IMF: Discussions have begun for the succession of DSK

AFP - IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who was accused of sexual crime and remanded in custody in New York, faced increasing pressure Wednesday after the statements by the U.S. Treasury Secretary doubting his ability to lead the institution.

"It is obviously not able to run the IMF," said Timothy Geithner at a conference Tuesday night, while the head of British diplomacy William Hague said Wednesday he "will take a decision on his future ".

"I think that Dominique Strauss-Kahn will take a decision on his future, but it is obviously in a very, very difficult," saidHague on Irish radio RTE.

This question should be "resolved in the coming days," added Wednesday the chief of the majority party UMP in France, Jean-Francois Cope.

Japan, however, felt it was too early to discuss replacing the IMF's managing director. "On this point, I think it's premature to even consider" the issue of replacing Mr. Strauss-Kahn said the government spokesman, Yukio Edano.

"We are aware that there is much speculation around the status of director general. We do not comment on these speculations," he said Tuesday night a spokesman for the IMF, William Murray, who said that the Fund has not "had contact" with him since his arrest.

Mr.Strauss-Kahn was arrested Saturday in New York and is accused of attempted rape of a maid in a Manhattan hotel.

He was imprisoned at Rikers Island prison in New York, pending his next court appearance Friday before a judge in New York.

According to NBC, quoting an unidentified source, he was placed under surveillance as a precaution against suicide.

Asked by AFP about it, a spokesman for the Prison Service of New York said in a statement that "the health of a prisoner is confidential."

"The prison administration of the City of New York observes the same rules of safety and health for all detainees," the document said, without commenting on the psychological state of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, whose photos in handcuffs have been around the world.

An indictment (grand jury) from 16 to 23 jurors popular due to meet in secret and in the absence of a judge to hear evidence from the prosecution and decide on a formal indictment or not.

To date, Mr.Strauss-Kahn denies the charges against him, according to his lawyers, which also appeal the decision to detain him and deny him bail.

The IMF chief was taken Monday night in the huge prison Rikers Island, an island in the East River, where it benefits from a single cell, according to a spokesman for the Prison Service.

"It is not in contact with other prisoners," he told AFP spokesman.

Mr.Strauss-Kahn, who was arrested Saturday, was detained by the decision of Judge Melissa Jackson on Monday, which has refused to release him on bail of one million dollars, two days after his arrest at Kennedy Airport in New York.

The judge cited a flight risk.

The defense of the former French minister suggested in vain that he surrender his passport to justice and a commitment to reside in New York with her daughter.

The wife of Mr.Strauss-Kahn, the former journalist Anne Sinclair, arrived Monday in New York, according to one of the DSK lawyers, Benjamin Brafman.

The case has rocked the French political class to one year's presidential, where "DSK" was a favorite, as part of a possible socialist candidate.

DSK is covered by seven charges, including criminal sexual act, attempted rape and kidnapping, after accusations of a maid of 32 years, employee of the Sofitel New York. The criminal sexual act, which includes forced oral sex in American law, French law corresponds to a rape.The term of rape under U.S. law that covers only forced vaginal penetration.

Out of his silence, the alleged victim's lawyer, Jeff Shapiro, told CNN that his client lived a trauma "extraordinary".

"The world is upside down for her," said Mr. Shapiro. "Since it happened, she could not go home. She can not return to work and she has no idea what the future holds," he said.

The alleged victim "would not stop crying" after the fact, acted on his side Tuesday at a restaurant AFP posing as his brother.The man from Guinea who runs a small restaurant in Harlem, said his sister called him by phone Saturday afternoon while she was with doctors and policemen.

"She said it just happened something bad, '" he said.

The defense has organized around particular time use the boss of the IMF. Its lawyers provide such that it would not escape, but he calmly lunched with a person whose identity is not yet known, before heading to the airport where his flight to Paris was already booked.

They also said he forgot at the hotel one of its mobile phones and called for the Sofitel we make him wear that would not have done if he was a fugitive.

Another possible line of defense, according to the New York press, is the thesis of consensual sex. The New York Post and The New York Times quoted a source "close to the defense" claiming that "the report may have been made." "The forensic evidence, we believe, does not coincide with forced intercourse," he said Monday before the court Mr Brafman.

Additional DNA samples were made Sunday on Mr.Strauss-Kahn, to detect any traces of violence.

Should he be convicted, the IMF chief risk 15 to 74 years in prison for all counts on which it is subject.

JUSTICE: France is reluctant to allow the ex-wife of Marc Dutroux

The Minister of Justice Michel Mercier said he had "no intention of saying yes to the home in a French convent Michelle Martin, the ex-wife and accomplice of the murderer pedophile Marc Dutroux, Wednesday leaving the Council of Ministers.

"We have not been seized by Belgium" in a formal request for this welcome, "said Mercier.

If that were the case, "we will implement the agreement between Belgium and France, we look at things," he added.

But "I'm not going to say yes, for my part," said the Keeper of the Seals.

Belgium Tuesday lifted the last obstacle to the liberation of the former wife of Marc Dutroux, who still has to wait for the green light from Paris to visit a French convent, which has agreed to host it.

This former teacher of 51 years was sentenced in 2004 by the Assize Court of Arlon (south-east) to 30 years in prison for his involvement in the crimes committed in the mid-1990s by her ex-husband, convicted his hand to life without possibility of early release.

LEBANON: Seven Estonians removed ask for help in a video

September Estonians kidnapped in Lebanon last month appeared on a video posted late Tuesday unauthenticated YouTube, imploring leaders Lebanese, Jordanian, Saudi and French to help them so they can return home.

Lebanon Files website was informed Wednesday of the publication of this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIHXHk4c5Gw&feature=player_embedded), posted by a user who is as thekidnaper2011 (the ravisseur2011 " , Ed).

The video, which lasts over a minute, shows perfectly shaved seven men in sportswear and appear healthy. They speak English and beg to turn for help.

"We look to you, Prime Minister of Lebanon Saad Hariri, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, King Abdullah of Jordan, French PresidentSarkozy, please do anything to help us go home, "said one of them.

"Please give what they (the kidnappers) asked (...), do everything so that we can go home, our families as soon as possible."

"It's really a difficult situation," said another. "Please do anything, all it takes for you to go home."

The video was released just hours after the Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet had concluded a visit to Lebanon without any news about the seven Estonian tourists kidnapped March 23 in eastern Lebanon.

The seven cyclists Estonians were abducted by a group of Lebanese and Syrians, according to security services.From Syria through the border post of Masnaa, they were intercepted by gunmen in Zahle in the Bekaa Valley.

In an email sent on April 5 at a website of Lebanon, a previously unknown splinter group, Al Nahda Haraket Wal Islah (Movement for Renewal and Reform), claimed the kidnapping of seven Estonians and demanded a ransom for their release , saying they were healthy.

Friday, 11 people, seven in custody and four at large, were charged in the kidnapping of Estonians.

Since the crisis of Western hostages in the 1980s in civil war (1975-1990), kidnappings of foreign tourists are very rare in Lebanon.

The Bekaa Valley is plagued by drug trafficking and rivalries between clan groups.

ISRAEL: A hundred Palestinian arrested by IDF

The Israeli army arrested Thursday over a hundred women in a Palestinian town near Nablus, West Bank, as part of the investigation into the murder of a family of Jewish settlers, local officials said.

The women, some elderly, were placed in a military camp near Awarta where their fingerprints were found, and most of them were later released, according to an AFP journalist.

Hundreds of Israeli soldiers penetrated Awarta in the night and imposed a curfew before stopping these women, told AFP the head of the municipal council of the locality Tayis Awwad.

The soldiers conducted in the night raids on the premises, he added, citing officials of the Palestinian security services.

The Israeli army arrested Tuesday a forty Awarta Palestinians for questioning.

Israeli troops entered regularly and massively Awarta since the massacre of 11 March in which a family of the neighboring Israeli settlement of Itamar, parents and their three children including a baby, were slaughtered in their sleep.

The Israeli army imposed last week including a curfew for five days Awarta following the killings, attributed to Palestinians, whose perpetrators have so far not been identified.

SYRIA: Bashar al-Assad appointed a new prime minister

AFP - Thousands of people accompanied the remains of Sunday killed eight demonstrators Friday Duma, near Damascus, when Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has appointed the outgoing Minister of Agriculture Adel Safar to lead the new government.

The protesters have announced new protests this week when the Internet was cut more than six hours and that the mobile communications were very difficult because, officially, a "congestion" of the network.

"Eight dead were buried Duma today.There are three other protesters were killed but neighboring villages and Sbinah Arbin, "said Mazen Darwish, head of the National Centre for Information and free expression, closed since 2009, who attended the funeral.

He said "tens of thousands of people attended the funeral. They chanted slogans in homage to the martyrs, and demanded the freedom to have attacked the official press."

"Where are the gangs," proclaimed the banners to make a mockery of the official version blaming "armed bands to have opened fire Friday from rooftops.

Some calls to the "fall of the regime" were suffocated by the crowd.The funeral is part of the Great Mosque of Duma to the cemetery through the streets of the city. There was no visible presence of security forces.

For his part, al-Atrash Muntaha, spokesman of the Syrian Organisation for Human Rights "Sawasiyah", who also attended the funeral, assured that "the protests will continue. The people do not keep silent over because the barrier of fear has fallen. "

On Friday, eight protesters were killed during demonstrations after a presidential speech was disappointingly low.

One resident said 90 people arrested by security forces have been released but there are 15 whose whereabouts are unknown.

The appointment of Safar, "a gesture"

Moreover, Assad "has issued a decree instructing Adel Safar to form the government," according the official news agency Sana.

Baath Party member, Mr. Safar, 58, is an expert on agricultural especially in arid regions."It's a gesture toward this population particularly affected in recent years by a terrible drought," he told AFP an economist.

The government led by Mohammad Naji Otri, in place since 2003, has not survived the challenge and submitted his resignation Tuesday.

But this appointment did not satisfy the protesters.They call for a "week of martyrs" with a day of protest on Tuesday to "boycott" on Wednesday that mobile phones have offered a free hour to the public for supporting the regime, and rallies on Thursday at the headquarters of the Baath Party to mark the anniversary of the founding of the party in 1947.

They also asked their supporters to march on Friday in all Syria to show "The dissatisfaction of the people."This will be the fourth Friday in which the Syrians are expected to take to the streets to show their displeasure with the lack of liberalization.

"The challenge is limited in scale but rooted," he told AFP a Syrian businessman who wished to remain anonymous.

And if the number of protesters remained limited, the challenge has expanded geographically. Friday demonstrations were held together for the first time in the northern, predominantly Kurdish.

In total, about 80 protesters were arrested since Friday in Damascus, Homs, Duma Deraa and Deir Ezzor (450 km northeast of Damascus).

The EU recognizes the legitimacy of opposition to the regime of Gaddafi

AFP - EU leaders believe that opposition to Muammar Gaddafi in the National Transitional Council (CNT) is an interlocutor "legitimate", said the EU president Herman Van Rompuy.

"The opposition in Benghazi is considered a legitimate political interlocutor," he said after an EU summit in Brussels on Libya.

The Heads of State and Government of the European Union "welcomed and encouraged the National Transitional Council (CNT) based in Benghazi (east), which is regarded as a political interlocutor" for the EU and a partner "worthy of faith, "he said.

Representatives of the CNT had several interviews with European leaders Friday on the sidelines of the summit, including Mr Van Rompuy, the head of European diplomacy Ashton and French President Nicolas Sarkozy, said the EU president.

In this regard, the French head of state assured that Colonel Muammar Gaddafi was "no longer an interlocutor" and should "go."

COTE D'IVOIRE: Fighting with heavy weapons in a district of Abidjan

The Ivorian crisis has taken a more violent turn Wednesday, with clashes involving heavy weaponry between forces loyal to incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo and unidentified fighters in a district of Abidjan supports Alassane Ouattara.

Defence Forces and Security (FDS), loyal to Mr.Gbagbo, lead a "major operation" to "secure" the neighborhood of Abobo (north), told AFP a senior military official on condition of anonymity.

"Exchanges of heavy weapons" are held in the neighborhood where fighting, sporadic since January between the FDS and the gunmen have stepped up in recent days, he confirmed in the afternoon.

According to several residents contacted by AFP, fighting in the northern Abobo started around 16:00 (GMT) and ended around 20:30.

"It takes all the time", said one resident, adding that "everyone is locked up at home."A taxi driver said that the SDS had made earlier fired warning shots to residents returning home.

Ten elements of the Centre for Security Operations Command (Cecos), an elite unit of the SDS, were killed Tuesday night in Abobo in fighting after an ambush by "attackers," said a security source.

Witnesses reported a death toll will FDS side, and several civilian casualties.The body of a civilian shot dead lay in pools of blood in the morning near a service station.

A senior Cecos but assured on Wednesday that the unit had lost only three men, lamented "seven bullet wounds" in her womb and killed "seven attackers.

In the morning, the SDS were deployed in Abobo, blocking access to certain areas, while many streets were deserted and shops closed, noted AFP.

Dozens of people, especially women and children, then fled the area."I leave the area," a woman let go, sack on his head.

The government accuses Gbagbo of "rebels" to operate in this neighborhood before Tuesday's fighting, at least a dozen of SDS had been killed since January.

The camp Ouattara, combined with the former rebel New Forces (FN) controlling the northern Ivory Coast since 2002, denies any involvement in these actions.

Inspired by the examples of Egypt and Tunisia, supporters of Mr.Ouattara has turned up the heat last week calling for a "revolution" to hunt out.

More than 300 people have been killed since mid-December according to the UN in the violence that marked the crisis resulting from the November 28 presidential, between Gbagbo and Alassane Ouattara, President recognized by the international community.

Since Saturday, at least a dozen pro-Ouattara demonstrators were killed by the SDS, which dispersed the crowd with live ammunition, according to several sources, but also in Abobo areas in Kumasi and Treichville (south).

This renewed tension comes as African Union deploys fresh efforts for a solution to the crisis, so far found.

Monday and Tuesday, four African presidents to a panel appointed by the AU met Laurent Gbagbo and Alassane Ouattara. Objective: To arrive by 28 February solutions "binding".

Group members, chaired by Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz (Mauritania), left the country since Tuesday evening and will meet in Nouakchott "in the coming days."

AU favors a peaceful settlement, but the former mediator Raila Odinga, Kenyan Prime Minister, has found that if economic sanctions fail to achieve "regime change, then of course the force will be used" as "West Africa has brandished the threat against Mr. Gbagbo.

Iran: Release of two German journalists detained for four months

Iran has released on Saturday after four months of custody, two German journalists who left for Germany on Sunday night with Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle came specially to find them.

During his visit of several hours, the first by a minister of the EU in Iran for several years, Westerwelle was received by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad held talks with his Iranian counterpart Ali Akbar Salehi.

Mr Ahmadinejad also drew attention with Westerwelle "regional issues, the situation in Afghanistan and the need for cooperation against terrorism and drug trafficking," the Iranian presidency website.

During a brief joint press conference with Mr. Salehi, M.Westerwelle said the meeting between the two ministers had allowed "an" exchange of views and opinions, "the direct translation made by the Iranian television channel Press-TV in English.

"It was a meeting to get acquainted," he said, adding she had "not been time to discuss major issues."

Salehi for his part said that the visit of Mr. Westerwelle Tehran was to "strengthen bilateral relations" and that the two ministers had "agreed to further meetings already planned in the future."

He expressed the desire of Iran to "look to the future" in its relations with Germany, saying the two countries had "many issues to discuss."

Iran has been subjected since 2007 to severe political and economic sanctions imposed by the EU because of its controversial nuclear program, which prohibit particular high-level bilateral contacts with Tehran.

Westerwelle departed for Germany immediately after the talks, about 2:00 local Sunday (2230 GMT Saturday) with the two journalists released, Marcus Hellwig, Jens Koch, the newspaper Bild am Sonntag (BAMS).

The two Germans held in Tabriz (northwest) since October 10, 2010, arrived by plane to Tehran in early evening."No comment," replied one of them to journalists who asked them questions.

Before their release, they were each sentenced to a term of imprisonment of 20 months which was immediately converted to a fine of 500 million rials (50,000 dollars), according to the judicial authority who said they were convinced "crime against national security".

The two journalists were arrested in Tabriz while interviewing the son and attorney-Ashtiani Sakineh Mohammadi, an Iranian woman sentenced to stoning in a case of murder and adultery and for which the international community 's is mobilized.

The Iranian authorities accused them of being entered Iran with tourist visas, without asking permission and special press visa that foreign journalists must obtain in order to work in Iran.

The Iranian Sakineh Mohammadi-Ashtiani, imprisoned in Tabriz, was sentenced to death by two courts in 2006 for his involvement in the murder of her husband and adulterers. His murder conviction was reduced to 10 years in prison on appeal in 2007 but his sentence of stoning for adultery was upheld by another court of appeal. The court decided to review his case and has not yet delivered its final verdict.

ALGERIA: Prime Minister announces the lifting of emergency rule by the end of February

Algerian Prime Minister and Secretary General of the National Democratic Rally (RND, Liberal) Ahmed Ouyahia announced Wednesday in Algiers in late February before the lifting of the state of emergency in force for 19 years.

"The lifting of emergency rule take place before the end of this month along with the announcement of several decisions regarding housing, employment and management of the administration," saidOuyahia, quoted by news agency APS, the opening of a meeting of the presidential alliance.

The state of emergency was proclaimed in 1992 at the beginning of the decade of Islamist violence that killed at least 150,000 dead.

Besides the RND, the presidential alliance, created in 2002 to support President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, includes the National Liberation Front (FLN, nationalist) and the Movement of Society for Peace (MSP, Islamist).

She holds an absolute majority in Parliament.

Ouyahia also said that it was "not ignore the events taking place in the Arab and Islamic countries."

He stressed "the need to provide adequate solutions to the problems of Algerian youth."

The announcement of Mr.Ouyahia occurs after an event which was attended by 12 February some 2,000 people in central Algiers.

The marches are banned in the Algerian capital and protesters were prevented from scrolling by deploying some 30,000 police officers.

The opposition in the National Coordination for Change and Democracy (NCCD) has called for a new event for February 19.

This coordination includes opposition parties, the Algerian League for the Defence of Human Rights and representatives of civil society.

Mr.Bouteflika announced February 3 the lifting of emergency rule "in the very near future" at a Council of Ministers.

He then instructed the government to tackle "without delay" to develop "appropriate texts that will enable the State to continue the fight against terrorism."

Unemployment has a very slight decrease

AFP - The official unemployment rate in the United States fell to 9% in January, its lowest level since April 2009, despite increased hiring whose mediocre testified Friday the government's monthly report on employment.

A thorough review of data from the Labor Department suggest that still leaves the rally on the employment front is not as good as it seems and that the slowdown in hiring is less serious than it seems.

The figures appear in fact disturbed by bad winter weather that raged in several regions and a change in the sample population used to calculate the unemployment rate.

"In short, none of these figures are reliable," said Ian Shepherdson economist, the research institute HFE.

We must therefore await the numbers and revisions will be published in early March or early April to get a clearer view of the situation.

The White House has also called for "not conclude too much from a single monthly report," even if economic growth strengthens.

Nigel Gault, the firm IHS Global Insight, January figures conceal "an underlying improvement in the labor market buried under snow and ice."

Compared to December, unemployment fell 0.4 percentage points formally, while the median forecast of analysts gave a recovery rate at 9.5%.

The report, however, shows a modest increase in the proportion of active employees, 0.1 percentage points over December, to 58.4%, less than a year earlier (58.5%), when unemployment reached 9 , 7%.

In addition, the net job creation month (36,000) was four times less than expected by analysts, and three times lower than in December.

The private sector, object of attention, appears to have established that 50,000 net jobs.It is his worst since the beginning of the upturn in employment in March, according to new estimates by the ministry.

The survey on employment and those on unemployment are not consistent since it is generally accepted that a minimum of approximately 150,000 net job creation per month is needed to reduce unemployment.

The number of jobs created in January was therefore likely to be revised upwards in a month, tens of thousands of people that the bad weather prevented them from going to work to receive their pay has been is excluded from the calculation of the department.

The Federal Reserve chairman, Ben Bernanke said Thursday that more than a year and a half after the end of the recession, we still could not consider the economic recovery as "very prepared" because of the slow improving employment.

The country has regained a million jobs over almost 8.7 million officially destroyed from December 2007 to February 2010.

Taking into account, in addition, positions that could not be created because of the crisis, are 11.4 million jobs we need today in the U.S. economy to reduce unemployment to its level before the recession (5.0% in December 2007), calculates Heidi Shirholz, the Economic Policy Institute.

To return to this level in five years, the economy would "create 285,000 jobs a month for 60 months without interruption," she adds, while employment increased by only 93,000 jobs per months on average since March.

EGYPT: The irreducible Tahrir Square are not about to sleep

A few hours after the end of the event that brought together nearly one million Egyptians in Cairo, nearly ten of thousands of protesters are still present on Tahrir Square towards which all eyes converge.

Armed with tents and sleeping bags, hundreds of them, including women and young children, are sleeping on the ground. "I come every day protest last week on this site. Tonight I will sleep here in the middle of my countrymen because it is a memorable day," said Hamdy, an unemployed 49 year old .He said the movement might take a more violent turn on Friday, after prayers, if the will of the people is not heard.

A strong smell of burning from several areas of the vast square, where fires were lit to protect against the cold. But the atmosphere gradually warms to the announcement of the impending speech by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

Mubarak's voice echoing in the square

It is almost 23 o'clock, when the voice of rai finally resonates through speakers instead and radios made by protesters. In a painful hiss, the voice of rai, so unpopular in those places, however, has been listened gravely.Unsurprisingly, just concluded, the statement raises a very strong backlash.

Some Cairenes, frustrated by the reaction of President Mubarak, kneel and take his head with both hands. Others hide their faces with their flags. Hosni Mubarak, who has held power for 30 years, has announced he will not abandon the presidency before the next presidential election scheduled for September 2011.

Instead, bit busy until then because of the late hour, suddenly caught fire. Spontaneously, protesters come alive to form more compact groups, to better block against the regime. "He does not want to leave, but he will leave. We are left," they cry, unanimous.Later, a group led by supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood slogan chanted demanding that Mubarak is "tried and sentenced to death." Alerted by the commotion visible from several kilometers Tahrir, foreign journalists who had deserted the flock up, cameras in hand, to gather initial reactions.

"He does not understand"

Came from Alexandria, to live a "historic day", Rawan, a young student in international business, is struggling to hide his disappointment. "We were millions in the streets today across Egypt to tell him to go, but Mubarak did not understand, he does not listen to the people," she laments.

For his part, Omar despair.This philosophy student fears the effects of the status quo. "If Mubarak persists, demonstrations continue. Our economy and our future will be so threatened," he says. He said the president must withdraw and leave a transitional government amend the constitution and hold a presidential election.

Tomorrow we will be even more

Already, a call for new events is launched. "We'll come back tomorrow, we will remain a week if necessary, or even a year. Mubarak is 30 years remained in power," quips Karim, a hairdresser at home aged 21. His forehead still bears the scars of the violent demonstration on 28 January during which a policeman hit him with a wooden club."I do not want a step backwards, says he visibly upset by the speech. We suffer, we, the poor Egyptians, and we can not get out until this corrupt regime will remain in place. "

Reconstructed as a seller of cigarettes on the sly Tahrir Square, like many Cairenes, Karim invites you to its customers for the next day. "You see, tomorrow we will be even more than today," he said before vanishing into the crowd of demonstrators. Around 3 am, the voices of the protesters were still ringing in the neighborhood of Tahrir Square, which is aptly named because it is the place of the "Liberation".