Martin Calls Vote for June 28/Canada--New WMW

[Gloria]

Full excerpts, links up now at http://www.zianet.com/insightanalytical
Tomorrow at Buzzflash.com


WORLD MEDIA WATCH FOR MAY 24, 2004

1//The Independent, UK--ALLIED TROOPS MAY WIN IMMUNITY FROM IRAQI LAWS (A deal to give British forces immunity from Iraqi law is being negotiated by British diplomats drawing up a United Nations Security Council resolution to set up an Iraqi government. Sources said they expected the British military to be under their own domestic and military laws. The deal would echo military operations in Afghanistan and Kosovo where foreign forces remain subject to the military law of their own countries.)



2//Asia Times Online, Hong Kong--BERG BEHEADING: NO WAY, SAY MEDICAL EXPERTS("I certainly would need to be convinced it was authentic," Dr John Simpson, executive director for surgical affairs at the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, said from New Zealand. Echoing Dr Simpson's criticism, when this journalist asked forensic death expert Jon Nordby, PhD and fellow of the American Board of Medicolegal Death Investigators, whether he believed the Berg decapitation video had been "staged", Nordby replied: "Yes, I think that's the best explanation of it.")



3//The Toronto Star, Canada--MARTIN CALLS VOTE FOR JUNE 28 (Prime Minister Paul Martin set a sharp tone for the federal election campaign that began today by portraying Conservative Leader Stephen Harper as a right-wing ideologue out to Americanize health care and social programs. In turn, Harper challenged voters to oust what he called a government of corruption and waste. Martin painted Harper as a man distant from Canadian values. Harper accused him of planning a campaign of fear…The five-week campaign pits Martin's Liberals against the uneasily merged Conservatives, an NDP revitalized by a snappy new leader and the resurgent Bloc Quebecois in an election that could be the closest vote in more than a decade.)



4//The Philippine Daily Inquirer, Philippines--LAWMAKER: RP NEEDS PRESIDENT BY JUNE 30 OR ELSE (The country must proclaim a president before noon of June 30. If it doesn't, this would be "the surest invitation for military adventurism'' or it could result in the declaration of martial law.
Deputy Speaker Raul Gonzales on Friday gave these two scenarios in the event Congress fails to do its Constitutional duty to proclaim the next president and vice president before noon of June 30. "A military junta is a remote possibility but not altogether impossible," he told reporters after the news conference of Senate President Franklin Drilon and Speaker Jose de Venecia where they announced the proposed set of rules that Congress hopes to approve in canvassing the votes starting next week.)

Related Story: CONGRESS DIVIDED ON HOW TO COUNT (Congress is set to convene Monday as the National Board of Canvassers for the presidential and vice presidential candidates, but it is divided over how to go about the counting of votes… At least 600 fully armed antiriot police officers will be assigned to the Batasan complex where an anti-election fraud alliance and supporters of actor Fernando Poe Jr. plan to set up camp to monitor the canvassing.)

5//The Sydney Morning Herald, Australia--KYOTO HEAT AS RUSSIA RATIFIES (The Howard Government has come under renewed pressure to sign the Kyoto protocol on greenhouse gas emissions after Russia's surprise announcement at the weekend that it intends to ratify the deal.When Russia signs the protocol it will become international law and leave Australia and the United States the only two developed countries opposing the international agreement to combat global warming. The executive director of the Australian Conservation Foundation, Don Henry, said yesterday that many Australian businesses would be disadvantaged by not having access to the trading mechanisms under the protocol…The European Union had flagged possible trade sanctions against countries that did not ratify the protocol, Mr Henry said.)