WASHINGTON, May 19 (UPI) -- Russia's Federal Atomic Energy Agency has announced that Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant will come online in 2007.
Federal Atomic Energy Agency spokesman Sergei Novikov told Iran's official Islamic Republic News Agency in Tehran Wednesday, "This is the same time which the agency's chief had declared in February in his trip to Tehran and Bushehr."
"There is no political obstacle to commission the Bushehr power plant," Novikov said. Construction work on the Bushehr reactor is now 92 percent complete, he said.
The reactor has been plagued by delays. Iran's deputy head of Atomic Energy Organization for international affairs Mohammad Saeidi recently said that the Russian company constructing the facility had caused the delays.
Saeidi said that if the Russians increased their work shifts per day from two to three, the power plant would be commissioned in the next few months.
The Bushehr power plant was originally scheduled to become operational in 2003.
Libyan leader Muammar Gadhafi is worried that Western nations will try to re-impose colonialism on Africa.
The Analyst newspaper reported Wednesday that Gadhafi during a speech on Sunday in Tripoli expressed concern that foreign nations under the guise of peace-keeping may use African political turmoil to re-impose colonialism.
Gadhafi made his comments while welcoming Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf on a visit
Gadhafi said he feared that because of the rise of election-related African conflicts and the subsequent deployment of foreign international peacekeeping forces, the re-imposition of colonialism was imminent unless the continent resisted it.
Gadhafi said, "Undoubtedly, there were revolutions in Africa and historic revolutions such as those liberating Africa from colonialism and racism. However such work is maimed with military coups -- such as the case in Africa -- whose outcome was backwardness from which Africa suffers up to now."
Gadhafi listed the elected governments in Sudan, Chad, Cote d'Ivoire, Mauritania, Guinea Bissau, and countries in the Horn of Africa as currently facing insurrections that require international military and peacekeeping intervention.
Gadhafi said, "We must express our concern that even plurality and elections seemed not to guarantee stability in Africa, because we started to see rebellions against supposedly democratically elected governments. This is a problem facing Africa today, so much so that we are not reassured about the election results.
"Now there are forces from over 70 countries on African land in the name of peacekeeping forces," the Libyan leader said. "There are 75,000 soldiers from the international peacekeeping forces, a third of them are in African territories."
"These conflicts existing now in Africa, opened the door wide open to the return of forces of colonialism again into Africa," Gadhafi said. "We may one day find our continent occupied by international forces. This requires that Africa should first make a peaceful direction and not the direction it is taking now. The political, economic, and social systems in Africa must recognize the way that would not lead into this anger, and explosion seen by Africa. We must solve our problems and get these forces out of our continent."
"We have two and quarter million soldiers and spend $14 billion on these forces annually, yet we need United Nations forces which are violating our dignity and honor. This is very shameful to Africa," Gadhafi concluded.
South Africa's state-owned arms manufacturer Denel in the past year has suffered a precipitous 23 percent decline in revenue.
Business Day reported Thursday that Denel CEO Shaun Liebenberg estimates the company's operational loss will be between $154 million and $277 million.
The losses came as the South African government this year injected $308 million into the company.
Liebenberg estimated that it would take two to three years for several major anticipated international defense contracts to come through to restore the company to fiscal health, expecting Denel to break even only in the 2009-10 financial year, and only if the South African government agreed to invest a further $477 million, bringing the total re-capitalization to $785 million.
Liebenberg informed Parliament's public enterprises portfolio committee, "Denel is facing a funding crisis." He said the company urgently needed an additional $92 million this year alone. Liebenberg said that most of Denel's 2005 losses were due to restructuring costs.
Denel told Parliament that Denel's funding needs would be significantly lowered if it won the Turkish government's $1.2-1.8 billion tender for 50-70 attack helicopters.
Filipino National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales has warned of an assassination plot against President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.
The Manila Times reported Friday that Gonzales told a news briefing that "elite force" from the Communist New People's Army intends to kill not only President Arroyo but opposition leaders as well.
According to Gonzales the "elite force" consists of hardcore communist cadres and handpicked by Jose Maria Sison, founding chairman of the Communist Party of the Philippines. Gonzales warned that the team is already in the capital Manila to carry out the assassination plot.
Sison is currently living in exile in Utrecht along with Luis Jalandoni, a former priest turned rebel leader.
Gonzales said, "They are here to assassinate key personalities in the opposition. What is striking is that they were handpicked by no less than Sison."
Gonzales declined to identify the targeted opposition leaders, adding that he has been tracking the special group for the last two years since it started its operations.
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