NKOREA THREATENS TO WIPE OUT USA

CHINA CRACKS DOWN ON DICTATOR GOOGLE
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1164082020&play=1
DICTATOR MICROSOFT PUTS PRESSURE ON DICTATOR GOOGLE AND YAHOO
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1164102874&play=1
BERNANKE SPEAKS
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1164056502&play=1

Czech MPs mull suspension of Klaus' powers over Lisbon treaty
ANDREW RETTMAN Today JUNE 25,09 @ 17:34 CET

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The Czech social democrat party is discussing the possibility of suspending president Vaclav Klaus' powers if he does not sign the EU's Lisbon treaty. The temporary suspension would require a simple majority of 41 votes in the country's 81-seat senate and would allow caretaker prime minister Jan Fischer to sign the document instead.Social democrat senator Alena Gajduskova is leading an intensive debate on the subject in her party, the secretary of the senate's constitutional commission, Jan Kysela, told EUobserver.Ms Gajduskova's campaign is linked to president Klaus' refusal to sign off on the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which was ratified by the Czech parliament in October 2008.The discussion is likely to pick up steam in the senate's next plenary session starting 20July. Senators are also waiting for the Czech Constitutional Court's decision on Lisbon before pressing ahead with the motion, Mr Kysela added.

The Czech parliament ratified the Lisbon treaty in May.

The court is expected to rule on Lisbon's compatibility with the Czech constitution in September. But the decision could come in late July if judges throw out the legal challenge on technical grounds.The eurosceptic Mr Klaus vowed earlier this week that he would be the last politician in Europe to sign Lisbon. The treaty is also awaiting final approval in Germany and Poland, as well as a second referendum in Ireland.The president's powers could be suspended on grounds that he is unable to discharge his official functions because he is trying to act above the law.There is nothing in the constitution that gives the president the right to veto decisions of the country's highest institutions. Otherwise we could be considered as some kind of absolutist monarchy,former Constitutional Court judge Vojtech Cepl told newspaper Mlada fronta Dnes on Thursday (25 June).It is unclear if a social democrat motion against Mr Klaus would secure enough votes, however.The pro-Lisbon party has 29 of the 81 senate seats. But the conservative ODS faction, which has become more anti-Lisbon since the ODS government fell earlier this year, has 35 votes. It depends how many people would turn up [to a vote],Mr Kysela said.The probability is very low. It's the opinion of just a few senators and not of the whole chamber. The president of the senate, Mr Premysl Sobotka [an ODS party member], has said he doesn't agree with the suspension, senate press spokesman, Petr Kostka, said.

EU parliament continues to be divided on Barroso vote
HONOR MAHONY Today JUNE 25,09 @ 17:27 CET

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - One week after EU leaders proposed to make Jose Manuel Barroso European Commission chief for a second time, it is no clearer whether the Portuguese politician is likely to get a majority if put to a vote mid July.
Consultations due to take place Thursday (25 July) between the incoming Swedish EU presidency and leaders of the political groups in the parliament have been postponed until 6 July in the hope to get a clearer picture of how each group stands on the matter.A spokesperson for the Swedish presidency said that Stockholm had made the move to show some flexibility.The ambience coming from the parliament showed that this was perhaps a good idea,he said, adding that Sweden is hoping the extra time will help opinions on the Barroso candidacy crystallise.But the political sands in the parliament continue to shift as the groups weigh up where to place their allegiances and where they are prepared to make concessions.The debate surrounds whether to hold a vote on Mr Barroso in mid- July – the Socialists and Greens say this is too soon and does not allow for a thorough examination of Mr Barroso's plans for the next five years – and whether he will get a majority if it does go to vote.

At the moment, there is something of a political stalemate between member states on the one side and a divided parliament on the other.The council does not want to formally nominate Barroso as a candidate until it is sure it will get a majority in the parliament and the parliament does not want to move until Barroso is confirmed as the candidate,noted one parliament official.On 19 June, EU leaders gave political backing to Mr Barroso which they hoped to turn into legal backing after consultations with the parliament. The centre-right Mr Barroso has the backing of his political family in the parliament, the European People's Party (EPP). It wants a July vote. But although it is the biggest group in the assembly, it cannot swing the issue alone.

It is hoping to force the Socialists' hand by linking the issue to the presidency of the parliament - a job normally stitched up by way of a technical agreement between the Socialists and the centre-right EPP who divide the five-year post between them.

Centre-right links top jobs

EPP chief Joseph Daul on Wednesday (24 June) indicated it would be difficult to form a technological alliance with the Socialists if they did not throw their weight behind a July vote.The Socialists, the second biggest group, have rejected this link out of hand and say the two posts are entirely different issues.They also say they will stick to their principled stand that there cannot be a vote in July because there will not have been enough time to thoroughly discuss Mr Barroso's programme for the next five years.This parliament cannot be treated as some giant rubberstamp, said one official from the group.But the Liberals have spiced things up by offering to come down in favour of a July vote, in return for certain concessions. These would include promising Graham Watson, the current leader of the group, the presidency of the assembly in 2012.Unlike the Socialists and the Greens, [the liberal group] is not resolutely opposed to a vote in July. [It] would wish to see a number of conditions fulfilled before such a vote could be taken,says a statement by Mr Watson issued on Wednesday, after a meeting of liberal delegation leaders.A right-wing alliance of the EPP (with 264 members) the Liberals (82) and the new European Conservatives and Reformists group (55) could give Mr Barroso an absolutely majority backing in the 736-strong EU assembly.The liberal stance will likely remain fluid however until it elects its new group leader on 30 June, set to be ex-Belgian premier Guy Verhofstadt.

Mr Verhofstadt has spoken out in favour of postponing the vote until September, but sources say he may be persuaded to back a July vote if Mr Barroso delivers some promises on financial reform proposals.

Tight timetable

For the Swedes, hoping for a clear working partner in the commission from mid-July rather than continuing uncertainty until autumn, the next weeks will represent a tight timetable of fine negotiating.They will meet political leaders on 6 July to sound out their positions. Three days later, the political leaders will vote whether to put the Barroso candidacy to vote in the mid-July parliamentary session. The votes will be weighted according to the size of the group.Once the parliament‘s position is clearer, member states will have to legally nominate the Portuguese politician, who will then meet with all the political groups to try and secure their support.Mr Barroso needs a simple majority of those present to get re-elected but a narrow win would lessen his political authority from day one.

EU data monitors outline Facebook ground rules
LEIGH PHILLIPS Today JUNE 25,09 @ 17:46 CET

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - Some users of social networking sites such as Facebook, Myspace and Bebo and not just the sites themselves are responsible for ensuring they adhere to European privacy laws, EU data protection enforcers have warned.All users should also be aware that they should only upload photographs to a social networking site with the consent of people in the image - a requirement that until now almost nobody has adhered to.Europe's Article 29 Working Party, a committee of data protection regulators from across the bloc that advises the European Commission on the subject, issued on Wednesday (22 June) its opinion on how European data privacy laws affect the rapidly growing world of social networking.

Much of the recommendations will not surprise observers of the phenomenon.

The regulators' guidelines recommend that sites make full privacy settings the norm, with users having to choose to opt out of them should they so, rather than having to opt in to tighter privacy controls.As soon as users begin to upload data on themselves or others, they should be warned of the privacy risk and users should also be made clearly aware of what bits of their personal data is being made available to others.Since the advent of such sites, newspapers have regularly reported on users who through have lost their jobs or otherwise been socially compromised when pictures or other information about them has found its way to employers, parents or partners.

The data regulators also warn that all inactive accounts must be deleted, along with their accompanying data. Family members of people who have died often report difficulties in having their loved ones' profiles taken down.The working party also recommended that the service providers maintain an easily accessible complaints procedure for dealing with data worries on their home page.Data on sensitive topics, such as race, religion, political belief or sexual orientation should not be processed or passed on to advertisers, the regulators suggested, and individuals should be allowed to adopt a pseudonym should they so wish.Additionally, particular care should be taken by service providers with regard to the processing of the personal data of minors.But it is the definition of a data controller that may represent the biggest problem.The service providers - defined not just as data processors, but data controllers - themselves must take great care in adhering to privacy laws, but there is an exception to this in the case of personal or household users.However, according to the opinion, when users begin to broadcast information very widely or gather data in a similar fashion, via such sites - such as when using Facebook for promoting a product or putting together a church group or organising political campaign, often to people well beyond a circle of direct contacts - then they too in effect become data controllers.This may have considerable implications for users who organise concerts, human rights letter-writing campaigns or try to sell their homemade jam via the new online technology.All users, not just those defined as data controllers, should only upload photographs of others once they have their approval.The opinion recommends that users should only upload pictures or information about other individuals with the individual's consent,the document reads.This too could present a problem for most everyday users, who regularly upload pictures of their friends.Most sites allow people if they have been tagged in an uploaded photograph - wherein a name is attached to a face, such as This is me with Jenny at the 1997 church disco- to untag themselves.But for EU data protection monitors, this may not be enough.

RON PAUL SPEECH ON FED
http://www.ronpaul.com/
SENATORS OF CONGRESS
http://www.downsizedc.org/etp/campaigns/112
http://senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
http://www.opencongress.org/committee/show/146
RON PAUL ON AUDIT THE FED
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYiHE35kCQI&feature=player_embedded

AUDIT THE FED HAS 242 SIGNED UP AS OF WEDNESDAY.

Ron Paul’s Bill To Audit The Federal Reserve Now Has 242 Co-Sponsors
By tmartin • June 24, 2009

Ron Paul’s bill to audit the Federal Reserve (HR 1207) now has 242 co-sponsors, and the numbers keep growing! This is history in the making, and victory is within reach. Imagine what will happen if HR 1207, The Federal Reserve Transparency Act, comes up for vote in Congress! With more than 50% of the House of Representatives already co-sponsoring this bill, it has real potential to pass — BUT only if we educate and rally the people to support it and get our Congresspeople to put it to vote and pass it.

Step 1: Your Representative
If your representative is not on the following list of HR 1207 co-sponsors, call their offices, write to them, email them, etc. Let them know they need to support HR 1207. If you live in their district, let them know. Go to their office.

Capitol Switchboard: (202) 224-3121

Step 2: Financial Services Committee
HR 1207 is now in the House Committee on Financial Services. This is THE MOST IMPORTANT STEP in this legislation! If it doesn’t get out of committee it will not come to a vote! There are 71 members on this committee and they are all listed below.

We need to let all members of the House Committee on Financial Services know that we want them to allow full House consideration of HR 1207 so it can move forward; we need them to support this. Now is the time.Call their offices, write to them, email them, etc. Let them know they need to support HR 1207. If you live in their district, let them know. Go to their office.

Help with this all important public outreach. NOW REALLY IS THE TIME!
Here’s a sample letter you can use:

Dear Representative,

Please co-sponsor and/or support H.R.1207, an effort to audit the Federal Reserve.

Recently, it has come to light that there is little to no accountability to the people on the part of the Federal Reserve. While the citizens of this country are required by law to give an accounting of every penny they come in contact with, the Federal Reserve has never been held to the same standard. During this time of extreme economic crisis, the people deserve an accounting of where our money is going.

Currently there are 242 co-sponsors for this legislation, and it is enjoying bi-partisan support. Your efforts in supporting this important legislation would go a long way in proving to your constituents that you not only hold the Federal Reserve to the same standard as you do your constituents, but it would also show that you believe in transparency. Anything less than support for this resolution suggests that you are in favor of secrecy and a lack of accountability to the people who pay the bills. We pay the tab; we have a right to know where our money is going.Unlike recent bills that you voted in favor of that had hundreds of pages and just a few hours to read, this bill can be read in under 5 minutes. I encourage you to take the time to read it, and then move to support it.Thank you in advance for your attention on this important legislation. I have every expectation that you will do right by your constituents and support this measure.

Sincerely,

Step 3: The People
Tell everyone you know about HR 1207 and ask them to support it and to contact their representative as well. Link to this page and to CampaignForLiberty.com.This initiative is crucial and we need to redouble our efforts to get HR 1207 passed.

STORMS HURRICANES-TORNADOES

LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity;(MASS CONFUSION) the sea and the waves roaring;(FIERCE WINDS)
26 Men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.

Andres weakens to depression, back out to sea By LORENA MOGUEL, Associated Press Writer JUNE 24,09

PUERTO VALLARTA, Mexico – The remnants of Tropical Storm Andres were dissipating over the Pacific on Wednesday after flooding homes and killing at least one person on Mexico's southwestern coast.Andres briefly flared up into the Eastern Pacific season's first hurricane Tuesday, skirting the coast south of the tourist resort of Puerto Vallarta.The storm had wind strength of near 30 mph (45 kph) and was expected to dissipate by Wednesday night as it moves further out to sea, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.At 11 a.m. PDT (2 p.m. EDT, 1800 GMT), the storm was centered about 145 miles (230 kilometers) northwest of Cabo Corrientes and 175 miles (285 kilometers) southeast of the tip of Baja California, and moving to the northwest about 15 mph (24 kmh).To the south, rain caused flooding Monday in the resort of Acapulco that forced about 200 people to evacuate their homes. A fisherman drowned when choppy currents overturned his boat in a lagoon in Tecpan de Galeana, between Acapulco and Zihuatanejo, a state police report said.A light rain fell Tuesday night in Puerto Vallarta as tourists emptied beaches and retreated to hotel restaurants. Port authorities said the arrival of a Carnival cruise ship was rescheduled from Wednesday to July 1.Late Sunday, Andres became the first named storm of the eastern Pacific hurricane season, which began May 15 and ends Nov. 30. It was the latest arrival of a named storm in 40 years.National Hurricane Center: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov

LAND FOR PEACE (THE FUTURE 7 YEARS OF HELL ON EARTH)

JOEL 3:2
2 I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.

THE WEEK OF DANIEL 9:27 WE KNOW ITS 7 YRS

Heres the scripture 1 week = 7 yrs Genesis 29:27-29
27 Fulfil her week, and we will give thee this also for the service which thou shalt serve with me yet seven other years.
28 And Jacob did so, and fulfilled her week: and he gave him Rachel his daughter to wife also.
29 And Laban gave to Rachel his daughter Bilhah his handmaid to be her maid.

DANIEL 9:26-27
26 And after threescore and two weeks(62X7=434 YEARS+7X7=49 YEARS=TOTAL OF 69 WEEKS OR 483 YRS) shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary;(ROMAN LEADERS DESTROYED THE 2ND TEMPLE) and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.(THERE HAS TO BE 70 WEEKS OR 490 YRS TO FUFILL THE VISION AND PROPHECY OF DAN 9:24).(THE NEXT VERSE IS THAT 7 YR WEEK OR (70TH FINAL WEEK).
27 And he( THE ROMAN,EU PRESIDENT) shall confirm the covenant with many for one week:(1X7=7 YEARS) and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease,(3 1/2 yrs in TEMPLE SACRIFICES STOPPED) and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.

ISAIAH 28:14-19 (THIS IS THE 7 YR TREATY COVENANT OF DANIEL 9:27)
14 Wherefore hear the word of the LORD, ye scornful men, that rule this people which is in Jerusalem.
15 Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us: for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves:
16 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste.
17 Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet: and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding place.
18 And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then ye shall be trodden down by it.
19 From the time that it goeth forth it shall take you: for morning by morning shall it pass over, by day and by night: and it shall be a vexation only to understand the report.

I KNEW DEMILITARIZING THE ARABS WOULD WORK AND IT WILL BE EU,NATO,AMERICAN TROOPS THAT COME IN I PREDICT BY WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS THE EU GUARENTEES ISRAELS SECURITY FOR A 7 YEAR TREATY.

Netanyahu: Demilitarized state plan gaining ground By STEVE WEIZMAN, Associated Press Writer JUNE 24,09

PARIS – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, after meeting the leaders of France and Italy on Wednesday, said his bid for a demilitarized Palestinian state is gaining international ground and is the only solution for Mideast peace.Netanyahu also was meant to meet in Paris with Washington's top Mideast envoy, George Mitchell, but Israel's government postponed the meeting because it wanted more time to straighten out diverging views on Jewish settlements. Netanyahu said he did that to allow both countries to work on a series of details and that Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak would instead meet with Mitchell next week in Washington.A senior official traveling with Netanyahu said on condition of anonymity that Israel sought more professional work before the meeting. The official said settlement construction was one of those issues. Israel insists natural growth of existing Jewish communities in the West Bank must be allowed.After meeting in Paris with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Netanyahu told reporters: The idea of a demilitarized (Palestinian) state will in course become accepted. If it is not accepted, there will not be an agreement. It cannot be that there is a Palestinian state and the struggle will continue within it.Sarkozy agreed that a future Palestinian state cannot in any way constitute a threat to the security of Israel.In Rome earlier Wednesday, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi endorsed Netanyahu's plan for a future demilitarized Palestinian state that recognizes Israel as a Jewish state.The issue of Jewish settlements emerged as a thorn in Israel's discussions with the United States and France on Netanyahu's first European tour since taking office.The U.S. says Israel must halt all Jewish settlement activity in the West Bank.Sarkozy stood firm in Wednesday's talks, urging Netanyahu to immediately order a total freeze of settlement activity,according to a statement from the French president's office.

Sarkozy, who calls himself a friend of Israel but whose country has traditionally good relations with much of the Arab world, urged faster action toward creating a Palestinian state.Netanyahu pledged that no new settlements would be built, but suggested existing colonies would be allowed to develop.Berlusconi, who gave Netanyahu a warm welcome in Rome earlier Wednesday, spoke only of the need for Israel to send signals on stopping settlement.It was a very warm welcome, an upbeat Netanyahu briefed Israel-based journalists traveling with him after the Berlusconi meeting.It would be hard to find a better friend.Sarkozy, meanwhile, offered to send international peacekeepers to secure a Mideast peace deal. But Netanyahu brushed off the offer.We're not looking for an international force,he said, adding that the only place such a force is needed is on the Gaza-Egypt border.Sarkozy and Netanyahu expressed shared concerns about Iran, whose president has called for Israel's destruction and whose nuclear activities worry the United States and its allies. Sarkozy stressed in the talks that the prospect of a nuclear Iran is unacceptable.

Sarkozy and his government strongly have denounced the violent crackdown on opposition demonstrations in Iran by protesters who believe that the June 12 presidential elections were fraudulent.Netanyahu praised Sarkozy's efforts toward securing the release of Israeli-French soldier Sgt. Gilad Schalit, seized by Hamas-allied militants in Gaza in 2006.Associated Press writer Laurent Pirot in Paris contributed to this report.

Migrants boost Jewish settler numbers in West Bank By AMY TEIBEL, Associated Press Writer – Wed Jun 24, 9:22 am ET

MAALEH ADUMIM, West Bank – Israelis moving to the West Bank accounted for more than a third of settler population growth in recent years, government statistics show, undercutting Israel's argument that it is continuing settlement construction only to accommodate growing families already living there.The so-called natural growth rationale for building on land the Palestinians claim for a future state has vaulted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu into an unusually vocal and public clash with the Obama administration, which has come out strong against continued settlement expansion.Settlement construction had been expected to be the focus of a meeting in Paris on Thursday between Netanyahu and America's top Mideast envoy, George Mitchell, a longtime settlement critic. But the meeting was abruptly postponed, and an Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject, said Israel sought more time to iron out differences with the U.S. administration, including over settlements.Opponents say the government invokes natural growth as a cover to build thousands of houses across the West Bank, including hundreds that Palestinian laborers are building in Maaleh Adumim, a major settlement outside Jerusalem.The Israelis are playing a game of deception by what they call natural growth,said Yasser Abed Rabbo, a senior aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.Data from Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics supports that argument, showing that in 2007, 36 percent of all new settlers had moved from Israel or abroad.More recent data, including for the period since Netanyahu's government took office in March, is not yet available, but there are few reasons to think Israel has reversed the trend, said Hagit Ofran, a settlement expert for Peace Now, a settlement watchdog group.Amid the influx of people drawn to cheaper housing in settlements, construction has continued — more than 5,500 new apartments have been completed over the past three years in the West Bank, bureau figures show.

Settlements are a major obstacle to peacemaking because Israel has used them to extend its de facto boundaries into the West Bank and to cement its claim on east Jerusalem. The Palestinians claim both territories, captured by Israel in 1967, for a future state, along with the Gaza Strip, and want the Jewish construction there to stop.Under the 2003 U.S.-backed road map peace plan, Israel promised to halt all settlement construction, including for natural growth. But the building has gone on.

Israel argues that growing families need bigger apartments and that grown children, raising their own families, should be allowed to live near their parents.Jerusalem-born Yaffa Shkibai, who has lived in Maaleh Adumim for 26 of her 50 years, has bought apartments for each of her four children here.They should continue building and not be afraid of the U.S.,she said.If we bend, they'll kick us out of here.The United States is among those monitoring settlement activity. The U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem said its officials regularly visit settlements and take photographs. A foreman at one construction project in Maaleh Adumim said Monday that U.S. officials had been there recently, walking around and taking pictures.Last week, Netanyahu grudgingly yielded to President Barack Obama's demand that Israel endorse Palestinian independence, albeit shackled by a series of conditions. But he flatly resisted Obama's pressure for a settlement freeze.We have no intention of building new settlements or of expropriating additional land for existing settlements,Netanyahu said in a major policy speech last week. But there is a need to enable the residents to live normal lives, to allow mothers and fathers to raise their children like families elsewhere.

Netanyahu pointedly dropped the politically charged natural growth phrase for normal lives.But the linguistic slight of hand doesn't mask the fact that migration — and not just the growth of families — is a major factor in settler population growth.
Migration from Israel and abroad accounted for 5,300 of the 14,500 new settlers in 2007, the last year for which bureau data are available. And 2007 wasn't a random blip. Migration accounted for between a third and half of the population growth in each year between 1999 and 2007, save 2005, when numbers were skewed by Israel's withdrawal of 8,500 settlers from the Gaza Strip. Nearly 300,000 Israelis currently live in the West Bank and 180,000 in east Jerusalem, whose annexation by Israel in 1967 is not internationally recognized. That's more than double from 116,300 at the end of 1993, the year Israel and the Palestinians signed their landmark accord.

Between 2006 and 2008 — roughly the tenure of the previous government — Israel completed building 5,503 apartments in the West Bank and began building 5,125, the statistics bureau said. Maaleh Adumim, home to more than 35,000 settlers, continues to be one of the biggest magnets for migrants. At the settlement's northeastern edge, overlooking the Judean desert, rumbling front-end loaders were busy scooping up mounds of dirt and stones at a new neighborhood that has been going up for the past 2 1/2 years. Bricks, steel rods and coils of rubber tubing were piled up outside the unfinished homes, which Palestinian laborers were building. Yossi Navon, the foreman who spoke of the Embassy personnel, said apartments were going for about half of what a comparable apartment in Jerusalem would fetch. I think Bibi said it right, Navon said, referring to Netanyahu by his nickname.Natural growth has to continue.
Associated Press writer Joseph Marks contributed to this report.

MESSIANIC BIBLE JUNE 24,09

Stan, usually our newsletters show our ministry reaching Orthodox Jews here in Israel, however the Bibles For Israel ministry reaches out to all segments of Israeli society. This week we sent Israeli Evangelists to the Gay Parade in Tel Aviv.God made me this way, and I can’t change,said Moti,and I’m PROUD of it,he said as he hugged his boyfriend.Senior Evangelist, Ze’ev Porat whose father and grandfather were Rabbis, responded to Moti saying: Moti, God changed me and delivered me from my sins when I accepted Yeshua because that’s what the Messiah came to do - to deliver you and me from our sins.The city of Tel Aviv’s main street was covered with the trademarked Gay Rainbow Colored Flags, however the city was in Spiritual Darkness.Tel Aviv which is more or less a secular city, accepts the politically correct view of Homosexual beliefs – and this year the rabbis did not even protest the parade.

In a couple of days there will also be the Gay Parade in Jerusalem (June 26) – and even in the Holy City, this year the rabbis will NOT be protesting against it. It seems that we are definitely living in the end times spoken about in Matthew 24.Being a democratic country the federal and local governments have to respect all viewpoints of Israeli society, however this year, we are very surprised that the rabbis and rabbinical courts have not taken any type of action against the Gay Parade.Ze’ev Porat marched within the parade sharing the Scriptures and LOVE OF YESHUA from his big white Tanakh (Jewish Scriptures/Old Testament) with more than 50 gay men.I showed them in the Scriptures how God judged Sodom and Gomorrah for the same sexual sins and how God’s plan of creation was meant for a man and woman, not for people of the same gender.One guy read in my Hebrew Bible as we turned to the verse in the Torah where it says that a man is not allowed to sleep with another man, and then he spit on me.

The gay community in Israel is estimated to be 30,000-40,000 – and there were about 15,000 of them marching in the parade. That’s a LOT of Jewish people marching in this parade!Some of these gay men and women were from religious backgrounds, and some of them still go to synagogue. There is even an organization of called HOD – which is for orthodox religious Jews who are gay.Six gay marriages took place on this day, as each year during the parade gay couples get married. They had a marriage ceremony, exchanging vows and rings.I must show my love to these people because all Israelis are my extended family,says Ze’ev, and I always speak with Love in heart. I don’t condemn them, I only want them to know Yeshua who saved me, and who can save them and give them eternal life.It is not our words that will convict them of their sin; they see that as a putdown - it is only the Word of God that brings someone to repentance and peace with God. We urgently need to complete the Messianic Prophecy Bible so that we can reach all people, here in Israel and around the world,said Ze’ev Porat.

There were thousands of gays and lesbians marching in this parade along the beachfront and afterwards there was a huge gay party with drugs and 10 gay couples having public sex on the beach. Ze’ev Porat got on his knees weeping and praying for these people as these public events were taking place. In two days from now there will be the gay parade in Jerusalem.One member of Israel’s parliament is Meretz MK Nitzan Horowitz, who is the second openly gay elected Knesset member. He recently met with more than fifty Israeli gays and lesbians to discuss gay rights and activism within Israel. Please pray that our elected officials and the rabbis will stand up to truth and the Word of God.It seems that everything today whether in America or even here in the Holy Land is being compromised – but we also believe that it is because we are in the LAST DAYS!

The poor in Israel are facing another unrelenting enemy: hunger JUNE 24,09INTERNATIONAL FELLOWSHIP OF CHRISTIANS AND JEWS.

Dear Friend of Israel,

A sad scene unfolds every Friday evening in The Shuk - the sprawling open-air market that is one of the most vibrant and bustling places in Jerusalem. When the crowd thins out, another group of people arrives. They cannot afford to buy food during the week and must come to The Shuk after merchants have marked down their leftover items to nearly nothing in order to clear them out before the start of the Jewish Sabbath, when shops are closed.It is heartbreaking to witness hungry and destitute people, many of them elderly, scrounging for the food no one else would buy, happy just to have a few scraps The scene at The Shuk highlights a very real and growing problem in Israel - poverty. A recent study showed that more than 1,600,000 Israelis, nearly half of them children, are poor.This desperate situation is made more difficult as threats from terrorists and nations bent on Israel's destruction are on the rise. Because of these threats, Israel must spend huge amounts of money on defense, leaving far too little to help the poor.Thankfully, our Guardians of Israel program provides food and other help to the poor in Israel, including many children and elderly. You can help us continue.Through Guardians, we fund soup kitchens, meals on wheels programs, support programs for people in crisis, and much more. This ministry of compassion reaches literally hundreds of thousands of people throughout Israel. But the need remains, and is growing. We need compassionate people like you to help us feed and care for Israel's poor and hungry.Your gift to Guardians of Israel now could literally save the lives of the most vulnerable Israelis. Please give now - and know that, through your generosity, you are truly making a difference in the lives of people who have nowhere else to turn.May God bless you for showing such loving care towards His children.With prayers for shalom, peace,Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein.

* * * * FLASH TRAFFIC: WASHINGTON UPDATE * * * * WHAT THE MEDIA ISN'T TELLING YOU THE MUSLIM WORLD By Joel C. Rosenberg

(Washington, D.C., June 22, 2009) -- Dramatic news out of Iran this weekend. More than 3,000 Reformers arrested. Some 600 wounded. Conflicting reports about deaths. Some say at least 19 have been killed by the security forces. CNN has unconfirmed reports put the number of deaths at 150. But this isn't the only story of revolution in the region. What the media isn't telling you is that the Revivalists are moving powerfully to share the gospel of Jesus Christ throughout the Muslim world. Two examples. Last month, the Kurdish government of Iraq in May gave permission for a Christian radio station that The Joshua Fund helped finance to officially begin broadcast operations. The establishment of such a station owned and operated by Iraqi followers of Jesus Christ is really an historic development in the history of Christianity in the land once called Babylonia, and we are deeply grateful for your prayerful and financial support in making this happen. The station's headquarters and main broadcasting facility is located in the northern Kurdish region of Iraq, in the capital of Erbil, a city of some one million people, not far from the border of Iran. The station is operating on 97.1 FM in Erbil and has a translator station operating on 104.7 FM in the city of Kirkuk, a city of about 850,000. Each transmitter operates at 250 watts. That station -- which can be heard throughout the Kurdish region and thus by more than two million people -- is broadcasting Christian music, original and previously-produced educational programs, original and previously-produced cultural programs, Bible reading programs and radio dramas based on the Bible. All of this is in the Kurdish and Arabic languages.

Growing up under the tyranny of Saddam Hussein, we never thought we would see the day when we who love Jesus could run a radio station in Iraq,the station manager told a TJF staffer.We are excited to see how the Lord will use us to bless the Iraqi people, and particularly the Kurdish people. Please be praying for us that the Lord's favor would be with us and we would make a real impact in people's lives here.Second example: Here's a quick update on the DAMASCUS film, the 77 minute docu-drama film. It tells the story of how Saul of Tarsus -- a religious extremist and persecutor of the Church in the first century -- comes to faith in Christ through a vision of Jesus Christ on the road to the Syrian capital. The Joshua Fund has invested $300,000 into producing and distributing 300,000 copies of the DAMASCUS film on DVD in the epicenter. The film just premiered in....If you would like to learn more about The Joshua Fund -- and/or make a tax-deductible donation of $25, $50, $100 or more into the projects TJF is engaged in -- please click here.

COME TO ISRAEL AND ATTEND THE JERUSALEM PRAYER SUMMIT

Israel has never needed the unconditional love and unwavering support of evangelical Christians more than she does today. Yes, Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas are making threats. But the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is a great and mighty God. He is calling us to bless Israel and show her our love in a real and practical way. That's why we are moving forward with The Joshua Fund's next Prayer & Vision Trip, and we would love for you to join us. It will be held November 5-17, 2009, and culminate in our first-ever Jerusalem Prayer Summit.And now, by God's grace, we have been able to reduce the price by $600 per couple. If you have never been to the Holy Land, it is hard to describe what a profound spiritual effect such a journey can have on you and your family. You may have heard others say God's Word seemed to come alive in a new way when they walked where Jesus walked, from the shores of Galilee to the Mount of Olives and into the streets of Jerusalem. Well, it's true, and I believe our 2009 Israel trip will allow you to experience this for yourself and intensify your desire to walk closely with Jesus Christ. If you have been to Israel before, this trip will be a great opportunity to deepen your understanding of how powerfully the Lord is moving there. I will teach at key locations and answer your questions about the future of the epicenter. You will have the opportunity to meet with and pray for local pastors and ministry leaders. We are arranging for you to spend time engaged in a practical Joshua Fund ministry project to bless the poor and needy. What's more, you will participate in a two-day conference to pray for the peace of Jerusalem at this critical hour.

We can take up to 300 people, and to make your experience as personal and special as possible, you will be assigned to one of seven buses of about 45 people. Each bus will be hosted by a Joshua Fund staff or board member or couple, or one of our close allies. You will ride that bus with your host every day, and in the process you'll get to know the people on your bus, study the Bible with them, pray with and for them, discover Israel together with them, ask questions with them, and thus form a small community. Lord willing, I will rotate through the buses to get to know you and answer your questions. Each bus will also have a professional, licensed Israeli tour guide who know every detail of the country inside and out. Please click the link below, learn more, pray about it, and then -- if the Lord gives you the green light --please sign up and come with us, while there is still space. As always, we will do our best to keep you up-to-date on the kinds of projects we are doing, and brief you on how those projects are proceeding. We will also let you know about the kinds of projects we are developing for the future. In no way do we want to pressure anyone to give financially. We fully believe the Lord will provide for the needs of the people we seek to serve. But if you or others wish to help, we welcome your support, and all financial gifts are tax-deductible. If you would like to make a contribution to the on-going work of The Joshua Fund please make your check payable to "The Joshua Fund" and send to:

The Joshua Fund
18950 Base Camp Road
Monument, Colorado 80132-8009

Thanks so much and may the Lord richly bless you and your family as you bless Israel and her neighbors in the name of Jesus -- especially at critical moment in history of the epicenter.

Young Jewish, Catholic leaders meet
June 24, 2009

ROME (JTA) -- About 50 young Jewish and Catholic leaders gathered near Rome at a conference sponsored by Vatican and Jewish interfaith bodies.Some 25 Jewish and 25 Catholic delegates from a number of countries are taking part in what organizers are calling the first Catholic-Jewish Emerging Leadership Conference to promote and facilitate the next generation of leadership in Catholic-Jewish relations.Hosted by the Vatican and convened by the International Catholic-Jewish Liaison Committee, Discovering Common Values: a Catholic-Jewish Leadership Conference is taking place at Pope Benedict XVI's summer residence at Castel Gandolfo.The program, which ends Thursday, includes seminars about the history of Catholic-Jewish relations, training sessions for Catholic-Jewish engagement, and discussion on issues facing Catholics and Jews today.

Obama to meet the pope while in Italy for G8
The Associated Press • June 24, 2009

A Vatican spokesman says Pope Benedict XVI and President Barack Obama will hold a much-anticipated meeting at the Vatican on July 10.The Rev. Federico Lombardi said Wednesday the Vatican has informed the White House that the pope is available to meet the president that afternoon. The meeting will be at the end of Obama's stay in Italy for a G-8 summit.Such meetings in the afternoon are unusual for the tradition-conscious Vatican. It is a sign of Benedict's interest in meeting the new American president despite his support for abortion rights and stem-cell research, which the Vatican opposes.The Vatican has been seeking common ground with Obama, although some American Catholic bishops have been hostile to his administration.

U.N. to Emerge as Global IRS Cliff Kincaid NewsWithViews June 24, 2009

While our media sleep, the United Nations is proceeding, with President Obama’s acquiescence, to implement a global plan to create a new international socialist order financed by global taxes on the American people.The Conference on the World Financial and Economic Crisis and its Impact on Development that begins on Wednesday will consider adoption of a document calling for new voluntary and innovative sources of financing initiatives to provide additional stable sources of development finance… This is U.N.-speak for global taxes. They are anything but voluntary for the people forced to pay them. [Read Cliff's book: Global Bondage: The UN Plan to Rule The World]

The most popular proposals, which could generate tens of billions of dollars in revenue for global purposes, involve taxes on greenhouse gas emissions and financial transactions such as stock trades.The document was agreed to at an informal meeting of expert facilitators and was made available on Monday afternoon at 3 p.m. It is doubtful that any changes will be made to it.The conference was postponed from June 1-3 and will now take place June 24-26 at the U.N. in New York. While the outcome document has been watered down somewhat from the previous version, it still reaffirms attainment of the U.N.’s Millennium Development Goals, which would require the payment of $845 billion from U.S. taxpayers. A commitment to the MDGs was a stated objective of the Global Poverty Act, which Barack Obama had introduced as a U.S. senator. It requires the U.S. to devote 0.7 percent of Gross National Income to foreign aid.Now, as President, Obama can bypass the Congress and simply direct his Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice to approve the U.N. conference document. Then the pressure will be increased on Congress to come up with the money and satisfy our international commitments.This is the pattern that he followed in regard to more money for the International Monetary Fund (IMF). After agreeing at the G-20 summit to provide more money for the IMF, the Obama White House slipped the cash and credit into the recently passed emergency war funding bill. The Obama White House had added billions in cash, as well as a $100 billion line of credit, for the IMF.Rep. Mike Pence commented, This legislation, which includes $108 billion in loan authorizations for a global bailout, for the International Monetary Fund—at a time when this government has run up a $2 trillion annual deficit—I believe does a disservice to taxpayers and to those that defend us. Passing a $108 billion global bailout on the backs of our soldiers is just not right.The U.N. conference document explains where all of this is leading—the destruction of the American dollar as the world’s reserve currency and the build-up of global institutions such as the IMF and the U.N.

It declares that We acknowledge the calls by many states for further study of the feasibility and advisability of a more efficient reserve system, including the possible function of SDRs in any such system and the complementary roles that could be played by various regional arrangements.SDRs are Special Drawing Rights, a form of international currency that enables global institutions like the International Monetary Fund to provide more foreign aid to the rest of the world. The U.S. pays for SDRs through its financial contributions to the IMF.If implemented, the document would officially mark the end of the United States as the world’s leading economic power.Urging socialism as the solution to the crisis, the document states that Insufficient emphasis on equitable human development has contributed to significant inequalities among countries and peoples. Other weaknesses of a systemic nature also contributed to the unfolding crisis, which has demonstrated the need for more effective government involvement to ensure an appropriate balance between the market and public interest.The nerve center of this emerging new international socialist system will be the United Nations, a body that has developed a reputation for corruption and incompetence and whose peacekeepers have been implicated in sexual abuse and other human rights violations.The United Nations, on the basis of its universal membership and legitimacy, is well positioned to participate in various reform processes aimed at improving and strengthening the effective functioning of the international financial system and architecture,the document says.This United Nations Conference is part of our collective effort towards recovery,it adds.

The Obama Administration’s unofficial point man in U.N. deliberations has been economist Joseph Stiglitz, who has been coordinating a Commission of Experts that has reported to U.N. General Assembly President Miguel D’Escoto, the notorious Communist Catholic Priest who received the Lenin Peace Prize from the old Soviet Union.Stiglitz produced his own document which called for the issuance of additional SDRs,additional sources of funding for global institutions, a new global reserve currency, and a new global credit facility. Key recommendations have been incorporated into the official U.N. conference document but Stiglitz and his experts provide far more details about them.In terms of new funding sources, the document calls for innovative sources of financing such as emission rights trading and financial transactions taxes…The concept of emissions trading enables corporations to avoid limits on greenhouse gas emissions if they pay taxes to government. It is part of the cap and trade legislation that the liberals are now pushing on Capitol Hill.

Chapter Five of this document,International Financial Innovations,goes into detail, declaring that For some time, the difficulty in meeting the UN official assistance target of 0.7 percent of Gross National Income of developed industrial countries as official development assistance, as well as the need for adequate funding for the provision of global and regional public goods (peace building, fighting global health pandemics, combating climate change and sustaining the global environment more generally) has generated proposals on how to guarantee a more reliable and stable source of financing for these objectives.The document notes that an international airline ticket tax is now in effect, as a result of the actions of the Leading Group on Solidarity Levies that now involves close to 60 countries and major international organizations. This money is going to fight global diseases.

The term Solidarity Levies is U.N.-speak for global taxes.

The Stiglitz document explains, Some of the initiatives that have been proposed encompass solidarity levies or, more generally, taxation for global objectives. Some countries have already decreed solidarity levies on airline tickets but there is a larger set of proposals. There have also been suggestions to auction global natural resources—such as ocean fishing rights and pollution emission permits—for global environmental programs.It goes on to say,The suggestion of taxes that could be earmarked for global objectives has a long history. To avert their being perceived as encroachments on participating countries’ fiscal sovereignty, it has been agreed that these taxes should be nationally imposed, but internationally coordinated.So the nations of the world, including the U.S., will collect the taxes but then turn them over to institutions such as the U.N. The world body will function, in effect, like a global IRS.Is it too much to ask that our media take some time off from talking about the girl with star tattoos on her face, Jon & Kate Plus 8, and Perez Hilton, to examine what is going on at the United Nations?

DOCTOR DOCTORIAN FROM ANGEL OF GOD
then the angel said, Financial crisis will come to Asia. I will shake the world.

JAMES 5:1-3
1 Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.
2 Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.
3 Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.

REVELATION 18:10,17,19
10 Standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas, alas that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come.
17 For in one hour so great riches is come to nought. And every shipmaster, and all the company in ships, and sailors, and as many as trade by sea, stood afar off,
19 And they cast dust on their heads, and cried, weeping and wailing, saying, Alas, alas that great city, wherein were made rich all that had ships in the sea by reason of her costliness! for in one hour is she made desolate.

EZEKIEL 7:19
19 They shall cast their silver in the streets, and their gold shall be removed: their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the LORD: they shall not satisfy their souls, neither fill their bowels: because it is the stumblingblock of their iniquity.

REVELATION 13:16-18
16 And he(FALSE POPE) causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:(CHIP IMPLANT)
17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.(6-6-6) A NUMBER SYSTEM

WORLD MARKET RESULTS
http://money.cnn.com/data/world_markets/

HALF HOUR DOW RESULTS THU JUNE 25,2009

09:30 AM -1.14
10:00 AM +12.62
10:30 AM +57.51
11:00 AM +38.31
11:30 AM +68.34
12:00 PM +138.30
12:30 PM +151.45
01:00 PM +136.86
01:30 PM +181.60
02:00 PM +169.59
02:30 PM +147.67
03:00 PM +149.49
03:30 PM +150.54
04:00 PM +172.54 8472.40

S&P 500 920.26 +19.32

NASDAQ 1829.54 +37.20

GOLD 939.20 +4.80

OIL 70.23 +1.56

TSE 300 10,361.38 +260.45

CDNX 1103.05 +12.39

S&P/TSX/60 628.27 +16.59

MORNING,NEWS,STATS

YEAR TO DATE PERFORMANCE
Dow -5.43%
S&P -0.26%
Nasdaq +13.65%
TSX Advances 1,079,declines 425,unchanged 256,Volume 2,181,252,323.
TSX Venture Exchange Advances 397,Declines 350,Unchanged 383,Volume 215,829,751.

Dow -9 points at 4 minutes of trading today.
Dow -40 points at low today.
Dow +162 points at high today so far.
GOLD opens at $937.40.OIL opens at $69.51 today.

AFTERNOON,NEWS,STATS
Dow -40 points at low today so far.
Dow +162 points at high today so far.

DAY TODAY PERFORMANCE - 12:30PM STATS
NYSE Advances 2,730,declines 855,unchanged 101,New Highs 17,New Lows 35.
Volume 2,830,942,672.
NASDAQ Advances 1,962,declines 631,unchanged 109,New highs 27,New Lows 10.
Volume 1,044,439,183.
TSX Advances 857,declines 456,unchanged 266,Volume 1,193,723,030.
TSX Venture Exchange Advances 313,Declines 268,Unchanged 271,Volume 97,289,836.

WRAPUP,NEWS,STATS
Dow -40 points at low today.
Dow +191 points at high today.
Dow +2.08% today Volume 222,084,128.
Nasdaq +2.08% today Volume 2,098,074,730.
S&P 500 +2.14% today Volume N/A

FED ENGAGED IN COVERUP
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1162809227&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1162813274&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1162777547&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1162765995&play=1
http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Sections/News_And_Analysis/_News/__EDIT%20Englewood%20Cliffs/BofAMerrillLynchMemo.pdf

Judge gives final OK to GM's bankruptcy financing JUNE 25,09

NEW YORK – A bankruptcy judge ruled Thursday that General Motors Corp. can have access to its full $33.3 billion in bankruptcy financing.Judge Robert Gerber gave final approval to the financing after he had given preliminary approval earlier this month for GM to use $15 billion of the total.The billions in U.S. and Canadian government financing is intended to keep the Detroit-based automaker going until it can sell its assets to a new company and emerge from Chapter 11. The U.S. government will take a 60 percent ownership stake in the new company, and the Canadian government would get 12.5 percent. The United Auto Workers union and GM's unsecured bondholders would own the rest.At a hearing Thursday, Gerber also denied a request from an unofficial committee of people with asbestos-related claims against GM to appoint a tort czar that would oversee all future claims against the old GM, not just those related to asbestos.The asbestos group had previously filed a motion requesting formal committee status, but told the court Thursday that it was no longer pursuing that. The group has one representative on the case's unsecured creditors committee.

Later in Thursday's hearing, a group of retired GM workers concerned about losing their benefits was expected to ask that they be granted their own committee, which would entitle them to have their legal fees paid by the automaker's estate.

BERNANKE TESTIFIES JUNE 25TH 09
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5HmTWl1lyc&feature=player_embedded
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdpbD99IqAg&feature=player_embedded
CNBC BERNANKE COVERAGE
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1164022265&play=1 (REACTION TO BERNANKE)
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163994745&play=1 BERNANKE 9 to 1 TESTIMONY
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163973671&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163959770&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163959755&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163807962&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163948225&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163891164&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163821818&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163765969&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163792856&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163737537&play=1
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163776660&play=1
GEITHNER ON REGULARY REFORM
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1163792893&play=1
CREDIT STILL SCARCE IN EUROPE
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1164019095&play=1

Bernanke says he didn't bully BofA to buy Merrill By JEANNINE AVERSA, AP Economics Writer JUNE 25,09

WASHINGTON – Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress Thursday he didn't pressure Bank of America into acquiring Merrill Lynch in a deal that ultimately cost taxpayers $20 billion.Bernanke told a House committee investigating the matter that he did not threaten action against Bank of America's CEO Kenneth Lewis or the bank's board members if they decided to abandon the takeover.I did not tell Bank of America's management that the Federal Reserve would take action against the board or management if they decided to invoke a clause in the acquisition contract in an attempt to stop the deal, Bernanke told the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Moreover, I did not instruct anyone to indicate to Bank of America that the Federal Reserve would take any particular action under those circumstances.

Earlier this month, Lewis testified that his job was threatened after he expressed second thoughts about the deal. Lewis said then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and federal regulators made clear that if Charlotte-N.C.-based Bank of America Corp. reneged on its promise, that he and the bank's board members would be ousted.Bernanke said no member of the Fed ever urged Bank of America to keep quiet about Merrill Lynch's financial problems. Not divulging that information would have violated Lewis' fiduciary duty to the bank's shareholders.Neither I nor any member of the Federal Reserve ever directed, instructed or advised Bank of America to withhold from public disclosure any information relating to Merrill Lynch, including its losses, compensation packages or bonuses or any other related matter,the Fed chief said.It marked Bernanke's first public comments since the House committee launched an investigation earlier this year into whether he or other government officials bullied Bank of America to stick with its plan to combine the two financial powers after Lewis found out about Merrill's financial woes.The committee's ranking member Darrell Issa, R-Calif., accused the Fed of having deliberately kept other regulators in the dark regarding the negotiations with Bank of America. The Federal Reserve's cover-up of important information and willingness to exclude key regulatory partners such as the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency raises troubling questions, he said.Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, said of Bernanke's denial that he threatened Lewis' job: With all due respect, I'm just not buying that.In turning aggressive toward Bernanke, Republicans are adopting the role of outsider and trying to link the Fed chairman to the Obama administration as advocates of government meddling in private industry. Many Republicans are suspicious of the administration's plan to expand the Fed's regulatory powers.

It's an odd shift, because Bernanke is a Republican appointee and many of his key advocates are Democrats. His term expires early next year, giving President Barack Obama an opportunity to pick his own Fed chief or reappoint Bernanke.Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, said he thought Lewis was the one pressuring the government. He said that the investigation revealed that Fed officials thought Bank of America failed to do proper due diligence when it came to Merrill Lynch.When asked about Bank of America's management, Bernanke said: I did have concerns, yes.Bank of America received $45 billion from the government's financial bailout program, $20 billion of which was linked to its acquisition of New York-based Merrill Lynch.Much of what the Fed, the Treasury and other agencies did in these transactions remains shrouded in secrecy,complained the committee's chairman Rep. Edolphus Towns, D-N.Y. It's time to yank the shroud off the Fed and shine some light on these events.Bernanke defended the deal and government bailout, saying the action was needed to avoid another blow to the financial system, which at the time was in distress.If Bank of America had decided to abandon the deal, it might have triggered a broader systemic crisis that could well have destabilized Bank of America as well as Merrill Lynch,Bernanke said.

Invoking the clause to rescind the deal also would have cast doubt in the minds of financial market participants — including the investors, creditors and customers of Bank of America — about the due diligence and analysis done by the company and the judgment of its management, Bernanke added. Bernanke also said the Fed's lawyers believed it was highly unlikely that Bank of America would be successful in terminating the deal through the special clause. The best option,therefore, for the companies and the broader financial system was to work with the Fed and the Treasury Department to develop a contingency plan to ensure that Bank of America would remain stable should the completion of the acquisition and the announcement of losses lead to financial stress, he said.The government helped orchestrate the deal at a time when the country's economic and financial landscape was especially fragile. Lending, the lifeblood of the economy, had come to a near halt and the financial system was on the brink of a meltdown.The transaction was hammered out over the same weekend in September that another investment bank, Lehman Brothers, went under, leading to the biggest corporate bankruptcy in U.S. history and plunging financial markets worldwide into crisis. One day later, the government was forced to bail out teetering insurance giant American International Group Inc. The week before the government seized control of mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Bank of America completed its purchase of Merrill Lynch on Jan. 1.In January, Bank of America reported a $2.39 billion fourth-quarter loss, and Merrill Lynch disclosed a loss of more than $15 billion.

Fed accused of cover-up in BofA deal: lawmaker
Wed Jun 24, 2009 4:14pm EDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Federal Reserve sought to hide its involvement in Bank of America Corp's (BAC.N) acquisition of Merrill Lynch as Merrill's financial condition worsened, the top Republican on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee said on Wednesday.The Fed engaged in a cover-up and deliberately hid concerns and pertinent details regarding the merger from other federal regulatory agencies, Representative Darrell Issa said in a statement released to Reuters.Bernanke has in the past denied any inappropriate pressure on Bank of America. Fed spokeswoman Michelle Smith on Wednesday referred to a letter Bernanke sent Representative Dennis Kucinich on April 30 and later testimony in which he offered an unconditional assertion that he did not ask Lewis to withhold information regarding Merrill.The Federal Reserve acted with the highest integrity throughout its discussions with Bank of America, Bernanke wrote to the Ohio Democrat, who chairs a subcommittee on the Oversight panel.The Democrat who heads the committee, Edolphus Towns of New York, has called Bernanke to testify Thursday. I am not going to prejudge these issues. We are not even close to finishing the Bank of America-Merrill Lynch investigation at this point,Towns said in a statement.

POLITICAL FOOTBALL

Democrats on the panel have focused on whether Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis illegally misled investors about Merrill's finances, while Republicans have zeroed in on whether the Fed and former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson inappropriately pressured Lewis to seal the deal.The issue has become a political football as lawmakers look to blame someone for the troubled deal amid taxpayer anger over the billions of dollars the government infused into banks to try to ease the world financial crisis.A Democratic source close to the committee said Republican members leaked documents just before the hearing where Lewis testified. They framed the story by looking at only a few of the documents, said the source, who was not authorized to be quoted on the matter.Some Democrats believe Bank of America's Lewis had to know about Merrill's deepening losses and that Lewis was threatening to pull out of the deal as a way to get more assistance from the Fed. Still, the Democratic source said, The Fed does not come out smelling like roses.Earlier this month, the same panel questioned Lewis about whether he was pressured to complete the deal with Merrill, which lost $15.8 billion in the fourth quarter of 2008. Lewis told the lawmakers that Bernanke never asked him to keep secret any information the bank wanted to disclose to shareholders.The committee has obtained a number of emails and documents from the Fed about its behind-the-scenes role in the merger, which was quickly brokered late in 2008 amid turmoil in the U.S. banking sector, according to sources familiar with documents. The sources declined to be identified because they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.

The sources said documents showed the Fed tried to keep some information about the Bank of America deal secret from the Office of Comptroller of the Currency, the North Carolina-based bank's direct regulator, and from the Securities and Exchange Commission. The bank is also regulated by the Fed.That behavior raises important questions about whether the Fed can work collaboratively with other regulators and should gain additional power, as proposed in the Obama administration's financial regulation plan, the sources said.Documents obtained by Republican panel members suggest that the Fed pushed Bank of America to complete the deal by threatening to fire Lewis and the board, according to the sources.They cited a December 20, 2008 email in which Jeffrey Lacker, president of the Richmond Fed, said he had spoken to Bernanke about Bank of America potentially trying to get out of the deal by claiming that a material adverse change (MAC) had occurred.Just had a long talk with Ben (Bernanke). Says that they think the MAC threat is irrelevant because it's not credible. Also intends to make it even more clear that if they play that card and they need assistance, management is gone,Lacker wrote, according to the sources.
Bernanke's term as Fed chairman expires in January.(Reporting by Julie Vorman and Kim Dixon; Additional reporting by Mark Felsenthal; Editing by Gary Hill)

Rep. Issa: Bernanke Engaged In Cover-Up In Bank of America-Merrill Merger
UPDATED below at 3:22 p.m. with internal e-mail obtained by The Post:

Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke engaged in a cover-up to disguise his actions in strong-arming the merger of Bank of America and Merrill Lynch last fall, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) charged in a statement released moments ago.Quick catchup: Bank of America chief executive Ken Lewis has twice testified under oath that Bernanke and former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson threatened to remove him (Lewis) and the B of A board if he didn't go through with a proposed merger with troubled brokerage Merrill Lynch.
Lewis said that he considered trying to back out of the deal as he saw Merrill's losses mounting into the billions in December, but said Bernanke told him he had to go through with the tie-up -- with $10 billion in government aid -- to keep the financial markets from collapsing. Bernanke has denied any wrongdoing in the matter.

Bernanke testifies on the Hill tomorrow before Issa's committee, so his provocative assertion today sets the stage for some drama. Issa is the ranking member of the House Oversight committee and has led the probe against Bernanke.The committee has already learned that Ben Bernanke and the Federal Reserve made inappropriate threats to fire Bank of America management unless they went ahead with the 'shotgun wedding' that was the Merrill Lynch acquisition,Issa said in a released to Reuters and since obtained by The Post.The Federal Reserve also engaged in a cover-up and deliberately hid concerns and pertinent details regarding the merger from other federal regulatory agencies,the statement said.

UPDATE: If there's anything like a smoking gun in Issa's holster, it's this e-mail exchange his committee obtained via subpoena, in which two Fed Reserve employees discuss withholding information from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the Fed's regulator. Quoting from a Republican committee staff memo obtained by The Post:Even the OCC, Bank of America’s direct regulator, was kept in the dark by Federal Reserve employees when it came to the Fed’s negotiations with Ken Lewis over the MAC clause. In one exchange, Fed employees refer to an upcoming conference call in which they express their interest in withholding Bank of America’s negotiations with the government over the MAC:Given the presence of the OCC on the call, I think we should not discuss or reference the call with Ken Lewis and Paulson,wrote one.

The reply came:Agree. Also not the MAC discussion.MAC: Material adverse change, a clause written into merger contracts that gives one party the opportunity to try to pull out if previously undisclosed, harmful facts are uncovered. Lewis considered trying the MAC -- a legal challenge, that you can win or lose -- when he saw how Merrill's losses were mounting in December.You can be sure Issa will ask Bernanke about this tomorrow. We'll be blogging it live.-- Frank Ahrens

ECB lends €442bn in record auction
ANDREW WILLIS Today JUNE 25,09 @ 09:28 CET

The European Central Bank (ECB) will pump a further €442 billion into money markets after a record auction on Wednesday (24 June), in which eurozone banks snapped up one-year loans amid expectations borrowing costs may rise in future. The ECB move to lend billions of euros across the 16-country currency area is designed to unblock bank lending, improve private sector access to credit and revive the area's ailing economy.Banks provide roughly three quarters of company financing in the eurozone.

Financial markets have dubbed the move a continuation of the ecb's non-standard measures, with Wednesday's auction part of a wider ECB policy to provide unlimited liquidity to banks since the financial crisis began. The €442.2 billion in 12-month loans – charged at the ECB's current benchmark interest rate of one percent - went to 1,121 banks. They will receive the funds on Thursday.The move appeared to take immediate effect with the euro area's interbank lending rate – the Euribor – falling to record low of 1.57 percent for 12-month loans on Wednesday. Faced with the worst recession since World War II, the ECB has also cut interest rates to a record low in recent months and will next month start buying €60 billion in covered bonds.Two more auctions of one-year loans are scheduled for this year, one in September and one in December, with their success depending on whether banks in turn make the money available to the private sector.

Weak recovery in sight

The ECB move came as the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) said in its latest World Economic Outlook report on Wednesday that a weak recovery is in sight but that damage from the crisis is likely to be long lasting. The organisation's revised GDP forecasts predict a contraction of 4.1 percent for this year and 0.7 percent positive growth for 2010, both improvements on previous estimates. OECD activity now looks to be approaching its nadir, following the deepest decline in post-war history,says the report.While the recovery is likely to be both weak and fragile for some time the report continues, the impact of the financial crisis could have been worse had it not been for the emergency measures that have been implemented.Thanks to a strong economic policy effort, an even darker scenario seems to have been avoided,it concludes.

Commission outlines clean coal China plan
ANDREW WILLIS Today JUNE 25,09 @ 17:40 CET

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS – The European Commission put forward plans on Thursday (25 June) for the financing of a demonstration coal plant in China that aims to have 'near zero' emission levels through the use of carbon capture and geological storage technology (CCS).Environment commissioner Stavros Dimas said the joint project to have a CCS-using coal plant up and running in China by 2020 could act as a template for future agreements between developed and developing countries. This important co-operation between the EU and China on CCS can act as a model for co-operation under the post-2012 global climate change regime the world must agree in Copenhagen in December,he said. In 2005 the EU and China signed a partnership agreement to co-operate on a range of climate change issues, with the two sides also signing a cooperation agreement on clean energy at the EU-China summit in Prague this May.However the commission's new proposals, now headed to the European parliament and EU member states for approval, warn that the general role-out of CCS technology in China could be significantly delayed without assistance from developed countries.One explanation for this is the greater cost of electricity production when using CCS, a process that involves capturing CO2 emissions after the coal combustion, transportation and the eventual burial of the gas underground or under the seabed.

To finance the demonstration coal plant, the commission proposes the use of a public-private partnership (PPP) - possibly in the form of an easy to set up investment fund known as a special purpose vehicle.The initiative has to be designed to inform and garner support from China, EU and European Economic Area member states, international financial institutions and private companies to contribute to this activity,says the communication.The commission itself has pledged several million euros for the initial stages of the plant's development, with the possibility of a further €50 million for the construction and operation phase of the project provided there is continued political support from China. The EU executive estimates the additional cost of constructing and operating the plant over a period of 25 years to be between €300 million and €550 million, assuming China introduces some form of carbon pricing instrument to help with the financing.

Carbon capture and geological storage

While the commission attempts to garner political and financial support for the demonstration plant, a majority of environmental NGOs consider CCS projects to be a dangerous waste of valuable funding.Groups such as Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth argue the money should be channeled towards the development of renewable energy sources, rather than invested in a technology that will prolong fossil fuel use and may not be ready for a commercial role out before 2030.This, they argue, is too late if world temperatures are to rise by no more than two degrees above pre-industrial levels, a crucial cutoff point say scientists. However supporters of CCS say it is a vital bridging technology that can help to keep emission levels down while the world is slowed weaned off fossils fuels. In particular, the continued high growth levels forecast for China over the coming decade are expected to drive the construction of hundreds of new coal-fired electricity plants that provide 70 percent of the country's energy.Already in 2007, the equivalent of one new 500MW coal-fired plant was being built at a rate of one every two and a half days estimates the International Energy Agency, with the country unlikely to make a rapid switch over to renewable energy.

Stocks zigzag after Fed rate announcement By MADLEN READ and TIM PARADIS, AP Business Writers JUNE 24,09

NEW YORK – Investors are reacting coolly to the Federal Reserve's assessment that the recession is easing.The central bank's decision Wednesday to leave a key lending rate at a low of zero to 0.25 percent wasn't a surprise. Stocks didn't make big moves after the Fed said inflation will remain subdued for some time, perhaps quelling some worries about rising prices.Stocks are fluctuating, as is typical after a Fed announcement. The Dow Jones industrial average, which had been up 44 ahead of the statement, is up 45 to 8,367. The Standard & Poor's 500 index is up 11 to 906. The Nasdaq composite index is up 35 at 1,799.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

NEW YORK (AP) — A surprise jump in orders for big-ticket manufactured items is boosting stocks ahead of the Federal Reserve's decision on interest rates.Investors were upbeat about a Commerce Department report Wednesday saying durable goods orders rose 1.8 percent in May. Economists surveyed by Thomson Reuters had anticipated a drop.The major indexes rose but pulled off their highs. The Commerce Department said sales of new homes fell 0.6 percent last month, while the market had expected a rise.

The gains come as investors wait for the Fed to finish its two-day meeting on monetary policy. The central bank's statements this year have tended to bring big moves in the stock and bond markets. The Fed is widely expected to leave its key rate unchanged at a range of zero to 0.25 percent, but investors are less sure about its outlook for the economy.

The Fed's announcement is due at 2:15 p.m. Eastern time.

Recent gauges of the economy have been improving, but they have not yet pointed to growth. Many investors are nervous that a recovery could be hampered if the Fed raises interest rates too soon or starts dismantling its emergency supports for the financial system.It's pretty obvious that the Fed has a delicate tightrope to walk here,said Craig Peckham, market strategist at Jefferies & Co. He said policy makers must acknowledge the long-term potential for inflation, but at the same time calm investors' worries about any near-term removal of liquidity from the system.You'll see this statement dissected more closely than anything we've seen in last couple of meetings,Peckham said.In midafternoon trading, the Dow Jones industrial average rose 44.66, or 0.5 percent, to 8,367.57. The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 11.67, or 1.3 percent, to 906.77, and the Nasdaq composite index rose 36.12, or 2.1 percent, to 1,801.04.Although the Fed has held its target rate steady since late last year, its statements have touched off big moves in stocks. In January, the statement coincided with hopes for a plan for banks' toxic assets; in March, the Fed announced it would start buying Treasurys; and in April, the Fed said it was seeing signs the recession is easing.In corporate news, software maker Oracle Corp.'s results late Tuesday for its most recent quarter exceeded analysts' average forecast. Oracle shares gained $1.54, or 7.8 percent, to $21.41.Stocks held their gains after a successful Treasury Department auction of $37 billion in five-year notes. Demand was stronger than at recent auctions.Auctions have been going smoothly this year, but both bond and stock investors are looking for signs that demand for new Treasury supply might be waning. If demand trails off, the government will have to raise yields sharply to attract buyers. Treasury yields are closely tied to borrowing rates for consumers on loans such as mortgages.Bond prices rose after the auction. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note, which moves opposite its price, slipped to 3.62 percent from 3.63 percent Tuesday. Crude oil fell 72 cents to $68.52 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The dollar was mixed against other major currencies. Gold prices rose.About five stocks rose for every one that fell on the New York Stock Exchange, where volume came to 542.9 million shares, compared with 660.1 million traded at the same point Tuesday.The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies rose 8.99, or 1.8 percent, to 498.76.Overseas stock prices advanced. Japan's Nikkei stock average rose 0.4 percent. In Europe, Britain's FTSE 100 rose 1.2 percent, Germany's DAX index rose 2.7 percent, and France's CAC-40 rose 2.2 percent.Investors, many of whom have placed bets over the past several months on a late-year economic recovery, are on edge as the second half of 2009 approaches. The Dow is up 27.1 percent from the 12-year lows reached March 9, but the index has fallen about 5 percent since June 12.

Fed says recession easing, inflation not a threat By JEANNINE AVERSA, AP Economics Writer JUNE 24,09

WASHINGTON – The Federal Reserve signaled Wednesday that the weak economy likely will keep prices in check despite growing concerns that the trillions it's pumping into the financial system will ignite inflation.Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues held a key bank lending rate at a record low of between zero and 0.25 percent, and pledged again to keep it there for an extended period to help brace activity going forward.Even though energy and other commodity prices have risen recently, the Fed said inflation will remain subdued for some time.This new language sought to ease Wall Street's concerns that the Fed's aggressive actions to revive the economy will spur inflation later on.The Fed also decided to maintain existing programs intended to drive down rates on mortgages and other consumer debt. Instead, the central bank again reserved the right to make changes if economic conditions warrant.The Fed in March launched a $1.2 trillion effort to drive down interest rates to try to revive lending and get Americans to spend more freely again. It said it would spend up to $300 billion to buy long-term government bonds over six months and boost its purchases of mortgage securities. So far, the Fed has bought about $177.5 billion in Treasury bonds.The Fed is on track to buy up to $1.25 trillion worth of securities issued by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac by the end of this year. Nearly $456 billion worth of those securities have been purchased.Fed policymakers noted that the pace of economic contraction is slowing and that conditions in financial markets have generally improved in recent months.That observation about the recession was stronger than after the Fed's last meeting in April.

Economists predict the economy is sinking in the April-June quarter but not nearly as much as it had in the prior six months, which marked the worst performance in 50 years. The economy is contracting at a pace of between 1 and 3 percent, according to various projections.Fed policymakers said its forceful actions, along with President Barack Obama's stimulus of tax cuts and increased government spending will contribution to a gradual return to economic growth.Bernanke has predicted the recession will end later this year. Some analysts say the economy will start growing again as soon as the July-September quarter.Fed policymakers noted that consumer spending has shown signs of stabilizing but remains constrained by ongoing job losses, falling home values and hard-to-get credit.Even after the recession ends, the recovery is likely to be tepid, which will push unemployment higher.The nation's unemployment rate — now at 9.4 percent — is expected to keep climbing into 2010. Acknowledging that the jobless rate is going to climb over 10 percent, President Barack Obama said Tuesday he's not satisfied with the progress his administration has made on the economy. He defended his recovery package but said the aid must get out faster.Some analysts say the rate could rise as high as 11 percent by the next summer before it starts to decline. The highest rate since World War II was 10.8 percent at the end of 1982.

The weak economy has put a damper on inflation.

Consumer prices inched up 0.1 percent in May, but are down 1.3 percent over the last 12 months, the weakest annual showing since the 1950s. The Fed suggested companies won't be in any position to jack up prices given cautious consumers, big production cuts at factories and the weak employment climate.

Moody’s Says World Has No Credible Alternative to U.S. Dollar By Keiko Ujikane and Jason Clenfield

June 24 (Bloomberg) -- Moody’s Investors Service said the dollar’s unchallenged status as the world’s reserve currency is supporting U.S.’s Aaa credit rating even as the nation’s budget deficit is set to quadruple this year. In the absence of a credible alternative it’s hard to see abrupt changes and that’s not even in the interest of the creditors,Pierre Cailleteau, managing director of sovereign risk at Moody’s, said in an interview in Tokyo yesterday. The credit rating remains solid,he said earlier at a briefing. The fiscal health of the world’s largest economy has come under scrutiny by its creditors as bailouts and stimulus plans swell a budget deficit forecast to soar to a record $1.85 trillion this year. China and Russia, the largest and third- largest foreign holders of the debt, have said they may diversify some of their reserves. Even if the U.S.’s ratio of debt to gross domestic product were to exceed 100 percent, more than double the current level, the country’s rating would still be secure as long as borrowing costs stay low, Cailleteau said. Moody’s estimates the ratio will rise to 59.9 percent this year from 40.8 percent. In the U.S., interest rates are low because the debt is issued in its own currency and the currency happens to be the international reserve currency,he said. Yields on benchmark 10-year Treasuries have risen to 3.63 percent since touching a record low 2.04 percent in December. They rose to their highest level since October this month after Alexei Ulyukayev, first deputy chairman of Russia’s central bank, said on June 10 his country may switch some of its Treasury holdings to International Monetary Fund bonds.

Guarantee Safety

China, which in March called for the U.S. to guarantee the safety of China’s assets, is still buying Treasuries. Premier Wen Jiabao’s government has increased its holdings of the securities by almost a quarter to $763.5 billion since the onset of the global credit crisis in September, according to U.S. Treasury data. The question you have to ask is: What does it mean to be a safe haven in the end? Cailleteau said. The test is that when you have a big problem, either in the economy or if you have the threat of a war, where do you think people are going to put their money? Policy makers have indicated there is no replacement for the dollar. Russian Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said on June 13 that it’s too early to speak of an alternative.Japanese Finance Minister Kaoru Yosano, whose government is the largest holder of Treasuries after China, this month said the dollar should remain the world’s reserve currency.

Fiscal Discipline

U.S. President Barack Obama has said that it is important his nation maintains fiscal discipline to ensure investors keep buying Treasuries. He plans to cut the deficit by half before the end of his first term. Even if he’s wrong, even if he’s too optimistic, that doesn’t necessarily meant we’ll have to act,Cailleteau said.The U.S. started the crisis in pretty good shape in terms of government finances.The global recession has put pressure on economies and government budgets around the world, forcing Moody’s to reconsider the credit quality required by the ratings, Cailleteau said. It’s a scale that is anchored on the Aaa rating and the Aaa anchor is drifting. Most Aaa governments are affected,he said, adding that the U.S is losing altitude in the top range. To contact the reporter on this story: Keiko Ujikane in Tokyo at kujikane@bloomberg.net; Jason Clenfield in Tokyo at jclenfield@bloomberg.net

EU mulls IMF solution to gas crisis threat
ANDREW RETTMAN 24.06.2009 @ 17:29 CET

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - An International Monetary Fund-led loan to help Ukraine buy Russian gas is emerging as the favoured option to prevent another European energy crisis this winter.A group of multilateral lenders - the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, the European Investment Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development - is to meet with EU, Russian and Ukrainian officials in Brussels on Monday (29 June) to discuss anti-crisis measures.Ukraine needs around $4 billion (€3bn) to stockpile Russian gas for winter when demand peaks. It also needs around $600 million by 7 July to pay for its monthly Russian gas consumption.

The option of private banks lending money to EU gas firms to help build stocks in Ukraine is falling by the wayside, EU officials indicated on Wednesday. Brussels ruled out using EU public money more than two weeks ago.Any IMF-type loan would likely be made to the Ukrainian state, rather than state gas distributor Naftogaz. It might also be attached to the disbursement of the IMF's next tranche of Ukraine's $16.4 billion general economic crisis aid, due in coming weeks.The gas crisis money would probably come with strings attached, such as oversight of and increased transparency in the Ukrainian state-owned firm.Naftogaz is notoriously badly managed and heavily in debt, making it a risky business partner for the EU private banking or energy sector.The January gas crisis, which saw Russia cut off Ukraine - a transit state for gas to the EU - for 10 days, left vast swathes of people in Bulgaria and Slovakia without heating in freezing weather.

But Russia came out the biggest loser in the dispute.

Russia's reputation suffered more than Ukraine's, despite its massive PR campaign. Gazprom lost €2 billion and was forced to flare gas at a time when gas prices were the highest in history,one EU official said.When asked at the EU summit last Friday what the EU can do to help avoid a re-run of the problem, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said: We are talking to Ukraine in various co-operation fora, as well as with the IMF, on how to increase transparency.There is a broad consensus in the [EU] that we have to put all our efforts to solve these issues thoroughly, not that they reappear every month.

SEC pitches tightened rules for money-market funds By MARCY GORDON, AP Business Writer JUNE 24,09

WASHINGTON – Federal regulators on Wednesday proposed tightened rules for money-market mutual funds that would require them to hold some assets that could be easily converted to cash and to invest only in the highest quality securities.The Securities and Exchange Commission action came after a $60 billion money fund broke the buck, exposing investors to losses that could ultimately reach about 8 cents on the dollar. The value of the Primary Reserve Fund's assets in September fell to 97 cents per investor dollar — below the dollar-for-dollar level needed for full repayment.The SEC voted 5-0, to issue the proposed rule changes for the popular money-market funds, which hold about $3.8 trillion in assets, for public comment. The new rules could be approved sometime after that 60-day period.The funds are a mainstay of financial management for U.S. families and companies, holding themselves out as safe and easily accessible investments that offer returns exceeding those of conventional savings accounts.I believe that the proposal ... will go a long way toward better protecting investors and making money-market funds more resilient to short-term market risks, SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro said before the vote.Money funds that cater to retail investors would be required to hold at least 5 percent of their assets in cash, Treasury bonds or other instruments that could be sold for cash within a day. At least 15 percent of the retail funds' assets would have to be convertible to cash within a week. There currently are no such liquidity requirements.The change would make it easier for investors to redeem their money from the funds amid a rush of demand.

The liquidity requirements for money funds marketed to institutional investors would be stricter, and the maximum maturity of bonds that money funds can invest in would be shortened to 60 days from 90 days.The SEC also proposed changes in money funds' operations, such as requiring that they be able to electronically process investors' purchases and redemptions at a price other than $1 a share — to make it easier for investors to get their money back if a fund breaks the buck.The commissioners punted, however, on more fundamental changes to the regulation of money funds, such as substituting a floating share price that would make them more akin to investments like conventional mutual funds whose value goes up and down.The SEC wants to examine whether a floating price would better protect investors from runs on money-market funds or if the efficiency of the $1 price provides a greater benefit, Schapiro said.

The role of credit rating agencies' assessments of money-market funds also will be studied. The industry, dominated by Standard & Poor's, Moody's Investors Service and Fitch Ratings, has been widely criticized for failing to give investors adequate warning of the risks in subprime mortgage securities, whose collapse helped set off the global financial crisis. The SEC has been studying proposals to tighten its oversight of the industry.On the day of the Primary Reserve Fund's blowup, it continued to be rated investment grade by the three big agencies, said Commissioner Kathleen Casey.There must be a better way,she said.The commissioners didn't issue proposals for such changes but recommended seeking public comment on them.The administration's plan for overhauling financial regulation, issued last week, recommended that the President's Working Group on Financial Markets — which includes Schapiro, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke — examine whether more fundamental changes are needed to better protect investors in money-market funds.The SEC plan proposed Wednesday closely reflects recommendations made by the Investment Company Institute, the mutual fund industry's major trade group. The biggest money-market funds are managed by BlackRock Inc., Fidelity Investments, Goldman Sachs Group Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Vanguard Group, according to Crane Data.The collapse of the money fund run by Reserve Management Co. last fall was one in the cascading series of troubling events in the financial meltdown. It marked only the second such instance in the nearly four decades that money-market funds have been available to keep money safe and readily accessible while earning a modest return.The breaking of the buck by the Primary Fund — the first U.S. money fund, established in 1970 — stoked fears over the safety of the trillions held in the money funds.

After investment bank Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy protection on Sept. 15, New York-based Reserve Management's board declared its $785 million investment in Lehman debt's worthless. That triggered a rush of orders from institutional clients to pull money out of the fund, gutting the fund's value as its managers were forced to sell assets amid sharply declining markets. The Treasury Department stepped in with a temporary program to guarantee money-market funds, but the Primary Fund didn't qualify and had to liquidate.The SEC last month charged Reserve Management and its two top executives with civil fraud, saying they withheld key facts from investors. The firm and the executives said they would defend themselves against the SEC's allegations.

Mexico: Green fund better than carbon credits By MARK STEVENSON, Associated Press Writer – Mon Jun 22, 11:35 pm ET

MEXICO CITY – Mexican President Felipe Calderon made a push Monday for his proposal for a $10 billion green fund as a more efficient way to fight climate change than carbon credits.Calderon spoke at the opening of the latest session of the Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate, which brings together representatives of 19 countries and the European Union that together account for 80 percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions.The current carbon credits would not have to disappear, but they are not an efficient mechanism, Calderon said, noting that the credits market has to match an industry that wants to pollute with another that has projects to compensate or reduce gas emissions.The two-day meeting opened near the city of Cuernavaca. It is the third in a series of talks called for by President Barack Obama that will culminate with a June summit in Italy.The goal is to help broker a replacement for the expiring Kyoto Protocol, ahead of a United Nations conference in Copenhagen next December on a new international treaty for dealing with global warming.Calderon said the green fund could be administered by the World Bank or some other multilateral agency.It would be funded by contributions from all nations — and open to finance projects from all nations — as opposed to largely private-sector carbon credit market.

It will have a framework of greater multilateral participation, which will result in a more equitable and efficient distribution of funds,Calderon said.He said the idea does not seek, as has been traditional, that the funds to fight climate change ... come from the same old donors as an act of charity or a handout given to developing countries.It is time to move on from mutual reproaches, to a shared scheme of responsibility,Calderon said.The amount each country would donate to the fund would be open to negotiation, but rich countries would be expected to give more.

THESE NUTCASE ENVIROMENTALISTS AND ANIMAL RIGHTS NUTS AND NEW AGE NUTS AND WORLD GOVERNMENT NUTS ARE ALWAYS TRYING TO CONTROL BUSINESSES AND PEOPLE. REDICULAS. THESE SO CALLED PEACE AND LOVE NUTCASES WANT TO KILL AND DESTROY PEOPLES LIVES.

Green group asks U.S. to bar Canada oil sands By Tom Doggett JUNE 24,09http://www.forestethics.org/

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – An environmental group on Wednesday asked U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to deny permits for pipelines that would bring oil from Canada's oil sands to the United States.ForestEthics said production from Canadian oil sands, also known as tar sands, generates up to five times more greenhouse gas emissions than conventional oil. It said this conflicts with President Obama's pledge to tackle global warming.Oil from the tar sands is one of the world's dirtiest, the group's executive director, Todd Paglia, said in a letter to Clinton. For the U.S., continued dependence on tar sands oil would impair plans to reduce our carbon footprint in the short and long term.Canada is the biggest foreign oil supplier to the United States and Canada's oil sands are the largest crude deposits outside the Middle East.The group urged Clinton to deny permits for pipelines that would move the oil to U.S. refineries, particularly the Alberta Clipper pipeline. The State Department has a say in pipelines that would cross the U.S. border.Enbridge Energy Partners LP's 1,000-mile (1,610-kilometre) pipeline would be able to carry 450,000 barrels of tar sands crude oil a day from Alberta, Canada to Superior, Wisconsin. The oil would then be sent to U.S. refineries to be processed into petroleum products such as gasoline and diesel fuel.The U.S. portion would be 326 miles long and cost $1.2 billion. If approved, it would be operational in mid 2010.Enbridge spokeswoman Denise Hamsher said the State Department's decision is based on a pipeline, not on oil production that occurs in Canada where it does not have jurisdiction.What would the Midwest do without that supply? asked Hamsher, who pointed out that 1 million barrels a day in Canadian sands oil is already exported to the United States.State Department spokesman Andrew Laine said the Alberta Clipper pipeline project was under review and it is premature to comment while the review process is ongoing.

U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu said this month that technology will help solve the environmental problems connected with Canada's oil sands production. But ForestEthics said technology will not be able to overcome human health hazards associated with oil sands production.In Alberta, where most of the Canadian tar sands operations are currently located, there are elevated rates of cancer in downstream communities,the group said.Travis Davies, spokesman for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, said studies have not cited a link between oil sands and cancer in nearby communities.Davies acknowledged that oil sands production causes higher greenhouse gas emissions, but not at the rate five times higher claimed by ForestEthics.He said the full life-cycle emissions from oil sands -- production, transport, refining and end use -- is only 5 to 15 percent more than oil imported from Saudi Arabia and about equal to oil from Venezuela, Mexico, Nigeria and even California.Still, ForestEthics protested outside the State Department on Wednesday by giving passersby the chance to smell glass vials of the tar sands that are labeled dirty oil by any other name would be as risky.The group joined with the Sierra Club to raise their concerns about Canadian tar sands to U.S. lawmakers by taking out a full-page ad in a prominent Capitol Hill newspaper.The political-based cartoon shows a young girl worried about a huge pipeline, labeled World's Dirtiest Oil at the U.S.-Canadian border, and asking Secretary Clinton: Is this my clean energy future? The ad can be seen at the group's website www.ForestEthics.org. Secretary Clinton now has an opportunity to show that America is a global leader in the clean energy economy. It's simply not in our national interest to allow this project to move forward, said Sierra Club executive director Carl Pope.(Reporting by Tom Doggett; Editing by Marguerita Choy)

WW3 THE 3 WAVES THAT MARCH TO ISRAEL

AMOS 9:10
10 All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword, which say, The evil shall not overtake nor prevent us.

DANIEL 11:40-45
40 And at the time of the end shall the king of the south( EGYPT) push at him:(EU DICTATOR IN ISRAEL) and the king of the north (RUSSIA AND MUSLIM HORDES OF EZEK 38+39) shall come against him like a whirlwind, with chariots, and with horsemen, and with many ships; and he shall enter into the countries, and shall overflow and pass over.
41 He shall enter also into the glorious land, and many countries shall be overthrown: but these shall escape out of his hand, even Edom, and Moab, and the chief of the children of Ammon.(JORDAN)
42 He shall stretch forth his hand also upon the countries: and the land of Egypt shall not escape.
43 But he shall have power over the treasures of gold and of silver, and over all the precious things of Egypt: and the Libyans and the Ethiopians shall be at his steps.
44 But tidings out of the east(CHINA 2ND WAVE OF WW3) and out of the north(RUSSIA, MUSLIMS WHATS LEFT FROM WAVE 1) shall trouble him:(EU DICTATOR IN ISRAEL) therefore he shall go forth with great fury to destroy, and utterly to make away many.( 1/3RD OF EARTHS POPULATION)
45 And he shall plant the tabernacles of his palace between the seas in the glorious holy mountain; yet he shall come to his end, and none shall help him.

REVELATION 14:18-20
18 And another angel came out from the altar, which had power over fire; and cried with a loud cry to him that had the sharp sickle, saying, Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe.
19 And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God.
20 And the winepress was trodden without the city,(JERUSALEM) and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the horse bridles, by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs.(200 MILES) (THE SIZE OF ISRAEL)

The Third and Final Wave of WW3 is when all Nations march to Jerusalem, but JESUS bodily returns to earth and destroys them,sets up his KINGDOM OF RULE FOR 1000 YEARS THEN FOREVER.

2ND WAVE CHINA AND KINGS OF THE EAST MARCH TO ISRAEL

REVELATION 16:12
12 And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared.(THIS IS THE ATATURK DAM IN TURKEY,THEY CROSS OVER).

DANIEL 11:44 (2ND WAVE OF WW3)
44 But tidings out of the east(CHINA) and out of the north(RUSSIA, MUSLIMS WHATS LEFT FROM WAVE 1) shall trouble him:(EU DICTATOR IN ISRAEL) therefore he shall go forth with great fury to destroy, and utterly to make away many.( 1/3RD OF EARTHS POPULATION)

REVELATION 9:12-18
12 One woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter.
13 And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God,
14 Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates.(IRAQ-SYRIA)
15 And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men.(1/3 Earths Population die in WW 3 2ND WAVE)
16 And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand:(200 MILLION MAN ARMY FROM CHINA AND THE KINGS OF THE EAST) and I heard the number of them.
17 And thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone.(NUCLEAR BOMBS)
18 By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths.(NUCLEAR BOMBS)

China arrests leading democracy advocate: state media by Marianne Barriaux JUNE 24,09

BEIJING (AFP) – Prominent Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo, a leading force behind a petition calling for democratic reforms, has been formally arrested for subversive activities, state media said Wednesday.Activist groups said the move was a blow for human rights and political freedom in China while US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi urged worldwide condemnation.Liu, who has been detained since December, was arrested Tuesday for alleged agitation activities aimed at subversion of the government and overthrowing the socialist system,Xinhua news agency said, citing Beijing police.The 53-year-old writer, who was involved in the 1989 Tiananmen Square pro-democracy movement that was crushed by the army, has long campaigned through his writings for human rights and democracy in China.He was taken into custody last year after signing Charter 08, a widely circulated manifesto calling for fundamental political and legal reforms to China's Communist Party-dominated system and respect for human rights.

The document was signed by about 300 Chinese scholars, lawyers and officials.Liu has been engaged in agitation activities, such as spreading of rumours and defaming of the government, aimed at subversion of the state and overthrowing the socialist system in recent years,Xinhua quoted a police statement as saying.Liu had confessed to the charge, the statement added.His lawyer, Mo Shaoping, said he was not informed of the arrest, but that police were still in the process of investigating the case. If formally charged Liu could get up to 15 years in prison, Mo said.Beijing police declined to comment to AFP.The arrest comes amid tightened controls in China amid a series of sensitive political anniversaries this year.China earlier this month passed the 20th anniversary of the crackdown on the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests with stifling security and next faces October's 60th anniversary of the founding of communist China.Mo said police had told Liu's wife, Liu Xia, that he might not be able to work as Liu's defence lawyer. Mo said this may be because he also had signed Charter 08.Mo said he was preparing a formal request to be allowed to meet with Liu.

Liu Xia could not immediately be reached for comment.

Liu Xiaobo has been under a form of house arrest in an undisclosed location away from his home since December.The decision by the Chinese government to formally arrest Liu Xiaobo deserves the full condemnation from the international community, said Pelosi, who is second in line for the presidency after US Vice President Joe Biden.Liu's arrest for peacefully criticising his government and advocating for human rights violates provisions in China's constitution as well as international human rights standards, Pelosi said in a statement. Nicholas Bequelin, a Hong Kong-based researcher with Human Rights Watch, said the arrest meant Liu would almost certainly go to prison, calling it a pre-determined result.We believe that Liu Xiaobo has done nothing but exercise his right to freedom of expression and in no circumstances should he have been arrested,Bequelin told AFP.

Amnesty International also condemned Liu's arrest.

This use of state security charges to punish activists for merely expressing their views must stop,it said in an emailed statement. Bequelin said Chinese authorities had long tolerated Liu's dissident writings. But he said his arrest made clear that hardline elements in the government blamed for a tightening of political controls since before last year's Beijing Olympics had gained the upper hand. The Ministry of Public Security has seen its power considerably enhanced and they are more aggressive. The room for dissent is shrinking,he said. Liu was jailed for nearly two years for his role in the 1989 Tiananmen protests and then again in the mid-1990s.

His case is the highest-profile dissident arrest since rights activist Hu Jia was arrested in December 2007 and sentenced four months later to three and a half years in prison for sedition.It has drawn intense international criticism, with the European Union and the United States demanding his quick release. Novelists such as Britain's Salman Rushdie and Italy's Umberto Eco, as well as Nobel literature laureates including Irish poet Seamus Heaney, have also campaigned for Liu's release.

U.S. sees multinational approach to North Korea ship JUNE 24,09

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States will likely agree with other countries about whether to contact a North Korean ship being monitored by the U.S. Navy, the Pentagon said on Wednesday.Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said there has been no decision yet to hail the Kang Nam, the first North Korean ship to be monitored under a new U.N. security resolution that bars Pyongyang from exporting weapons including missile parts and nuclear materials.That is a decision I think we will likely take collectively with our allies and partners out there and make a determination about whether we choose to hail and query this particular ship. And if we make that decision, when and where to do so,Morrell told reporters at a Pentagon briefing.That is not a decision that's been made yet and I don't get the sense that it is imminent.

Morrell did not say which countries would be party to any decision. The U.N. sanctions, adopted this month in response to Pyongyang's nuclear test in May, authorized U.N. member states including South Korea, Japan and China to inspect North Korean sea, air and land cargo.Separately on Wednesday, U.S. Under Secretary of Defense Michele Flournoy said in Beijing that the United States had assured China it would implement the U.N. resolution fully, responsibly and in concert with other nations in the region.U.S. officials have not said why the Navy is monitoring the Kang Nam, which left a North Korean port a week ago. South Korean media reports have said the ship, a known North Korean weapons trader, is probably heading for Myanmar, while other media outlets have named Singapore as a possible destination.Singapore's government said on Saturday it would take action against the North Korean ship if the vessel heads to its port with a cargo of weapons.

Morrell declined to discuss the ship's location or possible destination.

U.S. military officials have said the U.N. resolution would allow the Navy to search a ship only with its flag country's consent. But Morrell stressed that Washington has a common interest with countries in the region.The U.N. authorized all of us who have an interest in deterring North Korea from proliferating banned weapons,he said.And so it's not just us who have this authority or this responsibility. All members of the United Nations have that authority and responsibility. And it's not just us who are interested in North Korean ships.(Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by John O'Callaghan)

NKorea threatens US as Washington, allies watch for signs of another missile launch Wed Jun 24, 9:16 AM By Hyung-Jin Kim, The Associated Press

SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea threatened Wednesday to wipe the United States off the map as Washington and its allies watched for signs the regime will launch a series of missiles in the coming days. Off China's coast, a U.S. destroyer was tailing a North Korean ship suspected of transporting illicit weapons to Myanmar in what could be the first test of U.N. sanctions passed to punish the nation for an underground nuclear test last month. The Kang Nam left the North Korean port of Nampo a week ago with the USS John S. McCain close behind. The ship, accused of transporting banned goods in the past, is believed bound for Myanmar, according to South Korean and U.S. officials.The new U.N. Security Council resolution requires member states to seek permission to inspect suspicious cargo. North Korea has said it would consider interception a declaration of war and on Wednesday accused the U.S. of seeking to provoke another Korean War. If the U.S. imperialists start another war, the army and people of Korea will ... wipe out the aggressors on the globe once and for all,the official Korean Central News Agency said. The warning came on the eve of the 59th anniversary of the start of the three-year Korean War, which ended in a truce in 1953, not a peace treaty, leaving the peninsula in state of war. The U.S. has 28,500 troops in South Korea to protect against an outbreak of hostilities.

Tensions have been high since North Korea launched a long-range rocket in April and then conducted its second underground atomic test on May 25. Reacting to U.N. condemnation of that test, North Korea walked away from nuclear disarmament talks and warned it would fire a long-range missile. North Korea has banned ships from the waters off its east coast starting Thursday through July 10 for military exercises, Japan's Coast Guard said. South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported Wednesday that the North may fire a Scud missile with a range of up to 310 miles (500 kilometres) or a short-range ground-to-ship missile with a range of 100 miles (160 kilometres) during the no-sail period. A senior South Korean government official said the no-sail ban is believed connected to North Korean plans to fire short-or mid-range missiles. He spoke on condition of anonymity, citing department policy. U.S. defence and counterproliferation officials in Washington said they also expected the North to launch short-to medium-range missiles. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence. South Korea will expedite the introduction of high-tech unmanned aerial surveillance systems and bunker-buster bombs in response to North Korea's provocations, the Chosun Ilbo newspaper said, citing unidentified ruling party members. Meanwhile, a flurry of diplomatic efforts were under way to try getting North Korea to return to disarmament talks. Russia's top nuclear envoy, Alexei Borodavkin, said after meeting with his South Korean counterpart that Moscow is open to other formats for discussion since Pyongyang has pulled out of formal six-nation negotiations.In Beijing, top U.S. and Chinese defence officials also discussed North Korea. U.S. Defence Undersecretary Michele Flournoy was heading next to Tokyo and Seoul for talks.South Korea has proposed high-level consultations to discuss North Korea with the U.S., Russia, China and Japan.Associated Press writers Jae-soon Chang in Seoul; Pauline Jelinek, Pamela Hess and Lolita Baldor in Washington and Min Lee in Hong Kong contributed to this report.

N.Korea warns of dark clouds of nuclear war JUNE 25,09

SEOUL (AFP) - North Korea warned that dark clouds of nuclear war are gathering over the peninsula and vowed to strengthen its atomic arsenal as it marked the anniversary of the 1950-1953 conflict.Rodong Sinmun, newspaper of the ruling communist party, accused the United States and its ally South Korea of trying to provoke another war with their pledge of a US nuclear umbrella over the South.A touch-and-go situation has been created on the Korean peninsula... with dark clouds of a nuclear war gathering as the hours tick by, it said in a lengthy commentary marking the anniversary, carried by the official news agency.The paper said a new war could break out any time and the North would continue to strengthen its nuclear arsenal.As long as the US hostile policy continues, we will never give up our nuclear deterrent and even strengthen it, Rodong said.The conflict began with a North Korean invasion on June 25, 1950. It ended with an armistice rather than a peace treaty, leaving the communist North and capitalist South still technically at war.Cross-border relations have soured since a conservative government took office in Seoul in February last year with a firmer policy towards the North.And international tensions have grown since Pyongyang's long-range rocket launch in early April and its nuclear test in late May.The North has also fired short-range missiles, renounced the truce in force on the peninsula and repeatedly warned of possible war.At a US-South Korean summit in Washington last week, Washington reaffirmed its commitment to provide the South with a nuclear umbrella.Rodong in a separate commentary Thursday said the nuclear protection pledge justifies the North's own nuclear programme. It warned of fiery showers of nuclear retaliation" in case of any aggression against it.The paper also denounced the leaders' joint summit statement as a disgusting kiss between the master and his servant.

Officials believe the North will fire short-range or mid-range missiles off its east coast in the next fortnight, after it warned foreign ships to stay clear of a specific area during the period.Washington has also said it is prepared for the North's possible firing of a long-range missile towards Hawaii, perhaps on or around the July 4 US Independence Day.The North reacted defiantly to a UN Security Council decision on June 12 to impose new sanctions, which tighten a ban on arms shipments among other measures.It vowed on June 13 to build more nuclear bombs from its plutonium resources and to start a separate atomic weapons programme based on enriched uranium.As part of efforts to curb the North's weapons programmes, a US destroyer is shadowing a suspicious North Korean cargo ship apparently heading for Myanmar.The US Defence Department said the Kang Nam 1 was still being monitored but declined to say where it was, or if or when the US Navy might ask to search it.

State media in military-ruled Myanmar said it had no information on the Kang Nam 1. Singapore said the ship has not asked permission to dock there.In the 1950-1953 conflict the US headed a United Nations force which fought for the South against North Korean and Chinese troops.An exhibition was held in the border town of Kaesong to display hundreds of historical and cultural artifacts destroyed by the Americans during the war, official Radio Pyongyang reported Thursday.Attendants hardened their will for revenge after seeing such evidence,it said.

MUSLIM NATIONS

EZEKIEL 38:1-12
1 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
2 Son of man, set thy face against Gog,(RULER) the land of Magog,(RUSSIA) the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW)and Tubal,(TOBOLSK) and prophesy against him,
3 And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW) and Tubal:
4 And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws,(GOD FORCES THE RUSSIA-MUSLIMS TO MARCH) and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords:
5 Persia,(IRAN,IRAQ) Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet:
6 Gomer,(GERMANY) and all his bands; the house of Togarmah (TURKEY)of the north quarters, and all his bands:(SUDAN,AFRICA) and many people with thee.
7 Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all thy company that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them.
8 After many days thou shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land that is brought back from the sword, and is gathered out of many people, against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them.
9 Thou shalt ascend and come like a storm, thou shalt be like a cloud to cover the land, thou, and all thy bands, and many people with thee.(RUSSIA-EGYPT AND MUSLIMS)
10 Thus saith the Lord GOD; It shall also come to pass, that at the same time shall things come into thy mind, and thou shalt think an evil thought:
11 And thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates,
12 To take a spoil, and to take a prey; to turn thine hand upon the desolate places that are now inhabited, and upon the people that are gathered out of the nations, which have gotten cattle and goods, that dwell in the midst of the land.

ISAIAH 17:1
1 The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.

PSALMS 83:3-7
3 They (ARABS,MUSLIMS) have taken crafty counsel against thy people,(ISRAEL) and consulted against thy hidden ones.
4 They have said, Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.
5 For they (MUSLIMS) have consulted together with one consent: they are confederate against thee:(TREATIES)
6 The tabernacles of Edom,and the Ishmaelites;(ARABS) of Moab, and the Hagarenes;
7 Gebal, and Ammon,(JORDAN) and Amalek;(SYRIA) the Philistines (PALESTINIANS) with the inhabitants of Tyre;(LEBANON)

DANIEL 11:40-43
40 And at the time of the end shall the king of the south( EGYPT) push at him:(EU DICTATOR IN ISRAEL) and the king of the north (RUSSIA AND MUSLIM HORDES OF EZEK 38+39) shall come against him like a whirlwind, with chariots, and with horsemen, and with many ships; and he shall enter into the countries, and shall overflow and pass over.
41 He shall enter also into the glorious land, and many countries shall be overthrown: but these shall escape out of his hand, even Edom, and Moab, and the chief of the children of Ammon.(JORDAN)
42 He shall stretch forth his hand also upon the countries: and the land of Egypt shall not escape.
43 But he shall have power over the treasures of gold and of silver, and over all the precious things of Egypt: and the Libyans and the Ethiopians shall be at his steps.

EZEKIEL 39:1-8
1 Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog,(LEADER OF RUSSIA) and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech (MOSCOW) and Tubal: (TUBOLSK)
2 And I will turn thee back, and leave but the sixth part of thee, and will cause thee to come up from the north parts,(RUSSIA) and will bring thee upon the mountains of Israel:
3 And I will smite thy bow out of thy left hand, and will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand.
4 Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and all thy bands,( ARABS) and the people that is with thee: I will give thee unto the ravenous birds of every sort, and to the beasts of the field to be devoured.
5 Thou shalt fall upon the open field: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD.
6 And I will send a fire on Magog,(NUCLEAR BOMB) and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
7 So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.
8 Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this is the day whereof I have spoken.

JOEL 2:3,20,30-31
3 A fire(NUCLEAR BOMB) devoureth before them;(RUSSIA-ARABS) and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them.
20 But I will remove far off from you the northern army,(RUSSIA,MUSLIMS) and will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea, and his hinder part toward the utmost sea, and his stink shall come up, and his ill savour shall come up, because he hath done great things.(SIBERIAN DESERT)
30 And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.(NUCLEAR BOMB)
31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come.

Zbigniew Brzezinski discusses intelligent manipulation in Iran
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41iVHWNuMPI&feature=player_embedded

Iran says Neda's death may be tied to terrorist group Story Highlights,Iran blames Neda Agha-Soltan's death on groups who want to create division JUNE 24,09

TEHRAN, Iran (CNN) -- Iran said the gunman who killed Neda Agha-Soltan may have mistaken her for the sister of an Iranian terrorist,the Islamic Republic News Agency reported Wednesday.In death, Neda Agha-Soltan has emerged as a powerful symbol of opposition to the Iranian government.Iran blamed the death of the woman known to the world simply as Neda squarely on those groups who want to create division in the nation,saying they planned the woman's killing to accuse the Islamic republic of ruthlessly dealing with the opposition,according to IRNA, Iran's state-run news agency.The report said the investigation into her death is ongoing, but according to the evidence so far, it could be said that she was killed by mistake. The marksmen had mistaken her for the sister of one of the Monafeghin who had been executed in the province of Mazandaran some time ago.Monafeghin refers to the People's Mujahedin Organization of Iran, or PMOI, which promotes a secular, Marxist government for Iran, and has waged a violent campaign against the fundamentalist Islamic regime, including bombings that killed politicians, judges and Cabinet members.Also known as Mujahedin-e-Khalq, the group initially was formed to oppose the Shah of Iran but fell out of favor with the Islamic Revolution of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini after 1979.

The European Union removed the group from its list of terrorist organizations this year, prompting outrage from Tehran. The Iranian Foreign Ministry accused the European Union of making friends and cooperating with terrorists by removing the group from its list.Neda, 26, rose to prominence within hours after a crudely shot video documenting her final moments was uploaded to the Web. Shortly after she died Saturday from a single gunshot wound to the chest, she emerged as a powerful symbol of opposition to the Iranian government.It's heartbreaking,President Obama said Tuesday, referring to the video of Neda, which means divine calling in Farsi. And I think anyone who sees it knows there's something fundamentally unjust about it.The Iranian government has sought to minimize the impact of her death.IRNA reported Wednesday that the killer, or killers, may have thought that they were targeting one of the government opposition people and that is why they immediately distributed the video of the aftermath of the killing through the official and unofficial media in order to reach their murderous objectives against the Iranian government and revolution.

Iranian Police Fight Protesters as Khamenei Says Vote to Stand Ali Sheikholeslami and Heather Langan JUNE 24,09

June 24 (Bloomberg) -- Protesters clashed with riot police again today around Iran’s parliament, as Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said the country won’t annul the results of last week’s disputed presidential election. Hundreds of people flocked to a central Tehran square, where police fired ammunition into the air and beat demonstrators protesting against the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Associated Press reported, citing witnesses. Some protesters fought back, AP said. The Islamic establishment and people will never give in to forceful demands in regard to the election,Khamenei, the highest authority among the Shiite Muslim clerics who rule Iran, told lawmakers today in Tehran, according to state television.The violation of the election will lead to dictatorship.Khamenei’s remarks came after President Barack Obama yesterday stepped up criticism of Iran’s crackdown on protesters, reacting to the violent confrontations between the government and the opposition. Ahmadinejad’s challengers have said the June 12 election was rigged. The United States and the international community have been appalled and outraged by the threats, the beatings and imprisonments of the last few days,Obama said at a White House news conference yesterday.I strongly condemn these unjust actions.The government has banned opposition rallies, with security forces using water cannon, tear gas and clubs to disperse crowds. Some 457 people were arrested in Tehran on June 20, state-run Press TV said. At least 17 people have been killed in protests since the election, according to the government.

Facebook Communication

Farsi-language users of Facebook said on the social- networking Web site that a young woman was shot when riot police and militia tried to disperse protesters near parliament today. It wasn’t immediately possible to verify the entries on Facebook, which Iranians have increasingly relied on to find out about the crisis since the government shut down or hampered other forms of communication. The planned demonstration near parliament was independent and unconnected to the campaign of Mir Hossein Mousavi, the main opponent in the presidential race, according to a statement on his Web site before the rally began. The law must be the last word in all issues, Khamenei said.If lawlessness prevails, then things will be difficult.

Leader’s Warning

The supreme leader warned against factionalism among lawmakers, who gathered at the complex that includes his residence and a mosque, and urged them to support Ahmadinejad's administration.The Guardian Council, which oversees the country’s elections, yesterday ruled out an annulment of the election. Obama said he’s waiting to see how the turmoil in Iran evolves before deciding how he might change his strategy of engaging the government there diplomatically to prevent the country from developing a nuclear weapon, which he called a core national security interest of the U.S. We don’t know yet how this thing is going to play out,he said.It is not too late for the Iranian government to recognize that there is a peaceful path that will lead to stability and legitimacy and prosperity for the Iranian people.

Significant Questions

Obama said significant questions cloud the election’s legitimacy.Ultimately, the most important thing for the Iranian government to consider is legitimacy in the eyes of its own people, not in the eyes of the United States.Iran’s crackdown on protests is obviously not encouraging for any diplomatic breakthrough, he said. He also said the U.S. and other nations aren’t interfering in Iran’s internal affairs. Shirin Ebadi, an Iranian human rights activist who won the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize, told the British Broadcasting Corp.’s Persian service in a Geneva interview yesterday that she had asked European Union officials in Brussels to downgrade relations with Iran. She said she urged them to adopt political sanctions to force Iran to stop violence against protesters.The U.S., the U.K. and Israel have been the focus of the Iranian leadership’s most vehement accusations of meddling since the protests began. Interior Minister Sadegh Mahsouli said today that demonstrators involved in unrest were financed by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency and the People’s Mujahedeen of Iran, an opposition group, the state-run Iranian Students News Agency reported.

Relations with U.K.

Iran, which hasn’t had diplomatic ties with the U.S. since 1980, will consider downgrading its relations with Britain, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said today, according to ISNA. Iran and the U.K. each expelled two of the other’s diplomats this week.Iranian authorities have detained seven foreigners in connection with the protests, including some with British passports, Press TV cited Intelligence Minister Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejei as saying. Iran is holding hundreds of opposition activists, who risk torture, human rights groups said. Many are being held without access to their lawyers or families and without being formally charged, the New York-based Human Rights Watch and the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran said in e-mailed statements yesterday.

Special Court

The deputy head of Iran’s judiciary, Ebrahim Raeisi, said a special court will be set up to try detained opposition supporters and teach a lesson to others, the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency reported yesterday. Zahra Rahnavard, Mousavi’s wife, demanded on his campaign Web site the quick release of those arrested during the protests. She was a force in Mousavi’s campaign, the first time in the 30 years since the country’s Islamic Revolution that a candidate’s wife has had such a prominent role.Ahmadinejad won 63 percent of the vote to 34 percent for Mousavi, a former prime minister, according to the official tally.Another defeated presidential candidate, former Parliament Speaker Mehdi Karrubi, likened Ahmadinejad’s government to the Taliban.You know well that those who support Ahmadinejad are those who promote a backward, Taliban version of Islam, something that is against the views of Imam Khomeini,Karrubi said in an open letter to Ezzatollah Zarghami, head of Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting. The letter, which referred to the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of the Islamic Revolution, was published yesterday on Karrubi’s Web site. Mousavi’s campaign released a report yesterday detailing allegations of fraud and demanding a truth commission.The report alleged that ballots were printed the day of the election without serial numbers, and that ballot boxes may already have held votes before arriving at polling stations. To contact the reporters on this story: Ali Sheikholeslami in London at alis2@bloomberg.net ; Heather Langan in London at hlangan@bloomberg.net.

Russia communists turn to Stalin to fight crisis JUNE 24,09

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian communists have put up giant billboards of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin in a southern city, promoting his tough methods as the best remedy for the world economic crisis.Stalin killed millions of people during his 30 year rule until his death in 1953, but many in recession-hit Russia have grown nostalgic for his strong leadership, and he was voted the third most popular historical figure in a nationwide poll.Everybody knows that under Stalin our country achieved the highest rate of economic growth and development in other spheres, and the great victory (over Nazi Germany),Sergei Rudakov, a senior Communist party official in the town of Voronezh, told Reuters by telephone.Local communists paid an advertising agency 80,000roubles ($2,534) to plaster Stalin's image for one month on 10 huge billboards around Voronezh, a city with a population of around one million.(Reporting by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Elizabeth Fullerton)

Medvedev in Nigeria to seal nuclear, gas pactsby Anna Smolchenko JUNE 24,09

ABUJA (AFP) – Russian President Dmitry Medvedev arrived in Nigeria Wednesday to sign a raft of pacts including key energy deals as part of a tour aimed at challenging Chinese and Western interests in Africa.The first Kremlin leader to visit the energy-rich nation was greeted with a machine-gun salute -- reserved for visiting heads of state -- at President Umaru Yar'Adua's palm-lined villa in the capital Abuja.Russia is negotiating to build a nuclear power plant in Nigeria and Russian natural gas giant Gazprom is set on further reinforcing its position as a cornerstone supplier for Europe and North America, officials said.Taken together, deals also covering cooperation in space, telecoms and geological prospecting underline Russian strategic moves to challenge Chinese and Western interests in Africa relinquished in early post-Soviet times.We have in principle agreed that we need to create conditions for cooperation in nuclear projects, said Sergei Kiriyenko, chief of Russian nuclear state corporation Rosatom.The broad agreement to be signed will allow for the construction of a nuclear station and a research reactor and training of personnel, he said.The pact, prepared in record short time,underlined the effects of a crippling electricity power crisis, Kiriyenko added.Russia could also explore for uranium in Nigeria although the lack of clear data on reserves was holding back cooperation in that sphere, he said.Unlike in Nigeria, work on uranium exploration is in full swing in Namibia -- the next stop on Medvedev's itinerary.Russian experts are hoping a site they are currently working on will yield between 20,000 and 30,000 tons of uranium, Kiriyenko told reporters aboard the flight to Abuja.

The site has so far been proven to contain 6,000 tons, he added.

Prospecting for uranium in Nigeria could become easier when the two nations seal an agreement to cooperate in space, said Anatoly Perminov, chief of Russian state space corporation Roskosmos.That deal -- to include telecoms and geological prospecting -- was set to be signed Wednesday, he said.The Kremlin said ahead of the visit that boosting economic ties and trade will be a major focus of Medvedev and Yar'Adua's talks.The two sides will also agree on cooperation in space and on mutual protection of investments, said the Kremlin.Nigeria is a member of the powerful OPEC cartel which pumps 40 percent of world oil and the Kremlin said the two leaders would also discuss global energy security issues.OPEC cut its production target three times late last year to stabilise prices that tumbled from record highs above 147 dollars but have since risen to about double their record low of 32 dollars.Gazprom wants a stake in Nigeria's vast gas deposits and is ready to invest in energy infrastructure to get that access, officials said. The Russian gas giant is also eyeing a share in the Trans-Saharan Gas pipeline, a project aimed at sending Nigerian gas to Europe as a way to diversify its energy resources.Gazprom has complained it is way behind its foreign competitors, saying it is ready to mount a challenge to companies like Royal Dutch Shell, Chevron and ExxonMobil in Nigeria. They are planning to cover all of Nigeria with pipelines,Alexei Vasilyev, head of the Africa Institute at the Russian Academy of Sciences, said of Gazprom.

Africa's oil and gas reserves are rising fast. That's the region with which we have to cooperate if we position ourselves as a great energy power,said Vasilyev, who is travelling with Medvedev.Nigeria and Angola -- another stop on Medvedev's itinerary --are competing for the title of the largest oil producer in Africa. Moscow's ties with former client states came to a sudden halt with the Soviet collapse but the Kremlin has now emphasised its wish to revive relationships in Africa, rich in oil, gas, diamonds, metals and uranium.Medvedev's predecessor Vladimir Putin was the first ever Kremlin leader to travel to sub-Saharan Africa when he visited South Africa and Morocco in 2006.Nigeria is Russia's second largest trading partner in sub-Saharan Africa after South Africa, the Kremlin said.