Boris Berezovsky wins Litvinenko poison spy libel case

Businessman Boris Berezovsky has won a libel case over allegations he was behind the murder of former Russian agent Alexander Litvinenko in London.

He was awarded £150,000 ($224,000) at the High Court over a claim made by Russian TV channel RTR Planeta.

Mr Berezovsky, 63, said he had been a friend and supporter of Mr Litvinenko and the comments were "outrageous".

Mr Litvinenko, a fierce critic of ex-Russian President Vladimir Putin, was poisoned with polonium in 2006.

'No evidence'

Mr Berezovsky, a Russian oligarch who lives in Surrey, said outside the court he had tried to protect his reputation and was satisfied with the judgement.

He later said he had "no doubt" RTR and the Russian authorities tried to undermine his asylum status in the UK and put the murder investigation of Mr Litvinenko on the "wrong track.

I am pleased that the court, through its judgement, has unequivocally demolished RTR's claims," he said.

"I trust the conclusions of the British investigators that the trail leads to Russia and I hope that one day justice will prevail."

The state-owned channel RTR had boycotted the hearing claiming the court had robbed it of the opportunity to defend itself.

The allegations were made on its programme Vesti Nedeli, the equivalent of BBC Two's Newsnight, which is available by satellite in the UK.

In his ruling, Mr Justice Eady told the court in London: "I can say unequivocally that there is no evidence before me that Mr Berezovsky had any part in the murder of Mr Litvinenko.

Nor, for that matter, do I see any basis for reasonable grounds to suspect him of it."

The Russian, who was granted political asylum in the UK in September 2003, was suing over the broadcast in April 2007.

It suggested the motive was that Mr Litvinenko had witnessed an attempt by Mr Berezovsky to avoid extradition and obtain political asylum by obtaining false evidence.

He was alleged to have procured the false account - that there was a security service plot to kill him - from a Vladimir Terluk.

Mr Terluk denied in court he was the person called Pyotr featured in silhouette in the programme, but the judge said he had "no doubt".

The broadcast suggested Mr Berezovsky was party to threats to Mr Terluk's life, but Mr Berezovsky insisted it was propaganda designed to threaten his asylum status and security.

'Criminal on run'

Both RTR and Mr Terluk are liable for the damages, but the judge said Mr Terluk was not personally responsible for the claim Mr Berezovsky was implicated in Mr Litvinenko's murder.

Mr Berezovsky had earlier told the court he first met Mr Litvinenko, whom he knew as Sasha, in 1994 when Mr Litvinenko was working for the Federal Counter-intelligence Service.

He said his friend had twice saved his life - in an explosion in Moscow which killed his driver and in a stand-off during a police raid.

Mr Berezovsky said: "We shared a dramatic and dangerous history - he had helped me and I him, and, fundamentally, we shared the same enemy."

He said he visited Mr Litvinenko several times when he fell ill and was shocked when he was told his friend had ingested polonium.

Mr Litvinenko had met two Russian men, one a former KGB security officer, at a hotel in London before he fell ill.

In November 2007, Mr Berezovsky was sentenced to six years in jail in his absence for stealing millions of pounds from the Russian airline carrier Aeroflot in the 1990s. He described the verdict by a Moscow court as "a farce".

Then, in June last year he was sentenced to 13 years in his absence for stealing thousands of cars from Avtovaz, also in the 1990s.

Mr Justice Eady said: "In the eyes of many people, including Russian speakers living in this country, Mr Berezovsky has acquired the reputation of a criminal on the run from Russian justice.

"On the other hand, he is seen by others as a political dissident who is working for justice and democratisation. Many see the criminal proceedings against him as politically motivated."

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China to build new international airport in Sri Lanka

China is to lend Sri Lanka about $200m (£133m) to build a second international airport in the south of the island.

Another $100m from Beijing will help boost the island's railway network, Sri Lanka's foreign ministry said.

The new airport will be near a vast sea port which is being largely funded with Chinese money.

China is financing a growing number of such projects in Sri Lanka, which some see as an attempt to undermine Indian influence in the region.

The two countries are vying for contracts in Sri Lanka following the end of more than 20 years of civil war.

'Best terms'

Last week, the Sri Lankan government said China was supplying more than half of all the construction and development loans it was receiving.

Work has already started on the airport.

It is close to the massive sea port under construction at Hambantota, which is largely being funded by the Chinese government's lending arm, the Export-Import Bank.

Both projects have the same Chinese state-owned company as contractor, says the BBC's Charles Haviland in Colombo.

The projects Beijing is financing include a host of road improvements in the formerly war-torn north, a huge theatre in the capital and coal power plants, our correspondent says.

They are built by Chinese contractors and use large numbers of Chinese workers.

Analysts in Sri Lanka say there is some unhappiness among Sri Lankan companies and workers who feel they are missing out.

They say Chinese interest rates are higher than those levied by Japan or the Asian Development Bank - but that Chinese projects happen more quickly and with fewer advance studies.

The government, however, says China is simply offering the best terms.

Some officials in India, Sri Lanka's neighbour and China's rival, have said they fear Beijing is trying to undermine Delhi's influence in the region through its economic assistance.

India, for its part, has just announced a credit of $70m to help upgrade Sri Lanka's southern railway line.

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Barack Obama says situation in quake-hit Haiti 'dire'

US President Barack Obama has warned of a second disaster in Haiti, saying people should be under no illusion that the crisis there is over.

Mr Obama said the situation in Haiti remained "dire" almost two months after the earthquake struck.

He was speaking after talks with Haitian President Rene Preval in Washington.

Mr Obama told Mr Preval that the US would continue to help Haiti in its recovery and reconstruction efforts.

He praised Mr Preval for being a "profile in courage" in the aftermath of the 7.0-magnitude quake.

Mr Obama said there remained a desperate need for humanitarian help, especially as seasonal rains could threaten the more than a million Haitians left homeless by the quake on 12 January.

Rapid reaction force

"The challenge now is to prevent a second disaster, and that is why at this very moment, thousands of Americans, both civilian and military, remain on the scene at the invitation of the Haitian government," Mr Obama said.

The US president also pledged to continue to help Haiti in the long term.

"Even as the US military responsibly hands off relief functions to our Haitian and international partners, America's commitment to Haiti's recovery and reconstruction must endure and will endure," he said.

Mr Preval thanked the US for the material and moral support it had provided.

More than 20,000 US civilian and military personnel have taken part in the relief efforts, according to figures released by the White House.

Mr Preval said that while the response to the disaster had been massive and generous, it could have been more effective.

He also called for the creation of a United Nations rapid response team to provide humanitarian help when natural disasters struck.

"I support the idea of the creation of so-called 'red helmets' within the United Nations and these would be an observatory, a warning provisional system for natural disasters and a humanitarian force which will be the equivalent of the 'blue helmets'," Mr Preval said.

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Ex-rebels accused of extortion in DR Congo mines

Former rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo who now serve in the army are running mafia-style extortion rackets in the mines, campaigners say.

The country has some of the world's richest mines, which provide minerals to the global electronics industry.

Ex-rebels of the CNDP group are said to have gained far greater control of the mines than they did as insurgents.

Campaign group Global Witness says the government and international community have failed to demilitarise the mines.

The ongoing conflict in Eastern Congo, which has claimed some six million lives in a little more than a decade, has long revolved over access to its mineral wealth, not just by DR Congo but also its neighbour Rwanda through its proxy forces.

After last year's high profile government offensive against one rebel group which controlled many of the mines in Eastern Congo, the military has moved in and transferred power to a competing armed group.

A move to integrate rebels from the CNDP - whose leader Laurent Nkunda has been under house arrest in Rwanda since last year - into Congo's national army has seen them enjoying more control of the country's mineral wealth than ever before, according to Global Witness investigators.

In one mine in South Kivu, civilian miners claimed they were being forced to pay $10 each to the military for permission to spend a night working in the mines.

Researchers say that instead of protecting civilians, the military is taxing them illegally, and subjecting them to abuse.

They also claim that high profile international companies are still knowingly sourcing minerals from these militarised mines - a contravention of UN sanctions, which campaigners say are not being enforced.

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Are Indonesian terror networks regrouping?

The Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has confirmed that the man killed in a raid on the outskirts of Jakarta on Tuesday was the widely sought terror suspect Dulmatin.

He was allegedly one of the key members of the group which helped to plan and carry out the attacks in Bali in 2002, killing 202 people, mainly foreigners.

Nicknamed the "Genius of Jemaah Islamiah (JI)", he has been on Indonesia's most wanted list for years, and is thought to be one of the few members of the militant group able to assemble and explode sophisticated bombs.

The raid, which killed three militants including Dulmatin, is believed to have links to the group of alleged militants they captured last month in Aceh.

He was the supplier of weapons and funding. He may have had even bigger roles in the group but for now that's what we have evidence for," Edward Aritonang, a spokesman for the Indonesian police told journalists.

"We have evidence of the weapons and ammunitions, and the flow of funding."

But security analysts say that while the recent killing and capturing of alleged militants across Indonesia is a sign that police are doing their job, it also shows a possible rejuvenation of terror networks in the country.

Splinter groups?

"The key question is how the people who participated in the training camp got to Aceh," says Sidney Jones, an Indonesian anti-terror expert with the Brussels-based International Crisis Group (ICG). It looks like this group is a composite of people from a number of different militant groups like Jemaah Islamiah, Kompak and Darul Islam, who are frustrated with what they see as a lack of action within these groups. They're more radical, and apparently see themselves as Indonesia's al-Qaeda."

Noor Huda, an independent security analyst agrees. He thinks that the raid on the alleged militant training camp in Aceh shows that there are elements within Indonesia who are still actively pursuing terrorist activities.

"How do you build a training camp in this remote part of Aceh without the support of others in the country, without weapons, without funding?" Mr Huda told the BBC.

"This shows that there are people who provided the money, people who housed the alleged militants, local networks that ideologically support the aims of this group.

"It is not clear what their goal is, but it's clear they exist and are operating here."

This news is potentially troubling for authorities who had hoped that their efforts to stamp out terrorism in the archipelago over the last few years had been successful.

'Radical ideologies'

Indonesia's anti-terror unit has been under pressure to show results in its efforts to clamp down on militancy ever since the July bombings in 2009.

Twin bombs were exploded in two luxury hotels in the heart of Jakarta, killing nine people, including two suicide bombers, and injuring dozens more.

The deadly blasts, coming after four years of relative peace and quiet, shattered the image of Indonesia as a safe nation and rocked the confidence of the international community in the country's ability to tackle terror.

Ansyaad Mbai, Indonesia's anti-terror chief, says there is no easy solution to eliminating terror cells in the country but the Aceh group does not necessarily point to a rise in militancy in Indonesia.

"I'm not sure if this means there's a rejuvenation of terrorist networks in the country, but it is evidence that terrorism is latent," he told the BBC.

"As long as radical ideology exists, terrorists will always exist. The fact remains that there are still one or more figures in local mosques that are teaching radical ideologies and support terrorist activities.

"But we have to be careful not to brand these places as institutions that support terrorism, it's just a few individuals within those institutions."

Security will be one of the key issues discussed during a planned visit by US President Barack Obama to Indonesia later in March.

America has been positioning Indonesia as a modern Muslim nation, a country that has successfully managed to tackle terror threats in the past.

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Boeing wins as EADS gives up mid-air refuelling battle

Efforts to unseat Boeing from its top spot in US aerospace have come to nought.

US defence behemoth Northrop Grumman and Boeing's European arch rival EADS have failed in efforts to wrestle from Boeing a particularly mundane, albeit hugely lucrative, role as the lead provider of aircraft refuelling for military aircraft.

For a while it looked as if they had succeeded.

In February 2008, the EADS/Northrop Grumman joint bid was awarded a long-running contract for aerial refuelling tankers, which fill up military aircraft with fuel mid-flight.

At some $35bn to $40bn (£23bn to £27bn), the order for KC-30 Advanced Multi-role Tanker Transport planes was set to become the second-biggest US defence contract yet.

Indeed, at the time it was thought it could have risen in value to more than $100bn over the next 30 years, which would have made it the biggest by far.

But Boeing, which has been supplying the United States Air Force with KC-135 flying refuelling tankers for decades, fought back.

For starters, the US giant engaged in passionate patriot games, with full-page newspaper adverts playing the "American jobs" card.

The company also formally raised more than 100 protest points. In the end, US government auditors upheld eight of them and the Pentagon changed its mind and pulled the plug on the deal, inviting the rivals back for a new beauty contest.

Cross-subsidies?

Two years later, EADS and Northrop Grumman has now withdrawn from the competition, with EADS chief executive Louis Gallois declaring: "We deeply regret that the United States Air Force will not get the best available airplane.

So in the end, it seems Boeing has won the day with its KC-7A7 project - featuring a vision rather than anything firm, as the company has yet to build its new tanker.

So far, all it has is a plan to modify one of Boeing's existing civilian freighter planes, such as the 767F or the 777F.

Such a plan to modify a civilian aircraft to deliver a military capability help provide ammunition for critics - including EADS and its subsidiary Airbus - which say Boeing's civilian and defence divisions cross-subsidise each other and thus enable them to undercut rivals.

Poisoned relationships

Losing the potentially lucrative tanker contract leaves EADS with a number of troubled projects that may well drain its resources rather than fill its coffers in the years ahead.

They include the A400M transport plane project, which was saved from closure last week by an additional 3.5bn euros ($4.8bn; £3.2bn) from seven European governments, as well as the slow-selling A380 giant passenger plane and the costly-to-develop, smaller A350XWB.

But the company also has 9bn euros in cash reserves and it expects revenues this year to come in close to last year's 42.8bn euros.

So rather than focusing on EADS's ability to cope without the tanker contract, it may be more relevant to consider how the affair will have affected relations between it and Boeing, as well as between Europe and the US.

Suggestions that the Pentagon actively tailored its tanker criteria to fit the Boeing pitch have been refuted, though EADS and Northrop Grumman nevertheless insist their bid was never given a fair hearing.

The row leaves a bitter taste that may well poison cross-Atlantic relations for years to come.

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Spanish hostage in Africa freed

A Spanish woman kidnapped in West Africa last year has been freed, the Spanish government says.

There are unconfirmed reports that an Italian woman held by the same group has also been released.

Spaniard Alicia Gamez, and Italian Philomene Kaboure, both 39, were seized last year and held by a militant group, al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

They were seized separately in Mauritania, and then held in neighbouring Mali.

Two other male Spaniards and another Italian - Ms Kaboure's husband - are still being held.

The two hostages were released in Burkina Faso, according to diplomatic sources cited by Spanish, French and Italian media.

The Spanish government later confirmed Ms Gamez' release, but there has been no confirmation about Ms Kaboure.

Ransom demands

The three Spanish aid workers were snatched from a convoy by armed men on a road between the Mauritanian cities of Nouakchott and Nouadhibou on 29 November.

Ms Kaboure and her husband, Sergio Cicala, 65, were seized the following month.

They were all taken to northern Mali.

A Frenchman seized in Mali in November and held by the same group was released last month after its demand that Mali release four prisoners was met.

The Mauritanian government reacted with outrage, saying giving in to the demands would encourage further kidnapping.

Spanish media reported recently that al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb had demanded a ransom to release the hostages, and El Mundo newspaper alleged that the Spanish government was in the process of paying.

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