Asia Cast for Monday 24th December

Posted by michaelanderson on Monday, December 24th, 2007

DEAR SOH LISTENERS
To give our wonderful SOH volunteer staff a deserved
Christmas break, only the written script is provided for
Asia Cast for the 24th, 25th, 26th . Merry Christmas to the world.

From all at SOH globally.

In this bulletin
- China continues it’s ferocious censorships
- North Korea still balking; and
- A historical decision by Nepal

In a historical move by Nepal’s governing coalition on Sunday, it has been decided to move away from the monarchy in favour of making Nepal a republic. The change will commence after general elections that are tipped to be held in Spring.
”The seven parties, including the Maoists, agreed to amend the constitution to include the phrase that Nepal ‘will be a federal democratic republic,’ ” Arjun Narsingh KC, a spokesman for the Nepali Congress Party which heads the government, said in a telephone interview.
Nepalis are slated to vote for the constituent assembly, thereby ending the 240-year-old monarchy and preparing the ground for a new constitution.
Sunday’s agreement with the former Maoist rebels ends months of political deadlock that had stalled the peace process.
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Nationwide concerns have been mildly apeased with a short interview received with the kidnapped French journalist in Somalia who has said that he is “quite okay”. He was filming a documentary about human trafficing. He has been allowed by his captors to make a mobile phone call to his girl friend in France.
Members of a tribal clan who took Gwen Le Gouil hostage last Wednesday have demanded an $80,000 ransom for his release, indicating the kidnapping is financial and not political, according to Mohamad Mohamed, the editor of Radio Garowe, which broadcasts from northern Somalia’s Puntland province.
The president of the breakaway Somalia region of Puntland has been critical of Le Gouil for traveling without government consent in the area to work on the documentary about the mass smuggling of refugees from the Horn of Africa to Yemen.
The hostage-holders allowed Mohamed to speak by phone with Le Gouil Saturday.
“It’s quite okay,” Le Gouil said when asked about how he is being treated.
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Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has been continuing his efforts to deflect US infuense in Latin America by suggesting at a regional petrolium summit in Cuba that more of his neighbors could pay for cheap oil with goods or services in lieu of cash.
In his opening speech to the Petrocaribe summit in Cienfuegos, a southern coastal city about 155 miles from Havana, Chavez said his plan to provide low-cost oil to the region should go beyond financing mechanisms. He offered other countries the option of following the model of Cuba, which repays by sending doctors who offer free services to the poor in Venezuela.
Chavez also called for creating an international fund to promote solar, wind, geothermal and other alternative energy sources.
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Israel is to spend $230 million over the next five years to develop a defense shield against rockets and short-range missiles.
Israel’s Security Cabinet has confirmed funding for the project that has been dubbed “the Iron Dome.”
Defense Minister Ehud Barak says the system should be operational within 30 months.
The first place it will be deployed is the town of Sderot, in southern Israel, where repeated Israeli incursions into Gaza have failed to stem almost daily rocket attacks by Palestinian militants.
The overall plan is for a comprehensive system that will also stop short-range missiles from places like Lebanon, or even medium-range missiles from Iran or Syria.
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North Korea is refusing to dispose of nuclear fuel and destroy a cooling tower at its main nuclear complex, arguing those steps can only be undertaken in return for benefits under the next phase of its disarmament procedures, a South Korean news report said Monday.
The North, which began disabling key facilities at its nuclear complex north of Pyongyang last month under the watch of U.S. experts, has balked at U.S. demands on the nuclear fuel and cooling tower.
It says it can take those steps only after it receives new benefits under the next disarmament phase — nuclear dismantlement — the Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported from Washington, citing unnamed diplomatic sources in the U.S.
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China Human Rights Defenders, an international network of activists and rights monitoring groups, said the recent regulation on text messages “raises serious concerns over the restriction of freedom of expression in China.”
The group said in a statement that an average of 180 million text messages are sent every day and that text messaging has become one of the most important means of receiving information unavailable in the mainstream media.
This summer, plans to build a chemical plant in the southern coastal city of Xiamen were suspended after residents sent nearly 1 million text messages to friends and family, urging the government to abandon the project because of its alleged health and environmental risks.
Meanwhile, a Tibetan language online discussion forum was shut down this month for having content that was against Chinese law, according to a notice on its Web site.