The blast occurred at 2:30 am local time (1830 GMT Nov 20) in Heilongjiang province, 10 km from Hegang City. Initial reports indicated that 139 were trapped.

Heilongjiang Longmay Mining Holding Group, the owner of the mine, said that around 528 miners were working at the time when the incident happened.

Vice premier Zhang Deijang will go to the mine and direct rescue operations.

China uses coal to generate much needed electricity, sharing 80% as source. The high demand caused too much pressure for the mines to produce coal triggering them to ignore safety procedures that increases chances of explosions to occur.

The country has a high death record from mines, factories and construction sites. Last year, around 3,200 died from the mines. However, the actual number could be higher as most coal mine explosions are covered up to avoid shutdowns.

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China Coal Mine Explosion Kills 31

Belgian Prime Minister Herman Van Rompuy was elected the very first permanent president of the European Union. He will assume the post on December 1, 2009 as mandated by the European Union Treaty of Lisbon. He will be chairing EU summits and coordinate meetings between the European governments.

Elected with him is British Baroness Catherine Margaret Ashton of Upholland as the first High Representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy.

The appointments were met with mixed reactions. Both are considered little, low-key figures. Van Rompuy has been prime minister for less than a year and he assumed the post after King Albert II asked him to form a new government after the 2007-2008 Belgian Political Crisis. Ashton never held an elected office before.

US President Barack Obama, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy all welcomed the appointments.

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair had been pursuing the EU President position but lost out his bid when current British Prime Minister Gordon Brown can’t find enough support for Blair.

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European Union’s First President Elected

One of Iraq’s Vice Presidents, Tariq Hashimi, vetoes a recently approved elections law putting a possible problem for the national elections to push through early next year. This will also put on hold the plans of the United States to withdraw its troops from the Middle East country.

Under Iraqi law, the president and its two vice presidents are entitled with the power to veto legislation. Under the Iraqi constitution, national elections should be conducted by the end of January.

Hashimi, a Sunni, made the move to demand that additional seats be provided to represent Iraqi refugees who had fled the country. The election law states that a given number of seats must be given to the minority, internally displaced nationals and refugees in other countries.

The election law was sent back to parliament. The parliament has been delayed in producing the law and is already in doubt on whether they can revise it in time.

The US under agreement with Baghdad needs to withdraw its troops by the end of 2011. US President Barack Obama wants the troops out by August. The withdrawal can only start after a national election occurs.

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Iraq’s 2010 National Elections in Trouble

Delta and its SkyTeam Alliance will offer Japan Airlines (JAL) $1 Billion to lure it away from American Airlines’ Oneworld Alliance.

JAL has asked the japanese government for financial aids for the fourth time since 2001. The airline has posted its third loss in four years. Japan’s transport minister already said that a court-led bankruptcy is still possible for the airline but Tokyo still refused to let that happen. JAL already cut jobs and routes to ease up its debt problems.

The financial lifeline offered by Delta consists of $500 million equity injection, a revenue guarantee worth 300 million dollars and 200 million dollars in asset-backed funding. A $20 million transition cost for changing alliances is also included.

American Airline is not putting this down without a fight. It has partnered with private equity group TPG to make a counter-proposal.

A transfer of alliance will cause a short-term disruption in US traffic air flows as the major hubs of American Airlines is in Chicago and Dallas while Delta is in Atlanta and Detroit.

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Delta to Offer $1 Billion to Japan Airlines

Transparency International released its 15th annual Corruption Perception Index (CPI) – a measure of domestic, public sector corruption with New Zealand winning as the least corrupt country in the world. The United States ranked 19th.

The CPI measures the perceived levels of public sector corruption in a given country and is a composite index, drawing on 13 different expert and business surveys. Countries are scored from 0 (perceived to be highly corrupt) to 10 (perceived to have low levels of corruption).

The top ten countries in order are: New Zealand, Denmark, Singapore, Sweden, Switzerland, Finland, Netherlands, Australia, Canada and Iceland. Scores of at least 9.0 reflect political stability, long-established conflict of interest regulations and solid, functioning public institutions. The top 5 countries scored at least 9.0.

Only 49 countries out of 180 (27%) had scores from 5.0 to 10.0. The report indicates that there is no region in the world where corruption does not exist. The general concern of the 2009 result is that corruption continues to lurk where opacity rules, where institutions still need strengthening and where governments have not implemented anti-corruption legal frameworks and that even highly industrialized countries still experience bribery.

Fragile, unstable states that are scarred by war and ongoing conflict linger at the bottom of the index. Somalia, Afghanistan, Myanmar, Sudan and Iraq are the countries at the bottom.

The complete list can be viewed here.

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New Zealand is the least corrupt nation

The mystery of how arsenic has widely spread in Bangladesh waters was finally solved. The culprit is the tens of thousands of man-made ponds that were designed to protect villagers from unclean and disease-ridden surface waters.

Researches made chemical tests and models to examine the flow of groundwater from a regular agricultural area in Bangladesh. They pointed to the man-made ponds. The study warned against the building of artificial ponds above existing tube wells. Drinking wells were also advised not to be placed downstream from existing ponds, wetlands or rivers.

Two million people from Bangladesh were estimated to have been poisoned from the arsenic drawn out from the tube wells found almost everywhere in the country.

Arsenic is a natural chemical that are poisonous to humans as it can bring skin lesions and cancer of the bladder, kidney, lung and skin.

Arsenic contamination can be found in other countries like Argentina, Chile, China, India, Mexico, Taiwan, Thailand and the United States.

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Man-Made Ponds Brought Poisonous Arsenic to Bangladesh Waters

Kosovo held its first elections since declaring itself as an independent nation. Kosovo broke away from Serbia last February 2008. Serbia refuses to recognize Kosovo as independent. The polls were generally peaceful.

Voter turnout exceeded the 45% expectations. Members of the ethnic Serbs community were visibly seen to have opted to join the polls despite calls from Belgrade, Serbia’s capital that they should not participate.

“Full success [of these elections] will reflect well on the country in the continuing process of Kosovo’s international recognition”, Prime Minister Hashim Thaci said. “This is a great step forward for the sovereign state.”

There were, however, rival ethnic parties issued allegations of fraud to the prime minister’s ruling party, the Democratic Party of Kosovo, by manipulating the commission handling the elections.

63 out of the 192 (32%) member states of the United Nations recognize Kosovo as independent. This includes Security Council permanent members United States, United Kingdom and France. Russia and China refused recognition. The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) already considered Kosovo as a member country.

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Kosovo holds First Election Since Disputed Independence

Google Street View, the famous Google product which showcases views of major cities of the world from the street is under attack again from an authority in Switzerland. Data protection commissioner Hanspeter Thuer wants Google to blur car plates and not take pictures of private compounds. He also wants Google to declare where they are planning to shoot pictures next 1 week in advance.

Google declined to comply and Mr Thuer was forced to take this matter to the Switzerland’s federal administrative tribunal.

‘We believe that Google Street View is absolutely legal, also in Switzerland.’ said a Google spokesman.

This Street View project has been under fire in several European countries like Britain and Germany the last several months. However, its sheer popularity and its usefulness seems to dominate the globe making it an unstoppable project.

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Google Street View – Under Attack Again

The 21 leaders from the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit had different results for discussed issues ranging from climate change to currencies.

The different heads of state assembled in Singapore believed that a legally binding agreement is not likely in Copenhagen next month. However, a political deal should be worked out. It was agreed that there is not enough time to make a legal binding agreement for reducing greenhouse gasses global emissions. After failing to meet targets in 1992 and 1997, a new objective to reduce the global emissions to half of the 1990 levels by the year 2050 was set.  This is the best decision that the leaders can think of despite declaring that climate change is one of the biggest global concerns.

At the business side, the summit attendees vowed to continue with the economic stimulus policies until recovery is guaranteed. However, they failed to make a reference for the currencies. Countries in Asia mostly rely on exports and are currently suffering on the decline of the US dollar and the Chinese yuan. The Americans and the Chinese are not willing to commit on a more balanced FX trading.

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APEC Leaders Agree on Climate Change, Disagree on Currencies

The 16-country Eurozone left the recession after Germany and France posted further growth during the third quarter. The news strengthened the Euro currency while the US Dollar lost ground against the other main currencies.

Germany and France improved for the second straight quarter, posting 0.7% and 0.3% respectively. Germany, France and Italy (0.6% growth), comprise about two-thirds of the aggregate output of the zone.

European Union statistic’s office Eurostat reported that the Eurozone’s growth was 4% while the 27-nation European Union had 2% growth.

The growth’s slowdown factor came from United Kingdom and Spain as both countries continue to struggle, dropping 4% and 3% respectively. Ireland, who declared national bankruptcy, is still in the negative value. Great Britain is not part of the Eurozone.

The United States economy posted at 3.5% increase signaling that it may be on the way out of recession.

Fears now move to a double-dip recession, which is the return to recession after a short-lived recovery. International Monetary Fund (IMF) chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn does not believe that however. He stated, “Our forecast has that, not only in the United States but also the rest of the world, 2010 will be a year of recovery.”

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Eurozone Exits Recession

US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton visited the Philippines to strengthen ties with the nation and to give help and support to victims of recent typhoon floods.

Clinton arrived in the Philippines Monday morning (US Tuesday evening).

She supported the government’s efforts to fight terrorism in the southern part of the country.  This is in support to her bid for the extension of the RP-US Visiting Forces Agreement. Under this agreement, the US military help train and equip Filipino soldiers. It was also cited that the agreement extends to more than military help as the US forces had a helping role during the latest typhoon floods.

Also, on one of her speeches, the former first lady took a swipe at corrupt governments. She said, “Corruption is corrosive in any society. When leaders enrich themselves at the expense of their people, when they put their own fortunes ahead of the fortune of their people, it has a very unfortunate impact – people don’t trust the government, they don’t rely on the government.”

She visited a local school in Manila that was badly affected by a recent typhoon where about 2000 cheering students waving US and Philippine flags greeted her. The school received books and other supplies from the US government.

The secretary also announced that the Philippines will receive an additional $5.2 million for flood assistance on top of the $14 million that the US government has already given.

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Clinton Visits Philippines to Give Support and Solidarity

A year after Japanese manufacturer Toyota took the number 1 spot as world’s largest automaker from General Motors, the crown was wrestled away and took in by German Volkswagen-Porsche (VW).

Owing to state-backed stimulus packages around the globe, VW produced 4.4 million vehicles compared to Toyota’s 4 million units. Since VW gained the crown by stimulus packages, analysts believe that the hold to the number ones spot may not last long. Toyota may move back again once those package deals run out not to mention that the production demands of Toyota is picking up again. Toyota has the capacity to produce 10 million units in a single year. The remaining edge of VW over Toyota after the packages dry up will be it’s huge sales in the Chinese market.

VW also reached the milestone after a forced take-over of Porsche earlier this year when the latter failed to take-over the former. Another contributing factor is the benefits garnered by VW in the clash-for-clunkers programs in Europe. These benefits may have been better than Toyota’s sales win over Volkswagen in the United States’ own car-swap program.

American General Motors was world number 1 three years ago, now sits third globally.

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Toyota Dethroned as World’s Largest Automaker

German national football team goalkeeper and probable World Cup 2010 starter Robert Enke was found dead. He was struck and killed by a train in Neustadt am Rubenburge close to a level crossing near his home on Tuesday. Initial investigation results show that it was a suicide. He was 32.

The two drivers of the train reported that they have seen a man in the tracks but were not able to stop the train in time that was running at about 100 mph.

The sportsman previously played for Hanover 96 in the German Bundesliga and had eight appearances with the national team.

Martin Kind, Hannover President who announced the death said that Enke appeared “unstable” lately. He and wife Teresa lost their two-year old daughter to a heart ailment in 2006 and was recently diagnosed with stomach bacteria.

It was widely considered that Enke would be starting as Goalkeeper for the German team, which recently qualified in the upcoming 2010 World Cup in South Africa.

Enke’s death may bring about the cancellation of a friendly match between Germany and Chile scheduled this Saturday. Meanwhile, fans flocked Hannover stadium and were laying flowers and lighting candles at the gates.

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Potential German World Cup Team Goalkeeper Found Dead

Geisy Arruda, the college student from Brazil who was expelled for wearing a short, pink dress to class in Bandeirante University in Sao Bernardo do Campo is no longer being expelled.

According to MSNBC reports, the private university where she was studying backed down Monday on its decision to expel her. This is after a flood of negative reactions across the globe ridiculing the said decision.

This might be or might not be good news for Geisy. It depends on her attitude towards the situation. If she takes this with an open mind, then I guess she can go her way and continue studying in the same university with peace of mind. On the other hand, if she thinks that people view her negatively at school then that might affect her studies for the worse.

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Geisy Arruda – No Longer Expelled?

Korean Peninsula

Naval forces of North Korea and South Korea exchanged fire at their west coast in the Yellow Sea at 11:28 AM local time (0228 GMT), November 10, 2009, Tuesday. South Korea’s Yonhap agency reported.

No casualties were initially reported but a North Korean boat was badly damaged.

A South Korean official was cited that North Korean ships crossed the boundary and that the South Korean ships fired warning shots. The North Korean ship continued sailing southwards and that is the time South Korean opened fire. The North Korean boat fired back.

The clash came eight days before a scheduled visit of US President Barack Obama in South Korea as part of his Asian tour.

The two Korean nations have disputed the actual water boundaries -known as the Northern Limit Line (NLL), between them. The Korean War, which paused in an armistice July 27, 1953, has not been officially ended though a treaty.

Previous skirmishes between the two nations occurred in 1999 and 2002. North Korean ships have also ventured into the South Korean waters. Four casualties and nine injuries were recorded in the 2002 conflict.

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North and South Korea Clash at Sea