Latest Post
Tampilkan postingan dengan label World. Tampilkan semua postingan
Tampilkan postingan dengan label World. Tampilkan semua postingan
Ministers: MH370 search may take another year
Written By Unknown on Kamis, 16 April 2015 | 10.58
Ministers: MH370 search may take another year
Try Another
Audio CAPTCHA
Image CAPTCHA
Help
]]>
Malaysia Airlines MH370 disappeared without a trace more than a year ago. Government ministers said if the plane is not found by May, the search zone in the Indian Ocean will expand by another 60,000 square kilometers. VPC
BEIJING — The search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, which disappeared without a trace more than a year ago, may take another year to complete, government ministers said Thursday.
An agreement was made to double the current search zone in the Indian Ocean if the plane is not found by the end of May.
Relatives of missing Chinese passengers, who formed the majority of the 239 passengers and crew on board the Beijing-bound flight, welcomed the proposed expansion of the search area. Some had feared the search would scale down if no evidence was found in the zone identified by satellite analysis as the plane's most likely location.
After a meeting in Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian capital from which MH370 took off, ministers from Malaysia, Australia and China vowed to extend the search zone from the current 23,000 square miles to a wider area of 46,000 square miles off the west coast of Australia.
The plane vanished within one hour of takeoff on March 8, 2014.
Satellite and radar analysis suggests it veered off course and turned south for several hours before running out of fuel. An underwater search first mapped, then began scouring the previously uncharted sea bed for evidence. Investigators have found submarine volcanoes, high ridges, deep trenches and containers from cargo ships, but no debris from the Boeing 777 plane.
Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai, center, Australian Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss, left, and Chinese Transport Minister Yang Chuantang during a joint press conference on the next steps in the search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370. (Photo: Ahmad Yusni, EPA)
The search has covered about 60% of the current search zone and is expected to conclude next month. If MH370 remains missing, the search area will double to "cover the entire highest probability area identified by expert analysis," said Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai, Australian Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss and Chinese Transport Minister Yang Chuantang in a statement.
Beijing railway worker Zhang Hongjie, whose wife Zheng Ruixian, an insurance saleswoman, was on board, welcomed the agreement on expanding the search.
"I saw a trace of hope. It's the first time after the accident I felt a little relieved," said Zhang, 45. "I'm looking forward to progress in their search. As a relative, we could do nothing but wait. I wish every party could do more to search for the plane. Such a long time has passed."
Many Chinese relatives have expressed anger at a perceived lack of information and transparency from the airline and Malaysian authorities during the past year. Some suspect an official cover-up lies behind one of aviation's greatest mysteries.
"I think they were searching in the wrong place before, I wish the three countries could collaborate to do more to search for the plane," said Li Xinmao, 57, whose daughter was on the flight. Despite the passage of time, Li retains hope. "I believe my daughter is still alive somewhere," he said.
Contributing: Sunny Yang
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1FVFgxK
0) { %>
]]>
Ministers: MH370 search may take another year
Try Another
Audio CAPTCHA
Image CAPTCHA
Help
]]>
Malaysia Airlines MH370 disappeared without a trace more than a year ago. Government ministers said if the plane is not found by May, the search zone in the Indian Ocean will expand by another 60,000 square kilometers. VPC
BEIJING — The search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, which disappeared without a trace more than a year ago, may take another year to complete, government ministers said Thursday.
An agreement was made to double the current search zone in the Indian Ocean if the plane is not found by the end of May.
Relatives of missing Chinese passengers, who formed the majority of the 239 passengers and crew on board the Beijing-bound flight, welcomed the proposed expansion of the search area. Some had feared the search would scale down if no evidence was found in the zone identified by satellite analysis as the plane's most likely location.
After a meeting in Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian capital from which MH370 took off, ministers from Malaysia, Australia and China vowed to extend the search zone from the current 23,000 square miles to a wider area of 46,000 square miles off the west coast of Australia.
The plane vanished within one hour of takeoff on March 8, 2014.
Satellite and radar analysis suggests it veered off course and turned south for several hours before running out of fuel. An underwater search first mapped, then began scouring the previously uncharted sea bed for evidence. Investigators have found submarine volcanoes, high ridges, deep trenches and containers from cargo ships, but no debris from the Boeing 777 plane.
Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai, center, Australian Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss, left, and Chinese Transport Minister Yang Chuantang during a joint press conference on the next steps in the search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370. (Photo: Ahmad Yusni, EPA)
The search has covered about 60% of the current search zone and is expected to conclude next month. If MH370 remains missing, the search area will double to "cover the entire highest probability area identified by expert analysis," said Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai, Australian Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss and Chinese Transport Minister Yang Chuantang in a statement.
Beijing railway worker Zhang Hongjie, whose wife Zheng Ruixian, an insurance saleswoman, was on board, welcomed the agreement on expanding the search.
"I saw a trace of hope. It's the first time after the accident I felt a little relieved," said Zhang, 45. "I'm looking forward to progress in their search. As a relative, we could do nothing but wait. I wish every party could do more to search for the plane. Such a long time has passed."
Many Chinese relatives have expressed anger at a perceived lack of information and transparency from the airline and Malaysian authorities during the past year. Some suspect an official cover-up lies behind one of aviation's greatest mysteries.
"I think they were searching in the wrong place before, I wish the three countries could collaborate to do more to search for the plane," said Li Xinmao, 57, whose daughter was on the flight. Despite the passage of time, Li retains hope. "I believe my daughter is still alive somewhere," he said.
Contributing: Sunny Yang
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1FVFgxK
0) { %>
]]>
Egyptians risk lives eating this dangerous delicacy
Written By Unknown on Rabu, 15 April 2015 | 10.58
CAIRO — Every year on the day of the spring festival Shem el-Nessim, Egyptians are rushed to the hospital after eating the traditional delicacy of fermented (sometimes rotten) fish, or fesikh.
The ancient holiday marking the new season falls every year on the day after Coptic Easter and is celebrated by Christians and Muslims. Shem el-Nessim means "smelling the Zephyrs," or smelling the breeze, in Arabic.
Fesikh — a gray mullet dried in the sun and fermented in salt for up to a year — is considered an essential part of the celebration, even though it can sometimes be deadly.
The way the fish is prepared leaves those who partake at risk of botulism. Every year the newspapers are full of stories of poisonings, despite calls from health officials for citizens to forgo the dish.
This year, like every year, Egypt's Health Ministry issued a warning that advised Egyptians against eating fesikh.
"The way of preparing fesikh can be unsafe due to the lack of salt in the fish, and some people use dead fish floating on the sea surface," Hossam Abdel Ghaffar, spokesman for the Ministry of Health, said Monday.
The most recent figures show that two people died from eating fesikh in 2010, and the same number in 2009. In 1991, 18 people were killed after eating it.
Although there have been no reports of deaths so far this year, six people have already been hospitalized.
But for some, the risk is worth it. A long line formed Tuesday outside a shop in Cairo belonging to Hajj Mohamed, who has been selling fesikh in his neighborhood for as long as anyone can remember.
"I throw those warnings out the window," says Ezzat el Hennawi, a local schoolteacher. "I've bought my fesikh from him forever. He has a great health record. No one's gotten sick."
"Hajj Mohamed is famous, everybody buys from him," says Mumtaza Zaki, 50. She is buying her fesikh on the day after the holiday because she didn't have enough money on the day.
Shop owner Ehab el-Yamani, left, sells a fish dish known locally as fesikh to his customers on April 26, 2008, in Nabaroh, Egypt. (Photo: Khaled Desouki, AFP/Getty Images)
The delicacy costs 80 to 100 Egyptian pounds ($10-$13) for a kilogram (about 2.2 pounds), a lot of money for many Egyptians. She buys nearly $2 worth.
Public parks have been filled with families getting some fresh air and eating a concoction of fesikh, onion, lemon, lettuce and tahini — some people say the lemon and onion aid with digestion.
It's not to everyone's taste, however. This year on Twitter was awash with fesikh humor. One meme subbed the word fesikh into well-known movie titles (50 Shades of Fesikh, The Fesikh and the Furious). Others on Twitter bemoaned the fesikh smell in their houses and having to eat it with their families.
This article originally appeared on GlobalPost.
MORE FROM GLOBALPOST:
GlobalPost is a USA TODAY content partner providing world news coverage. Its content is produced independently of USA TODAY. It recently launched a kickstarter campaign to expand its coverage of the world's war zones.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1yv3Wxh
World marks one year since Nigerian girls' abduction
Written By Unknown on Selasa, 14 April 2015 | 10.58
World marks one year since Nigerian girls' abduction
Try Another
Audio CAPTCHA
Image CAPTCHA
Help
]]>
April 14 marks one year since Boko Haram kidnapped 276 schoolgirls. Habiba Bologun, a member of the "Bring Back Our Girls" campaign, is working hard to secure the release of the girls who are still captive. Newslook
People worldwide are marking one year since Boko Haram militants abducted nearly 300 schoolgirls in Nigeria, sparking global outrage.
The girls were kidnapped from their school in Chibok, in the northeast of the country, leading millions around the world to call for their return as the #BringBackOurGirls hashtag exploded on social media.
A number of girls later escaped the militants — who often force those abducted to convert to Islam and fight or work as sex slaves — but 219 remain missing.
A march and vigil were being held in the Nigerian capital of Abuja on Tuesday, with 219 girls taking part to represent each of the missing.
The Empire State Building in New York City will be lit up in purple and red after sunset Tuesday, during the hours the girls were snatched. Activists are using slogans including "Bring Back Our Girls Now" and "Never to be Forgotten."
Nigeria's President-elect Muhammadu Buhari said Tuesday he cannot promise to find the girls, but that his government will do everything in its power to bring them home.
Buhari, who was elected last month and will take office May 29, vowed to rid the nation of Boko Haram after outgoing President Goodluck Jonathan failed to defeat the insurgents, who want to create an Islamic caliphate in the region.
"We do not know if the Chibok girls can be rescued. Their whereabouts remain unknown. As much as I wish to, I cannot promise that we can find them. But I say to every parent, family member and friend of the children that my Government will do everything in its power to bring them home," Buhari said in a statement. "What I can pledge, with absolute certainty, is that starting on the first day of my administration Boko Haram will know the strength of our collective will and commitment to rid this nation of terror, and bring back peace and normalcy to all the affected areas."
A file screengrab taken on May 12, 2014, from a video of Nigerian Islamist extremist group Boko Haram obtained by AFP shows girls, wearing the full-length hijab and praying in an undisclosed rural location. (Photo: AFP/Getty Images)
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai — shot in 2012 by Taliban militants opposed to the education of girls — wrote an open letter to the missing schoolgirls.
"On this first anniversary of your captivity, I write to you a message of solidarity, love and hope," she said.
Boko Haram, whose attacks on schools have forced thousands out of education, loosely translates as "Western education is forbidden" in the Hausa language that is spoken by about 40 million people in Nigeria and neighboring Niger.
Malala, 17, expressed her view that Nigerian leaders and the international community have not done enough to help the girls.
"I'm one of the millions of people around the world who keep you and your families foremost in our thoughts and prayers," she said. "We cannot imagine the full extent of the horrors you have endured but please know this — we will never forget you.
"We will always stand with you, today and every day we call on the Nigerian authorities and the international community to do more to bring you home. We will not rest until you have been reunited with your families."
Amnesty International says at least 2,000 women and girls have been abducted by the extremists since the beginning of 2014.
A United Nations Children's Fund report published Monday reported an estimated 800,000 children have been forced from their homes by Boko Haram. The fund is using the messaging app Snapchat to share images based on drawings by children in Nigeria and neighboring countries to highlight the issue.
Last year, Boko Haram killed an estimated 10,000 people and forced about 1.5 million to flee for southern Nigeria and neighboring countries.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1yq8l4O
USA NOW
'Avengers' premiere rocks Hollywood
Apr 14, 2015
0) { %>
]]>
World marks one year since Nigerian girls' abduction
Try Another
Audio CAPTCHA
Image CAPTCHA
Help
]]>
April 14 marks one year since Boko Haram kidnapped 276 schoolgirls. Habiba Bologun, a member of the "Bring Back Our Girls" campaign, is working hard to secure the release of the girls who are still captive. Newslook
People worldwide are marking one year since Boko Haram militants abducted nearly 300 schoolgirls in Nigeria, sparking global outrage.
The girls were kidnapped from their school in Chibok, in the northeast of the country, leading millions around the world to call for their return as the #BringBackOurGirls hashtag exploded on social media.
A number of girls later escaped the militants — who often force those abducted to convert to Islam and fight or work as sex slaves — but 219 remain missing.
A march and vigil were being held in the Nigerian capital of Abuja on Tuesday, with 219 girls taking part to represent each of the missing.
The Empire State Building in New York City will be lit up in purple and red after sunset Tuesday, during the hours the girls were snatched. Activists are using slogans including "Bring Back Our Girls Now" and "Never to be Forgotten."
Nigeria's President-elect Muhammadu Buhari said Tuesday he cannot promise to find the girls, but that his government will do everything in its power to bring them home.
Buhari, who was elected last month and will take office May 29, vowed to rid the nation of Boko Haram after outgoing President Goodluck Jonathan failed to defeat the insurgents, who want to create an Islamic caliphate in the region.
"We do not know if the Chibok girls can be rescued. Their whereabouts remain unknown. As much as I wish to, I cannot promise that we can find them. But I say to every parent, family member and friend of the children that my Government will do everything in its power to bring them home," Buhari said in a statement. "What I can pledge, with absolute certainty, is that starting on the first day of my administration Boko Haram will know the strength of our collective will and commitment to rid this nation of terror, and bring back peace and normalcy to all the affected areas."
A file screengrab taken on May 12, 2014, from a video of Nigerian Islamist extremist group Boko Haram obtained by AFP shows girls, wearing the full-length hijab and praying in an undisclosed rural location. (Photo: AFP/Getty Images)
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai — shot in 2012 by Taliban militants opposed to the education of girls — wrote an open letter to the missing schoolgirls.
"On this first anniversary of your captivity, I write to you a message of solidarity, love and hope," she said.
Boko Haram, whose attacks on schools have forced thousands out of education, loosely translates as "Western education is forbidden" in the Hausa language that is spoken by about 40 million people in Nigeria and neighboring Niger.
Malala, 17, expressed her view that Nigerian leaders and the international community have not done enough to help the girls.
"I'm one of the millions of people around the world who keep you and your families foremost in our thoughts and prayers," she said. "We cannot imagine the full extent of the horrors you have endured but please know this — we will never forget you.
"We will always stand with you, today and every day we call on the Nigerian authorities and the international community to do more to bring you home. We will not rest until you have been reunited with your families."
Amnesty International says at least 2,000 women and girls have been abducted by the extremists since the beginning of 2014.
A United Nations Children's Fund report published Monday reported an estimated 800,000 children have been forced from their homes by Boko Haram. The fund is using the messaging app Snapchat to share images based on drawings by children in Nigeria and neighboring countries to highlight the issue.
Last year, Boko Haram killed an estimated 10,000 people and forced about 1.5 million to flee for southern Nigeria and neighboring countries.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1yq8l4O
USA NOW
'Avengers' premiere rocks Hollywood
Apr 14, 2015
0) { %>
]]>
U.S. protests Russian jet move on Air Force plane
Written By Unknown on Senin, 13 April 2015 | 10.58
The Pentagon says a Russian fighter jet intercepted a U.S. reconnaissance plane over the Baltic Sea last week in an aggressive, unsafe maneuver that recalls Cold War tensions.
The U.S. European Command said on Twitter that the U.S. "is raising this unprofessional incident with Russia in the appropriate diplomatic and official channels.''
Defense Department spokesman Mark Wright said Sunday that the Air Force RC-135U reconnaissance plane was flying a routine route in international airspace when a Russian SU-27 fighter jet flew close by "in an unsafe and unprofessional manner.''
"Unprofessional air intercepts have the potential to cause harm to all air crews involved. More importantly, the careless and unprofessional actions of a single pilot have the potential to escalate tensions between countries,'' Wright said.
"The nature of Russian air activity is expanding west into Europe and becoming more aggressive," he said. "This air activity takes place in the context of a changed security environment in view of Russia's aggression against Ukraine.''
The encounter took place April 7.
Russian Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov of the Russian Defense Ministry said "there were no emergency situations" during the interception of the U.S. plane, the Interfax News agency reported.
Russia accused the U.S. plane of approaching Russian airspace with its electronic transponder signal, which identifies a plane, turned off, The Wall Street Journal reported. Navy Capt. Greg Hicks, the U.S. European Command spokesman, said the plane's transponder was operational.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1FNguQj
Turkey recalls Vatican ambassador after pope's remarks
Written By Unknown on Minggu, 12 April 2015 | 10.58
Pope Francis on Sunday called the slaughter of up to 1.5 million Armenians the "first genocide of the 20th century," prompting Turkey to recall its ambassador to the Vatican.
Turkey, which denies a genocide took place, swiftly challenged the pope's comments to mark 100 years since the start of the killings, during a Mass in St. Peter's Basilica attended by Armenian President Serge Sarkisian.
The Foreign Ministry said the Turkish people would not recognize the pope's statement "which is controversial in every aspect, which is based on prejudice, which distorts history and reduces the pains suffered in Anatolia under the conditions of the First World War to members of just one religion."
Francis, in his message to the Armenian faithful, said, "In the past century our human family has lived through three massive and unprecedented tragedies,"
"The first, which is widely considered 'the first genocide of the 20th century,' struck your own Armenian people, the first Christian nation, as well as Catholic and Orthodox Syrians, Assyrians, Chaldeans and Greeks," he said, citing a September 2001 declaration signed by St. John Paul II and Armenian church leader Karenkin II that described the deaths as genocide.
The pontiff also referred to the Holocaust and Stalinism, and mass killings in countries including Cambodia, Rwanda, Burundi and Bosnia.
Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of All Armenians, Karekin II, left, attends a papal mass for Armenian Catholics marking 100 years since the mass killings of Armenians under the Ottoman Empire. (Photo: Andreas Solaro, AFP/Getty Images)
Armenians have long campaigned for recognition that the killings, which happened between 1915 and 1917 under the rule of the Ottoman Empire, constituted genocide.
Armenia — which formally marks the killings on April 24 — and a number of historians say up to 1.5 million people died.
The pope's words strained relations with Turkey, which argues that the number of deaths has been inflated, and the people who died were victims of civil war and unrest during the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, not genocide.
In a message to all Armenians, the pope said: "A century has passed since that horrific massacre which was a true martyrdom of your people, in which many innocent people died as confessors and martyrs for the name of Christ.
"Even today, there is not an Armenian family untouched by the loss of loved ones due to that tragedy: it truly was Metz Yeghern, the 'Great Evil', as it is known by Armenians."
The killings are recognized as genocide by a number of countries around the world, but Turkey's allies Italy and the United States have avoided using the contentious term. The United Nations defined genocide as acts intended to destroy a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, in whole or in part.
Turkey's embassy to the Vatican canceled a planned news conference for Sunday, presumably after learning that the pope would utter the word "genocide" over its objections. Instead, the Foreign Ministry in Ankara issued a terse statement conveying its "great disappointment and sadness." It said the pope's words signaled a loss in trust, contradicted the pope's message of peace and was discriminatory because Francis only mentioned the pain of Christians, not Muslims or other religious groups.
The pope on Sunday also pronounced St. Gregory of Narek — a 10th-century Armenian monk and mystic — a doctor of the church, a title which has been given to just 35 other people.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1FMAwul
'Historic time': Obama, Castro to meet Saturday
Written By Unknown on Sabtu, 11 April 2015 | 10.58
'Historic time': Obama, Castro to meet Saturday
Try Another
Audio CAPTCHA
Image CAPTCHA
Help
]]>
President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro on Friday exchanged greetings and handshakes at the opening of the Summit of the Americas in Panama. (April 11) AP
PANAMA CITY — Sitting just a few feet from one another, President Obama and Cuban President Raúl Castro gave heartfelt, starkly different speeches Saturday at the Summit of the Americas.
The speeches were the first official order of the summit's second and final day. Obama and Castro are expected to sit down for substantial talks later Saturday, the first such discussions between leaders of the two nations since 1956.
"We have come together at a historic time," Obama said during his speech. "The United States will not be imprisoned by the past. We're looking to the future."
Castro began his speech by saying he had asked for more than the allotted eight minutes for his discourse since he's been banned from the previous six summits, drawing laughs from the room. In an impassioned speech, Castro at times pounded the table as he recounted previous perceived hostility from the USA stretching back to U.S. intervention during the Cuban War of Independence in 1898, the Platt Amendment, the failed Bay of Pigs invasion and the ongoing economic embargo.
"None of this is the responsibility of President Obama," Castro said, repeatedly praising the American president. He added: "President Obama is an honest man."
The speeches come on the heels of a historic handshake by the two leaders at the summit late Friday, seen as another step toward defrosting five decades of icy relations between the countries.
The handshake happened as the two leaders arrived at a Panama City convention center for the summit's opening ceremonies, mostly away from journalists' view. But a reporter for a Venezuelan TV network posted video online showing the two greeting each other comfortably with multiple handshakes and small talk, while U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez looked on.
The White House said the interaction was informal and the leaders didn't engage in substantive conversation. The pair spoke by phone Wednesday to pave the way for more meaningful discourse here.
When the two leaders talk later Saturday, it'll be the most meaningful face-to-face encounter between U.S. and Cuban presidents since Dwight Eisenhower and Fugencio Batista met in 1956 – incidentally at another summit organized by the Organization of American States in Panama.
The White House has said Obama would soon decide whether to remove Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism, possibly even at the summit. The president said in Jamaica on Thursday that the State Department has completed its review on the issue but he has yet to receive its recommendation.
Removal from the list after 33 years would allow American banks and businesses to operate in Cuba, and clear an impediment to full diplomatic relations with the United States. If talks at the summit go well, other announcements could include the reopening of embassies and other steps to normalized ties.
The United States and Cuba have been working to restore diplomatic ties since December, when Obama held the first conversation between U.S. and Cuban leaders in more than a half-century as part of the first steps toward normalizing ties.
In late 2013, Obama became the first U.S. president since 2000 to shake hands with a Cuban leader when he exchanged the gesture with Castro as they took seats at a memorial service for Nelson Mandela.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1FKQFQP
USA NOW
Video captures chaotic brawl in Walmart parking lot
Apr 11, 2015
0) { %>
]]>
'Historic time': Obama, Castro to meet Saturday
Try Another
Audio CAPTCHA
Image CAPTCHA
Help
]]>
President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro on Friday exchanged greetings and handshakes at the opening of the Summit of the Americas in Panama. (April 11) AP
PANAMA CITY — Sitting just a few feet from one another, President Obama and Cuban President Raúl Castro gave heartfelt, starkly different speeches Saturday at the Summit of the Americas.
The speeches were the first official order of the summit's second and final day. Obama and Castro are expected to sit down for substantial talks later Saturday, the first such discussions between leaders of the two nations since 1956.
"We have come together at a historic time," Obama said during his speech. "The United States will not be imprisoned by the past. We're looking to the future."
Castro began his speech by saying he had asked for more than the allotted eight minutes for his discourse since he's been banned from the previous six summits, drawing laughs from the room. In an impassioned speech, Castro at times pounded the table as he recounted previous perceived hostility from the USA stretching back to U.S. intervention during the Cuban War of Independence in 1898, the Platt Amendment, the failed Bay of Pigs invasion and the ongoing economic embargo.
"None of this is the responsibility of President Obama," Castro said, repeatedly praising the American president. He added: "President Obama is an honest man."
The speeches come on the heels of a historic handshake by the two leaders at the summit late Friday, seen as another step toward defrosting five decades of icy relations between the countries.
The handshake happened as the two leaders arrived at a Panama City convention center for the summit's opening ceremonies, mostly away from journalists' view. But a reporter for a Venezuelan TV network posted video online showing the two greeting each other comfortably with multiple handshakes and small talk, while U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez looked on.
The White House said the interaction was informal and the leaders didn't engage in substantive conversation. The pair spoke by phone Wednesday to pave the way for more meaningful discourse here.
When the two leaders talk later Saturday, it'll be the most meaningful face-to-face encounter between U.S. and Cuban presidents since Dwight Eisenhower and Fugencio Batista met in 1956 – incidentally at another summit organized by the Organization of American States in Panama.
The White House has said Obama would soon decide whether to remove Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism, possibly even at the summit. The president said in Jamaica on Thursday that the State Department has completed its review on the issue but he has yet to receive its recommendation.
Removal from the list after 33 years would allow American banks and businesses to operate in Cuba, and clear an impediment to full diplomatic relations with the United States. If talks at the summit go well, other announcements could include the reopening of embassies and other steps to normalized ties.
The United States and Cuba have been working to restore diplomatic ties since December, when Obama held the first conversation between U.S. and Cuban leaders in more than a half-century as part of the first steps toward normalizing ties.
In late 2013, Obama became the first U.S. president since 2000 to shake hands with a Cuban leader when he exchanged the gesture with Castro as they took seats at a memorial service for Nelson Mandela.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1FKQFQP
USA NOW
Video captures chaotic brawl in Walmart parking lot
Apr 11, 2015
0) { %>
]]>
