Kuwait to scrap new refinery project: PM

Kuwait to scrap new refinery project: PM

1 hour 41 mins ago
AFP

Kuwait will scrap a 15-billion dollar project to build a new oil refinery after an independent watchdog said the project was not feasible, the prime minister said in comments published Sunday.

"The government is committed to the Audit Bureau report, and the council of ministers will officially halt the project at its next meeting," which takes place on Monday, Sheikh Nasser Mohammad al-Ahmad al-Sabah told Al-Watan daily.

Kuwait in May awarded contracts to build the 630,000-barrels per day refinery to four South Korean companies and a Japanese firm and later signed letters of intent with them.

The deals prompted a dispute between the government and opposition MPs who alleged the bidding process and awarding of contracts involved flawed procedures.

MPs said the contracts should have been awarded through the state-run Central Tenders Committee (CTC) to ensure transparency, and vowed they would quiz the oil minister if the contracts were signed.

The Gulf state's government in August bowed to political pressure and referred the project to the Audit Bureau for an investigation.

Though the outcome of the report was not published, local media and MPs said the Bureau concluded that the project was technically and economically not feasible and should go through the CTC.

In December, Kuwait scrapped a 7.5-billion dollar partnership with US Dow Chemical after pressure from MPs, citing high cost amid the global economic downturn.

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Yemen eyes financial windfall from first gas plant

2 hours 58 mins ago
AFP Christian Chaise

Yemen, one of the poorest countries on Earth despite its proximity to oil powerhouse Saudi Arabia, hopes to join the international club of gas exporters this year -- and reap a desperately needed multi-billion dollar windfall.

If all goes according to plan, a gas tanker carrying the country's first shipment of 120,000 cubic metres (more than four million cubic feet) of liquefied natural gas will leave Yemen in June for South Korea.

This maiden cargo of exported gas will mark the culmination of a project launched in October 2005 whose total cost of four billion dollars makes it the largest project ever in the history of the Arabian Peninsula nation.

Yemen LNG, whose major shareholder is French energy giant Total, is pushing hard to complete construction of its LNG plant in Balhaf, a bay on the southern Yemen coast, which is running several months behind schedule.

A notice on the wall of a building at the Balhaf plant is a clear indicator of how vital the project is to the economic future of Yemen, where oil revenues currently make up 70 percent of state revenue.

"Estimates suggest that the government of Yemen will receive between 30-50 billion US dollars during the 20-25 years of operation," the sign reads.

When a second liquefying unit becomes operational, probably at the end of the year, Yemen will be able to export 6.7 million tonnes of gas annually -- equivalent to 180,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd).

"Yemen is a new player" in the global gas market, Yemen LNG general manager Joel Fort told AFP. It remains a small player nevertheless, with reserves of 259 billion cubic metres.

"The reserves are significant," Fort said, but "it's marginal compared to Qatar."

In comparison, the tiny emirate of Qatar on the northeast coast of the Arabian Peninsula boasts reserves of 25 trillion cubic metres -- the world's third largest after Russia and Iran.

For Yemen to become a gas exporter of LNG is already a major achievement, however.

Last year it produced less than 300,000 bpd of crude oil, and production is decreasing by five to six percent a year, Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs Abdulkarim Ismail al-Arhabi told AFP.

He expects Yemen's modest oil reserves to be exhausted by 2020.

"Gas will make up for the decrease in oil production," he said.

The gas will flow through a 320-kilometre (198-mile) pipeline from the Safer fields near Marib, northwest of Balhaf, where Total currently extracts 43,000 bpd of crude.

The pipeline passes through regions controlled by Yemen's powerful tribes, which often resort to violence and kidnapping foreigners to express grievances and force the government to respond to their demands.

Yemen -- the ancestral homeland of Osama bin Laden -- has also witnessed a recent upsurge in violence by groups linked to his Al-Qaeda group, including attacks on foreign targets and oil installations.

However officials at Balhaf and the authorities have stringent security measures to protect the project, with troops deployed outside the plant and also along the pipeline's route.

The plant itself is surrounded by 11 kilometres (seven miles) of barbed wire fencing dotted with optical sensors. More sensors are buried along the path of the pipeline, and coastguards patrol the waters off Balhaf.

The economic importance of the project has been underlined by President Ali Abdullah Saleh visiting Balhaf three times so far.

"It's not the solution" to Yemen's economic and financial problems, "but it's part of the solution," said Fort, noting that the project may last longer than the planned 25 years if more gas reserves are discovered.

Total is Yemen LNG's main shareholder, owning 39.62 percent, and the Texas-based Hunt Oil Company owns 17.22 percent. The Yemen Gas Company, an oil ministry subsidiary, holds 16.73 percent.

Three South Korean companies, SK Corporation, the Korea Gas Corporation (KOGAS) and Hyundai, hold 9.55 percent, six percent and 5.88 percent respectively.

The remaining five percent belongs to the General Authority of Social Security and Pensions, a Yemeni public agency.

KOGAS is set to receive the first shipment of Yemeni liquefied gas in June, and it has also bought 30 percent of the 6.7 million tonnes to be exported annually for the next 20 years.

The remaining output has been sold to GDF Suez and Total Gas and Power, and will be destined for the north American market.

Under Yemen's agreement with Total, the Sanaa government is expected to earn 65 percent of profits "on average" in the first years of production, Fort said, adding that for Total "this is one of our largest projects."

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Emirates unhappy with giant Airbus: report

Yesterday, 09:03 pm
AFP

Dubai-based airline Emirates is unhappy with its first four giant Airbus A380 aircraft, which showed manufacturing faults that forced flights to be cancelled, a report said Saturday.

The German weekly Der Spiegel, in its issue to be published Monday, said Emirates in February gave Airbus officials a 46-page report listing its complaints, including burned electric cables, missing cabin fittings and engine defects.

A source close to Airbus told AFP on Thursday that Emirates was seeking a delay in the delivery of several of the long-haul A380 superjumbo jets because of financing difficulties.

The airline is Airbus's biggest customer for the double-decker A380, having ordered 58 of them.

"Emirates could delay deliveries on several planes ... They are in talks" with Airbus, the source said on condition of anonymity.

Emirates "is beginning to have problems for the first time. We always relied on this type of company as a major stable client," the source said.

A spokeswoman for Airbus said discussions with clients were confidential.

And in Dubai an Emirates spokesperson said: "We had a routine meeting with Airbus to discuss aircraft delivery positions down the line. Like all airlines, Emirates continues to assess all options for its fleet and route operations."

Launching of the A380, which entered service with Singapore Airlines in October 2007, was delayed for months because of cabling problems and Airbus has failed to meet delivery schedules since.

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Switzerland risks OECD tax blacklisting: govt

Yesterday, 08:45 pm
AFP

Switzerland said the OECD economic grouping threatened to blacklist it as a tax haven and it risked being punished with economic sanctions, according to comments published on Saturday.

The comments by Swiss Finance Minister Hans-Rudolf Merz came a day after Switzerland and other states said they would relax their bank secrecy laws, within strict limits, amid global pressure to stamp out tax havens.

"The secretariat general of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), without informing us, drew up a proposal for a new blacklist on March 5. I have learned that Switzerland was on it," Merz was quoted as saying by the daily Le Temps.

He said the list was drawn up at the request of the Group of 20 (G20) rich and emerging countries, whose finance ministers were meeting in England on Saturday ahead of a full summit of its leaders on April 2.

The G20 has made the fight against tax havens one of its top priorities, with Germany and France pushing particularly hard.

"For the moment it's just a threat," Merz said of the blacklist proposal. "But if this threat becomes a reality during the G20 on April 2, it could entail economic sanctions for the countries targeted."

Switzerland joined Luxembourg, Austria and Monaco on Friday in saying it would relax bank secrecy laws. Merz said the decision came in response to pressure from the G20.

"We cannot run such a risk" of being blacklisted and suffering sanctions, he said.

Friday's announcements followed similar moves Thursday by Belgium, Liechtenstein and Andorra. The latter two are already on an OECD list of uncooperative tax havens.

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Gazprom to supply extra gas to Poland, if there are no mediators

13.03.2009, 16.20

MOSCOW, March 13 (Itar-Tass) -- Gazprom will be prepared to provide extra amounts of gas to Poland on the condition no mediators are included in the supply chain, Russian Transport Minister Igor Levitin told the media on Friday.

Levitin, who chairs the Russian-Polish inter-governmental commission, recalled that Poland had asked Russia for providing extra amounts of gas. Gazprom will be prepared to meet the request, on the condition, though, an addendum to the 1993 treaty is concluded to rule out the role of mediators.

“If Poland is ready to sign such an arrangement, Gazprom will deliver the gas,” Levitin said.

Earlier, Poland's state-owned gas and oil company, PGNiG (or Polskie Gornictwo Naftowe i Gazownictwo SA), said it was in talks over extra gas import from the East. PGNiG CEO Michal Szubski said the amount in question was about 2.3 billion cubic meters.

“The talks are in progress. We would like very much to see greater gas supplies at the end of April or early May,” he said, adding that the company was conducting negotiations with different providers.

PGNiG has an effective contract for the supply the required gas with RosUkrEnergo, but that company has defaulted on its liabilities since January.

Moreover, according to the Polish company “Poland today is getting from the East 78 percent of the originally expected amounts of gas.”

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Chavez open to Russian strategic bombers using Venezuelan island
15:51 | 14/ 03/ 2009

MOSCOW, March 14 (RIA Novosti) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has proposed to Russia using a Venezuelan island for temporary hosting of Russian long-range aviation, a top-ranking Russian Air Force official said Saturday.

"There is such a proposal on the part of the Venezuelan president. Chavez proposed to us a whole island with an airfield that we can use for temporary basing of strategic bombers," said Maj.-Gen. Anatoly Zhikharev, the chief of the long-range aviation staff.

"If there is the relevant political decision, the island ... could be used by the Russian Air Force," Zhikharev told journalists.

He said the temporary basing opportunity could be used for air patrol missions.

In September 2008 two Russian Tu-160 Blackjack multi-mission strategic bombers arrived in Venezuela after a 13-hour flight over the Arctic and Atlantic oceans. There were no nuclear weapons on board the aircraft. After that, they carried out a patrol mission over the Caribbean.

The Tu-160 Blackjack is a supersonic, variable-geometry heavy bomber, designed to strike strategic targets with nuclear and conventional weapons deep in continental theaters of operation.

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Russia welcomes Kazakh proposal for electronic single currency
15:51 | 14/ 03/ 2009

MOSCOW, March 14 (RIA Novosti) - The Kazakh president's idea for a unified currency for payments between states in the Eurasian Economic Community will be examined and could go forward, Russia's foreign minister said on Saturday.

President Nursultan Nazarbayev's suggestion would not mean replacing national currencies with an equivalent of the euro, but would create a non-cash currency for interstate transactions within the grouping of Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.

Nazarbayev suggested calling the electronic currency the "euras" or the "eurasia."

"I think that objective consideration of the proposal of Kazakhstan will take place within the limits of EurAsEC. This idea, certainly, will receive development," Sergei Lavrov said at a news conference after a meeting with his Kazakh counterpart, Marat Tazhin.

The foreign ministers had discussed bilateral cooperation on international and regional issues.

"We value this chance to discuss bilateral interaction in international and regional affairs, including Kazakhstan's forthcoming chairmanship of the OSCE," Lavrov said.

Kazakhstan will be the 2010 chair of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, taking over from Greece.

Tazhin said that in spite of the current global and region economic turmoil, Russian-Kazakh collaboration on trade and financial issues was developing.

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Khodorkovsky asks court to freeze Yukos assets
18:01 | 13/ 03/ 2009

MOSCOW, March 13 (RIA Novosti) - Mikhail Khodorkovsky has asked a court to impound the assets of the defunct oil company Yukos, the jailed tycoon's lawyer said on Friday.

"Khodorkovsky has filed a complaint alleging that the prosecution has failed to ensure the safety of the property they themselves believe to have been stolen," Vadim Klyuvgant said. "He has, therefore, asked the court to take measures to prevent the property from disappearing."

Klyuvgant said Russian law provides for an array of measures to preserve assets, including through a restraining order and seizure.

The lawyer said failure to take such action violates the interests of the parties to the trial, since in the event of an acquittal, these assets must be returned to Khodorkovsky.

Once Russia's largest oil producer, Yukos collapsed after charges of tax evasion led to the company being broken up and sold off to meet debts. The bulk of the company's assets were bought up by state-run oil company Rosneft.

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Iranian president declares his country a space and nuclear power
19:36 | 13/ 03/ 2009

TEHRAN, March 13 (RIA Novosti) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Friday that pressure from Western powers trying to keep Iran in economic isolation have in fact spurred the country to become a space and nuclear power.

"Had you not been bad-tempered and blocked the way, the Iranian nation would not have been present in space, and would not have become a nuclear power," Fars news agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying at the inauguration ceremony of a natural gas deposit in the Bushehr province.

Iran put its first communications satellite, Omid (Hope), into a near-Earth orbit on February 2. The research satellite was carried into orbit by a home-made launch vehicle, Safir (Messenger). Iranian Communications Minister Mohammad Soleimani earlier said that the country's scientists were working on the creation of four new satellites to be placed into near-Earth orbit.

The Iranian president said Western powers are unable to stop Iran's technological and scientific progress with their "spiteful actions." He also called the international economic sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program a "grave blunder."

"Of course, we believe that the Iranian nation can tread the path to progress under God's mercy," he said.

Western powers led by the United States, along with Israel, have accused Tehran of attempting to develop nuclear weapons and ballistic missile technology for their delivery. Iran says it needs its nuclear program for electric power generation, and its missile program for space exploration.

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Expansion of membership announced by the Basel Committee
13 March 2009

At its 10-11 March meeting, the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision decided to expand its membership and invite representatives from the following countries to join the Committee: Australia, Brazil, China, India, Korea, Mexico and Russia.

Nout Wellink, Chairman of the Basel Committee and President of the Netherlands Bank, stated that "this expansion in membership will enhance the Committee's ability to carry out its core mission, which is to strengthen regulatory practices and standards worldwide." He added that this step carries forward the call from G20 leaders for major standard-setting bodies to review their membership. The Basel Committee's governance body will also be enlarged to include the Central Bank Governors and Heads of Supervision from these new member organisations.

The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision provides a forum for regular cooperation on banking supervisory matters. It seeks to promote and strengthen supervisory and risk management practices globally. With its expanded membership, the Committee is comprised of representatives from Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Korea, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States. The Committee's Secretariat is based at the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland.

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Biggest Brazil soy state loses taste for GMO seed
Fri Mar 13, 2009 3:34pm EDT

By Inae Riveras

SORRISO, Brazil (Reuters) - Farmers in Brazil's Mato Grosso, the country's top soy state, are shunning once-heralded, genetically modified soy varieties in favor of conventional seeds after the hi-tech type showed poor yields.

"We're seeing less and less planting of GMO soy around here. It doesn't give consistent performance," said Jeferson Bif, who grows soy and corn on a large 1,800 hectare farm in Ipiranga do Norte, near the key Mato Grosso soy town of Sorriso.

He said he obtained average yields of 58 bags (60 kg) per hectare with conventional soy last season while fields planted with GMO soy in the same year yielded 10 bags less.

Growers began illegally using genetically modified varieties of soy even before Brazil passed a biosafety law around four years ago permitting their use, in the hope of gaining higher yields and reducing production costs.

Around half of Mato Grosso's soy is estimated to be genetically modified but the tide is turning against it.

Part of farmers' disappointment over the performance of the modified soy may stem from misunderstanding of the specific conditions in which its altered characteristics can bring rewards.

Uptake of GMO soy was fast in the state Rio Grande do Sul because of its resistance to glyphosate, which is used to kill the weeds that flourish there. But this feature is much less useful in Mato Grosso, where weeds grow much less thickly.

Farmers in Mato Grosso also benefit from better support from cooperatives and government bodies which provide advice and technical assistance and help them maximize yields even with conventional soy.

Another reason for Mato Grosso's ongoing shift away from GMO-soy is that trading houses and meat processors, conscious that some consumers strive to avoid GMO foods, prefer conventional soy and will pay a premium for it.

Soy is a key component of many cattle feed products.

Alexsander Gheno, agronomist at APAgri consultancy, said GMO soy may have other uses which could indirectly boost yields. By rotating planting of conventional soy with GMO soy, it could help break the cycle of diseases afflicting the crop.

But Gheno said the momentum that GMO crops have gained may see them chase out conventional soy in the long run, even if growers don't prefer the high-tech varieties.

"Companies have been focusing their research on GMO soy more than on conventional ones. So in 10 years we could have 100 percent of the area planted with GMO soy not because this was farmers' choice exactly but because development of new conventional varieties is getting scarce," he said.

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Monaco to join tax haven shift - OECD head
* Hard for countries to avoid crackdown

By Brian Love

HORSHAM, England, March 14, (Reuters) - Monaco will soon join moves to relax bank secrecy, following Switzerland, Austria, Luxembourg and representing a quantum leap in the fight against tax fraud, the head of the OECD said on Saturday.

It is even better news for governments at the moment because they need every cent they can get because the worst downturn in decades is shrinking state revenue and bloating outgoings, Angel Gurria, secretary general of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and development, told Reuters in an interview.

After Belgium and others, Switzerland, Austria and Luxembourg offered on Friday to relax strict bank secrecy in some tax evasion cases in a response to international pressure on tax havens, which is rattling the offshore banking industry.

The OECD spearheaded a campaign with limited success in the earlier half of the decade but its efforts have been given a new lease of life by governments responding to the global financial crisis, notably the G20 economic powers.

Gurria, who attended a meeting tagged to the end of talks among G20 finance ministers in Horsham, south of London, on Saturday, said the international pressure had triggered a "dramatic transformation in just a few days".

The OECD has supplied the G20 governments with information showing which countries met its standards on cooperation in tax matters. G20 finance ministers were preparing a G20 summit due to take place on April 2 and considering whether or not to revise a blacklist of tax havens they would move against.

As far as some still recalcitrant tax havens in places such as the Caribbean were concerned, Gurria said:

"It's going to be difficult to stay out of the loop now".

TALKS ON MONDAY

Among the large financial centres, Gurria said, the likes of Singapore and Hong Kong were now looking to adhere to standards of disclosure established by the Paris-based OECD and Andorra and Liechtenstein had gone public with similar intentions.

Then the Belgians budged on bank secrecy, followed on the eve of the G20 meetings in England by the Swiss, Austrians and Luxembourg, he said.

"We're now working with Monaco," he said, noting that he had been in touch with "the highest authorities" there in the issue and that further contacts were due on Monday to clear the way for similar moves.

A small principality on the Mediterranean, Monaco is famed for its wealthy residents and casino.

Estimates of how much is stored in offshore accounts range from one or two to more than 10 trillion dollars, according to various estimates made in the past decade and cited by the OECD in various reports.

Gurria said it was hard to put a price tag on it just as it was impossible to price the size of the parallel economy in general, but that governments would in any case be delighted to see things moving after years of inertia.

"Clearly governments need every penny they can get into the coffers of their national treasuries due to the recession," he said.

German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck told Der Spiegel, a German weekly, his country was happy about the announcements in neighbouring countries where Germany is worried many nationals park money to duck tax. But he remained cautious.

"We're happy about the positive developments. But declarations of intent have to be backed by concrete acts," he said.

So far, Switzerland was not talking about providing names of bank account holders, he said.

Gurria's response was that the pledges to start to lift the lid on decades of strict bank secrecy were a stating point.

"It's early days. This is happening as we speak," he said.

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スト決行！ＴＢＳからアナ消えた

　ＴＢＳのニュース、情報番組に出演しているレギュラーのアナウンサー陣が１３日、一斉に番組から姿を消す事態が起こった。ＴＢＳの労働組合が同日正午からストライキを行ったためで、組合員であるアナウンサーらも番組への出演を取りやめた。アナウンサーがストのため出演を見合わせるのは、他局を含めてもここ１０年ほど例はなく、異例の事態だ。

　　◇　　◇

　「木村郁美アナウンサーは、今日はお休みです」。フリーの福沢朗キャスターが「ピンポン」でこう説明したのを皮切りに、午後から夜にかけて、人気アナウンサーの“欠席”が相次いだ。

　ＴＢＳ広報によれば、今回のストは春闘の会社側の一次回答に対するもので、１３日正午から深夜０時までの時限スト。このため「ピンポン！」のほか「２時っチャオ！」「イブニング・ファイブ」「ニュース２３」などの生放送で組合員アナが不在となり、代わりに管理職アナウンサーや外部キャスターが穴を埋めた。また、番組内容も多少変えてしのいだという。

　ＴＢＳの労働組合は、ＴＢＳとＴＢＳテレビ社員からなるユニオン制で、管理職以外は全員加入する。スト自体は正当な権利だが、ストライキによって番組に影響が出るのは極めてまれ。ＮＨＫを含めた他局でも、ここ１０年は行われた例がない。ＴＢＳによれば「自分がストに入るか入らないかはそれぞれの判断」というが「除外申請」をすれば業務を行うことも可能という。

　ＴＢＳのストライキ決行を知った各局も驚きを隠せない。民放局員は「かなり昔はあったみたいだけど、最近はストが成立したことがない」「すごいね。ウチは組合が弱いからそんなことは起きたことがない」「伝説として聞いたことはあるが…」と、口々に驚きのコメント。ＮＨＫ職員も「かなり昔はありましたが、画面上影響が出るようなことはここのところはないですね」と話した。

　各番組では「○○アナは休み」という事実だけを冒頭で知らせ、理由の説明は行われなかったため、ＴＢＳに問い合わせた視聴者もあった。

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日立労組、無給休日提案の受け入れ決定

　平日1日を無給の休日とする日立製作所の経営側の提案に、同社の労働組合は14日、提案を受け入れることを決めた。国内の全社員4万人が対象で、1カ月の賃金が3―5％減る見込み。急激に業績が悪化するなか、労組も協力する必要があると判断した。近く経営側に伝える予定で、4月から1年間実施する。

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自動車３社、米国で在庫調整進む　２月は１割減

　日本の自動車大手3社が米国市場で抱える在庫が減り始めた。何日分の在庫を持っているかを示す在庫日数をみると、2月末は3社平均で91日分と1月末に比べ約1割減少。昨年末以降の減産効果で在庫調整が進んできたためだ。ただ2月の新車販売が前年同月比4割減るなど米市場は冷え込んだままで、厳しい収益環境は続きそうだ。

　在庫日数は販売店が保有する月末の在庫台数を1日あたりの販売台数で割った値。販売が滞るとこの日数が増え、減産や資金回収の長期化などで経営を圧迫する。(07:00)

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民主に「検察不信」発言　鳩山氏「可視化法案が影響も」

　民主党内で15日、小沢一郎代表の公設秘書が逮捕された西松建設の巨額献金事件を巡り、東京地検特捜部の捜査に不信感を強調する発言が相次いだ。一方、小沢氏の進退は自身の決断を待つという様子見の姿勢が目立つ。

　鳩山由紀夫幹事長は千葉県船橋市内の街頭演説で、小沢氏の秘書逮捕に関し、同党が取り調べの全過程を録音・録画する「可視化法案」の成立を目指していることも影響したとの認識を表明。仙谷由人元政調会長はテレビ朝日番組で「検察が無理筋を事件として立てようとしている形跡もある。うまく成立させないと、検察の大失態になる」と述べた。

　小沢氏の進退を巡っては、仙谷氏が都内で記者団に「選挙のプロだから、耳をそばだてて分析し態度表明されるのではないか」と静観する姿勢を強調した。

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火災：国重文の「旧住友家俣野別邸」が全焼　横浜

　１５日午前５時ごろ、横浜市戸塚区東俣野町にある国の重要文化財「旧住友家俣野別邸」の敷地内から出火、木造２階建ての同建物延べ６５１平方メートルと工事用プレハブ建物２棟の計８２８平方メートルを全焼した。けが人はなかった。当時は無人で火の気もなく、神奈川県警戸塚署は不審火とみて調べている。

　同署によると、建物に住人はおらず、近くの主婦（３７）が火柱に気付き１１９番した。別邸とプレハブのどちらが先に燃えたかなど、出火元も不明。別邸は０８年１月から耐震補強や庭園散策路設置などの工事中で、３棟はアルミフェンス（高さ約３メートル）で覆われ、赤外線センサーもある。１４日は午後６時ごろまで業者が作業、同７時半ごろにフェンス出入り口を施錠し、警報装置をセットして帰宅。出火時まで警報は作動しなかった。

　横浜市によると、別邸は１９３９年建設。昭和前期のモダニズムの意匠を伝える建物として、０４年７月に国の重要文化財に指定された。国所有で、管理を委託された市が敷地５．８ヘクタールを公園として一般公開するため、１０年度末完成を目指して整備していた。

　現場は小田急江ノ島線藤沢本町駅の北東約２キロの住宅街。

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「住まいの保障を」　解雇者ら支援へ、ネットワーク設立

　解雇と同時に住まいを失ったり、賃貸住宅から強制的に追い出されたりする人々を支援するため、特定非営利活動法人（ＮＰＯ法人）「自立生活サポートセンター・もやい」（東京・新宿）などの市民団体などが14日、「住まいの貧困に取り組むネットワーク」を立ち上げた。

　住居を確保できない人々からの相談を受け付けるほか、国や自治体などに、低所得者向けの住宅支援の拡充を求める。

　東京都内で開かれた同ネットワークの設立集会には約100人が参加。自動車メーカーで働いていた元派遣社員や、アパートの家賃を滞納したとして、強制的に“追い出し屋”といわれる家賃保証会社から退去を迫られた人々が窮状を訴えた。(07:00)

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ハンドボール：アジア連盟会長にアハマド氏を再選

　アジア・ハンドボール連盟（ＡＨＦ）は１４日、クウェート市で総会を開き、クウェート王族のアハマド会長を再選した。日本ハンドボール協会の渡辺佳英会長もＡＨＦ副会長に再選された。