Global News Journal
Beyond the World news headlines
The view from Iqaluit: mostly white
When we told Reuters editors we’d be adding plenty of color to the stories we’re putting together from a G7 finance meeting in the Canadian Arctic this weekend, there was a split second of bemused silence on the line. “I suppose that color is mostly white,” said one wag. And that just about sums up Iqaluit, which is clearly the remotest and most inaccessible place where the Group of Seven finance ministers and central bankers have ever met.
Iqaluit, for the geographically challenged, is a town of some 6,000 people about three hours flight from either Ottawa or Montreal. (Greenland might be closer but you would have to get to Greenland first.) At this time of year, the snow is everywhere — gray-white on the roads, blue-white in the shadows and a sort of yellow-white when the watery sun hits it full on. The temperature is a balmy -15C today (0F), although there’s a wind that bites right through you, and it’s chilly enough that you really don’t want to take your gloves off for more than one picture before your fingers start to freeze.
“It’s cold,” was all Bank of Japan Governor Masaaki Shirakawa told reporters when he arrived at his hotel, wearing a thick winter coat and a fur-lined hat. “I’m sure everyone will be feeling very alert and sharp because of this beautiful and cold weather,” IMF official John Lipsky added.
Today’s picture, from Thomson Reuters technical guru Joe Lukach, is a very far-off shot of the adventure of the day — a dogsledding party led by Canada’s Finance Minister Jim Flaherty for some of his guests. We took this one from the press center. We’ll post some close-up shots when we get them.
Criticise Italy at your peril!
Attacks on Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in the British press have hit an especially raw nerve as he hosts this year’s G8 summit and some Italian newspapers have had enough.
The summit has come at a particularly sensitive time for the beleaguered Italian leader, who has been dogged for weeks by salacious scandals involving allegations he has a soft spot for underage women and has entertained escort girls.
Quake tours, spartan rooms at no-frills G8 summit
Hiking through rubble-strewn streets, taking in a quake exhibit or bedding down in a concrete police compound — leaders at this week’s G8 summit in the Italian town of L’Aquila are in for a change of pace from the routine luxury spa and resort experience of past summits.****** Devastated by an April earthquake that killed nearly 300 people and ringed by tent camps with portable toilets, L’Aquila is a far cry from previous G8 host cities like the Baltic seaside town of Heiligendamm, French lakeside resort Evian and Scottish golf resort Gleneagles.******
****** ****** ****** ****** ****** ****** ****** ****** ****** U.S. President Barack Obama and other leaders are being housed in a grey police school building on the outskirts of the mountain town, where they are to stay in spartan rooms with granite floors and cream-coloured walls and furnished with little more than simlpe wooden beds with white sheets.****** “There won’t be the luxuries of hotels on (Sardinia’s) Emerald Coast or (Rome’s) Via Veneto, but there will be dignified accommodation worthy of welcoming such important people,” said Italy’s emergency services chief, Guido Bertolaso.****** Room service menus will be absent, but each room will be supplied with instructions on what to do in the event of another earthquake. Aftershocks have been persistent and plentiful in the run-up to the summit.****** In their free time, leaders can browse through an exhibit on “100 years of earthquakes” in Italy or take up Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s offer of a guided tour of areas laid to waste by the tremor, like Germany’s Angela Merkel did on Wednesday.******Earthquake victims have even welcomed leaders with a giant sign on a hill near the summit site declaring “Yes we camp” to protest the slow pace of reconstruction in the area.
****** ****** ****** ****** ****** ****** ****** ****** ****** ******For all the lack of luxury, L’Aquila does guarantee voters back home will see images of their leaders rolling up their sleeves under the hot Abruzzo sun at a time of recession and financial turmoil.****** “I think it’s better to have (the summit) in a damaged zone than in an ultra-touristy region where people are spending millions of dollars on their vacations, while the leaders are there to discuss solutions to the global economic crisis,” said Dimitri Soudas, spokesman for Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, ahead of the summit.****** Italy was initially set to host the annual summit of leaders from the world’s richest nations on the picturesque island of Sardinia, but hastily moved it to L’Aquila citing solidarity with victims when faced with complicated logistics and spiralling costs.****** One thing that won’t be lacking at the summit is fine Italian cuisine, since good food is not a luxury given up easily in Italy. Among the local delicacies on offer are goat on skewers, baby lamb, rabbit from the small town of Goriano Valli, artichokes from Prezza and red garlic from nearby Sulmona.
Steinbrueck admits long meetings hurt his rear end
It took only a few disarmingly pointed questions from four 7th grade Berlin students to get German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck to loosen up and deviate from the usual stock answers he – and fellow political leaders – serve up.
In perhaps his most candid public comments since taking office three years ago, Steinbrueck admitted long meetings cause his rear end to get sore and also compared deficit-spending just for consumption purposes to spending money on chocolate bars. He also said he doesn’t forget the names of journalists who write nasty comments about him. Here are a few of the more choice morsels from Steinbrueck’s interview in the Welt am Sonntag newspaper published on Sunday:
