Haitian university students will be allowed to use facilities in the Dominican Republic and all Haitian students receiving higher education in the republic will be offered financial support, a visiting Dominican minister said on Friday.

“Since the catastrophe in Haiti, we have been seeking measures to help rebuild the Haitian higher education system,” said Ligia Amada Melo, minister for higher education, science and technology of the Dominican Republic.

All education activities in Haiti were halted by the Jan. 12 quake, which killed more than 200,000 people and left more than a million others homeless.

“Dominican Republic universities are ready and willing to support Haiti for its recovery … to give it the financial, educational and psychological help needed, as well as waiving fees,” she said.

Amada said her country is also willing to help build ties between Haitian universities and higher education institutions across Spanish speaking countries in South America.

“The Dominican government and President Leonel Fernandez have promised to help the Haitian higher education system by all possible means,” she added.

Continuous rains have struck Mexico’s southwest state of Michoacan for three days, killing at least 18 people, said the authorities on Friday.

Twelve bodies were found buried in three different landslides in Ocampo town of Michoacan on Friday, bringing the death toll from the heavy rains to 18, said the Office of General Prosecutor of Michoacan.

Another three died in landslides and overflowing rivers in the area on Thursday. A day before, three children died in the neighboring town of Angangueo, after a landslide crushed their house, said the office.

The continuous rains, which began to pour on Wednesday, have caused landslides and floods in Michoacan, leaving at least 10,000 people homeless.

The Mexican government declared a state of emergency in the towns of Angangueo, Tuxpan and Tuzantla for the overflowing of the river on Friday.

Haitian people should be aware of the dangers posed by unsafe buildings left by the devastating earthquake on Jan. 12, an official of the UN Environment Program (UNEP) said Friday.

It is necessary to ask the Haitian people to keep away from weakened buildings because they might collapse in aftershocks, Andrew Morton, program director of the UNEP, told Xinhua.

“We could use a system of red, yellow and green cards” to categorize the “unusable under any circumstances,” the ones possible for “restricted use,” and the “safe,” Morton said.

He said conditions of many residential buildings need to be assessed by experts to “reduce the population’s vulnerability,” but “unfortunately people continue to use buildings that are extremely unsafe.”

Morton said the UNEP is working with the Haitian Mining and Energy Bureau and the Communication Ministry to enhance Haitians’ understanding of the risks.

The authorities issued a joint statement on Friday urging people to stay in temporary shelters.

“The second thing to do is to make sure the population take anti-quake measures,” Morton said.

Haiti does not have anti-quake standards, and buildings were often built in the pattern of “concrete ceilings on weak walls,” making them more likely to injure residents, he said.

by Alexander Manda

Haiti needed to rebuild not only its infrastructure but the way the nation was run to completely recover from the Jan. 12 quake, Haitian economist Camille Chalmers said Thursday.

“Haiti urgently needs a response not only to the humanitarian crisis, but to its long-term structural problems,” said Chalmers, who is a professor with Port-au-Prince University and was cabinet chief for President Bertrand Aristide in the 1990s.

“We need to make sure the country has multiple public services deployed across its territory,” he told Xinhua in an interview.

Many Haitians said public services like education disappeared when Port-au-Prince was struck by the quake, which has killed more than 170,000 people.

“Everything was done in Port-au-Prince. Haiti is practically the Republic of Port-au-Prince,” Chalmers said in a room he had borrowed because his house had collapsed in the quake.

“We need multiple capitals: a financial capital, a tourist capital and capitals for education and other areas, so that we take full advantage of the skills of Haitians living in the provinces.”

On Wednesday, officials from the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) told Xinhua that schools were shut down across Haiti, and the Education Ministry in Port-au-Prince was reduced to rubble.

UNICEF is working with Haitian officials to get schools open in unaffected areas by Monday.

The lopsided development pattern came into existence during the U.S. occupation of the island country from 1915 to 1934, when the U.S. military focused on the construction of the capital to make Haiti more militarily manageable. Long after U.S. forces left, Haiti’s decision makers continued to follow the same model.

Chalmers said Haiti’s citizens had been exemplary during the first days of the quake crisis, which he estimated has left as many as 1.5 millon homeless across the nation.

“People were able to organize themselves to live in the streets. They shared money, clothes and resources,” said Chalmers, who lost his mother-in -law when his home was destroyed. Academic papers, research projects, clothes and furniture were also lost or damaged.

“It was exemplary and a lesson to the world,” Chalmers said. “Without such goodwill, things could have been much more serious.”

International aid organizations that came to Port-au-Prince three or four days after the quake found ordinary citizens had formed improvised cleaning committees, police and local governments to ensure the places where they slept were clean and safe.

Even the Haitians whose homes were not destroyed were unwilling to return to their homes, fearing further collapse due to aftershocks. Last week, a 6.1-magnitude aftershock struck the capital, but fortunately didn’t cause major casualties and damage.

Solidarity had transformed the lives of the people in Chalmers’ neighborhood and broken down social barriers, Chalmers said.

“One man, who mobilized the rescuing of people, was a man mostly considered as a beggar, but after the quake he was considered a leader,” he said.

by Xinhua writer Wang Fengfeng

U.S. President Barack Obama’s first State of the Union address rippled through the United States, stirring emotion and thought, casting hope as well as doubt in the hearts and minds of many Americans.

On Thursday, the day after Obama’s speech, a small band of anti-war protesters gathered in front of the White House to demonstrate again the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. Several protesters who smeared themselves in fake blood and lay on the pavement were taken away by police.

Washington resident Sam Brown watched from across the street as the protesters made their point. He acknowledged Obama’s pledge Wednesday night to withdraw all combat troops from Iraq by the end of August made an impression, but noted it was “what he said he was going to do when he took office on Jan. 20 last year.”

“He mentioned nothing about Guantanamo Bay. He said a year ago he was going to close Guantanamo Bay. He said nothing about it last night,” Brown said.

The president promised on Jan. 22 last year to close in one year’s time the infamous prison in Guantanamo, Cuba. However, he has failed to deliver. He said earlier this month the plan to close the military prison was still on.

Brown was also unhappy about Obama’s failure to mention U.S. involvement in Yemen, where Nigerian national Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was trained and equipped for his failed Christmas attempt to bomb a U.S. airliner.

Obama made no direct reference to the anti-terrorism fight in Yemen in his address, but he did say the attack revealed “unacceptable gaps” in the government, especially among intelligence agencies.

Homeland security and the unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were not part of the centerpiece of Obama’s first State of the Union address. Instead, the president devoted about two-thirds of his speech to the economy, unveiling a set of proposals to assure Americans worried about their jobs and other economic issues.

“I think it’s a great idea that he’s giving money to small businesses and helping the local people,” Loraine Alamo of St. Louis, Mo., said as she walked down Pennsylvania Avenue near the White House.

“Taking it from Wall Street to main street, that’s the way to go,” she said.

Obama made America’s double-digit unemployment his top priority Wednesday night.

“Jobs must be our number one focus in 2010,” Obama said, announcing a 30 -billion-dollar credit fund to help small businesses. The fund came from money Wall Street banks have repaid for ferderal bailouts. He also proposed a new small business tax credit, and called for a new jobs bill.

Health care reform, which also tops the president’s domestic agenda, has been dragging on for the past year, costing the White House and the Democratic Party dearly.

“The longer it was debated, the more skeptical people became,” Obama said.

The skepticism was evident on the streets of Washington the day after Obama’s address to the nation.

Tim Smith of Georgia said that although he didn’t have an informed opinion, he just didn’t think health reform was the way to go, as “too many special interests had to be included in that.”

Obama made a pledge to deal with those special interests in his State of the Union address, saying the government faced “a deficit of trust,” vowing to end the “outsized influence of lobbyists.”

“I believe he’s doing the right thing,” said Tom Hughes of California.

Obama’s address also stirred interest amongst seasoned political observers.

Thomas Pickering, former under secretary of state for political affairs, applauded the president’s announcement that “the United States and Russia are completing negotiations on the farthest-reaching arms control treaty in nearly two decades.”

Pickering told Xinhua that Obama shared the sense that the world’s most powerful weapons are so destructive they should never be used.

“If that’s the case … then we should get rid of them, because there’s still the danger of accidental or miscalculated use,” he said, noting there’s also the risk that nuclear weapons could fall into the hands of terrorists.

Obama didn’t delve much deeper into the topic but American University political historian Allan Lichtman said there was a reason for doing that.

“If you look at the recent history of elections, foreign policy either hasn’t helped or has hurt,” Lichtman said Thursday at a briefing concerning the State of the Union address. “Obama would be very happy if it was neutral.”

A new research institute focusing on the development of sustainable energy was launched Thursday in the U.S. state of Texas.

The Texas Institute for Sustainable Technology Research would focus on sustainable technology such as advanced electricity meters, founder Jonathan Shapiro told a press conference in Dallas, Texas.

The new institute would work to develop new ways to create reliable and affordable energy from renewable and traditional sources, with the hope of reducing carbon footprints for a long-term benefit, he said.

The institute would solicit smart grid projects from major companies all over the nation, and would work with local universities and companies to create solutions, said Shapiro, who has invested millions of dollars in the institute.

A number of universities across Texas have signed a memorandum of understanding with the institute to commit their talents to the focus of sustainable technologies, according to local media reports.

Source: Xinhua

Visiting Colombian President Alvaro Uribe said Friday that his government is working on a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Panama, which could be reached “in a few weeks.”

“We have all the enthusiasm to achieve in a few weeks the FTA with Panama,” Uribe said at a regional business conference.

Uribe added that his country has been signing trade agreements with many countries, which has boosted its foreign trade and benefited its economy.

A free trade deal is expected to greatly enhance commercial links between Colombia and Panama. Their two-way trade generated some 185 million U.S. dollars annually.

Uribe also called for more efforts to finish the Colombia-Panama section of the Pan-American highway.

An 87-km stretch of rainforest between the borders of Colombia and Panama has been a controversial part of the ambitious highway.

Many groups and environmentalists have been against completing the section between Panama’s Darien Province and the Darien Gap on the Colombian border.

They believed a road link will destroy the rainforest in the area, disrupt the lives of indigenous peoples and lead to rampant drug trafficking.

Unemployment is expected to be a focal issue in U.S. President Barack Obama’s first State of the Union address next week.

Obama’s maiden State of the Union address comes at a time when the jobless rate stands at a record high and his stimulus package seems to be doing little to create jobs.

The double-digit unemployment figures do not include the underemployment rate — a measure of part-time workers who would prefer full-time work. If the underemployed were counted in, the jobless rate would be 17 percent.

The president’s challenge over the next year will be to “generate some measurable improvements in the economy and to persuade voters that he and the Democrats are a much better bet than the Republicans to clean up the mess they inherited,” said Tom Mann, fellow at the Brookings Institution.

But while Obama has taken steps to spur employment, such as the 787-billion-U.S. dollar stimulus package, none have put a dent in jobless numbers.

Proponents say the measures prevented the economy from further ruining and contend that stimulus dollars are still working their way through the economy. Critics say the package is unlikely to bring many jobs at all.

Obama recently told a meeting of House Democrats that the economy is on the mend and that there will be a “sustained and relentless focus” on creating jobs in the coming months.

But for the unemployed, it may seem as though little has improved. And when addressing the country next week, the president needs to reassure the public that the matter is being dealt with, Mann said.

“(Obama needs to) clearly explain why we are in this shape, what he has done to date, and what additional actions he intends to take in the months ahead,” he said.

Unemployment has stirred anxiety among the public and has sparked a sharp drop in the president’s popularity to around 50 percent from highs a year ago of around 70 percent.

Obama is grappling with those numbers amid the looming 2010 midterm elections, in which many believe Republicans have a shot at reliving their majority status.

Indeed, many feel Tuesday’s election of Scott Brown, a Republican from Massachusetts, to replace a Senate seat held for more than 40 years by the now deceased Democrat Ted Kennedy is a harbinger of more such wins.

“Brown’s victory will make it easier to recruit strong challengers in the House and Senate, and it underscores the likelihood of a difficult midterm election for the Democrats,” Mann said.

But the outcome of the November 2010 elections will hinge on the pace of the economic recovery and the direction of the unemployment rate, he said.

“As for (general elections in) 2012, there is plenty of time for Obama, like (former president Ronald) Reagan, to consolidate his position and ride an economic recovery to reelection,” Mann said.

Experts are mixed on Obama’s handling of the economy.

The president inherited a recession that began long before he took office, the result of reckless lending practices and mortgage-backed securities that fed a massive bubble that popped and sent the economy reeling.

But much of the government’s spending, while credited with preventing the economic crisis from spiraling out of control, is contributing to a massive deficit that could lead to inflation and tax hikes years down the road, critics say.

And that is another point on which the president is likely to touch in his address next week, as the budget deficit has skyrocketed to 1.4 trillion dollars during the recession.

Economic questions aside, others say the president’s legislative agenda is at odds with the nation’s ideological pulse. The president’s health care overhaul and deficit spending have been the source of heated debate between liberals and conservatives, both inside and outside of Washington.

Obama, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid thought Americans were further to the left than they really are and embarked on a liberal political agenda, said Mike Franc, vice president for government relations at the Heritage Foundation.

That mistranslation could spur losses in the midterm elections for Democrats, he said.

Franc said Obama needs to convey a reassuring sense to the U.S. people that he gets the message from the public and pledge policies accordingly.

“He has to convey ‘message received’ and that ‘we are going to recalibrate what we are doing to get things more in line with where the American people are.’”

Latin American countries and Spain are continuing their relief efforts for quake-stricken Haiti.

The Mexican Red Cross (CRM) has collected more than 4,000 tons of humanitarian aid for Haiti, CRM Vice President Francisco Ramirez said Friday.

Ramirez said the aid included bottled water, toilet paper, canned food, cereals, cookies, beans, rice, pasta and tooth brushes. The CRM will also send different kinds of medicines.

In addition, the CRM has collected donated funds worth 15 million pesos (1.1 million U.S. dollars).

Ramirez estimated that the amount would rise to 1.5 million dollars in the coming days.

Meanwhile, Mexican President Felipe Calderon on Friday arrived at the port of Veracruz to supervise the departure of a vessel loaded with 1,720 tons of humanitarian aid for Haiti.

Mexico has sent seven planes and one vessel with aid, including rescuers, sniffer dogs, medical staff and journalists, Secretary of Navy Mariano Francisco Saynez said.

Two military vessels from Venezuela arrived Friday in Barahona, southwest of the Dominican Republic, loaded with tons of food, medicine, machinery and 281 people to assist the quake victims.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Friday announced an extraordinary meeting of the Bolivarian Alliance of the Americas (ALBA) to discuss Washington’s unnecessarily heavy military presence in Haiti.

But the United States said its troops in Haiti were aimed to keep the safety of Haitian citizens and international rescue and aid workers.

Spain, which has traditional links with Latin America, will send 450 military personnel, 23 Civil Guard members and a group of security forces to provide protection for the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti, the government said.

The military personnel include a 37-member search and rescue unit, a medical unit and a group of engineers with machinery needed to clear rubble, dig wells and distribute fresh water.

The Dominican Republic, which neighbors Haiti by land, announced Friday that it would repatriate Haitian survivors that were being attended in its hospitals.

Some of the 15,000 injured Haitians will be sent to a recuperation camp in Haiti across the border, with a capacity to host 3,000 people, Dominican Republic’s Health Minister Bautista Rojas Gomes said.

Last week’s 7.3-magnitude earthquake has killed more than 110,000 people, the Haitian Interior Ministry said Friday.

by George Bao

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to censor the broadcast of the federal trial challenging the constitutionality of California’s Proposition 8 has met with strong opposition.

California State assembly member Ted Lieu said Thursday the goal of the American civil justice system is to seek justice. The Supreme Court’s decision to censor the public broadcast of the historic trial to reverse California’s Proposition 8 amounts to a fear of too much justice.

“Our courts are not star chambers, where testimony and rulings are made in secret and hidden from the public,” said Lieu.

“We do not live in a Totalitarian State,” Lieu stressed.

He said the Supreme Court majority’s rationale that broadcasting this trial will result in “irreparable harm” has no basis in fact.

The Court states that witnesses may suffer harm because they are concerned about possible “harassment” if the public actually found out what they will say under oath. Under that rationale, the Court should seal the transcript of this entire proceeding, not allow any non-witness to attend the proceeding, and block newspapers from reporting on this trial.

To show the silliness of the Court’s opinion, consider that witnesses who apparently would suffer “irreparable harm” are witnesses like William Tam who intervened in federal court to defend Proposition 8, said Lieu.

“I suppose I just caused ‘irreparable harm’ by announcing his name publicly, the same way that multiple newspapers have already reported his name publicly as a ‘reluctant’ witness allegedly afraid of potential harassment,” said Lieu.

He said if the Court is actually that concerned about shielding witnesses, “we have the technology to put a blue dot or otherwise shield the witnesses’ identity during the broadcast. The Court never even considered that far less restrictive option. They just decided to censor the entire proceeding and keep it away from the general public.”

Even some judges and justices disagree with the Supreme Court ruling.

“The Court today issues an order that will prevent the transmission of proceedings in a non jury civil case of great public interest to five other federal courthouses,” wrote Justice Stephen G. Breyer.

“The majority’s action today is unusual. It grants a stay in order … to intervene in a matter of local court administration that it would not (and should not) consider. It cites no precedent for doing so. It identifies no real harm, let alone ‘irreparable harm’… And the public interest weighs in favor of providing access to the courts.”

Advocates for equal marriage rights opposed the decision.

“The Supreme Court just struck a huge blow against transparency and accountability,” said Rick Jacobs, chairman of the Courage Campaign in Los Angeles.

“The five conservative justices are enabling Proposition 8 supporters to mask their radical views. This historic trial will remain largely hidden from public view,” he said.

“Now, without video, it’s even more critical that we continue to get the truth out about the Prop 8 trial. The Courage Campaign will continue our live coverage of the trial at Prop8TrialTracker.com. In just three days, the site has been viewed more than 250,000 times and has become one of the leading sources of information about what is going on inside Judge Walker’s courtroom,” Jacobs said in a statement.

The trial in San Francisco will decide whether California ’s Proposition 8, the November 2008 ballot initiative that overturned the right of same-sex marriage in the state, is constitutional.

This current suit was filed in May 2009 by two prominent attorneys known for arguing against one another over the 2000 presidential election in Bush v. Gore and is on behalf of two same-sex couples who were denied marriage licenses after the passage of Proposition 8.

It is the first case in the U.S. at the federal level to consider whether it is legal for states to ban same sex marriage through ballot initiatives.

In May last year, the California Supreme Court upheld Proposition 8 in a 6 to 1 ruling. The proposition, which passed 52percent to 48 percent, overturned a May 2008 ruling of California Supreme Court that resulted in, among other provisions, the legalization of same sex marriage in the state.

The Court’s 2009 opinion preserved the marriages of the 18,000 same-sex couples who married in California during the period same-sex marriage was legal.

Same sex marriage is currently legal in Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont. Washington D.C. approved same sex marriage legislation in December 2009 and is waiting for a mandatory 30 day congressional review period to expire before the legislation becomes law.