Due to a lack of commitment from those invited, Hands across the UK has been canceled

Suicide bomber kills 10 police cadets in Yemen, Al Qaeda blamed

Nineteen other cadets and police officers were injured in the attack, four of them critically, the embassy statement said.

A suicide bomber detonated an explosives-laden vest at the gates of a police academy in Yemen's capital, Sana, on Wednesday, killing 10 in the crowd of cadets headed out on weekend furloughs, the Yemeni Embassy in Washington announced.

In a statement condemning the "inhumane killings," Charge D'Affaires Adel Suneini blamed the attack on Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which security analysts now consider the most dangerous vestige of the terror network founded by the late Osama bin Laden.

The bomber, identified in a Yemeni Interior Ministry statement as Mohamed Nasher al-Uthy from Amran province, survived the detonation that blew off the lower part of his body but bled to death after being taken to a nearby hospital.

Yemeni government and security institutions have become frequent targets of Islamic militants who gained control of key coastal territory last year during an uprising against President Ali Abdullah Saleh. The former leader left the country earlier this year under a negotiated transition that in February brought to power President Abdo Rabbo Mansour Hadi, who has been cooperating with the United States and other Western forces to eradicate the terrorists' foothold in Yemen.

Militants killed a senior Yemeni intelligence officer in a car bombing last week, and the general in command of the operation against Al Qaeda was killed by a suicide bomber last month. A bombing at Sana's military parade grounds killed 96 soldiers during a ceremony on May 21.

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has been linked to the attempted bombing of a U.S. jetliner on Christmas Day 2009 and with plots to attack the U.S. Embassy in Sana.

Officials in Sana and Washington announced last month that Yemeni forces had recovered two strategic southern towns after weeks of fierce battles the officials claimed had "broken the strength of Al Qaeda." The recapture of the coastal town of Zinjibar, capital of Abyan province, and Jaar appeared to lessen the threat of the militants attacking vital shipping lanes from the Gulf of Aden to the Red Sea.

From the embassy in Washington, Suneini denounced the attack on the cadets in a cable to Yemen's president.

"Al Qaeda today is not only facing the military and security services but also the fury of the Yemeni public," the diplomat said in an apparent reference to the new leadership's commitment to wipe out the remnants of the insurgency.

China employs thousands of North Koreans

China is quietly inviting tens of thousands of North Korean guest workers into the country in a deal that will provide a cash infusion to help prop up a teetering regime with little more to export than the drudgery of a desperately poor population.

The deal, which has not been publicly announced by either Beijing or Pyongyang, would allow about 40,000 seamstresses, technicians, mechanics, construction workers and miners to work in China on industrial training visas, businesspeople and Korea analysts say. Most of the workers' earnings will go directly to the communist North Korean regime.

"The North Koreans can't export weapons anymore because of [international] sanctions, so they are using their people to raise cash," said Sohn Kyang-ju, a former South Korean intelligence official who now heads the Seoul-based NK Daily Unification Strategy Institute.

Although migrants from North Korea, as well as Vietnam, Myanmar and the Philippines, have worked illegally in China for years, it is unprecedented for Beijing to issue visas for unskilled and semi-skilled workers, several labor experts in China said. The deal, which provides workers for a region where China suffers no labor shortages, underscores how far Beijing is willing to go to support its potentially unstable protege.

Longtime leader Kim Jong Il died last year and was replaced by his son Kim Jong Un, who is in his late 20s.

"My gut feeling is that this is the beginning of a larger wave of North Korean workers coming in. It could be quite significant," said John Park, an academic who has written widely on North Korean-Chinese relations. "It will allow the North Koreans to piggyback on China's economic success to jump-start the economy under the new leadership."

Over the years, North Korea has exported smaller numbers of workers to far eastern Russia, where they work in logging and mining, as well as to Libya, Bulgaria, Saudi Arabia and Angola. Hundreds of young North Korean women used to work in garment and shoe factories in the Czech Republic, but their contracts were canceled because of European human rights activists' concern that they were virtually slave laborers.

The first North Korean workers under China's new program arrived a few months ago in Tumen, a sleepy town hugging the North Korean border.

"They are already here," said a Tumen-based businessman, who asked not to be quoted by name. He said he knew of 140 North Koreans who were working in an underwear factory in town.

Other workers were reported to be arriving in Dandong, a larger border city on the Yalu River, famed as the crossing point for Chinese Communist troops during the Korean War, and in Hunchun, a border town on a new road leading to the North Korean shipping port of Rason, where China is also developing port facilities.

Under the new arrangement, each North Korean worker should bring Pyongyang cash remittances of about $2,000 per year. Out of salaries of $200 to $300 per month, workers are likely to keep less than $50. Nevertheless, the jobs are considered a privilege because wages at home are well under $10 per month and food is scarce for many families, experts say.

The North Korean government "will make a very meticulous selection process. They will pick mostly people who are very loyal, with relatives in the Workers' Party, so they can be sure they will not run away, and they will be very tightly controlled while in China," said Kim So-yeol, a reporter with NK Daily, a specialty news service in Seoul. Workers also must be married.

Kim believes that the workers already agreed to are only the first wave and that as many as 120,000 will arrive this year.

North Korea already has a small number of workers in China at North Korean-government run restaurants where young women in traditional Korean gowns sing karaoke and grilled beef and nengmyon, a cold noodle specialty, are served. But most North Korean workers in China are illegal border crossers who do hard labor for $1 a day and bowls of rice.

The remittances from the sanctioned workers should help to make up for some of the cash flow Pyongyang has lost with the collapse of several South Korean-run projects, which had netted the regime hundreds of millions.

"Right now, the North Korean economy is practically bankrupt. In order to expand employment, they need to reform, but the leadership is unwilling. So they look overseas to earn money," said Park Hyeong-jung, a senior research fellow at the Korea Institute for National Unification.

As for the Chinese employers, Park said, "There are no better employees than North Koreans: They are obedient, efficient and cheap."

The labor deal has not been publicized by either government, both preternaturally secretive, especially when it comes to deals struck by their respective ruling parties. Another sensitivity is that the arrangement could be seen as violating the spirit, if not the letter, of U.N. sanctions against North Korea for its continued pursuit of nuclear weapons and long-range missiles.

The hiring of North Korean workers is not likely to be popular in China. A recent incident in which North Korean sailors hijacked three Chinese fishing boats infuriated many Chinese who believe their government is too indulgent of Pyongyang. And although many parts of China have labor shortages, the northeastern provinces don't.

The North Koreans "will be competing directly with local youths for job opportunities," said Zhang Lianggui, a North Korea expert at the Central Party School in Beijing.

Africa won the poll

Every week we will be doing a feature on an African country (each week different) there will be an extra page popping up for you to find them easily.

Saudi women urged again to flout driving ban

Women are being urged to get behind the wheel Sunday in Saudi Arabia to defy its driving ban. The protesters plan to hit the road more than a year after a Saudi woman sparked an uproar by sharing a video of herself driving online, leading to her arrest and a flood of condemnation.

"The struggle is not about driving a car, the struggle is about being in the driver’s seat of our own destiny, about being free not just to dream but free to live," Manal Sharif told the Oslo Freedom Forum last month, describing the attacks she had weathered since the video of her driving hit the Internet.

Saudi women took the wheel the same day last year -- June 17, 2011 -- in protest. This year, more than 700 people have signed a petition to King Abdullah asking for women to be allowed to drive. The Women2Drive campaign is also urging women who hold driver's licenses from abroad to take cars for a spin Sunday, and those who don't to flood the government with applications for licenses. Feminists outside of Saudi Arabia plan to drive to Saudi embassies and consulates and honk their horns.

There is no law against women driving in Saudi Arabia, but Saudi officials have declared it is banned. Driving has remained forbidden even as Saudi women have gained the right to vote and run for local office. Some women get around with the help of paid chauffeurs; others rely on male relatives for rides.

The rape of a Saudi woman, reportedly by her driver, stepped up the calls last summer to allow women to drive themselves. But so far, women are still stopped in Saudi Arabia for doing so.

Human rights activists say women who have tested the ban have been forced to sign pledges promising not to drive again. Sharif faced calls for her to be publicly flogged; another defiant driver, Sheima Jastaniah, was sentenced to 10 lashes last year, a punishment that was ultimately overturned.

"We merely request that any woman who needs to go about her daily business and does not have a man to help her be allowed to help herself," the Women2Drive petition says.

I am unable to post the video but if you want to watch it click here

New Firm Offers Training to Counter Terrorism

A new security firm in the country has started giving counter terrorism and marine techniques training to its security guards. XFOR security solutions which started operating in the country recently saw 49 security personnel come out with training in residential security, counter terrorism, anti-piracy and asset protection. The firm's CEO Gary Lincoln said the country is in need of highly trained security guards to help counter crime and improve security.

He said this is a time that the country is experiencing security threats hence a high degree of vigilance and security is needed. "We want to change the face of security guards in the country by making them professionals. We must have guards who are technically prepared to handle different special assignments with a different approach to security," said Lincoln.

He said out of the 49 guards who passed out yesterday, more than ten will go to London where they will assist in offering security services at the London Olympics. "We have organized for five percent of our guards who have received special training to go to London on a six month security project," Lincoln added. The company has also been organizing small arms and explosive awareness workshops to security managers of hotels at the coast. The CEO called on all security organs in the country to be on the high alert following the continued terror threats that have affected the country.

Military Team Meets With South African Counterparts

Military teams of Angola and South Africa are analysing since Tuesday, in Luanda, the state of co-operation and see the perspectives for the development of both countries' armed forces.

The teams are being led by the two countries' chiefs of Staff of the Armed Forces, namely Geraldo Sachipengo Nunda (Angola) and Solly Shoke (South Africa).

General Nunda said at the opening ceremony that the meeting is taking place under the co-operation protocol between the two governments in the military field.

He said that the meeting foresees to determine the actions that will be implemented and the interaction between the various sectors, as well as exchange experiences.

The talks will finish on Thursday with the signing of an official document, followed by the reading of a press communiqué.