Date certain withdrawal - always a mistake

This death and devastation is what you get when you tell the enemy the date when you will withdraw your troops. It was a mistake in Iraq - 127 dead in one day - and it is a mistake in Afghanistan. Setting a date certain for leaving the fight is a bad idea - it almost guarantees an outcome less than victory.

This concept is not new, nor is it rocket science. It is, however, irresponsible and dangerous. Expect the scene above to continue in Iraq, and expect it to begin in about 18 months in Afghanistan.

I don’t know who the President is listening to for military advice, but I suspect that it is some political hack that has never worn a uniform or heard a shot fired in anger. I keep wondering where is General Jim Jones, the alleged national security advisor - surely he knows better. The former commandant of the Marine Corps should be telling the President that his seemingly unwavering commitment to begin the withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan in June of 2011 is a bad idea.

Withdrawal of troops should begin only when the mission has been accomplished. Of course, much of that depends on how you define mission accomplishment. For those of us who have worn a uniform and heard a shot fired in anger, it means victory. I used to believe that the President had trouble using the word victory, however, I am starting to believe that he has trouble with the actual concept of victory.

The President has taken the first step - he made the decision to augment American forces in Afghanistan. Personally, I question the wisdom of a counterinsurgency strategy versus counterterrorism, but in any case, he has made the decision. We can debate whether his stated goal of defeating al-Qa’idah is reasonable, given the fact that most of al-Qa’idah is no longer in Afghanistan, and the Taliban is not a threat to American interests.

Obama’s acceptance speech at the Nobel ceremony was another good step. I am sure he ruffled the feathers of the pacifist Europeans - another good step. One might get the impression that the President was on the road to recovery and actually becoming the commander in chief in more than just name. Then, he fell off the wagon and reiterated his commitment to the 18-month timetable for withdrawal.

If the President continues with this policy, we are setting up Afghanistan for the type of continuing internecine violence we see now in Iraq. Al-Qa’idah in Iraq waited patiently until the more-capable American forces withdrew from the cities and turned over security duties over to Iraqi units, then began a series of attacks hoping to restart the civil war with the Shi’a majority. Thus far, they have failed, but have killed thousands of Iraqis and highlighted the fragility of the Iraqi government.

The Taliban understands the concept as well. They will wait out the Americans, just as the Afghans have waited out invaders before. At least this time, they know exactly how long they have to wait. In June 2011, this latest set of invaders will declare victory and start to return home.

Come on, General, explain to the President what a bad idea this is.

Iraq: Kurdish lawmakers confirm support for new electoral laws with UN envoy

The top United Nations envoy to Iraq met today with parliamentarians from the Kurdish Alliance Bloc to discuss the recently brokered electoral laws that allow for national elections expected to take place early next year.

CNN’s Dan Rivers reports on rising sea levels and its impact on people

“A Night with Saddam” - a unique perspective

I don’t normally endorse books - unless they favorably reference me….

I am making an exception here for two reasons. I was intimately involved in the reportage at NBC News (NBC News, CNBC and MSNBC) of Saddam’s capture, subsequent trial and execution.

Who can forget The Today Show segment with Matt Lauer and I in the mock up of the spider-hole from which Saddam was pulled six years ago this weekend - December 13, 2003? (See also my recent piece, Execution of Saddam - in hindsight a good thing.)

The other reason is that the author, Dr. Mark Green, will donate a portion of the proceeds to my favorite charity - the Wounded Warrior Project, as well as to the Night Stalker Association and the Bay Medical Foundation. Dr. Green, before becoming a physician, commanded a rifle company in the 82nd Airborne Division. As an Army physician, he was the American medical officer who examined and spoke with Saddam Husayn that night.

The book is A Night with Saddam - A Special Ops Flight Surgeon’s Interview With Saddam Hussein On The Night Of His Capture And The Missions Which Led To Their Meeting. Read more at Dr. Green’s website.

An excerpt from the book:

“There was very little interrogating going on at this late hour in the battlefield interrogation facility (BIF). Most of the intelligence people wanted Saddam to rest prior to their intense questioning. The dignitaries and senior commanders had visited him and were now gone.

About this time, around midnight, the physician assigned to the BIF left. One of the senior intelligence officers recognized me standing outside the cell speaking with the interpreters and told me that the admiral wanted a medical officer with Saddam constantly. He asked if I would go in and stay the first night with him. I said yes and gathered my thoughts. The shear excitement of the moment was balanced by the realization of the terror and evil this man had produced in his lifetime.

I grabbed a worn-out copy of the Stars and Stripes newspaper and walked into his makeshift cell to share in the first night of captivity with the captured King of Babylon.”

Detroit Forum Commemorating the 40th Anniversary of the Assassinationof Fred Hampton & Mark Clark, Today at 5:00pm

Commemorating the 40th anniversary of the FBI/police murder of Black Panther Party leaders Fred Hampton & Mark Clark

Police Violence & the Capitalist State

WHAT’S BEHIND THE FBI KILLING OF IMAM LUQMAN AMEEN ABDULLAH AND THE FRAME-UP CHARGES AGAINST THE DETROIT 10 (MEMBERS OF MASJID AL-HAQQ)?

Hear: Family and Supporters of Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah, the Masjid al-Haqq and the Detroit 10 (Defendants being unjustly prosecuted by the feds)

HEAR: Sandra Hines (Detroit Coalition Against Police Brutality) –
police violence and the worsening economic crisis.

Andrea Egypt (Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice) –the connection between the wars abroad and the war at home.

Abayomi Azikiwe (Editor of the Pan African News Wire and Contributing Editor to Workers World newspaper) - the nature of the police and FBI in a capitalist state where violence is used to suppress the working class and oppressed people. Also the history of FBI/police spying, entrapment and assassination against the African American community.

Kevin Carey (Detroit People’s Task Force will chair the meeting).

Saturday – December 12, 2009 – 5 P.M.
5920 Second Avenue
(at Antoinette, just north of WSU)
dinner served at 5 PM

sponsored by: Workers World Party
313-671-3715

Giant iceberg heading towards Australia

A massive iceberg — more than twice the size of New York’s Manhattan island — is drifting slowly toward Australia, scientists said Wednesday.(At left: NASA satellite image of iceberg)

The iceberg, measuring 140 square km (54 square miles), cleaved off an ice shelf nearly 10 years ago and had been floating near Antarctica before commencing on its unusual journey north.

Named B17B, it was about 1,700 km (1,056 miles) off the coast of West Australia, according to the country’s Antarctic Division.

“B17B is a very significant one in that it has drifted so far north while still largely intact,” said Australian Antarctic Division glaciologist Neal Young, who spotted the slab using satellite images taken by NASA and the European Space Agency.

“It’s one of the biggest sighted at those latitudes.”

It is unlikely to drift too close to the coast in its current form, Young said. The warmer waters will cause it to melt.

“As the water warms up, the iceberg is slowly breaking up, resulting in hundreds more smaller icebergs in the area,” Young said on the Australian Antarctic Division Web site.

In November, an iceberg estimated to be 500 meters wide and 50 meters high was spotted close to Macquarie Island in the southern Pacific drifting towards New Zealand.

Scientists working on the island were astounded by its size.

“We pulled out the binoculars that we use for work on the seals and, sure enough, it was a huge floating island of ice basically and, yeah, it was an incredible sight,” Australian researcher Dean Miller told CNN affiliate TVNZ.

The Australian Antarctic Division said the iceberg was part of a flotilla that would have broken off from a larger ice flow that possibly came from the Ross Ice Shelf(left), Antarctica’s largest.

Although shipping lanes in this region are not particularly busy in November, the icebergs prompted Maritime New Zealand to issue navigation warnings.

Three years earlier, another family of icebergs led to a small tourist boom when they drifted along the east coast of New Zealand’s South Island.

Oceanographer Mike Williams told Radio New Zealand the icebergs had “pretty much the same origin” but that some had probably been trapped in the icy seas of Antarctica for longer, before being carried north by the currents.

However he was reluctant to cite global warming as the reason for the large-scale movement of ice. “We do have to a change our position a little because in 2006 we thought this was a ‘once in a lifetime’ event.

“But large ice shelf carvings, where the ice comes from, are still only carving on a 30 to 50-year period.”

Source:
Cable Network News, “Giant iceberg heading towards Australia“, accessed December 9, 2009

Angola Poll Set to Be Shelved

Angola poll set to be shelved

By Richard Lapper in Luanda
December 11 2009 16:50

José Eduardo dos Santos, Angola’s president for the past 30 years, has provided the strongest indication yet that long-expected presidential elections will be delayed until 2012.

Critics believe Mr dos Santos is trying to extend his rule as long as possible. Oil-rich Angola has not held a presidential election since 1992. Polls have repeatedly been delayed.

Mr dos Santos told his Angolan Popular Liberation Movement (MPLA) “everything indicated” that a constitutional reform abolishing presidential elections in favour of a parliamentary system would be approved in the next few months.

That would in turn “set new times for the mandates of elected bodies”. The MPLA, a left-wing movement that won a 27-year civil war, holds more than 80 per cent of legislative seats. In the new system, the party with a majority in parliament would choose the president.

Mr dos Santos added that the MPLA government should serve out the four-year term it won during last year’s parliamentary contest. “It’s desirable that MPLA can complete its mandate,” said the president, to loud applause from about 2,000 party members. That means the next elections are not likely to take place until 2012.

Critics say Mr dos Santos, 67, intends to stay in power indefinitely. “The system of government favoured by the MPLA will concentrate a lot of power in the hands of the president,” said Fernando Macedo, a professor of constitutional law at the Lusíada University in Luanda.

“The strategy [of Mr dos Santos] is to be in power as long as he can without term limits,” he added.

Mr Macedo argued that the weakness of Angola’s opposition made a parliamentary system particularly dangerous for the country’s democracy. He described the popular consultation surrounding the proposed constitutional reform as a “farce”.

A senior foreign diplomat said: “If there is any opposition within the MPLA, it is hidden.”

The same diplomat added that the party was a “ruthless and efficient machine”.

Mr dos Santos emphasised the need to do more to fight poverty, which has worsened this year thanks to a sharp fall in oil prices and an economic slowdown. Boosted by high oil prices and burgeoning demand by China, Angola enjoyed double-digit growth rates between 2005 and 2008. But the country is expected to grow by only about 1 per cent this year.

Delegates overwhelmingly voted in a secret ballot to re-elect Mr dos Santos as party president.

50 Years of Revolution: Cuba’s Legacy in Fighting Racism

50 years of revolution: Cuba’s legacy in fighting racism

WW COMMENTARY
By Larry Hales
Published Dec 10, 2009 9:41 PM

On Dec. 1 a statement began to be circulated entitled “A Declaration of African-American Support for the Civil Rights Struggle in Cuba.” The statement has 60 signatories—well-respected Black intellectuals, cultural performers and political activists, many of whom were leaders during the Civil Rights era and continue to be tod
The statement alleges not only racism in Cuban society but systemic racism. It insinuates that racism is a policy of the Cuban government, not merely a lasting vestige of the neo-colonial government before the 1959 socialist revolution.

To anyone who has ever been to Cuba or is in the movement to defend the Cuban Revolution, such a statement seems odd. It seems rather ironic coming from the U.S., despite the existence of the first Black president.

This statement signed by prominent figures is extremely dangerous for the Cuban Revolution and its admirers, defenders and those who look upon it as an example of what is not only necessary but possible when working and oppressed people confront their oppressor.

Such a statement comes at a time when the U.S. is trying to fix its image around the world. While the election of President Barack Obama is progressive—meaning that the consciousness of white workers was advanced enough to see beyond racism and even reject not only the racism of Hillary Clinton’s campaign but also that of McCain/Palin’s—the Obama administration has not meant much materially for the oppressed in the U.S.

The situation of the people of New Orleans has not changed, and many thousands have still not been able to return to their homes or been allowed to rebuild. They haven’t received the training and materials needed, nor prevailing wages, in order to come back and rebuild what had historically been a Black city.

While the U.S. government sat criminally by and millions around the world watched as tens of thousands of Black people languished in rising waters and oppressive heat, facing roving white bands armed to the teeth and racist police, the Cuban government amassed hundreds of doctors, nurses and other professionals who were ready to descend on New Orleans to assist the people, but their offer was ignored.

Racism permeates U.S. society

Today, the situation for Black people, especially young people, has worsened. Oppressed people in the U.S. are left behind greatly in every category.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, while youth unemployment is at an all-time high, it is direr in the oppressed communities. Black youth unemployment is at 32 percent; it’s at 22 percent for Latino/a youth and much higher in Indigenous communities. These numbers are inadequate, as they don’t account for youth who are discouraged and who have probably never had a job.

Poverty continues to increase: 34 percent for Black youth and 28 percent for Latino/a youth, while for Indigenous youth statistics are difficult to find—though 60 percent of Native people outside of cities are impoverished.

The rates of Black and Latino/a youth who graduate on time with a high school diploma are 59 and 61 percent, respectively. Only 50,000 Black men graduate each year with a bachelor’s degree. A much higher number of Black men between the ages of 20 and 29 are under correctional supervision or control. As of 2008, one in three or 846,000 Black males were incarcerated. (childrensdefense.org)

The reality of oppressed people is tied to the very foundation of U.S. society. The roots of the rise of U.S. capital are the most naked forms of exploitation—theft of land, genocide, pillage, plunder and racism. In order to maintain the status quo, racism, sexism, homophobia and other ills are not only tolerated but used by the ruling elite and continue to be written into the laws of society.

Millions of people—undocumented workers—are pushed into the U.S. by imperialism, whether by neo-liberal policies or the military in their homelands, and they fear being rounded up and deported. Their labor not only makes millions for the capitalists, but taxes collected from them put billions into government coffers. The government uses immigration agents to raid workplaces and homes and allows local police to be deputized so they can be used federally to round up people for having brown or black skin and speaking a different language. And then there is the current war being waged against Muslims and Arab people, evident in the seizing of mosques and religious institutions by the federal government.

Cuba demonstrates anti-racist solidarity

But Cuba is targeted for racism? This is nothing more than a ploy to further try and undermine the revolutionary government. Cuba has a long history of showing solidarity with liberation movements around the world. Though it is a resource-poor nation, it has sent tens of thousands of doctors and educators around the world. Cuba’s assistance to the Angolans defeated the South African military and was crucial in breaking the back of apartheid.

Cuba has also shown support to Black people in the U.S. and has given political asylum to a number of Black militants, including Assata Shakur, who has a $1 million bounty on her head from the state of New Jersey.

The Cuban revolution has made great strides in reversing backwards ideas and building a society upon the principles of socialism, where people are in solidarity with one another instead of in competition. This is its greatest weapon and ultimately the greatest weapon any society can use to combat racism, sexism and homophobia.

Afro-Cuban artists have written a letter to the African-American people answering the outrageous claims in the Dec. 1 “declaration” regarding alleged racism in Cuba. The letter can be downloaded in its entirety by clicking on Cuban Solidarity at www.blackeducator.org. It reads in part:

“If the Cuba of these times was that racist nation they want to invent, its citizens would not have contributed massively to the liberation of the African people. More than 350,000 Cuban volunteers fought alongside their brothers of Africa against Colonialism. More than 2,000 fighters from the Island fell in the lands of that Continent.

“A personality of undisputed worldwide relevance, Nelson Mandela, has recognized the role of those volunteers in the definitive defeat of the infamous Apartheid regime.

“From Africa we brought back only the remains of our dead. Cuba has over there in that continent no property, no bank, no mines, no oil wells.

“If the Cuba of today were to feel such disrespect for Blacks, more than 35,000 African youth would not have been trained in our schools over the past 40 years, nor would 2,600 young people from some 30 African nations be studying right now in our universities.

“A people sick with racism would refuse to collaborate in the training of medical doctors and other human resources in health care at the Schools of Medical Sciences founded in Guinea Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Gambia, and Eritrea. They would have turned their back on the Health assistance programs that have saved thousands of lives in Latin America and the Caribbean, where the African Diaspora is significant, and they would have not provided services to the more than 20,000 Haitians and English-speaking Afro-Caribbeans who have recovered their eyesight through surgical operations performed in our country, free of charge.

“It is very probable that the majority of those who signed the document aren’t aware that when the City of New Orleans was devastated by Hurricane Katrina, dozens of Cuban medical doctors and paramedics volunteered to provide help to storm victims in a humanitarian gesture that received no response from the American authorities.”

Articles copyright 1995-2009 Workers World. Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article is permitted in any medium without royalty provided this notice is preserved.

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Email: ww@workers.org
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Greece Struggles to Stay Afloat as Debts Pile On

December 12, 2009

Greece Struggles to Stay Afloat as Debts Pile On

By RACHEL DONADIO and NIKI KITSANTONIS
New York Times

ATHENS — Ever since Greece’s credit rating was downgraded last week, its new Socialist government has fought back, saying it has the mettle to tackle the soaring deficit and structural woes that have earned the country a reputation as the weak link in the euro zone.

“We will reduce the deficit, we will control the debt and there will be no need for a bailout,” the Greek finance minister, George Papaconstantinou, said in an interview in his office here this week. “We are not Iceland; we are not Dubai.”

But Mr. Papaconstantinou may have good reason for the traditional Greek metal worry beads he fingered during the interview. Outside his office, garbage was piled high in Syntagma Square, a result of a two-week strike by trash collectors that ended Friday.

A student demonstration was advancing on the square a day after pensioners had taken to the streets. Last week, protests for the first anniversary of the death of an Athenian teenager shot by the police turned violent, but did not cause as much damage as disturbances last year.

Common in Greece even during better times, such protests are expected to increase drastically once the government introduces austerity measures in its 2010 budget, including wage freezes and measures to scale back public sector hiring, steps it says are needed to bring Greece’s finances under control.

As Mr. Papaconstantinou suggested, the problem is not Greece’s alone: heavily indebted countries, including Ireland, Britain and Spain, are under pressure to show that they can stimulate growth and grapple with debt burdens at the same time. Investors and European monetary officials are skeptical.

Greece, in particular, has to transform a culture with a low tolerance for change and a high tolerance for protest, no easy task for a two-month-old Socialist government that says it is committed to sustaining social spending. While convincing European Union leaders in Brussels, the new government also has to win over Greece.

The president of the civil servants’ union Adedy, Spyros Papaspyros, said the union was prepared to strike if cutbacks were unilateral and severe. “If funding cuts are made in critical sectors such as health or welfare, we create a serious risk of destabilization,” he said.

The political and social challenges are intense. “It will be a very tall order for any country to pull off the fiscal rescue they’ve now got to pull off,” said Simon Tilford, the chief economist at the Center for European Reform in London, a research group. In light of Greece’s political challenges, he added, “I find it at this point difficult to see how Greece is going to manage this without some kind of fiscal crisis.”

Certainly, the bond markets think Greece is a risky bet. Yields on the country’s two-year bonds soared to 3.09 percent from 1.9 percent this week — the worst for the markets here in more than a decade — and were about 3 percent on Friday, while the 10-year bond rose to 5.3 percent this week from an already elevated 4.99 percent. In the United States, by contrast, a 10-year bond yields 3.55 percent, and a two-year bond 0.81 percent.

The dire economic situation has prompted the question of what went wrong in a country that was once seen as a model for European Union membership and that enjoyed 15 years of sustained growth, coming from behind to host the 2004 Summer Olympics.

“We didn’t use the Olympic spirit well,” said Elias Clis, a former Greek ambassador. “The previous government took the safe way, and the safe way is a very dangerous path.”

After winning by a wide margin in October, the Socialist government of Prime Minister George Papandreou announced that the country’s budget deficit was 12.7 percent of the gross domestic product, more than four times the 3 percent ceiling set by the European Monetary Union.

Mr. Papandreou last week estimated the national debt at $430 billion, calling it Greece’s worst crisis in three decades and blaming his conservative predecessors for the economic state. Greece’s national debt is expected to rise above 110 percent of its gross domestic product.

Last week, the ratings agency Fitch downgraded Greece’s credit rating based on fears that the deficit might cause the country to default, and the change sent Greek shares plunging and made the markets jittery. Standard & Poor’s has said it will reserve judgment until it sees the plan the government is expected to announce in January.

On Friday, Mr. Papandreou stressed the need for drastic measures. “We acknowledge the scale of the problem that we are faced with, and we are determined to make the shift toward a sustainable and healthy economy,” he said in Brussels.

He called for a “merciless crackdown on the corruption that is endemic in society and on widespread tax evasion.”

Yet that is not expected to be easy. The underground economy, which some estimates place as high as 30 percent of gross domestic product, helps people in countries like Greece that have European prices but salaries below the European average.

As he sat in a cafe with friends in the chic Kolonaki area on a recent afternoon, Antonis, 33, who disclosed only his first name, proudly announced that he refused to pay taxes.

“Why should I pay?” he asked with a grin. “I don’t care about my government; I don’t care about my country,” he added. He conceded, however, that he did care about soccer and women.

Such views, while not always so vehement, are common in Greece, where the government is widely seen as corrupt, regardless of who is in power. Few people expect much from the state — except highly coveted public sector jobs. Today, one in four Greek workers is employed by the state, a result of decades of public hiring to stave off social unrest.

The Papandreou administration has said that in 2010 it will hire only one new state worker for every five who retire. But that, too, poses problems. Savas Robolis, a member of the main labor union, the Greek General Confederation of Labor, who serves on a government committee on pension reform, called the pension situation a “time bomb.”

He said Greece had only enough money to pay pensions for one more year. If the country does not replenish the pension funds, “then we will face a huge social crisis in 10 years,” Mr. Robolis said.

Fears of cutbacks are causing widespread anxiety. Lambrini, who works in the Health Ministry and would give only her first name, said a possible freeze on her $1,300 monthly salary was a real concern for her and her husband, a municipal worker.

“We want to plan a family, but I don’t see how we can with such low incomes and with prices going up all the time,” she said.

She said she had never joined a labor protest before, but would take to the streets if her salary was frozen or cut. “I’ll be there,” she said. “And so will half the population.”

Guinean Junta Accuses French Foreign Minister in AttemptedAssassination of Camara

Guinea’s junta accuses Kouchner

France’s Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner was involved in a plot to kill the leader of Guinea’s ruling junta, the country’s military rulers say.

Junta spokesman Idrissa Cherif told the BBC that Mr Kouchner had “activated some networks” in order to “change the situation” in the West African country.

France’s government said the claims were “completely groundless”.

Junta leader Capt Moussa Dadis Camara is said to be recovering after being shot in the head last week.

He was flown out to Morocco for treatment and the soldier suspected of the shooting, Lt Toumba Diakite, is still on the run in Guinea.

‘No polemics’

Mr Cherif told the BBC’s World Today programme he did not believe the shooting was official French government policy.
——————————————————————————-
CAMARA’S RULE

–23, 24 December 2008 Strongman President Lansana Conte dies, Capt Camara takes over, promises 2010 election
–15 August 2009 Says he may stand for president
–28 September Soldiers kill protesters in Conakry, reports of atrocities and rapes
–October US, EU, African Union and Ecowas impose sanctions on junta
–3 December Capt Camara shot in the head in apparent assassination attempt
–4 December Flown to Morocco for surgery
—————————————————————————

“I wouldn’t say that I am accusing France entirely. I said that certain services were used to make this attempt on Mr Camara’s life, and the regime ruling the country,” he said.

“In the event, it’s Mr Bernard Kouchner. Mr Kouchner activated some networks in order to change the situation here.”

French Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Christine Farges rejected the allegations.

“We don’t want to enter into any polemics with anyone in Guinea,” she said.

“The international community… [is] waiting for Guinea to enter into a transition that is democratic and peaceful, and that will lead to free and fair elections as quickly as possible.”

Tensions between France, the former colonial power, and Guinea have been rising in recent days, culminating on Wednesday with France making an official complaint to the junta.

Security staff stopped the French ambassador near Conakry airport and demanded to search his car - which the French said was a deliberate attempt to violate the Vienna Convention on diplomatic relations.

City crackdown

Meanwhile in Guinea, Capt Camara’s deputies have moved to squash rumours of a power vacuum and confusion over who is in charge.

Interim leader Gen Sekouba Konate appeared on television for the first time since last Thursday’s shooting to urge unity.

BBC West Africa correspondent Caspar Leighton says there are increasing signs that Capt Camara will not be returning to head the government in the near future.

He says one of the junta’s leaders, while vouching for the loyalty of Gen Konate, suggested the general would lead this interim period - even if it were to last some years.

Elections had been due in January 2010.

Earlier this week the military launched a crackdown on anyone they believed could be linked with Lt Diakite or the plot to kill Capt Camara.

The authorities say more than 100 soldiers have been arrested since the shooting.

Reports from the capital, Conakry, say soldiers have also been sweeping through the city rounding up civilians.

Eyewitnesses have told journalists of people being shot in the streets as they fled from patrols.

Guinea has been in turmoil since the military took over last December just hours after the death of long-time ruler Lansana Conte.

Capt Camara initially promised to guide the country back to civilian rule, but soon dropped hints that he would stand for president himself.

That led to a large protest in a Conakry sports stadium - which was brutally suppressed by the military with widespread reports of mass killings and rapes carried out by soldiers.

The crackdown has been condemned by France, as well as the EU, US and the African Union.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/8405488.stm
Published: 2009/12/10 11:31:59 GMT