We are see the Tiny East Timor declares war on leprosy

Tiny East Timor declares war on leprosy
AP – This July 7, 2010 photo shows the feet of Luis Siqueira Aforn, 65, who's toes were chewed by rats while


OE-CUSSE ENCLAVE, East Timor – If there really was a place so remote it could be called the end of the earth, Adelino Quelo's shabby little hut would be prime real estate.
His thatch teepee-shaped home is the last stop in tiny East Timor. It is perched on the side of a rugged emerald mountain with a million-dollar view of neighboring Indonesia, so close you can almost touch it.
As rare visitors holler his name, a slow shuffling comes from the dirt floor inside. A minute passes and Quelo, 68, appears at the small opening carved out near the ground. He scoots on his rear and grunts while laboriously dragging one leg, then one arm on each side, using a torn pair of mismatched flip flops as his only aid.
His fingers, toes and parts of his hands and feet are missing. Only stubby knobs remain, keeping him from standing, gripping or even bathing himself. But Quelo smiles a toothless grin and motions for his guests to come closer, apologizing for having nothing to offer but his story.
He is just one face of leprosy in a country that has declared war on the age-old scourge. East Timor is one of two places worldwide — the other is Brazil — where the disease is still widespread enough to be considered a public health threat.
But for Quelo, the fight comes far too late.
"I, myself, already suffer from this, and it's enough," he says, a dirty sarong hiked up on his right thigh, exposing a large open sore. "I hope no one else will suffer this."
____
Oe-cusse Enclave, a lush secluded area cut off from the rest of East Timor by the Savu Sea, is thought to have been a leprosy colony during Portuguese and later Indonesian rule.
Roughly the size of New York City, it was positioned on the front lines during the brutal fight for independence from Indonesia 11 years ago and was nearly destroyed. Monuments now mark the sites of bloody massacres.
Its 60,000 people are survivors, but they are dangerously poor. Living conditions worsen as the roads narrow and grow steeper, exposing naked children with bulging bellies and blond-streaked hair — signs of malnutrition.
Time seems to have stopped here, and the disease believed long gone in many parts of the world continues to nibble away at lives, despite a three-pill cure recommended for the past three decades. But the number of new infections in East Timor, home to about 1 million people, has dwindled to 160 last year. It is nearly within the World Health Organization's target for elimination, or less than one case per 10,000 people.
Now leprosy specialists like Dr. Rosmini Day, who's battled the disease for 20 years across Asia, are scouring this secluded pocket for new cases to determine if East Timor will meet the mark by year's end. Since the campaign began in 1991, the number of new leprosy patients worldwide has plummeted from about 10 million to 250,000. Leprosy is virtually nonexistent in the West, with only about 150 cases reported in the U.S. annually.
Some experts argue the WHO target makes people wrongly believe that an already neglected disease has been wiped out entirely. And some question the authenticity of the count in countries driven to meet world goals.
But Day, a 62-year-old Indonesian grandmother, has come out of retirement to help East Timor with its last fight. She is a master at identifying the disease and believes no one should be overlooked, no matter how remote.
She hikes up a muddy mountain road too treacherous for even a 4X4 and examines a patient in the rain outside his hut. She interrupts a cock fight in another village to pinch and pull at the skin of a second patient's elbow to see how fast it snaps back. She stops at a third man's house and calls him out onto the road from a funeral to have a look beneath his shirt.
Leprosy is difficult to identify in the early stages, but Day says it's important for a new generation of health workers to learn the traits to stop the spread and cure patients before damage is done. It's the only way to truly get rid of the disease.
"I use a sarong to protect my toes, but the rats still come in the nighttime and eat at my toes," says Luis Siqueira Afoan, 65, a patient who walked more than 2 miles (1 kilometer) on dry blackened nubs to see the doctor who can do nothing to help. "When I'm sleeping, I put my fingers under my head, but the rats still come and eat at my fingers."
coppied by http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101011/ap_on_re_as/as_east_timor_leprosy_s_last_frontier;_ylt=Av.gd5Fcp49Xp2afhc5Tvums0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTFkYjR1bm84BHBvcwMxNDgEc2VjA2FjY29yZGlvbl9oZWFsdGgEc2xrA3RpbnllYXN0dGltbw--

conference IMF meets amid threat of currency war

IMF meets amid threat of currency war


WASHINGTON (AFP) – The specter of a damaging global currency war is set to dominate a meeting of economic powers in Washington Friday, amid bleak hopes for a deal between China, the United States and other powers.
Finance ministers and central bankers from 187 countries will convene for an annual meeting of the International Monetary Fund amid warnings that beggar-thy-neighbor policies could wreck the global recovery.
With the recovery still painfully slow, recent weeks have seen a range of countries from Japan to Colombia intervene to stop their currencies from rising to levels that would make exports prohibitively expensive.
But the summit is set to be dominated by a long running and increasingly antagonistic dispute between the United States and Beijing -- whose weak yuan policies are accused of slowing the global recovery and hurting American jobs.
While the US Congress moves toward slapping retaliatory sanctions on Chinese goods, Washington has ratcheted up the pressure by hinting that China may not be allowed a bigger say at the IMF unless the currency issue is resolved.
US officials are adamant that the IMF meetings should address the need for "market oriented exchange rates" and a fundamental "rebalancing" of the global economy.
On the eve of the meeting IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn said there was no "formal" link between the two issues, but the United States was "right" to call for reform.
"I think it is right to insist on the fact that the more an emerging country will have a voice and representation in the fund, the more they have a responsibility in the stability of the system."
"You can be at the center of the system, or you can be at the border of the system. But if you want to be at the center of the system... it goes with having more responsibility."
China has rebuffed pressure to lift the value of the yuan, fearing it would put Chinese businesses at risk.
Meanwhile European officials said a rapidly rising euro, victimized by an undervalued US dollar and Chinese yuan, could threaten eurozone recovery and vowed to press both Washington and Beijing to take action.
India warned that imbalances in the global economy have become "unsustainable" but called on major economies to avoid confrontation to avert a feared currency war.
On Thursday Indian Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, speaking ahead of a meeting of top economic policymakers in Washington, said that building an international consensus was the best way forward.
But reaching that consensus appears to be an uphill struggle.
Youssef Boutros-Ghali, who heads the International Monetary Fund's steering committee, said a quick agreement on currency exchange rates was unlikely.
When asked if action before next month's G20 summit in Seoul was feasible, Boutros-Ghali said "this late in the game, no. But in the coming three to six months, yes absolutely."
Some are pressing for quicker action. The IMF has warned that rich and emerging economies must dramatically change the way they trade with each other or risk throttling the recovery.
In its latest economic outlook, the IMF said growth would slow more than previously expected in 2011, as the United States, Europe and Japan continue to struggle and China remains overly dependent on exports.
Wading into sensitive political waters, the IMF said China must allow its currency to strengthen to boost domestic demand and reduce its reliance on exports.
"To the extent that a stronger Chinese currency eases this process, other surplus countries in the region could follow suit, which would facilitate the needed shift towards domestic sources of growth."
As part of that rebalancing IMF members are also expected to discuss how to reform decision-making at the fund, giving more say to emerging and developing economies.
Europe, seen as a major loser from the reshuffle, has been reluctant to reduce its voting share or representation on the IMF's decision-making board.
European finance ministers last week agreed to review representation at the Washington-based international lender, but attached significant conditions.
Coppied by http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101008/bs_afp/imfeconomyforex

Watches Afghan leaders, Taliban reportedly in high-level talks to end war

Afghan leaders, Taliban reportedly in high-level talks to end war


WASHINGTON — Taliban representatives and the government of President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan have begun secret, high-level talks over a negotiated end to the war, according to Afghan and Arab sources.


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The talks follow inconclusive meetings, hosted by Saudi Arabia, that ended more than a year ago. While emphasizing the preliminary nature of the current discussions, the sources said that for the first time they believe that Taliban representatives are fully authorized to speak for the Quetta Shura, the Afghan Taliban organization based in Pakistan, and its leader, Mohammad Omar.

“They are very, very serious about finding a way out,’’ one source close to the talks said of the Taliban.

Although Omar’s representatives have long publicly insisted that negotiations were impossible until all foreign troops withdraw, a position seemingly buoyed by the Taliban’s resilience on the battlefield, sources said the Quetta Shura has begun to talk about a comprehensive agreement that would include participation of some Taliban figures in the government and the withdrawal of US and NATO troops on an agreed timeline.

The leadership knows “that they are going to be sidelined,’’ the source said. “They know that more radical elements are being promoted within their rank and file outside their control. . . . All these things are making them absolutely sure that, regardless of [their success in] the war, they are not in a winning position.’’

A half-dozen sources directly involved in or on the margins of the talks agreed to discuss them on the condition of anonymity. All emphasized the preliminary nature of the talks.

The United States’ European partners in Afghanistan, with different histories and under far stronger domestic pressure to withdraw their troops, have always been more amenable to a negotiated settlement.

“What it really boils down to is the Americans both supporting and in some cases maybe even participating in talking with the enemy,’’ a European official said.

“If you strip everything away, that’s the deal here. For so long, politically, it’s been a deal breaker in the United States, and with some people it still is.’
Coppied by http://www.boston.com/news/world/asia/articles/2010/10/06/afghan_leaders_taliban_reportedly_in_high_level_talks_to_end_war/

General who planned Gaza war appointed army chief

Watch and enjoy General who planned Gaza war appointed army chief


MARK WEISS in Jerusalem

DEFENCE MINISTER Ehud Barak has appointed Maj Gen Yoav Galant, the head of the army’s southern command, as Israel’s new military chief of staff.

Maj Gen Galant (52) is a former head of Israel’s naval commando unit. As head of southern command, he masterminded the 22-day war in Gaza in the winter of 2008-2009.

The cabinet is expected to approve the appointment next week and Gen Galant will take up the post early next year.

Top of his agenda will be the possibility of an Israeli military strike to prevent Iran acquiring a nuclear bomb.

The defence minister’s selection of the new military commander was put on hold earlier this month because of what was dubbed the “Galant document” – a memo allegedly written by Maj Gen Galant to smear other top generals contending for the job.

But a police investigation determined last week that the document was a fake and Maj Gen Galant had nothing to do with it.

Also yesterday, Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu vowed that the 10-month freeze on West Bank settlement construction would end on September 26th.

Pressed on the issue by ministers from his ruling Likud party, Mr Netanyahu said there has been no change in his position that the moratorium will not be renewed when the 10-month period expires next month.

Mr Netanyahu leads a largely right-wing and religious coalition which is committed to Jewish settlement across the West Bank. He warned extending the 10-month moratorium would endanger the future of his government.

Two moderate ministers have proposed a compromise under which building will only continue in the larger West Bank settlement blocs – areas which Israel hopes to incorporate under a final peace agreement.

Such a policy, which is likely to meet stiff opposition from other ministers, is similar to that adopted by the previous Israeli government headed by Ehud Olmert.

Despite the difficulties, Mr Netanyahu declared that the optimistic target set by US secretary of state Hilary Clinton for reaching a comprehensive peace deal within a year was possible.

He said compromises would be required from both sides.

The prime minister said any deal must provide real security for Israel and a solution to the refugee problem within a future Palestinian state, and include Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state, and an “end of conflict” clause.

Coppied by http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2010/0823/1224277380241.html

June was the bloodist month NEWS CENTRAL/S. ASIA Troop deaths top 2000 in Afghan war

Watches this NEWS CENTRAL/S. ASIA Troop deaths top 2000 in Afghan war

More than 2,000 foreign troops have died in Afghanistan since the war began in late 2001, according to the independent icasualties.org website.

In all, 2,002 soldiers have been killed since the US-led invasion, including 1,226 Americans and 331 British.

In contrast to these deaths over a span of almost nine years, 1,271 civilians were killed in the first six months of 2010.

Last week, a UN mid-year report showed civilian casualties had risen by 31 per cent this year compared with the same period last year.

So far this year, 434 foreign troops have been killed, compared with a peak of 521 in 2009, icasualties.org reported on Sunday.

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June 2010 was the bloodiest month of the war with 102 killed as foreign forces pushed ahead with operations in southern Helmand and Kandahar provinces. Another 88 were killed in July.

There are currently more than 140,000 US and Nato-led troops in Afghanistan aiming to to flush out remnants of Taliban fighters, who went on the offensive after being toppled from government in the 2001 invasion.

Disputes over the Afghan war have already brought down a Dutch government in February and a German president in May.

The losses in Afghanistan are less than half of those in the Iraq war, where at least 4,723 foreign troops have been killed since 2003 - 4,405 of them Americans.

Civilian casualties

But, with the US government cutting troop numbers in Iraq before the formal end of combat operations on August 31, attention is certain to be focused back on the Afghan conflict.

Civilian casualties caused by US and other foreign forces have long been a source of friction between the Afghan government and its Western allies and led to a major falling-out between the two sides last year.

The UN report added that Taliban and armed groups were responsible for 76 per cent of casualties.

Deaths caused by "pro-government forces" fell to 12 per cent of the total from 30 per cent last year, due mainly to a 64 per cent fall in deaths caused by aerial attacks.
Coppied by http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/08/20108161532562124.html