Kyrgyzstan opposition sets up 'people's government'

Violence on the streets of Bishkek as protesters and police clash

The opposition in Kyrgyzstan says it is setting up a "people's government" after deadly clashes left dozens dead.

An opposition leader and former foreign minister, Roza Otunbayeva, told the BBC that new defence and interior ministers had been appointed.

The whereabouts of President Bakiyev are not clear but reports say that he has flown out of the capital, Bishkek.

Protests at rising prices, corruption and the arrest of opposition leaders had erupted in three cities.

Ms Otunbayeva said the interim government would remain in power for six months and draw up a new constitution.

Kyrgyzstan is a strategically important Central Asian state and houses a key US military base that supplies forces in Afghanistan. Russia also has a base there.

Ms Otunbayeva said these military bases could continue as before.

The United States said it deplored the violence and urged "respect for the rule of law". It also said it believed the government was still in control.

Russian PM Vladimir Putin denied that Moscow had played any role in the unrest, saying it was a "domestic affair" and that there should be "restraint".

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said the protests showed the "outrage at the existing regime".

A spokesman for Ban Ki-moon said the UN secretary general was "shocked by the reported deaths and injuries that have occurred today in Kyrgyzstan. He urgently appeals for dialogue and calm to avoid further bloodshed".

AT THE SCENE Rayhan Demytrie, BBC News, Bishkek Stun grenades and live rounds were fired at protesters in Bishkek's main square. The situation was chaotic with protesters attempting to move towards the presidential administration. They were shouting that President Bakiyev must go. A young protester was shot dead at the scene. His body was lying on a marble pavement and a large crowd was gathering around it. There was anger, lots of it. The protesters attacked riot police with rocks and machetes - some police officers were badly injured. Men in Kyrgyzstan compare Wednesday's riots to the ones five years ago when mass protests brought President Bakiyev to power. He was the hero of the so-called Tulip Revolution - a politician who many in Kyrgyzstan hoped would bring democratic changes to the country. But today, people are angry and frustrated. The detention of opposition leaders on Tuesday night backfired. Wednesday's protests were uncontrollable. The day angered boiled over

Gunfire is continuing into the night in Bishkek with shops set alight.

The BBC's Rayhan Demytrie in Bishkek says there is widespread looting, with hundreds of protesters moving from one store to another.

The Kyrgyz health ministry said 40 people had died in the clashes and more than 400 were injured.

But the opposition says that is far too low. In a broadcast on a TV channel it took over, spokesman Omurbek Tekebayev said at least 100 demonstrators had been killed.

The opposition used its channel to say that it was setting up a government that would be headed by former foreign minister, Rosa Otunbayeva.

Ms Otunbayeva said in a broadcast: "Power is now in the hands of the people's government. Responsible people have been appointed and are already working to normalise the situation."

The Associated Press news agency reported that an opposition leader had taken over the National Security Agency, the successor to the Soviet KGB.

But Galina Skripkina, of the opposition Social-Democratic Party, told Reuters news agency that the president had not yet resigned.

"He must... formally submit his resignation to parliament so we can appoint a caretaker government," she said.

Reuters also quoted the Kyrgyz border control as saying the frontier with Kazakhstan had been closed.

Agence France-Presse says the US has suspended military flights at its base in Kyrgyzstan.

Curfews

The whereabouts of the president remain unknown. Opposition figures said he had flown out of Bishkek and had landed in the southern city of Osh.

KYRGYZSTAN FACTS One of the poorest of the former Soviet states Hosts both US and Russian military air bases Population mostly Kyrgyz but 15% are Uzbek and a significant number of Russians live in the north and around the capital Kurmanbek Bakiyev has been president since the Tulip Revolution of 2005, which overthrew the government of Askar Akayev Mr Bakiyev vowed to restore stability but has been accused of failing to tackle corruption Opponents also complain he has installed relatives in key government posts Domestic media have come under increasing pressure from the government in recent months In pictures: Kyrgyzstan crisis Kyrgyz crisis: Eyewitness accounts Country profile: Kyrgyzstan Kyrgyzstan: Superpower hub Violence leaves uncertainty

Mr Bakiyev came to power amid a wave of street protests in 2005 known as the Tulip Revolution, but many of his allies have deserted him claiming intimidation and corruption.

The unrest had broken out in the provincial town of Talas on Tuesday and spread to Bishkek and another town, Naryn, on Wednesday. All three were put under curfew.

Interior Minister Moldomusa Kongatiyev, who was believed to have gone to Talas to calm the situation, was reportedly severely beaten.

Some reports said he had been killed by the mob, others that he was taken hostage, but there is no confirmation of his fate.

The violence may also have been exacerbated by the arrest of several opposition leaders, including Temir Sariyev, who was detained after arriving on a flight from Moscow on Wednesday. He was freed by protesters on Wednesday.

Police in Bishkek initially used tear gas and stun grenades to try to disperse protesters.

But the demonstrators overcame the police and marched to the presidential offices in the city centre.

Police cars were overturned and set alight and officers attacked by the crowd.

Gunfire could be heard crackling through the centre of Bishkek. The prosecutor's office was also set alight.

Source

Israel & Palestine w/ Author Mark Braverman

CrossTalk on IMF: To be or not to be...

Obedience To Authority

A commentary on Stanley Milgram's psychology classic

Being aware of our natural tendency to obey authority may lessen the chance that we blindly follow orders that go against our conscience.

In 1961 and 1962, a series of experiments were carried out at Yale University. Volunteers were paid a small sum to participate in what they understood would be 'a study of memory and learning'. In most of the experiments, a white-coated experimenter took charge of two of the volunteers, one of which was given the role of 'teacher' and the other 'learner'. The learner was told he had to remember lists of word pairs, and if he couldn't recall them, the teacher was asked to give the person, who was strapped into a chair, a small electric shock. With each incorrect answer, the voltage rose, and the teacher was forced to watch as the learner moved from small grunts of discomfort to screams of agony.

What the teacher didn't know was that there was actually no current running between his control box and the learner's chair, and that the volunteer was in fact an actor who is only pretending to get painful shocks. The real focus of the experiment was not the 'victim', but the reactions of the teacher pressing the buttons. How would they cope with administering greater and greater pain to a defenseless human being?

The Milgram experiment is one of the most famous in psychology, written up in his 1974 book Obedience to Authority. Here we take a look at what actually happened and why the results are important.

Expectations and reality

If you are like most people, you would expect that at the first sign of genuine pain on the part of the person being shocked, you would want the experiment halted. After all, it is only an experiment. This is the response Milgram got when, separate to the actual experiments, he surveyed a range of people (psychiatrists, graduate students, psychology academics, middle-class adults) on how they believed the subjects would react in these circumstances. Most predicted that the subjects would not give shocks beyond the point where the other subject asked to be freed. These expectations were entirely in line with Milgram's own. But what actually happened?

Most subjects were very stressed by the experiment, and protested to the experimenter that the person in the chair should not have to take any more. The logical next step would be then demand that the experiment be terminated.

In reality, this rarely happened.

Despite their reservations, most people continued to follow the orders of the experimenter and inflict progressively greater shocks. Indeed, as Milgram notes, “...a substantial proportion continue to the last shock on the generator”. This is even when they could hear the cries of the other subject, and even when that person pleaded to be let out of the experiment.

How we cope with a bad conscience

Milgram’s experiments have caused controversy over the years; many people are simply unwilling to accept that normal human beings would act like this. Many scientists have tried to find holes in the methodology, but the experiment has been replicated around the world with similar outcomes. As Milgram notes, the results astonish people. They want to believe that the subjects that volunteered are sadistic monsters. However, he made sure the subjects covered a range of social classes and professions, were 'normal' people put in unusual circumstances.

Why don't the subjects administering the 'shocks' get guilty and just opt out of the experiment? Milgram is careful to point out that most of his subjects knew that what they were doing was not right. They hated giving the shocks, especially when the victim was objecting to them. Yet even though they thought the experiment cruel or senseless, most were not able to extract themselves from it. Instead they developed coping mechanisms to justify what they were doing. These included:

• Getting absorbed in the technical side of the experiment. People have a strong desire to be competent in their work. The experiment and its successful implementation became more important than the welfare of the people involved.
• Transferring moral responsibility for the experiment to its leader. This is the common “I was just following orders” defense found in any war crimes trial. The moral sense or conscience of the subject is not lost, but is transformed into a wish to please the boss or leader.
• Choosing to believe that their actions need to be done as part of a larger, worthy cause. Where in the past wars have been waged over religion or political ideology, in this case the cause was Science.
• Devaluing the person who is receiving the shocks: ‘if this person is dumb enough not to be able to remember the word pairs, they deserve to be punished’. Such impugning of intelligence or character is commonly used by tyrants to encourage followers to get rid of whole groups of people. They are not worth much, the thinking goes, so who really cares if they are eliminated? The world will be a better place.

Perhaps the most surprising of the above is Milgram's observation that the subject's sense of morality does not disappear, but is reoriented, so that they feel duty and loyalty not to those they are harming but to the person giving the orders. The subject is not able to extract themselves from the situation because – amazingly – it would be impolite to go against the wishes of the experimenter. The subject feels they have agreed to do the experiment, so to pull out would make them appear as a promise-breaker.

The desire to please authority is seemingly more powerful than the moral force of the other volunteer's cries. When the subject does voice opposition to what is going on, he or she typically couches it in the most deferential terms – as Milgram described one subject: “He thinks he is killing someone, yet he uses the language of the tea table.”

From individual to 'agent'

Why are we like this? Milgram observed that the tendency of human beings to obey authority evolved for simple survival purposes. There had to be leaders and followers and hierarchies in order to get things done. Man is a communal animal, and does not want to rock the boat. Worse even than the bad conscience of harming others who are defenseless, it seems, is the fear of being isolated.

Most of us are inculcated from very young that it is wrong to hurt others needlessly, yet
we spend the first twenty years of our life being told what to do, so we get used to obeying authority. The experiments threw subjects right into the middle of this. Should they 'be good' in the sense of not harming, or 'be good' in the sense of doing what they're told? Most subjects chose the latter – suggesting our brain is hardwired to accept authority above all else.

The natural impulse not to harm others is dramatically altered when a person is put into a hierarchy structure. On our own we take full responsibility for what we do and consider ourselves autonomous, but once in a system or hierarchy we are more than willing to give over that responsibility to someone else. We stop being ourselves, and instead become an 'agent' for someone or something else.

How it becomes easy to kill

Milgram was influenced by the story of Adolf Eichmann, whose job it was to actually engineer the death of six million Jews under Hitler. Hannah Arendt's book Eichmann in Jerusalem had argued that Eichmann was not really a psychopath, but an obedient bureaucrat whose distance from the actual death camps allowed him to order the atrocities in the name of some higher goal. Milgram's experiments confirmed the truth of Arendt's idea of the 'banality of evil' - that is, humans are not inherently cruel, but become so when cruelty is demanded by authority. This was the main lesson of his study: that “...ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process.”

Obedience to Authority can make for painful reading, especially the transcript of an interview with an American soldier who participated in the Mai Lai massacre in Vietnam. Milgram concluded that there was such a thing as inherent psychopathy, or 'evil', but that it was statistically not common. His alarm was more about your average person (his experiments include women too, who showed almost no difference in obedience to men) if taken off the street and put into the right conditions, can do terrible things to other people – and not feel too bad about it.

This, Milgram notes, is the purpose of military training. The trainee soldier is put in an environment separate from normal society and its moral niceties and instead is made to think in terms of 'the enemy'. He or she is instilled with: a love of 'duty'; the belief that they are fighting for a great cause; and a tremendous fear of disobeying orders: “Although its ostensible purpose is to provide the recruit with military skills, its fundamental aim is to break down any residues of individuality and selfhood.” The trainee soldier is made to become an agent for a cause, rather than a freethinking individual, and herein lies his or her vulnerability to dreadful actions. Other people stop being human beings, and become 'collateral damage'.

The ability to disobey

What makes one person able to disobey authority, while the rest cannot? Disobedience is difficult. Subjects generally feel their allegiance is to the experiment and experimenter; only a few are able to break this feeling and put the person suffering in the chair above the authority system. There is a big gap, Milgram noticed, between protesting that harm that was being done (which nearly all subjects did), and actually refusing to go on altogether. Yet this is the leap that is made by those few who do disobey authority on ethical or moral grounds. They assert their individual beliefs despite the situation, whereas most of us bend to the situation. It is the difference between a hero who is willing to risk their own life to save others - and an Eichmann.

Culture has taught us how to obey authority, Milgram remarks, but not how to disobey authority that is morally reprehensible.

Final comments

Obedience To Authority seems to give little comfort about human nature. Because we evolved in clear social hierarchies over thousands of years, part of our brain wiring makes us want us to obey people above us. Yet it is only through knowledge of this strong tendency that we can avoid getting ourselves into situations in which we might do evil.

Every ideology requires a lot of obedient people to act in its name, and in the case of Milgram's experiment, the ideology that awed subjects was not religion or communism or a charismatic ruler. Apparently, people will do things in the name of science in the same way the Spanish Inquisitors tortured people in the name of God. Have a big enough 'cause', and it is easy to see how giving pain to another living thing can be justified without too much difficulty.

That our need to be obedient frequently overrides previous education or conditioning towards compassion, ethics or moral precepts would suggest that the cherished idea of human free will is a myth. On the other hand, Milgram's descriptions of people who did manage to say 'no' to further shocks should give us all hope for how we might act in a similar situation. It may be part of our heritage to obey authority mindlessly, but it is also in our natures to set aside ideology if it means causing pain, and to be willing to put a person above a system.

Milgram's experiments might have been less well-known were it not for the fact that Obedience To Authority is a gripping work of scientific literature. This is a book that anyone interested in how the mind works should have in their library. The genocide in Rwanda, the massacre at Srebrinica, and the affronts to human dignity at Abu Ghraib Prison are all illuminated and partially explained by its insights.

Source

Secret world of Vietnamese workers in Russia

By Hung Nguyen BBC Vietnamese, Moscow

Vietnamese migrants work up to 20 hours a day in this Russian factory

Three years ago, Cuong left his wife and two children in Vietnam and went to Russia in search of a job.

The young man from Hai Duong province thought he could make a good living as a garment factory worker.

Like many other Vietnamese illegal workers, he even changed his name - Cuong is an assumed identity - in order to avoid being detected and thrown out of the former communist state.

Vietnam has a rapidly growing economy, but many people still go and work in Russia, whose ties with the South East Asian nation date back to the Cold War era.

Cuong is one of thousands of Vietnamese who have left the heat of the countryside for the Russian cold to become "ghost workers" - people who are employed in factories that are not registered and do not pay taxes.

Now, three years after arriving, Cuong's dream of making lots of money has become a nightmare.

It all started when he could not find work in Moscow, so had to travel to Tula 200km (125 miles) away to find a job.

Cuong says from there everything went downhill.

Bad conditions

"I had to work 20 hours a day to make just over $30 (£19)," he says.

Despite working day and night, Cuong soon ended up in financial trouble because he could not earn enough money to make ends meet.

"Within a few months I was in the red by more than $165."

He says his passport was confiscated by the owner and foreman to prevent him and other workers from leaving.

Eventually Cuong managed to escape and found another job in a Russian construction company.

I am lucky to have a good employer. Work is hard but I made enough to make it worthwhile Thanh Ghost worker in Russia

Just as things began to pick up the owner of the firm withheld several months of his salary for no reason.

Today Cuong is worse off than when he first arrived.

He is desperate to go back to Vietnam because his mother has been diagnosed with cancer and his wife is raising their two daughters without any help from him.

Legal issues

Under Russian law migrant workers like Cuong and the companies they work for do not actually exist.

Critics say this means employees can easily be exploited.

Some factory owners told me they survive by paying bribes to rogue Russian police, tax officials and people in charge of overseeing foreign visitors.

Working in these invisible factories is very risky because it is illegal and as some workers told me, they over-stay their visas and live in constant fear of being deported.

Russian law bars deportees from returning for five years. But people have found ways around the system.

Some workers explained that with a certain amount of money, they bought new passports with new names to come back and earn more dollars.

Some Vietnamese told me, that despite the dangers, they have made money that they would not dream of earning back home.

Opportunities

Thanh, a young woman, comes from the same province as Cuong. She returned to Moscow for the second time in 2006.

She admits that there are many pitfalls, but has absolutely no regrets.

Workers clean a van as they prepare to go on a rare shopping trip

"I am lucky to have a good employer. Work is hard but I make enough to make it worthwhile."

Thanh works 12-14 hours a day in a "ghost" factory just outside Moscow and earns $700-800 a month.

She does not spend any money on rent because she sleeps at the factory for free.

Thanh fell in love with a Vietnamese man in the same factory.

They went home to get married and returned to Russia under the names they have now.

She is now seven months pregnant, but her bump is still tiny - she says the long work hours have probably taken their toll on the baby's development.

The couple have already decided to return to Vietnam for the baby's birth.

They say they are prepared to take the risk because it is too expensive to deliver the child in Moscow.

Once the baby is born they will go back to Russia with their new baby and new names.

However some, like Cuong, cannot wait to get out of Russia.

He obtained a document from the Vietnamese embassy in Moscow which will allow him to travel back home - a new passport is too costly.

His hopes of making a living have been well and truly dashed and now he just wants to be with his family in Vietnam.

The only problem is he is stranded in Russia because he does not have the plane fare to go home, and he cannot leave until his family sends the money for the flight.

Source

US girl sues for $1m over arrest for desk scribble

Alexa Gonzalez was led out of her school in handcuffs by police

A 12-year-old US schoolgirl is suing the New York City authorities for $1m ($650,000) in damages after she was arrested for writing on her desk.

Alexa Gonzalez was led out of her school in handcuffs by police after she was caught scribbling a message to her friends with an erasable, green marker.

Miss Gonzalez and her mother are suing the police and education departments in New York City.

They are claiming for excessive use of force and violation of her rights.

Miss Gonzalez was caught scribbling "I love my friends Abby and Faith" on her desk during a Spanish class in February.

The 12-year-old said her Spanish teacher then "dragged" her to the dean's office where police were called.

'Better judgement'

Miss Gonzalez told the New York Daily News she broke down as she was led out of Junior High School 190 in Queens in handcuffs.

"I started crying, like, a lot," she said. "I made two little doodles... It could be easily erased. To put handcuffs on me is unnecessary."

We want to stop this from happening to other young children in the future Joseph Rosenthal, Gonzalez family lawyer

She said she was then held at a local school precinct for hours in what she calls a traumatising and excessive ordeal.

New York City officials have acknowledged the arrest was a mistake, saying better judgement should have been used by the arresting officers.

Miss Gonzalez was suspended from school and tried in a family court, where she was given eight hours of community service and ordered to write an essay about lessons to be learned from the incident.

Her family's lawyer said the school had overreacted by calling the police.

"We want to stop this from happening to other young children in the future," the lawyer, Joseph Rosenthal, told the New York Daily News.

Source

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Commentary

What a horrible thing to do to a 12 year old.

An easily erasable mark on a desk does not deserve 8 hours of community service, and an arrest.

I would sue for as much as the legal maximum, to punish the police force for such use of brutality and such heinous injustice.

US Treasury delays China currency report

By Madeleine Morris BBC News, Washington

The US says an undervalued yuan damages its economy

The US Treasury is delaying by several months a report on whether China manipulates its currency, the yuan.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said he would delay the report, which was due out on 15 April, until after a series of high-level international meetings.

The decision may improve US relations with China but could upset some American lawmakers.

It is no secret that the US believes China keeps the yuan artificially low, harming the US economy.

But saying that in an official report is a different matter.

It would set off a chain of events that could eventually result in unilateral US sanctions against Chinese products and could damage relations between the two countries.

Pressure on Iran

Mr Geithner justified pushing back his report to the US Congress by saying he would use upcoming events, including a G20 meeting and a US-China summit, to try to encourage the communist superpower to change its currency position.

Branding China as a currency manipulator at this stage would cause headaches for the US administration.

Chinese President Hu Jintao is due in Washington later this month for a nuclear summit, and the US is expected to push hard to sign China up to sanctions against Iran over Tehran's nuclear programme.

But the US government is under pressure from its own lawmakers to take a tougher line on China's currency.

A number of members of the US Congress believe the low yuan - which has been pegged to the dollar for nearly two years - is directly affecting their local economies.

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Scrap dealer who accidentally set off the Falklands War

Daniel Schweimler BBC News, Buenos Aires

While Britain has been involved in a number of conflicts since the Falklands War 28 years ago, it remains Argentina's only war in more than 100 years. Its defeat - and the issue of the island's sovereignty - continues to dominate on both a national and a personal level.

A war could have been avoided Constantino Davidoff, scrap dealer

Constantino Davidoff played a small but significant role in a small but significant war.

At the end of March 1982, a party of Argentine scrap metal merchants landed on the distant and inhospitable South Georgia island - 900km (600 miles) east of the Falkland Islands.

He was the owner of a company contracted to dismantle a whaling station on the British-owned island.

It was a simple business deal that promised to make him a lot of money - but ended up provoking a war and ruining his life.

I meet Mr Davidoff at his small, neat apartment in the working class Avellaneda neighbourhood, just south of Buenos Aires.

He still deals in scrap metal from a garage below his home. He is in his late 60s now, wearing a cream-coloured safari suit and dangling a large gold cross around his neck.

His walls are covered in maps of the South Atlantic and framed letters of thanks from Argentine veterans' groups he has spoken to about his experience.

"I lost everything - my house, my planes, my boats, my company and eventually, my family. I simply couldn't defend my interests after the war. I was very sick," Mr Davidoff tells me.

Military invasion

He has been trying to sue the British government for $200m (£132m), but the Argentine courts, he explains, are slow and only told him a couple of years ago that he would have to pursue his claim through the international courts.

He told me he had done everything he could to avoid problems with the British authorities.

At the end of 1981, he visited the British ambassador in Buenos Aires, spoke to the Falkland Island authorities, signed a deal worth $270,000 (£180,000) with the Scottish owners of the derelict whaling station and then went back to the British ambassador to ask if there was anything else he might need to do.

His claims are confirmed by the 1983 Franks Committee report carried out by the British authorities into the events leading up to the conflict.

But some in London thought the scrap metal workers were the advance party of an invasion of South Georgia island, by the then ruthless Argentine military government.

It was reported that they had planted the Argentine flag and were singing their national anthem.

British Royal Marines were despatched from the Falkland Islands to find out.

The 39 scrap metal workers were detained. Argentina sent its troops to rescue them and, while they were about it, invaded the Falkland Islands.

War declared

Margaret Thatcher, the British Prime Minister at the time, had no hesitation in dispatching a task force to the South Atlantic, and the two previously friendly countries fought a war in which more than 900 people died before Argentina surrendered on 14 June.

Britain won the military battle but is losing the diplomatic war... When the truth is known, then we'll have justice Constantino Davidoff

"There were no military among my workers. And they didn't sing the national anthem or plant a flag. This was a business deal. I'd have been crazy to ruin it. All it needed was a phone call from the British embassy and I would have withdrawn my workers. I'd have cancelled the contract," Mr Davidoff says. "A war could have been avoided."

Mr Davidoff insists that Britain started the war by sending a military contingent to deal with a civilian matter.

He says though, that, despite his legal claim, he doesn't bear any ill-will towards the British people.

But like every Argentine I've met in the more than four years that I've lived here, and the 20 or so that I've been visiting, he firmly believes that "Las Malvinas son Argentinas" - the Malvinas are Argentine.

Constant theme

Britain is now drilling for oil in the waters near the islands. But it is not the oil or the fishing rights that upset most Argentines - it is a somewhat idealistic sense of justice.

Argentina has been claiming the Falkland islands, or Las Islas Malvinas as they call them, since 1833.

More than 700 Argentines were killed fighting for Las Malvinas - the Falklands

They are marked as Argentine territory in every school atlas. Streets and ice-cream parlours are named after them and there are monuments to the fallen all over the country. For Argentina, it is a constant theme.

For most in Britain, the Falklands War is an historical footnote. And London will not negotiate while the 2,000 or so islanders say they want to remain British.

"Britain won the military battle but is losing the diplomatic war," explains Mr Davidoff.

In February, Latin American and Caribbean nations voted unanimously to back Argentina's claim, while Buenos Aires has renewed its complaint to the United Nations.

The scrap metal merchant believes that in his lifetime, he will see Argentina's sky-blue and white flag flying over the islands, perhaps in a power-sharing deal with Britain.

"Argentina has so much to give the islands. The war didn't end when the white flag went up," says Constantino Davidoff, leafing through the documents on his dining room table. "I believe in truth and justice. When the truth is known, then we'll have justice."

Source

Afghanistan Mullahs in London to bridge cultural divide

Emily Buchanan BBC News world affairs correspondent

Hajji Meherdell is against premature withdrawal of British forces

Their faces etched from years of conflict in the war-torn deserts of Helmand Province, four senior Islamic scholars step into a pod on the London Eye.

As the giant wheel turns they stare in silence at the city spread beneath them; the River Thames, the Houses of Parliament and miles beyond.

It is their first time ever in Britain. As they soak up the sights, they know this visit is about much more than tourism.

It marks a new initiative in British government strategy; the recognition that military progress in southern Afghanistan will not hold unless international forces also win the battle for hearts and minds.

In the intense propaganda war on the ground, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office now hopes to improve communication with ordinary Afghans by targeting their religious leaders.

Massive influence

Officials invited these scholars to see life for themselves in the UK, as they have the unique ability to influence thousands of mosques and their congregations in Britain's key military campaign ground.

Across Afghanistan there is widespread ignorance and deliberate misinformation about Britain and Britain's military intentions.

Ordinary people will listen to religious scholars often before politicians. The Taliban uses its religious credentials to tell local people repeatedly that the British are an occupying force which wants to destroy Muslims and their faith.

We have found true Islam in this country, a peaceful tolerant society Haji Mulla Meherdell Kajar

The four scholars, or ulemas, are supporters of the Afghan government and defy the Taliban, themselves often suffering death threats. They view the Taliban as an arm of foreign powers in the region who want to keep Afghanistan weak, and they are adamant they do not see Britain and its allies as occupiers.

Haji Mulla Meherdell Kajar, chief imam of the Central Mosque in Lashkar Gah, says the foreign forces are doing what they can to help Afghanistan and are making huge sacrifices in the process.

"The propaganda says that the invaders want to destroy us, and illiterate people listen to the propaganda. But these forces were invited in to help overcome our problems."

He was amazed to hear from the BBC that some British Muslims want the international forces to pull out. Hajji Meherdell was emphatically against a premature withdrawal.

False beliefs

"Those Muslim brothers who say Britain should leave Afghanistan - they don't know Islam. Don't they know our whole country is at war? They should advise the British not to withdraw their forces until they bring stability, security and development to us, and then they can go."

What surprised the scholars most, though, was to find Muslims in every walk of life in Britain.

Whether meeting them in the Foreign Office, or as security guards on the London Eye, they had not known before that Muslims had jobs. They believed that Muslims were treated badly and not allowed to practise their religion.

Haji Mokhtar Aqqani is the most senior religious figure in Helmand

They were particularly taken aback by the Afghan mosque in north-west London. They watched as several hundred turned up to pray.

Haji Mokhtar Aqqani, the most senior religious figure in Helmand, addressed the congregation. In Afghanistan he has spoken out against the Taliban, delivered radio messages condemning suicide bombings, and issued a fatwa against the growing of poppies. However even he still thought that Muslims in the UK could not go to the mosque.

After prayers, he told the BBC: "People in Helmand say that in Britain there are no mosques and no freedom to worship, so I was really surprised to see so many people come and pray here freely. I will take that message back home."

The scholars went to other mosques too in Birmingham and London.

Small cost, big dividend?

By the end of the trip, Haji Meherdell concluded: "We have found true Islam in this country, a peaceful tolerant society where Muslims are not harmed, the opposite of what the Taliban and insurgents tell us."

The Foreign Office hopes that if the scholars can go back and influence opinion in Afghanistan it will not just help the security of Afghanistan, but it will disarm the arguments of those who want to recruit young jihadis to strike Britain.

If it proves successful, there could be more attempts to try and bridge the gulf in knowledge and understanding between the two cultures.

Exchanges with British imams could also influence how Muslims in Britain view the international operation.

However this battle progresses, at least it is cheap; the cost of the ulemas' tour being a tiny fraction of that of the military campaign.

Source

Daimler agrees to pay $185m after admitting bribery

Daimler is best known for its Mercedes-Benz brand

German carmaker Daimler has pleaded guilty to corruption in the US and will pay $185m (£121m) to settle the case.

The charges relate to US Justice Department and Securities and Exchange Commission investigations into the company's global sales practices.

Daimler, the owner of Mercedes-Benz, admitted to paying tens of millions of dollars of bribes to foreign government officials in at least 22 countries.

The company said it had now reformed the way it did business.

Offshore accounts

The offences were committed between 1998 and 2008 by Daimler's German-based exports subsidiary Export and Trade Finance, and its Russian business Mercedes-Benz Russia.

Today, we are a better and stronger company, and we will continue to do everything we can to maintain the highest compliance standards Daimler chairman Dieter Zetsche

They were said to have given money and lavish gifts to help win contracts in countries including China, Russia, Thailand, Greece, and Iraq.

The Justice Department said that by "using offshore bank accounts, third-party agents and deceptive pricing practices, these companies saw foreign bribery as a way of doing business".

Daimler has since fired 45 employees implicated in the bribery.

The company's chairman Dieter Zetsche said the firm had "learned a lot from past experience".

"Today, we are a better and stronger company, and we will continue to do everything we can to maintain the highest compliance standards," he added.

'Deserves credit'

The case was heard in a federal court in Washington, where the presiding judge, Judge Richard Leon called the financial settlement a "just resolution".

Prosecutor John Darden added that Daimler had "showed excellent cooperation".

"The company has undertaken an effort to clean its own house," he added.

"That reflects a serious change of mind on part of Daimler. This deserves credit."

Daimler's agreement to pay $185m is broken down into $93.6m to end the US Justice Department investigation, and a payment of $91.4m to settle the civil case from the Securities and Exchange Commission, the US financial watchdog.

The company made a 2.6bn euros ($3.5bn; £2.3bn) loss last year.

Back in 2008, German industrial group Siemens paid $800m to settle a US investigation into bribes paid to government officials in Argentina, Bangladesh, Iraq and Venezuela.

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