Police questioned Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert yesterday for the second time since he announced he would resign after his centrist Kadima party chooses a new leader next month.
Anti-fraud officers were at Olmert’s official residence in Jerusalem to conduct the interview, the fifth since claims the premier accepted illegal funds from a wealthy US financier emerged in May.
Dogged by six police investigations over alleged wrongdoing in the years before he took office in 2006, Olmert, 62, announced last week he would step down after Kadima party holds a leadership election on Sept. 17.
Public radio said yesterday’s questioning would likely focus on the graft allegations as well as claims of influence peddling.
On Thursday, police questioned a former aide to Olmert over the influence peddling allegations that date back to the time when Olmert was trade and industry minister between 2003 and 2006.
The advisor, Eldad Rothman, was placed under 24-hour house arrest. The Maariv newspaper cited law enforcement sources as saying the measure was necessary in order to prevent obstruction of the investigation against Olmert.
On Aug. 1 police had questioned Olmert on claims he sent out multiple bills for the same overseas trips and asked him about suspicious transfers of cash.
The allegations against Olmert, which all date back to the time before he took office in 2006, had prompted widespread calls for his resignation, which even several of his allies supported.
In his dramatic resignation announcement on July 30, Olmert admitted he made “mistakes” during his time in office but that he would fight to prove his innocence.
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and hawkish Transport Minister Shaul Mofaz are seen as the frontrunners in the race to become leader of Kadima, the party founded by Olmert’s predecessor and mentor Ariel Sharon.
But political analysts believe it is unlikely that whoever wins the Kadima leadership would be able to garner enough support to form a new coalition government.
This means Olmert, also a former mayor of Jerusalem, may remain at the head of a caretaker government for months until a general election is held.
Opinion polls indicate right-wing Likud leader and former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is the favorite to take over from Olmert as prime minister.
Unless early elections are held, Israelis are not scheduled to go to the polls until 2010.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not