IAEA TO OUTLINE FURTHER IRANIAN NUCLEAR PROGRESS
VIENNA: Iran is on the threshold of being able to significantly ramp up production at its most controversial nuclear plant, diplomats expect the United Nations nuclear agency to say in a new

report on Friday. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will outline that despite sanctions, Iran’s engineers have now fully fitted out the Fordo enrichment facility, dug into a mountain near the holy city of Qom, envoys said. The findings will likely be read with alarm in Israel, the Middle East’s sole if undeclared nuclear weapons state, which has refused to rule out bombing Iran to stop it from also getting the bomb. Fordo, which Iran only revealed the existence of to the IAEA in 2009, began operation in 2011, enriching uranium to 20 percent purities—close to the level needed for the fissile core of a nuclear weapon.

S. KOREA PRESIDENT’S SON TO FACE TAX PROBE
SEOUL: South Korean prosecutors said on Wednesday they would refer President Lee Myung-Bak’s only son to the tax authorities as they handed down indictments over a land deal for Lee’s retirement home. Although Lee Si-Hyung was not among the three people indicted, prosecutors said that his tax records would be checked for possible evasion of gift tax on funds that he received from family members to help purchase a plot for the home. The indictments followed a one-month investigation by special prosecutors into alleged irregularities in the purchase of a plot of land on the southern edge of Seoul. The land was to be used to build a retirement home for Lee, who will formally leave office in February having served the single presidential term allowed under the South Korean constitution.

HUNDREDS OF COBRAS SEIZED IN THAI CUSTOMS BUST
BANGKOK: Thai customs officers have seized hundreds of cobras being smuggled through the country for use in traditional medicine as a supposed sexual aid, an official said on Wednesday. The 600 deadly wild snakes were discovered in crates on a truck when it was stopped at a checkpoint in the south of the country. The cobras, worth an estimated $16,300, were destined to be used in traditional Chinese medicine, which holds that their blood and meat boosts sexual potency. The snakes had been smuggled in via the southern Thai border and were believed to be on their way through the kingdom and destined for neighboring countries, the official added.

LEAKED UN REPORT SAYS IT FAILED SRI LANKA WAR VICTIMS
COLOMBO: The United Nations (UN) failed to protect civilians and halt rights abuses during the end of Sri Lanka’s civil war, according to an internal review that triggered an angry response on Wednesday from the government. The leaked report said that the UN, under intense pressure from Sri Lankan authorities, did not make public that “a large majority” of deaths in the closing months of war in 2009 were caused by government shelling. It also said that the Sri Lankan government’s “stratagem of intimidation”—including control of visas for critical UN staff—prevented the UN from protecting civilians in the conflict zone.
AFP