Oil of War

JUAREZ: Cecilia Juarez, 22, incarcerated for drug trafficking, was crowned Miss Captive Beauty 2010 during a pageant for the women inmates at the Cereso prison in Juarez.

Municipal authorities organized the pageant, dubbed “Belleza Cautiva,” or captive beauty, as part of the International Day of the Woman.

The jury chose the most beautiful inmate among 15 participants.

Juarez won the title by unanimous decision. She has been imprisoned for two months on drug charges and awaits sentencing.

Tehran: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will visit Afghanistan, the Mehr news agency reported Sunday.

Ahmadinejad will start the one-day visit on Monday and confer with his Afghan counterpart Hamid Karzai on bilateral and international issues, the report said.

Afghanistan is one of the few countries where Iran and its arch-foe the United States have common interests, and common enemies such as the Taliban Islamists. Both sides also support the government of Karzai.

The Iranian president has often said the dilemma in Afghanistan could not be solved by military means.

Ahmadinejad said that instead of waging war, the West should have invested a very small part of its military budgets to create jobs for the 25 million people in Afghanistan.

WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama warned on Monday that women in America still faced unfairness and hardship, as he vowed to fight for gender equality at a White House reception on International Women’’s Day.

“I didn”t run for president so that the dreams of our daughters could be deferred or denied,” Obama said.

“I didn”t run for president to see inequality and injustice persist in our time.”

Obama was joined by his wife First Lady Michelle Obama, the first female secretary of state Madeleine Albright, and his rival-turned-ally and current top US diplomat Hillary Clinton at an event in the East Room of the White House.

“Even as we reflect on the hope of our history, we must also face squarely the reality of the present — a reality marked by unfairness, marked by hardship for too many women in America,” Obama said.

“I ran for president to put the same rights, the same opportunities, the same dreams within the reach for our daughters and our sons alike.”

The president also praised Clinton and US ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice for making the alleviation of suffering of women a priority in US foreign policy, including lifting restrictions on access to family planning.

Michelle Obama introduced her husband with a joke: “I get to speak first while he stands and watches. I love this,” she said to laughter.

“Look at me adoringly,” she told her husband.

“I can do that,” the president quipped.

“With sincerity,” she said, sparking loud laughs.

RIYADH: Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Tuesday Turkey is not ready to return its ambassador to Washington after a US Congress panel branded the World War I massacre of Armenians as genocide.

“As long as the situation does not get any clearer we will not send back our ambassador to Washington,” Erdogan said about the tiff over the Armenia resolution passed by the US House Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday.

“America should not let go of a strategic ally like Turkey over such an issue,” he said.

An infuriated Ankara recalled Ambassador Namik Tan on Thursday, shortly after the panel narrowly approved the non-binding resolution.

The move, opposed by the administration of President Barack Obama, now opens the door for a vote by the full House of Representatives.

Erdogan called the move “a comedy stunt” and blamed the vote on a combination of “unbecoming” voting procedures in the US Congress and a change of attitude by the “Jewish lobby” to back the action.

“The Jewish lobby in the US supported this resolution,” he said.

The resolution calls on Obama to ensure that US foreign policy reflects an understanding of the “genocide” and to label the mass killings as such in his annual statement on the issue.

Armenians say up to 1.5 million of their kin were killed during World War I by their Ottoman rulers in a planned campaign of extermination as the empire was falling apart, a stance that is supported by several other countries.

The massacres followed a roundup in Istanbul on April 24, 1915, the date on which Armenians each year hold rallies around the world.

Turkey categorically rejects the genocide label. It argues that between 300,000 and 500,000 Armenians and at least as many Turks were killed in civil strife when Armenians rose up for independence and sided with invading Russian forces.

BAGHDAD: The U.S. military says two American soldiers have died in a vehicle accident in Iraq.

A statement says the soldiers died Monday. It says two other soldiers were injured in the same accident, which is under investigation.

The names of the soldiers are being withheld pending notification of next of kin.

The deaths raise to at least 4,381 the number of U.S. military personnel who have died in Iraq since the war began in March 2003. That’’s according to a US-based news agency count.

TEHRAN: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad plans to travel to Afghanistan on Wednesday, the Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday, a day after the United States accused the Islamic state of a “double game” in its neighbor.

On Sunday, a local news agency said Ahmadinejad would visit Kabul the following day for talks with his counterpart Hamid Karzai, but later reports suggested the trip was postponed.

It was not clear whether this was linked to U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates” visit to Afghanistan on Monday. Gates said he was concerned Tehran was playing a “double game” in the country, being friendly to the Afghan government while looking to undermine the United States.

Western powers want regional players to cooperate in bringing stability to a country where U.S. and other foreign troops back Karzai’’s government in the face of an insurgency by the Taliban.

Iran says the presence of foreign troops in Afghanistan is a key reason for the problems in its eastern neighbor.

“Two dates were set (as possibilities), either Monday or Wednesday. Based on the president’’s schedule, Wednesday has been set as a date for the visit and God willing this visit will take place,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast told a televised news conference.

It would be Ahmadinejad’’s first visit to Afghanistan since both he and Karzai were re-elected last year.

The news agency said on Sunday Karzai had invited Ahmadinejad and the visit was aimed at expanding bilateral ties. They would also discuss “solutions for settling the problems” in Afghanistan.

Western forces have been in Afghanistan since 2001, when the United States led an invasion to drive the Taliban from power over their alliance with al Qaeda.

Western security analysts have long talked of the need for a regional settlement on Afghanistan to prevent a resurgence of old rivalries which could stoke a renewed civil war when U.S.-led troops begin to leave.

But Tehran, locked in a showdown with the United States over its nuclear program, has little reason to cooperate with Washington in helping it stabilize Afghanistan.

BOSTON: Mary Josephine Ray, a sports-loving card-player who was the oldest person living in the United States, died on Sunday at the age of 114.

Ray, who was born before Henry Ford built his first car or Marconi patented the radio, died at Maplewood Nursing Home in Westmoreland, New Hampshire, where she had lived since the age of 101, Steven Wilson, the home’’s activity director, said.

Born on May 17, 1895 in Canada, Ray was the world’’s second-oldest person according to the Gerontology Research Group, which maintains a registry of the oldest people. It says Kama Chinen of Japan was born seven days before Ray.

According to the group’’s website, the oldest American is now Neva Morris of Iowa, born August 3, 1895.

Ray was a big sports fan — particularly of the Boston Red Sox baseball team — and liked to play cards, particularly rummy, which she played at least twice a week, Wilson said.

“Mary would always win, one way or another,” Wilson said.

She outlived her husband, Walter Ray, by more than 40 years and is survived by two sons, eight grandchildren, 13 great-grandchildren and five great-great-grandchildren.

The lifestyle and business relationships of Julius Malema, an official of the ruling African National Congress, are coming under intense scrutiny. His dealings, among others, are prompting calls for “lifestyle audits” to help root out corruption.

» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us