Politics this week: 8th - 14th October 2005

From The Economist print edition

China launched its second manned space-rocket. The Shenzhou 6, carrying two astronauts, was successfully placed in Earth orbit.

North Korea held mass celebrations for the 60th anniversary of the founding of its ruling Workers' Party. An official took the opportunity to give warning that his country would “mercilessly crush” American and Japanese forces if they threatened it.

America and Kirgizstan reached an agreement to allow coalition forces in Afghanistan to continue using a military base near the Kirgiz capital, Bishkek. The issue gained prominence after Uzbekistan told America to leave its base there by the end of this year.


Angela Merkel was on course to become the first female chancellor of Germany after striking a political deal that will give her Social Democrat rivals some of the most powerful ministries. In his farewell speech, the outgoing chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, said that he would not serve in a government led by his Christian Democratic opponent.

Gun-battles raged in the southern Russian town of Nalchik, near Chechnya, after fighters described as “religious extremists” attacked government buildings. Scores of casualties were reported.

The EU's commissioner for enlargement met Orhan Pamuk, a Turkish novelist, to discuss Turkey's record on free speech. Mr Pamuk faces trial for allegedly insulting Turkey about its relationship with Armenians and Kurds. Last week, Hrant Dink, a journalist of Armenian-Turkish descent, was given a six-month suspended sentence for insulting Turkish nationality.

Mr Pamuk had also been in the running for the Nobel prize for literature, which was won by Harold Pinter, a British playwright and critic of the war in Iraq.

Jean-Bernard Merimée, France's former ambassador to the UN and a special adviser to Kofi Annan between 1999 and 2002, was formally placed under investigation in France on suspicion of receiving illegal Iraqi oil allocations under the UN's oil-for-food programme.


Guatemala ended a search for survivors after a week of flooding and mudslides caused by torrential rains following Hurricane Stan. The death toll in the country stood at over 650, but was expected to rise as the recovery of bodies began in two villages near Lake Atitlan that were buried under mud. Over 130 people were killed in the rest of Central America.

Several governments placed restrictions on beef imports from Brazil after an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in the southern state of Mato Grosso do Sul.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation resumed normal programming after unions ratified a deal to end a two-month management lock-out. The start of the new National Hockey League season, a huge source of commercial revenue for the public broadcaster, persuaded bosses to back down from most of their plans relating to the hiring of temporary employees.


Ghazi Kanaan, Syria's interior minister, who was his country's proconsul in Lebanon for 20 years until 2002, died, officially by his own hand. This increased speculation that the UN's investigation into the murder earlier this year of Rafik Hariri, a long-time Lebanese prime minister, was closing in on Syria's top people, perhaps even threatening the president, Bashar Assad.

Liberians went peacefully to the polls in the first round of their first general election since the end of a civil war nearly three years ago. George Weah, a former footballer, was expected to vie with Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, a former World Bank and UN official, for the lead.

Provisional results of a general election in the breakaway state of Somaliland, still technically part of anarchic Somalia, suggested that the two main opposition parties had scored well against the president's ruling one.