7 released after arrests in Nigeria newspaper raid

 

A man walks by the front of the headquarters of The Nation newspaper in Lagos, Nigeria, Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2011. Police in Nigeria raided one of the newspaper's offices Wednesday after detectives arrested four journalists over the publication of a purported letter from the nation's former president instructing its current leader to fire government officials. 

LAGOS — A Nigerian journalist said Thursday police threatened him with sedition charges over a story he wrote about presidential influencing in the oil-rich nation, as he and six newspaper colleagues were released from custody.

Yusuf Alli of The Nation newspaper said detectives also claimed he'd face forgery and defamation charges for his Oct. 4 story alleging former President Olusegun Obasanjo wrote a letter to current leader Goodluck Jonathan to fire government officials.

Alli said he refused to admit anything and was released after about two days in custody with an assurance he wouldn't face criminal charges.

"No matter what the pressure, I won't disclose my source," Alli told The Associated Press. "I stood my ground that the letter was not forged and I did cross-check my facts before I published."

Police arrested Alli and his colleagues Tuesday following a raid on the Lagos-based newspaper's office. Several of those arrested had nothing to do with the story, with police jailing them as they couldn't immediately find the newspaper's senior management, the publication said.

The small daily, one of many in Nigeria's unruly and outspoken press, published Alli's story alleging Obasanjo wrote Jonathan to replace the leaders of the Petroleum Technology Development Fund and four other agencies with his own candidates.

The letter has hit a nerve in Nigerian politics, as it recommends replacing leaders from the Muslim north as opposed to the country's Christian south, where Jonathan and Obasanjo both come from. Some also view Jonathan as beholden to Obasanjo's interests, so the letter raises new concerns about Jonathan's independence as a leader.

Alli said threat of sedition charges came from that perceived religious-and-ethnic divide in Africa's most populous nation.

"They said that the story was a security breach, that I intended to cause separation between the north and the south," the editor and investigative reporter said. "I wrote the story in the public interest, in the sake of the unity of Nigeria."

Obasanjo denied the authenticity of the letter and threatened legal action, but the newspaper said it stood by its story.

Activists and other journalists criticized the arrests as a means to stifle criticism of the country's weak central government.

Attacks against journalists remain common in Nigeria, a country of 150 million where corruption pervades government and business. Reporters found themselves routinely targeted during military rule of Africa's most populous nation as well, though 12 years of democracy in the nation have enshrined a belief, if not an absolute right, to free speech.

However, many reporters accept cash payments from interview subjects or "brown envelope" bribes slipped into briefing materials at news conferences. Major politicians also finance newspapers to influence their coverage.

Wall Street protests present political dilemma

Protestors participating in the Occupy Wall Street protests march towards Wall Street Friday, Oct. 14, 2011, in New York. At least ten people were arrested during the march, which began after protestors heard the news that the owners of Zuccotti Park had withdrawn their request to have the park cleaned by the New York Police Department. (AP Photo/Andrew Burton)

WASHINGTON — Democrats and Republicans alike are struggling to make sense of the Wall Street protests and figure out how to respond to the growing nationwide movement a month after young people pitched a tent in front of the New York Stock Exchange and began demonstrating against economic inequality.

The political establishment's quandary centers on this question: Will the protests have long-lasting political consequences or are they simply a temporary reflection of voter frustration with the economy?

Democrats have been largely supportive of the so-called Occupy Wall Street movement, which has drawn attention to the economic concerns of the country's middle class, Wall Street greed and high unemployment. The protesters have referred to themselves as the "99 percent," or the vast majority of Americans who do not fall into the wealthiest 1 percent of the population.

The spontaneous protests have taken root in New York's Zuccotti Park and spread to other U.S. cities, including Boston, Chicago and Los Angeles, at a time when President Barack Obama's poll numbers have declined and Democrats have privately grown wary that they may be suffering from an enthusiasm gap compared with Republicans.

With the focus on the middle class, some Democrats say the protests could amplify the party's message leading up to the 2012 elections. But others caution that they should not try to co-opt the movement, which includes many protesters who have criticized Obama's handling of big banks in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis.

"The people are raising serious concerns ... they have every reason to be angry," said Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., who recently visited a protest in his home state. "My advice to any elected official is don't go down there and try to take over, don't ask for the microphone. Just listen to the people."

Said Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill.: "This is not something you can exploit politically because you cannot control it."

Obama struck a sympathetic tone last week, saying "people are frustrated, and the people are giving voice to a more broad-based frustration about how our financial system works." But he reiterated that the nation needs a "strong, effective financial sector in order for us to grow."

On Friday, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told business leaders in midtown Manhattan that the protests "ought to be a reminder to all of us that we have a great deal of work to do to live up to the expectations of the American people."

Other Democrats have spoken in support of the protesters, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Rep. John Larson of Connecticut, the fourth highest-ranking House Democrat. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the House Democrats' fundraising arm, began circulating a petition on Monday asking people to state that they "stand with the Occupy Wall Street protests."

Several protests are planned this weekend in the U.S., Canada and Europe, as well as in Asia and Africa. Plans to clean up the New York plaza where protesters have camped out was postponed early Friday, a boost to demonstrators who had worried it was the first step in evicting them.

In some ways, the movement reflects the early days of the tea party, a populist reaction against the $787 billion economic stimulus plan, the bank and auto bailouts and Obama's health care plan. While tea party activists eventually became a key part of the Republican Party and fueled a GOP takeover of the House in 2010, it remains unclear if the Wall Street protesters will become a potent force in electoral politics.

Republicans were critical of the movement but have shifted their tone in recent days.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., said he was concerned about the "growing mobs" occupying Wall Street and U.S. cities but then changed course, saying the protesters were "justifiably frustrated." He urged elected officials to refrain from "the pitting of Americans against Americans."

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney even used the protesters' language during a recent town hall meeting in New Hampshire, saying he doesn't "stay up nights worrying" about the top 1 percent. "I worry about the 99 percent in America," Romney said. "I want America, once again, to be the best place in the world to be middle-class."

During Tuesday's Republican presidential debate, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., drew a distinction between "left-wing agitators" and "sincere middle-class people who, frankly, are very close to the tea party people and actually care."

Liberal Democrats think the movement draws bright lines between Democrats and Republicans, arguing that the Republican presidential candidates have uniformly supported tax breaks for corporations and the wealthy. The growth of the movement has prompted speculation about what role the protests could play in the fall debate in Congress on the economy and spending — and whether Obama should try to meet with the protesters as a way to show that he is listening to them.

"It would be a super bold move on his part. I can't imagine his political advisers ever telling him to do it," said Justin Ruben, executive director of MoveOn.org. "But there are voices down there with important perspectives that have mostly not been heard in American politics and the president, just going there, would open up some spaces for those (voices)."

Van Jones, a former Obama administration official who has helped organize an effort by liberal activists and unions to recapture the American Dream, said the movement "is about a wholesale political failure of the entire political class and the financial elite to respond to the American people. That creates opportunities and dangers for all politicians."

New fighting breaks out in heart of Libyan capital

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A sniper with revolutionary forces takes aim at Gadhafi loyalist positions in Sirte, Libya, Thursday, Oct. 13, 2011. Anti-Gadhafi fighters have been closing in on armed supporters of the fugitive leader in Sirte, the most important of two major cities yet to be cleared of loyalists more than two months after the fall of Tripoli. (AP Photo/Manu Brabo)

TRIPOLI — A gunbattle erupted Friday between hundreds of revolutionary forces and Moammar Gadhafi supporters in the capital for the first time in more than two months after loyalists tried to raise the green flag that symbolizes the ousted leader's regime.

The fighting began when dozens of loyalists carrying the green flag appeared on the streets of Tripoli's Abu Salim neighborhood, which houses the notorious prison of the same name.

Shouting "God is Great," anti-Gadhafi fighters converged on the area, which has long been a pro-Gadhafi stronghold, in pickups mounted with weapons, setting up checkpoints as heavy gunfire echoed through the streets.

Friday's outbreak of violence underscored the difficulty Libya's new rulers face in restoring order as Gadhafi remains on the run. The capital has been relatively calm since then-rebels swept into the city in late August, toppling the regime and sending Gadhafi, the ruler for nearly 42 years into hiding. But his loyalists have control of at least two cities around the country and have battled off revolutionary forces besieging them for weeks, while Gadhafi has issued several audio recordings from hiding trying to rally supporters against the North African nation's transitional leadership.

The crowd of men and women tried to raise Gadhafi's green flag at the end of a street in the Hay Nasr district, witnesses said.

"I looked out of my window and I saw men and women in a group of 50 to 80 people, carrying the green flag," said Abadi Omar, a resident in one of the buildings in the area. "They put one of these flags at the end of our street. This is when the rebels came out and these people disappeared."

Revolutionary forces started searching every building in the area and found weapons on some of the rooftops, many hidden under water tanks, Omar said. Then snipers opened fire and the gunbattle began as anti-Gadhafi fighters gave chase around the closely packed buildings.

Assem al-Bashir, a fighter with Tripoli's Eagle Brigade, also said revolutionary forces suspected there were snipers in the surrounding high rises after spotting a man trying to raise the green flag.

Another fighter, Ahmad al-Warsly, from the Zintan brigade, said several Gadhafi supporters apparently planned a protest but drew fire because they were armed. They then fled and were pursued by revolutionary forces, prompting fierce street battles.

Al-Warsly said one man carrying a gun was captured and identified as a suspect wanted for the killings of protesters in the nearby city of Zawiya.

"It seems like it was organized," he said. "They were planning to have a big demonstration, then the fight started."

Explosions also were reported elsewhere in the capital, but details could not immediately be confirmed.

While Tripoli has remained mostly calm in recent weeks, revolutionary forces are fighting remnants of the regime in Gadhafi's hometown of Sirte and the desert enclave of Bani Walid.

In Geneva, a senior U.N. human rights official expressed concern about a risk of serious abuses against suspected loyalists occurring when Gadhafi's last strongholds fall to revolutionary forces.

The head of the U.N. human right's office's rule of law section, Mona Rishmawi, said Libya's transitional government is trying to ensure the rights of captured Gadhafi fighters are protected but "the system that is currently in place is not adequate."

She said in Geneva Friday that "there is a lot of room for abuse" of the estimated 7,000 people detained in sometimes makeshift prisons throughout Libya.

Rishmawi recently visited Libya as part of a U.N. delegation.

Fighters in Sirte pounded loyalists holed up in two neighborhoods with rocket and machine-gun fire Friday, but also suffered heavy casualties themselves, with wounded men streaming into frontline medical units, then being evacuated to field hospitals on the city's outskirts.

Libya's new rulers have insisted Sirte's fall is imminent, and they expect to declare liberation this week. That could allow them to name a new interim government and set a timeline for holding elections within eight months.

But Gadhafi's forces have proven resilient, fighting back fiercely despite heavy shelling and NATO airstrikes.

Former rebels control much of the battered coastal city after launching a major push a week ago, but they were still under intense sniper fire Friday.

NATO was conducting "intensive overwatch missions" around both areas, according to the British Ministry of Defense.

British warplanes struck three armed trucks belonging to former regime forces hidden beneath trees east of Bani Walid on Thursday, the ministry said.

"The vehicles were successfully engaged by our aircraft, using Paveway guided bombs, and destroyed," Maj. Gen. Nick Pope said in a statement.

NATO has called the continued resistance by Gadhafi forces in Sirte "surprising," as they appear to be losing the battle since revolutionary forces have the area surrounded.

Tanks and weapons-mounted vehicles from the revolutionary forces have kept up a steady barrage of fire into the small enclave known as District 2, where commanders believe several hundred remaining loyalists, possibly including high-ranking figures from the former regime, are hiding.

AP Television footage on Friday showed smoke rising from a building in one part of the city, and a burning car presumably in another. Pick-up trucks with mounted machine guns are seen driving through a flooded street, and elsewhere, an injured revolutionary soldier is carried on a stretcher into an ambulance.

Thousands of civilians have fled the city to escape the violence.

One resident returned Friday to collect personal items from his home, which had been used as a firing position for pro-Gadhafi forces. Their uniforms and mattresses littered the front courtyard.

The owner, who would not give his name because of fear of reprisals, left carrying just a blanket, saying, "the pictures speak for themselves." He then left the city with several of his relatives.

ONLY GOD CAN SAVE

This was the accident i was involve in last night. I was in the Honda and the Hilux wanted to crushed us against a trailer. But GOD showed Himself God in our lives. Nothing happened to all involved both in our car and in the Hilux, glory to God.