Global News Blog
People watch the Costa Concordia cruise liner off the tiny Tuscan island of Giglio, Italy, Friday. (Gregorio Borgia/AP)
Costa Concordia wreck: What we know a week later
A week after the Costa Concordia sank in shallow water two hours into a holiday cruise, transfixing the world, attention is now focused on the behavior of the captain before and after the ship hit a rock formation at 9:40 p.m.
What began as a serious tragedy off the Tuscan island of Giglio may now have some serious tabloid elements to the story.
New questions involve the role of a 25-year old blonde Moldovan, a Filipino cook, the captain’s alcohol intake, a dinner ordered after the collision, and the captain’s moves after the ship ran aground, leaving a 160-foot gash in the hull.
Captain Francesco Schettino seems to have been attentive to Domnica Cemortan, alternately described as a hostess and a dancer, for much of the evening before, during, and after the ship hit the rock, possibly dining with her as late as 10:30 p.m. The two were also together as late as midnight, according to Ms. Cemortan, at a lifeboat station, where he ordered her to leave the semi-submerged ship.
What was clarified this week: After charting an alternate course to sail closer to Giglio Island – a course that Costa Cruises denies it authorized – Schettino told investigators he “turned too late” to avoid rocks that some maritime experts say are uncharted but do show up on other nautical charts. In one animated mapping using nautical GPS positioning of the Concordia, the back half of the ship is shown grazing what is described as an exposed rock.
Transcripts of radio conversations between the Coast Guard and Schettino confirm that he left the ship while hundreds of passengers were still onboard.
In upcoming days, an accurate timeline may emerge of Schettino’s precise movements between the restaurant and the bridge as well as who he called and consulted – facts that are still murky and confused right now. The details have serious legal implications and consequences for insurance and recovery of the $450 million ultra-modern vessel.
Today rescue workers said the 117,000 ton Concordia is shifting on the ocean floor by 1.5 centimeters an hour, delaying additional rescue efforts and attempts at removing the oil onboard. Relatives of the 11 dead and 21 still missing are arriving from Peru, India, and European nations.
Building a timeline
Between 9 p.m. and 10:50 p.m., Schettino and Ms. Cemortan, who works for the cruise line but was not employed for the cruise, were seen eating and drinking together. The two were caught on an amateur camera at 9 p.m. in a ship restaurant. Cemortan, who gave an interview to a Romanian paper Thursday, said she was dining with Schettino at 9:30 p.m., around the time the boat hit the rocks. Rogelio Barista, a ship cook, told Manila TV he was befuddled by orders from the captain at 10:15 to serve food, including dessert, to Cemortan.
"I have had 12 years of experience as a cook on a cruise ship,” Mr. Barista said, in comments translated by CNN. “I have even witnessed fires, so I wasn't that scared. But I did wonder, though, what the captain was doing ... why he was still there."
Moreover, in what is generally an industry taboo, Schettino consumed at least part of a decanter of wine, according to Italian passengers who saw him in the restaurant.
William Wright, a British sea captain interviewed on Sky News today, said that just as commercial air pilots are forbidden to drink within a certain time frame of flying, so are ship captain eight hours prior to a voyage. Drinking on board by ship captains is “absolutely unacceptable” and there is a “zero tolerance” policy, Mr. Wright said.
Tapes indicate the Concordia did not make the call to abandon ship until more than an hour after the collision. The initial warning of danger came from a cell phone call by a passenger to a relative on shore who alerted the Coast Guard. It appears that ship communications with the Coast Guard deliberately hid its plight by presenting the crisis as an electrical blackout.
New tapes show that in the meantime, chaos ensued. The crew initially told passengers the problem was an electrical malfunction, then told them to don their lifejackets and head to lifeboat stations, but tapes show that passengers were later told to return to their rooms.
“We have a message from the captain,” says a crew member to passengers in a corridor in a video released Thursday. “We kindly ask you to return to your cabins, or go for a walk if you like. We’ll resolve the electrical problem that we have with the generator. I’m kindly asking you to go back to your rooms, where you’ll be seated and tranquil.”
Cemortan, who has so far not explained why the captain was so attentive to her under such extraordinary conditions, has defended Schettino, echoing his initial story that his maneuver of the ship to shallow water saved thousands of lives and that he was not one of the first to leave.
What Schettino himself told investigators is that he tripped and fell into a lifeboat accidentally while trying to help others. What remains unexplained is how he landed in the same lifeboat as the No. 1 and No. 2 next ranking Concordia officers.
“Seems quite amazing both for myself and other people,” said Mr. Wright, the British captain. “But we need to see the investigation.” The cruise liner was commissioned in 2006 and is one of the largest cruise vessels in the Carnival fleet.
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This undated image obtained by The Associated Press shows the homepage of the website Megaupload.com. Federal prosecutors in Virginia have shut down one of the world's largest file-sharing sites, Megaupload.com, and charged its founder and others with violating piracy laws. (AP)
US files charges against Megaupload in 'largest copyright case'
In New Zealand, police had to cut through an iron door of a safe room to get their fugitive, Kim Dotcom, the founder of an Internet-based video sharing site called Megaupload.com.
Mr. Dotcom (a German citizen born as Kim Schmitz), along with six of his colleagues, has been charged with criminal copyright infringement, racketeering, and money laundering.
Meanwhile, a worldwide network of hackers took up the battle on behalf of Megaupload.com, launching a massive denial-of-service attack on several entertainment websites, as well as on the US Department of Justice website.
The mayhem and legal proceedings are just the opening shots in what US prosecutors are calling the largest criminal copyright case ever, and involves $500 million in damages to the entertainment industry, as well as complex legal issues of what constitutes copyright infringement in the age of YouTube, Facebook “liking,” and DVD burners. And the legal battle is likely to reverberate around the world, as countries contemplate their own laws over intellectual property rights.
If found guilty, Dotcom and his Megaupload associates – who are thought to have earned up to $175 million by selling advertisements on their website –could face 20 years in prison.
The Washington Post quoted Sen. Patrick Leahy – author of the controversial Protect IP Act (PIPA) – praising the arrest of Dotcom.
“Today’s action by the Department of Justice against the leaders of Megaupload.com shows what law enforcement can do to protect American intellectual property that is stolen through domestic Web sites,” the Post quoted Leahy saying.
The New York Times quoted Ira P. Rothken, a lawyer for Megaupload, as saying in a Times phone interview, “Megaupload believes the government is wrong on the facts, wrong on the law.”
Supporters of the PIPA and Stop Online Piracy Acts (SOPA) going through Congress argue that those who create entertainment, from novelists to hip-hop artists to movie directors, deserve the legal protective environment that allows them to be paid for their work. Online activists worry that the SOPA and PIPA bills, if enacted, take things too far and would stifle the sharing creativity that is the very essence of the Internet.
US prosecutors accuse Dotcom of running a virtual mafia, and the Paris paper, Le Monde, quotes an e-mail by a Megaupload employee, showing that the company knowingly skirted the law, creating an environment for law-breaking on an industrial scale.
“We are not pirates,” Le Monde quoted the e-mail as saying. “We provide boats to pirates.”
Following massive online campaigns, several former supporters of new anti-piracy laws had begun to back away from SOPA and PIPA, but the new arrests indicate that US officials feel they have strong enough legislation in place to take action against companies such as Megaupload, even if those companies operate overseas.
The online hacking community, meanwhile, has responded in its own way, effectively shutting down the websites of the White House, the US Department of Justice, as well as the websites for entertainment companies Warner Brothers and Universal Music.
The Guardian quoted a statement from a hackers’ group known as Anonymous explaining their actions in support of Megaupload, posted on the collective’s website.
"We Anonymous are launching our largest attack ever on government and music industry sites. The FBI didn't think they would get away with this did they? They should have expected us."
How five websites are protesting SOPA
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Make way for cyclists in Tel Aviv
• A local, slice-of-life story from a Monitor correspondent.
Back in the 1990s, Tel Aviv’s bicycles were pushed to the margins of the urban landscape, which lacked bike lanes or bike racks.
In the past decade, however, Israel’s cosmopolitan capital has reimagined itself as an Amsterdam of the Middle East with miles of bike paths on sidewalks, boulevards, and in the streets.
With its generally flat terrain and temperate climate, Tel Aviv is an ideal city to navigate on two wheels. The network, marked with bicycle stencils, runs the length of the city’s Mediterranean seacoast, reaches down leafy historical avenues, and sweeps through the commercial center. The city also inaugurated a bike rental system, the Tel-O-Fun, with some 150 rental stations throughout the city. Usage has exceeded expectations, and the distinctive green and gray bikes with upright seating have become ubiquitous. A leading enthusiast is Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai, who test-drove one of the Tel-O-Fun bikes and christened a bike traffic light.
Let’s be clear: Tel Aviv is no Amsterdam – most of the bike lanes are on sidewalks. On trendy Rothschild Boulevard, the cyclists must dodge cafe tables, and on Ibn Gavirol, the bike path is interrupted by trees, benches, and building columns. But in a country where the volatile Israeli driver dominates the roads, some of that turf is being retaken by cyclists.
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A resident, with her pet dog, walks past trees with red lantern decorations for the Spring Festival Temple Fair at Ditan Park (the Temple of Earth), in Beijing, Friday. The Lunar New Year, or Spring Festival, begins on January 23 and marks the start of the Year of the Dragon, according to the Chinese zodiac. (Jason Lee/Reuters)
China's New Year: there be dragons, but not enough train tickets
Is this any way to run a railroad? Some 235 million Chinese travelers have their doubts.
Every year at the Chinese New Year the Ministry of Railways has the same problem: carrying the hundreds of millions of people who want to go home to celebrate the new year, China’s biggest holiday with their families. And every year it is a nightmare.
Passengers have long complained about endless lines at ticket offices or about paying high prices to scalpers who corner the market; and that’s before they even get on the train to brave agonizingly long and cramped journeys. Being with family at new year is like Thanksgiving and Christmas wrapped into one for Chinese.
So this year, as China prepares to usher in the Year of the Dragon on Sunday, the Ministry offered holidaymakers the chance to buy their tickets online.
That would have been a good idea, except that its server collapsed under the strain.
IN PICTURES: Year of the dragon
On Jan. 9, the ticket booking website took 1.4 billion hits, the Ministry said.
The ensuing crash left a lot of disgruntled customers.
“I tried on the Internet for a whole day but I never managed to log on,” says Fan Zhixin, who works in a website’s finance department, as she lined up for a ticket outside Beijing’s central station on Thursday.
Eventually, she recounted, she had reached the sales office on the phone, “but by the time I got through all the seats had been sold, so I had to buy a standing only ticket.”
Since her journey to Ulanhot, in Inner Mongolia, was going to take 20 hours and the idea of standing in a crowded corridor for that long was too appalling, Ms. Fan was making one last bid for a seat.
As she dreaded, there were none. “This will be very terrible,” she says, wheeling her imitation Louis Vuitton suitcase through the crowd toward the platform.
Ma Anjia, a migrant construction worker heading for his hometown in Shanxi, 16 hours West of Beijing, had secured a seat, but no thanks to the new Internet booking system. In fact, that had made it harder for him.
“I don’t know how to use the Internet,” Mr. Ma laughs. “I queued up.”
But because tickets became available online two days before they were sold at railroad ticket offices, he kept finding the agencies had sold out. “I went to five or six different places and waited hours at each one before I managed to buy the tickets I needed,” Ma says.
Still, at least he should be home before the weekend.
Travelers leaving things until the last minute have something else to worry about: Weather forecasters are warning that a wave of snow and rain over the coming days could make travel even more tricky.
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A ropes course at the Juwi Group’s wind farm. (Isabelle de Pommereau)
Climbing higher at German wind farm
• A local, slice-of-life story from a Monitor correspondent.
Welcome to the world’s first ropes course ever installed on a wind farm. Built by the Juwi Group, one of Germany’s leading renewable-energy companies, and located at the foot of one of the farm’s 10 towering wind turbines, it’s attracting tourists in droves.
Why would a green company also build a climbing ropes course?
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“We wanted to make the windmills more inviting,” says Ricarda Schuller, a spokesperson for Juwi. As interest in green energy use grows, the interactive course could help provide an alternative view of wind farms, which are often criticized here for being eyesores.
The course also fits into the company’s overall philosophy of providing attractive services to its employees: In addition to the ropes course, Juwi has a kindergarten, a swimming pool, and a beach volleyball court.
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Incoming Venezuela's Defense Minister Gen. Henry Rangel Silva attends his swearing-in ceremony at Fort Tiuna military base in Caracas, Venezuela, Tuesday Jan. 17. (Fernando Llano/AP)
Chávez appointment - a slap to Colombia?
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos has tried to build better relations with his counterpart in Venezuela, Hugo Chávez, who once accused the Colombian president of trying to have him assassinated.
But as Mr. Chávez enters election year with stepped up rhetoric aimed at Washington and the opposition at home, Mr. Santos may be caught in the crossfire. One of the primary sources of antagonism between the two nations was Chávez’s alleged links to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).
The links are personified by Venezuelan Gen. Henry Rangel Silva, who was accused by the United States in 2008 of aiding drug trafficking and pushing for cooperation between the Venezuelan government and FARC.
IN PICTURES: Colombia: Living with the FARC
Chávez swore in General Rangel Silva this week as Venezuela’s new defense minister.
The ceremony came just days after two major Colombian news outlets published correspondence which they claim proves that Rangel Silva was for a long time the principle contact between the Venezuelan government and FARC and also shows links between the general and FARC’s newly appointed leader Rodrigo Londono, also known as Timochenko.
Authorities in both Washington and Bogotá will have grimaced at the appointment. Chávez, however, defended his decision in typically theatrical language.
“If our defense minister is attacked by imperialism and its lackeys and if our defense minister is attacked by the Venezuelan bourgeoisie, it is because we have a tremendous defence minister,” said Chávez as he spoke to the thousands of troops gathered at Fort Tiuna in Caracas. “[They] have no proof,” Chávez added. “It is all untrue.”
It is not just US and Colombian diplomats who will be worried. With elections due in less than 10 months, and primaries within a month, there are concerns that Chávez is asserting his control on the army in preparation.
Rangel Silva even declared last year that the Venezuelan military was “absolutely loyal” to Chávez.
If elections don’t go Chávez’s way in October, there are worries that the military will fail to support the alternative successor; this would inevitably destabilize the OPEC-member country.
Chávez did say in a 10-hour state of the nation speech on Friday that he would honor election results and show off the “political maturity” the country had acquired during his now 13-year Bolivarian revolution.
IN PICTURES: Colombia: Living with the FARC
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Somalis from southern Somalia demonstrate against the lack of food and water at Maka Al Mukarama road in Mogadishu, Somali, September 2011 carrying placards which read 'We need food and water.' Aid groups gave the world plenty of time to prepare, but a late response by the world’s donor nations cost thousands of lives during last year’s drought in the Horn of Africa region. (Farah Abdi Warsameh/AP/File)
Aid groups: With new Africa drought looming, donors must speed response
Scientists and aid organizations gave the world plenty of time to prepare, but a late response by the world’s donor nations cost 50,000 to 100,000 lives during last year’s drought in the Horn of Africa region.
That is the message of a joint report by Oxfam International, Save the Children and other charities, released today, during the global meetings at Davos, Switzerland, and at the African Union in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Now, with a new drought looming in the West African nations of Mauritania, Niger, Mali, and Chad, the joint report, “The Dangerous Delay,” is calling for an overhaul of the world’s aid delivery system to avoid more preventable deaths from starvation.
“The humanitarian community needs to come together and raise its voice louder so governments and donors know the gravity of crises such as the one in the Horn of Africa,” said Carolyn Miles, President and CEO of Save the Children in a statement. “By the time the world sees starving children on TV, it’s too late. Tens of thousands of deaths could have been prevented had aid groups and governments received funding earlier to scale up programs.”
Aid groups estimate that 50,000 to 100,000 people died of hunger between April and August 2011, more than half of them children. Even today, the UN warns that as many as 750,000 Somalis could die in the ongoing food crisis in Somalia.
What makes the deaths in the Horn of Africa so galling for many activists is the fact that the world had advance warning. Unlike the famine in the Horn of Africa in 1984, which caused an estimated 1 million deaths in Ethiopia alone, aid organizations had received alerts from a massive computerized system called the Famine Early Warning System, which is comprised of ground sensors, satellite imagery, and field observations. FEWS-Net and other systems alerted aid groups as early as August 2010 that drought conditions were worsening, but slow funding from international donors meant that aid groups could not mount a full-scale response until July 2011, when the drought was in full force.
A famine warning and a global economic crisis
It’s logical to point fingers at the governments of rich nations such as Britain, France, the United States, and Germany for the slow donor response, because they are the nations who tend to give the most aid in times of emergency. As of 2002, the US donated 64 percent of the world's food aid, followed by Europe with 13.8 percent, Japan with 3.2 percent, and China with 1.7 percent. When these nations respond slowly, that hampers the ability of aid groups like Oxfam and Save the Children to send out extra personnel or emergency relief to a disaster zone.
But the truth is that 2011 is the year that the global economic crisis came to a head. The US Congress contemplated massive spending cuts to curb the US’s historic $14.7 trillion debt. The European Union appeared, at times, close to breaking up, as debt-strapped nations Greece, Italy, and Portugal veered toward insolvency.
Ordinary voters in the US told pollsters during this time period they thought that the US should scale back foreign aid spending. In a November 2010 poll conducted by WorldPublicOpinion.org and Knowledge Networks, Americans were asked what percentage of the US federal budget was spent on foreign aid, and what amount was “appropriate.” The most common answers were 25 percent and 10 percent, respectively. The US actually spends only 1 percent of its federal budget on foreign aid.
Oxfam's director emphasized the dangers of delayed responses.
“We all bear responsibility for this dangerous delay that cost lives in East Africa and need to learn the lessons of the late response,” said Oxfam’s Chief Executive, Barbara Stocking in a joint statement. “It’s shocking that the poorest people are still bearing the brunt of a failure to respond swiftly and decisively. We know that acting early saves lives but collective risk aversion meant aid agencies were reluctant to spend money until they were certain there was a crisis.”
Youth find their voice on Tunisian radio
• A local, slice-of-life story from a Monitor correspondent.
In the year since Tunisia’s Arab Spring revolution shed its former dictator’s tight grip over public expression, many are exploring myriad ways to be heard.
Ana Tounsi Radio, a US-funded effort, aims to keep young voices in the mix through Web radio and online video broadcasting. More than 100 young volunteers received technical training and now make programming decisions for the initiative, which went live in October under the slogan (translated from the local Arabic dialect) “It’s not enough that you listen. It’s time now to speak.”
On-air topics range from sports and culture to social and political issues. Conversations spill over onto social media sites and YouTube. Programs run 24/7, with live broadcasts from 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. During Tunisia’s fall elections, the station says young people provided extensive coverage from around the country.
Fedia Gasmi, part of a nongovernmental organization that oversees the project, says the station empowers youths by giving them a space to articulate their priorities. As they re-invent the communications landscape, she says, the goal is to enhance civic engagement as well as to “create critical thinking about media.”
A $215,000 grant from the US State Department’s Middle East Partnership Initiative helped pay for equipment and start-up costs.
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Britain's Queen Elizabeth and Prince Edward arrive for a Christmas Day service at St Mary Magdalene Church on the Royal estate at Sandringham, Norfolk in east England, December 2011. Does Queen Elizabeth need or deserve a new royal yacht to mark her 60th year on the throne? (Suzanne Plunkett/Reuters/File)
Should Queen Elizabeth be a 'have-yacht' among have-nots?
It’s the other big boat story this week: Does Queen Elizabeth need or deserve a new royal yacht to mark her 60th year on the throne? The debate is hotting up, with Prime Minister David Cameron sailing into rough seas of opinion after supporting the idea, despite an epic year of job loss and austerity in the United Kingdom.
Cameron’s Liberal Democrat coalition partner Nick Clegg, who has been pushing “tax the rich” schemes of late, told reporters it was a debate about “haves and have-yachts.”
In a memo this fall, Education Secretary Michael Gove floated the idea of funding a $125 million yacht with Britain's public funds. Mr. Gove, a staunch monarchist, was worried that her majesty’s Diamond Jubilee could be overshadowed by the 2012 Olympic Games to be held in London.
IN PICTURES: Queen Elizabeth's birthday
The proposed vessel would replace the former royal yacht Britannia, whose decommissioning in 2006 caused a famous tear from Queen Elizabeth.
The notion of using public funds to buy a yacht for one of the world’s richest women in the midst of a dire economic climate was quickly scotched by Mr. Cameron, who favors private financing for the idea.
Prince Charles supported the plan
British newspaper The Guardian broke the story about Gove's suggestion that public funds be used for the gift and later reported that Prince Charles and a prominent rear admiral supported the plan. (In an article today headlined "Britannia CAN rule the waves!" The Daily Mail – a major proponent of the project and often of the monarchy – rejected the claims that Gove had proposed public funding.)
Since the Guardian broke the story and the government made strong reassurances that the project would not receive public funding, the charity behind the plan has set out to campaign for private donations instead.
Plans for the yacht to be turned into a self-financing training and instructional vessel are in the works, should the proposal pan out. However, potential donors say it is still unclear how much of the upkeep, security, staff, and other often hidden expenses of large vessels will cost the public.
Queen Elizabeth is still going strong in her Diamond Jubilee year, and has achieved a singular level of popularity among ordinary Brits that is helping the monarchy and the damaged reputation of the royal family, says Nick Spencer of Theos, a public theology think tank.
“But this is very badly timed,” says Mr. Spencer.
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A Kazakh woman casts her ballot at a polling station in Kazakhstan's commercial capital Almaty, on Sunday. Voters cast ballots Sunday in the oil-rich Central Asian nation of Kazakhstan in elections that are expected to slightly broaden democratic representation in parliament's rubber-stamp lower house. (Anatoly Ustinenko/AP)
Kazakhstan vote fails key democracy test, say officials (+video)
International election observers have slammed Sunday's snap parliamentary elections in Kazakhstan as failing to meet the fundamental principles of democracy.
That verdict could be a painful blow to Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, who moved the voting forward after oil worker protests shook a city in western Kazakhstan. The elections were a possible effort to improve the country’s international image and avoid an "Arab Spring" type uprising in the oil-rich central Asian republic.
Mr. Nazarbayev hailed the voting as "unprecedented in terms of transparency, openness, and honesty." Although he allowed two opposition parties to gain entry to the country's parliament (Mazhilis), which had formerly been completely dominated by members of the ruling Nur Otan Party, as well as a few independents he selected.
"If Kazakhstan authorities are serious about their stated goals of increasing the number of parties in parliament, then they should have allowed more genuine opposition parties to participate in this election," OSCE Parliamentary Assembly President Joao Soares told a press conference in the Kazakh capital of Astana Monday.
According to final election results, Nur Otan won 81 percent of the vote, which will give it 83 deputies in the 107-seat lower house. The pro-government Ak Zhol Party (once led by Nazarbayev’s daughter) won 7.5 percent (8 seats), while the Communist Peoples Party gained by 7.2 percent (seven seats). Other parties failed to clear the 7 percent threshold.
Most opposition parties were barred from participating in the elections, and several candidates who were objectionable to authorities were stricken from the ballot, according to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), which fielded 400 observers.
Opposition party leaders said they had evidence of ballot stuffing, multiple voting, and coercion of voters, which they said they would post online.
"This election took place in a tightly controlled environment, with serious restrictions on citizens’ electoral rights," Miklos Haraszti, head of the OSCE office for democratic institutions and human rights added. "Genuine pluralism does not need the orchestration we have seen. Respect for fundamental freedoms will bring it about by itself."
The snap elections were called after at least 17 striking oil workers were killed after security forces in the western town of Zhanaozen opened fire on them last month.
International observers have complained that the area still remains tightly locked down, under a police state of emergency, and inaccessible to outsiders.
Experts express skepticism at government claims that 70 percent of citizens in Zhanaozen voted for Nur Otan.
"We can expect future unrest in the oil-rich western provinces, and in some big factories, if economic difficulties lead to a reduction in state budgets for workers in these industries," says Andrei Grozin, head of the central Asia department of the official Institute of the Commonwealth of Independent States in Moscow. "Kazakhstan cannot muster enough police force to keep order in the tough manner it did in Zhanoazen if unrest spreads. There is a real danger that strikes will spread in the spring, and authorities will be faced with the tough choice between buying the workers off or ordering in the Army."
Nazarbayev, the only leader post-Soviet Kazakhstan has ever known, was re-elected last year for another 5-year term with a celestial 95 percent of the votes, in polls that international observers also described as deeply flawed.
Opposition leaders say that the president was trying to clean up his international image by calling the early parliamentary polls – but that he had no intention of allowing a free and fair vote.
"Nazarbayev needed to make political changes, because his health is failing and if oil prices fall there will be serious financial problems," says Pyotr Svoik, a leader of the Azat Party, which officially won 1.5 percent of the votes but claims its actual total was much higher.
"The one-party parliament was always an embarrassment, and the oil strike and its aftermath was an awful, unexpected event for the authorities. They made sure these elections would produce a better-looking parliament, but kept most genuine opposition parties from participating or winning enough votes to get into the parliament ... Now there will be protests against electoral fraud, as there were in Russia last month though probably on a smaller scale. Nazarbayev is feeling alarmed, and he has good reasons to."
Kazakhstan is the ninth-largest country in the world. It is a transit route for US supplies headed to Afghanistan, and home to the second largest oil reserves among the former Soviet republics after Russia.
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