WASHINGTON, Nov. 29 — The bipartisan Iraq Study Group reached a consensus on Wednesday on a final report that will call for a gradual pullback of the 15 American combat brigades now in Iraq but stop short of setting a firm timetable for their withdrawal, according to people familiar with the panel’s deliberations.
The report, unanimously approved by the 10-member panel, led by James A. Baker III and Lee H. Hamilton, is to be delivered to President Bush next week. It is a compromise between distinct paths that the group has debated since March, avoiding a specific timetable, which has been opposed by Mr. Bush, but making it clear that the American troop commitment should not be open-ended. The recommendations of the group, formed at the request of members of Congress, are nonbinding.
A person who participated in the commission’s debate said that unless the government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki believed that Mr. Bush was under pressure to pull back troops in the near future, “there will be zero sense of urgency to reach the political settlement that needs to be reached.”
The report recommends that Mr. Bush make it clear that he intends to start the withdrawal relatively soon, and people familiar with the debate over the final language said the implicit message was that the process should begin sometime next year.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/30/world/middleeast/30policy.html?ei=5094&en=1b8f934bb873891b&hp=&ex=1164862800&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
Thousands of armed Venezuelans are preparing to ensure that President Hugo Chavez is re-elected on Sunday and will "shed their blood" for the cause if necessary.
Paranoid about the prospect of a coup or losing the presidential election fair and square, the firebrand leader of anti-American sentiment in Latin America has spent his eight years in office filling government jobs with acting and retired army officers.
With Mr Chavez hoping to win another six years in power, the opposition fears that even if it wins at the ballot box it will never be able to take power.
After purging the armed forces of elements opposed to his populist Left-wing rule, Mr Chavez has ensured that a new reserve force is outside the normal military command chain, answering only to him.
The former paratrooper colonel, who led a failed coup in 1992, has military men in most ministries, in politics, and even on the Supreme Court.
"What we have now is a form of Praetorian government," said Domingo Irwin, a defence analyst at the Pedagogical University in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital.
One proud member of Venezuela's new military reserve is Edgar Fajardo. He does not know much about handling guns, but he does know who he will vote for in the election: Hugo Chavez.
"I was unemployed until 'El Comandante' [Mr Chavez] gave me this chance to serve my country," said Mr Fajardo 54, who irons his uniform every morning before acting as a sentry at government installations in the capital's poor neighbourhood of Catia.
He said: "Now I am ready to shed my blood for him and the Bolivarian Revolution."
That socio-economic "revolution", as Mr Chavez likes to call it, is inspired by his hero Simón Bolívar, the 19th century Venezuelan and Latin American revolutionary leader. For it to continue, Mr Chavez, 52, will have to defeat the veteran politician Manuel Rosales to secure another term.
By distributing his oil-rich country's wealth, Mr Chavez has made many friends who should help him to achieve his goal. He has doubled the number of state sector jobs to more than two million in a population of 26 million.
The United States and alarmed neighbours have accused Mr Chavez of using his oil windfall to spark an arms race in the region.
He has acquired 100,000 Russian Kalashnikov rifles, SU30 fighter jets and more than 50 helicopters.
But it is more about political control than national defence.
For Alberto Garrido, a leading political analyst in Caracas, the president is building up and arming his support base, should he lose elections or be removed from power by other means.
"He believes in the revolutionary principle of a people in arms, and he believes that he can never be beaten should his people be armed," said Mr Garrido.
Disembowelled, then torn apart: The price of daring to teach girls
The gunmen came at night to drag Mohammed Halim away from his home, in front of his crying children and his wife begging for mercy.
The 46-year-old schoolteacher tried to reassure his family that he would return safely. But his life was over, he was part-disembowelled and then torn apart with his arms and legs tied to motorbikes, the remains put on display as a warning to others against defying Taliban orders to stop educating girls.
Mr Halim was one of four teachers killed in rapid succession by the Islamists at Ghazni, a strategic point on the routes from Kabul to the south and east which has become the scene of fierce clashes between the Taliban and US and Afghan forces.
Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams has revealed he was warned by police of another threat to his life.
The party said members would "take precautions to minimise risks" but would continue to do the work they "were elected to do".
Earlier this month, Mr Adams said dissident republicans were behind threats to him and other party members.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/northern_ireland/6195510.stm
UN Troops Face Child Abuse, Prostitution Charges
(RTTNews) - An investigation by a leading news organization has revealed that children have been subjected to rape and prostitution for food or money by United Nations troops in Haiti and Liberia. Girls have told of regular encounters with soldiers where sex is demanded in return for food or money, a BBC investigation has found.
The UN has faced several scandals involving its troops in recent years, including a DR Congo pedophile ring and prostitute trafficking in Kosovo.
Meanwhile the assistant secretary-general for peacekeeping operations acknowledges that sexual abuse is widespread.
"We've had a problem probably since the inception of peacekeeping - problems of this kind of exploitation of vulnerable populations," Jane Holl Lute told the BBC.
"My operating presumption is that this is either a problem or a potential problem in every single one of our missions." (RTTNews)