Japan mourns tsunami dead; grapples with unfinished business

With a minute of silence, tolling bells and prayers, Japan will on Sunday mark the first anniversary of an earthquake and tsunami that killed thousands and set off a nuclear crisis that shattered public trust in atomic power and the nation's leaders.

 

Girls pray after arranging candles at a candlelight event in Iwaki, Fukushima prefecture March 10, 2012. REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon

 

A year after the magnitude 9.0 earthquake unleashed a wall of water that hit Japan's northeastern coast, killing nearly 16,000 and leaving nearly 3,300 unaccounted for, the country is still grappling with the human, economic and political costs.

 

Paper lanterns, lit to mourn March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami victims, are released into the sea in Yamada town, Iwate Prefecture March 10, 2012, a day before the disaster's one-year anniversary. REUTERS/Kyodo

 

Koyu Morishita, 54, with his dog Muku, takes a moment of silence in front of his father's grave, who was killed during last year's earthquake and tsunami in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture March 10, 2012, ahead of the one-year anniversary of the disasters. Koyu's father, Tokusaburo died at 84 years-old. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

 

Along the coast, police and coastguard officers, urged on by families of the missing, still search rivers and shores for remains even though the chances of finding any would appear remote. Without bodies, thousands of people are in a state of emotional and legal limbo.

 

Koyu Morishita, 54, lost his 84-year-old father, Tokusaburo, as well as his home and family-run fish factory in the port of Ofunato. Tokusaburo's body has not been found.

 

"I do cry a little bit every once in a while, but my true tears will come later, when I have time," Morishita said while visiting a memorial for his father at a hilltop temple above Ofunato, accompanied by his dog, Muku.

 

Like the rest of the country, Ofunato will observe a moment of silence at 2:46 p.m. (0546 GMT) when the quake struck and then again, 33 minutes later when a 23-metre (75-foot) wall of water hit the town, killing 340 of its 41,100 residents and leaving 84 missing.

 

A "bell of hope" will toll and mourners will sail out to sea to release lanterns.

 

The Japanese people earned the world's admiration for their composure, discipline and resilience in the face of the disaster while its companies impressed with the speed with which they bounced back, mending torn supply chains.

 

As a result, the economy looks set to return to pre-disaster levels in coming months with the help of about $230 billlion in rebuilding funds agreed in rare cooperation between the government and the opposition.

 

"In recent history, Japan seized rapid economic expansion from the ashes and desolation of World War Two, and we built the most energy-efficient economy in the world in the aftermath of the oil shock," Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda said in an article published in the Washington Post.

 

"On the anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake, we remember that today we face a challenge of similar proportions."

 

"100 PEOPLE, 100 OPINIONS"

 

Yet people are increasingly sceptical about whether the political establishment is up to the task.

 

Politicians and bureaucrats drew fire for the chaotic response to the crisis at the tsunami-wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant and their failure to seize the moment and tackle a myriad of ills that have dogged Japan for two decades.

 

"If there are 100 people, there will be 100 opinions," said Morishita. "We are hoping that someone can lead us and show us hope and dreams. But that doesn't exist."

 

After a brief truce, politicians resumed business as usual: parliamentary squabbles that gave Japan its sixth leader in five years and now threaten to block important tax and welfare reforms and stall progress in dealing with other business.

 

"There is no leadership," said Hiroaki Oikawa, 56, another Ofunato resident who lost his two fish factories and his home.

 

Nine people from three generations of his family now live under one roof in temporary housing. Oikawa resumed operations at one of his factories last September and he is leading efforts to rebuild a shopping arcade.

 

"There are no politicians to whom we can leave things."

 

Anti-nuclear demonstrations planned across the country for the anniversary also serve as a reminder that many want bolder action than the government's preferred scenario of a gradual reduction in reliance on nuclear power.

 

Not a single community has agreed to restart reactors taken off line since the disaster, meaning all of Japan's 54 reactors may be shut by the middle of the year.

 

Slow progress in drawing up plans for the tsunami and radiation tainted region is deepening the misery of survivors, about 326,000 of whom are still homeless, including 80,000 evacuated from the vicinity of the Fukushima plant.

 

While the government declared the plant's reactors had reached "cold shutdown" in December, its dismantling and the clean-up of an area the size of Luxembourg will take decades at an incalculable cost using technologies yet to be developed.

 

Taxpayers, facing proposed sales tax increases to help fund the country's debt, will need to cough up tens of billions of dollars to prop up Fukushima plant operator Tokyo Electric Power -- widely attacked for ignoring the possibility of a disaster and for what critics say has been arrogance since.

 

($1 = 81.4000 yen)

 

REUTERS

Canadians split on who's to blame for robocalls: poll

OTTAWA — Canadians are deeply split over allegations the federal Conservative party ran a "co-ordinated" robocalls campaign in the last federal election to deceive voters — but most seem to agree that byelections should be held in ridings where the practice occurred, a new poll has found.

 

Canadians are deeply split over allegations the federal Conservative party ran a "co-ordinated" robocalls campaign in the last federal election to deceive voters — but most seem to agree that byelections should be held in ridings where the practice occurred, a new poll has found. About 200 protesters called Canadians Against Electoral Fraud took to Parliament Hill Monday to protest against the ongoing "robocalls" issue. Photograph by: JULIE OLIVER, OTTAWA CITIZEN

 

The national survey, conducted for Postmedia News and Global TV, comes after a two-week storm of controversy that erupted when Postmedia News revealed that fraudulent phone calls were placed in the Guelph, Ont., riding directing voters to the wrong polling stations.

 

Since then, political debate on Parliament Hill has been dominated by the robocalls — which opposition parties claim occurred in dozens of ridings — and Elections Canada has begun a major investigation after being deluged with thousands of complaints.

 

Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his senior campaign team have denied categorically any involvement in the affair, and no evidence has emerged publicly to suggest they are connected.

 

The Tories say they are victims of "baseless smears" by the Liberals and New Democrats — who contend that the Tories are stonewalling as they push for answers.

 

As this political jockeying was going on, Ipsos Reid conducted a blended telephone and online poll this week of 3,154 Canadians to determine their views.

 

In the survey, people were told there had been accusations that some people working for the Conservative party in the last election "made calls to supporters of other parties and either pretended to represent their party of choice and deliberately harassed them or to deliberately confuse them about which polling stations to vote at on election day." The pollster also told respondents that Harper and senior Tories had said they had "nothing to do with these calls."

 

The survey found that 50 per cent of Canadians agree with the statement that "these accusations are true and the Conservative Party had a co-ordinated campaign to deceive Canadian voters with misleading telephone calls in the last federal election."

 

By comparison, 47 per cent disagreed with the statement, while the remainder said they did not know.

 

Ipsos Reid president Darrell Bricker said in an interview Friday the results are reflective of the current political landscape.

 

"The country is divided on this. There is a group of the population that thinks they probably were involved in some kind of shenanigans.

 

"It's reflective of the fact that if you don't like the Conservatives you probably think they are guilty of this."

 

At the same time, said Bricker, the Tories maintain a strong level of support among Canadians who don't believe they were involved in misleading robocalls.

 

"It hasn't fractured their core. It hasn't fractured that group that voted for them.

 

"As far as the public is concerned, the charges haven't been proven. For a large amount of the population, there's more work that needs to be done here by the opposition parties."

 

Prime Minister Stephen Harper is shown in a file photo. A new poll shows Canadians are deeply split over allegations the Conservative party ran a "co-ordinated" robocalls campaign in the last election to deceive voters.

Photograph by: Chris Wattie, Reuters

 

Meanwhile, the pollster appeared to find that many Canadians believe the robocalls have become a part of the political system and are not confined to one party.

 

When asked about the robocalls, 54 per cent agreed with the statement that "this is just politics as usual and something that all parties do in one way or another." By comparison, 45 per cent disagreed with that statement.

 

Bricker said this finding suggests many Canadians believe the opposition parties themselves are not "pure" on the issue — something which could weaken their own credibility as they attack the governing Tories on the controversy.

 

"High dudgeon and outrage, particularly from some of the people seen as being potentially equally culpable, is a difficult position to sustain."

 

As the controversy over the issue unfolded in recent days, there have been suggestions it might be necessary to hold byelections in ridings which saw narrow wins, and where claims of vote suppression may have tainted the results.

 

The Ipsos Reid poll suggests there would be strong public support for such a move. Sixty-eight per cent of those polled said if the Conservatives are found to have conducted the misleading robocalls, there should be new elections "in the ridings where it happened." By comparison, 32 per cent disagreed with that course of action.

 

The poll also found that four per cent of Canadians "strongly" believe that in last year's election campaign they personally "received a call that deliberately tried to confuse" them about the location of their polling station. Another seven per cent also agreed "somewhat" with the statement that this happened to them personally.

 

Bricker said he was surprised by these specific findings related to voters' own experiences and believes they are likely too high. He said he thinks that, in fact, many of those people were merely recalling any phone call they received during the 2011 election — a result known in the polling business as "false positives."

 

For the March 6-8 survey, a representative randomly selected sample of 1,001 adult Canadians was interviewed by telephone, and 2,153 interviews were conducted online.

 

Ipsos Reid merged the two samples. The margin of error is two percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

 

 

© Copyright (c) Postmedia News

Bletchley Park tweet saves Alan Turing computing papers

There is something quite fitting that a single tweet sparked off a campaign to save the work of a man who helped to develop the world's first modern computer.

 

Alan Turing's nephew Sir John Dermot Turing looks at Stephen Kettle's sculpture of his uncle at the exhibition

 

This, in turn, led to the development of an exhibition devoted to his life and work.

 

Rare mathematical papers written by Alan Turing are now part of a new display at the World War II codebreaking centre Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire.

 

Turing, who look his own life in 1954 at the age of 41, helped to create the Bombe machine which was used to crack the Enigma code at Bletchley Park and later created one of the first designs for a stored-program computer.

 

During his life he only published 18 papers and gave offprints of 15 of them to his friend Professor Max Newman.

 

But after Newman's death, they changed hands a number of times and could have been lost to a private collector had it not been for the actions of a member of the Bletchley Park staff.

 

'Desolate tweet'

 

Director of Museum Operations, Kelsey Griffin, spotted they had come up for sale at Christie's auction house, and took matters into her own hands, turning to the social media network Twitter.

 

“What started off as just one tweet had become almost the mission of a determined nation” - Kelsey GriffinDirector of Museum Operations, Bletchley Park

Disappointed to realise that the cost of this "very valuable cache of Turing's works" was way out of the reach of the Bletchley Park Trust, she posted what she called "a desolate tweet".

 

"The guide price of £300,000 and £500,000 meant that there was absolutely no way the Bletchley Park Trust could afford to buy them," she explained.

 

"I sent out a desolate tweet saying "If only the Trust could afford to buy these for the museum and its visitors".

 

The call for help was spotted by Bletchley supporter and IT journalist Gareth Halfacree, who promptly launched a campaign to save the papers for the nation, which became viral across the Internet.

 

"Incredibly he raised £28,500 within 11 days," said Ms Griffin.

 

Search engine Google then pledged $100,000 and together with a "significant sum" from a private donor, the trust had £100,000 to spend on auction day.

 

"Sadly, it was a huge anti-climax because bidding started at £200,000, they failed to reach their reserve price and bidding stopped at £240,000," explained Ms Griffin.

 

'Determined nation'

 

With the papers still in danger of being sold overseas, "never to be seen or heard of again", Simon Greenish, then CEO of the trust, entered into talks with Christie's and the National Heritage Memorial Fund (NHMF).

 

The campaign also received the backing of prime minister David Cameron.

 

Then, in February 2011, the papers were finally saved when the NHMF stepped in to provide the final piece of funding of nearly £213,500.

 

"What started off as just one tweet had become almost the mission of a determined nation to bring this collection here to Bletchley Park," said Ms Griffin.

 

After the papers went on display, people began to offer items to the museum, which eventually became 'The Life and Works of Alan Turing' exhibition.

 

It has now been longlisted for the Art Fund Prize 2012, the UK's annual 'museum of the year' award.

 

Turing's family then stepped forward with some of his personal artefacts, which are now on show to the public for the first time.

 

Alan Turing used to practice his lectures on teddy bear 'Porgy'

 

These include a teddy bear called Porgy, a biography of the scientist written by his mother, prize books awarded at school and his wristwatch, all of which provide a personal insight into the man.

 

William Newman, son of Cambridge professor Max Newman, then provided a hand-drawn Monopoly board on which the young William had played and beaten Turing.

 

Ms Griffin said they now not only had his papers, "but the most comprehensive exhibition of the life and works of Alan Turing in the world, the personal artefacts have added a very human dimension and we're very proud to have this open".

 

She said she was "thrilled" that her actions had led to the development of the exhibition and was proud that the tweet linked the story back to its origins.

 

"I'm absolutely delighted and almost still in a state of disbelief that all of this has come together," she said.

 

"One of the very poignant things in the exhibition is a letter to Alan Turing's mother written 20 years after his death when she was told for the very first time what a huge contribution he'd made to the outcome of World War II and also the vital contribution he'd made to the modern computer.

 

"So the fact that this astonishing collection of his life and works has been brought here by the very act of a tweet on a computer is rather fitting in itself - it rounds off the story."

 

BBC

Afghan officials visit Guantanamo in peace bid

An Afghan government delegation visited the Guantanamo Bay military prison this week to secure approval from five Taliban detainees who may soon be moved to Qatar, a sign that the Obama administration is inching closer to establishing peace talks to end the war in Afghanistan.

In this photo reviewed by a U.S. Department of Defense official, a Guantanamo detainee holds onto a fence inside the Camp 6 high-security detention facility at Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base April 27, 2010.
REUTERS/Michelle Shephard/Pool

The delegation, which visited the top-security detention center in Cuba on Monday, included Ibrahim Spinzada, a senior foreign policy aide to Afghan President Hamid Karzai, sources familiar with the subject said.

Government sources in Kabul said Spinzada and Shahida Abdali, a senior Afghan security official, visited the United States this week. The White House said the two officials were in Washington briefly but both the White House and the Pentagon declined comment on the Guantanamo visit.

U.S. Army Military Police escort a detainee to his cell during in-processing to the temporary detention facility at Camp X-Ray in Naval Base Guantanamo Bay in this file photograph taken January 11, 2002 and released January 18, 2002.
REUTERS/Stringer/Files

Karzai's government has demanded the five former senior members of the Taliban government, held at Guantanamo Bay for a decade, give their consent before they are transferred to , the small Gulf state where they would under Qatar's custody.

The transfer would be one of a series of good-faith measures that, if U.S. diplomats can surmount remaining hurdles, would set in motion the first substantial political negotiations on the bloody conflict in Afghanistan since the Taliban government was toppled in 2001 in a U.S.-led invasion.

A year after it was unveiled, the Obama administration's peace initiative may soon offer the United States a historic opportunity to broker an end to a conflict that began as the response to the September 11, 2001, al Qaeda attacks on the United States. The war has dragged on for a decade at great financial and human cost.

But the peace gambit also presents extraordinary risks for Obama, facing the potential for political fallout months before presidential elections, as his government considers backing an arrangement that would give some degree of power to the Taliban, a movement known for its brutality and extreme interpretation of Islam.

Despite months of covert diplomacy, it remains unclear whether the prisoner transfer will go ahead. Doubts are growing about whether the Taliban leadership is willing to weather possible blowback from junior and more hard-core members who appear to oppose negotiations.

U.S. officials have been hoping the behind-the-scenes peace initiative will gain enough momentum to permit Obama to announce the establishment of full-fledged political talks between the Karzai government and the Taliban at a NATO summit in May.

Such an announcement would mark a major victory for the White House and might dispel some of the anxiety created by NATO nations' plans to gradually pull most of their troops by the end of 2014, leaving an inexperienced Afghan military and wobbly Afghan government to fend off a still-potent insurgency.

The confidence-building measures the administration has proposed also include the opening of the Taliban office in Qatar and a Taliban statement distancing itself from terrorism.

The Taliban detainees are seen by some U.S. officials as among the most threatening inmates remaining at Guantanamo. Their possible transfer has become a lightning rod for attack - or at least anxiety - from U.S. politicians from both parties even before the administration formally begins a required congressional notification process.

Among the prisoners that may be sent to Qatar is Mohammed Fazl, a "high-risk" detainee alleged to be responsible for the killing of thousands of minority Shi'ite Muslims between 1998 and 2001.

They also include Noorullah Noori, a former senior military commander; Abdul Haq Wasiq, a former deputy intelligence minister; and Khairullah Khairkhwa, a former interior minister.

Republicans particularly have voiced concerns that transferred Taliban officials might regain positions of power or rekindle an insurgency that Western forces are working to extinguish.

Detainees in orange jumpsuits sit in a holding area under the watchful eyes of military police during in-processing to the temporary detention facility at Camp X-Ray of Naval Base Guantanamo Bay in this January 11, 2002 file photograph.
REUTERS/Stringer/Files

"My assumption is that my client would welcome an opportunity to be released from Guantanamo," said Frank Goldsmith, an attorney for Khairkhwa, who arrived at Guantanamo in May 2002.

This week's visit to Guantanamo may reflect the narrow course that Karzai, who had gone from Western darling to frequent antagonist, must tread as he seeks to build support for peace talks among Afghans who fear a Taliban return - all while shoring up his own fragile political backing.

It was unclear who else may have accompanied Spinzada to Guantanamo.

The reconciliation initiative has proceeded in fits and starts in part because of what U.S. officials describe as an unpredictable partner in Kabul. U.S. officials have held eight meetings with Afghan militant interlocutors since the peace initiative began, Reuters learned.

Karzai, meanwhile, has complained the United States has repeatedly sidelined in a process that is supposed to be "Afghan-led."

While those disagreements may have been put to rest, the latest diplomatic maneuvers come at a particularly sensitive time for the U.S.-Afghan relationship following the burning of copies of the Koran on a NATO military base, an incident that sparked protests and attacks on Western forces.

On Friday, the two governments announced a breakthrough in efforts to strike a bilateral deal that would outline their long-term presence and authorize a U.S. military presence in Afghanistan beyond 2014.

REUTERS

US woman, 81, keeps lottery ticket in Bible, wins jackpot

An 81-year-old Rhode Island woman, who slept with her winning lottery ticket in a Bible, came forward on Tuesday to claim a $336.4 million (214 million pounds) PowerBall prize, one of the largest ever jackpots in the United States, lottery officials said.

Louise White kept her identity secret for weeks after buying the lucky ticket at a grocery store in Newport, Rhode Island, when a family member wanted some rainbow sherbet dessert.

She took the prize in one lump sum payment of $210 million, the highest cash jackpot ever, lottery officials said.

"I'm very happy and I'm very proud and this will make my family very happy. We are truly blessed," White, a Newport resident, said during a brief appearance at a news conference.

White slept with the winning ticket in her Bible the night after the drawing and later kept it in a safe deposit box.

PowerBall is played in 42 U.S. states, Washington, D.C. and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The largest PowerBall jackpot was in 2006 for $365 million, according to lottery officials.

The odds of winning the PowerBall jackpot are roughly 1 in 175 million.

REUTERS

‘We Won in Fair and Open Fight' – Putin

Vladimir Putin told tens of thousands of supporters at a rally in downtown Moscow that he had won Sunday's presidential elections in a “fair and open fight."

Mr. Vladimir Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev in downtown Moscow

"I told you we would win and we won!" said a jubilant Putin, flanked by outgoing President Dmitry Medvedev, told a crowd of tens of thousands of supporters at a rally in downtown Moscow.

"We urge everyone to unite around the interests of Russia," he added, his voice cracking with emotion and his eyes moist.

According to preliminary results, Putin is leading with about 63.4 of the vote. His closest competitor Gennady Zyuganov, has gained about 17 percent of the vote.

There was a heavy security presence in downtown Moscow, with trucks full of riot police parked outside major metro stations.

The mood at Putin headquarters was celebratory.

“This was the cleanest election in Russian history," Putin campaign chief Stanislav Govorukhin said.

“Today is a clear sign that the people have made their choice for a great Russia,” said Russian film director and Putin supporter Nikita Mikhalkov. “The part of the opposition that does not listen to anything and tries to declare the elections illegitimate doesn’t interest Putin.”

Source: RIA-Novost