JAPAN

JAPAN
Yomiuri Shimbun, Feb.27: In December, the U.N. Security Council adopted a resolution calling for sanctions against Iran and demanding that the Islamic republic suspend its enrichment of uranium and related activities. Although Iran was told to comply within 60 days, it refused to meet the deadline.
As the U.N. resolution warns of additional sanctions if Iran does not comply, the Security Council must hold urgent deliberations to consider new sanctions.
It is absolutely imperative the five permanent members work together in this matter, as Iran's nuclear program is progressing at a rapid pace.
China and Russia were reluctant to introduce strict sanctions against Iran during Security Council deliberations in December over the current resolution. While Beijing and Moscow do have close economic ties with Tehran, the two permanent Security Council members need to adopt a responsible attitude as major nations to help prevent nuclear proliferation.
Iran continues to demand that a diplomatic solution be found. If Tehran is serious about this, it should take a tangible first step, such as suspending its enrichment of uranium. Doing so may help to ease tensions Iran has caused and provide a major premise on which to base further negotiations.
ITALY
La Stampa, Turin, on the ruling exonerating Serbia of genocide in Bosnia: The ruling by the International Court of Justice sounds almost like an international mockery. While, on one hand, it legally exonerates Serbia from its responsibility, on the other it does not specify the responsibilities of the self-proclaimed Serbian Republic of Bosnia, whose militias operated under president Radovan Karadzic and Gen. Ratko Mladic. Both are being sought on war crimes charges by the Court and are now most likely hiding in Serbia under the shelter of local authorities.
At this point, we don't understand who were those who murdered more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslims or where they were from. We don't understand the reason why the same Court tried late former Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic on charges of war crimes for years.
The bloodiest genocide that Europe has witnessed after 1945 is left, so to speak, without an author.
Never, since the onset of a democratic Europe, has the memory of so many innocent victims been so clearly sacrificed to the altars of international politics.
NORWAY
Aftenposten, Oslo, Feb 28: It is not an encouraging situation facing the American in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, five and a half years after the terror attacks on the United States.
The most serious is American intelligence, in leaks to U.S. newspapers, saying the Al-Qaida terror network is gaining support, training new terrorists and has restored its command structure.
Al-Qaida's old ally in Afghanistan, the Taliban, has also gained strength, five years after the U.S. attacked training camps there. The Americans see signs of a major spring offensive.
Even though the picture is not completely clear, it seems the United States is on the defensive in several countries, places where the Americans primarily used the military against terrorism.
In Afghanistan the U.S. has broad political support for its battle, from the U.N., from NATO and from Norway. Today, there is internal agreement in the alliance to do more to help civilians in Afghanistan, a change of course that may be too late.
Now it is important to have tight dialogue between allies in Afghanistan, and share information so all can have a clear picture of the situation. That raises concern.
We know such a war (on terror) cannot be won by military means alone. That is the dilemma for the U.S., NATO and us.
GREAT BRITAIN
The Independent, London, Feb. 27: The unhappy people of Darfur made the first significant steps along the road to justice yesterday when the International Criminal Court in the Hague was asked to issue arrest warrants against two named individuals for crimes against humanity in the war-torn province in the remote west of Sudan.
The two men named were the Sudanese & quot;Humanitarian Affairs & quot; minister and a militia commander _ the planner and executor, it is alleged, of a deliberate strategy of massacres, summary executions and rapes on a massive scale, in which 200,000 people died and two million were forced to flee their homes. The charges filed cover just 51 counts of those war crimes. But it is a start. If the pair are convicted, they face life imprisonment.
There is, of course, little chance of that happening at present. The court has no powers of arrest and relies for enforcement on governments who have signed up to the Rome treaty which founded the court. Sudan has not signed. It said on Monday that the ICC had no jurisdiction over its nationals, and that it would not allow anybody to be tried outside the country. It promised to stage its own trials, but that idea is rather a sick joke.
So the two men are safe so long as they remain in Sudan -- which is why the minister, who had been receiving medical treatment in Jordan, has swiftly left that country. United Nations troops could arrest them, which is one reason why Khartoum is refusing to allow 22,000 international peacekeepers into the country.