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[OMEN]

An embassy boardroom in Bangkok has been revealed as the venue for an extraordinary gathering of United States and New Zealand officials to debate a new era in relations.

The gathering of defence, state department, coastguard, law enforcement and foreign affairs officials, held in secret at the New Zealand embassy early in 2006, came up with a plan called the "matrix process" to see whether both countries might be able to cooperate in more areas.

Since that meeting and others in Washington and Wellington, New Zealand defence personnel have served on US hospital ship Peleliu; a four-star general at first refused Pentagon permission to attend a conference in New Zealand has been allowed to make the trip; New Zealand SAS forces in Afghanistan have received a rare presidential citation; Prime Minister Helen Clark returned to the White House for a second time; and the waiver system that acted as a barrier to military training and exercises between the two countries for more than 20 years has been streamlined.

A retiring US defence attache and former nuclear submarine captain, Rick Martinez, has spoken about the gathering, revealing that it helped to "kick off" the new way of tackling issues, including cooperation in the Pacific.

Though both countries have agreed their long-standing differences over New Zealand's anti-nuclear legislation remain, the meeting came as they looked for ways to focus on other areas where they could agree.

Captain Martinez, who has served at the US embassy in Wellington for the past four years, was among the group of about 20 officials who met in Bangkok.

He said their political masters in Washington and Wellington had been fully briefed on the meeting and were supportive of it.

But it appears to have been organised quickly and his first notification of it was when a US embassy staff member in Wellington phoned him when he was already in Bangkok to advise that she was on her way over.

"It was just a big session, where we said, `Okay, we've never done anything like this, but if we're going to move forward in the relationship, what steps need to be taken on both sides?'

"So we called it the matrix process. Because it was just a table of events that needed to happen on both sides to start this process rolling."

US officials emphasised yesterday that "the matrix" process was a "historical reference", but said both countries were continuing to work together and look for ways to expand their cooperation.

Captain Martinez said that, when he arrived in Wellington in 2004, he was surprised to find the anti-nuclear issue was apparently still too raw for either country to put it to one side.

"It seemed that the relationship had essentially been stagnant for the last 20 years."

It also took a personal toll. He removed his daughters from a Wellington school because of anti-American sentiment.

But there had been a significant shift in attitudes on both sides, which had begun building momentum even before Bangkok.

"I think the conditions for change were already in the air ... It seemed like everyone wanted to move the relationship forward."

The Dominion Post

[OMEN]

Slovakia's leading daily newspapers have come out with blank front pages in protest at a two-day-old media law they say undermines press freedom.

The papers yesterday ran empty front pages apart from a call for the abolition of the law, which was approved despite condemnation from human rights groups and the media.

"The parliament approved a media law that is a gross interference into the freedom of the press and editorial independence," the newspapers said in the front page protest.

"We are appealing to the president, the constitutional court and international organisations to allow newspapers to continue serving their readers," they said.

Both broadsheet and tabloid dailies object chiefly to a clause that forces newspapers to run responses from people they have reported on, even if the published information is true.

The media fear they will be overwhelmed by politicians' requests to print their reactions.

The law also sparked a drawn-out fight over approval of the European Union's landmark treaty on institutional reform, as the opposition had threatened to block ratification of it unless Prime Minister Robert Fico toned down the bill.

Fico refused to accept the opposition's main demands, but eventually won support for the EU treaty after the ethnic Hungarian SMK party broke ranks with other opposition factions and helped the government push through the document on Thursday.

The media law awaits signature by President Ivan Gasparovic.

He has not made any comment on the law but he has had good relations with the Fico administration.

The country's union of publishers and some opposition parties said they would consider challenging the law either in Slovak or European courts.

Leftist leader Fico, who has clashed with the media since taking power in 2006 as most of them are critical of his welfare policies, rejected allegations that the law would offer limitless press access for politicians.

Fico has said the bill is only aimed at giving even chances to ordinary people whose reputation may suffer as the result of a published story.

The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, a rights and democracy watchdog, reiterated its earlier criticism of the law.

"I deeply regret the situation that the new Press Act will create for the Slovak media... Yesterday's vote offers politicians undue influence over the opinion content of all newspapers," said Miklos Haraszti, the OSCE's media freedom representative."

Reuters

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[OMEN]

Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama is trying to quell a political furore over his comments about small-town Pennsylvanians, saying he used the wrong words to describe their mood.

Democratic rival Hillary Clinton and Republican candidate John McCain kept the heat on the Illinois senator for his comments that small-town residents were bitter over job losses and turned in frustration to religion, guns and anti-immigrant sentiments.

Clinton, campaigning in Indiana ahead of the state's May 6 contest, said the comments were elitist, divisive and out of touch and did not reflect the values of Americans she met.

"I don't think it helps to divide our country into one America that is enlightened and one that is not," Clinton, a New York senator, said in Indianapolis. "If you want to be the president of all Americans, you need to respect all Americans."

Obama said he did not use the right language to describe the anger and frustration small-town residents feel about the struggling economy and the failure of government to help them.

"I said something that everybody knows is true, which is that there are a whole bunch of folks in small towns in Pennsylvania, in towns right here in Indiana, in my hometown in Illinois, who are bitter," Obama said in Muncie, Indiana.

"So I said well you know when you're bitter you turn to what you can count on. So people they vote about guns, or they take comfort from their faith and their family and their community," he said.

"Now, I didn't say it as well as I should have."

Obama touched off the controversy with his remarks at a closed San Francisco fundraiser earlier in the week. The remarks became public on Friday.

He said jobs have been disappearing in small towns in Pennsylvania and across the Midwest for 25 years with nothing to replace them.

"It's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations," he said.

The furore could threaten Obama's chances in Pennsylvania, which votes on April 22, the next big showdown in his fight with Clinton for the Democratic nomination to face McCain in November's presidential election.

Clinton once enjoyed a big lead in Pennsylvania polls but that has dwindled to about 4 to 6 points in a state that has struggled from job losses and has a large number of the blue-collar voters who have been Clinton's biggest backers.

Both Democratic candidates have campaigned for the support of working class families battling a shaky job market and a home foreclosure crisis.

Clinton visited a transmission assembly plant in Indianapolis that supplies US tanks to talk about her plans to rejuvenate defence industries. She later took a tour and met employees of a plant in Mishawaka, Indiana, that manufactures Humvees for the military.

Obama's comments "are not reflective of the values and beliefs of Americans," she said.

"Americans who believe in God believe it's a matter of personal faith. People embrace faith not because they are materially poor but because they are spiritually rich."

The Obama campaign accused Clinton of supporting special-interests that leave common workers behind.

"We won't be lectured on being out of touch by Sen. Clinton, who believes lobbyists represent real people and is awash in their money," said Obama spokesman Hari Sevugan.

Obama also came under fire from McCain's campaign.

"Barack Obama's elitism allows him to believe that the American traditions that have contributed to the identity and greatness of this country are actually just frustrations and bitterness," McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds said.

Indiana Sen Evan Bayh, a Clinton supporter, said the controversy could hurt Obama's effort to win over superdelegates, the Democratic Party insiders who are free to back any candidate at the August nominating convention and could decide the race.

Obama leads Clinton in pledged delegates won in state contests, but neither is likely to reach the 2024 needed for nomination without support of the nearly 800 superdelegates.

"It's a real potential political problem and it's something for superdelegates and voters to think about," Bayh said.

"We have to win the election in November and the far right wing has a real good track record of using things like this against our candidates," he said.

Reuters

[OMEN]

South African President Thabo Mbeki has played down concern over Zimbabwe's post-election impasse as regional leaders met in the Zambian capital to discuss fears that the deadlock could lead to violence.
Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa called the Southern African Development Community (SADC) summit on Saturday to discuss Zimbabwe after a chorus of international demands for President Robert Mugabe to release the result of the presidential poll held two weeks ago.

"SADC can no longer continue to stand by and do nothing when one of its members is experiencing political and economic difficulties," said Mwanawasa, the SADC chairman, when the summit opened.

Zimbabwe is experiencing a severe economic crisis and many of its people had hoped the election would draw a line under their deprivation and mark the start of a recovery.

Mugabe did not attend the summit, but denied his absence amounted to a snub to the other leaders.

Mwanawasa told the 14-nation body: "This summit should focus on helping Zimbabwe to find an answer that genuinely reflects the mood of the people."

But Mbeki, who has consistently favoured a softer line with Mugabe, said things were proceeding normally. "I wouldn't describe that as a crisis. It's a normal electoral process in Zimbabwe," Mbeki said after meeting Mugabe in Harare and before flying on to Lusaka.

"We have to wait for ZEC (Zimbabwe Electoral Commission) to release (the results)," Mbeki told reporters, echoing Mugabe's own stance on the unusually long delay in issuing the result

.

Reuters