Parents demand answers from Israel in bulldozer death

A 23-year-old American activist stands in front of an Israeli bulldozer in Gaza. The bulldozer drives over her, crushing her to death. These are the facts. Rachel Corrie, along with colleagues from the International Solidarity Movement, was trying to prevent Israel from bulldozing homes in Rafah, close to the Egyptian border. Her activism cost her her life in March 2003.
A colleague said at the time, "Many times the bulldozer came up to us and buried us with dirt, but they always stopped."
Corrie's parents want to know the truth about their daughter's death, whether the killing was intentional and who is accountable.
Craig and Cindy Corrie's civil suit against Israel's defense ministry starts in Haifa, Israel, on Wednesday -- a court date that took years to reach.
"The more we found out, the more likely that the killing was intentional, or at least incredibly reckless," Craig Corrie said. "And, as a former soldier, I was even in charge of bulldozers in Vietnam... You're responsible to know what's in front of that blade, and I believe that they did."
The Israeli military carried out a month-long investigation, which found no Israeli soldier was to blame.
"The armored bulldozer crew involved in the incident did not see Ms. Corrie, who was standing behind the mound of earth, and was unable to see her or hear her voice," the military said.
Corrie's parents are proud of what their daughter did, recalling how important it was to her to help Palestinian families in Gaza.
In an interview shortly before her death, Rachel Corrie, who grew up in Olympia, Washington, said, "There are just countless ways in which these children are suffering. I want to support them."
Her mother, Cindy Corrie, told , "She deserves the attention that she's receiving in this case. Every human being who is assaulted and whose life is taken in this way deserves some accountability, some explanation for why this happened, particularly when it's done by a military and particularly when it's a military supported by me and my tax dollars."
The Corries say they cannot take the bulldozer driver to court, because the Israeli military has refused to identify him for the past seven years. But Craig Corrie doesn't necessarily want to see the driver sent to jail.

"We don't think about the soldiers being the victims, but they are, and we ask a lot of these people. So I'm not full of hatred for this person, but it was a horrendous act to kill my daughter, and I hope he understands that."

Dozens dead from earthquake in Turkey

 A pre-dawn earthquake collapsed homes and killed more than 50 people in a mountainous region of southeastern Turkey Monday, government officials said.


About 71 others were injured when the earthquake struck at 4:32 a.m., according to officials. The U.S. Geological Survey registered the quake at magnitude 5.9, while the Turkish earthquake monitoring center listed it as a 6.0.


The quake struck in Elazig province, with the village of Okcular the worst hit, according to Ozcan Yalcin, the press secretary for the province's governor. Most of the mud brick homes in the village were destroyed, he said. Villagers had buried 15 of the people that died, he added.

"The people are sad but they are calm," Yalcin said. "They lost relatives and loved ones, they are crying, but all of their needs are being met by the state."

The quake killed 51 people, the office of the Prime Minister and Crisis Center in Elazig province said. The death toll revises an earlier report by Turkey Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek that at least 57 people had died. There was no further detail on the discrepancy.


Dozens of aftershocks, ranging up to magnitude 5.5, shook the region in the hours after the quake.

 "According to the information that we got from the technical teams on the ground, there shouldn't be anyone left in the rubble by now. But the search and rescue operations are continuing," said the deputy governor of Elazig, Mehmet Ali Saglam.

 "Most of the houses that were demolished in the villages are not cement houses. ... Other buildings, such as schools, were not destroyed," the deputy governor said.

"The Red Crescent is there. They are giving all kinds of help to the people. They are setting up tents. The weather is cloudy, 8 to 10 degrees Celsius (46 to 50 degrees Fahrenheit)."

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on television said: "Teams from the state mass housing project have also been sent to the area to study how to rebuild the area in different methods."


Monday's quake occurred near the meeting point of two major fault lines, geologists said.

The Northern Anatolian Fault and East Anatolian Fault juxtapose each other, in an area where other fault lines exist, said Okan Tuysuz, a professor of geology at Istanbul Technical University.

"The Anatolian plate, which is surrounded by these two different fault systems, moves every year 2.5 centimeters westwards," Tuysuz said. "And the movement of the Anatolian plate westwards creates different fault systems in this area. And the earthquake occurred in such a complex geological environment."

Turkey is periodically pummeled by deadly earthquakes. In 1999, two powerful earthquakes hit heavily populated areas near Istanbul, Turkey's largest city, killing at least 20,000 people.

Sarkozy Warns Against Quick Exit From Stimulus

French President Nicolas Sarkozy warned central banks on Wednesday lambaste withdrawing cash stimulus measures too abruptly, saying it could prompt a collapse of the world economy.

In a keynote address to the totality Economic Forum of game leaders and policymakers in the Swiss ski resort of Davos, Sarkozy made an intensive plea for global relief to regulate the money system.

"Either we are capable of responding to the demand for protection, justice and fairness over cooperation, upper hand again governance, or we cede have isolation and protectionism," he said.

The French leader said tentative cipher of economic recovery should make governments bolder, not more timid, spell regulatory and structural reforms.

"We use manage prudently the adoption of measures to second (economic) activity and the withdrawal of liquidities injected during the crisis," he spoken. "We requisite bring misfortune to prevent vitally abrupt a tightening that would result in a rampant collapse."

Sarkozy, a radical advocate of stronger regulation again construe industrial policy called now a refoundation and moralisation of capitalism, and curbs on the business bonus culture.

He endorsed U.S. President Barack Obama's proposals to terminate commercial banks from engaging in speculative proprietary trading and from owning hedge funds and private equity funds.

But he vocal the G20 grouping of major economies was the right forum to get done a consensus on earmark financial regulation.

Sarkozy also vocal prevalent imbalances needed to body corrected to prevent a repeat of the financial crisis, cover surplus countries consuming more and exiguity countries cutting back their spending.

Haiti rescuers pull man alive from rubble after 11 days

Rescuers could hear knocking and finally managed to free the trapped man

A 24-year-old man has been rescued alive from the rubble of a ruined hotel in Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince, 11 days after the earthquake.

It came hours after Haiti's government declared a formal end to the search for survivors.

Onlookers cheered as Wismond Exantus - smiling and apparently in a good condition - emerged on a stretcher from what remains of the Napoli Inn Hotel.

He later told reporters that soft drinks and snacks had kept him going.

"I survived by drinking Coca-Cola and I ate some little tiny things," Mr Exantus, who worked in the hotel's grocery store, told news agency AFP from his bed in a French field hospital.

"Every night I thought about the revelation that I would survive," he was quoted as saying by the Associated Press agency.

Greek, French and US rescue teams were involved in the two-and-a-half-hour operation to bring him out of the remains of the hotel.

A French rescue worker, Lt Col Christophe Renou, described his survival as "a miracle".

He said rescuers - who had been alerted by the man's family - had managed to get water to him while they worked to dig him out.

Lt Col Renou said the man had probably been helped by the fact that the 5-6m (16-20ft) of debris above him was largely wood, rather than concrete.

He said the man had told his rescuers that another four people were trapped with him but that they had stopped moving a couple of days ago.

The BBC's Adam Mynott, in Port-au-Prince, says some Haitians have questioned the announcement that search-and-rescue operations are to end - and the discovery of Mr Exantus will have lent weight to their argument.

Drank his own urine

Speaking before Mr Exantus's rescue, UN spokeswoman Elizabeth Byrs in Geneva said the decision to end the search for survivors was "heartbreaking" but that it had been taken on the advice of experts.

She said most search-and-rescue teams would now be leaving Haiti, although some with heavy lifting equipment might stay to help with the clean-up operation and with aid distribution.

Two people, an 84-year-old woman and a 21-year-old man, were pulled alive from the rubble in Port-au-Prince on Friday.

The woman, who was found in the wreckage of her home seriously injured and severely dehydrated, was taken to the main city hospital for treatment.

The 21-year-old man, Emmannuel Buso, was rescued by an Israeli search team and is said to be in a stable condition.

Speaking from his hospital bed, he described how he had had no food, and had drunk his own urine to keep thirst at bay.

An estimated 1.5 million people were left homeless by the 7.0-magnitude quake, which some have estimated has killed as many as 200,000 people.

At least 75,000 bodies have so far been buried in mass graves, Haiti's government has said. Many more remain uncollected in the streets.

The UN says 130,000 people have now been relocated out of Port-au-Prince, easing the pressure on overcrowded camps in the city.

The BBC has started a new radio service in Creole, one of the country's main languages.

The 20-minute long daily broadcast, called Connexion Haiti, will try to give people up-to-date information about the basic services they need to survive - such as where to find food, clean drinking water, medical assistance and shelter.