don’t they have jaguars?

Srebrenica was a UN-mission under NATO-controll, so these soldiers were not operatings as blue berets. In normal fighting conditions, like here, they should have got the air support they requested, but something went wrong at NATO HQ.

I do think these peacekeepers will be quite effective. Actually, for peacekeeping mission operations, it doesn’t matter wheter you have a modern or good equipped army. Using too much force will cause reactions much like Somalia. These people didn’t attack because they were against Americans (they were so drogued they probably didn’t even know what America was), but because they were getting overwhelmed and didn’t know what peacekeepers were.

Russia helps fight Europe blazes

SAINTE-MAXIME, France — Russia is to send two helicopters to help douse devastating forest and brush fires along France’s Mediterranean coast and is considering dispatching water-dropping planes, officials said.

Two more of the fast moving forest fires on the French Riviera were brought under control overnight, an official told CNN, but firefighters remained on high alert because of the rising Mistral wind.

A 15-year old and two other boys were being questioned, officials said, after suspicion many of the blazes were arson. A 30-year old municipal worker rejected as a fireman has admitted setting fires but not those this week.

Fueled by a heat wave and the worst drought in a quarter of a century, the fires continued to threaten a swathe of Europe Thursday including south-eastern France, Corsica, Portugal and north-eastern Italy.

In Portugal two people died from fire injuries Wednesday, one caught trapped in his car by the advancing flames, bringing the Europe-wide death toll to seven.

In France five people have died in the blazes including four foreign tourists.

A Russian emergencies ministry spokesman said that two giant Mi-26 helicopters were undergoing final technical checks and would probably be sent to France Friday.

The craft, the biggest transport helicopters in the world, can carry 15 tonnes of water each and drop them on a precise point, ITAR-TASS quoted experts as saying.

It was the first time France had ask for foreign reinforcements to battle fires. Italy, Greece and Norway followed Italy and Russia in offering firefighters and equipment Wednesday.

On Thursday stunned vacationers on the French Riviera sorted through their blackened belongings while firefighters battled to contain the last of nearly 30 fires.

The blazes, fueled by parched undergrowth, transformed the picturesque and touristic region between Toulon and Nice into an ashen moonscape dotted with tree stumps.

Firefighters tackle a blaze outside Sainte-Maxime, southern France.
Near Salon-de-Provence, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) northwest of the port city of Marseille, nine firefighters were injured.

Up to 10,000 hectares (24,700 acres) of land have gone up in flames since the start of the Riviera infernos, making them the worst in a generation, fire officials said. Scores of homes have been damaged or destroyed, some 20,000 people temporarily evacuated.

A fire which since Tuesday destroyed 2,700 hectares of pinewood and brush around the town of La Motte in the hard-hit Var department was still burning but had been stabilized, officials said.

To the west in the Bouches-du-Rhone department a fire which broke out Wednesday near the town of Salon-de-Provence was brought under control during the night. The fire destroyed 500 hectares of woodland and seriously injured two firemen.

Temperatures remained high Thursday and, with forecasters predicting that the Mistral wind would pick up again during the day, emergency workers were on permanent stand-by.

Officials said that they were looking into arson as a possible cause of the blazes after soft drink bottles made into Molotov cocktails were found scattered in the region.

A 15-year-old was being questioned near Marseille Thursday after being seen acting suspiciously at the scene of a fire, and near Beziers in the Herault department to the west two boys were placed under judicial investigation after being spotted fleeing a fire on bicycles.

A 30-year-old municipal employee from the Var department, Stephane Jousse, was also placed under investigation Wednesday for arson after admitting starting several forest fires in July — though not the deadly outbreaks this week.

Arrested on Monday, Jousse was being held at the medical wing of a prison in Marseille as he underwent psychological tests. Police said he was aggrieved after failing to be taken on as a volunteer fireman.

Jousse faces 10 years in prison and a euro150,000-euro (US$170,000) fine if convicted.

The four who died in the fires in France included a 63-year-old British woman and her 15-year-old granddaughter, who were caught in the blazes which tore through the Maures mountain range near the village of Grimaud in the scenic Var region.

It is believed the pair were trying to escape the ferocious fires by car and became trapped in the La Garde-Freinet area. Their bodies were later found yards from their intact holiday home.

A Dutch woman and a Polish man were also killed in the French blazes.

Two people were killed in northern Portugal on Wednesday in a forest fire which has blazed out-of-control for more than three days in a rugged mountainous area, police and emergency services said.

The first victim, a man in his 60s, burned to death as he helped firefighters battle the fire which broke out Sunday afternoon in a mountainous region near Silvares, 260 kilometers (160 miles) north of Lisbon.

A second man was later found burned to death in his car near Povoa da Ribeirinha in the same area.

More than 500 firefighters and 600 soldiers were battling against steep terrain, strong easterly winds and temperatures which soar to nearly 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) during the day.

The firefighters, who have come from all over the country, are equipped with 145 vehicles, four helicopters and six fire-fighting planes, including two on loan from neighboring Spain.

In Croatia, a number of blazes raged near popular tourist destinations in the south of the country, devouring hundreds of acres of pine forest and olive groves.

Make sure you don’t get toasted like me. It hurts like hell!!! And don’t try to run 5km’s at 34 degrees. Had to stop after 3km’s and lay down on the ground.

And all enjoy another hot plakzak week.

Well, Europe is becoming a tropical region :). 36 degrees in Belgium (region around Antwerp), even in Lapland there are reports of temperatures up to 28 degrees!!! Enjoy the weather, drink a cool glass of water. No beer!

I do think the farmers, the firemen and the IT’s would rather have some rain. Our gov’t has already begun to warn people about the dangers of this kind of weather.

Vortex,

If a country wants to join the EU, it has to be a liberal democracy. We don’t force countries to become democracies, but once they’ve signed the papers and became member, they also have to fulfill their commitments. The EU is giving lots of benefits to these countries, mainly Italy and France, but then in turn, they should also respect the guidelines that are delivered with the EU-package, and that its that each member should be a liberal democracy. Otherwise, the EU would be even more uncontrollable, I hope you can understand that.

What would happen if the state of Texas one day wants to abandon democracy. Wouldn’t that upset the other states. Either way you look at it, Italy is becoming less and less of a democracy and this is worrying. I still think there’s a difference between being worried about some country because it’s losing some of its democratical principles and simply bombing it. We shouldn’t judge Italy on their foreign policy, but it’s their internal affairs that worry me. If one man controlls all media, parties of the majority, the parliament and now also has the power to fire judges he doesn’t like, isn’t that what we call a dictatorship?

Sauron,

I hope problems will be solved with a permanent president. We should have the best man on the best place. The annual EU-summits in each host-country are for example very expensive, and because politicians hide themselves behind an impressive police force, it seems like the EU itself is undemocratic. The only thing that’s undemocratic about the EU is the fact that the parliament doesn’t have much power, but all decissions are made by the national ministers instead of the elected EMP’s.
This should change with the constitution. Now we will have real laws and not just agreements between the individual gov’ts. Therefor, all summits should be held in Brussels for instance, and without the usual police commando’s. This would give a better image of the EU to its population. Ironically, Berlusconi is the first one who will hold his summits in Brussels rather than in Rome, but this has nothing to do with his Europhilia, but because he wants to avoid the foreign press and media broadcasting the thousands of unsatisfied Italians who will be protesting against him.

Admitted, there’s still some work to do in the Union. But a stable and democratic Italy is a necessairy thing, not some small problem which we are discussing now because there’s not much else news around. Even Eurosceptics admit that Berlusconi is a problem for Europe, not just for the EU as an institution. Otherwise such a Eurosceptic magazine like The Economist wouldn’t have started an initiative like this.

Regards,
Ben

Potemkin? Is that the one with the famous scene on the stairs in Odessa?