Crude Oil Falls 0.7 Percent in New York to $106.80 a Barrel
3 comments Posted by Articles Internet at 7:17 PMfrom bloomberg.com
March 28 (Bloomberg) -- Crude oil fell as much as 78 cents, or 0.7 percent, to $106.80 a barrel in New York.
Crude oil for May delivery traded at $106.92 a barrel at 9:05 a.m. Singapore time in after-hours trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Futures are up 67 percent from a year ago.
From reuters
BEIJING (Reuters) - Tibetan monks stormed a news briefing at a temple in Lhasa on Thursday, accusing officials of lying about unrest and embarrassing Chinese authorities during a stage-managed tour by foreign reporters.
Authorities say calm has been restored since an anti-Chinese uprising erupted in the Tibetan capital two weeks ago. China says its security forces acted with restraint and that 19 people died at the hands of Tibetan mobs during the unrest.
But the Tibetan government-in-exile says 140 died in Lhasa and elsewhere, most of them Tibetan victims of security forces, arousing international protest soon before the Beijing Olympics.
On Thursday young monks at the Jokhang Temple, one of the most sacred in Tibet, stormed into a briefing by a temple administrator for a select group of foreign journalists, the first allowed into Tibet since the uprising.
"About 30 young monks burst into the official briefing, shouting: 'Don't believe them. They are tricking you. They are telling lies'," USA Today's Beijing-based reporter Callum MacLeod said by telephone from Lhasa.
Hong Kong's TVB aired television footage of the bold outburst in front of the foreign journalists, showing monks in crimson robes, some weeping, crowded around cameras.
They said they had been barred from leaving the temple since March 10, when demonstrations erupted on the 49th anniversary of an abortive uprising against Chinese rule that saw Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, flee into exile in India.
"They just don't believe us. They think we will come out and cause havoc -- smash, destroy, rob, burn. We didn't do anything like that -- they're falsely accusing us," said one monk. "We want freedom. The have detained lamas and ordinary people."
Authorities say calm has been restored since an anti-Chinese uprising erupted in the Tibetan capital two weeks ago. China says its security forces acted with restraint and that 19 people died at the hands of Tibetan mobs during the unrest.
But the Tibetan government-in-exile says 140 died in Lhasa and elsewhere, most of them Tibetan victims of security forces, arousing international protest soon before the Beijing Olympics.
On Thursday young monks at the Jokhang Temple, one of the most sacred in Tibet, stormed into a briefing by a temple administrator for a select group of foreign journalists, the first allowed into Tibet since the uprising.
"About 30 young monks burst into the official briefing, shouting: 'Don't believe them. They are tricking you. They are telling lies'," USA Today's Beijing-based reporter Callum MacLeod said by telephone from Lhasa.
Hong Kong's TVB aired television footage of the bold outburst in front of the foreign journalists, showing monks in crimson robes, some weeping, crowded around cameras.
They said they had been barred from leaving the temple since March 10, when demonstrations erupted on the 49th anniversary of an abortive uprising against Chinese rule that saw Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, flee into exile in India.
"They just don't believe us. They think we will come out and cause havoc -- smash, destroy, rob, burn. We didn't do anything like that -- they're falsely accusing us," said one monk. "We want freedom. The have detained lamas and ordinary people."
Wang Che-nan, a cameraman for Taiwan's ETTV, said the incident lasted about 15 minutes, after which police took the monks elsewhere in the temple, away from the journalists.
They told the journalists: "your time is up, time to go to the next place", Wang said.
Reuters was not invited on the government-organized trip.
Chhime Chhoekyapa, secretary to the Dalai Lama, said the incident made clear "that brute force alone cannot suppress the long-simmering resentment that exists in Tibet".
"We are deeply concerned about the safety and well-being of the monks and appeal to the international community to ensure their protection," he said.
On Wednesday, President George W. Bush urged Chinese President Hu Jintao to hold talks with the Dalai Lama.
Hu said China was willing to continue engaging in "contact and discussions" with the Dalai Lama, but he must renounce support for independence of the Himalayan region and Taiwan, and "stop inciting and planning violent and criminal activities and sabotaging the Beijing Olympics", Chinese newspapers reported.
"DALAI CLIQUE"
China has blamed the "Dalai clique" for the unrest and called him a separatist. The Dalai Lama denies he wants anything more than autonomy for his homeland and has condemned violence "from the Chinese side and also from the Tibetan side".
They told the journalists: "your time is up, time to go to the next place", Wang said.
Reuters was not invited on the government-organized trip.
Chhime Chhoekyapa, secretary to the Dalai Lama, said the incident made clear "that brute force alone cannot suppress the long-simmering resentment that exists in Tibet".
"We are deeply concerned about the safety and well-being of the monks and appeal to the international community to ensure their protection," he said.
On Wednesday, President George W. Bush urged Chinese President Hu Jintao to hold talks with the Dalai Lama.
Hu said China was willing to continue engaging in "contact and discussions" with the Dalai Lama, but he must renounce support for independence of the Himalayan region and Taiwan, and "stop inciting and planning violent and criminal activities and sabotaging the Beijing Olympics", Chinese newspapers reported.
"DALAI CLIQUE"
China has blamed the "Dalai clique" for the unrest and called him a separatist. The Dalai Lama denies he wants anything more than autonomy for his homeland and has condemned violence "from the Chinese side and also from the Tibetan side".
from NY Times
BAGHDAD — American-trained Iraqi security forces failed for a third straight day to oust Shiite militias from the southern city of Basra on Thursday, even as President Bush hailed the operation as a sign of the growing strength of Iraq’s federal government.
The fighting in Basra with the Mahdi Army, the armed wing of the political movement led by the radical Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr, set off clashes in cities throughout Iraq and major demonstrations in Sadr City, the huge Baghdad neighborhood that is Mr. Sadr’s base of power, and other Shiite neighborhoods in the capital.
Although Mr. Bush praised the Iraqi government for leading the fighting, it also appeared that the Iraqi government was pursuing its own agenda, calling the battles a fight against “criminal” elements but seeking to marginalize the Mahdi Army.
The Americans share the Iraqi government’s hostility toward what they call rogue elements of the Mahdi Army but will also be faced with the consequences if the battles erupt into more widespread unrest.
The violence underscored the fragile nature of the security improvements partly credited to the American troop increase that began last year. Officials have acknowledged that a cease-fire called by Mr. Sadr last August has contributed to the improvements. Should the cease-fire collapse entirely, those gains could be in serious jeopardy, making it far more difficult to begin bringing substantial numbers of American troops home.
Although Sadr officials insisted on Thursday that the cease-fire was still in effect, Mr. Sadr has authorized his forces to fight in self-defense, and the battles in Basra appear to be eroding the cease-fire.
During a lengthy speech at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, near Dayton, Ohio, Mr. Bush praised Iraq’s government for ordering the assault in Basra and portrayed the battle as evidence that his strategy of increasing troop strength was bearing fruit.
“This offensive builds on the security gains of the surge and demonstrates to the Iraqi people that their government is committed to protecting them,” he said.
“There’s a strong commitment by the central government of Iraq to say that no one is above the law.”
Mr. Bush also accused Iran of arming, training and financing the militias fighting against the Iraqi forces.
Mr. Bush spoke after three days of briefings with senior advisers and military commanders on the situation in Iraq and the options for reducing the number of American troops there beyond the withdrawals already announced. It was one in a series of speeches he has been giving to build support for his policy before Gen. David H. Petraeus, the senior commander in Iraq, testifies before Congress next month.
In a videoconference with the president on Monday, General Petraeus recommended taking up to two months to evaluate security in Iraq before considering additional withdrawals, officials said Monday.
On Thursday, medical officials in Basra said the toll in the fighting there had risen to about 100 dead and 500 wounded, including civilians, militiamen and members of the security forces. An Iraqi employee of The New York Times, driving on the main road between Basra and Nasiriya, observed numerous civilian cars with coffins strapped to the roofs, apparently heading to Shiite cemeteries to the north.
Violence also broke out in Kut, Hilla, Amara, Kirkuk, Baquba and other cities. In Baghdad, where explosions shook the city throughout the day, American officials said 11 rockets struck the Green Zone, killing an unidentified American government worker, the second this week.
Another American, Paul Converse of Corvallis, Ore., an analyst with a federal oversight agency, the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, died of wounds suffered in a rocket attack on Sunday, a spokeswoman for the agency said Thursday.
The Iraqi government imposed a citywide curfew in Baghdad until Sunday.
Thousands of demonstrators in Sadr City on Thursday denounced Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, who has personally directed the Basra operation, and Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the Shiite cleric who leads the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, a political party that is a crucial member of the coalition keeping Mr. Maliki in power.
The Supreme Council’s armed wing, the Badr Organization, is one of the most powerful rivals of the Mahdi Army in Basra, where Shiite militias have been fighting among themselves for years to control neighborhoods, oil revenues, electricity access, the ports and even the local universities.
The third powerful element in the city is the Fadhila Party, which split from the Sadrists years ago and has its own militia. The three parties are expected to be rivals in the next round of provincial council elections, now scheduled for October. Many Sadr supporters pointed to those elections, and the possibility that their party might gain a majority of the seats, as a motivation for the Basra assault.
That assertion was rejected by Sadiq al-Rikabi, the prime minister’s political adviser, who said that the deteriorating security situation in Basra had left Mr. Maliki no choice but to act.
The fighting in Basra with the Mahdi Army, the armed wing of the political movement led by the radical Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr, set off clashes in cities throughout Iraq and major demonstrations in Sadr City, the huge Baghdad neighborhood that is Mr. Sadr’s base of power, and other Shiite neighborhoods in the capital.
Although Mr. Bush praised the Iraqi government for leading the fighting, it also appeared that the Iraqi government was pursuing its own agenda, calling the battles a fight against “criminal” elements but seeking to marginalize the Mahdi Army.
The Americans share the Iraqi government’s hostility toward what they call rogue elements of the Mahdi Army but will also be faced with the consequences if the battles erupt into more widespread unrest.
The violence underscored the fragile nature of the security improvements partly credited to the American troop increase that began last year. Officials have acknowledged that a cease-fire called by Mr. Sadr last August has contributed to the improvements. Should the cease-fire collapse entirely, those gains could be in serious jeopardy, making it far more difficult to begin bringing substantial numbers of American troops home.
Although Sadr officials insisted on Thursday that the cease-fire was still in effect, Mr. Sadr has authorized his forces to fight in self-defense, and the battles in Basra appear to be eroding the cease-fire.
During a lengthy speech at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, near Dayton, Ohio, Mr. Bush praised Iraq’s government for ordering the assault in Basra and portrayed the battle as evidence that his strategy of increasing troop strength was bearing fruit.
“This offensive builds on the security gains of the surge and demonstrates to the Iraqi people that their government is committed to protecting them,” he said.
“There’s a strong commitment by the central government of Iraq to say that no one is above the law.”
Mr. Bush also accused Iran of arming, training and financing the militias fighting against the Iraqi forces.
Mr. Bush spoke after three days of briefings with senior advisers and military commanders on the situation in Iraq and the options for reducing the number of American troops there beyond the withdrawals already announced. It was one in a series of speeches he has been giving to build support for his policy before Gen. David H. Petraeus, the senior commander in Iraq, testifies before Congress next month.
In a videoconference with the president on Monday, General Petraeus recommended taking up to two months to evaluate security in Iraq before considering additional withdrawals, officials said Monday.
On Thursday, medical officials in Basra said the toll in the fighting there had risen to about 100 dead and 500 wounded, including civilians, militiamen and members of the security forces. An Iraqi employee of The New York Times, driving on the main road between Basra and Nasiriya, observed numerous civilian cars with coffins strapped to the roofs, apparently heading to Shiite cemeteries to the north.
Violence also broke out in Kut, Hilla, Amara, Kirkuk, Baquba and other cities. In Baghdad, where explosions shook the city throughout the day, American officials said 11 rockets struck the Green Zone, killing an unidentified American government worker, the second this week.
Another American, Paul Converse of Corvallis, Ore., an analyst with a federal oversight agency, the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, died of wounds suffered in a rocket attack on Sunday, a spokeswoman for the agency said Thursday.
The Iraqi government imposed a citywide curfew in Baghdad until Sunday.
Thousands of demonstrators in Sadr City on Thursday denounced Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, who has personally directed the Basra operation, and Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the Shiite cleric who leads the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, a political party that is a crucial member of the coalition keeping Mr. Maliki in power.
The Supreme Council’s armed wing, the Badr Organization, is one of the most powerful rivals of the Mahdi Army in Basra, where Shiite militias have been fighting among themselves for years to control neighborhoods, oil revenues, electricity access, the ports and even the local universities.
The third powerful element in the city is the Fadhila Party, which split from the Sadrists years ago and has its own militia. The three parties are expected to be rivals in the next round of provincial council elections, now scheduled for October. Many Sadr supporters pointed to those elections, and the possibility that their party might gain a majority of the seats, as a motivation for the Basra assault.
That assertion was rejected by Sadiq al-Rikabi, the prime minister’s political adviser, who said that the deteriorating security situation in Basra had left Mr. Maliki no choice but to act.
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