Italy's Berlusconi says a woman cannot be a mother and a mayor

A woman could not handle being a mother and mayor of Rome, former Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi said on Tuesday, drawing sharp criticism from across the political spectrum in a country where many complain of rampant sexism.
The 79-year-old leader of the right-wing Forza Italia party also defended his choice of Rome mayoral candidate, Guido Bertolaso, who was quoted this week as saying that a pregnant potential rival, Giorgia Meloni, should focus on being a mother.
"It is clear to everyone that a mother cannot devote herself to a job and this would be a terrible job, because Rome is in such a terrible state," the billionaire said on state radio RAI.
Parties of all stripes are tearing themselves apart over municipal elections slated for June, and the new mayor will have a particularly tough job in Rome, where years of alleged corruption have been laid bare in a Mafia trial.
Meloni, who leads the right-wing Brothers of Italy party, has not yet decided whether to run but, if she does, that would split the center-right vote in the capital.
On Sunday, the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement's (M5S) candidate for mayor of Milan dropped out of the race, saying she had been shaken by criticism of her looks and weight.
"When will they ask a male candidate to withdraw because he is not telegenic, or because he needs to be a father?" Reforms Minister Maria Elena Boschi said on Twitter.
Democratic Party deputy Titti Di Salvo said: "This is pure patriarchal machismo, deciding what place a woman should occupy. Harping on this matter shows we are still in the Middle Ages culturally."
Gender inequality is writ large in Italy's employment data, which shows less than half of working-age women has a job, 18 percentage points below their male counterparts. The female employment rate was the second lowest in the European Union in 2014 after that of Greece, according to Eurostat.
Prime Minister Matteo Renzi has trumpeted gender equality within his government, but political watchdog Openpolis says only 14 percent of Italy's mayors are women, and no city with more than 300,000 inhabitants has a female mayor.
"This is not a country for women. What is going on at the moment is incredible, it reveals a fundamental misogyny," Health Minister and mother of twins Beatrice Lorenzin said on Monday.
However, an opinion poll, published on Tuesday, suggested that M5S's female candidate to take charge of corruption-riddled Rome, Virginia Raggi, was leading the field of contenders.
(Reporting by Isla Binnie; Editing by Louise Ireland)

Poll: Voters back Sanders as the next commander in chief

By Chris Kahn

Who do Americans think would be the most trustworthy person to lead the nation’s military? The answer may surprise you. According to a new Reuters/Ipsos poll, the highest-scoring candidate for the post is Democrat Bernie Sanders, who wins a total of 38 percent of those surveyed among Democrats, Republicans and independents. Hillary Clinton also beats out her Republican rivals, placing second with 31 percent overall.
Among Democrats, Sanders and Clinton won roughly similar support within the poll’s margin of error (61 percent and 57 percent respectively.)
Republicans, meanwhile, don’t seem to be fazed by the latest scuffles at Donald Trump’s rallies. with a majority of polled party members still thinking front-runner Trump would make the best head of the armed forces–and, by implication, the next president.
When Democrats and independents were added to the mix, a smaller total of 26 percent overall supported Trump leading the armed forces.
Reuters asked the commander-in-chief question a second time in this election cycle to see if there was a change as Trump continued to express his admiration for Russian leader Vladimir Putin, Trump’s embrace of water boarding as an interrogation technique and his threats to “take out” the families of suspected militants.
The answer: Republicans are even more trusting of Trump as commander in chief than they were in December. According to the Reuters/Ipsos poll from March 10-13, 51 percent of Republicans say they’d trust him in the position, compared with 41 percent for Ted Cruz, 30 percent for Marco Rubio and 29 percent for John Kasich.
When we asked the question in December, 42 percent of Republicans said they’d trust Trump, compared with 35 percent for Cruz, 32 percent for Rubio and 12 percent for Kasich. Both polls included more than 600 Republicans and have a credibility interval, a measure of accuracy, of about 4.5 percentage points.

Trump eyes Republican breakthrough via wins in Florida, Ohio

TAMPA, Fla. | By Steve Holland

 

Donald Trump could take a giant step on Tuesday toward securing the Republican presidential nomination if he wins the Florida and Ohio primaries, which would intensify pressure for rivals from the party establishment to pull out of the race.Trump has the potential to sweep five big states holding party primary contests for the November election: Florida, Ohio, Illinois, North Carolina and Missouri. The Republican front-runner could knock out his two mainstream rivals, Ohio Governor John Kasich and U.S. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, if he wins their states.
The 69-year-old billionaire businessman has a significant lead over Rubio in opinion polls in Florida, but is neck and neck with Kasich in Ohio. Any win by either Rubio, Kasich or U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, 45, of Texas would give at least a small degree of hope to Republicans battling to deny Trump the nomination.
Trump said on Tuesday that his momentum was already drawing in establishment Republicans who had previously balked at his candidacy but now see him as the likely nominee.
"They're already calling," the New Yorker told NBC's "Today" show, without naming names. "The biggest people in the party are calling."
Trump victories in the five states could make what once seemed inconceivable a strong probability, putting the former reality TV star - who has vowed to deport 11 million illegal immigrants, impose some protectionist trade policies and temporarily ban Muslims from entering the country - on a glide path to being the Republican Party's presidential candidate in November.
Trump drew first blood on Tuesday, winning the Northern Mariana Islands caucuses with almost 73 percent of the vote. The win in the U.S. Pacific commonwealth gave him nine delegates.
On the Democratic side, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, 68, could put some distance between herself and rival Bernie Sanders, 74, a U.S. senator from Vermont, in Tuesday's Democratic primaries.
Opinion polls gave her a big lead in Florida and North Carolina, but showed Sanders gaining ground in Ohio, Illinois and Missouri, a possibly worrisome sign for Clinton after Sanders' surprise victory in Michigan a week ago.
"I voted for Bernie because I want to see a real change to how we do things in this country," Jackie Zydeck, 52, an attorney for the federal government, said after voting in Chicago's liberal Albany Park neighborhood.
"I like his single-payer healthcare idea; I like his ideas about taxes," Zydeck said.
'OPTIMISM OVER PESSIMISM'
Trump held rallies in Florida, Ohio and North Carolina on Monday and said establishment Republicans who have labored to stop his outsider candidacy needed to rally to his cause.
An outbreak of clashes between Trump supporters and protesters that forced him to cancel a rally in Chicago on Friday, and scattered protests at some of his campaign events this week have prompted more concerns from mainstream party figures.
U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan on Tuesday condemned efforts to disrupt political rallies, but said all presidential candidates must bear responsibility for helping curb violence at campaign events and creating a less hostile atmosphere.
"All candidates have an obligation to do what they can do ... provide an atmosphere of harmony, to reduce violence, to not incite violence," Ryan told reporters.
The Republican establishment's only real hope for stopping Trump is to deny him the 1,237 delegates needed for the nomination, even though he may win a majority of them. That would extend the battle to the party's nominating convention in July in Cleveland.
"I believe the ideal outcome in this campaign is to have someone not named Donald Trump coalesce the party with 1,237 delegates and go on to defeat Hillary Clinton in November," Rubio, 44, told Fox News. "If he's the nominee, he is not going to be able to unite the party. In fact, I think he'll bitterly divide it."
Kasich, 63, slammed Trump for a series of comments he has made over the years that disparage women. Those remarks featured in an ad released this week by an anti-Trump Republican Super PAC group.
"I have two daughters. They see this stuff; what do you think they think?" Kasich told reporters in Westerville, Ohio.
(Additional reporting by Amanda Becker in Ohio, Fiona Ortiz in Chicago, Susan Heavey, Doina Chiacu in Washington; Writing by Alistair Bell; Editing by Peter Cooney, W Simon and Jonathan Oatis)
 

Russia drops the mic: Syria pullout comes at perfect moment

By Mark Galeotti

 

After five years of brutal fighting and two weeks of a scrappy ceasefire, President Vladimir Putin has suddenly announced that “the main part” of Russia’s forces currently in Syria will begin to be withdrawn. Assuming this is not some public relations stunt (and if it is, it will very quickly become clear, seriously damaging Moscow’s credibility), then it represents a shrewd and pragmatic move.
They will not go quickly, and it is still unclear quite who will be leaving and who will stay. The Tartus naval resupply station will remain in Moscow’s hands — presumably with some security forces — and so will the Hmeymime (Latakia) air base, implying that there will still be some Russian bombers along with their flight and technical crews, guards and commanders.
However, the creeping expansion of the ground forces contingent within the expeditionary force — first some Spetsnaz special forces for spotting, next some extra tanks, then heavy artillery — is presumably going to be reversed. This way, not only does Russia make itself less vulnerable to attacks from insurgents, it also sets aside the temptation to get more deeply involved in the fighting.
Speaking to officers in Moscow in an off-the-record session, one of their greatest concerns was of being swept up in a cycle of escalation if a serious attack was carried out against Russian forces by any of the many rebel groups. As one put it, “if the president sees this as a challenge, he’ll be tempted to send a brigade of paratroopers, and before you know it, we’re there for 10 years.”
This was not a casually chosen timeframe: 10 years is how long Soviet troops were mired in Afghanistan, another intervention that was expected to be short-lived and uncomplicated and turned out to be anything but.
Politicians tend to find it easier to start wars than to end them, to escalate rather than to withdraw. For a leader who clearly relishes his macho image and who has been articulating a very aggressive foreign policy in recent years to opt for such a stand-down is a striking act of statesmanship.
That said, Putin’s announcement that “the objectives given to the Defense Ministry and the Armed Forces as a whole have largely been accomplished” is probably accurate.
This intervention was, after all, never about “winning” the war in Syria: even the most starry-eyed optimist would not expect a relative handful of aircraft and ground forces to end this bloody and complex conflict. Nor was it primarily to save Bashar al-Assad’s skin and position.
Rather, it had three main objectives. Firstly, to assert Russia’s role in the region and its claim to a say in the future of Syria. Secondly, to protect Moscow’s last client in the Middle East, ideally by preserving Assad, but if need be by replacing him with some other suitable client. Thirdly, to force the West, and primarily Washington, to stop efforts diplomatically to isolate Moscow. For the moment, at least, all three have indeed been accomplished.
Now, Russia is a more significant player in Syria’s future than the United States. Influence is bought by blood and treasure; by being willing to put its bombers, guns and men into play, Moscow not only helped Assad but reshaped the narrative of the war. The Kurds and even some of the so-called “moderate rebels” are beginning to show willing to talk to the Russians.
At the time of the intervention, Assad’s forces were in retreat, momentum was favoring the rebels, and Moscow was terrified that the regime’s elite might begin to fragment. The client state the Soviets left behind when they withdrew from Afghanistan was actually surprisingly stable and effective. But when Defense Minister Shahnawaz Tani broke with President Najibullah, it began to break apart and was doomed; this was something Moscow feared could happen in Damascus.
However, the unexpected injection of Russian airpower on Sept. 30 not only changed the arithmetic on the battlefield, it also re-energized the regime. The scale of the bombing assault, with more than 9,000 sorties flown according Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, allowed government forces to turn back the tide. Not only were they able to retake Aleppo and some 400 other settlements by Shoigu’s count, but the Syrian Arab Army’s morale recovered considerably too, and with it Assad’s personal authority.
Finally, on the diplomatic front there is no question that Putin’s intervention did indeed end any hope of ignoring and isolating him. Russia and the United States are joint guarantors of the ceasefire in Syria now, and even in Ukraine the two countries have renewed conversations about a settlement in the Donbas, though it was Moscow that began the conflict.
In short, for once there is more truth than rhetoric in claims of a “mission accomplished.” By beginning to withdraw his forces, Putin also addresses three important concerns.
He will reassure a domestic audience that enjoyed the daily doses of gun-camera footage and upbeat military assessments, but remained worried that what started as a relatively bloodless — for the Russians — campaign could become something much more serious. Indeed, the military will also be happy, conscious as they are that the longer forces are in-country, the greater the risk of something going badly wrong. That’s not least because many of Russia’s senior officers served in Afghanistan.
He can present himself as a peacemaker; it is hardly a coincidence that this announcement was made on the first day of real negotiations in peace talks being held in Geneva. This will strengthen Russia’s claim to a role in those negotiations and the shaping of Syria’s future: a spokesman for the rebel High Negotiations Committee said that “if there is seriousness in implementing the withdrawal, it will give the talks a positive push.” It may also offset some of the ground lost internationally after a recent escalation of fighting in the Donbas and the show trial of kidnapped Ukrainian pilot Nadiya Savchenko.
Finally, Putin can retain the initiative, something he clearly savors. He has once again caught the West off guard (and probably also Assad for that matter: he seems to have been informed by Putin only earlier in the day).
He has reduced his exposure to reverses on the ground, but not abandoned Syria. Rather, he has the best of both worlds. He will retain not just some troops there but the ports and airfields which will allow him to surge forces back into Syria if need be — or simply just threaten to do so. He can also, as he has in the past, use long-range bomber strikes or cruise missiles fired from naval units to deliver devastating reminders of Russia’s military capabilities.
In short, this is at once classic, and yet also unusual Putin. It is a characteristic move in its decisiveness and its unexpectedness (even Russians within the defense and foreign affairs apparatuses appear to have been taken by surprise).
But Putin, especially in this presidential term, has up until now tended to default to escalation, confrontation and defiance. Even though it is for entirely pragmatic reasons, this is the first time he has stepped back from an adventure. It may prove to be a propaganda move, or short-lived. It may be precisely that he wants to concentrate on his vicious war in the Donbas. Or it may be that, his economy suffering, his elite worried and his people increasingly discontent, that this is the first sign of the emergence of a more pragmatic Putin, who has come to realize that his grand vision for a re-empowered Russia is actually driving it towards penury and chaos. Time will tell.
 

Seat at geopolitical top table allowed Putin to scale back in Syria

MOSCOW | By Andrew Osborn

 

Vladimir Putin cited Russian military success in Syria as his reason for scaling back his forces there. But his belief that the intervention delivered him a seat at the top table of world affairs is more likely to have tipped his hand.Russia's Syria operation, launched on Sept. 30 last year, made military, diplomatic and domestic political sense for the Kremlin which was keen to shore up its closest Middle East ally and protect its only naval facility on the Mediterranean. It has largely achieved both aims.
But an analysis of comments made by the Russian president and other officials, and conversations with people familiar with his thinking, suggests his primary aim was to make Russia so indispensable to the Syrian peace process that it could regain a measure of the global clout the Soviet Union once enjoyed.
"Russia has returned to the global board of directors," said Alexander Baunov, a senior associate at the Carnegie Moscow Center. "(It has returned) to the table where world and regional powers decide the fate of others' conflicts and Russia is clearly not a local but a world player."
Putin is famously inscrutable and unpredictable, and his decision to draw down in Syria was no exception. He confides in only a small coterie of people around him, and it came as a total surprise for many in the Kremlin and the defense ministry.
"I spent all day at the defense ministry and did not hear a peep," one defense industry source told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the matter's sensitivity.
State propaganda outlets spoke on Tuesday of a "mission accomplished", a phrase that deliberately mimicked the one plastered on a U.S. warship in 2003 when President George W. Bush declared the end of major combat operations in Iraq.
The real mission, some say, was to give Russia a say in world affairs.
In the space of six months it has gone from being a pariah state in the West because of its annexation of Crimea and support for pro-Kremlin rebels in eastern Ukraine to being the go-to partner over Syria. Once spurned by Western leaders, it is now a regular interlocutor for both Washington and EU leaders.
"Putin has already got all the political benefits," said Nikolai Petrov, a political expert at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow. "It is better to withdraw before costs increase, before any accident can happen, and before the risks become too high."
Reuters estimates the 5-month operation has cost the Kremlin $700-800 million. The human cost has been higher. Although the official Russian military body count is just four, Islamic State claimed it blew up a Russian passenger plane over Egypt in October, killing all 224 people onboard, in revenge for Syria.
NEW WORLD ORDER
Reasserting Russia's global voice is crucial to Putin, who has been alternately president and prime minister for over 15 years, and is thought to have a close eye on his historical legacy while showing no signs of wanting to leave the Kremlin.
He has long pushed for a new multilateral world order where other powers counter-balance U.S. influence.
In a speech to the United Nations in New York in September, in a barely disguised dig at the United States, he complained of the "arrogance, exceptionalism and impunity" of those he said had engineered the Arab spring.
Dmitry Medvedev, his prime minister and ally, outlined the world order the Kremlin craved as recently as last month, evoking the 1962 Cuban missile crisis as a model of how Moscow and Washington were able to solve dangerous crises.
He said he believed the world's powers could come together in "a fair and equal union" to maintain global peace.
Russian officials say recent events show how Moscow has, once again, come to matter.
They point out that it was Russia, along with the United States, which co-brokered the current cessation of hostilities in Syria, however fragile. Officials also rarely miss a chance to note that it is the Americans who have time and time again come to them for help over Syria.
John Kerry, the U.S. Secretary of State, flew to Moscow in December to discuss Syria with Putin, and has recently spoken almost daily to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Kremlin and White House statements confirm.
Even Putin's critics have recognized the clout Syria has gifted the Russian leader.
"There's one man on this planet who can end the civil war in Syria by making a phone call and that's Mr Putin," Philip Hammond, Britain's foreign secretary, told BBC TV last month.
ASSAD SEEN SAFE
By scaling back after a campaign of over 9,000 sorties estimated to have cost $700-800 million, the Kremlin has made it less likely it will be dragged into a potential regional conflict with Turkey or Saudi Arabia.
And although it did not in the end help bag a spectacular battlefield victory, such as the complete taking of Aleppo, the Kremlin thinks it has done enough to ensure that Assad and his forces can hold the line.
Domestically, the intervention helped keep Putin's ratings near record highs and served as a useful distraction at a time of economic pain. Amid brass bands and rousing speeches, state TV on Tuesday presented the decision to start drawing down forces as the culmination of a short, victorious war.
But though Putin's partial Syria withdrawal may be seen as a diplomatic coup by some, his country's return to the world stage has not been a complete success.
U.S. and EU sanctions imposed over the Ukraine crisis remain in place and compound a domestic financial crisis made worse by the collapse in oil prices.
And the decision to scale back Russian forces was, some analysts believe, conversely dictated more by weakness and a realization that Russia could not make a deal with the West over Syria to lift sanctions on it.
Others, including one Western diplomat who told Reuters the news came as a complete and inexplicable surprise, say Putin's motives are unfathomable.
"None of us knows what the intent of Mr Putin is when he carries out any action, which is why he is a very difficult partner in any situation like this," Britain's Hammond said on Tuesday.
Putin's move is being interpreted in some circles as an attempt to influence the outcome of Syrian peace talks in Geneva and possibly to put pressure on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to get serious about doing a deal.
Yet few inside Russia believe Assad is in danger of losing Putin's support, even if the Kremlin does want him to contest any future presidential election.
Putin has shown no particular fondness for the Syrian leader but appears to see little point in replacing him with someone who might turn out to be even worse and does not believe Syria is ready for Western-style democracy anyway.
Putin has in any case hedged his bets.
If he feels his new-found global influence or Assad is threatened he can use the two military bases left behind to rapidly expand the Kremlin's military footprint.
His public relations strategy is also hedged.
"If the ceasefire turns into a lengthy peace he will automatically be considered the victor," said Carnegie's Baunov. "But if war breaks out again, he can always say: 'You see, when we were there everyone was making peace but after we left war erupted.'"
(Additional reporting by Dmitry Soloyvov, Jack Stubbs, Lidia Kelly and Parniyan Zemaryalai and by William James in London, Editing by Timothy Heritage) 

Police kill gunman in Brussels siege linked to Paris attacks

BRUSSELS | By Robert-Jan Bartunek, Philip Blenkinsop and Clement Rossignol 

 

Belgian police on Tuesday killed a gunman in a raid on a Brussels apartment linked to Islamist militants involved in November's Paris attacks, and two others were on the run, state broadcaster RTBF reported.Belgium's federal prosecutor said earlier one or more suspects had barricaded themselves into an apartment after police had come under heavy weapon fire through a door when carrying out the raid.
Belgian media said four police officers were wounded.
Belgian daily DH said one suspect was shot dead after being spotted from a police helicopter in a nearby garden.
Phone calls made by Reuters seeking comment from police and prosecutors were not answered.
French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said French police took part in the raid in the Belgian capital. Streets around the house in a southern section of the city were sealed off by police, Reuters journalists at the scene said.
"This operation is connected to the Paris attacks," a spokesman for Belgium's federal prosecutor said.
Reuters journalists heard gunshots as police commandos crowded into the street where the raid unfolded.
Investigators believe much of the planning and preparation for the Nov. 13 bombing and shooting rampage in Paris that killed 130 people were carried out by young French and Belgian nationals, some of whom fought in Syria for Islamic State.
The area around Tuesday's raid, near a car factory and a major north-south railway linking Paris and Amsterdam, was sealed off, and a police helicopter buzzed overhead.
Police told residents to stay indoors and schools and kindergartens close to the scene of the shootings were in lockdown, residents said.
Belgian security forces have been actively hunting suspects and associates of the militants involved in the attacks in Paris. Some of the attackers came from Brussels.
One of the prime suspects, 26-year-old Brussels-based Frenchman Salah Abdeslam, is still on the run. He left Paris shortly after his brother blew himself up in the attacks. Belgian authorities are holding 10 people who have been arrested in the months since the attacks, mostly for helping Abdeslam.
RTBF quoted French police sources as saying Abdeslam had not been the target of Tuesday's raid.
Brussels, headquarters of the European Union as well as Western military alliance NATO, was locked down for days after the Paris attacks for fear of a major incident there. Brussels has maintained a high state of security alert since then, with military patrols a regular sight.
Soldiers were on streets in central Brussels on Tuesday as the operation continued.
Belgium, with a Muslim population of about 5 percent among its 11 million people, has the highest rate in Europe of citizens joining Islamist militants in Syria.
(Additional reporting by Miranda Alexander-Webber; Editing by Mark Heinrich) 

UN’s Ban furious with Morocco over Western Sahara protests

© Fadel Sena, AFP | Moroccan protesters hold placards and shout slogans in the capital Rabat, on March 13, 2016.

Text by NEWS WIRES

Latest update : 2016-03-15

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told Morocco’s foreign minister on Monday he was angered and disappointed by a demonstration in Rabat he said was a personal attack on him over remarks he made about the disputed territory of Western Sahara.

Tens of thousands of Moroccans marched though the capital on Sunday to protest Ban’s position on Western Sahara and rally support for the king.
Ban “conveyed his astonishment at the recent statement of the government of Morocco and expressed his deep disappointment and anger regarding the demonstration that was mobilized on Sunday, which targeted him in person,” Ban’s press office said in an unusually tough statement.
“He stressed that such attacks are disrespectful to him and to the United Nations,” said the statement, which was issued after he met with Moroccan Foreign Minister Salaheddine Mezouar.
Rabat accused Ban last week of no longer being neutral in the Western Sahara conflict, saying he used the word “occupation” to describe Morocco’s presence in the region that has been at the center of a dispute since 1975.
The United Nations acknowledges he used the term. Monday’s statement said there was a misunderstanding over his use of the word “occupation,” noting it was Ban’s “personal reaction to the deplorable humanitarian conditions in which the Sahrawi refugees have lived in for far too long.”
The U.N. statement issued on Monday evening said Ban asked Mezouar for “clarification regarding the reported presence of several members of the Moroccan government among the demonstrators.”
State news agency MAP said 3 million people attended Sunday’s march, although those figures could not be confirmed. Some protesters said they were bused for free to the march and that trains had also been free for the day of the rally.
The dispute over the region in the northwest edge of Africa has dragged on since Morocco took control over most of it in 1975 after the withdrawal of former colonial power Spain.
The Polisario Front, which says the territory belongs to ethnic Sahrawis, fought a war against Morocco until a U.N.-brokered ceasefire in 1991, but the two sides have since been deadlocked.
Polisario, backed by Morocco’s regional rival and neighbor Algeria and a number of other African states, wants a referendum promised in the ceasefire agreement on the region’s fate.
Morocco says it will not offer more than autonomy for the region, rich in phosphates and possibly offshore oil and gas.
(REUTERS