Legion of Angels News Archive

TEHRAN, Iran – Russia, Iran and Qatar made the first serious moves Tuesday toward forming an OPEC-style cartel on natural gas, raising concerns that Moscow could boost its influence over energy markets spanning from Europe to South Asia.

Such an alliance would have little direct impact on the United States, which imports virtually no natural gas from Russia or the other nations.

But Washington and Western allies worry that closer strategic ties between Russia and Iran could hinder efforts to isolate Tehran over its nuclear ambitions. In addition, the United States opposes a proposed Iranian gas pipeline to Pakistan and India, key allies.

In Europe — which counts on Russia for nearly half of its natural gas imports — any cartel controlled by Moscow poses a threat to supply and pricing.

Russia, which most recently came into confrontation with the West over its five-day war with Georgia in August, has been accused of using its hold on energy supplies to bully its neighbors, particularly Ukraine.

Moscow cut natural gas exports to the former Soviet republic over a price dispute during the dead of winter in 2006 — a cutoff that caused disruptions to European nations further down the pipeline.

The 27-nation European Union expressed strong opposition to any natural gas cartel Tuesday, with an EU spokesman, Ferran Tarradellas Espuny, saying: “The European Commission feels that energy supplies have to be sold in a free market.”

Together Russia, Qatar and Iran account for nearly a third of world natural gas exports — the vast majority supplied by Russia — according to U.S. government statistics. The three hold some 60 percent of world gas reserves, according to Russia’s state-controlled energy company Gazprom.

The United States — the world’s largest consumer of oil and gas — produces most of its natural gas needs at home, importing only from Canada and Mexico.

Russia is also a major oil producer, though not an OPEC member. For its part, Iran, in its standoff with world powers over its nuclear program, has threatened to choke off oil shipments through the Persian Gulf if it is attacked.

A gas cartel could extend both countries’ reach in energy and politics, particularly if oil prices bounce back to the highs seen earlier this year, prompting renewed interest in cleaner-burning natural gas and other alternative fuels.

Tuesday’s gathering in Tehran appeared to be the most significant step toward the formation of such a group since Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, first raised the idea in January 2007.

“Big decisions were made,” said Iranian Oil Minister Gholam Hossein Nozari. His Qatari counterpart, Abdulla Bin Hamad al-Attiya, said at least two more meetings were needed to finalize an accord, according to the Iranian Oil Ministry’s Web site. No timeframe was given.

Calling the grouping the “big gas troika,” the chief executive of Russia’s state-controlled energy company Gazprom, Alexei Miller, said it would meet three or four times a year.

“We are consolidating the largest gas reserves in the world, the general strategic interests and — what is very important — the high potential for cooperation on three-party projects,” Miller said.

Already, Russia has built Iran’s first nuclear reactor, which Iranian officials say could begin operating later this year. The West fears Iran’s nuclear program could lead to development of atomic weapons; Iran insists it is only for peaceful energy production.

Experts say a natural gas cartel would not have the same influence on prices as OPEC has on oil since natural gas is not subject to the same severe fluctuations.

“There’s always some worry when these guys get together that they’ll try to replicate OPEC, but they know that’s not doable,” said Robert Ebel, senior adviser to the Energy and National Security Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “They can try to get more control over gas, but it’s not OPEC.”

That’s because gas, unlike oil, is traded on much longer-term contracts, of as much as 25 years.

“Gas is a regional commodity and oil is an international commodity,” Ebel said. “If you want to buy a tanker of crude, you can buy one at today’s prices. When you want to build a natural gas pipeline, you have to have two things: enough gas to justify building a pipeline that will operate for 25 years, and … customers that will agree to buy that gas at a range of prices for 25 years.”

Still, a natural gas cartel could wield some influence on world prices, particularly in Europe and Asia, said James Cordier, president of Tampa, Fla.-based trading firms Liberty Trading Group and OptionSellers.com.

“To try to maneuver the supply … makes perfect sense,” he said. “Just because it doesn’t have the clout of oil, it’s still in their best interest to deliver natural gas where it needs to go and manage supply in order to help manage the price.”

Liquefied natural gas — a rapidly growing segment of the market — could be traded as a commodity similar to oil at some point in the future, and the move by Russia, Iran and Qatar appears to anticipate that, said Konstantin Batunin, an analyst with Moscow’s Alfa Bank.

Gazprom, the Russian state energy company, is looking to make the U.S. one of its prime markets for liquefied natural gas, and sent senior executives to Alaska last week to discuss energy projects.

Source — Yahoo!

FORT WAINWRIGHT, Alaska - Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin left open the option Thursday of waging war with Russia if it were to invade neighboring Georgia and the former Soviet republic were a NATO ally. “We will not repeat a Cold War,” Palin said in her first television interview since becoming Republican John McCain’s vice presidential running mate two weeks ago.

Palin told Charles Gibson of ABC News that she’d favor including Georgia and Ukraine, both former Soviet republics, in NATO despite opposition by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Asked whether the United States would have to go to war with Russia if it invaded Georgia, and the country was part of NATO, Palin said: “Perhaps so.”

“I mean, that is the agreement when you are a NATO ally, is if another country is attacked, you’re going to be expected to be called upon and help,” she said.

Pressed on the question, Palin responded: “What I think is that smaller democratic countries that are invaded by a larger power is something for us to be vigilant against … We have got to show the support, in this case, for Georgia. The support that we can show is economic sanctions perhaps against Russia, if this is what it leads to.”

She added: “It doesn’t have to lead to war and it doesn’t have to lead, as I said, to a Cold War, but economic sanctions, diplomatic pressure, again, counting on our allies to help us do that in this mission of keeping our eye on Russia and Putin and some of his desire to control and to control much more than smaller democratic countries.”

Palin spoke the same day Putin insisted that Russia has no intention of encroaching on the sovereignty of Georgia, following a brief war that left Russian troops in firm control of two breakaway regions. Putin also aggressively defended the decision to send troops to Georgia, saying Russia had to act after Georgia attacked South Ossetia last month.

On other matters, Palin said she “didn’t hesitate” when McCain asked her to be his running mate, a surprise selection that shook up the presidential race.

“I answered him ‘yes’ because I have the confidence in that readiness and knowing that you can’t blink, you have to be wired in a way of being so committed to the mission, the mission that we’re on, reform of this country and victory in the war, you can’t blink. So I didn’t blink then even when asked to run as his running mate,” said the 44-year-old Palin, who has been in office less than two years.

Questioned about whether she felt ready to step in as vice president or perhaps even president if something happened to the 72-year-old McCain, Palin said: “I do, Charlie, and on January 20, when John McCain and I are sworn in, if we are so privileged to be elected to serve this country, we’ll be ready. I’m ready.”

Gibson also read Palin a comment she made in her former church — “Our national leaders are sending U.S. soldiers on a task that is from God” — and asked whether she thought the United States was fighting a holy war.

Palin said she was recalling Abraham Lincoln’s words when she made the comment and said: “I would never presume to know God’s will or to speak God’s words.”

She said she didn’t know if her son Track who is headed to Iraq was on a mission from God.

“What I know is that my son has made a decision. I am so proud of his independent and strong decision he has made, what he decided to do and serving for the right reasons and serving something greater than himself and not choosing a real easy path where he could be more comfortable and certainly safer,” Palin said.

Source — Yahoo!

FORT WAINWRIGHT, Alaska - Sarah Palin proposed NATO membership for Georgia and Ukraine, at risk of putting the U.S. in conflict with Russia, and declared her readiness for high office Thursday as she took a cautious step out of the protective bubble she’s been in since joining John McCain’s ticket.

“You can’t blink,” said the first-term Alaska governor, asserting in an ABC News interview that she is prepared to be vice president and take on the weight of the presidency should it ever come to that.

It was her first extended interview and followed days of preparation by McCain’s campaign for the foreign policy neophyte, who was scarcely known outside her state and political circles until McCain selected her.

Now a figure of intense national interest who has helped McCain pull even or ahead of Democrat Barack Obama in polls, the 44-year-old Palin has been limited to stages and stump speeches, with little spontaneous interaction with voters — a star on camera who has been sheltered from questioning to the point of appearing cosseted.

Her interview with ABC’s Charles Gibson is the only one scheduled for her to date.

“We will not repeat a Cold War,” she said. But she said she favored including Georgia and Ukraine, former Soviet republics, in NATO despite opposition by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Asked whether the United States would have to go to war with Russia if it invaded Georgia, and the tiny country was part of NATO, Palin said: “Perhaps so.”

“I mean, that is the agreement when you are a NATO ally, is if another country is attacked, you’re going to be expected to be called upon and help,” she said.

McCain also has talked a tough line in defense of Georgia, while speaking of a role for NATO in less explicit terms. He said last month that NATO should “begin anew the discussions about a membership track for both Georgia and Ukraine.”

Palin said she didn’t hesitate when McCain asked her to be his running mate.

“I answered him ‘yes’ because I have the confidence in that readiness and knowing that you can’t blink, you have to be wired in a way of being so committed to the mission, the mission that we’re on, reform of this country and victory in the war, you can’t blink,” she said. “So I didn’t blink then even when asked to run as his running mate.”

In the interview, Palin said she’s never met a foreign head of state.

Afterward, she spoke at a deployment ceremony for her son Track’s Army brigade, soon going to Iraq, and described the mission as “defense of America, in America’s cause. And it’s a righteous cause.”

She did not single out her son and was restricted by the Pentagon from making political remarks on the military base. She appeared in her capacity as governor.

The ceremony honored Fort Wainwright’s 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team. The brigade, a 4,000-soldier unit that includes Private First Class Track Palin, is heading to northern Iraq at the end of the month for a yearlong assignment. Track, 19, is Palin’s oldest son.

He will provide security for his brigade’s top officers, an assignment that is expected to take his unit to Diyala, the fourth most violent of Iraq’s provinces.

Maj. Chris Hyde, brigade spokesman, said: “He doesn’t want to be known as the governor’s son. He wants to pave his own route in life. I have to say, I admire him for it.”

In her speech to the Republican National Convention, Palin drew huge cheers when she announced that her son’s brigade was readying for Iraq, and she’s talked about his deployment many times since.

Palin had not done interviews since the first and only one she gave to People magazine on the day McCain introduced her as his vice presidential choice.

McCain campaign manager Rick Davis said earlier this week that Palin will do more interviews “when we think it’s time and when she feels comfortable doing it,” and asserted: “She’s not scared to answer questions.”

In the ABC interview, Palin was asked about a comment she made in her former church that “our national leaders are sending U.S. soldiers on a task that is from God” and whether she thought the United States was fighting a holy war.

Palin said “I would never presume to know God’s will or to speak God’s words.”

And she said she did not know whether her Iraq-bound son was on a mission from God.

“What I know is that my son has made a decision,” she said. “I am so proud of his independent and strong decision he has made, what he decided to do and serving for the right reasons and serving something greater than himself and not choosing a real easy path where he could be more comfortable and certainly safer.”

Palin arrived in Alaska on Wednesday to a warm homecoming from a crowd of more than 2,000. It was her first stop without McCain.

She’s expected to rejoin him next week and spend much of the fall campaign at his side, even as Democratic running mate Joe Biden campaigns independently of Obama. Palin has proved a powerful draw at McCain’s rallies, and keeping them together limits media access to her.

Source — Yahoo!

UNITED NATIONS - Russia and China vetoed U.S.-proposed sanctions on Zimbabwe’s leaders Friday, the global community’s latest attempt to take action against an authoritarian regime widely criticized for a violent and one-sided presidential election.

Western powers mustered nine votes, the minimum needed to gain approval in the 15-nation council. But the resolution pushed by the Bush administration failed because of the action by two of the five veto-wielding permanent members.

The other three nations with veto power — the U.S., Britain and France — argued that sanctions were needed to respond to the government-backed violence and intimidation against opponents of President Robert Mugabe during Zimbabwe’s first round presidential vote in March and runoff in late June.

Mugabe’s government has denied responsibility for the bloodshed surrounding the vote, which he won in the runoff after his sole rival — opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai — dropped out because of attacks on his followers. Tsvangirai’s party reported Friday that at least 113 of its members were killed in political violence since March.

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad harshly criticized the vetoes, saying “China and Russia have stood with Mugabe against the people of Zimbabwe.”

The action put an end for now to efforts to apply more international pressure on Mugabe’s regime and force it to share power with Tsvangirai.

It follows a recent summit where African Union leaders adopted a resolution calling for dialogue in Zimbabwe, but did not directly criticize Mugabe or the runoff vote. The AU leaders said they were “deeply concerned” about the situation but their only promised action was be to support “the will” for a unity government.

The proposal would have imposed an arms embargo on the southern African nation and an international travel ban and a freeze on the personal assets of Mugabe and 13 other officials. It also called for a U.N. special envoy for Zimbabwe to be appointed.

But Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said sanctions would have taken the U.N. beyond its mandate in trying to punish political disputes by “artificially elevating them to the level of a threat” to international peace and security.

Chinese Ambassador Wang Guangya, whose nation is one of Zimbabwe’s major trading partners, expressed similar sentiments, saying Zimbabwe should be allowed to resolve the political crisis on its own.

“The development of the situation in Zimbabwe until now has not exceeded the context of domestic affairs,” Wang said, adding that sanctions would “interfere with the negotiation process.”

Mugabe and Tsvangirai both say they are willing to share power, if only during a transition to new elections, but differ on who should lead the government. The long-ruling ZANU-PF party wants Mugabe at the head, something the opposition and Mugabe’s critics in the West have rejected.

Mugabe, in power since the country gained independence from Britain in 1980, has been accused of holding onto power through fraud and intimidation and trampling on people’s rights. Western powers and rights groups also accuse him of overseeing an economic slide blamed on the collapse of the key agriculture sector, after often violence seizures of farmland from whites. Mugabe has claimed his actions are aimed at benefitting poor blacks.

In addition to dodging sanctions, Mugabe “will be coming” to the U.N. General Assembly in September, said Zimbabwean U.N. Ambassador Boniface Chidyausiku.

Supporters of the resolution had expected Russia and China to abstain because of the depth of the crisis in Zimbabwe.

“They read the situation wrong,” Chidyausiku said. “It’s the arrogance of the Americans. They think they can rule the world. They can’t.”

Khalilzad said the vote called into question Russia’s reliability as a Group of Eight partner because he said it had indicated earlier that it would abstain.

“The U-turn in the Russian position is particularly surprising and disturbing. Only a few days ago the Russian Federation was supportive of a G8 statement which said, and I quote, ‘We express grave concern about the situation in Zimbabwe,” he said.

In London, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said the vetoed measure “will appear incomprehensible to the people of Zimbabwe.”

South Africa, a Zimbabwe neighbor that holds one of the council’s non-permanent seats, led the opposition to the sanctions, arguing that Zimbabwe is not a threat to international peace.

Voting for the resolution were Belgium, Britain, Burkina Faso, Costa Rica, Croatia, France, Italy, Panama and the United States. Voting against were China, Libya, Russia, South Africa and Vietnam. Indonesia abstained.

Washington is considering tougher unilateral sanctions by expanding the list of about 130 officials now banned from visiting the U.S. and hit with financial penalties.

The European Union and Australia have imposed their own limited sanctions on Zimbabwe’s government, and the EU likewise is studying whether to add to travel bans and an asset freeze already in place on Mugabe, his Cabinet ministers and top ruling party officials.

Source — Yahoo!

Looking to cleanse your soul as well as your body on your next vacation? The monks of Russia’s Valaam Monastery might have just the ticket.

The monastery, which is located on an archipelago in Lake Ladoga, northeast of St. Petersburg, is looking for volunteers to work there, in exchange offering room and board for two weeks, as well as transportation by boat to the islands.

This would not be your typical getaway. It’s a world away from Club Med or Sandals.

At the monastery, one of the holiest sites in the Russian Orthodox faith, volunteers work 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday — with a break for lunch — and from 9 until 1 p.m. on Saturdays.

Men and women — including married couples who might want to volunteer together — are housed separately, in rooms for between four and 10 people.

You don’t have to be Orthodox, a Christian or even a believer at all to volunteer, but the work is an opportunity to learn about a faith that is little known in the United States.

“Orthodox spirituality is always powerful,” said Father John Oliver of St. Elizabeth’s Orthodox Church in Murfreesboro, Tenn., who volunteered at the monastery before he joined the clergy. “The idea of remembering God in every aspect of life. It’s the sense that I have to work the field, so I’m going to use it to get close to God.

“Physical work humbles the body,” he said. “It familiarizes a person with the basic cycles of nature, and with how life works.”

The work is mostly agricultural — plowing, sowing, harvesting, weeding and other tasks. The monastery is self-sufficient, but a lot must be done in the short summer to ensure that there is enough food for winter.

The monastery also maintains its own fleet, a garage, farm, stables, forge and workshops, as well as orchards with about 60 varieties of apple trees. There are also a bakery and a dairy.

All of this is necessary, because Lake Ladoga, the largest lake in Europe, is at least partially icebound from November until March or April, leaving the monastery virtually cut off from the outside world for nearly half the year.

That isolation, though, is part of what makes Valaam such a deeply affecting place to visit, even if you’re not quite ready to commit two weeks to living like a monk.

“It felt fundamentally sane — the pace of life felt organic,” Oliver said of his time there. “There’s never a wasted moment, but it felt fundamentally sane.”

The effects of that pace of life are visible on the faces of the men and women who live at the monastery. They glow with a calm and seemingly generous energy, a warmth that even casual visitors to the islands quickly come to feel within themselves, as though it was in the air itself.

If the spirit of the people who live in a place, can come to inhabit the landscape and change the very atmosphere, then maybe that is why Valaam feels the way it does. The islands have been home to a monastery for more than 1,000 years. According to church chronicles, it was founded in the first half of the 10th century by a Greek monk, St. Sergius, and his Karelian companion, St. German, when Christianity was just starting to spread throughout what is now Russia.

Despite its isolation on the rocky islands in the center of an icy lake 60 miles wide and nearly twice as long, the monastery was ravaged several times in wars between Sweden and Russia, but each time, the monks returned to rebuild the site.

During the Soviet era, the islands were used at various times as a navy school, a home for disabled soldiers and the elderly, and as a dumping ground for people the government considered undesirable. Through it all, the monastery buildings were allowed to go to ruin by a government that banned religion.

In the 1960s, there were plans to turn the islands into a tourist resort, with rides and attractions and an airport to make them more accessible, plans that, according to the monastery Web site “would have killed Valaam.” The plans, however, were never carried out.

The monks were only allowed to return to Valaam in 1989, and as they had many times before, they immediately began restoring the monastery.

After seven decades of Soviet rule in Russia, though, the monks had a more important goal.

“The monastic task is not the restoration of the cloister walls and not the gold of iconostasises, but rising a man in Christ’s spirit, living in patience, humility, and obedience to God, keeping clear conscience,” Archimandrite Pankraty, the abbot of the monastery, said after the buildings were returned to the church.

Nevertheless, the churches and other buildings of the monastery have been lovingly restored. Its current incarnation dates from the late 19th century, when a new cathedral was built, consisting of the smaller Church of St. Sergius and St. German and the majestic Church of the Transfiguration of the Savior.

Perched on the highlands at the northern end of the largest of the archipelago’s islands, the cathedral’s sky-blue and white belfry and five domes reach up to the sky, the gold details glistening in the sun.

There is very little on the islands besides the monastery and several sketes — small communities of hermits. Most of the land is pristine pine forests, untouched by any development. In the harbor, there is a small café, but no other amenities for the tourist.

That, however, is what makes the place so special for the visitor. Unlike the palaces around St. Petersburg, which are certainly beautiful and lovingly restored to their imperial glory, Valaam is not a museum, not a historic site. It is alive.

Yet, it is a life that you will have difficulty finding in St. Petersburg or Moscow, which are both increasingly glittering, bustling cities, where it can seem that oil and natural gas money has bought out the famous Russian soul.

Valaam, however, feels completely out of time. There are trucks and machines — the monks do not disdain modern technology, and even have a Web site, www.valaam.ru — but those signs of the modern world seem oddly anachronistic.

On Valaam, the spiritual life of the monastery is stronger than the modern world.

“The benefit of a visit to Valaam is an exposure to an ancient way of life that has produced saints, a way of life that — if followed — will produce sane men and women,” Oliver said. “Going to Valaam helped me fall in love with the sacred, and with what the sacred can do in human lives.”

That may be a lot to expect out of a vacation, but if you are looking for a place where the beauty of nature and the beauty created by man are in harmony, Valaam is the perfect destination.

For information about the volunteer opportunity at the monastery, e-mail valaam2008@east.ru.

Source — ABC