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MILAN – Automaker Fiat Group SpA will walk away from a deal to take a 20-percent stake in Chrysler LLC if the U.S. automaker's unions don't agree to major cost cuts, Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne said in an interview published Wednesday. Fiat and Chrysler are up against an April 30 deadline for Fiat to take a stake in the failing U.S. automaker in exchange for small car technology, but Chrysler first needs concessions from creditors and unions to ink the Fiat deal. The Canadian Auto Workers union is scheduled to resume negotiations with Chrysler on Monday after a two-week hiatus,...

The Obama administration is abandoning the demand for the UAW to accept wage parity with transplant auto manufacturers. According to Bloomberg.com, Steven Rattner, the Treasury’s chief auto adviser said, GM and Chrysler must be “on a path” to bring wage rates in line with foreign automakers based in the U.S. rather than have those pay rates take effect immediately, he said. The phrase "on a path" is so vague there is now a mile wide loophole for the UAW to jump through. The Bush Administration demanded the UAW accept a wage and benefit package at the level of the transplant...

On 13 September 1993 in a public ceremony in the presence of PLO chairman Yasser Arafat, Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and US President Bill Clinton, with Mahmud Abbas signing for the Palestine Liberation Organization, foreign Minister Shimon Peres for the State of Israel, Secretary of State Warren Christopher for the United States and foreign minister Andrei Kozyrev for Russia, the Oslo Accords were signed The accords tied Israel to making one-sided concessions and tied the PLO to nothing. The Destruction of Israel is still called for in their charter and terrorism was formalized as a legitimate way of obtaining political...

The UAW has failed to give serious concessions to the Big Three as part of a deal to satisfy the terms of the automotive bailout. They have only offered token reductions that will mean very little to Detroit's bottom line. According to the Associated Press the UAW agreed to limit overtime, reduce cash bonuses, forgo cost of living pay increases and limit supplemental pay for laid-off workers. Are they serious? Who in the automotive manufacturing sector is working overtime now? Auto production is down almost 40% this year. Also, they are going to reduce their cash bonuses? How do you...

The bailout concessions sought by the "big three" may mean the death of the UAW. Reportedly, a tentative agreement has been reached to bring UAW union's wages and benefits in line with the transplants. Based on the UAW's history of delaying tactics, we will have to wait to see if this is true. The UAW has been trying to delay having any serious wage or benefit concessions take place until two or three years down the road. If that is what the current agreement is about, it is a sham. In two or three years, the auto market and economy...

(IsraelNN.com) Israeli diplomatic sources said Sunday that the American delegation was very surprised at the extent of Israeli concessions to the Fatah-controlled "Palestinian Authority" (PA) announced by Defense Minister Ehud Barak. However, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was quick to say that they were not enough, and vowed to monitor Israel's execution of its promises. The latest Israeli concessions to the PA in Judea and Samaria include permission for construction of two new Arab neighborhoods in the Ramallah area, with a total of 5,000 to 8,000 housing units. In addition, about 50 dirt roadblocks in Samaria will be removed, thus...

SH 130 Concession Company LLC finalized the legal details of a financial close with Texas DOT on a $1,360m toll concession to build SH130 segments 5&6 Thursday and Friday last week in bankers' offices in New York City - at Orrick, 666 Fifth Avenue. The actual money flows should occur on Thursday or Friday (Mar 13 or 14) this week, Jose Maria Lopez de Fuentes, president of Cintra North America, told us this morning. Hundreds of documents and over 20 lawyers were involved last week representing TxDOT, private equity people, banks, mostly European, the TIFIA loan group from FHWA, and...

SEOUL (AFP) — North Korea said Monday that the United States has decided to remove it from a list of states sponsoring terrorism -- a crucial step towards the normalisation of relations between the two countries. The US decision came at a weekend meeting between the chief nuclear negotiators of the two countries in Geneva, a foreign ministry spokesman told the official Korean Central News Agency. "Both sides discussed the issue of taking practical measures to neutralise the existing nuclear facilities in the DPRK (North Korea) within this year and agreed on them," the spokesman said. "In return for this...

Special Mideast envoy says Jerusalem must bolster Abbas, agree to release more prisoners and reopen Gaza crossings to prevent humanitarian crisis. ‘I would hope something would be done with regard to the illegal West Bank outposts,’ he adds AFP Published: 08.22.07, 20:50 / Israel News The UN special envoy to the Middle East urged Israel on Wednesday to take further measures to bolster Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas to sustain efforts to renew peace talks. Michael Williams also urged Israel to agree to reopen crossings into the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip in order to prevent a humanitarian crisis in the overcrowded and...

VIENNA, Austria - Iran has lifted its ban on visits to a nuclear facility by U.N. experts and now will allow them to inspect the site, the International Atomic Energy Agency said Friday. It also said Tehran was ready to answer key questions on past suspicious experiments that the international community fears could be linked to a weapons program. The IAEA — the U.N. nuclear monitor — said Iran promised the concessions earlier this week in meeting between its officials and a senior delegation from the Vienna-based agency. Years of Iranian stonewalling have left the IAEA unable to ascertain whether...

LONDON - Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says he is ready to make painful concessions after completing a plan to withdraw from parts of the West Bank and unilaterally draw Israel's borders with the Palestinians. "I am ready to make concessions that will be painful and divisive, the specific nature of which, the accurate aspect of all this will take place during the process of negotiations," he said in an interview to be aired on Sky Television Sunday at the start of his visit to Europe. "I'm not going to negotiate on television, but I'm ready to make these sacrifices...

During memorial for victims of terrorism, president calls on Islam leaders to fight terror President Moshe Katsav said during a memorial ceremony for Israel's fallen soldiers at Mount Herzl in Jerusalem that the fight for freedom has been going on for over a century. "We are managing a war for our existence for over 100 years. We've already gone down a significant part of the road, a large, historical journey, to settle the conflict. But it became clear to us that from the time we started making far-reaching compromises, out of a sincere and true aspiration for peace – that...

Among the Trans Texas Corridor's most fervent opponents are farmers and ranchers who are closely tied to family land. Many are like Susan Ridgeway Garry of Coupland, a small, rural community in the Austin area. "When you say the Trans Texas Corridor 'will be built on state land handed to investors,' you leave out an important step," she wrote. "It is not currently state land, it is Texas citizens' land, some of which has been in the same family for generations." Though they no longer farm, the Garrys live on land that has been in her husband's family for generations....

As Israel struggled Thursday to evacuate the Gush Katif settlements, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said it must take further steps. "Everyone empathizes with what the Israelis are facing," she said in an interview with The New York Times. But, she added, "It cannot be Gaza only." Rice said this is "really quite a dramatic moment in the history of the Middle East," and praised Sharon for proving himself "enormously courageous." According to the Times, Rice said that while the withdrawal would take several weeks, Israel must take further steps soon afterward, including loosening travel restrictions in the West...

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice scolded Sudan's government for failing to end bloodshed in the troubled region of Darfur but signaled a possible easing of US sanctions on humanitarian grounds. Rice had a round of talks with Khartoum leaders, demanded and got an apology for a dustup between her entourage and Sudanese security men, and visited battered Darfur. US officials said Rice made clear Washington would not improve ties with Sudan without a resolution of the crisis in Darfur, where up to 300,000 people have died in 29 months of fighting branded by Washington as genocide. "I told them...

There has been much talk about terrorism's "root causes" following last week's London bombings, but I have yet to hear anyone mention the most important cause of all: the fact that terrorism has thus far proven extremely effective – thereby encouraging the terrorists to continue. If you accept the West's formulation of the terrorists' goals, that may sound counterintuitive. The Israeli "occupation," for instance, could have ended in 2000, when Israel offered to uproot most settlements and establish a Palestinian state, with east Jerusalem as its capital, in some 97 percent of the territories. But since the Palestinians responded by...

On Saturday May 4th, the Associated Press quoted a source from U.S. intelligence and foreign allies who avowed havingg enough evidence to prove that several top Al Qaeda operatives are hiding in Iran - with the complicity of the Iranian government. If that is confirmed (and in part it already is), it will be a huge blow to the credibility of those who tell us that Shiite and Sunni fundamentalists could never collaborate with each other. This alliance of rivals has been built as a way to wage a "holy war" on the U.S., Israel and the democratic world at...

The Associated Press blares the headline that all conservatives have been dreading: “GOP Considers Dropping Personal Accounts.” The story begins, “Senate Republican leaders are considering whether to seek Democratic support for Social Security legislation without the personal accounts.” The story continues, “top Republicans discussed an approach under which they would effectively acquiesce in an attempt to test the waters for bipartisan legislation without personal accounts.” What would be included in such legislation? The story cites “extending the payroll tax beyond the current $90,000 in income” and “raising the retirement age.” It also refers to a proposal advanced by Sen. Robert...

FRANKENSTEIN'S PEACE musings #103 - March 3, 2005 The 22nd of Adar Alef Isralert.com source: Subscriber/commentator Batya Medad in Shiloh, Israel I’m assuming that you all know the classic story of Dr. Frankenstein, a great scientist who discovered the “secret of life” and decided to “create a man.” This morning as I was dovening Shacharit, the morning prayers, suddenly I noticed a phrase that appears in many, but this morning, it stood out. Baruch Atah …oseh shalom uvoray et hacol.” “Blessed are You…who makes peace and creates everything.” Then the phrase “Hu oseh shalom,” “ He makes peace” kept going...

JERUSALEM - Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Cabinet began charting Israel's future borders in a historic session Sunday, giving final approval to a withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and a revised route for the West Bank separation barrier that would move Israel's border closer to that of its original frontier. With the vote, an Israeli government agreed for the first time since capturing the West Bank and Gaza in the 1967 Mideast war to dismantle some of the dozens of Jewish settlements it has built there. However, approving the route of the barrier, Israel acted unilaterally on what was to be...