Obama pushes back at Israel: No ‘freebies’ to Iran in nuclear talks Obama pushes back at Israel: No ‘freebies’ to Iran in nuclear talks ADVERTISING CARTAGENA, Colombia — Exposing a rift with Israel, President Barack Obama on Sunday insisted that
Obama pushes back at Israel: No ‘freebies’ to Iran in nuclear talks
CARTAGENA, Colombia — Exposing a rift with Israel, President Barack Obama on Sunday insisted that the United States has not “given anything away” in new talks with Iran as he defended his continued push for a diplomatic resolution to the dispute over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions.
Obama said he refused to let the talks turn into a “stalling process,” but believed there was still time for diplomacy.
His assessment, delivered at the close of a Latin American summit in Colombia, came after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday had said the U.S. and world powers gave Tehran a “freebie” by agreeing to hold more talks next month.
Obama shot back: “The notion that somehow we’ve given something away or a ‘freebie’ would indicate Iran has gotten something. In fact, they’ve got some of the toughest sanctions that they’re going to be facing coming up in just a few months if they don’t take advantage of these talks.”
Still, in a news conference here, Obama warned to Iran, “The clock’s ticking.”
Muslim Brotherhood suffers setback
CAIRO — The elimination of three of the main contenders from Egypt’s presidential race has eroded the chances of an Islamist candidate to seize the country’s top job.
The Muslim Brotherhood, the most powerful political group to emerge from last year’s uprising, finds itself increasingly in a bind. It is unable to exercise the power of its electoral wins so far and is jostling with the ruling generals and liberal and secular groups that drove the uprising but now fear religious domination of politics.
The Brotherhood was outraged over the election commission’s decision late Saturday to bar its chief strategist and leading choice for president, Khairat el-Shater. It threatened more protests like a large march on Friday that drew tens of thousands of Islamists to Cairo’s Tahrir Square.
“This is a political decision not a legal one, said Murad Mohammed Ali, a spokesman for el-Shater’s campaign. “This commission is politicized and we will exert all political pressures to restore our rights.”
The election commission disqualified 10 candidates from the May 23-24 vote including el-Shater and a popular, more hardline Islamist from another party, Hazem Abu Ismail. Omar Suleiman, who was ousted President Hosni Mubarak’s long-time spy chief and only vice president, was also barred. He was believed to have been backed by the ruling military council that took power after Mubarak’s ouster and is headed by Mubarak’s long-time defense minister.
Stiff-legged marching in North Korea part of long military tradition
The high-stepping precision marching on display by North Korean soldiers in recent photos is the latest in a long tradition of goose-stepping, performed to varying degrees by militaries around the world.
European historian Norman Davies writes that the stiff-legged step originated in the Prussian Army in the 17th century. In “Europe: A History,” Davies wrote that the march was meant to send “a clear set of messages” through the synchronicity of the marchers, their high kicks and their chins held high, a message that “Here, quite literally, was the embodiment of Prussian militarism.” He said critics were the ones who dubbed it the goosestep.
Different armies varied the height of the kicks in their marching as the precision step made its way around the world. Perhaps the most well-known example of its usage is by the Nazis in Germany.
Its authoritarian display has also been parodied, as in Mel Brooks’ musical “The Producers,” which featured goose-stepping in the song “Springtime for Hitler.”
The precision and height of the steps can be challenging. In 2010, India said it was modifying its nightly marching ritual at the border with Pakistan because the impact was harmful to soldiers’ joints.
By wire sources
