Syrians protest Arab vote; embassies attacked

BEIRUT (AP) — Tens of thousands of Syrian government supporters poured into the streets Sunday to protest an Arab League vote to suspend the country's membership, as Turkey sent planes to evacuate diplomatic staff and their families after a night of attacks on embassies.

Pro-Syrian regime protesters, carry a giant Syrian flag during a demonstration against the Arab League decision to suspend Syria, in Damascus, Syria, on Sunday Nov. 13, 2011. Tens of thousands of pro-regime demonstrators gathered in a Damascus square Sunday to protest the Arab League's vote to suspend Syria over its bloody crackdown on the country's eight-month-old uprising. Saturday's Arab League decision was a sharp rebuke to a regime that prides itself as a bastion of Arab nationalism, but it was unlikely to immediately end a wave of violence that the U.N. estimates has killed more than 3,500 people since mid-March. (AP Photo/Muzaffar Salman)

Facing growing isolation, the Syrian government called for an urgent Arab summit to discuss the country's spiraling political unrest and invited Arab League officials to visit before its membership suspension was to take effect on Wednesday.

In a significant concession, the government said the Arab officials could bring any civilian or military observers they deem appropriate to oversee implementation of an Arab League plan for ending the bloodshed.

The 22-member bloc's vote on Saturday was a stinging rebuke to a regime that prides itself as a bastion of Arab nationalism and left Syria increasingly isolated over its crackdown on an eight-month uprising that the U.N. estimates has killed more than 3,500 people since mid-March.

The violence continued Sunday, with activists reporting at least 11 people killed in shootings by security forces in several parts of the country.

The Local Coordination Committees activist network said at least four of the deaths occurred in the central city of Hama when security forces fired on a group of opposition protesters who infiltrated a pro-government rally in the area.

Sunday's protests in support of the government drew large numbers in the capital and four other cities — a turnout helped by the closure of businesses and schools.

"You Arab leaders are the tails of Obama," read one banner held by protesters accusing the Arab League of bowing to pressure from the U.S. president.

Thousands of people carried red, black and white Syrian flags and posters of President Bashar Assad in a Damascus square. Similar demonstrations were held in the cities of Aleppo, Latakia, Tartous and Hasakeh.

The Syrian leader asserts that extremists pushing a foreign agenda to destabilize Syria are behind the country's unrest, rather than true reform seekers aiming to open the country's autocratic political system. Sunday's demonstrators accused Arab countries of being complicit with the purported conspiracy.

The government called the Arab League decision "illegal," claiming it was intended to set the stage for foreign military intervention like in Libya.

However, the offer to allow a visit by an Arab League ministerial committee and accompanying monitors appeared to signal some will to try to implement an Arab League-brokered deal for ending the violence that the government has so far seemed unwilling or unable to do. The Nov. 2 deal calls for Syria to halt attacks on protesters, pull tanks out of cities and hold talks with the opposition.

There was no immediate reaction from Arab League officials on the Syrian invitation. Arab League Secretary General Nabil Elaraby, on a visit to Libya, demanded immediate implementation of the Arab peace initiative.

Youssef Ahmed, Syria's ambassador to the Arab League, said the official request for an emergency meeting was on its way to the organization and that Syria was awaiting a response.

Iraq's representative with the Arab League has offered Baghdad as a location for the meeting if it is approved.

Members of the Syrian opposition rejoiced and saw the Arab vote to suspend Syria as a step toward greater recognition for their movement.

"This gives strong legitimacy to our cause. ... We consider this decision to be a victory for the Syrian revolution," Bassma Kodmani, a spokeswoman for the Syrian National Council opposition group, told The Associated Press.

Hours after the Arab League vote, pro-regime demonstrators in Syria assaulted the diplomatic offices of countries critical of the Syrian government, including break-ins at the Saudi and Qatari embassies and attacks at Turkish diplomatic posts across the country.

The overnight embassy attacks are likely to stoke anger in Arab states against the regime in Damascus. Arab disapproval in itself may not seriously damage President Assad's hold on power, but if Syria further antagonizes Gulf states, it risks having them build up the Syrian opposition into a unified body that can win international recognition, as happened during Libya's civil war this year.

Syrian security forces had confronted Saturday night's protesters at embassies with batons and tear gas but were unable to stop a group from breaking into the Qatari embassy and bringing down the Qatari flag and replacing it with the Syrian flag. Others entered Saudi Arabia's embassy compound, broke windows and ransacked some areas, the kingdom's media reported.

The kingdom strongly condemned the attack in a Foreign Ministry statement and said it held the Syrian authorities responsible for protecting its interests.

Saudi King Abdullah, who has condemned Assad's crackdown, had already recalled the Saudi ambassador to Syria in August. Kuwait and Bahrain have also recalled their ambassadors.

Protesters also tried to break into the Turkish Embassy in Damascus Saturday and into the country's consulates in the cities of Aleppo and Latakia, Turkey's state-run Anatolia news agency reported. Turkey is not a member of the Arab League but has also been sharply critical of Syria's crackdown, and Turkey's foreign minister welcomed the League vote.

Turkey on Sunday sent a plane to Damascus to evacuate the families of its diplomats as well as nonessential staff, Anatolia reported. The Turkish Foreign Ministry also said Turkey summoned Syria's charge d'affaires who was given a formal protest note demanding protection for its diplomatic missions.

France also said it had summoned Syria's ambassador to "remind" him of Syria's international obligations, after demonstrators tried to attack an honorary French consulate in Latakia and another French office in Aleppo.

On Sunday, hundreds of baton-carrying Syrian riot police in helmets ringed the U.S., Qatari, Saudi and Turkish embassies — all located in the capital's upscale Abu Rummaneh district. Three fire trucks were parked in front of the Turkish Embassy. The Turkish and Qatari embassies were closed for the day but the Saudi Embassy was operating, an operator said.

Source: The Associated Press

Read More

Bombings, beheadings? Stats show a peaceful world

WASHINGTON (AP) — It seems as if violence is everywhere, but it's really on the run.

Yes, thousands of people have died in bloody unrest from Africa to Pakistan, while terrorists plot bombings and kidnappings. Wars drag on in Iraq and Afghanistan. In peaceful Norway, a man massacred 69 youths in July. In Mexico, headless bodies turn up, victims of drug cartels. This month eight people died in a shooting in a California hair salon.

Yet, historically, we've never had it this peaceful.

In this March 26, 1979 file photo, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, U.S. President Jimmy Carter and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin clasp hands on the north lawn of the White House in Washington as they completed the signing of the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. It seems as if violence is everywhere. Yet, historically, we've never had it this peaceful. That's the thesis of three new books, including one by Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker. Statistics reveal dramatic reductions in war deaths, family violence, racism, rape, murder and all sorts of mayhem. (AP Photo)

That's the thesis of three new books, including one by prominent Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker. Statistics reveal dramatic reductions in war deaths, family violence, racism, rape, murder and all sorts of mayhem.

In his book, Pinker writes: "The decline of violence may be the most significant and least appreciated development in the history of our species."

And it runs counter to what the mass media is reporting and essentially what we feel in our guts.

Pinker and other experts say the reality is not painted in bloody anecdotes, but demonstrated in the black and white of spreadsheets and historical documents. They tell a story of a world moving away from violence.

In his new book, "The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined," Pinker makes the case that a smarter, more educated world is becoming more peaceful in several statistically significant ways. His findings are based on peer-reviewed studies published by other academics using examinations of graveyards, surveys and historical records:

— The number of people killed in battle — calculated per 100,000 population — has dropped by 1,000-fold over the centuries as civilizations evolved. Before there were organized countries, battles killed on average more than 500 out of every 100,000 people. In 19th century France, it was 70. In the 20th century with two world wars and a few genocides, it was 60. Now battlefield deaths are down to three-tenths of a person per 100,000.

— The rate of genocide deaths per world population was 1,400 times higher in 1942 than in 2008.

— There were fewer than 20 democracies in 1946. Now there are close to 100. Meanwhile, the number of authoritarian countries has dropped from a high of almost 90 in 1976 to about 25 now.

Pinker says one of the main reasons for the drop in violence is that we are smarter. IQ tests show that the average teenager is smarter with each generation. The tests are constantly adjusted to keep average at 100, and a teenager who now would score a 100 would have scored a 118 in 1950 and a 130 in 1910. So this year's average kid would have been a near-genius a century ago. And that increase in intelligence translates into a kinder, gentler world, Pinker says.

"As we get smarter, we try to think up better ways of getting everyone to turn their swords into plowshares at the same time," Pinker said in an interview. "Human life has become more precious than it used to be."

Pinker argued his case in a commentary this past week in the scientific journal Nature. He has plenty of charts and graphs to back up his claims, including evidence beyond wartime deaths — evidence that our everyday lives are also less violent:

— Murder in European countries has steadily fallen from near 100 per 100,000 people in the 14th and 15th centuries to about 1 per 100,000 people now.

— Murder within families. The U.S. rate of husbands being killed by their wives has dropped from 1.2 per 100,000 in 1976 to just 0.2. For wives killed by their husbands, the rate has slipped from 1.4 to 0.8 over the same time period.

— Rape in the United States is down 80 percent since 1973. Lynchings, which used to occur at a rate of 150 a year, have disappeared.

— Discrimination against blacks and gays is down, as is capital punishment, the spanking of children, and child abuse.

But if numbers are too inaccessible, Pinker is more than happy to provide the gory stories illustrating our past violence. "It is easy to forget how dangerous life used to be, how deeply brutality was once woven into the fabric of daily existence," Pinker writes in his book.

He examines body counts, rapes, sacrifice and slavery in the Bible, using an estimate of 1.2 million deaths detailed in the Old Testament. He describes forms of torture used in the Middle Ages and even notes the nastiness behind early day fairy tales, such as the evil queen's four gruesome methods for killing Snow White along with a desire to eat her lungs and liver.

Even when you add in terrorism, the world is still far less violent, Pinker says.

"Terrorism doesn't account for many deaths. Sept. 11 was just off the scale. There was never a terrorist attack before or after that had as many deaths. What it does is generate fear," he said.

It's hard for many people to buy the decline in violence. Even those who deal in peace for a living at first couldn't believe it when the first academics started counting up battle deaths and recognized the trends.

In 1998, Andrew Mack, then head of strategic planning for U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, said a look at the statistics showed the world was becoming less violent. The reaction from his professional peacekeeping colleagues?

"Pffft, it's not true," they told Mack, arguing that the 1990s had to be the worst decade in U.N. history. It wasn't even close.

Joshua Goldstein, a professor of international relations at American University and author of "Winning the War on War," has also been telling the same story as Pinker, but from a foreign policy point of view. At each speech he gives, people bring up America's lengthy wars in the Middle East. "It's been a hard message to get through," he acknowledged.

"We see the atrocities and they are atrocious," Goldstein said. "The blood is going to be just as red on the television screens."

Mack, who's now with Simon Fraser University in Canada, credits the messy, inefficient and heavily political peacekeeping process at the U.N., the World Bank and thousands of non-governmental organizations for helping curb violence.

The "Human Security Report 2009/2010," a project led by Mack and funded by several governments, is a worldwide examination of war and violence and has been published as a book. It cites jarringly low numbers. While the number of wars has increased by 25 percent, they've been minor ones.

The average annual battle death toll has dropped from nearly 10,000 per conflict in the 1950s to less than 1,000 in the 21st century. And the number of deadliest wars — those that kill at least 1,000 people a year — has fallen by 78 percent since 1988.

Mack and Goldstein emphasize how hard society and peacekeepers have worked to reduce wars, focusing on action taken to tamp down violence, while Pinker focuses on cultural and thought changes that make violence less likely. But all three say those elements are interconnected.

Even the academics who disagree with Pinker, Goldstein and Mack, say the declining violence numbers are real.

"The facts are not in dispute here; the question is what is going on," John Mearsheimer, a professor of political science at the University of Chicago and author of "The Tragedy of Great Power Politics."

"It's been 21 years since the Cold War ended and the United States has been at war for 14 out of those 21 years," Mearsheimer said. "If war has been burned out of the system, why do we have NATO and why has NATO been pushed eastward...? Why are we spending more money on defense than all other countries in the world put together?"

What's happening is that the U.S. is acting as a "pacifier" keeping the peace all over the world, Mearsheimer said. He said like-minded thinkers, who call themselves "realists" believe "that power matters because the best way to survive is to be really powerful." And he worries that a strengthening China is about to upset the world power picture and may make the planet bloodier again.

And Goldstein points out that even though a nuclear attack hasn't occurred in 66 years — one nuclear bomb could change this trend in an instant.

Pinker said looking at the statistics and how violent our past was and how it is less so now, "makes me appreciate things like democracy, the United Nations, like literacy."

He and Goldstein believe it's possible that an even greater drop in violence could occur in the future.

Goldstein says there's a turn on a cliché that is apt: "We're actually going from the fire to the frying pan. And that's progress. It's not as bad as the fire."

Source:

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Read More

Saudi heir's death brings conservative to fore

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Saudi Arabia's ruling monarchy moved into a critical period of realignment Saturday after the death of the heir to the throne opened the way for a new crown prince: most likely a tough-talking interior minister who has led crackdowns on Islamic militants but also has shown favor to ultraconservative traditions such as keeping the ban on women voting.

Saudis watch a TV broadcast on the death of Crown Prince Sultan bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Saturday, Oct. 22, 2011. Prince Sultan died abroad Saturday after an illness, state TV said. Sultan, who was the kingdom's deputy prime minister and the minister of defense and aviation, has had a string of health issues. He underwent surgery in New York in February 2009 for an undisclosed illness and spent nearly a year abroad recuperating in the United States and at a palace in Agadir, Morocco. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

A state funeral is planned for Tuesday in Riyadh for crown prince Sultan bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud, who died in New York at the age of 80 after an unspecified illness, the official Saudi Press Agency said.

Now, Saudi rulers are expected to move quickly to name the new king-in-waiting — which royal protocol suggests will be Sultan's half brother, Prince Nayef.

Moving Nayef to the top of the succession ladder would not likely pose any risks to Saudi Arabia's pro-Western policies and, in particular, its close alliance with Washington. But Nayef cuts a much more mercurial figure than Saudi's current leader, the ailing King Abdullah, who has nudged ahead with reforms such as promising women voting rights in 2015 despite rumblings from the country's powerful religious establishment.

Nayef, 78, has earned U.S. praise for unleashing the internal security forces against suspected Islamic extremist cells in Saudi Arabia, which was home to 15 of 19 of the Sept. 11 hijackers. Yet he brought blistering rebukes in the West for a 2002 interview that quoted him as saying that "Zionists" — a reference to Jews — benefited from the 9-11 attacks because it turned world opinion against Islam and Arabs.

Nayef also has expressed displeasure at some of Abdullah's moves for more openness, saying in 2009 that he saw no need for women to vote or participate in politics. It's a view shared by many Saudi clerics, who follow a strict brand of Islam known as Wahhabism. Their support gives the Saudi monarchy the legitimacy to rule over a nation holding Islam's holiest sites.

"Nayef is more religious, and is closer to the Saudi groups who are very critical of the king's decisions regarding women and other steps he's taken to balance out the rigid religious practices in society," said Ali Fakhro, a political analyst and commentator in Bahrain.

But it remains doubtful that Nayef — if ever made king — would outright annul Abdullah's reforms, which include the establishment of a coed university where both genders can mix. More likely, Nayef would put any further changes on hold, said Abdulkhaleq Abdulla, a political affairs professor at Emirates University.

"It's not good news for Saudis or for the region," he said. "(Nayef) is the security guy. He is the mukhabarat (secret police) guy. He is the internal affairs guy."

Although it's not certain that Nayef will be selected to succeed Sultan, the signs point clearly in that direction.

After Sultan fell ill two years ago, Nayef was named second deputy prime minister, traditionally the post right behind the crown prince. For the first time, however, the mechanism of picking the next No. 2 in the royal succession is not entirely clear.

Traditionally, the king names his successor. But this time it is possible that Abdullah will put the decision to the Allegiance Council, a 33-member body composed of his brothers and cousins. Abdullah created the council as part of his reforms and gave it a mandate to choose the heir.

Abdullah formed the council in order to modernize the process and give a wider voice. When it was created, it was decided that the council would choose the heir for the first time when Sultan rose to the throne, and his crown prince would need to be named. But it was not specified whether it would be used if Sultan died before the king.

The choice of whether to convene the council now will likely be made by the 87-year-old Abdullah, who is currently recovering from his third operation to treat back problems in less than a year.

"It is with deep sorrow and grief that the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah mourns the loss of his brother and Crown Prince, His Royal Highness Prince Sultan," the palace said in a statement announcing Sultan's death.

The announcement did not elaborate on his illness. According to a leaked U.S. diplomatic cable from January 2010, Sultan had been receiving treatment for colon cancer since 2009.

Sultan was the kingdom's defense minister in 1990 when U.S. forces deployed in Saudi Arabia to defend it against Iraqi forces that had overrun Kuwait. His son, Prince Khaled, served as the top Arab commander in the 1991 operation Desert Storm, in which U.S.-led troops drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait.

As defense minister, Sultan closed multibillion-dollar deals to establish the modern Saudi armed forces, including land, air, naval and air defense forces. On more than one occasion, the deals implicated several of his sons in corruption scandals — charges they have denied.

Sultan is survived by 32 children from multiple wives. They include Bandar, the former ambassador to the United States who now heads the National Security Council, and Khaled, Sultan's assistant in the Defense Ministry.

"The crown prince was a strong leader and a good friend to the United States over many years as well as a tireless champion for his country. He will be missed," said U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during a visit to Tajikistan. "Our relationship with Saudi Arabia is strong and enduring and we will look forward to working with the leadership for many years to come."

Britain's foreign secretary, William Hague, said Sultan served his country with "great dignity and dedication."

Saudi Arabia has been ruled since 1953 by the sons of its founder, King Abdul-Aziz, who had more than 40 sons by multiple wives. Sultan was part of the aging second generation of Abdul-Aziz's sons, including Nayef, the full brother of the late King Fahd, who died in 2005.

While Nayef has taken only minor roles in foreign affairs, he has been outspoken in one of Saudi Arabia's chief regional concerns: ambitions by rival Iran to expand its influence in the Middle East.

Earlier this year, he blamed the Shiite power for encouraging protests among Saudi Arabia's minority Shiites.

Nayef also was involved in the kingdom's decision in March to send military forces into neighboring Bahrain to help crush pro-reform demonstrations led by tiny island nation's majority Shiites against its Sunni rulers — which Gulf Arab leaders accuse of having ties to Iran.

With Yemen, he has called for Saudi Arabia to take a harder line with embattled President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who was treated in Saudi Arabia after surviving a blast in June and later returned to Yemen.

In August, Nayef accepted undisclosed libel damages from Britain's newspaper The Independent over an article which accused him of ordering police chiefs to shoot and kill unarmed demonstrators in Saudi Arabia.

Nayef has chaired Cabinet meetings in place of Abdullah and Sultan. He also draws considerable prestige from being among the sons of Abdul-Aziz's most prominent wife, known as the Sudeiri Seven. Abdullah's predecessor Fahd also was among the seven.

"Nayef's closer links to the Wahhabi establishment may see a reversal of some recent reforms, especially regarding women," said Christopher Davidson, a lecturer at Britain's Durham University and an expert on Gulf affairs. "But more likely business as usual, I think, with no further major reforms."

Source:

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Read More

Attack shuts Iraq's largest oil refinery, kills 1

BAGHDAD (AP) — Gunmen attacked Iraq's largest oil refinery before dawn Saturday, killing a guard and detonating bombs that sparked a fire and forced the facility to halt operations, officials said.

A few hours later, a small refinery in the south shut down after a technical failure sparked a fire in a storage unit, an official said.

If not fixed swiftly, the two shutdowns could translate into long lines at fuel stations and longer electricity outages. The dearth of reliable electricity — some Iraqis get just a few hours a day — was one of the leading complaints of protesters during violent anti-government protests across Iraq on Friday.

FILE - In this Sept. 18, 2003 file photo, Iraqi firefighters battle an oil pipeline explosion along the main line from Iraq to Turkey near the northern Iraqi town of Beiji, Iraq. Gunmen attacked Saturday, Feb. 26, 2011, Iraq's largest oil refinery of Beiji, killing one guard and detonating bombs that sparked a fire and forced the facility to shut down, officials said. (AP Photo/Samir Mezban, File)

The attack on Iraq's largest refinery, Beiji, began at about 3:30 a.m. Assailants carrying pistols fitted with silencers attacked guards and planted bombs near some production units for benzene and kerosene, said the spokesman for Salahuddin province, Mohammed al-Asi.

One guard was killed and another wounded, al-Asi said.

Iraqi Oil Ministry spokesman Assem Jihad said an investigation would be launched and that he hoped operations could resume shortly.

The Beiji refinery, located about 155 miles (250 kilometers) north of Baghdad, has two sections. The attackers targeted the installation's North Refinery that handles 150,000 barrels a day. The second section, the Salahuddin Refinery, is under renovation. It used to process 70,000 barrels per day.

At the height of the insurgency from 2004 to late 2007, the Beiji refinery was under control of Sunni militants who used to siphon off crude and petroleum products to finance their operations.

Hours after the Beiji facility was attacked, a small refinery in Samawa, a city on the Euphrates River about 230 miles (370 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad, went offline due to a fire in the storage unit, according to a local official.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to release information, said the fire was caused by a technical failure, not foul play. He wouldn't say when work would resume at the plant which has the capacity of 30,000 barrels of a day.

Iraq's overall refining capacity is currently slightly over 500,000 barrels per day. Its three main oil refineries — Dora, Shuaiba and Beiji — process slightly over half of the 700,000 barrels-per-day capacity they had before the 2003 U.S. invasion.

Iraq sits on the world's third-largest known oil reserves with an estimated 115 billion barrels, but its production is far below its potential due to decades of war, U.N. sanctions, lack of foreign investment and insurgent attacks.

Iraq has been importing refined products since 2003 because of the dilapidated refining sector and booming local demand.

Saturday's closures could spell trouble for Iraqi consumers, especially at a time when the weather is just beginning to warm and more citizens will be relying on their air conditioning.

Also Saturday, health officials and police said two teens, ages 12 and 18, died of injuries sustained in the anti-government protests, bringing the death toll for the day to 14. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release information.

On Friday, thousands marched on government buildings and clashed with security forces in cities across Iraq in an outpouring of anger, the largest and most violent anti-government protests in the country since political unrest began spreading in the Arab world weeks ago.

The protests, billed as a "Day of Rage, were fueled by anger over corruption, chronic unemployment and shoddy public services from the Shiite-dominated government.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Read More