BEIJING, Dec. 14 -- Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, is being treated at a hospital in Milan, for a broken nose and facial injuries, after being assaulted during a political rally. Berlusconi was signing autographs when a man threw a souvenir statue of Milan's Dome at him. The prime minister was then rushed into a car and driven away to a nearby hospital. His personal doctor said the prime minister had suffered severe nose trauma, two broken teeth and an injured lower lip. The prime minister stayed overnight at the hospital and will be kept under medical observation for the coming days. Police identified the suspect as 42-year-old Massimo Tartaglia, who has a history of mental illness.
2. les vis: watershed moment?
excerpt:
What happened to Berlusconi yesterday is a watershed moment. This won’t be the general impression. In most minds this will come across as an anomaly and one of the things that happen now and then to those who are in the public eye and whose public actions have a certain amount of controversy to them. It could be said that all public figures have a certain amount of controversy attached to them, just from being public figures.
The very rich and powerful have put themselves in a most undesirable position. Instead of making sure that the underclass has enough to get by and then keeping all the usual distractions in operation, they have overstepped themselves. Their greed and lust for power and wealth and their disdain for public opinion, which they demonstrate by their arrogant disregard for what others think; believing themselves to be above the reach and judgment of those they consider beneath them, is going to come back on them with a fury. The King Louis and Marie Antoinette mindset never goes out of style with those driven mad by vanity and self-interest. It comes with the territory.
3. UK reportedly issues arrest warrant for Livni
Opposition leader Tzipi Livni on Monday canceled her participation in a Jewish function in London, after a warrant for her arrest was issued over part in last winter's Israel's Gaza offensive, Arab-language media have reported.
Al-Quds Al-Arabi claimed that Scotland Yard advised the organizers of the Jewish National Fund conference in northwest London that the former foreign minister had canceled her scheduled address to the assembly over threats of a possible lawsuit by pro-Palestinian groups.
more @ haaretz
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1134978.html
4. Copenhagen talks stall as African bloc accuses UN of trying to kill Kyoto
One of the two negotiating tracks at the UN climate talks in Copenhagen broke up in drama and confusion today when the Africa group of countries followed by other developing countries accused the chair of the conference of trying to "kill" the Kyoto protocol. They were also objecting to what they characterised as efforts to sideline the poorest countries.
The crisis was then exacerbated after Australia said that rich countries should suspend talks about emission cuts.
The UN and the chair of the conference, Denmark, tried hurriedly to repair the rifts as ministers began to arrive in Copenhagen for the high level political section of the talks. But after the talks were suspended for two hours, observers said that it looked increasingly unlikely that an ambitious deal would now be negotiated by Friday.
5. especially Frau Merkel
As the second week of negotiations at the climate conference in Copenhagen began on Monday, developing nations accused German Chancellor Angela Merkel of blocking progress with stingy financial contributions.Sudan’s Lumumba di-Aping, spokesperson for the so-called G77 coalition of developing nations, told daily Frankfurter Rundschau that the European Union’s contribution €2.4 billion per year was far too little.
“Mrs Merkel has two faces,” he said. “At home she is a great ecologist, but when it comes to money for climate change, she hits the brakes.”
Between €300 and €500 billion per year is needed to stop climate change, di-Aping said.
“The EU is throwing us bread crumbs,” he said, adding that Europe and the United State “spend far more money for the military than climate change” and financial crisis bail-outs.
Di-Aping also said that the current goals for emissions reductions are insufficient. In order to prevent the “death of Africa” through a significant temperature increase, industrial nations must reduce their emission by 65 percent from their 1990 levels by 2020, he said. Failing to do so would mean a 3.75 degree Celsius temperature increase on the continent.
6. Blair's 'sycophancy to US and alarming subterfuge with Bush'
The British people were misled and cajoled into a deadly war in Iraq because of Tony Blair's sycophancy towards George Bush, a former prosecutions chief has claimed.
Sir Ken Macdonald, who was director of public prosecutions for much of Mr Blair's premiership, accused the former prime minister of using 'alarming subterfuge' to lead the British people into the conflict.
Referring to Mr Blair's weekend interview on the BBC with former This Morning host Fern Britton in which he defended his role, the former prosecution chief wrote in The Times: 'This was a foreign policy disgrace of epic proportions and playing footsie on Sunday morning television does nothing to repair the damage.'
Sir Ken said the U.S. seat of power 'turned his head and he couldn't resist the stage or the glamour that it gave him'.
7. more reports of chickens coming home to roost here
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