This morning's key headlines from
GenerationalDynamics.com:
- China and Japan in naval standoff in East China Sea
- Military intervention in Mali comes a step closer
- Lebanon confirms that Hizbollah is fighting in Syria
- Iran's Ahmadinejad blames disastrous fall of rial on U.S.
China and Japan in naval standoff in East China Sea
China announced on Tuesday that four Chinese marine surveillance ships
had begun patrolling in the waters around the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu
islands in the East China Sea. The purpose was to confront "the
Japanese right-winger's intrusion." The new Chinese surveillance
ships will be patrolling the same waters as Japanese Coast Guard
ships. With both countries in highly nationalistic moods, the
possibility of an incident involving military action has increased
significantly. Xinhua and VOA
Military intervention in Mali comes a step closer
France and several African countries have been calling for military
intervention in Mali to throw out the Ansar Dine, the al-Qaeda linked
terrorist group that is now in control of the northern two-thirds of
Mali. However, the calls for intervention have been largely ignored,
since the Mali government itself has been unwilling to request
military intervention, apparently out of fear that neighboring armies
would never leave. But Mali's government has now given the go-ahead
for a major troop deployment in northern Mali. If the military
deployment goes ahead, the troops will come from France and from
countries belonging to the Economic Community of West African States
(ECOWAS). The U.S. has expressed caution about military intervention
in Mali, and may not support the effort. Guardian/Le Monde and IRIN
Lebanon confirms that Hizbollah is fighting in Syria
An announcement on Tuesday that is likely to raise the level of
tension between Sunni and Shia Muslims in the Mideast was confirmation
from a Lebanon security official that a commander and several fighters
from the terrorist group Hizbollah were killed inside Syria.
Hizbollah is a Shia terrorist group located in Lebanon but more loyal
to Iran than to Lebanon. Hizbollah has been supporting Syria's
president Bashar al-Assad as he's been torturing Sunni children and
sending rockets into Sunni apartment buildings, and so he has been
receiving a great deal of criticism for supporting a mass murderer.
Hizbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has repeatedly claimed that he is
not providing military support to al-Assad, but it now appears that in
fact he is. AP and BBC
Iran's Ahmadinejad blames disastrous fall of rial on U.S.
Iran's rial currency has lost a catastrophic 80% of its value since
2011, including an 18% plunge on Monday, and another 9% on Tuesday.
In a speech on Tuesday, Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad blamed
the "enemies" of his country for the sharp falls in the rial. He may
be right, in the sense that U.S.-led sanctions are thought to be the principal
cause of the rial's collapse. Iran is having a great deal of
difficulty selling oil, or in getting paid after the oil has been
delivered. In addition, many Iranians are selling rials and hoarding
dollars, exacerbating the situation. BBC
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