Thousands march in Spain to protest austerity

Thousands march in cities across Spain protesting government austerity policies, unemployment

Associated Press -

MADRID (AP) -- Tens of thousands of demonstrators are marching in dozens of Spanish cities to protest sky-high unemployment, what they say is the government*s inefficient handling of theeconomy and corruption scandals, including one engulfing the royal family.

Rallies have been organized in Madrid and 60 other cities Sunday by 150 organizations including trade unions representing the construction, car and television industries as well as police and health services.

Spain's unemployment rate is at a staggering 26 percent and the economy is immersed in its second recession in three years, with many young graduates and qualified professionals emigrating to find jobs elsewhere.

General Workers Union spokesman Candido Mendez said it was clear most people rejected the government's austerity policies, which he said were pushing many toward poverty and away from democracy.

Captured Syrian city a test for rebel forces

FILE - In this file image taken from video on Tuesday, Sept. 18, 2012 from the Ugarit News, which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, Free Syrian Army soldiers seize the main square in the northern town of Raqqa, Syria. Since Raqqa fell under rebel control last week, opposition fighters have posted guards at government buildings to prevent looting, brought down the price of bread and opened a telephone hotline for residents to report security problems. Raqqa is shaping up as a test case for how rebels will administer their areas. (AP Photo/Ugarit News via AP video, File)

FILE - In this Monday, March 4, 2013 file image taken from video obtained from Ugarit News, which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, a statue of former Syrian President Hafez Assad is pulled down in a central square in Raqqa, Syria. Since Raqqa fell under rebel control last week, opposition fighters have posted guards at government buildings to prevent looting, brought down the price of bread and opened a telephone hotline for residents to report security problems. Raqqa is shaping up as a test case for how rebels will administer their areas. (AP Photo/Ugarit News via AP video, File)

BEIRUT (AP) — Since rebels seized the capital of Raqqa province in northern Syria from the government last week, they have posted guards at state buildings, returned bread prices to pre-war levels and opened a hotline that residents can phone to report security issues, anti-regime activists said Sunday.

At the same time, they have killed captured security forces in public squares and driven their dead bodies through the streets. The most powerful rebel brigades in the city are extremist Muslims and include Jabhat al-Nusra, which the U.S. government says is linked to al-Qaida.

As the first major Syrian city to fall entirely under rebel control, Raqqa is shaping up to be the best test case yet for how opposition fighters will administer territory amid Western concerns over who will fill the vacuum if President Bashar Assad is ousted. While the city's new rulers try to govern, they are struggling with the same divisions that have hampered the rebel movement's effectiveness throughout Syria's civil war.

The rising power of Islamic extremists in their ranks also could block them from receiving badly needed aid from countries that support the anti-Assad struggle but fear weapons could fall into the wrong hands. The United States recently promised $60 million in new, non-lethal assistance to the opposition inside Syria, and other powers are considering sending arms. Most of these countries would look askance, however, at rebels who seek an Islamic state or stand accused of war crimes.

Rebels in Raqqa reached via phone and Skype on Sunday acknowledged the strength of Islamic brigades but said these groups didn't seek to impose outside ideologies on the city. "This is not Islamic extremism," said Abu Yazan, a leader in the Islamist Faithful of Raqqa Brigade. "It is these Islamic movements that freed us from the criminal regime."

Over the last year, rebels have greatly expanded the territory they hold in the provinces of Idlib and Aleppo along the Turkish border. In February, they extended their control into Raqqa province, seizing a hydroelectric dam on the Euphrates River. After storming a central prison, they seized most of Raqqa city on March 4, solidifying their control over the next two days.

That made Raqqa, a north-central city of 500,000 people, the first of Syria's provincial capitals to fall entirely under rebel control.

Since then, the city's rebels have been bedeviled by the same problems that have hindered them elsewhere. Most residents fled during the fighting and have stayed away, fearing the government attacks that often follow rebel takeovers.

Two such strikes hit the province on Saturday, killing at least 14 people and leaving dead bodies scattered in the streets, according to activists and a video posted online.

Other videos have surfaced online of government security officers killed after their capture by rebels.

One shot Saturday shows the bodies of three men face down in a public square, their hands bound and their brains blown out.

"The dogs of military security were executed in Clock Square," an off-camera narrator says.

Another video shows rebels driving the dead body of a military intelligence official around town in the back of a truck. At one point, they lay it in a street next to another body. Both have holes in their heads.

A Raqqa activist said Sunday via Skype that military security was notorious for its brutality toward the opposition during the uprising, which began with anti-regime protests in March 2011 and later spiraled into civil war. The U.N. says more than 70,000 people have been killed since.

When rebels entered the city, they surrounded the military security compound and granted safe passage to the 60 officers inside to a nearby airport, he said. On the way to the airport, however, the officers tried to break away, sparking clashes that killed four rebels and nine officers. The rest fled. Rebels then killed them upon capture as punishment, he said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he attends university in a government-controlled area.

Abu Yazan, the rebel leader, corroborated the story but said only 30 officers were involved. The body displayed in the truck, he said, was an officer named Mohammed al-Ahmed who was known for his brutality.

"Praise God that we killed him," he said. "God willing we have finished with his evil forever."

Other regime officials appear to have been kept alive. Activists have distributed videos of the provincial governor, Hassan Jalali; the branch head of the ruling Baath party, Suleiman al-Suleiman; and the deputy chief of military security, Col. Ahmed Abdullah al-Jadou.

All videos appeared authentic and corresponded to other reporting by The Associated Press.

The activist also said rebels had captured some 50 political security officers, who are now in a local prison.

The Syrian government has remained mum on the situation in Raqqa in recent days. It blames the violence in the country on an international conspiracy carried out by terrorists.

Syria's pro-government al-Watan newspaper denied Wednesday that Raqqa had fallen, while naming officials who had been captured. It said army reinforcements had reached the city and quoted a military official as saying the city would be "freed" in a few days.

Also Sunday, some of the fiercest fighting in a year was reported in Baba Amr, the neighborhood in the central city of Homs that stood for rebel defiance earlier in the war but also for the government's ability to strike back. The Syrian military besieged Baba Amr for a month last year, killing hundreds of people before retaking the area.

Rebels and regime troops clashed again Sunday in Baba Amr as the government shelled and bombed, said the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an activist group. Amateur video showed clouds of smoke above Homs.

In the Damascus suburb of Harasta, a rocket-propelled grenade was fired at a van carrying preschoolers, according to Syrian state TV and a government official. The attack killed one child and wounded nine, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with briefing regulations.

As some fighters left to attack the remaining regime bases in the province, others have struggled to run the city's affairs.

The Raqqa activist said the city's market opened Sunday, though most residents have not returned. He said rebels had secured enough flour to reopen bakeries and return bread prices to their pre-war level of about 20 cents a bag from about ten times much, he said.

The city currently has two local councils, each run by lawyers who don't like each other, he said.

The city still has about 80 rebel groups, he said, which make coordination difficult. But he said the Faithful of Raqqa Brigade has led efforts to provide security, posting gunmen at government buildings to stop looters.

In a video posted online, the group announced a hotline that residents can call to request assistance. A call placed to the number by an AP reporter was promptly answered by a brigade member.

Abu Yazan, a leader with the group, said he expects they'll get more calls as civilians return to the city.

"The primary goal is to serve the citizen and nothing more," he said.

___

Associated Press writer Albert Aji contributed reporting from Damascus, Syria.

Pakistan starts work on Iranian gasline opposed by U.S

By Marcus George

DUBAI (Reuters) - The presidents of Iran and Pakistan marked the start of Pakistani construction on a much-delayed gas pipeline on Monday, Iranian media reported, despite U.S. pressure on Islamabad to back out of the project.

Dubbed the "peace pipeline", the $7 billion project has faced repeated delays since it was conceived in the 1990s to connect Iran's giant South Pars gas field to India via Pakistan.

The United States has steadfastly opposed Pakistani and Indian involvement, saying the project could violate sanctions imposed on Iran over nuclear activities that Washington suspects are aimed at developing a weapons capability. Iran denies this.

India quit the project in 2009, citing costs and security issues, a year after it signed a nuclear deal with Washington.

Iranian state television showed live footage of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Pakistani President Asef Ali Zardari shaking hands and offering prayers after unveiling a plaque to mark Pakistan's involvement.

Alluding to the United States, Ahmadinejad accused "foreign elements" of seeking to undermine Iran's relations with Pakistan and to thwart the Islamic Republic's progress by using its nuclear programme as a pretext.

"I want to tell those individuals that the gas pipeline has no connection whatsoever with the nuclear case," Ahmadinejad said in a translated address broadcast live on state television that followed the ground-breaking ceremony.

"With natural gas you cannot make atomic bombs. That's why they should have no excuse to oppose this pipeline."

"BROWNIE POINTS"

Pakistan has pursued the pipeline scheme as a way of alleviating severe energy shortages that have sparked demonstrations and battered a weak government. At the same time, it badly needs the billions of dollars it receives in U.S. aid.

"The Pakistani government wants to show it is willing to take foreign policy decisions that defy the U.S., particularly when such crucial issues as energy security are at stake," said Anthony Skinner, a director of British-based Maplecroft risks consultancy.

"The pipeline not only caters to Pakistan's energy needs, but also lodges brownie points with the many critics of the U.S. amongst the electorate," he told Reuters.

Iran has completed 900 km (560 miles) of pipeline on its side of the border and Iranian contractors will also construct the pipeline in Pakistan, Iran's national broadcasting network IRIB reported.

Tehran has agreed to lend Islamabad $500 million, or a third of the estimated $1.5 billion cost of the 750 km Pakistani section of the pipeline, Fars news agency reported.

The two sides hope the pipeline will be complete in time to start delivery of 21.5 million cubic metres of gas per day to Pakistan by December 2014.

The project faces security challenges posed by ethnic Baluch militants who have demanded greater control over Baluchistan's natural resources, and by Iranian Sunni insurgents also based in Pakistan who are fighting for greater rights in Iran.

"Having a pipeline running through the region makes it particularly vulnerable to bombings and disruption," said Skinner. "Washington could bolster its support for local elements, causing significant disruption to pipeline infrastructure."

(Reporting by Marcus George; Editing by Alistair Lyon)

2,800 pigs dumped in Shanghai river raises concern

China pulls out 2,800 adult, baby pigs from Shanghai river after contaminated pork crackdown

Horsemeat Scandal: Now With More Drugs!

It's bad enough when those burgers and meatballs you thought were beef actually contain horse meat. But what about finding out they're also laced with a veterinary drug that can sometimes pose health risks for humans?

Well, that's exactly what a Portugal consumer protection group says they found in meatballs and burgers, opening a new front in the lingering horse meat scandal that just won't end.

Officials at DECO, the agency that found the drug, said there was no immidiate risk to human health, since the amount of Phenylbutazone —or bute — detected was so small. But it raised new questions about the safety of food production throughtout Europe.

Since January, horse meat DNA has been popping up in all kinds of places where it isn't supposed to be, all across Europe. Officials are still trying to track down the sources of the illicit horse meat, but the entire episode has been one scary insight into what happens in our huge industrialized food chain.

European food safety and medical experts are carrying out a risk assessment on the dangers posed by consuming products tainted with bute. A final report is due April 15.

More on the European Horsemeat Scandal from TakePart:

• Horsemeat Lasagna? Europe’s Meat Scandal Spreads

• Tacos Caballos? Taco Bell Now Implicated In Worldwide Horsemeat Scandal

• Burger King Gets Caught Up in U.K.’s Horsemeat Scandal