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GENEVA (AFP) - World Trade Organization countries met at a vital stage on the tough road towards a treaty to open up global commerce, after almost four years of on-off talks. The 148 member countries met against a background of persistent splits particularly on farm subsidies and services and with a WTO summit in Hong Kong looming just five months away. They are under growing pressure to accelerate the so-called Doha Round negotiations and EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson, initially not due to attend, is now expected to play a part. India's trade minister Kamal Nath was another top official...

SACRAMENTO (AP) - With negotiations between Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Democratic leaders at a halt, both sides are poised to go to political war in a Nov. 8 special election, even as the number of ballot measures dwindle and new calls are made by some to cancel the balloting all together. "We are so deep into it now, I don't see how you can get the toothpaste back into the tube," said Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, D-Los Angeles. "We are so far down the path, I think we should have the special election and put the whole issue to rest."...

SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea on Monday said it won't give up nuclear weapons without receiving anything in exchange and called on the United States to agree at revived arms talks to peacefully coexist with the communist state. Meanwhile, South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun told visiting former Secretary of State Colin Powell that Washington's moves will be the deciding factor in resolving the latest nuclear standoff with North Korea that began in 2002. "The United States still has the final key to the six-party talks," Roh said Monday, according to a pool report. The North said last week it...

WASHINGTON - Democrats say the courtesy calls they've received from President Bush and his top aide, while appreciated, fall far short of the advice and consent consultations they expect before Bush announces a Supreme Court nominee. Democratic Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois got a call Wednesday from White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card, who is with Bush in Europe for the Group of Eight summit. Card has also called Democratic Sens. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Charles Schumer of New York and Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts, but no names of possible nominees were mentioned, according to their aides. The Democrats...

LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) - The city voted Wednesday to continue negotiations with a Japanese company that wants to build the first West Coast terminal for liquefied natural gas. During a session that lasted until after midnight, the council voted 5-4 to continue talks with a Mitsubishi subsidiary on a deal that would involve building a pipeline and selling supplies of LNG to the city, said Chris Garner, director of Long Beach Energy, the city's gas utility. No date for the talks was scheduled but Garner said he believed "some kind of business deal" could be crafted by midsummer. In...

On Saturday May 4th, the Associated Press quoted a source from U.S. intelligence and foreign allies who avowed havingg enough evidence to prove that several top Al Qaeda operatives are hiding in Iran - with the complicity of the Iranian government. If that is confirmed (and in part it already is), it will be a huge blow to the credibility of those who tell us that Shiite and Sunni fundamentalists could never collaborate with each other. This alliance of rivals has been built as a way to wage a "holy war" on the U.S., Israel and the democratic world at...

West fears nuclear talks with Iran are doomed to failure By Anton La Guardia, Diplomatic Editor (Filed: 25/05/2005) Make-or-break talks between Europe and Iran are doomed to failure and US military action will only delay, not halt, Teheran's suspected nuclear weapons programme, a leading think-tank predicted yesterday. In a gloomy assessment, the London-based International Institute of Strategic Studies said America had no simple military way of stopping Iran going nuclear. It said the West's best hope was to buy time through diplomacy. IISS expressed alarm at the "erosion" of counter-proliferation measures, saying it could lead ultimately to terrorist groups such...

I really get tired of these kinds of arguments.http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_05/006275.php Look, having six-party talks regarding issues affecting the Korean peninsula has been an overwhelmingly bipartisan project ever since the end of the Korean War. Any effort to pretend that the Bush Administration is the first one to have come up with the concept is wrong. Ridiculously wrong. And even beyond the traditional nature of the demand for six-party talks, they make sense. If you don't have six-party talks, then North Korea will try to push South Korea out of the diplomatic equation altogether and will be able to avoid getting any...

Annan calls for calm as threats overshadow nuclear talks By Francis Harris in Washington (Filed: 03/05/2005) Kofi Annan, the United Nations secretary-general, urged nuclear rogue states to step back from the brink of atomic weapons yesterday. His comments came at the UN in New York after a defiant Iran and North Korea had both provided new evidence of their determination to pursue technology that can be used to manufacture and deliver nuclear arms. Kofi Annan wants ‘a world free of nuclear weapons’ Speaking at the opening of a month-long meeting to review the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, Mr Annan said...

Annan talks of 'lynch mob' determined to destroy him By Charles Laurence in New York and Philip Sherwell in Washington (Filed: 01/05/2005) Kofi Annan, the beleaguered secretary-general of the United Nations, has claimed that a "lynch mob" is out to "destroy" him in the wake of the Iraq oil-for-food debacle and other UN scandals. In his first big interview since he was criticised in a report into the discredited oil-for-food scheme, which the UN administered, Mr Annan refused to rule out stepping down in the autumn, a year before his second term is due to end. Some diplomats believe that...

   Pentagon delegation arrives in Taipei for talks with militaryBy Rich ChangSTAFF REPORTER Thursday, Mar 17, 2005,Page 1 A US military delegation arrived in Taipei yesterday, and will discuss the People's Liberation Army's (PLA) capabilities with Taiwanese military officials. A member of the delegation, who requested anonymity, told the Taipei Times that the US saw the possibility of China's launching an attack using asymmetric warfare tactics against Taiwan as increasing. "The US is concerned as to whether the PLA would be able to start an asymmetric war against Taiwan and whether there exists a fifth column of infiltrators in Taiwan," he...

Our Best and Bravest A young Marine officer talks about Fallujah By John Hillen February 28, 2005, 8:47 a.m. I went to a presentation by a young Marine infantry lieutenant last week about the platoon he led in the assault on the insurgents in Fallujah a few months ago. It was fascinating stuff for us military types — acronyms were being slung with abandon. Some points were particularly worth noting and sharing: * The intensity of combat in Fallujah: Of the 46 Marines in this lieutenant's platoon, 20 were evacuated for wounds during the three days of fighting and only...

TOKYO (Reuters) - North Korea has told officials in South Korea it is willing to take part in six-party talks on its nuclear arms program in June, a Japanese newspaper reported. Pyongyang also said in its message, which was conveyed to South Korea by unofficial routes and then to Japan by Seoul, that it was willing to sign a treaty with the United States by October, the conservative Sankei Shimbun said on Monday. North Korea declared on Feb. 10 that it had nuclear weapons and that it was pulling out of the talks, which include Japan, Russia, China and the...

LONDON,Feb 19 (IranMania) - There is no evidence to support the claim that Iran is developing nuclear weapons, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog Mohamed ElBaradei said, according to The Washington Post. "On Iran, there really hasn't been much development, neither as a result of our inspections or as a result of intelligence," said the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) director general. ElBaradei called for greater U.S. participation in diplomatic efforts to engage Iran and North Korea in talks about their nuclear programs. "North Korea and Iran are still the two 800-pound gorillas in the room and not much...

TEHRAN -- Iran has begun publicly preparing for a possible U.S. attack, announcing efforts to mobilize militia recruits and making plans for the kind of scattershot warfare that has plagued U.S. troops in neighbouring Iraq, officials and analysts say. "Iran would respond within 15 minutes to any attack by the United States or any other country," said an official close to the conservative camp that runs Iran's security and military apparatus, speaking on condition of anonymity. Tensions between Iran and the United States have increased over Iran's pursuit of nuclear technology. The Islamic republic says it needs nuclear power to...

A series of diplomatic contacts are scheduled this week to help relieve the North Korean nuclear issue. Sources say South Korea plans to send its top nuclear negotiator, Deputy Foreign Minister Song Min-soon, to Beijing this week to ask China to use more of its influence over North Korea in getting Pyongyang back to the negotiating table. China, in turn, is expected to dispatch a high-level communist party official, Wang Jiarui, to North Korea as early as this weekend. In the meantime, South Korea, the U.S. and Japan are reportedly pushing to open a 6-way consultative meeting also comprising North...

Rice warns North Korea over nuclear talks (Filed: 10/02/2005) Condoleezza Rice, the American secretary of state, has called on North Korea to return to talks on nuclear disarmament following the country's first public admission that it has nuclear weapons. A North Korean propaganda poster Earlier, the North Korean foreign ministry issued a statement saying that it had suspended participation in talks for "an indefinite period" after scrutinising George W Bush's inaugural and state of the union speeches. Dr Rice who is in Luxembourg as part of her European tour, said: "We are trying to give the North Koreans a different...

The European Union is resuming trade talks with Iran, 18 months after they were halted over Tehran's nuclear programme. Negotiations are restarting after Iran's agreement in November to suspend the enrichment of uranium. The European Commissioner for External Relations said the resumption of talks was a clear signal that the EU wished to work with Iran. Discussions in Brussels will also encompass human rights and security. The Iran-EU trade talks, which were launched in December 2002, were suspended in mid-2003 amid mounting tensions, particularly over Tehran's refusal to allow snap inspections of its nuclear facilities. But despite the latest move,...

European leaders gathering in Brussels are expected to agree to start EU accession talks with Turkey, at a summit which opens on Thursday. European Commission head Jose Manuel Barroso has urged them to reject any half measures when they discuss the Turkish membership bid. Mr Barroso said if the EU was to start talks, it should be on full membership, with no last-minute conditions. But he urged Turkey to "go the extra mile" and recognise EU member Cyprus. Mr Barroso asked what kind of message Turkey was sending if it did not recognise all the members of the club it...

France has said it will ask Turkey to acknowledge the mass killing of Armenians from 1915 as genocide when it begins EU accession talks. French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier said Turkey had "a duty to remember". Armenians say 1.5 million of their people died or were deported from their homelands under Turkish Ottoman rule. France is among a group of nations that class the killings as genocide. Turkey denies any organised genocide, claiming they were quelling a civil uprising. Mr Barnier said France did not consider Turkish acknowledgement a condition of EU entry, but insisted his country would raise the...