Half of World's Refugees Live in Cities

VOA News: UN refugee agency reports half of the world's 10.5 million refugees and nearly 20 million of internally displaced people and returnees are living in cities

UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres, left, next to Jose Riera, right, HCR Secretary, opens a two-day United Nations conference trying to boost support for Iraqis who have fled violence in their country

Mayors from some 20 cities around the world are attending a two-day meeting hosted by the United Nations refugee agency to address the problems faced by millions of refugees, internally displaced people and returnees who are living in cities and towns around the world. Representatives of national governments and international organizations are seeking ways to help the urban refugees and to ease the growing strains on the cities.

The U.N. refugee agency reports half of the world's 10.5 million refugees are living in cities and towns. They are joined by nearly twice that number of internally displaced people and returnees.

It says the perception that most refugees live in sprawling tented camps is no longer true. It says the growing phenomenon of urban refugees poses many new problems and challenges for both the refugees and the cities that host them.

UNHCR Senior Policy Advisor Jose Riera tells VOA this is why the agency is reaching out for the first time to mayors.

Tearing up MoU on JDA is so wrong

Bangkok Post The government's tit-for-tat response to Cambodia's appointment of fugitive ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra as its economic adviser by tearing up the accord to settle disputed waters, raises the serious question whether this serves our country's interests at all.

Linking the MoU to Thaksin and politics because the MoU was signed on June 18, 2001 when he was in power, in order to justify the MoU's termination, is not a fair statement.

It's a pity the Abhisit Vejjajiva administration was so quick to cancel the memorandum of understanding (MoU) that would have led to a sharing of the potentially rich hydrocarbons in the territorial claims in the Gulf of Thailand, without first thoroughly deliberating the implications and consequences.

The government's decision to nullify the MoU reached with Cambodia in 2001 may not be the right means to retaliate against Phnom Penh's growing hostility and Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen's siding with Thaksin.

That knee-jerk reaction effectively demolished a foundation on which lay the goodwill and intention of both countries to negotiate for mutually-acceptable terms to open the 26,000-sqkm area for exploration and production while possibly unlocking the age-old disagreement of the maritime boundary.

Twins' birth mum wants daughters to stay

 Yahoo News The birth mother of twins Krishna and Trishna who gave them up due to poverty says she wants them to remain in Australia to be educated.

The two-year-old conjoined Bangladeshi twins were separated by a 16-member surgical team during marathon surgery at Melbourne's Royal Children's Hospital this week.

Lavlee Mollik, 22, handed over her girls to an orphanage in Dhaka one month after birth because she and husband Kartik, 35, were unable to care for them, News Ltd newspapers reported on Saturday.

"I want them to live in Australia and be educated in Australia. And one day when they have become very respected people I want them to call me mother."

Mrs Mollik, speaking through a translator by telephone from Bangladesh, said she was praying for her daughters' safe recovery.

She was tracked down by Bangladeshi newspaper Daily Shamokal.

But the couple are unable to care for them and Mrs Mollik wants them to live and be educated in Australia.

"We don't want them back because we don't have the ability to take proper care of them," Mrs Mollik said.

Solution to Thai - Cambodia conflict

Bangkok Post

If former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra resigns or is replaced as economic adviser to the Cambodian government, the diplomatic row between Thailand and Phnom Penh will cool down, Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban said on Friday.

If former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra resigns or is replaced as economic adviser to the Cambodian government, the diplomatic row between Thailand and Phnom Penh will cool down, Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban said on Friday.

“This does not mean that I am asking the Cambodian government to do this. They would not do it. But I think this is the easiest way to ease tension between the two countries,” said Mr Suthep.

The deputy premier said he thought Thaksin traveled to Cambodia quite often because he wants to use the neighbouring country as his political base. It was easier to meet his political supporters there.

Mr Suthep thanksed Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister Gen Tea Banh for coming forwardand denying that his government has an audio recording of Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya ordering the Thail embassy’s first secretary Kamrob Palawatwichai to obtain Thaksin's flight schedule, as claimed by Puea Thai party list MP Jatuporn Promphan.

Earlier in the day, Gen Tea Banh was reported as saying the Cambodian government has no secret audio recording as claimed by Mr Jatuporn.

“I think the person who exposed this case has an ill-intention or a hidden agenda. The person might want to incite war between the two countries and then put the blame on Cambodia,” Gen Tea Banh said in an interview published in the Thai-language Kom Chad Luek newspaper

Japanese whaling fleet leaves for Antartica

Japanese whaling ships left port on Thursday for Antarctic waters for their annual hunt of the ocean giants, Greenpeace said, setting the stage for high-seas confrontations with anti-whaling activists.

The factory ship Nisshin Maru and the smaller Yushin Maru 2 and 3 set sail from western Innoshima port while the Shonan Maru left eastern Shiogama harbour for their planned five-month voyage, said the environmental activist group.

Japan kills hundreds of whales a year in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary by using a loophole in a 1986 international moratorium on commercial whaling that allows the sea mammals to be hunted for lethal "research".

Anti-whaling nations led by Australia and New Zealand and environmental groups including Greenpeace have long attacked Japan for its annual whaling expeditions, criticising them as cruel and unnecessary.

Japan, which says whaling is part of its culture, makes no secret of the fact that whale meat ends up on its dinner tables.

Japan's fisheries agency declined to confirm the ships' departure, citing security reasons, and urged anti-whaling activists to refrain from violence.

"We don't say you shouldn't campaign against whaling, but there is a strict line between peaceful campaigns and violence," said Shigeki Takaya, a fisheries agency official in charge of whaling.

Militant activist group the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has harassed the whalers in recent years, moving their own ships and inflatable boats between the harpoon ships and the sea mammals.

Last year their ship the Steve Irwin collided with a whaling ship. Activists were also accused of hurling stink bombs and rancid butter at the whalers, who allegedly deployed ear-piercing sonic weapons against them.

During their five-month hunt last season, the six Japanese ships caught 679 minke whales and one fin whale - well below the fleet's planned haul of between 765 and 935 whales, Japan's fisheries agency said.

The captain of the Steve Irwin, Canadian Paul Watson, has vowed to "be their ongoing nightmare every year until they stop their horrific and unlawful slaughter of the great whales in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary".

Twin awake , talking after epic surgery

Yahoo 7 News

Within hours of waking up from a medically induced coma after ground-breaking brain surgery to separate her from her twin sister, Trishna was talking and cuddling her guardian.

"She is talking, she is being Trishna, she's behaving the way she always has, she's fantastic," proud neurosurgeon Wirginia Maixner said.

Ms Maixner, the Royal Children's Hospital's director of neurosurgery, worked for 27 hours with her colleague Alison Wray to separate the conjoined twin girls Trishna and Krishna.

Trishna awoke on Thursday morning and was cuddled and comforted by her legal guardian Moira Kelly, founder of the Children First Foundation, who was instrumental in bringing the twins from Bangladesh to Melbourne for surgery in December 2007.

"She's been cuddling Moira, which is lovely, she's been talking to our speech therapist," Ms Maixner told reporters in Melbourne on Thursday.

"She's just come through major, major, major surgery. It is a huge operation, so she is phenomenally good at the moment."

Positive signs for separated twins Trishna and Krishna

News.com.au Results of brain scans to be known today

Guardian says tests went extremely well

Praised the efforts of the surgical team

THE first brain scans of Trishna and Krishna since they were separated have fuelled hopes the Bangladeshi orphans have come through their marathon operation in good health.

The full results of the scans will be known today, but guardian Moira Kelly said the tests had gone extremely well.

An emotional Ms Kelly said she had high hopes for the still sedated twins, 24 hours after they were separated during miracle surgery at the Royal Children's Hospital, the Herald Sun reports.

All she needed was a "raspberry" kiss from her little Krishna to know everything would be fine.

"That is my MRI - she does that and it's like she is telling me 'Moira, I'm OK, and I'm looking after Trishna'," Ms Kelly said.