Category Archives: Transhuman News

Libya's Congress elected a human rights lawyer as interim prime minister on Sunday, a week after his predecessor was sacked for failing to present a Cabinet line-up that political factions could agree on.

Ali Zidan, also a former independent congressman, won 93 votes, securing a majority of those who voted in a poll to determine the country's leader for a transitional period of around 20 months.

Zidan's top priority will be to name a new government that congress approves. The Cabinet will be faced with the daunting task of disarming thousands of young men who fought in last year's eight-month civil war that led to the capture and killing of longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

The ministers will also be pressed to provide basic services, restore security by creating a military and police force capable of asserting authority over disparate militias left over from the war, and unifying the country's tribes and towns.

One such militia, a radical Islamist group that now claims to have dissolved, has been linked to the attack last month on the U.S. Consulate in the eastern city of Benghazi that killed the American ambassador and three others.

Feuds between cities and towns also flare up frequently. Militias are currently deployed on the outskirts of the mountain town of Bani Walid, one of the few remaining strongholds of Gadhafi loyalists. The possibility of an outbreak of violence there highlights the highly polarized atmosphere.

Any prime minister who wants to impose his authority on the militias will need broad national support for his government but such support is hard to obtain.

The 200-member congress selected Zidan following last week's dismissal of Mustafa Abushagur after just 25 days in the post for failing to present a Cabinet list that satisfied legislators.

Some parliamentarians argued that Abushagur's Cabinet choices were not diverse enough, involved too many unknown individuals for key posts, and also had too many names from the previous interim government, which was seen by some Libyans as weak and corrupt.

Zidan was a diplomat under Gadhafi before defecting in the 1980s and joining Libya's oldest opposition movement, National Front for the Salvation of Libya, from Geneva where he lived.

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Libya elects human rights lawyer as new interim PM

TRIPOLI, LibyaLibya's Congress elected a human rights lawyer as interim prime minister on Sunday, a week after his predecessor was sacked for failing to present a Cabinet line-up that political factions could agree on.

Ali Zidan, also a former independent congressman, won 93 votes, securing a majority of those who voted in a poll to determine the country's leader for a transitional period of around 20 months.

Zidan's top priority will be to name a new government that congress approves. The Cabinet will be faced with the daunting task of disarming thousands of young men who fought in last year's eight-month civil war that led to the capture and killing of longtime dictator Muammar Qaddafi.

The ministers will also be pressed to provide basic services, restore security by creating a military and police force capable of asserting authority over disparate militias left over from the war, and unifying the country's tribes and towns.

One such militia, a radical Islamist group that now claims to have dissolved, has been linked to the attack last month on the U.S. Consulate in the eastern city of Benghazi that killed the American ambassador and three others.

Feuds between cities and towns also flare up frequently. Militias are currently deployed on the outskirts of the mountain town of Bani Walid, one of the few remaining strongholds of Qaddafi loyalists. The possibility of an outbreak of violence there highlights the highly polarized atmosphere.

Any prime minister who wants to impose his authority on the militias will need broad national support for his government - but such support is hard to obtain.

The 200-member congress selected Zidan following last week's dismissal of Mustafa Abushagur after just 25 days in the post for failing to present a Cabinet list that satisfied legislators.

Some parliamentarians argued that Abushagur's Cabinet choices were not diverse enough, involved too many unknown individuals for key posts, and also had too many names from the previous interim government, which was seen by some Libyans as weak and corrupt.

Zidan was a diplomat under Qaddafi before defecting in the 1980s and joining Libya's oldest opposition movement, National Front for the Salvation of Libya, from Geneva where he lived.

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Human rights lawyer elected new Libyan PM

The police force in Egypt was the backbone of 30-year dictator Hosni Mubarak's government. During the heady days of the revolution, demonstrators fought pitched battles with the police, a force trained to crush all opposition with violence. Now, human rights groups say the police must be a top priority of reform under the new Islamist president's rule. NPR's Leila Fadel reports.

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SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

Now to Egypt, where human rights groups are pressing for sweeping reforms that country's police force. During the heady days of the revolution, demonstrators fought pitched battles with Egyptian police, a force trained to crush all opposition with violence. As NPR's Leila Fadel reports from Cairo, those pushing for reform say they've seen no indication that change is near.

LEILA FADEL, BYLINE: The trouble in the slum of Ramlet el Boulaq began after administrators at a nearby mall and hotel refused to pay the salaries of guards hired from the area. The guards protested and a confrontation ensued. Video of the clashes and raids were posted on YouTube.

(SOUNDBITE OF YOUTUBE VIDEO)

FADEL: One of the local guards was killed. Police say they killed him in self-defense, but human rights groups and witnesses say the man was unarmed when he was shot dead.

KARIMA SULEIMAN: (Foreign language spoken)

FADEL: Local resident Karima Suleiman says her husband tried to help the victim, but then he too was shot and wounded as was her son. The youngest boy, only 14, was so angry he went and threw rocks at security forces. He was then detained and beaten, his front teeth knocked out of his mouth.

After the shootings, angry residents set cars on fire. The police responded by bombarding the neighborhood with tear gas and raiding homes. The raids in this slum of mud-brick shacks and sewage-soaked roads haven't stopped. More than 40 men have been detained, many others have fled the neighborhood including Karima's sons and husband.

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Post-Mubarak Egypt Wants Police Force Reined In

New Delhi, Oct. 13: CBI director Amar Pratap Singh is set to get a post-retirement job as a member of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC).

Sources said Singh, who retires on November 30, would be appointed a member of the NHRC the next day, replacing P.C. Sharma, a former director of the Central Bureau of Investigation, whose term with the rights panel ended in June.

Permanent members of the rights commission, headed by former Chief Justice of India K.G. Balakrishnan, enjoy the rank of a minister of state at the Centre.

The nine-member NHRC includes four permanent and four ex-officio members apart from the chairperson.

Very few CBI directors have been rewarded with post-retirement sinecures. The last to be rewarded was Sharma, who was one of the few commission members not related to the judiciary when he was appointed in March 2004.

His successors ' U.S. Misra, Vijay Shanker and Ashwani Kumar ' had retired without plum post-retirement jobs.

Singh's successor will be shortlisted on October 18 at a meeting held by the chief vigilance commissioner, The Telegraph has learnt. The CBI comes under the vigilance commission, which shortlists three names before sending the recommendations for the director's post to the Prime Minister's Office.

Singh ' who is known to have been a strong supporter of keeping the CBI out of government control and under whom the agency has been investigating several scams that have troubled the UPA government ' would retain his Lodhi Road house.

Sources said the house, the official residence of the agency director for years, had already been allotted in the name of the outgoing director.

A new bungalow on Janpath is understood to have been earmarked by the urban development ministry for the new director.

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CBI chief set for post-retirement job