The U.S. government is pressing Japanese auto giant Toyota about the automaker’s spate of recalls in the United States as Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said on Wednesday that he plans to speak with Toyota President Akio Toyoda and expressed his concerns at the Congress.

LaHood said he will call Toyoda in the coming days to make sure the Japanese automaker is aware of the U.S. government’s concerns about safety issues with Toyota vehicles.

He also said that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will conduct an investigation into electronic throttle control systems and potential electromagnetic interference in the nation’s fleet of vehicles.

In a statement, HaHood said that the government “will continue to hold Toyota’s feet to the fire to make sure that they are doing everything they have promised to make their vehicles safe.”

Besides, the agency was studying the possibility of civil penalties on Toyota for safety violations, which could mean fines of millions of dollars.

LaHood told a congressional panel that owners of millions of Toyota vehicles affected by the defect which causes sudden, unintended acceleration should “stop driving” them.

On Tuesday, LaHood said Toyota’s recall of millions of vehicles with defective pedals that can get stuck and cause unwanted acceleration came only after pressure from the US government.

But Toyota said it had made the recall voluntarily.

Analysts said that Toyota, which overtook General Motors in 2008 as the top-selling automaker, is losing its reputation as one of the safest and most reliable vehicles.

The company is recalling almost eight million vehicles worldwide — roughly equivalent to its entire 2009 global sales — due to problems with accelerator pedals that could cause the car to speed up unintentionally.

Industry data showed that sales by U.S. domestic automaker brands General Motors and Ford increased in recent months when Toyota fell.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said on Wednesday that the Nigerian man suspected of attacking a U.S.-bound airliner is to be charged in criminal court rather than military system.

The Obama administration has drawn strong criticism from Republicans on its handling of the suspect, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who attempted to set off an explosive device on a Delta/Northwest flight from Amsterdam to Detroit on Christmas Day.

Republicans insisted that the Nigerian should have been taken as an enemy combatant and refused of access to an attorney, in a way that they deemed to present a better chance to get key information.

“No agency supported the use of law of war detention for Abdulmutallab, and no agency has since advised the Department of Justice that an alternative course of action should have been, or should now be, pursued,” the attorney general wrote in a letter to Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell and 10 other Republican senators who had raised skepticism on charging Abdulmutallab.

“The practice of the U.S. government followed by prior and current administrations without a single exception, has been to arrest and detain under federal criminal law all terrorist suspects who are apprehended inside the United States,” he added.

Abdulmutallab has been accused of six accounts including attempted murder and attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction.

During the investigation, the suspect admitted that he received the explosive device and training from al-Qaeda’s branch in Yemen, but later pleaded not guilty at a court in Detroit, Michigan.

It’s been 12 days since the Jan. 12 earthquake unleashed its wrath, leveling much of this backward Caribbean economy. Yet amid the rubble in Leogane, hope is rising, touching the hearts of the visiting Xinhua reporters.

DEPARTURE TO LEOGANE

Located some 29 km west of the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince, the small town of Leogane was hit even harder by the quake, with over 90 percent of its buildings flattened.

Crumbled houses, dead parents still buried underneath the debris — that was the tragedy Ricardi Moreunel had to accept when rushing back from Port-au-Prince to his birthplace in the immediate aftermath of the devastating earthquake.

It has long been a forgotten place, naturally the most impoverished and the least developed part of the country, Moreunel told Xinhua reporters before they headed for the small town.

He said Leogane was tranquil and peaceful. Local people made their living by growing sugar cane. Their optimism and honesty about life and work have never been diminished by poverty.

Determined to rebuild his quake-ravaged country for the remainder of his life, he was convinced Leogane would be a land of happiness if given adequate surpport of funds and skills.

DEVASTATION OF A SMALL TOWN

Instead of trees and a bucolic scenery that could comfort the eyes, makeshift refugee camps are dotting the roadsides where Haitians are taking shelter from the heat and their troubled destiny.

Adults were chatting and cooking the food delivered as disaster relief, looking rather quiet. Kids were playing and laughing, without a single trace of horror.

Meeting reporters, they would never fail to greet them in their local tongue.

The town, according to UN assessment, is the most damaged place among all the affected areas in the earthquake. There, warped, demolished rocks and remains of houses are scattered all around the field. It looks like a deserted construction site.

In front of the collapsed houses, horses, goats and cows were still tied up, feeding on the grass sticking out through the cracks of ruins — vestiges of vigor and a symbol of eternal hope.

“Where are you from? What are you bringing to us?” Upon hearing the engines rolling, some cute and beautifully dressed girls came up and asked the reporters.

The smiling faces of these girls gathering in front of their diminished hometown reflected neither anger nor sadness, but patience for help and hope.

Jeantilus Nelson, aged 19, used to be a college student majoring in telecommunications. He couldn’t go back to study, for his school collapsed in the earthquake.

He said all that he and his schoolmates could do at the moment is to wait for international assistance to rebuild the campus. “I hope the government could get the school on its feet again so that I can get my diploma,” said the young man.

He also expressed his wish to be a journalist, traveling around the world and letting Haitians learn more about the outside world.

HERE AND BEYOND

Gressier is another town not far from Leogane. The UN disaster relief personnel and U.S. marines are handing out food and water to the local Haitians.

Since the earthquake struck on Jan. 12, the international community has been responding to the suffering of the survivors in a timely manner. Right now, over 60 rescue teams are on the ground, lending a helping hand and delivering not only food, medicine and water, but also hope.

According to the UN staff, they would send out trucks loaded with goods whenever they found a refugee camp. Once everyone received the deliveries, they would start seeking their next stop.

When the young Mylrick Louis came to Gressier from Leogane for UN assistance along with many of his friends, he was asked to wait patiently as many more were also waiting to be delivered from hunger, thirst and pain.

As long as hope is on the way, patience might be a small price to pay. For in such an age of calamity, hope shall dispel the darkness and lead the Haitian people to a better day.

Many voters are disappointed with Californian Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s job six years into his tenure and believe things will get worse, the latest Field Poll showed Sunday.

The survey found 59 percent of those surveyed believe the state will be in worse condition after Schwarzenegger’s tenure is over.

Only 7 percent of the registered voters surveyed said Schwarzenegger will leave state government in better shape than he found it, when he took over from Gray Davis in late 2003.

Just 27 percent of the electorate now approves of the job Schwarzenegger is doing, equaling the lowest ratings he received in office last October, according to the poll conducted by California Politics’ Anthony York, a self-claimed non-partisan institution.

Views of the governor are negative across all demographic subgroups of the registered voter population.

By last October, Schwarzenegger had called lawmakers into special session 16 times, setting a record for any California governor in history, reports say. However, his success rate — measured by legislation produced from those special sessions — is the lowest of any governor in the modern era.

The latest Field Poll survey was completed by telephone on Jan. 5-17, 2010 among a total of 1,232 registered voters in California. The survey was conducted in six languages and dialects — English, Spanish, Cantonese, Mandarin, Korean and Vietnamese — based on the preference of the voters.

Source: Xinhua

The representatives of 13 countries and six international organizations attended on Monday to the pre-Summit “United for a Better Future for Haiti,” hosted at the government palace of Dominican Republic.

The pre-Summit was attended by Dominican Republic’s President Leonel Fernandez and the representatives of Bahamas, Barbados, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Dominica, Spain, Jamaica, United States, Mexico and Trinidad and Tobago.

The participants agreed to hold the Summit on Jan. 25 in Montreal, Canada in order to evaluate the work plans drafted by the United Nations (UN) and Organization of American States (OAS) in Haiti.

The representatives of the countries and international organizations discussed the coordination of the humanitarian aid being sent to Haiti.

Fernandez, host of the pre-Summit, said that a central force is needed to coordinate the aid efforts and logistic problems.

He also proposed the Dominican Republic’s soldiers join the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (Minustah).

Fernandez also proposed the rehabilitation of the maritime and aerial ports of Haiti handle the humanitarian aid.

Spain’s First Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega said the Haitian government and people “must be the main actors of their country’s reconstruction, they are the ones who must decide their collective destiny.”

She added that the international community has the responsibility of “offering all its support for what today is uncertain becomes trust.”

The attendants also proposed the condonation of Haiti’s external debt.

Also present are the representatives of the World Bank, the Inter American Development Bank, the Community of the Caribbean, the International Red Cross, the UN, the OAS and the European Union.

Haitian President Rene Preval also attended the summit.

After a 7.3-magnitude earthquake battered Haiti on Tuesday, the international community has exerted unremitting efforts to help relieve the impoverished Caribbean country, but a number of difficulties have hindered relief work.

INTERRUPTED COMMUNICATION

According to a UN estimation, the quake has not only caused huge property damage to Haiti, but also paralyzed the country’s administration and public security sectors.

Haiti’s Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive estimated on Sunday that around 100,000 people have died from the quake and that more than 90 percent of the nation’s buildings were damaged.

A large number of governmental buildings, including the presidential office, were damaged or destroyed, while numerous governmental officials have been killed, injured or missing in the quake.

Moreover, the UN headquarters in Port-au-Prince collapsed in the quake, killing both Hedi Annabi, the UN’s special representative in Haiti, and his deputy Luiz Carlos da Costa alongside dozens of UN staff members.

In the first hours after the quake, there were nobody directing the rescue work.

Telecommunication in the country, except for a few satellite phones, was totally cut in the first days after the quake. The whole country lost contacts with the outside world.

Elisabeth Byrs, spokeswoman for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), said the relief work in Haiti was one of the most difficult ones the UN has ever launched in its history.

PARALYZED TRAFFIC

The international community has quickly mobilized to send aid and rescue teams to Haiti in the aftermath of the earthquake.

However, the nearly collapsed transportation network hindered the distribution of relief supplies and urgently needed machines on the ground.

As a flux of assistance was pouring into Haiti, the only airport in the capital has overrun its limit in the past week.

According to Byrs, some 40 rescue teams have registered at the On-Site Operations Coordination Center (OSOCC) and more than 17 had started their mission in Haiti.

She added the OCHA has opened a special aerial route between the Dominican Republic capital of Santo Domingo and the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince to speed up the aid delivery.

But the paralyzed traffic made it difficult to distribute relief supplies and a large amount of aid piled up at the border areas of the country.

Meanwhile, most rescuers have been scouring survivors without diggers or other heavy machinery since it’s difficult to deploy heavy rescue equipment to the rescue scene via the rubble-filled roads.

More than 70 lives have been saved as international rescue teams have completed about 60 percent of the search and rescue work, but hopes are slim for finding more survivors six days after the quake.
STRANDED CROWDS

Among other difficulties, the injured have been short of medical treatments as most hospitals, damaged or collapsed, are not running after the quake.

Hou Shike, a doctor with the Chinese rescue team, said that “Doctors and medicine are of great need here. I hope more rescue teams would join us.”

Although local volunteers have done their best to offer basic treatment, but infections among some of the wounded have deteriorated because of the lack of wound cleansing.

Experts warned that widespread epidemic may break out due to exposure of bodies in the ruins.

Meanwhile, survivors in the quake are facing a catastrophic situation, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Monday.

The people of Port-au-Prince are now struggling even to survive and nerves are fraying as hungry and thirsty survivors face up to the reality, the Geneva-based humanitarian agency said in a statement.

Access to shelter, sanitation, clean water, food and medical care remains extremely limited, according to Riccardo Conti, head of the ICRC’s delegation in Haiti.

“Even if the presence of aid agencies is starting to be felt in hospitals and clinics, many medical facilities in Port-au-Prince still lack staff and medicine. Given the scale of the needs, the task facing humanitarian organizations is daunting,” Conti said.

With virtually no infrastructure or services left and vast numbers of people sleeping in the streets, the availability of toilets and fresh water is extremely limited. All over Port-au- Prince, the stench of urine is overpowering.

“We must rapidly address these water and sanitation issues if we want to minimize the risk of an outbreak of disease,” said Conti.

Prices for food and transport have skyrocketed and incidents of violence and looting are on the rise as the desperation grows, according to the agency.

The ICRC, which was already active in Haiti before Tuesday’s earthquake, is currently stepping up efforts to provide help to the Haitians.

U.S. secretary of state Hillary Clinton postponed her visit to Australia in order to deal with the aftermath of the Haiti earthquake, Australian Associated Press reported on Thursday.

This means an annual Australia-US ministerial dialogue on foreign affairs and defense (AUSMIN), to be held in Canberra on Monday, will be delayed.

The earthquake decimated Port-au-Prince, the capital of the impoverished Caribbean nation, leaving schools, hotels, hospitals and the presidential palace in ruins.

Hillary Clinton will return to Washington DC from Hawaii to lead relief efforts for Haiti, which is home to many US citizens.

She called Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith to explain the decision, which was prompted by a disaster she described as of “biblical” proportions.