industrial and political heartland province of Punjab, in part to evade U.S. drone strikes in the tribal belt.
Civilian deaths in the drone attacks, the eight-year-old U.S. intervention in Afghanistan and U.S. support for Pakistan's former military dictatorship also have sown widespread ambivalence about the threat the insurgency poses and revulsion at fighting fellow Muslims.
"The government has to ratchet up the urgency and ratchet up the commitment of resources. This is a serious moment for Pakistan ," said Sen. John Kerry , D- Mass. , the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman, on April 14 in Islamabad . "The federal government has got to . . . define this problem as Pakistan's ."
Many Pakistanis, however, dismiss such warnings as inflated. They think that the militants are open to dialogue and political accommodation to end the unrest, which many trace to the former military regime's cooperation with the U.S. after 9/11.
Ahsan Iqbal , a top aide to opposition leader and former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif , said the insurgency can be quelled if the government rebuilds the judicial system, improves law enforcement, compensates guerrillas driven to fight by relatives' deaths in security force operations and implements democratic reforms.
"It will require time," Iqbal told McClatchy reporters and editors this week. "We need a very strong resolve and internal unity."
Many U.S. officials, though, regard the civilian government of Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari as unpopular, dysfunctional and mired in infighting. It's been unable to agree on an effective counterinsurgency strategy or to address the ills that are feeding the unrest. These include ethnic and sectarian hatreds, ineffective police, broken courts, widespread corruption, endemic poverty and a deepening financial crisis, they said.
Pakistan's army, meanwhile, is hobbled by a lack of direction from the country's civilian leaders, disparaged for its repeated coups and shaken by repeated defeats by the militants. It remains fixated on India to ensure high budgets and cohesion among troops of divergent ethnic and sectarian allegiances, U.S. officials and experts said.
Many officers and politicians also oppose fighting the Islamist groups that Pakistan nurtured to fight proxy wars in Afghanistan and Kashmir , and because they think the U.S. is secretly conspiring with India to destabilize their country.
Alarm rose in Washington this week after the parliament and Zardari agreed to impose Islamic law in the Swat district, where extremists have repelled several army offensives; closed girls' schools; and beheaded, hanged and lashed opponents and alleged criminals.
The government's capitulation handed the militants their first refuge outside the remote tribal area bordering Afghanistan , and less than 100 miles north of Islamabad . Taliban fighters also advanced virtually unopposed from Swat into the Buner district, 60 miles north of Islamabad .
Buner is close to a key hydroelectric dam and to the highways that link Pakistan to China , and Islamabad to Peshawar , the capital of the North West Frontier Province , much of which is already under Taliban sway.
Many U.S. officials and other experts expect the militants to continue advancing.
The Taliban "have now become a self-sustaining force," author Ahmed Rashid , an expert on the insurgency, told a conference in Washington on Wednesday. "They have an agenda for Pakistan , and that agenda is no less than to topple the government of Pakistan and 'Talibanizing' the entire country."
Iqbal, the adviser to Sharif, disagreed. While militants will overrun small pockets, most Pakistanis embrace democracy and will resist living under the Taliban's harsh interpretation of Islam, he said.
"The psychology, the temperament, the mood of the Pakistani nation does not subscribe to these extremist views," Iqbal said.
The U.S. intelligence official, however, said that Pakistan's elite, dominated since the country's independence in 1947 by politicians, bureaucrats and military officers from Punjab, have failed to recognize the seriousness of the situation.
"The Punjabi elite has already lost control of Pakistan , but neither they nor the Obama administration realize that," the official said. " Pakistan will be an Islamist state — or maybe a collection of four Islamic states, probably within a few years. There's no civilian leadership in Islamabad that can stop this, and so far, there hasn't been any that's been willing to try."
Several U.S. officials said that the Afghanistan - Pakistan strategy that President Barack Obama unveiled last month is being called into question by the accelerating rate at which the insurgency in Pakistan is expanding.
The plan hinges on the Pakistani army's willingness to put aside its obsession with Hindu-dominated India and focus on fighting the Islamist insurgency. It also presupposes, despite doubts held by some U.S. officials, that sympathetic Pakistani military and intelligence officers will sever their links with militant groups.
WARWICK, R.I. – An attempted robbery of a woman at a suburban Providence hotel may be linked to the slaying at an upscale Boston hotel of a woman who advertised massage on Craigslist, police said Friday.
A 26-year-old woman who also advertised massage services on Craigslist was bound with cord and held at gunpoint at the Holiday Inn Express at about 11:15 p.m. Thursday, Warwick Police Chief Stephen McCartney said. The assailant fled when the victim's husband returned to the room.
The husband briefly chased the assailant out of the room, but then returned to check on his wife, McCartney said. The woman told police she worked at The Cadillac Lounge, a Providence stripclub.
"She may have been involved in some sort of a sex-for-money transaction at the point in time when she had the confrontation with this alleged assailant," McCartney said.
The suspect's description matches that of a "person of interest" wanted for questioning in the fatal shooting of 26-year-old Julissa Brisman of New York City at the Marriott Copley Place in Boston on Tuesday night.
And the same person may have been involved in the robbery last week of a woman at the Westin Copley Hotel, Boston Police Commissioner Edward Davis said.
That woman had also advertised massage services on Craigslist, the online classified service.
Police in Warwick, which is about 60 miles south of Boston, describe the suspect as a clean-cut white male, approximately 6-foot tall, 200-pounds, with blond hair, wearing a black coat and blue jeans.
Warwick police said they are working with Boston police on the case.
Police in Boston have said that they believe the victim at the Westin was involved in prostitution but that they are uncertain about Brisman.
Brisman's friends said they didn't know she had advertised massage services online.
Matthew Terhune, 34, a photographer from New York City, said he photographed Brisman last year for head shots she needed for a tanning salon.
He said Brisman told him she had been paid $1,000 to fly out to private parties in Chicago and walk around in a bikini or topless. "But I don't think it went beyond that," Terhune said. "They were just parties where guys wanted to see hot girls."
Makeup artist Emily Claire, 30, Terhune's girlfriend, worked with Brisman during the photo shoot. She said Brisman, a recovering alcoholic, wanted eventually become an Alcoholics Anonymous counselor.
By JOHN HEILPRIN and PAUL ALEXANDER, Associated Press Writer John Heilprin And Paul Alexander, Associated Press Writer
UNITED NATIONS – The U.S. and its allies sought punishment Sunday for North Korea's defiant launch of a rocket that apparently fizzled into the Pacific, holding an emergency U.N. meeting in response to the "provocative act" that some believe was a long-range missile test.
President Barack Obama, faced with his first global security crisis, called for an international response and condemned North Korea for threatening the peace and stability of nations "near and far." Minutes after liftoff, Japan requested the emergency Security Council session in New York.
U.S. and South Korean officials claim the entire rocket, including whatever payload it carried, ended up in the ocean but many world leaders fear the launch indicates the capacity to fire a long-range missile. Pyongyang claims it launched an experimental communications satellite into orbit Sunday and that it is transmitting data and patriotic songs.
"North Korea broke the rules, once again, by testing a rocket that could be used for long-range missiles," Obama said in Prague. "It creates instability in their region, around the world. This provocation underscores the need for action, not just this afternoon in the U.N. Security Council, but in our determination to prevent the spread of these weapons."
Council members met for three hours, seeking above all a unified response, but broke up for the night without issuing even a customary preliminary statement of condemnation. Diplomats privy to the closed-door talks say China, Russia, Libya and Vietnam were concerned about further alienating and destabilizing North Korea.
"We're now in a very sensitive moment," Chinese Ambassador Zhang Yesui said after the talks concluded. "Our position is that all countries concerned should show restraint, and refrain from taking actions that might lead to increased tensions."
Diplomats continued bilateral talks into the evening. The council's five permanent members — the U.S., Britain, France, China and Russia — left for a meeting with Japan.
The U.S. Britain, France and Japan drafted a proposal for a resolution that could be adopted by the end of the week. It is aimed at toughening existing economic sanctions by "naming and shaming" individuals and entities, council diplomats said.
Mexican Ambassador Claude Heller, the council's president, said the council would reconvene "as soon as possible" on Monday to reach consensus on what to do about North Korea.
Using a possible loophole in U.N. sanctions imposed after the 2006 nuclear test that barred the North from ballistic missile activity, the Pyongyang government claimed it was exercising its right to peaceful space development.
The U.S. said nuclear-armed North Korea clearly violated the resolution, but objections from Russia and China — the North's closest ally — will almost certainly water down any strong response. Both have Security Council veto power.
"Obviously today's action by North Korea constitutes a clear violation," said Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. "My government has called this a provocative act, and we have been in consultation today with our allies in the region and other partners on the Security Council ... to work toward agreement on a strong collective action."
Yukio Takasu, Japan's ambassador to the U.N., called for a "clear, unified and firm" council resolution to back up the earlier sanctions.
"This is in direct defiance of all members of the international community," he said. "It is quite regrettable; we should condemn it."
North Korea had warned that debris might fall off Japan's northern coast when the rocket's first stage fell away, so Tokyo positioned batteries of interceptor missiles on its coast and radar-equipped ships to monitor the launch. Nary a shot was necessary.
Obama warned the launch would further isolate the reclusive nation. But U.S. officials also called for pragmatism, especially with efforts to get North Korea back to the negotiating table for the six-party talks.
While the rogue communist state has repeatedly been belligerent and threatening — as it was when it carried out an underground nuclear blast and tested ballistic missiles in recent years — Pyongyang showed increased savvy this time that may make severe punishment more complicated than ever.
Unlike its previous provocations, the North notified the international community that the launch was coming and the route the rocket would take, although critics of North Korea leader Kim Jong Il claim he really was testing a ballistic missile capable of hitting U.S. territory.
Analysts say sanctions imposed after the North's underground nuclear test in 2006 appear to have had little effect because implementation was left up to individual countries, some of which showed no will to impose them.
Kim is reportedly a big film buff and his strategy appears to have borrowed heavily from the 1959 movie "The Mouse That Roared," about a fictional poor country that declares war on the U.S., expecting to lose and get aid like the Marshall Plan that Washington used to help rebuild its World War II foes.
In a statement released just hours after the launch, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko said North Korea had informed Moscow ahead of time, and Russian radars tracked it.
Russia urges "all states concerned to show restraint in judgments and action," Nesterenko said.
Despite its policy of "juche," or "self-reliance," communist North Korea is one of the world's poorest countries, has few allies and is in desperate need of outside help. The money that flowed in unconditionally from neighboring South Korea for a decade dried up when conservative President Lee Myung-bak took office in 2008.
Pyongyang has little collateral and for years has used its nuclear weapons program as its trump card, promising to abandon its atomic ambitions in exchange for aid and then dangling the nuclear threat when it doesn't get its way.
It's been an effective strategy so far, with previous missile launches drawing Washington to negotiations. The North also has reportedly been selling missile parts and technology to whoever has the cash to pay for it.
Kim wants food for his famished people, fuel and — perhaps most importantly — direct talks and relations with Washington.
Right now, the main contact is through six-nation talks aimed at getting Pyongyang to give up its nuclear weapons program.
"We must deal with North Korea as we find it, not as we would like it to be," Stephen Bosworth, the U.S. envoy on North Korea, said Friday.
Kim Keun-sik, a North Korea expert at South Korea's Kyungnam University, said the launch would chill ties between Pyongyang and Washington, but likely not for long.
"Wouldn't they eventually come to hold talks? There is no other way," Kim said.
U.S. officials also are trying to obtain the release of two American journalists recently detained by the North along its border with China. Paik Hak-soon, an analyst at the Sejong Institute think tank, predicted they would be used as bargaining chips, with the North likely "to try to link them to the nuclear and missile talks."
Iran, which also has a contentious relationship with the international community over its nuclear program and is believed to have cooperated extensively with North Korea on missile technology, defended the launch.
"North Korea, like any other country, has the right to enter space," Iran's state TV said in a commentary, adding that the "pressure on North Korea to give up its undisputable right" was "unfair and dishonest."
By Caren Bohan and Paul de Bendern Caren Bohan And Paul De Bendern ANKARA (Reuters) – President Barack Obama will seek on Monday to shore up ties with Turkey, a Muslim country with growing clout whose help Washington needs to solve confrontations and conflicts from Iran to Afghanistan.
Obama's April 5-7 visit is a nod to Turkey's regional reach, economic power, unrivalled diplomatic contacts and status as a secular Muslim democracy that has accommodated political Islam.
It is last leg of an eight-day trip marking his debut as president on the world stage.
"The president will discuss the need for the U.S.-Turkish partnership to address regional challenges like the threat from terrorism, the war in Afghanistan, relations with Iran, and the shared goal of lasting peace between Israel and its neighbors," the White House said.
The U.S.-Turkish relationship suffered in 2003 when Ankara opposed the invasion of Iraq and refused to let U.S. troops deploy on its territory. Turkey has also criticized Washington for allowing Kurdish separatists to be based in northern Iraq from where they stage deadly attacks into Turkish territory.
Turkey is a major transit route for U.S. troops and equipment destined for Iraq as well as Afghanistan. As the United States reduces its troops there, Incirlik air force base could play a key role and Obama will discuss this.
"Obama wants to settle with Turkey over Iraq. It is a neighbor of Iraq and important to work with it as the United States moves troops out. Erdogan has hinted that he will allow the United States to use Turkey," said Hugh Pope, an analyst for International Crisis Group.
The United States also wants Turkey to be helpful in convincing its neighbors to allow their territory to become supply routes to Afghanistan where U.S. and other NATO forces are fighting a Taliban insurgency.
"Given Turkish activity and credibility in the wider region stretching from Afghanistan to the Middle East, passing over energy transit routes, Obama wants to give new blood to a real strategic partnership with Turkey," Cengiz Candar, a leading Turkish commentator and Middle East expert.
Polls show antipathy among most Turks for Washington.
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Obama has had an eye to ties with Turkey during his tour.
In Prague on Sunday, Obama urged the European Union to accept Turkey as a full member, in remarks rejected outright by France and met coolly by Germany.
And Turkey said it dropped objections to Anders Fogh Rasmussen becoming the next head of NATO after Obama guaranteed one of the Dane's deputies would be a Turk.
Obama may unlock the kind of goodwill generated by former U.S. President Bill Clinton when he came to Turkey in 1999, but risks dissipating it all if he uses the word "genocide" to describe the fate of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in 1915.
In his election campaign, Obama pledged to call the massacres of Armenians genocide, and a resolution to so designate them was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives last month.
Turkey accepts that many Christian Armenians were killed by Ottoman Turks during World War One, but denies that up to 1.5 million died as a result of systematic genocide.
"We're not out to ask favors from Obama. His presence is enough for us," a senior Turkish government official, who declined to be named, told Reuters. "His visit will give credibility to Turkey on the global stage and what we are trying to achieve in bringing peace to the region."
Turkey has sought to engage Syria with the West and acted as an indirect peace negotiator between Syria and Israel. It has also pushed to end the isolation of the Hamas militant group in Gaza and bring Iran out of isolation.
Turkey will not be the venue for Obama's promised major speech in a Muslim capital, but his stop will still be a way to emphasize his message of reaching out to Muslims.
Obama will give an address at the parliament in Ankara, and during a visit to Istanbul he will attend a reception of the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations, co-hosted by Turkey and Spain to bridge the gap between Western and Islamic countries. He will also meet students at an Islamic museum.
(Writing by Paul de Bendern; Editing by Alison Williams)
By JENNIFER QUINN, Associated Press Writer Jennifer Quinn LONDON – Michelle Obama's meeting with Queen Elizabeth II began with a handshake and ended in a hug.
The first lady arrived Wednesday with President Barack Obama. After separate meetings on the eve of the G-20 summit, the couple attended an evening reception for world leaders hosted by the queen.
Mrs. Obama clearly made an impression with the 82-year-old monarch — so much that the smiling queen strayed slightly from protocol and briefly wrapped her arm around the first lady in a rare public show of affection.
It was the first time Mrs. Obama — who is nearly a foot taller — had met the queen. The first lady also wrapped her arm around the monarch's shoulder and back.
A Buckingham Palace spokesman who asked not to be identified because of palace policy said he could not remember the last time the queen had displayed such public affection with a first lady or dignitary.
"It was a mutual and spontaneous display of affection," he said. "We don't issue instructions on not touching the queen."
When the former Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating put his arm around the queen in 1992, the tabloids dubbed him the "Lizard of Oz." When his successor, John Howard, was accused of doing the same, a spokesman insisted: "We firmly deny that there was any contact whatsoever." In 2007, President George W. Bush gave the queen a sly wink during a visit she paid to the United States.
The Daily Mail said the "two women clearly took to each other."
Wednesday's reception was followed by a dinner at Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Downing Street home, where the leaders' spouses were joined by notable British women, including "Harry Potter" author J.K. Rowling and Olympic gold medal runner Kelly Holmes.
"Michelle walks in and she is as she seems," Holmes told reporters Thursday. "So warm, engaging, a beautiful, beautiful lady — and I quickly got my photo in the middle of her and Sarah Brown," the prime minister's wife.
Mrs. Obama also seemed to win over the often feral British press.
The last time a first lady made such a hit in Britain was last year with French President Nicolas Sarkozy's wife, the former fashion model and songwriter Carla Bruni.
But on Thursday, London's Times newspaper had moved on, writing "Carla who?"
The BBC described Mrs. Obama as her husband's co-star rather than supporting act — appropriate for a Harvard-educated lawyer.
Mrs. Obama visited an all-girls school in north London on Thursday afternoon. She told the 240 girls about growing up on Chicago's south side, and urged them to think of education as "cool."
"I never cut class. I liked being smart. I liked getting A's," she said. "You have everything you need. Everything you need to succeed you already have right here."
At the end of the visit, Mrs. Obama doled out hugs to the students, and was swarmed by them — to the extent that some Secret Service agents stepped nervously forward.
Earlier Thursday, Mrs. Obama attended a performance at the Royal Opera House with the other spouses and guests. The program included music by Handel and a dance performance by Ballet Black, a troupe set up to give performing opportunities to black and Asian classical dancers.
Wearing a bright teal blue dress by Jason Wu — who designed her inauguration gown — and a sweater by Junya Watanabe, Mrs. Obama posed for photographs with Sarah Brown, Therese Rein, wife of Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso's wife Chikako Aso, and Laureen Harper, who is married to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, on the stage of the opera house.
