PARIS (AP) — EU observers being sent near Georgia’s breakaway regions could be armed for security reasons, France’s Foreign Ministry said Tuesday, despite earlier pledges that the monitors would not carry weapons.

France is sending 31 observers to Georgia on Wednesday as part of a broader EU deal to send 200 people to help monitor areas where tensions still simmer after a brief war between Russia and Georgia last month, ministry spokesman Frederic Desagneaux said.

“It is a civilian mission, but there are clearly security procedures that are applied, and that do not prevent … some of them from being armed,” he told a news conference in Paris.

He gave no details about the possible weapons they could carry or their mandate to use them. France holds the rotating EU presidency.

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By Joshua Partlow

A Cuban boy fills bags with rice in Los Palacios. A third of the island’s crops and about 500,000 of its homes were ruined by the hurricanes that struck recently. (By Javier Galeano- Associated Press)

LOS PALACIOS, Cuba — A pair of devastating storms have prompted new calls for the United States to end its long isolation of Cuba, including from hard-line exile groups that are pushing for the Bush administration to loosen restrictions they had long favored.

For the first time in the 47-year history of the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba, Washington has offered direct aid to the island’s Communist government, long dominated by Fidel Castro and his younger brother, Raúl, who is now nominally in charge. The offer marks a slight softening of the Bush administration’s policy toward Cuba, motivated in part by a new generation of Cuban Americans who think a more open approach to the island during a time of political transition could help bring about a lasting change in government.

But even the most hawkish Cuban exile groups are pushing the Bush administration to go much further. Traditionally a voice for greater isolation of the Castro government, the Cuban exile lobby has asked Congress to lift the four-year-old rules that limit Cuban Americans to sending $300 every three months to immediate family on the island and to making just one trip to Cuba every three years. Some have even proposed a temporary suspension of the trade embargo, a cause taken up by a few members of Congress.

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By MIKE GLOVER

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., speaks during a campaign event in Green Bay, Wis., Monday, Sept. 22, 2008.(AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

GREEN BAY, Wis. – Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama moved to claim the mantle of fiscal responsibility in a roiling economy, vowing on Monday to slash federal spending on contractors by 10 percent and saving $40 billion.

Urging members of his own party to be just as fiscally tough as the most conservative Republicans, Obama said the $700 billion economic bailout plan proposed by the Bush administration and congressional leaders is forcing a renewed look at federal spending.

As president, Obama said he would create a White House team headed by a chief performance officer to monitor the efficiency of government spending.

“I am not a Democrat who believes that we can or should defend every government program just because it’s there,” Obama said at a rally in Green Bay. “We will fire government managers who aren’t getting results, we will cut funding for programs that are wasting your money and we will use technology and lessons from the private sector to improve efficiency across every level of government.”

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By VOA News

Haiti is observing three days of mourning for the victims of a series of hurricanes and tropical storms that ravaged the impoverished nation in recent weeks.

Flags began flying at half-staff Monday.

The death toll from the storms in Haiti is estimated to be about 500, including 70 from the latest storm, Hurricane Ike. Hurricane Gustav passed over Haiti late last month.

In addition, the United Nations says some 800,000 people, or almost 10 percent of Haiti’s population, are in dire need of emergency assistance. The United States has announced it is providing $10 million for disaster assistance.

Some information for this report was provided by AFP.

Source: VoaNews.Com

By EDITH M. LEDERER

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (L) gestures to members of the media during his meeting with United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon during the United Nations General Assembly at U.N. headquarters in New York September 22, 2008. (Mike Segar/Reuters)

UNITED NATIONS – Iran’s president blamed U.S. military interventions around the world in part for the collapse of global financial markets ahead of his speech Tuesday to the U.N. General Assembly.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also said the campaign against his country’s nuclear program was solely due to the Bush administration “and a couple of their European friends.”

“The U.S. government has made a series of mistakes in the past few decades,” Ahmadinejad said an interview with the Los Angeles Times. “The imposition on the U.S. economy of the years of heavy military engagement and involvement around the world … the war in Iraq, for example. These are heavy costs imposed on the U.S. economy.

“The world economy can no longer tolerate the budgetary deficit and the financial pressures occurring from markets here in the United States, and by the U.S. government,” he added.

In a separate interview with National Public Radio, Ahmadinejad said he does not want confrontation with the United States.

Despite U.N. sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program, Ahmadinejad claimed vast international support for his position and said the campaign consisted “of only three or four countries, led by the United States and with a couple of their European friends.”

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