Enfrentamientos cerca de Damasco pese al alto el fuego en Siria
Los frentes en Siria vivían el sábado su segundo día de calma a pesar de algunas hostilidades, mientras Rusia busca obtener el apoyo del Consejo de Seguridad a esta tregua, que abriría la vía a negociaciones para poner fin al conflicto.
El alto el fuego, del que están excluidos los grupos yihadistas Estado Islámico (EI) y Fateh al Sham, debería ser el preludio de las negociaciones de paz previstas a finales de enero en Kazajistán, auspiciadas por Moscú y Teherán, aliados del régimen, y Ankara, que apoya a los rebeldes.
Enfrentamientos cerca de Damasco pese al alto el fuego en Siria
Evo Morales felicita a Ban Ki-moon al concluir su mandato en la ONU
El presidente boliviano Evo Morales felicitó este sábado la gestión cumplida por el secretario general de Naciones Unidas, Ban Ki-moon, destacando su trabajo por la paz y contra el cambio climático, horas antes de que éste concluya su mandato.
“Felicitar a nombre del pueblo boliviano (a Ban) por su excelente gestión como secretario general de Naciones Unidas. Esperamos que su pueblo lo cuide para seguir trabajando por la paz con justicia social a nivel internacional”, dijo el gobernante en conferencia de prensa.
Evo Morales felicita a Ban Ki-moon al concluir su mandato en la ONU
Italia localizará y deportará a los inmigrantes sin derecho a asilo
Italia buscará deportar a más inmigrantes que no tengan derecho a estar en el país y abrirá nuevos centros de detención para retenerles antes de su expulsión, según una directiva escrita y una fuente ministerial.
El jefe de policía Franco Gabrielli envió una directiva a las comisarías de todo el país el viernes en la que ordenaba que se incrementaran los esfuerzos para identificar y deportar a inmigrantes, una semana después de que el agresor del mercado navideño de Berlín, Anis Amri, fuera abatido a tiros cerca de Milán.
Italia localizará y deportará a los inmigrantes sin derecho a asilo
Fin de año sangriento en Bagdad por un doble atentado suicida
Al menos 27 personas murieron este sábado de fin de año en un doble atentado suicida en un mercado de Bagdad reivindicado por el Estado Islámico, en momentos en que las fuerzas iraquíes tienen dificultades para arrebatar Mosul al grupo yihadista.
El ataque tuvo lugar el sábado por la mañana, en un mercado mayorista de Al Sinek, en pleno centro de Bagdad, donde se venden sobre todo piezas de recambio de coche y ropa.
Fin de año sangriento en Bagdad por un doble atentado suicida
Caution marks Iraqi army advance against Islamic State north of Mosul
The earth shook three times with the impact of air strikes targeting Islamic State positions north of Mosul. Only then did the Iraqi troops assembled on the edge of the small farming village advance.
The army had gathered on Friday afternoon in a muddy street that showed signs of heavy fighting with the jihadists from a day earlier: store fronts shorn off, electricity poles pulled down, bullet casings carpeting the ground. A rooftop sentinel kept watch.
The Iraqis’ tan-colored Humvees, reinforced with steel plates around the wheels to guard against sniper fire, were dwarfed by four MRAPs (mine-resistant ambush-protected vehicles) manned by U.S. military advisers.
The second phase of the operation to retake Mosul, Islamic State’s last major stronghold in Iraq, began on Thursday after several weeks of deadlock in the most complex operation in the country since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.
Conventional U.S. forces deploying more extensively in this phase are now visible very close to the front lines. They are backing Iraq’s army, federal police and counter-terrorism service (CTS), whose levels of training and experience vary widely.
Since the offensive began 10 weeks ago, CTS punched into Mosul from the east and took a quarter of the city, but regular army troops like those in Sada have made slower progress advancing from the north and south, slowing the operation.
MARGINAL ADVANTAGE
Western officials from a coalition providing air support, training and advice to the Iraqi military have hailed the recovery of the army and police, which dropped their weapons and fled Islamic State’s blitz across a third of the country in 2014 despite billions of dollars in U.S. support.
“They don’t have to be as good as us, they just have to be better than Daesh,” one U.S. military official told Reuters earlier this year, using an Arabic acronym for Islamic State.
That marginal advantage, though, means the Mosul campaign is likely to drag on for many months and could wreak significant destruction.
During earlier battles like the one in Ramadi a year ago, coalition officials said they often had to prod the Iraqis to advance rather than wait for aerial bombardment to eliminate all enemy positions.
The Iraqi commanders in Sada huddled with the Americans for a few minutes on Friday, and after the third air strike piled into their vehicles. Half a dozen Humvees charged ahead, firing mounted machine guns and a rocket-propelled grenade.
As the sound of gunfire pierced the clear blue sky, the U.S. vehicles followed them down the road and appeared to establish overwatch positions in an adjacent field.
“The Americans came this morning. They are for guidance and direction only,” said one Iraqi soldier, a bandoleer hanging around his shoulders. “They don’t enter combat. They will turn and have our backs.”
Behind the Americans came a dozen more Iraqi Humvees, some of whose occupants fired wildly as they advanced. One soldier standing in the bed of a military truck lost balance and nearly tumbled out when the vehicle lurched forward.
Army officers said intelligence suggested about 30 Islamic State fighters were holed up inside the village with two car bombs and a truck bomb and were using tunnels between houses and into agricultural areas to furtively resupply or launch attacks.
Inside Sada, reporters saw the bodies of a dozen Islamic State fighters the army said were killed in earlier clashes. A soldier held up the severed head of one, an expression of shock still on its face.
Caution marks Iraqi army advance against Islamic State north of Mosul
India’s PM Modi defends cash ban, announces incentives
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a series of incentives to the poor, farmers, women and small businesses on Saturday in a New Year’s address, and defended his recent decision to abolish high denomination bank notes.
The televised speech was widely seen as an opportunity for Modi to shore up support after a radical move on Nov. 8 to withdraw all 500 and 1,000 rupee bills, accounting for 86 percent of currency in circulation.
Millions of Indians were forced to queue outside banks for hours to deposit old money and withdraw as much new currency as was permitted, causing widespread anger and raising concerns about India’s economic growth in the current quarter.
The so-called “demonetization” was designed to crush India’s huge shadow economy, increase tax revenues and promote the use of bank accounts and digital transactions, but perceptions that the ambitious operation was botched have hurt Modi’s standing.
It comes only weeks before Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state with 200 million people, holds an election that will test whether the popular leader has been significantly weakened.
Modi praised Indians for their forbearance.
“In this fight against corruption and black money, it is clear that you would like to walk shoulder to shoulder with us (the government),” Modi said.
“For us in government, this is a blessing … Corruption, black money, and counterfeit notes had become so rampant in India’s social fabric, that even honest people were brought to their knees.”
The prime minister, who swept to power in 2014 on the back of promises to root out graft, said the authorities would continue to stamp it out.
“Serious offences by bank and government officials have come to light. No one will be spared,” he said.
NO “BIG BANG OFFERINGS”
Among the measures announced on Saturday was an offer of a 4 percent discount on interest rates for home loans for up to 900,000 rupees ($13,200) taken out in 2017 by middle class Indians.
Modi also said the government would increase credit guarantees for small businesses and provided additional incentives for digital transactions.
There were steps to help pregnant women and senior citizens, as well as financial support for farmers, an apparent bid to win backing among the huge rural population of Uttar Pradesh that has been hit hard by the cash overhaul.
Modi did not say how the government would pay for the measures, although economists said the package was unlikely to be too costly. It was unveiled as the government gears up to announce its annual budget, probably some time in February.
“It’s clear that Modi is chastened and he had no big bang offerings today,” said Mohan Guruswamy, chairman of the independent economic think-tank Centre for Policy Alternatives.
“He is clearly doing this to win back political support.”
The Uttar Pradesh poll will be a litmus test for Modi and his ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, and will go some way to determining the prime minister’s chances of winning a second term in office in national polls scheduled for 2019.
While he has introduced several major reforms to Asia’s third largest economy, the cash ban is seen as his biggest political gamble to date.
Members of the main opposition Congress party were quick to criticize the speech.
One senior member, Prithviraj Chavan, said the address was vague and lacked accurate accounting details.
“It was his day to present a report card and specifically disclose the benefits of ‘demonetization’, but clearly the entire drive has been a failure,” he said.
In his speech, Modi sought to cast the move as something all Indians should support.
“I urge all parties and leaders to move away from a ‘holier than thou approach,’ to come together in prioritizing transparency, and take firm steps to free politics of black money and corruption.”
India’s PM Modi defends cash ban, announces incentives
Syria rebels: ceasefire ‘void’ if government violations persist
Syrian rebel groups said on Saturday they would consider a ceasefire deal brokered by Russia and Turkey “null and void” if the Damascus government’s forces and their allies continued to violate it.
Russia, which supports Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, has urged the United Nations to give its blessing to the fragile ceasefire, the third truce this year seeking to end nearly six years of war in Syria.
Clashes and air strikes have persisted in some areas since the ceasefire began on Friday, though the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group, said on Saturday the truce was still largely holding.
“Continued violations by the regime and bombardment and attempts to attack areas under the control of the revolutionary factions will make the agreement null and void,” a statement signed by a number of rebel groups said.
The statement said government forces and their allies including Lebanese Hezbollah had been trying to press advances, particularly in an area northwest of Damascus in the rebel-held Wadi Barada valley.
The Observatory, which is based in Britain, said government forces and the rebels had clashed on Saturday in Wadi Barada.
Rebels say the army is seeking to recapture the area, where a major spring provides most of Damascus’s water supplies. Several people were killed in violence there on Friday, the Observatory said.
Blasts from government shellfire were also heard in the southern provinces of Quneitra and Deraa, the Observatory said.
Each side blames the other for continued unrest. Russia’s defence ministry said on Friday rebels had violated the truce 12 times in 24 hours.
PEACE TALKS
Russia and Turkey, which backs the armed opposition to Assad, brokered the ceasefire agreement in the hope of preparing the way for peace talks in Kazakhstan in the new year.
In their statement, the rebels said it appeared the government and the opposition had signed two different versions of the ceasefire deal, one of which was missing “a number of key and essential points that are non-negotiable”, but did not say what those were.
There has been confusion over which groups in the opposition are included in the ceasefire. Islamic State, which has made enemies of all sides in the conflict, is not included.
The Syrian army said on Thursday the militant group formerly known as the Nusra Front was not part of the truce. However, several rebel officials said the group, which has been renamed Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, was also included in the ceasefire deal.
Syria rebels: ceasefire ‘void’ if government violations persist
Italy to seek to track down and deport migrants with no right to stay
Italy will seek to deport more migrants who have no right to be in the country and will open new detention centers to hold them before their expulsion, according to a written directive and a ministry source.
Police chief Franco Gabrielli sent a two-page directive to stations across the country on Friday ordering them to increase efforts to identify and deport migrants a week after Berlin Christmas market attacker Anis Amri was shot dead near Milan.
The directive, seen by Reuters, says police should take “extraordinary action” before the “growing migratory pressure in an international context marked by instability and threats” to “control and remove irregular foreigners.”
Interior Minister Marco Minniti plans to open several new detention centers that hold migrants prior to their expulsion, a ministry source said, in line with repeated requests by European Union partners.
The tougher migrant stance, which several Italian papers ran on their front pages on Saturday, is the first major policy change made by Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni’s government since it took power in mid-December, and comes on the heels of a record year of boat migrant arrivals.
It also comes less than a month after the Berlin truck attack by Amri that killed 12, including an Italian woman.
The Tunisian Amri came to Italy by boat in 2011. Italy later tried without success to deport him back to Tunisia. He was then released from a detention center and ordered to leave the country in 2015.
Gentiloni’s predecessor, Matteo Renzi, agreed to set up “hotspots” to identify and fingerprint migrants who arrived on Italian shores, but he refused to build large detention centers to hold migrants who did not qualify refugee status.
Only four pre-deportation detention centers with about 360 beds are now functioning. The Interior Ministry is aiming to open up about 16 more with at least 1,000 more spots, the source said. That would still accommodate only a fraction of migrants without permits of stay estimated to be living in Italy.
Of the more than 27,000 expulsion orders handed out in Italy in 2015, fewer than 5,000 were deported, according to Eurostat figures.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has also called for greater efforts to deport those who do not qualify for international protection, but the process is slow and expensive, and it requires bilateral agreements with the countries of origin.
Italy currently has bilateral agreements with only a handful of African countries.
Italy to seek to track down and deport migrants with no right to stay
Baghdad blasts kill 29 as Mosul fighting intensifies
Three bombs killed 29 people in Baghdad on Saturday as fighting intensified in the northern city of Mosul, where Iraqi government forces are trying to rout Islamic State militants from their last major stronghold in the country.
Blasts, including one suicide attack, tore through a busy market in the Sinak neighborhood, police said. A pro-Islamic State news agency said the target was Shi’ite Muslims, whom the militants regard as apostates.
A third blast later in the day killed four people in the eastern New Baghdad district, where a minibus packed with explosives blew up in a busy commercial street, police and medics said.
Islamic State has continued to launch attacks in the heavily fortified capital, even after losing most of the northern and western territory it seized in 2014.
The recapture of Mosul would probably spell the end for Islamic State’s self-styled caliphate, but the militants would still be capable of fighting a guerrilla-style insurgency in Iraq, and plotting or inspiring attacks on the West.
The second phase of a U.S.-backed offensive launched on Thursday following weeks of deadlock has encountered fierce resistance. Conventional U.S. forces deploying more extensively in this phase are now visible very close to the front lines.
The third day of the renewed push saw heavy clashes on the southeastern and northern fronts.
An army officer deployed in the southeast said there was fierce fighting on the edge of Intisar district on Saturday and advances were slowed by heavy machine gun fire, snipers and rockets attacks by militants entrenched in houses.
The officer said Islamic State fighters were firing from houses with white flags raised over the roofs, falsely indicating they are civilians to avoid being targeted by Iraqi forces and coalition airstrikes.
“The more we advance the tougher it becomes. The job of differentiating between fake and real houses with civilians inside is becoming more painful to our troops,” he told Reuters by phone.
BATTLE FOR MOSUL
An elite Interior Ministry unit continued to push on Saturday through the Intisar district, where a U.S.-trained army unit had struggled to advance far after entering the southeast district last month.
Heavy gunfire was audible and attack helicopters fired overhead as hundreds of civilians fled their homes, a Reuters cameraman said.
In the north, a separate army unit pressed towards the border of Mosul proper after recapturing several outlying villages in the past two days.
“There is a battle in Argoob area, which is considered the gateway to Hadba,” Lieutenant Colonel Abbas al-Azawi said by phone, referring to a strategic northern neighborhood.
Since the offensive began on Oct. 17, elite forces have retaken a quarter of Mosul in the biggest ground operation there since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein. Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has said the group would be driven out of Iraq by April.
Although the militants are vastly outnumbered, they have embedded themselves among Mosul residents, hindering Iraqi forces who are trying to avoid civilian casualties. Despite food and water shortages, most civilians have stayed in their homes rather than fleeing as had been expected.
One resident reached by phone late on Friday said a rocket had landed on a house in the eastern Mithaq district, killing six members of one family.
“We have not seen Daesh since the Iraqi forces restarted their offensive,” he told Reuters. “We hear the sounds of large car bombs. Today I heard no fewer than 10 huge explosions.”
Baghdad blasts kill 29 as Mosul fighting intensifies
Escasez y alza de gasolina encienden el fin de año en México
Filas de coches esperaban fuera de las gasolineras, día y noche, para repostar en la ciudad de León, Guanajuato, una de las ciudades del centro de México que los días previos a Navidad se convirtieron en “un caos”.
Al menos así lo calificó Guadalupe López, una oficinista de León que tuvo que recorrer ocho gasolineras hasta llenar el tanque de su automóvil. “Un trabajador me dijo que llevaban día y medio sin abasto y la noticia corrió como la pólvora”.
Escasez y alza de gasolina encienden el fin de año en México
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