Iraq's al-Sadr Urges Rejection of US-Iraqi Deal

pix: Demonstrators carry banner during rally in Baghdad to protest draft US-Iraqi security agreement, 18 Oct 2008

Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has called on Iraq's parliament to reject a security agreement with the United States, as tens of thousands of his supporters rallied in Baghdad against the deal.

The demonstrators chanted anti-U.S. slogans and waved Iraqi flags as they marched from the capital's Sadr City district to the central Mustansiriyah Square Saturday.

A Sadr aide read aloud a statement from the influential cleric, who urged Iraqi lawmakers not to vote for the proposed security deal. He said the agreement will not end the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq, and will not give sovereignty to the Iraqi people.

The mass demonstration comes as U.S. and Iraqi leaders try to build political support for the draft security agreement. The deal would allow for the extension of the presence of American forces in Iraq after their United Nations mandate expires on December 31.

The U.S. Defense Department spokesman, Geoff Morrell, has said the draft includes target dates for the withdrawal of at least some of the 154,000 U.S. troops stationed in Iraq.

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates and U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice briefed key members of Congress on the draft Friday to try to build broad political backing for it. It has not been publicly released.

The Bush administration has said the text does not need ratification by Congress. But a final deal will require the approval of Iraq's parliament and other bodies.

Separately Saturday, Bahrain's foreign minister arrived in Iraq's capital for a visit aimed at improving bilateral relations between the countries.

Some information for this report was provided by AP and Reuters. -- source: VOA News 18 October 2008

T-Systems in outsourcing coup

T-Systems in outsourcing coup
DEUTSCHE TELEKOM’S enterprise customer unit T-Systems has secured the global hosting and storage section of a multi-sourcing contract, worth about RM4.9bil, from multinational oil group, Royal Dutch Shell.T-Systems described the contract as a major outsourcing win.

Under the initial five-year agreement, T-Systems will take over the infrastructure of Shell’s five global datacentres — three in Holland, one in Houston, Texas, and one in Cyberjaya here.

These datacentres run more than 7,400 application servers supporting Shell operations in over 100 countries. A total of 900 IT specialists at the five centres will join T-System's staff.

T-Systems said it will manage the Shell account from the Hague, but will move its US headquarters to Houston to show commitment to Shell.Meanwhile, the Cyberjaya centre will become a T-Systems centre for service management and also its operational hub for the Asia-Pacific region.

T-Systems said Shell selected T-Systems’ Dynamic Services platform to host most of its global SAP services.

The Dynamic Services platform adapts ICT (information and communications technology) capacities like bandwidth and data storage to customers’ business processes, boosting efficiency and reducing costs.

“Winning this contract clearly demonstrates that T-Systems understands customer needs and requirements, and that we have the skills and the infrastructure to deliver the most demanding services,” said T-Systems Singapore and Malaysia chief executive Thomas Jakob.

“We are unequivocally committed to establishing ourselves in Malaysia and reaching out to the Asia-Pacific region with world-class ICT services to meet the global requirements of multinational customers,” he added. – The Star

Source:TheStar-http://star-techcentral.com/tech/story.asp?file=/2008/4/5/technology/20080405145617&sec=technology

Reasons for an impending US economic recession

Trying to assess the situation and further growth prospects of the US economy, the first important fact to see is that the US economic recovery since November 2001 has been by far the weakest in the whole postwar period.

Just a few tidings composed by the Economic Policy Institute in Washington: First, inflation-adjusted hourly and weekly wages today are below where they were at the start of the recovery in November 2001; Second, median household income (inflation adjusted) has fallen five years in a row and was 4% lower in 2004 than in 1999; Third, total jobs since March 2001 (the start of the recession) are up 1.9% and private jobs 1.5% (at this stage of previous business cycles, jobs had grown 8.8%); Fourth, the unemployment rate is low only because several million people have given up looking for a job.

And here are some cursory remarks on our part: First, job growth has steeply fallen during the last three months, from 200,000 in February to 75,000 in May (2006 - report published on Wed 09 August, 2006 -ed.) ; Second, all the job growth has come from the artificial net birth/death model, implying that it is booming among small new firms not captured by the payroll survey, while slumping in existing firms; Third, private household indebtedness since 2000 has soared by 70%. This compares with an overall increase in real disposable personal income by 12%.

ASSESSMENT REPORTS: A weak report about the services sector has caused some experts to declare that the economy has already entered downturn. Recession is here – ECONOMISTS

Recession is the least of our worries. The days of the American empire might be at an end, Fortune's Andy Serwer argues. Play video Bye-bye superpower

Wal-Mart's distress signal: The world's largest retailer leads a parade of sales misses in January, indicating trouble in the U.S. economy.

To understand more on the Reasons (Published : Wed 09 Aug, 2006 -ed.) for an impending US economic recession i.e. US consumer spending, Current credit expansion, The US trade deficit, Debt trap, and House price crash, consult Dr Kurt Richebacher’s assessment report here.

LATEST DEVELOPMENT: Can Malaysia's Economy Withstand a U.S. Slowdown? This is that which warns us of something hateful in the future: ASIAN stocks plunged yesterday, pulled by Wall Street's sharp decline on Tuesday as fears of the US going into a recession intensified, analysts said.