1 0 The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com .
Friday Februar y 5, 201(
* The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom Friday, February 5 201
NEWS BRIEFS
DETROIT
Obama nominates
Oakland County
judge for U.S.
District Court
President Barack Obama has
nominated an Oakland County cir-
cuit judge for a seat on the U.S. Dis-
trict Court in Detroit.
The White House says Mark
A. Goldsmith was nominated yes-
terday along with three others for
seats on U.S. district courts. U.S.
Senate confirmation is needed for
the judges to take office,
Goldsmith has been on the state
court since 2004. Before that,
he was a trial lawyer with the
Detroit law firm Honigman Miller
Schwartz & Cohn.
He's a former president of the
Eastern Michigan chapter of the
Federal Bar Association.
Goldsmith received a bachelor's
degree from the University of
Michigan in 1974 and a law degree
from Harvard University in 1977.
WASHINGTON
Obama to meet
with Dalai Lama
over China-U.S.
relations
President Barack Obama will
welcome the Dalai Lama to the
White House this month for a
meeting sure to enflame tensions
between China and the U.S.
Yesterday's announcement from
the White House, which had long
been expected, is the latest in a
series of blows to a relationship
the United States views as criti-
cally important. The U.S. wants
China's help in solving nuclear
standoffs with Iran and North
Korea and economic and climate
change crises.
China, which believes that shun-
ning the exiled Tibetan monk
should be a basic principle of inter-
national relations, was quick to
denounce the meeting.
Wang Baodong, spokesman for
the Chinese Embassy in Washing-
ton, said in an interview that China
has been regularly pressing the
United States on the Dali Lama,
whom China accuses of pushing for
Tibetan independence.
SAN JOSE, Costa Rica
Costa Rica likely
to elect first female
president
" Costa Rican voters appear likely
to elect the country's first female
president, a protege of Nobel lau-
reate Oscar Arias who holds a
nearly 20-point lead over two male
rivals ahead of Sunday's balloting.
Laura Chinchilla's election
would mark another political tri-
umph in the storied career of out-
going President Arias, who has
been regularly called on to put out
Central America's political fires.
Chinchilla was Arias' vice presi-
dent before launching her cam-
paign. Ifvictorious, she has pledged
to continue Aria's moderate free-
market policies in what is consid-
ered the most politically stable
country in the region.
Costa Rica "got on the right
path four years ago and now is the
moment to stay the course," Chin-
chilla said during a recent debate.
"It's not the moment for some
change that will take us down a
road we don't know."
DETROIT
Ward appointed
Detroit Schools'
administrator for
athletics
A former Grand Valley State
University football star and high
. school principal has been named
the Detroit Public Schools' admin-
istrator of athletics.
Alvin Ward has spent the past
- 32 years as an administrator,
teacher and basketball coach in
the Detroit district. He has been
principal of Kettering and Finney
high schools, and served as presi-
dent of the Athletic Governance
Board.
The district says Ward holds a
master's degree in sports adminis-
tration from Wayne State Univer-
sity.
Former NBA and college bas-
ketball star Derrick Coleman was
named commissioner of athletics
for the district in October.
- Compiled from
Daily wire reports
10 American missionaries charge
with kidnapping Haitian children
Baptist missionaries
face up to 15
years in prison
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP)
- Ten U.S. Baptist missionaries
were charged withkidnappingyes-
terday fortrying to take 33 children
out of Haiti to a hastily arranged
refuge just as officials were trying
to protect children from predators
in the chaos of a great earthquake.
The Haitian lawyer who repre-
sents the 10 Americans portrayed
nine of his clients as innocents
caught up in a scheme they did not
understand. But attorney Edwin
Coq did not defend the actions of the
group leader, Laura Silsby, though
he continued to represent her.
"I'm going to do everything I
can to get the nine out. They were
naive. They had no idea what was
going on and they did not know
that they needed official papers to
cross the border," Coq said. "But
Silsby did."
Family members of the Ameri-
cans released a statement late last
night saying they were concerned
about their relatives jailed in a for-
eign country.
"Obviously, we do not know
details about what happened and
didn't happenonthis mission," the
statement said. "However, we are
absolutely convinced that those
who were recruited to join this
mission traveled to Haiti to help,
not hurt, these children."
TheAmericans,mostmembersof
two Idaho churches, said they were
rescuing abandoned children and
orphans from a nation that UNI-
CEF says had 380,000 even before
the catastrophic Jan. 12 quake.
But at least two-thirds of the chil-
dren, who range in age from 2 to 12,
have parents who gave them away
because they said the Americans
promised the children a better life.
The investigating judge, who
interviewed the missionaries
Tuesday and Wednesday, found
sufficient evidence to charge them
for trying to take the children
across the border into the Domini-
can Republic on Jan. 29 without
documentation, Coq said.
Each was charged with one
count of kidnapping, which car-
ries a sentence of five to 15 years in
prison, and one of criminal associ-
ation, punishable by three to nine
years. Coq said the case would
be assigned a judge and a verdict
could take three months.
The magistrate, Mazard Fortil,
left without making a statement.
Social Affairs Minister Jeanne
Bernard Pierre, who has harshly
criticized the missionaries, refused
to comment. The government's
communications minister, Marie-
Laurence Jocelyn Lassegue, said
only that the next court date had
not been set.
U.S. Ambassador Kenneth
Merten showed up after 5 p.m. out-
side judicial police headquarters,
where the Americans are being
held and where President Rene
Preval and top ministers now have
temporary offices because theirs
were destroyed in the quake.
"The U.S. justice system cannot
interfere in what's going on with
these Americans right now," he
told reporters. "The Haitian justice
system will do what it has to do."
U.S. consular officials have been
making regular visits to the mis-
sionaries.
On Wednesday, Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton called the
Americans' behavior "unfortunate
whatever the motivation."
State Department spokesman
P.J. Crowley said the U.S. was open
to discuss "other legal avenues" for
the defendants, an apparent refer-
ence to the Haitian prime minis-
ter's earlier suggestion that Haiti
could consider sending the Ameri-
Four out of 10 Americans, who were arrested while trying to bus children out of Haiti without pr
ernment permission, arrive to court inside a Haitian police truck in Port-au-Prince yesterday.
cans back to the United States for
prosecution.
It's unlikely the Americans could
be tried back home, according to
Christopher J. Schmidt, an expert
on international child kidnapping
law in St. Louis, Mo. U.S. statutes
may not even apply, he said, since
the children never crossed an
international border.
Silsby waved and smiled faintly
to reporters but declined to answer
questions as the Baptists were
whisked away from the closed
court hearing back to the hold-
ing cells where they have been
held since Saturday. People ren-
dered homeless by the quake sat
idly under tarps in the parking lot,
smoke rising from a cooking fire.
Earlier, Silsby expressed opti-
mism about being released.
"We expect God's will will be
done. And we will be released.
And we're looking forward to what
God is going to do," she told APTN
before learning they would be
charged.
Coq complained about condi-
tions where the Americans were
being held. He said they are sleep-
ing on the floor without blankets
and aren't being provided with
adequate food. He said he had
delivered pizza and sandwiches.
Silsby had begun planning last
summer to create an orphanage for
Haitian children in the Dominican
Republic. When the earthquake
struck she recruited other church
members to help kick her plans into
high gear. The 10 Americans rushed
to Haiti and spent a week gathering
children for their project.
Most of the children came from
the quake-ravaged village of Calle-
bas, where residents told The Asso-
ciated Press that they ha ndedo scr
their children to the Af\rericarns
because they were unahJo to feed
or clothe them after tire erth-
quake. They said thek mis;ra
promised to educate tire ctliden
and let relatives visit.
Their stories contradicted Sits-
by's account that the children c:te
from collapsed orphainge ors s;e
handed over by disrarr cl s
She said the Americans hellcd
they had all the papernor i -ed
- documents she said she obtainred
in the Dominican Republic - to
take the children out of Haiti.
"They are very precious kids that
have lost their homes and families
and are so deeply in need of, most
of all, God's love and his compas-
sion," she told the AP in ajailhouse
interview Saturday.
Settlers' house
EU leaders: Obama's absence
to be evacuated at summit won't be a problem
in Jerusalem
Mayor agrees to
tear down Israeli,
Palestinean homes
JERUSALEM (AP) - The
Jerusalem mayor has agreed
to evacuate a Jewish settlers'
house built illegally in the heart
of a predominantly Palestinian
neighborhood - but also plans to
demolish dozens of Palestinian
buildings erected without per-
mission in the area, his spokes-
man said yesterday.
Sovereignty over east Jerusa-
lem and its Old City holy sites is
one of the most explosive issues
in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Evacuations and demolitions on
either side of the political divide
have sparked violence inthe past.
Also yesterday, a roadside bomb
exploded near a convoy of Red
Cross vehicles driving through
northern Gaza, blowing out the
windows of one car but injuring
no one, a spokesman for the group
said. There was no immediate
claimof responsibility.
Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat,
who opposes sharing Jerusalem
with the Palestinians in any final
peace deal, had tried to buck an
evacuation order against the sev-
en-story structure, built in 2004
in east Jerusalem's Silwan neigh-
borhood by an ultranationalist
settler group.
Buttheattorneygeneral'soffice
backed the order, and forced Bar-
kat to drop his resistance.
Barkat announced in a state-
ment released yesterday that he
would evacuate the structure,
named after the convicted U.S.
spy Jonathan Pollard. The state-
ment also said Barkat had been
"forced to take action to carry
out all the demolition orders in
the Silwan neighborhood."
The municipality said not all
of the 200 Palestinian structures
set for demolition were homes
but it did not have an accurate
breakdown.
Palestinians say they can-
not obtain building permits from
Israeli authorities, and argue the
planned demolitions are meant to
assert Israel's controlover the city.
"This is a provocation that
sabotages the peace process," said
RafiqHusseini, atop aideto Pales-
tinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
"Nopeaceprocesscansurviveand
no negotiations can begin while
people's homes in Jerusalem are
being demolished."
Jerusalem is one of the most
intractable issues in the Israeli-
Palestinian conflict because of
the conflicting claims. Israel
annexed east Jerusalem imme-
diately after capturing it from
Jordan in the 1967 Mideast war.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netan-
yahu claims the entire city as
Israel's capital, but the interna-
tional community does not rec-
ognize the Israeli claim.
The Palestinians want east
Jerusalem for their future capital.
The four-car convoy carry-
ing International Red Cross staff
was driving in Gaza toward Isra-
el's Erez border crossing when a
roadside bomb exploded near the
vehicles, said Iyad Nasr, a spokes-
man for the Red Cross in Gaza.
The foreigner staffers were
unharmed and dropped off at the
border post, Nasr said.
The blast, which took place
about half a mile (one kilome-
ter) from the frontier, ripped a
crater in the ground about three
feet (one meter) across and two
feet (half a meter) deep. An AP
reporter at the scene saw glass
from broken car windows scat-
tered on the side of the road.
Hamas security officials said
police pursued a car seen fleeing
the scene.
Therewas no immediateclaim
of responsibility.
A Hamas official, Ehab Ghus-
sein, said old Israeli ordnance
might have exploded, although
that appeared unlikely. The
Israeli military said it had no
involvement in the incident.
Palestinian militants have
targeted foreigners working in
Gaza in the past. .
The Hamas-allied Popular
Resistance Committees group
was the prime suspect in a 2003
bomb attack on a U.S. Embassy
convoy that killed three U.S.
Marine guards. That bombing
took place near the site of Thurs-
day's explosion..
Last June, Hamas security
found whatappeared tobeexplo-
sives buried in a sand dune next
to the route taken at the time by
former President Jimmy Carter.
It was unclear whether Carter
was the target.
European media
reading too much
into it, leaders say
PARIS (AP) - French Presi-
dent Nicolas Sarkozy and German
Chancellor Angela Merkel brushed
off President Barack Obama's deci-
sion not to attend an annual sum-
mit with European leaders while
stressing yesterday the importance
of Russia as a European partner.
A U.S. State Department deputy
briefingreportersmadetheannounce-
ment Monday that Obama would miss
the EU-U.S. summit in May that will
take place in Spain, which now holds
the rotating EU presidency.
Since then, European media
have been awash with commentary
wondering what the White House's
snub means for Europe as it strug-
gles to find a united voice in for-
eign affairs following the creation
of the new posts of EU president
and foreign minister.
"With the United States, I don't
understand the debate," Sarkozy
told a news conference with
Merkel after a joint meeting of the
entire French and German gov-
ernments in Paris.
"Where is the drama? Is that
our only problem in the world
today?" he continued.
Spanish Prime Minister Jose
Luis Rodriguez Zapatero also
expressed understanding yester-
day for Obama's decision, telling a
meeting of the Atlantic Council in
Washington that European lead-
ers "do not think he has lost inter-
est in the EU."
Obama already had miffed
Merkel by skipping the ceremonies
marking the 20th anniversary of
the fall of the Berlin Wall in Novem-
ber, and she was more taciturn. She
said that along with Sarkozy and
other EU leaders, she would discuss
the issue at an informal summit in
Brussels next week.
Sarkozy indicated that Obama
might choose to meet with Euro-
pean leaders in the fall when the
U.S. president would be expected
to attend the annual NATO lead-
ers summit which this year is in
Portugal - a combined solution
the French leader said was a "rath-
er good idea."
"If the summit is in November
instead of May, it truly doesn't
matter. My feeling is that there
are too many summits. There are
too many trips. There is too much
time lost," Sarkozy said.
Zapatero, who spokebriefly with
Obama earlier yesterday echoed
that idea, indicating the timing of
the next sumnit would be based on
"content" and not a specific date.
"We will be holding an EU-U.S.
summit whenthe agendaso allows,"
Zapatero said. "By that I do not
mean dates, I mean the content."
The U.S. leader traveled to
Europe half a dozen times last year
and met European leaders at other
international venues, including at
the United Nations.
Sarkozy and Merkel stressed the
importance of their relationship
with Russia. Both Russian President
Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Min-
ister Vladimir Putin are scheduled
to visit France in comingmonths.
The French leader said that he
wanted France and Germany to be
in total harmony regarding rela-
tionswith Russia, while Merkelsaid
Russia's relationship with Europe
was a "central question."
"We have to end the Cod iat,"
she said.
Sarkozy and Merkel er rrert
ing for the first timie with their
entire governments sirce ti. ter-
man leader's re electon.' they
outlined a roadirap for rilar i
relations until 2020, airriig to
strengthen their joit leadership
role in Europe
Most of the proposals concerned
economy, education, climnnte
change, civil affairs and isriga-
tion. The two countris pledged
greater cooperation on iAfyVasri-
stan, fighting nuclear prolifer ation
and transatlantic security
Concerning the biggest issue of
the day, however, the fate yo the
financing of the A400tM ritt
transport plane that is m c ring r
and behind schedule, botr bleaders
said only that a soluti on wouild be
found.
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