World

MOSCOW — Russia and Ukraine were to resume efforts to resolve a gas pricing dispute late on Tuesday after a Russian deadline for Kiev to pay some of its debts passed without Moscow cutting off supplies.

The gas dispute is at the heart of a crisis between Russia and Ukraine, and failing to resolve it would set back peace moves that are gaining momentum after weeks of violence in east Ukraine.

Russia gave Ukraine until 10am Moscow time (0600 GMT) on Tuesday to pay some of the billions of dollars it owes, but pulled back from the deadline after officials said talks brokered by the European Commission would continue in Brussels.

Russian energy ministry spokeswoman Olga Golant confirmed the Russian delegation was flying back to Brussels for evening talks after consultations with President Vladimir Putin in Moscow. The Russian leader will have the final say on any deal.

After annexing Crimea in March following the overthrow of Ukraine’s Moscow-leaning president, and facing unpredictable events in east Ukraine, Putin appears to have reason to reduce tension.

Ukraine looks poised to pay more of its debt, but talks have stalled on the price, threatening possible supply disruptions to the European Union, which gets about a third of its gas imports from Russia, almost half of it via Ukraine.

A source at Gazprom said Russia was supplying Ukraine with the usual volumes of gas and levels may have increased recently.

“Ukraine has been taking 112-115 million cubic metres a day, at a peak, as it pumps gas into storage facilities. Transit to Europe remains stable, at 200 million cubic metres per day,” the source said.

Talks between Russia, Ukraine and the European Commission have been going on while Kiev, Moscow and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe discuss peace proposals put forward by Ukraine’s new president, Petro Poroshenko.

Those talks have produced what Kiev says is a mutual understanding on key aspects of the peace plan, intended to end an insurrection by separatist rebels who want to join parts of Russian-speaking east Ukraine with Russia.

Disagreement on price mechanism

The talks, which ended early on Tuesday, faltered over the price Moscow would charge Kiev in future.

Ukraine wants to change the 2009 contract that locked Kiev into buying a set volume of gas, whether it needs it or not, at $485 per 1,000 cubic metres — the highest price paid by any customer in Europe.

Moscow dropped the price to $268.50 after Ukraine’s then-president Viktor Yanukovych turned his back on a trade and association agreement with the European Union last year, but reinstated the original price after he was ousted in February.

Ukrainian Energy Minister Yuri Prodan, who stayed in Brussels all day Tuesday, said the negotiations had stumbled over a Russian price mechanism proposal, which would link lower prices to an export duty.

Russia has floated the idea of scrapping its export duty for gas exports to Ukraine — $100 per 1,000 cubic metres, introduced after Moscow annexed Crimea — to reduce the price for the neighbouring country.

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said on Tuesday he had proposed “a very constructive plan, which we believe all stakeholders could and should accept”.

Moscow has said Ukraine must pay some of its debt before it can talk about price. Kiev paid off $786 million of its debts in late May and Russian officials have suggested it could pay off a $1.45 billion for November and December and a further $500 million as a part of a bill for April and May deliveries.

“The Russia-Ukraine gas tensions are not over yet, and will likely continue for a while, further threatening the stability and reliability of Russian gas transit to the EU via Ukraine,” analysts from Moscow-based Alfa bank said in a note.

KARACHI — Taliban gunmen attacked a security post outside Pakistan’s Karachi airport on Tuesday, a day after an all-night siege by the militants left 37 dead and shredded a tentative peace process.

The latest assault on the airport raised further questions about the authorities’ ability to secure key facilities in the face of a resurgent enemy, and came as air force jets pounded suspected militant hideouts in the northwest, killing 25 people.

The attack on the security post targeted an entry point to an Airport Security Force (ASF) camp 500 metres from the airport’s main premises, and around a kilometre from the passenger terminal.

Police, paramilitary rangers and army all raced to the site but officials reported there had been no casualties and they had not traded fire with the militants.

“Two people came towards the ASF [Airport Security Force] checkpost and started firing,” Colonel Tahir Ali, a spokesman for the force told reporters. “Nobody has been killed or injured,” he added.

Army spokesman Major General Asim Bajwa confirmed the incident was over, but said three to four assailants were involved.

“Three-four terrorists fired near ASF camp, ran away. No breach of fence, no entry. Chase is on, situation under control,” he tweeted.

Flights resumed after temporarily being suspended for the second time in as many days, Abid Qaimkhani, a spokesman for the Civil Aviation Authority, told AFP.

A senior rangers official at the scene who wished to remain anonymous said the gunmen may have fled to a nearby shanty settlement.

“We are chasing them, we will get them, its not easy to hide here, there are no buildings, no population except for two small shanty towns nearby,” he told AFP.

The Taliban later claimed responsibility for the attack, saying they were in response to air strikes in the tribal areas.

“Today’s attack on ASF [Airport Security Force] in Karachi is in response to the bombardment on innocent people in Tirah Valley and other tribal areas. We will continue such attacks,” spokesman Shahidullah Shahid said, referring to Pakistani air strikes of suspected militant hideouts.

Air strikes 

Earlier in the morning, Pakistani jets launched air strikes on a militant-infested tribal district in apparent retaliation for Monday’s siege.

The military said nine “terrorist hideouts” were destroyed in the raids, launched after the Taliban stormed Pakistan’s biggest airport, killing 37 people in an all-night battle that ended Monday.

The dramatic siege by heavily armed militants targeting Pakistan’s economic hub piled pressure on the government to act.

The strikes were the latest in a succession of attacks carried out by the Pakistani military in the tribal belt this year after talks with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) broke down.

The last was in North Waziristan in late May, killing at least 75 people and triggering an exodus of some 58,000 people — half of them in the past few days in fear of a ground offensive that has been anticipated for years.

The military’s death toll from Tuesday’s strikes, in the restive Tirah Valley area of Khyber tribal district, could not be independently verified. The district was also targeted in April, with aerial bombing that killed dozens.

Resurgent Taliban 

Pakistan entered into talks with the Taliban in February and agreed upon a ceasefire in March, which broke down a month later.

Hasan Askari, an analyst, said the talks period had allowed the Taliban to gather their strength while the government dithered over what to do.

“The Taliban are very clear so far as their targets are concerned —they want to humble the Pakistani state and they are striving for it,” he said.

“They re-grouped themselves during the last couple of months as the talks process continued and they can do these things for the next couple of weeks and then they will need time to regroup again,” he added.

Many observers believe the peace process is dead and that the government must now take more strident measures, including attacking the Taliban’s North Waziristan stronghold.

An offensive there has been long rumoured but analysts say it is unclear if the military has the ability to carry out the operation without assistance from the Afghan side of the border where militants are likely to flee in the event of an attack.

The civilian exodus from the region has been fuelled by a leaflet distributed last week by local warlord Hafiz Gul Bahadur, who is seen as friendly to Pakistan while concentrating his attacks on NATO forces in neighbouring Afghanistan.

Bahadur’s leaflet told residents to leave their homes because the government was likely to begin an offensive, and included a veiled threat to join hands with the TTP if the government did not agree to end air strikes there.

KARACHI — Twenty-eight people were killed as Pakistan’s military fought an all-night battle Monday with Taliban gunmen who besieged Karachi airport armed with rocket launchers and suicide vests, leaving a nascent peace process in tatters.

Ten militants were among the dead, officials said, as Pakistan’s biggest city witnessed a return of the kind of spectacular offensive waged before by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) during an insurgency that has claimed thousands of lives since 2007.

The attack at Karachi’s Jinnah International Airport began just before midnight Sunday. At around dawn, the military said that all 10 attackers had been killed.

Some of the gunmen were dressed in army uniform, as authorities put their mangled bodies, assault rifles, grenades and rocket launchers on show for the press. At least three blew up their suicide vests, witnesses said, and one severed head formed part of the grisly display.

But after authorities initially declared the airport cleared around dawn, an AFP reporter witnessed fresh gunfire break out inside the airport — where explosions and fires had erupted during the night — prompting security forces to relaunch the operation.

“The attack is over and we have cleared the area of all militants,” a spokesman for the paramilitary Rangers, Sibtain Rizvi, told reporters later after nearly 12 hours of fighting in all.

The bodies of the 18 victims of the Taliban assault — including 11 airport security guards and four workers from Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) — were taken to a Karachi hospital where another 26 wounded people were being treated, a hospital official said.

After the siege, some 50 Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) and PIA employees who had been trapped inside the building all night were seen leaving. PIA spokesman Mashud Tajwar said no airline passengers were caught up in the incident.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s office issued a statement “commending the bravery” of security forces and saying normal flight operations would resume in the afternoon, while Afghan President Hamid Karzai — who is battling his own Taliban insurgency — condemned the attack in a statement.

The airport remained on high alert late Monday with military patrolling the area as engineers carry out inspections on planes before outbound flights resume, a CAA official said.

Latest revenge 

The TTP said the brazen attack was its latest revenge for its late leader Hakimullah Mehsud, who was killed in a US drone strike in November.

TTP spokesman Shahidullah Shahid said the Pakistani government had used peace talks as a ruse and promised more attacks to come in retaliation against recent air strikes in the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.

A statement later issued by the group said the targets were selected “to have minimum public loss and maximum loss of government personnel”, implying the TTP had not planned to attack any planes on the airport tarmac.

Talks to end the TTP’s bloody seven-year insurgency in Pakistan have been under way since February, after Sharif returned to power last year, but little clear progress has resulted and more than 300 people have been killed in militant strikes since then.

The assault will raise fresh concerns about Pakistan’s shaky security situation and questions about how militants were able to penetrate the airport, which serves one of the world’s biggest cities.

KIEV — Ukraine launched delicate dual-track diplomatic negotiations with Russia on Monday aimed at averting a debilitating gas cut and ending a bloody separatist insurgency by the end of the week.

The meetings in Brussels and Kiev throw down an immediate challenge to new Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko’s European commitment, and vow to preserve the territorial integrity of the splintered ex-Soviet state.

The 48-year-old confectionery tycoon and political veteran promised late Sunday to end fighting “this week” in Ukraine’s economically vital eastern rustbelt that has claimed more than 200 lives.

And he affirmed after being sworn in as Ukraine’s fifth president on Saturday that Kiev would sign a historic pact with the European Union that would finally wrest it out of Russia’s orbit.

But the eight-week insurgency that Kiev and the West accuse Russia of orchestrating rages unabated.

Ukrainian defence sources told AFP that militants had staged a wave of failed attacks on the international airport in the Russian border city of Lugansk after briefly seizing its counterpart in neighbouring Donetsk late last month.

Intense artillery fire and air bombardments also continued in the rebel Donetsk region stronghold of Slavyansk — an industrial city of 120,000 where many have been sheltering in basements for weeks.

The Ukrainian army also said pro-Russian gunmen had taken several of its soldiers prisoner overnight.

“Some were out in the field, but others were abducted,” military spokesman Vladyslav Seleznyov wrote in a Facebook post.

“We are still learning the details of everything that happened.”

Gas deal ‘highly likely’ 

The EU-mediated gas talks in Brussels come on the eve of a Russian deadline for Ukraine to cover a debt of nearly $4.4 billion (3.2 billion euros) or have its shipments end on Wednesday.

About 15 per cent of Europe’s gas from Russia transits through Ukraine — a dependence that EU nations have been trying to limit ever since suffering similar disruptions in 2006 and 2009.

But analysts said the fuel freeze would also deal a bruising blow to a Ukrainian economy that the IMF already expects to contract by five percent this year.

Ukraine has refused to pay the bills in protest at Russia’s decision to nearly double its neighbour’s rates in the wake of the February ouster of Kiev’s Kremlin-backed president.

Sources said the pressure on all sides to agree greatly boosted the chances of a compromise.

“There is a high likelihood that this really will be the final meeting at which we expect to agree on a schedule of payments for the already delivered gas,” a Russian source close to the negotiations told Moscow’s Vedomosti business daily.

An unnamed Ukrainian official said he expected Kiev’s Naftogaz state energy holding to make an immediate payment of $1 billion (730 million euros) for gas it received in the last two months of last year.

“Another $451 million may be paid in the near future,” the Ukrainian source told the daily.

“And for April and May, we expect an initial payment of $500 million.”

Moscow’s VTB Capital investment bank said the price for future deliveries would probably hover around $360 per thousand cubic metres of gas — a sum about halfway between Russia’s old price and the one set after the rise to power of the new pro-Western authorities.

‘End fighting this week’ 

Poroshenko conceded upon taking the oath of office that the eastern uprising could not be resolved without the direct involvement of Russia.

The two sides conducted the first of what the Ukrainian leader said should be daily negotiations on Sunday involving a representative from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe — a Vienna-based body that was first tasked with securing peace during the Cold War.

Poroshenko affirmed after that meeting that “we must end the fighting this week”.

Ukraine’s acting Defence Minister Mykhailo Koval said on Monday that Poroshenko’s peace push “instills great hope that wise steps will be taken shortly that let the residents of eastern Ukraine live in peace”.

But the president’s pledge was dismissed as political grandstanding by separatists who have taken effective control of a dozen towns and cities, and are now seeking a formal invitation to join Russia.

“We are continuing to mobilise, preparing volunteers for the defence of Donetsk,” the region’s self-proclaimed deputy premier Andriy Purgin told Russia’s Interfax news agency.

And Poroshenko himself did not spell out how he intended to make the gunmen comply with the ceasefire or whether he would order a full military withdrawal.

Some analysts said the hurdles facing Poroshenko’s presidency were too daunting to quickly surmount.

“Ukraine’s new president has inherited considerable political and economic problems, which are more likely to worsen than improve in 2014,” said Chris Weafer of Moscow’s Macro Advisory consultancy.

WASHINGTON — Hillary Clinton embarks this week on her most high-profile tour since leaving the State Department, a cross-country bonanza where the American public and media will focus as much on her political future as her past.

Of course, she is hawking her new memoir too. “Hard Choices,” which details her four-year tenure as President Barack Obama’s first secretary of state, hits bookshelves Tuesday and is the rationale for the publicity blitz.

But the optics of Clinton’s weeks long book tour, when she comes face to face with voters and refreshes some of the skills she has not used as much since leaving public office last year, unavoidably suggest the opening salvo of a 2016 presidential run.

Team Hillary has spent months carefully crafting a systematic rollout of the most anticipated book of the year, teasing the Beltway press corps with excerpts about her response to the deadly attacks in Benghazi and how America remains the “indispensable nation”.

Along the way, the former first lady has kept up a frenetic pace of speeches and television interviews, a whirlwind that will only intensify beginning Monday with a one-hour interview with ABC News, followed by a swarm of book-related events in places like New York, Chicago and even Canada.

Amid the battle by US networks for on-air interviews, Clinton has scheduled speeches in Philadelphia and Kansas City, a townhall in Washington, a book-signing event at a Virginia Costco and a “conversation” in Austin, Texas, among several other appearances in June.

The woman who narrowly lost the 2008 Democratic nomination to Obama has even agreed to a sit-down interview with Fox News, hardly the friendliest of media outlets for Clinton.

Would someone not interested in the world’s top job really be putting herself through such paces?

“Obviously, she’s getting ready to run for president, [and] she well knows that everything she does is a step in the direction of that goal,” University of Michigan assistant professor, Michael Heaney, told AFP.

‘Safe Choices’ 

One of those steps is publishing a memoir that is less a tell-all and more a series of cautious revelations about her time as chief US diplomat.

It is also a reactive and pre-emptive strike against her Republican critics.

The memoir touches on the Iraq war — she called her 2002 Senate vote authorising it a “mistake” — the deadly attack on the US mission in Benghazi, Washington’s shaky Kremlin ties and Russia’s invasion of neighbouring Ukraine.

She also tactfully put some distance between herself and Obama, writing that she favoured arming rebels early in Syria’s civil war. Obama resisted.

“No one likes to lose a debate, including me. But this was the president’s call,” she wrote, according to CBS News, which obtained an early copy of the book.

She peppered her memoir with personal tales, including husband Bill Clinton’s emotional first dance with their daughter Chelsea at her wedding.

With Clinton only handing in her manuscript on April 23, the memoir includes passages that seem pulled from recent headlines, including criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s aggression in Ukraine.

She also addresses her mulling the 2011 negotiations with the Taliban over a US soldier who coincidentally was released last weekend as part of a controversial exchange for five Taliban officials held at Guantanamo.

But “Hard Choices” shares little gossip, and does not shed much light on the inner workings of an administration contending with a dangerous world. “Safe Choices” is how Slate magazine described it.

“No politician is going to write a tell-all book if they think they’re going to have to face the voters again,” said Jennifer Lawless, a professor of government at American University.

Its publication provides “a venue for her to now start travelling across the country and dipping her toe back in the water, and meeting voters and talking to people”.

As for whether Clinton will seek the White House, the former first lady has said she will make her decision this year.

“Will I run for president in 2016?” she writes in her memoir. “The answer is, I haven’t decided yet.”

KIEV — Ukraine’s new Western-backed President Petro Poroshenko got down on Sunday to the Herculean task of pacifying a deadly pro-Kremlin insurgency and averting a devastating Russian gas cut.

The 48-year-old candy magnate — dubbed the “chocolate king” — delivered a forceful inauguration address the day before in which he vowed to pursue Ukraine’s new pro-European course and never to accept Russia’s annexation of Crimea.

He flatly rejected dialogue with “gangsters and killers” who have declared independence in two heavily Russified eastern regions, and are waging a bloody campaign against Ukrainian forces that Kiev and the West accuse the Kremlin of choreographing.

Europe’s worst security crisis in decades has now plunged East-West relations into a Cold War-style stand-off, and left the ex-Soviet country of 46 million facing disintegration and economic collapse.

Daily battles in the economically vital region have killed more than 200 people since mid-April and continued unabated on Sunday.

A Ukrainian military source told AFP that gunmen had staged a series of unsuccessful raids late Saturday and early Sunday on an airport in the Russian-border city of Lugansk.

The source said Ukrainian forces suffered no casualties but could not say if any militants had been killed.

“It is the first time we have had an attack of this kind,” the soldier said by telephone.

The insurgents lost more than 40 fighters — most of them Russian nationals — while briefly seizing the main international hub in the neighbouring industrial city of Donetsk in late May.

Ukrainian media also reported intense fighting involving mortar fire and air assaults being waged in the region’s rebel stronghold of Slavyansk.

Yet the outlines of a possible solution to the crisis seemed in evidence on Friday when Russian President Vladimir Putin, nudged by German Chancellor Angela Merkel, held what he described as a brief but “very positive” meeting with Poroshenko during D-Day commemorations in France.

Putin appeared to respond to US pressure on Saturday by demanding extra protection of Russia’s western border in order to stem the flow of militants and weapons into Ukraine.

The seeming shift in Putin’s aggressive approach prompted Poroshenko to indicate he might receive a top Russian envoy for talks on Sunday.

Such direct discussions have been strongly promoted by both Merkel and US President Barack Obama but previously rejected by Putin.

“There can only... be real progress when there are direct, substantial talks between Moscow and Kiev,” German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told Sunday’s edition of Berlin’s Tagesspiegel daily.

“That will be our message when [Polish Foreign Minister] Radoslaw Sikorski and I speak with the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Saint Petersburg on Tuesday,” Steinmeier said.

But the Kremlin refused to confirm the meeting and no Moscow negotiator was known to have arrived in Kiev by Sunday evening.

Russian gas threat 

Ukraine won a vital reprieve last week when Russia pushed back until Tuesday an ultimatum for Kiev to deliver billions of dollars in overdue payments or see its fuel supplies cut.

Two decades of economic mismanagement and several months of acute crisis have left Kiev struggling to meet its commitments. Its economy last year plunged into its second recession since 2009.

But Moscow demanded immediate payment after stripping Ukraine of price discounts it had awarded the ousted pro-Kremlin regime — a decision denounced by the new Kiev leaders as a form of “economic aggression”.

About 15 per cent of Europe’s gas from Russia transits through Ukraine and neighbouring countries are deeply concerned about a repeat of interruptions that took place in 2006 and 2009.

A top EU envoy is now urgently seeking a compromise that could save 18 member states from seeing their deliveries start dwindling this week.

The Russian energy ministry said the final round of EU-mediated talks will be held on Monday evening in Brussels.

Russia’s seizure of Crimea in March set off a wave of nationalistic fervour that saw Putin’s approval rating hit 80 per cent.

But the threat of further economic sanctions and a stampede by Western investors from Russia have also drawn questions about the long-term costs of Putin’s combative stance.

“With his Ukrainian escapade, Vladimir Putin embroiled the entire country in a reckless geopolitical game, making the Russian people hostage to his own ambitions,” former Russian prime minister and heavy Putin critic Mikhail Kasyanov wrote in a blog post.

“The game is over, and Putin’s primary job now is to minimise his political losses and save face.”

Recent studies conducted in Ukraine’s eastern rustbelt also show a majority opposing independence or an outright merger with Russia.

Poroshenko was the top vote-getter in both the Donetsk and Lugansk districts despite his vow to use force if necessary to keep Ukraine whole.

“As strange as it may seem, it is these very imperialistic ambitions of Putin that made the people of Ukraine start to increasingly demonstrate the unity of a hardened nation,” respected military analyst Valentyn Badrak wrote in Kiev’s Dzerkalo Tyzhnia weekly.

He added that Poroshenko’s promise to quickly crush the insurgency may only further weaken Putin’s hand.

“One theory says that the Kremlin leader’s compliance directly depends on Kiev’s military success,” Tyzhnia wrote.

BANGKOK — Cheer up, Thailand. That’s an order.

The military junta that seized power here last month has no plans to restore civilian rule any time soon. But it has launched an official campaign to bring back something else it says this divided nation desperately needs — happiness.

The project has involved free concerts, free food, alluring female dancers in suggestive camouflage miniskirts, even the chance to pet horses trucked into downtown Bangkok with makeshift stables and bales of hay. The fair-like events are supposed to pave the way for reconciliation after a decade of political upheaval and coups.

But critics point out the feel-good project is being carried out alongside an entirely different junta-led campaign — an effort to stifle all opposition to the army’s May 22 putsch, which deposed a government elected by a majority of Thai voters three years ago.

“The very first question you have to ask is, whose happiness are they talking about?” said Pavin Chachavalpongpun, a Thai professor of Southeast Asian studies at Kyoto University who has refused to respond to a junta summons ordering him to return home and report to the army.

“I’m sure this is not happiness for Thais who want a civilian government, whose rights were taken away by the coup,” he said. “It’s surreal. And it’s ridiculous to believe this will create an environment conducive to reconciliation. That can’t happen when the military is harassing, hunting and detaining its enemies.”

Last month’s coup, the 12th in Thailand since the end of absolute monarchy in 1932, ousted a civilian government accused of abuse of power and corruption that had increasingly been cornered by protesters, the courts, and finally the army.

The junta says it had to restore order after half a year of political turmoil left dozens dead and the government paralysed. And it insists it will be a neutral arbiter. But since taking power, the army appears to be carrying on the fight of the anti-government protesters by mapping out a similar agenda to redraft the constitution and institute political reforms before elections, and going after politicians from the grassroots “Red Shirt” movement that had vowed to take action if there was a coup.

Although the junta has censored partisan media on both sides, it has begun prosecuting opponents and summoned hundreds of politicians — mostly those who supported the former government or were perceived as critical. The moves have forced some of the nation’s most prominent activists and scholars to flee or go into hiding.

Deputy army spokesman Col. Weerachon Sukondhapatipak said the clampdown was necessary because “if you let people talk at the moment, they will talk with emotion, they will be very critical”.

The aim of the project, dubbed “Return Happiness to the People” by the military, is to get people “to relax”, he said. “We’re trying to create an atmosphere to gain trust and build confidence. That is the plan.”

And the junta is serious about it.

The weekly radio address of military ruler Gen. Prayuth Chan-ocha is now titled, “Bringing Back Happiness to the Nation.” It is also now prefaced with a new song Prayuth commissioned called “Return Happiness to Thailand.”

At a junta-sponsored event on Wednesday in Bangkok — part concert, part street fair — an army truck operating as a mobile kitchen dished out thousands of free “Happy Omelets and Rice”. Doctors from a military hospital gave out free medicine and checked blood pressure. A line of soldiers with shields and face paint stood ready for crowds to snap selfies.

The event drew mostly residents who supported the takeover, and it took place at a roundabout where just a few days earlier soldiers in riot gear had faced off against hundreds of anti-junta protesters.

“Some people may not be happy with the coup, but they have to accept what has happened and live in the moment,” said Kanyapak Deedar, a 32-year-old airline employee who stood swaying on a blue plastic chair as a Royal Thai Army rock band with drums, guitars and saxophones entertained the crowd.

“Not everyone can be satisfied,” she said. “But the soldiers have restored order... and it’s time to move on.”

Similar events have been held in Bangkok and elsewhere, with music and free haircuts, and there are plans for more.

Weerachon said the events would preface the establishment, in every province, of official “reconciliation centres” in coming weeks. Precise plans are still being drawn up, but he said the centres would enable people to come together voluntarily in a calm environment to discuss the nation’s problems.

“We are not forcing happiness. We are asking for cooperation,” Weerachon said. “We believe this is a time for healing and we must listen to one another and understand. We realise our society has been divided for quite some time.”

A satirical cartoon this week in The Nation, an English-language newspaper in Thailand, portrayed the junta campaign this way: A lone anti-coup protester stands in front of a line of smiling tanks reminiscent of the iconic photo from Tiananmen Square in 1989. As two undercover policemen drag an anti-coup demonstrator into a taxi — a reference to a recent, real-life incident in Bangkok — a smiling tank commander shouts through a mega-phone: “Unhappiness will not be tolerated!”

Thailand has been deeply split for nearly a decade. On one side is an elite, royalist establishment based in Bangkok and the south that can no longer win elections and says the democratic process had been subverted by “the tyranny of the majority”. On the other side is a poorer majority centred in the north and northeast that has watched the governments it has voted into office ousted again and again — by coups and controversial court verdicts.

Prayuth, the military ruler, said the divide forced him to take power last month. “We were unhappy, so I had to ask myself, ‘Can we let this continue’?”

“We tried everything to resolve the problems through peaceful means. Nothing was successful,” he said. “What we are doing today is to try and bring everything back to normal. We intend to return happiness to everyone.”

KIEV — Western-backed tycoon Petro Poroshenko vowed Saturday to avert civil war and mend ties with Russia after being sworn in as Ukraine’s fifth post-Soviet president with the nation facing disintegration and economic collapse.

Poroshenko took the oath of office one day after holding his first meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin since a May 25 election victory entrusted him with taming a bloody crisis that has shaken the post-Cold War order and redrawn Europe’s map.

The 48-year-old candy magnate — dubbed the “chocolate king” — first asked a packed session of parliament to observe a minute of silence for the 100 people killed in three days of carnage in Kiev that led to the February ouster of Ukraine’s Kremlin-backed regime.

The self-made billionaire then vowed to grant amnesty any insurgents who had “no blood on their hands” as the first step in a peace initiative designed to save the nation of 46 million — whose Crimea peninsula was annexed by Russia in March — from fracturing further along ethnic lines.

“I am assuming the presidency in order to preserve and strengthen Ukraine’s unity,” Poroshenko said, alternately speaking Ukrainian and Russian.

“The citizens of Ukraine will never feel the blessing of peace and security until we resolve our relations with Russia,” he added.

But Poroshenko also said he would never accept Russia’s seizure of Crimea or attempts to divert Ukraine’s pro-European course.

US Secretary of State John Kerry voiced hope that Putin’s first talks with a Ukrainian leader since the Kiev uprising heralded an easing of the standoff that has also unsettled eastern Europe’s ex-Soviet satellite states.

“I hope that in the next few days we can see some steps taken that will reduce the tensions,” Kerry told reporters in France.

“I’m confident there are ways forward,” he added. “We look for Russia’s help, and our hope is that we won’t have to move to more serious sanctions and other steps.”

But separatist commanders whom the West accuses Russia of openly backing dismissed Poroshenko’s presidency as illegitimate.

“He is the president of another country,” the self-styled prime minister of the “Donetsk People’s Republic” told Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency.

Thankless job 

Poroshenko is one of Ukraine’s more experienced politicians who held senior Cabinet posts under both the Western-leaning government that followed Ukraine’s 2004 Orange Revolution and the Moscow-friendly leadership of ousted president Viktor Yanukovych.

That pragmatic approach has instilled hope among many Ukrainians that he will be able to resolve an eight-week secessionist drive by pro-Russian militants in the eastern rust belt that has claimed 200 lives and grown even more violent since his election.

Poroshenko — who has vowed to give up direct ownership of his holdings to avoid a conflict of interest — must also address a two-year recession and tackle endemic corruption that has turned Ukraine into one of Europe’s poorest countries and has fed broad public discontent.

On Friday, he shook hands with Putin on the sidelines of D-Day commemorations in Normandy that were haunted by the spectre of an outright civil war breaking out on the European Union’s eastern edge.

Moscow had previously said it was ready to work with the new president but stopped short of explicitly recognising him as the legitimate leader of the Ukrainian people.

US President Barack Obama — who met Putin for 10 minutes on Friday despite earlier efforts to isolate the hardline Kremlin chief — told NBC Nightly News that Russia had to recognise Poroshenko as legitimate if it wanted to resolve the flaring conflict.

Russia also needs “to stop financing and arming separatists who have been wreaking havoc in the eastern part of the country”, Obama added.

Western powers have threatened to slap punishing new sanctions on entire sectors of Russia’s economy should Putin fail to demonstrate a more cooperative approach by the end of the month.

And the Kremlin chief appeared to take the first step in that direction Saturday by ordering the Federal Security Service (ex-KGB) to reinforce its protection of the Ukrainian border to stem the flow of Russian arms into the separatist east.

Mounting tensions in the rebel regions have seen Kiev concede that it was losing control of three border posts that were being routinely attacked by rebels who had crossed over into Ukraine from Russia.

Militants on Friday shot down a Ukrainian military cargo plane near Slavyansk — an insurgency stronghold where many of the 120,000 residents have been forced to spend nights in basements because of the ceaseless fighting.

A military spokesman said that three servicemen were killed in the incident and two remained missing.

‘Positive’ Normandy talks

Putin sounded a surprisingly upbeat note after Friday’s brief chat with Poroshenko — a meeting that he grudgingly accepted after personal intervention by German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

“I cannot but welcome the position of Poroshenko on the necessity to end the bloodletting immediately in the east of Ukraine,” he told reporters in France.

But Putin also warned that Russia would have no choice but to slap trade restrictions on Ukraine should it proceed with plans to sign a historic economic treaty with the European Union in the coming weeks.

Poroshenko brushed aside Putin’s pressure Saturday.

“We must sign this agreement by June 27 at the latest,” he told a reception of foreign dignitaries after delivering his inauguration address.

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria — Hundreds of people may have been killed in a suspected Boko Haram attack on four villages in northeast Nigeria, a local lawmaker and residents said on Thursday.

Gunmen in military uniform struck the Gwoza district of Borno state late on Tuesday, razing homes, churches and mosques, and killing residents who tried to flee the violence.

Some community leaders put the death toll in the attacks as high as 400 to 500, although there was no independent verification of the claim because of poor communications and difficulties by the emergency services in accessing the area.

If confirmed, the attack on the villages of Goshe, Attagara, Agapalwa and Aganjara would be one of the deadliest in the Islamists’ deadly five-year insurgency, and top the more than 300 who were killed on May 5 when militant fighters laid siege to the nearby town of Gamboru Ngala.

“The killings are massive but nobody can give a toll for now because nobody has been able to go to that place because the insurgents are still there. They have taken over the whole area,” lawmaker Peter Biye told AFP.

“There are bodies littered over the whole area and people have fled,” added Biye, who represents Gwoza in Nigeria’s lower chamber of parliament, the House of Representatives.

‘Hundreds of bodies’ 

Reports from the remote region, said the insurgents continued their attack on Wednesday, stealing livestock and food, and burning property.

“Hundreds of dead bodies are lying there... because there is nobody that will bury them,” said one community leader in Attagara, who requested anonymity.

He said the attackers only spared women and that young boys were “snatched from the backs of their mothers and killed”.

Men, women and children fled the villages but gunmen on motorcycles tracked them down, shooting as they ran, he added.

Gwoza shares a border with Cameroon and is surrounded by mountains and the Sambisa forest, a known Boko Haram base and the focus for a Nigerian military search for more than 200 schoolgirls kidnapped on April 14.

Many people fled across the border, as soldiers were deployed to fight the heavily armed Islamists, who took over at least seven villages hoisting their black flag, Biye said on Wednesday.

The community leader called the situation a grave “humanitarian crisis” while others called for relief agencies to be allowed in to enable the dead to be buried.

Another, Zakari Habu, said: “The women and elderly men in our villages also need food and water. The injured need drugs and all of them need shelter.”

A revenge attack 

Military jets bombarded Boko Haram positions in the affected area to try to flush out the insurgents, Biye said on Wednesday.

In mainly Muslim Goshe, where the entire village of about 300 homes was razed with several mosques, local resident Abba Goni said “at least 100 people were killed”.

Bulus Yashi, who lives in predominantly Christian Attagara, said the attack seemed to be a reprisal after four Boko Haram gunmen were killed after they opened fire on a church, killing nine.

Another attack on May 25 had been repelled, killing seven Boko Haram gunmen, he said.

“We believed they came on a revenge mission,” he said.

Residents had allegedly sought assurances from the military that they would be protected from reprisals over Sunday’s church attack but they claimed that no troops were sent.

There was no immediate word from the local military, police or state government when contacted by AFP.

Boko Haram Islamists have recently stepped up raids in northern Borno state near the borders with Cameroon, Chad and Niger, pillaging villages, looting food stores and killing residents.

The attacks are generally seen as response to villagers forming civilian vigilante groups against Boko Haram, who in turn accuse locals of helping the Nigerian military’s counter-insurgency.

Civilians have increasingly been targets of the violence and more than 2,000 are estimated to have been killed this year alone.

In February, the United Nations said that nearly 300,000 people, more than half of them children, had fled their homes in northeast Nigeria since a state of emergency was imposed in May last year.

BRUSSELS — The United States and its allies used the first Group of Seven (G-7) meeting without Russia in 17 years to condemn Moscow’s actions in Ukraine and threaten hard-hitting sanctions if President Vladimir Putin does not help restore stability.

Meeting in Brussels rather than the Black Sea resort of Sochi — a snub to Russia which was supposed to have hosted the G-8 — Western powers and Japan delivered strong rhetoric, even if the EU’s commitment to further sanctions remains in doubt.

“We are united in condemning the Russian Federation’s continuing violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine,” the United States, Germany, Japan, France, Britain, Italy and Canada said in a joint statement.

“Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea, and actions to destabilise eastern Ukraine, are unacceptable and must stop.”

That message was reinforce by President Barack Obama, who said Russia’s economy was already suffering and would only suffer more if Putin did not change behaviour.

“If Russia’s provocations continue, it’s clear from our discussions here that the G-7 nations are ready to impose additional costs on Russia,” he said. “Today, in contrast to a growing global economy, a sluggish Russian economy is even weaker because of the choices made by Russia’s leadership.”

Putin, who will meet Germany’s Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and Britain’s David Cameron on the sidelines of 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings in France on Friday, appeared unfazed by the threats.

Asked at an event in St. Petersburg how he felt about being excluded from the G-8 for the first time since joining the club in 1997, Putin was typically pointed, barely breaking stride to speak to Kremlin reporters as he left a meeting.

“I would like to wish them bon appetit,” he said, before walking away swiftly.

It appears unlikely that Obama and Putin will talk in France.

“Should we have the opportunity to talk, I will be repeating the same message that I’ve been delivering to him throughout this crisis,” Obama said.

Widespread condemnation

With Putin not at the table, the G-7 leaders chose to criticise Russia either by name or implicitly for its actions on several fronts, including Syria and energy policy.

On Syria, the G-7 “deplored” a decision by Russia and China to veto a draft UN Security Council resolution involving crimes committed by both sides in the conflict, and on energy policy it highlighted the problem of countries using energy as a weapon.

“The use of energy supplies as a means of political coercion or as a threat to security is unacceptable,” the statement said.

Since Russia supplies around a third of Europe’s gas and oil needs, and has threatened to cut off supplies to and through Ukraine if it does not settle outstanding bills, the reference was clearly directed at Moscow.

Yet despite efforts to present a united front against Russia’s seizure of Crimea and its tacit support for actions in eastern Ukraine, there remain chinks in the G-7’s armour when it comes to hitting where it hurts.

France, which has come under pressure from the United States to cancel a contract to sell Russia two Mistral warships, appeared to win the argument, with Obama acknowledging that the deal would probably go ahead despite his objections.

Merkel also gave Hollande support, saying that since the EU was not yet ready to impose tougher economic sanctions against Russia, there was no reason for France to cancel contract.

Japan, which geopolitically has less interest in Ukraine, struck a conciliatory note, saying dialogue with Russia remained the best approach.

“I want Russia to be involved in various issues concerning the international community in a constructive manner,” Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said. “That’s what the world desires too. To this end I’m hoping to continue dialogue with President Putin.”

EU leaders said they would closely monitor Russia’s actions over the coming weeks and take a decision at a summit at the end of June on whether there was a need for further measures.

“Should events so require, we stand ready to intensify targeted sanctions and to consider additional measures,” said European Council President Herman Van Rompuy, who chairs EU summits and coordinates the position of EU member states.

“The European Council will assess the situation at the end of June. The day after tomorrow in France individual G-7 leaders will convey this message to President Putin.”