Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, addressing a U.N. nuclear conference that opened Monday, sought to turn the tables on the United States over its criticism of Iran's nuclear program, asserting that his country does not need nuclear weapons and accusing Washington of fomenting a global nuclear arms race. Ahmadinejad also described the issue of nuclear terrorism as "misleading" and "phony," charging that the Obama administration was using it to divert the world's attention from U.S. "noncompliance" with disarmament obligations. He claimed that "major terrorist networks" are supported by "U.S. intelligence agencies" and Israel, but he provided no details or evidence. During his 35-minute speech, delegates from the United States conspicuously walked out of the conference hall in protest. Reuters: Iran: US should be punished for nuclear threats. Refreshing News: US has more than 5,000 nuclear warheads.

PressTV: Iran wants US nukes dismantled.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says the United States should dismantle its nuclear bases around the world as a step to create a nuke-free world. "Nuclear weapons stationed in military bases in the US and those in its allied countries such as Germany, Italy, Japan and the Netherlands must be dismantled," President Ahmadinejad said in an address before the 2010 Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) at the UN headquarters in New York on Monday. "Those who used nuclear weapons for the first time in history are the most detested and disgraceful people in the world," he said, adding that nuclear arms are "the most disgusting and shameful kind of weapons in the world." Ahmadinejad, who is the only head of state attending the summit, said world powers should set a deadline to create a nuke-free world, calling on the UN to rebrand the NPT as the "Disarmament NPT."

A US drone attack has killed at least six people and wounded several others in the troubled tribal areas of northwestern Pakistan, officials say. According to Pakistani officials, the drone fired three missiles in the Mir Ali area in Waziristan tribal area near the Afghan border on Monday, DPA reported. The death toll is expected to rise as some of the injured are reported to be in critical condition, sources said. According to the sources, those killed were "militants." So far this year, 300 people have lost their lives in 42 drone attacks in Pakistan's tribal belt. Washington claims the raids target militants in Pakistan, but hundreds of civilians have fallen victim to the US drone attacks since 2008. Islamabad has repeatedly condemned the strikes, saying they threaten the country's sovereignty and fuel public anger.

AWIP: US drone kills seven PEOPLE in NW Pakistan: security officials:

A US drone fired three missiles into a militant compound in Pakistan's tribal area near the Afghan border on Saturday, killing seven militants people, security officials said. The strike took place at 9:00 pm (1600 GMT) in Marsikhel area, 20 kilometres (12 miles) east of Miranshah, the main town of North Waziristan, which is known as a hub for Taliban and Al-Qaeda linked militants [Justification post factum for state terrorism.] The nationalities of the seven dead were not immediately clear, a senior Pakistani security official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

STATE TERROR: US drone attack kills 5 PEOPLE in Pakistan: At least five people have been killed in a US drone attack in the troubled North Waziristan tribal region of Pakistan on the Afghan border. Several more people were injured when two missiles hit a nearby compound in Boya village, located about 20 kilometers (12 miles) west of Miranshah. Since last year, the US has carried out many such attacks on Pakistan's tribal areas. Washington claims its airstrikes target militants. Most of the attacks, however, have killed civilians. AWIP: 11th Drone Strike of 2010: Latest US Attack Kills Six in North Waziristan: AFP: 11 killed in US missile strikes in NW Pakistan: officials. AntiWar: US Drone Fired Missile Into a Crowd of "Suspects," Killing 13 Afghans. TANSW: Pakistan Taliban deny US drone strike killed top leader. This comes on top of this Nobel Peace Prize winner Kills at Least 15 in North Waziristan and this Civilians Slain as Latest US Drone Strike on North Waziristan, Kills Five and this US Drones Kill 12 in North Waziristan: Third TERROR Strike in 24 Hours in Tribal Area and this U.S. Drones Kill 15 People Near Border in Pakistan and summing up all of 2009, this: 44 US drone hits in Pakistan killed 700 civilians in 2009. + AWIP: No assent given to US drone attacks: Pakistan. The Guardian: The 'Obama doctrine': kill, don't detain -George Bush left a big problem in the shape of Guantánamo. The solution? Don't capture bad guys, assassinate by drone. PressTV: Suspected US drone strikes kill eight in north-west Pakistan. PressTV: In Pakistan, death toll from US drone attack hits 8 Yahoo: US drone kills seven PEOPLE in NW Pakistan: security officials.

SEOUL - North Korea's hardline leader Kim Jong-il appears to have entered China, his isolated state's biggest benefactor, for a rare trip abroad as tensions are running high on the peninsula, reports said Monday. China has the most influence in curbing the North's military grandstanding and Kim's previous trips to his neighbor have led to steps that have reduced security concerns for the economically vibrant region. The trip to China would be the first in four years and comes at a time when Seoul is considering ways to respond to a suspected North Korean attack on one of its naval ships. South Korea lost 46 sailors in what could be one of the deadliest strikes since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War.

Bita Ghaedi is an Iranian UK-based asylum seeker. On May 5th she will be dragged back against her will into a brutal regime and family situation that will very likely lead to her murder.

She is at very high risk from an honour killing because she fled an unhappy marriage with a lover. Bita’s links with the People’s Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI) also put her at even more risk if she is deported. Supporters of the PMOI are punishable by death according to the current Iranian regime.

To underestimate danger of being deported to Iran under these circumstances, and the risk of being targeted by an honour-crime, would be a fatal mistake. However this mistake has been made many times before in the UK, including cases where police did not believe women who came to them with strong reason to believe their family would murder them for so-called honour. When the women’s dead bodies were eventually found, the police were ashamed. Bita Ghaedi endured beatings and mental torture at the hands of her family. There is no reason to deny her asylum claim, but the British government has refused her case.

What the British government are doing to Bita is illegal according to UN guidelines. It is illegal under UN agreements on the Status of Refugees to violate the principle of non-refoulement, or returning an asylum-seeker to a country where they have grounds to fear persecution. England is a signatory to the legally-binding agreements on Status of Refugees, and Bita’s case is very clear cut.

Debt-ridden Greece yesterday agreed the largest ever financial bailout of a country. It will receive 110billion euros (£95billion) from the European Union and IMF in return for deep cuts in government spending to reduce a huge budget deficit. Announcing the deal yesterday, prime minister George Papandreou told his people to prepare for 'great sacrifices' after violent clashes between police and protesters opposing the cuts at the weekend.

He unveiled austerity measures and tax rises worth 30billion euros (£26billion) including:

* ˜An increase in the retirement age from an average age of 53 to 67;#
* ˜Government workers to lose annual bonuses worth an extra two months' pay;
* ˜Ten per cent tax rise on alcohol, cigarettes and petrol;
* ˜Three-year wage freeze in the public sector;
* ˜Early retirement will be limited or abolished altogether;
* ˜VAT increase from 21 per cent to 23 per cent.

Eurozone finance ministers yesterday met in an emergency session in Brussels to approve the three-year aid package before Athens is due to make a large repayment to commercial creditors later this month.

'It is an unprecedented support package for an unprecedented effort by the Greek people,' Mr Papandreou told a televised cabinet meeting.

He is a very, very rich man – and will soon profit from very, very generous German hand-outs. Spiros Latsis, who according to ‘Forbes’ has a fortune of €4 billion, is the wealthiest man in Greece. He lives a life of luxury enjoyed in private. He mingles with leading lights from the world of entertainment and business. And politics! The 63-year-old made his money through oil, shipping, housing – and banking. He lives by Lake Geneva and has villas in numerous European cities as well as yachts and private jets. “He lives discretely and shuns publicity,” wrote the ‘Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung’ newspaper. [-We can see why!]

MUMBAI, India — The only surviving gunman of the 2008 terrorist attack against this city was convicted Monday of waging war against India, murder, conspiracy and other crimes during a the three-day assault that killed more than 160 people. The defendant, Ajmal Kasab, a Pakistani, hung his head as a judge read a summary of the judgment to him in Hindi at a special jail courtroom here. Mr. Kasab, who had spent most of the hearing bent over, held a grave expression but did not say anything.

According to the U.N. Children’s Fund report, more than 6.3 million children under 14 are working in Bangladesh. Many of them work under very poor conditions; some of them even risk their life. Factory owners pay them about 400 to 700 taka (10 USD) a month, while an adult worker earns up to 5,000 taka per month.

A Christian street preacher was arrested and locked in a cell for telling a passer-by that homosexuality is a sin in the eyes of God. Dale McAlpine was charged with causing “harassment, alarm or distress” after a homosexual police community support officer (PCSO) overheard him reciting a number of “sins” referred to in the Bible, including blasphemy, drunkenness and same sex relationships. The 42-year-old Baptist, who has preached Christianity in Wokington, Cumbria for years, said he did not mention homosexuality while delivering a sermon from the top of a stepladder, but admitted telling a passing shopper that he believed it went against the word of God.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says there is no need for Tehran to gain the trust of Western nations since Iran abides by international regulations. Arriving in New York to take part in a conference reviewing the 40-year-old Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), President Ahmadinejad also insisted that Iran considers disarmament an influential factor in global security and will accordingly pursue the matter. Iran has "practical, impartial and clear proposals for this conference" to help the "global security and disarmament," the president said on Sunday upon his arrival at JFK airport. In response to a reporter's question on ways to gain the trust of Western nations on the nuclear question, Ahmadinejad emphasized, "we should not offer ways to obtain their trust as Iran abides by the international law and acts within its framework," IRNA reported.

The rain dance is getting a twenty-first-century revamp using laser technology. Optical physicists have demonstrated that shooting lasers into the air can trigger the formation of water droplets, a technique that could one day help to stimulate rainfall.

For more than 50 years, efforts to try to artificially induce rain have concentrated on 'cloud seeding' — scattering small particles of silver iodide into the air to act as 'condensation nuclei', or centres around which rain droplets can grow. "The problem is, it's still not clear that cloud seeding works efficiently," says optical physicist Jérôme Kasparian at the University of Geneva, Switzerland. "There are also worries about how safe adding silver iodide particles into the air is for the environment."

Kasparian and his colleagues realized that there might be a more environmentally friendly alternative. Firing a laser beam made up of short pulses into the air ionizes nitrogen and oxygen molecules around the beam to create a plasma, resulting in a 'plasma channel' of ionized molecules. These ionized molecules could act as natural condensation nuclei, Kasparian explains.

More than 3,000 European Jews, including prominent intellectuals, have signed a petition speaking out against Israeli settlement policies and warning that systematic support for the Israeli government is dangerous. AWIP: Even Israel's biggest lovers are growing impatient.

An Israeli military court sentenced a 16-year-old Hebron boy to three months in prison, while six others were sentenced to three years of probation and a 2,000 shekel (537 US dollars) of fines for participation in an anti-wall rally. The sentencing, carried out at the Ofer military base and detention center near Ramallah in the West Bank on Sunday, saw the Israeli military prosecutor argue that the men and teenagers had "endangered" the lives of Israeli soldiers.

[Editor's Comment:] This is nothing but but the usual political theater of the Zionists. The apartheid wall is both illegal and immoral and has no legitimacy whatsoever. In the words of the International Court of Justice, it is "contrary to international law”. Israel, far from being a democracy, is a very repressive and stalinist state.

As British voters head for the ballot box to elect the government that will run them for the next five years, one key question is conspicuous by its absence from the election campaign and the party leaders' televised debates: to what extent are the two main parties, the Conservative Party and the incumbent Labour Party, answerable to their members and to the British people, rather than to a foreign power, the State of Israel?

Below, we highlight the degree to which the Conservative and Labour parties are beholden to Israel, with the Conservatives significantly funded by Israel lobbyists and at least half, if not more, of their shadow cabinet being members of the party's Israel lobby group, Conservative Friends of Israel. We also remind our readers of the Labour Party leaders' self-confessed loyalty to Israel, and we look at how the Liberal Democratic Party, despite being the most British and least Israeli of the three parties, still lacks the courage to speak out against Israeli racism and crimes and to cleanse itself of Israel lobbyists. My Catbird Seat: A light is cast upon pro-Israel groups.

BP, the company that owns the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that exploded on April 20, is claiming that the spreading oil spill threatening US states along the Gulf of Mexico with economic and ecological disaster was unforeseeable. Oil is now flowing into the Gulf at a rate of as high as 25,000 barrels a day due to the explosion and the subsequent failure of a blowout preventer (BOP), which is designed to plug the well in the event of an emergency. The BOP is still not responding to attempts to close it.

Neither the company nor the government had in place any backup plans in the event of a failure of the BOP. Options currently being considered to plug the well will take weeks or months to implement and may not be successful.

“We’re breaking new ground here,” said Coast Guard Commandant Thad Allen. “It’s hard to write a plan for a catastrophic event that has no precedent, which is what this was.” But was a failure of the BOP really unforeseeable? A 1999 report from the government’s Minerals Management Service (MMS), leaked by Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington, found that there were 117 BOP failures in a two-year period in the late 1990s. While none of these failures resulted in a spill at the magnitude of the Deepwater Horizon, they clearly demonstrate the fallibility of BOPs. One crucial difference is that the other BOP failures occurred in shallower waters. WSWS: BP oil spill threatens environmental catastrophe on US Gulf Coast. Washington's Blog: The Gulf oil spill is much worse than originally believed.

The Pakistani Taliban has claimed responsibility for the attempted car bomb attack in New York's Times Square, although it is not possible to verify the authenticity of the claim. Posted on YouTube, the video says the attempted bombing was in revenge for the recent killing of two top Al Qaeda leaders in Iraq and US drone strikes in Pakistan. The bomb, described as "amateurish", consisted of propane tanks, fireworks, petrol and a clock device, and was planted in a sports utility vehicle. It was discovered after a street vendor alerted police. Forensic teams are going over the vehicle in detail while security cameras in Times Square are being examined. AWIP: Times Square cleared as suspected car bomb found. Al Jazeera: The so-called Pakistani Taliban has claimed responsibility for a failed car bombing in New York's Times Square. AntiWar: "Pakistani Taliban" Claims Responsibility for Failed NYC Car Bomb. Gordon Duff: TIMES SQUARE BOMB HOAX, ISRAELI INTEL GROUP SHOWS IT’S HAND. CNN: "Pakistani Taliban" Leader, killed by US 7 times, threatens to attack US major cities in new video.

At least two children have been killed in a US missile attack in eastern Afghanistan, amid rising public opposition to the presence of foreign troops in the country. Afghan authorities say the incident took place after rockets hit a residential area in Kunar Province. At least six people, including one woman, were severely injured in the attack. The development as heavy clashes between US troops and Taliban militants in the region are ongoing. Under criticism form the Afghan government over heavy civilian casualties in US-led military operations, American forces have been faced with increasing anti-US sentiments in the country. According to the UN, over 2,400 Afghan civilians were killed in 2009 -- the largest number of civilian deaths reported since the 2001 US-led invasion of Afghanistan.

The French army has admitted killing four children with a missile strike in a Taliban-controlled area of Afghanistan. "This happened on April 6, but it only came out today because, according to French military spokesman, it took that long to carry out the investigation," Al Jazeera's Hoda Abdel Hamid, reporting from Kabul, said on Thursday.