Around the Globe

U.N. head: Timing key to Iran nuclear deal

2009-11-05T14:39:00.000-08:00

The outgoing head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency said a question of timing is the top issue delaying a nuclear deal between Iran and international powers.

"The major issue, the rocky issue which is facing us, is the sequencing," Mohamed ElBaradei, the director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told CNN's Christiane Amanpour on Thursday in an exclusive -- his first television one-on-one exit interview. He is stepping down at the end of the month.

A draft agreement has been supported by the United States, France and Russia. It calls for Iran to ship low-enriched uranium outside the country, possibly to Russia, to be converted into fuel rods.

Read Article CNN

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Tunnel scam targets dirt-poor Palestinians

2009-11-05T14:33:00.000-08:00

Poverty-stricken Gaza, where even the most basic goods are in short supply, has spawned its very own financial scandal -- centered on the tunnels that run under the border with Egypt to circumvent the Israeli blockade.

Palestinians desperate to pull themselves out of poverty were encouraged to invest in the smuggling tunnels constantly being built in the border town of Rafah.

There is big money to be made from operating a tunnel -- they are the main economic lifeline for Gaza -- but some of those who collected money for construction disappeared without building any tunnels. Estimates of how much was lost vary widely from $100 million to $500 million.

Read Article CNN

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French Foreign Minister Calls Situation in Iran 'Dangerous'

2009-11-04T15:24:00.000-08:00

France is worried about the latest violence in Iran as well as Tehran's failure to reply to U.S.-backed proposals to export most of its enriched uranium for processing into fuel for a nuclear research reactor, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said Wednesday.

Kouchner appeared impatient about Iran's reticence with regard to proposals to ease concerns over its nuclear program and firmly stated that Israel and the international community would never agree to allow Iran to have nuclear weapons.

"I don't think one should provoke the Israelis with the potential existence, putative, or at least unproved manufacture of a nuclear bomb," Kouchner said.

However, Kouchner ruled out sanctions at the present time as a possible means to gain leverage against Iran.

"For the moment, the situation is blocked, which I deplore but we won't have sanctions right now," Kouchner told reporters Wednesday evening. "It is not question of sanctions, it's a question of talking," Kouchner added. "Maybe sanctions will come later. ... It's not a question of them now."

Iran's failure to reply to the proposals hinted at divisions within the government, Kouchner said. However, he said that the five Security Council nations plus Germany which have been talking with Iran about its nuclear program would not be willing to wait forever.

Read Article Fox News

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Obama calls for new relationship with Iran

2009-11-04T15:21:00.000-08:00

US President Barack Obama has called for establishing new ties between Iran and the US, saying that his country wants to "move beyond the past" tensions with Iran.

Obama issued a statement on Wednesday that marked the 30th anniversary of the takeover of the US Embassy in Tehran.

A group of students held 52 Americans for 444 days, after it was revealed that the embassy had been engaged in espionage in the country.

"This event helped set the United States and Iran on a path of sustained suspicion, mistrust and confrontation," Obama said in his statement.

I have made it clear that the United States of America wants to move beyond this past, and seeks a relationship with the Islamic Republic of Iran based upon mutual interests and mutual respect," the Los Angeles Times quoted Obama as saying.

Iranian officials have repeatedly declared that they will decide on Obama's overtures only after a real change is seen in the US administration's policies.

Read Article Press TV

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Thousands flee Nigeria violence

2009-07-29T17:59:00.000-07:00

Hundreds of people have been killed and thousands have been forced to flee their homes in northern Nigeria amid continued fighting between government forces and fighters seeking Islamic law across the country.

Troops on Wednesday continued to hunt members of the Boko Haram group across five states, three days after the group launched a series of co-ordinated attacks against police.

Apollus Jediel, a relief official, said that at least 1,000 people ran from their homes in the northern city of Maiduguri on Wednesday, as army soldiers laid siege to a Boko Haram compound.

They joined 3,000 people who had already fled their homes amid the clashes across northern Nigeria, he said.

At least 30 people were killed in fresh clashes in the northern state of Yobe on Wednesday, a police source said.

Wednesday's violence came after the army shelled a mosque and the home of Mohammed Yusuf, the group's alleged leader, in Maiduguri, which is the capital of Borno state.

Read Article aljazeera.net

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Al Qaeda group said to claim Jakarta hotel bombings

2009-07-29T17:58:00.000-07:00

A group claiming to be the Indonesian arm of the al Qaeda terrorist network is purportedly taking responsibility for a pair of deadly bombs that exploded within minutes of each other at two luxury hotels in Jakarta.

The July 17 blasts at Jakarta's JW Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels killed nine people, including at least two presumed suicide bombers, and wounded more than 50.

On Wednesday, Noordin M. Top -- the suspected leader of a small splinter group of the militant Jemaah Islamiyah, which has ties to al Qaeda -- purportedly issued statements claiming responsibility for the attacks on behalf of "al Qaeda in Indonesia." Top purportedly signed the statements posted on radical Islamist Web sites as the head of al Qaeda in Indonesia.

CNN could not independently authenticate the statements.

One of the statements says the Ritz-Carlton attack was carried out by "one of our mujahedeen warriors against the American lackeys and stooges visiting the hotel."

"God has given us a blessing for us to find a way to attack the biggest hotel that America owns in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta -- the Ritz-Carlton, where security was very tight making it very difficult to initiate the attack that we did," the statement says.

Read Article CNN

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Honduran Leader Backs Return of President

2009-07-29T17:57:00.000-07:00

The head of Honduras’s de facto government, Roberto Micheletti, has expressed support for a compromise that would allow the ousted president of his country to return to power, according to officials in the de facto government and diplomats from the region.

But the nation is so polarized over the possible return that Mr. Micheletti is reaching out to other regional leaders for help in building support for such a deal, especially among the country’s elite, the officials said.

Mr. Micheletti has repeatedly refused to entertain the reinstatement of the ousted president, Manuel Zelaya. But on Wednesday, the officials said, Mr. Micheletti called President Óscar Arias of Costa Rica, who has tried to mediate a diplomatic solution to the Honduran political crisis, to express his support for a 12-point plan Mr. Arias presented. The plan, known as the San José Accord, would allow Mr. Zelaya to return as president, although with significantly limited powers.

Read Article New York Times

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China protests over Uighur tour

2009-07-29T17:56:00.002-07:00

Mrs Kadeer, the head of the Uighur World Congress, is in Tokyo, where she has met members of the governing party.

Beijing accuses Mrs Kadeer, 62, of inciting ethnic violence in western China this month that left nearly 200 people dead - an allegation she denies.

China has also complained to Australia about Mrs Kadeer's forthcoming visit there, officials say.

She is due to attend a film festival in Melbourne next week, and will give a televised speech.

Japanese Ambassador Yuji Miyamoto was summoned to hear China's "strong dissatisfaction" over Mrs Kadeer's visit, said the Chinese foreign ministry.

China's Vice-Foreign Minister, Wu Dawei, said Beijing "demanded the Japanese government immediately take effective measures to deter [Mrs Kadeer] from engaging in anti-China separatist activities in Japan".

Read Article BBC News

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Telling Israel No: Obama's Bold Move

2009-07-29T17:56:00.001-07:00

President Barack Obama, who vowed to revive the Arab-Israeli peace process at the start of his term, has begun with a direct and public challenge to Israel’s latest plan to build new settlements in East Jerusalem.

It’s a risky move that has already provoked a sharp rebuke from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. But it is hard to see how the peace process could move forward if Washington had remained silent.

Mr. Obama picked a small but symbolic issue, a 20-unit housing project on the site of the former Shepherd Hotel, sparking a full-blown diplomatic standoff. Just days after the United States objected to the project, the European Union, Russia and France did the same.

This gambit puts the settlement issue at the center of the table, even before the next round of Arab-Israeli negotiations starts — if it ever does. The downside is that it might only serve to harden Israel’s stance, without softening Arab positions.

The stalemate in the Middle East needs a new approach. By opening the most sensitive dossier first, Mr. Obama has delivered to Israel its first dose of tough love since the administration of President George H.W. Bush.

Read Article New York Times

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Sarkozy insists health is 'fine'

2009-07-29T17:54:00.000-07:00

Following his release from hospital on Monday he admitted he needed to scale down on activities in the coming weeks.

"I need to rest," Mr Sarkozy, 54, told reporters outside the Elysee presidential palace in Paris. He said he would enjoy a quiet summer holiday with his wife Carla Bruni and his children. He said he had undergone several tests but the results showed nothing abnormal.

Mr Sarkozy's collapse has fuelled fears that his hectic lifestyle is taking its toll on his health. His often frenetic schedule has earned him the nickname the "hyper-president". Traditionally the health of the head of state is treated as a private matter in France. The late Francois Mitterand kept his prostate cancer secret for most of his time in office as president.

Mr Sarkozy has admitted his 2007 decision not to disclose an operation to treat a throat infection was a mistake, according to AFP news agency.

Read Article BBC News

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Britain Says It Fears 2 Hostages in Iraq Are Dead

2009-07-29T17:53:00.000-07:00

The British government announced Wednesday that two more British hostages in Iraq were believed to have been killed by their captors, leaving just one of five men kidnapped together in 2007 still unaccounted for, but thought to be alive.

The announcement cast fresh doubts on a plan that sought to win the hostages’ freedom with the staged release of Shiite insurgent leaders from American custody.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown, on vacation in Scotland, issued a statement saying it was “very likely” that the two hostages, Alan McMenemy and Alec MacLachlan, were dead, and urging the release of another hostage, Peter Moore, “whom we still believe to be alive.”

The bodies of two other hostages, Jason Swindlehurst and Jason Creswell, were handed over to the British Embassy in Baghdad last month.

Officials at the Foreign Office said it appeared that the four had been shot dead at the same time, with the bodies of Mr. McMenemy and Mr. MacLachlan held back by the captors. That appeared to suggest that the Shiite militants holding the Britons had killed them while they were negotiating a deal to exchange them for 10 members of the group that carried out the kidnappings.

Read Article New York Times

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Mehbooba tears Omar's 'clean chit' to bits

2009-07-29T17:52:00.000-07:00

In a fit of rage, Opposition leader Mehbooba Mufti tore up a CBI letter absolving CM Omar Abdullah of any link to the Srinagar sex scandal on Wednesday, while the ruling party moved a privilege motion against PDP’s Muzaffar Hussain Beig for levelling the accusation.

J&K parliamentary affairs minister Ali Muhammad Sagar said NC moved the breach of privilege motion, as Beig had levelled false accusations against the CM. ‘‘The assembly’s rule book prevents members from speaking against fellow legislators inside the assembly,’’ said Sagar while presenting the motion.

There was pandemonium in the House after the speaker, Mohammed Akbar Lone, admitted the motion and read out the CBI letter exonerating Omar. ‘‘Omar Abdullah’s name doesn’t figure in the list of accused persons,’’ the letter read.

The PDP legislators, led by Opposition leader Mehbooba Mufti, took exception to the clean chit and accused the CBI of cover up. ‘‘We want a judicial probe. We won’t allow the cover up,’’ Mehbooba said as she tore the letter to bits. PDP legislators walked out after they were prevented from making any statement.

Read Article Times of India

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Search for missing Haitian migrants called off

2009-07-29T17:49:00.000-07:00

PROVIDENCIALES, Turks and Caicos Islands -- been recovered from the 15 that were plucked out of the shark-infested waters in two days of searches.

But the number of survivors grew from 118 to 119 Wednesday after TCI police say the U.S. Coast Guard found a man on West Caicos, an uninhabited island 2.3 miles from where the boating tragedy occurred, and he was taken for medical treatment on the resort island of Providenciales.

``We made sure he got medical attention and then we'll interview him at a later stage,'' TCI police Sgt. Calvin Chase said. ``His health was our priority.''

Chase credited the U.S. Coast Guard with locating the survivor, but a spokeswoman for the maritime agency said she had no knowledge of the rescue.

Survivors say more than 200 Haitian migrants were crammed aboard the wooden sloop when it began taking water over the weekend. Several of the survivors have been treated for bruises and dehydration. TCI officials have contacted the Miami-Dade County medical examiner's office for help with autopsies; the agency is expected to come to the island next weekend, Chase said.

Read Article Miami Herald

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UN chief backs NKorea's call for direct talks with US

2009-07-29T17:48:00.000-07:00

UN chief Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday voiced support for North Korea's call for direct talks with the United States on dismantling Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program.

"I am encouraged by the willingness of DPRK (North Korea) authorities to engage in direct dialogue with the United States," he told a press conference.

"While I believe the six-party talks still can provide a good way for solution through dialogue, if necessary there should be some other form of dialogue," he added.

Monday North Korea hinted at a new dialogue over its nuclear arms, in what observers said was a direct overture to the United States -- despite a US refusal to abandon the six-party process to ensure a nuclear-free Korean peninsula.

A statement from the North's foreign ministry, carried by state media, said there was a "specific and reserved form of dialogue" that Pyongyang would entertain over the nuclear impasse.

"Any attempt to side with those who claim the resumption of the six-party talks without grasping the essence of the matter will not help ease tension," a North Korean foreign ministry spokesman said.

The United States has repeatedly refused to sidestep the multilateral negotiations and insisted there is no chance of direct talks.

Read Article Associated Press

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US pressure behind soft line with Pakistan?

2009-07-17T18:01:00.000-07:00

When Prime Minister Manmohan Singh reached his Parliament office on Friday morning, it was barely eight hours since his return from ameeting with his Pakistani counterpart Yousaf Gilani. Though tired after two taxing back-to-back foreign tours, Singh found himself bracing to tackle a brewing political storm.

The morning papers were near-unanimous that India had given away too much on terrorism at the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh. It was a reaction, felt political sources, the PM could not have not anticipated. This had been clear enough from his press interaction in Egypt where he stressed dialogue was contingent on Pakistan delivering on terror against India.

But what bemused political circles was delinking of terrorism with the composite dialogue. When he spoke in Lok Sabha, the PM reiterated the point, saying action on terrorism could not await other developments. He pointed to Gilani's assurance to bring the 26/11 guilty to book and the latter's claim that there was a "consensus" in Pakistan over combating terror. He also said broadening the dialogue would depend on "future developments".

Read Article Times of India

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Clinton Aims to Boost Strategic Relationship During India Visit

2009-07-17T18:00:00.000-07:00

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in Mumbai at the start of a visit aimed at deepening an emerging strategic partnership between the United States and India. Clinton is urging India to join Washington in supporting Pakistan's efforts against terrorism.

Clinton arrived late Friday in a heavy rain at the Taj Palace Hotel on Mumbai's ocean front, which was one of the targets of Pakistan-based terrorists who killed 166 people in a coordinated series of attacks in the Indian business capital last November.

The Secretary joins in a ceremony of remembrance Saturday for victims of those attacks. In an opinion piece published in the Times of India newspaper she said the United States and India - which have both experienced searing terrorist attacks - should intensify anti-terrorism cooperation, and encourage Pakistan as it confronts the challenge of violent extremism.

Read Article Voice of America

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Pope Fractures His Wrist in a Fall

2009-07-17T17:59:00.000-07:00

Pope Benedict XVI fractured his right wrist in a fall early Friday morning while on vacation in northern Italy, the Vatican said. He was released from the hospital later in the day after undergoing successful surgery.

Vatican officials were quick to defuse any alarm over the first medical intervention known to the public since Benedict, 82, became pope in 2005.

“It’s nothing serious,” the Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said in a telephone interview. He said doctors had ruled out the possibility that Benedict had been ill before falling.

Doctors operated on the pope’s wrist for about 20 minutes, Reuters reported. Father Lombardi called the operation “not difficult.” He said doctors had inserted pins to help the wrist heal, using a local anesthetic.

Read Article New York Times

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Zelaya 'to make fresh return bid'

2009-07-17T17:58:00.000-07:00

Mr Chavez was speaking after talks in Bolivia with other left-wing Latin American leaders supporting Mr Zelaya.

But journalists in Nicaragua, where Mr Zelaya has been staying, said he was still in the capital Managua and there was no indication that he was leaving.

The interim government, which has vowed to arrest him if he returns, prevented his attempted homecoming on 5 July.

Mr Chavez said: "Zelaya is going back to Honduras. Let's see what the gorillas will do," referring to the coup leaders.

He was speaking in La Paz, following talks with Bolivian President Evo Morales, Ecuador's Rafael Correa and Paraguay's Fernando Lugo.

Mr Zelaya's foreign minister has also said the ousted leader is returning to Honduras.

Read Article BBC News

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Malaysian suspected in Indonesia hotel attacks

2009-07-17T17:56:00.000-07:00

International suspicion focused Friday on a Malaysian accountant-turned-bomb-maker as the instigator of a pair of blasts at Western hotels in Jakarta that may have signaled the reemergence of deadly attacks by Southeast Asian groups affiliated with Al Qaeda, according to counter-terrorism officials and analysts.

Noordin Mohammad Top, regarded as the ideological leader of the most violent wing of the terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah, drew immediate suspicion because of his alleged involvement in attacks in Indonesia between 2002 and 2005, including bombings in Bali and Jakarta.

But after the region's first significant attack in four years, suspicion also fell on others in the sprawling network of militant cells known collectively as "JI." Those include other top Jemaah Islamiyah commanders and dozens of hard-liners released recently from Southeast Asian prisons, several current and former U.S. counter-terrorism officials said.

Read Article Los Angeles Times

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Spain: Bull Kills Man at Pamplona

2009-07-10T18:36:00.002-07:00

A Spanish man was fatally gored by a bull at the San Fermín festival in Pamplona on Friday, the first such fatality in 14 years at the event, where crowds of people race a narrow course each morning alongside a herd of bulls. Daniel Jimeno Romero, 27, was gored after he tripped near an 1,135-pound bull, which had begun charging people.

An amateur video of the episode shown on the Spanish television channel. Cuatro showed Mr. Jimeno falling and then trying to scramble backward under a wooden barrier when he was gored. Mr. Jimeno suffered wounds to his aorta and left lung, according to the official San Fermín Web site, and died at a hospital. The fatal goring was the 15th since 1924, when records were first kept. The last was a 22-year-old American, Matthew Peter Tassio, in 1995.

Read Article New York Times

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Poor Nations Get G8 Promise of $20 Billion Toward Food Security

2009-07-10T18:36:00.001-07:00

Leaders of the world's wealthiest nations have promised twenty billion dollars to increase food security in poor countries. The promise came Friday on the third and final day of the Group of Eight summit meeting in L'Aquila, Italy.

The aim is to help fight world hunger through agricultural development programs. The announcement followed talks between G8 leaders and leaders from Africa. The United States has promised three and a half billion dollars toward the three-year program.

A statement noted that while food prices have decreased from their peak last year, they remain high in historical terms. And the economic crisis has only pushed even more people into poverty.

Read Article Voice of America

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China’s Ethnic Fault Lines

2009-07-10T18:35:00.001-07:00

The myth of a monolithic China was shattered this past week. Running barely beneath the surface of what the government has sought to portray as a “harmonious” society, the fracture created by the Urumqi and Lhasa riots threatens to shake the country.

Foreigners and the Chinese themselves typically picture China’s population as a vast Han majority with a sprinkling of exotic minorities living along the country’s borders. This understates China’s tremendous cultural, geographic, and linguistic diversity—in particular the important cultural differences within the Han population. Across the country, China is experiencing a resurgence of local ethnicity and culture, most notably among southerners such as the Cantonese and Hakka, who are now classified as Han.

Cultural and linguistic cleavages could worsen in a China weakened by internal strife, an economic downturn, uneven growth, or a struggle over future political succession. The initial brawl between workers in a Guangdong toy factory, which left at least two Uighur dead on June 25, prompted the mass unrest in Xinjiang on July 5 that ended with 156 dead, thousands injured and 1,500 arrested, with ongoing violence spreading throughout the region.

Read Article Wall Street Journal

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Vatican, White House: Abortion one topic of Obama-pope chat

2009-07-10T18:33:00.000-07:00

U.S. President Obama and Pope Benedict XVI discussed current affairs, the Catholic Church's teachings and abortion as they met for the first time Friday, according to the White House and the Vatican.

The president also handed the pontiff a letter from Massachusetts Sen. Edward Kennedy, who was diagnosed with brain cancer last year, and asked that the pontiff pray for the senator, Deputy National Security Advisor Denis McDonough said.

Kennedy, 77, a Democrat, received the diagnosis after suffering a seizure in May 2008.

Obama and the pope spent about a half-hour talking, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said.

Obama told the pope he understands the church's teachings and said, as he has before, that he would like to reduce the number of abortions in the United States, Vatican spokesman the Rev. Federico Lombardi told CNN.

Read Article CNN.com

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Israel intercepts Gaza aid boat: activists

2009-06-29T18:58:00.000-07:00

The Israeli navy intercepted activists sailing to Gaza with aid on Tuesday, surrounding their boat and telling them to turn back, activists said.

The vessel with 21 people on board was in international waters when it was told to turn back, members of the U.S.-based Free Gaza Movement on the boat and in Cyprus told Reuters.

The Israeli military declined to comment.

"There is a patrol boat around us and we were told that if we did not turn back they would open fire," said Derek Graham, an Irish activist.

"We are continuing our course to Gaza," he said.

He was speaking via satellite telephone from a small ferry boat which had departed from Cyprus on Monday. Among the activists were an Irish Nobel peace laureate and a former U.S. Congresswoman.

Read Article Reuters

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Iraq launches historic oil and gas auction

2009-06-29T18:56:00.000-07:00

Iraq will auction off eight giant oil and gas fields on Tuesday in its first major tender since 2003, giving oil firms a foothold in a country that may hold some of the world's largest untapped energy reserves.

Private jets flew representatives from leading global firms like Exxon Mobil and Total into Baghdad, a city still ringed by blast walls and gripped by violence, to place their bids for the 20-year development contracts.

The companies are wading into a morass of controversy surrounding the deals, which some Iraqi lawmakers condemn as illegal and which even some within the state-run oil industry have criticised for selling Iraq's vast oil wealth short.

Over six years after Saddam Hussein's ouster was supposed to unleash Iraq's oil potential, the auction marks the first real centre-stage moment for the Oil Ministry, under growing pressure to boost disappointing output around 2.4 million barrels a day.

Read Article Guardian.co.uk

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Explosion in northern Italy kills one

2009-06-29T18:55:00.000-07:00

At least one person was killed and 50 injured in northern Italy on Tuesday when a train derailed near the town of Viareggio and gas tanks on two of the wagons exploded hitting surrounding buildings, state television said.

News agency ANSA quoted Viareggio police as saying one person had been killed and some 50 were injured, some of them badly.

It said two buildings close to Viareggio station had collapsed and police and fire crews were on the scene looking for other possible victims among the rubble.

State television RAI said two gas tanks containing liquified petroleum gas had exploded. Initial reports had spoken of "several dead".

Read Article Reuters

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Police block protests as Iran confirms election results

2009-06-29T18:54:00.000-07:00

The Iranian government's electoral watchdog Monday confirmed President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's landslide victory in the disputed June 12 presidential election after police wielding batons and cables prevented more than a thousand demonstrators from organizing a rally to protest the results.

The announcement effectively ended any possibility that regime would grant demands for a new vote by second-place finisher Mir Hossein Mousavi.

The decision of the 12-member Guardian Council, whose chairman endorsed Ahmadinejad, found no evidence in a random recount of 10 percent of the 40 million ballots cast to sustain charges of massive fraud, state television said.

"The Guardian Council, after studying the issues in numerous sessions, dismisses all the complaints received and approves the accuracy of the 10th presidential election," the chairman, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, was quoted as saying in a letter to the interior minister.

"The regime committed suicide by announcing Ahmadinejad the winner," countered a pro-reform journalist, on condition he remained unidentified to avoid retribution. "Ahmadinejad has no legitimacy in the eyes of the majority of Iranians and he won't be able to rule a country with clubs and rifles for four years."

Read Article Miami Herald

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U.S. treads carefully in Honduras crisis

2009-06-29T18:53:00.000-07:00

After failing to stave off the military coup in Honduras, the Obama administration moved gingerly Monday to try to undo it, leaving key levers of U.S. influence untouched as it urged Hondurans and other countries in the region to seek a settlement.

The administration's approach appeared designed to avoid damaging Washington's ties either to U.S.-allied backers of the coup that forcibly removed President Manuel Zelaya or the regional powers who have universally condemned it.

President Obama expressed "great concerns" about the strife, and U.S. officials planned on attending an extraordinary session of the Organization of American States in Washington today to address the situation.

"We believe that the coup was not legal and that President Zelaya remains the president of Honduras, the democratically elected president there," Obama said after a meeting with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe. "In that we have joined all the countries in the region, including Colombia, and the Organization of American States."

Read Article Los Angeles Times

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Iranian protesters defy warning

2009-06-22T15:12:00.001-07:00

Anti-government protesters have continued their demonstrations on the streets of Tehran, the Iranian capital, despite a warning from the country's security forces.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards, a military unit, threatened on Monday in a statement on its website to crush further protests over the country's disputed June 12 presidential election.

The Revolutionary Guards is an armed force parallel to Iran's army which claims to defend the gains of the 1979 revolution against a possible coup.

But the warning fell on deaf ears as shortly afterwards hundreds of protesters gathered in central Tehran amid reports of teargas and batons being used to disperse the crowd.

Riot police and members of Basij, a pro-government armed volunteer force, were deployed heavily in Tehran.

Read Article aljazeera.net

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Pakistani Jets Hit Militants Near Afghan Border

2009-06-22T15:10:00.000-07:00

Pakistani officials have reported fresh fighting in the South Waziristan tribal region, where the military is preparing a new offensive targeting a stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban leadership.

Officials said jets firing on suspected militant positions killed at least 14 people earlier Monday, hours after gunmen fired rockets at local army bases. Officials said most of the dead were militants. Witnesses said several women were among those killed. No government casualties were reported.

Days after Pakistan's government opened up a new front targeting the stronghold of Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud, officials said they are scaling back the operation in the greater Swat valley.

A military statement said troops are in the final phase of eliminating militants in Swat. The army said forces killed 22 militants in the latest fighting, bringing the total to 1,592 militants killed since operations began.

Read Article Voice of America

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Leader of Russian region wounded in suicide attack

2009-06-22T15:08:00.000-07:00

A suicide bomber badly wounded a provincial president in Russia's North Caucasus on Monday, an assassination attempt that undermined the Kremlin's claim that it has brought stability to the predominantly Muslim region.

Yunus Bek Yevkurov was the third top official to be wounded or killed in the last three weeks in the area of southern Russia around Chechnya, which was devastated by two separatist wars in the last 15 years.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing in Ingushetia province, where Yevkurov has tried to halt violence by Islamic militants.

A car rigged with TNT exploded as the presidential convoy traveled outside the provincial center, Nazran. The blast tore Yevkurov's armored sedan to pieces and killed two of his bodyguards.

Yevkurov spokesman Kaloi Akhilgov said the president suffered a serious concussion and broken ribs, but that his life was not in danger. Hospital and emergency officials, however, said Yevkurov was in critical condition with burns, brain injuries and damage to internal organs.

Read Article Associated Press

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Rwanda: UN-Backed Tribunal Gives Ex-Minister Found Guilty of Genocide 30 Years

2009-06-22T15:07:00.000-07:00

The United Nations tribunal set up to deal with the mass killings that engulfed Rwanda in 1994 has found a former Government minister guilty of genocide and sentenced him to 30 years in prison.

April 1994 saw the beginning of a slaughter in the tiny East African country in which more than 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and Hutu moderates died, mostly by machete, during a period of less than 100 days.

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) today said that on 23 April 1994, Callixte Kalimanzira, former Acting Minister of Interior, lured thousands of Tutsi refugees to Kabuye hill in Butare prefecture, where they were attacked and killed.

The Tribunal's Trial Chamber found that Mr. Kalimanzira substantially contributed to the overall attack, finding him guilty beyond a reasonable doubt that he aided and abetted genocide at Kabuye hill.

Read Article allafrica.com

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Toronto Workers Strike After Negotiations Break Down

2009-06-22T15:05:00.000-07:00

The City of Toronto’s top manager said he’s “optimistic” a strike by 24,000 city workers that shut down day-care centers and halted garbage pickup will end soon as talks continued. Labor leaders said the two sides remain far apart.

“We are still very optimistic that we’ll see a settlement fairly soon,” Toronto City Manager Joe Pennachetti told reporters.

About half of the city’s workers went on strike today after two union groups and city negotiators failed to agree on new labor accords. Workers began picketing early this morning at municipal facilities and garbage drop-off locations, and employees held protests outside City Hall.

The strike closed pools, city-run child-care centers and many other municipal facilities in Canada’s biggest city. Garbage pickup for 500,000 homes and as many as 20,000 small businesses has been scrapped. Applications for city permits and licenses is suspended and Toronto’s island ferries are halted.

Read Article Bloomberg

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U.S. sees new Pakistan combat drive in Waziristan

2009-06-12T18:07:00.001-07:00

Pakistan's military looks set to mount a significant combat drive in the Taliban stronghold of Waziristan, U.S. officials said on Friday and praised Islamabad's resolve against Islamic militants.

Several U.S. defense officials told reporters in Washington the Pakistanis were completing an offensive begun in April in the Swat valley and moving to a new phase aimed at isolating militants in other restive parts of northwestern Pakistan.

"The operations that appear to be underway now would be the largest operations that have been undertaken in Waziristan," said one official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The official said the Pentagon anticipated "fairly significant combat operations in South Waziristan" aimed at the network run by Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud, one of the main sources of suicide bombers that have plagued Pakistan.

Read Article Reuters

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Air France Wreckage Searchers Recover Six Bodies

2009-06-12T18:06:00.000-07:00

Six more bodies from last week’s Air France crash have been recovered from the Atlantic Ocean by the French ship Mistral as the hunt for victims and debris continues amid bad weather conditions, the Brazilian military said today.

The six are in addition to the total of 44 bodies already recovered and will be transferred to a Brazilian ship, Brazil Navy Vice Admiral Edison Lawrence told a news conference today in Recife.

The search for wreckage from the May 31 crash concentrated today in a spot about midway between Brazil and Senegal, as authorities held out hope there may still be a chance of recovering more bodies near the site where the Airbus SAS A330- 200 last reported its position. A total of 228 passengers and crew were aboard the plane.

Read Article Bloomberg

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Whoever wins election, U.S. wants talks with Iran

2009-06-12T18:05:00.000-07:00

U.S. President Barack Obama plans to pursue attempts to engage Tehran whether hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or his moderate rival Mirhossein Mousavi ultimately emerges as the winner of Iran's election.

"The president's decision to engage Iran was not based on a particular electoral result. We are going to engage the Iranian government whether it is led by one faction or the other," a senior State Department official said.

State media declared Ahmadinejad the winner but challenger Mirhossein Mousavi alleged irregularities and claimed victory for himself after the hotly contested election.

Washington hoped that, whoever wins, the election will end the acerbic tone from Iran and reduce tension as major powers seek to curb Tehran's nuclear ambitions.

Read Article Reuters

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Israel kills Palestinian man in West Bank

2009-06-05T17:57:00.001-07:00

Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian man on Friday in a confrontation with stone-throwing protesters in the occupied West Bank, Israeli and Palestinian officials said.

The violence took place as U.S. President Barak Obama, during a visit to Germany, urged both Israel and the Palestinians make tough compromises, in his latest call to resume the peace talks that stalled months ago.

Medics said Aqel Srour, 35, was hit in the chest by a live bullet and another protester was wounded when soldiers fired at protesters in Nilin, a village near the city of Ramallah.

An Israeli military spokesman confirmed a protester had died of his injuries and said Israel was investigating the incident.

Micky Rosenfeld, an Israeli police spokesman, said border police and soldiers had been authorised to open fire on protesters, said to have numbered about 200, when the troops faced a life-threatening situation due to stone-throwing.

Read Article Reuters

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North Korea Remains Silent on Trial of US Journalists

2009-06-05T17:55:00.000-07:00

North Korea remained silent Friday on the fate of two female American journalists who are being tried on charges that could send them to a labor camp for years.

On Thursday, North Korean state media announced that Euna Lee and Laura Ling of U.S. media company Current TV were scheduled to go on trial at 3 p.m. local time (0600 GMT). Pyongyang has yet to comment further on the trial.

The U.S. State Department says North Korea has barred observers from attending the trial.

North Korean authorities arrested Lee and Ling in March while they were working on a story near the Chinese-North Korean border.

Read Article Voice of America

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Dutch anti-immigrant party emerges as big winner in EU elections

2009-06-05T17:54:00.000-07:00

A far-right anti-Islamic party emerged as the big winner in the European elections in the Netherlands yesterday as the rest of the Continent braced itself for further gains by fringe parties over the weekend.

The Party for Freedom led by Geert Wilders, the maverick Dutch MP who was banned from entering Britain this year for his beliefs, won four seats in the European Parliament at the first time of asking, having been formed in 2006.

The result, which placed the party second in the Netherlands, behind only the ruling Christian Democratic Alliance (CDA), suggested that anti-immigrant parties would attract disaffected voters in a number of countries in the European polls. They are expected to gain seats in Austria, Belgium, Italy, Hungary, Slovakia and Romania.

Read Article Times Online

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Brown Resists Resignation Calls, Reorganizing Britain’s Cabinet

2009-06-05T17:53:00.000-07:00

Gordon Brown resisted calls for him to resign, reorganizing his Cabinet to shake off the worst local election defeat in three decades and the biggest challenge to his authority since he became U.K. prime minister two years ago.

“I’m not going to waver, and I’m not going to walk away,” Brown said at a press conference in London last night. “We suffered a very big defeat. The task before this country is so big that we’ve got to get on with the job.”

Alan Johnson, the favorite to replace the prime minister, was promoted to manage the Home Office and pledged his loyalty to Brown. Alistair Darling remains chancellor of the exchequer, dashing a plan to install Brown’s ally Ed Balls in the job.

The overhaul stopped short of the sweeping changes Brown had planned to reassert his authority over the Cabinet after six ministers walked out of the government, one calling for his resignation. With the economy in a recession, Brown is trailing the Conservative opposition in polls less than a year before the deadline for the next election.

Read Article Bloomberg

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Barack Obama predicts progress but gets mixed reactions across the Middle East

2009-06-05T17:52:00.000-07:00

Speaking a day after his keynote speech to the Muslim world in Cairo, Mr Obama said he was sending his Middle East envoy George Mitchell back to the region next week.

Palestinians had to make "hard choices" and the Israelis "tough commitments", he said.

"I am confident that if we stick with it, we can make some serious progress this year," he said.

"The moment is now for us to act on what we all know to be the truth, which is that each side is going to have to make some difficult compromises."

Mr Obama's speech received a mixed reaction across the Middle East, after the initial euphoria it aroused among his largely pro-Western audience, much of it youthful.

In Israel, newspaper commentators were clearly nervous over the change in tone from the pro-Israel rhetoric of the Bush administration. The Jerusalem Post called the speech "extraordinary" but added: "Critics will see the speech as incredibly naive."

Read Article Telegraph

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Russia gambles control by ending Chechen curbs

2009-04-17T16:58:00.000-07:00

Russia has taken a gamble in giving Chechnya's independent-minded president responsibility for security as this may embolden him to attempt to wrest the province from Moscow's control. Russia has fought Chechen rebels in two wars since 1994 to crush attempts at independence, but in recent years the Kremlin has preferred to empower former enemies in exchange for their support against the remaining insurgents.

President Dmitry Medvedev took that process a step further on Thursday by lifting a so-called "special security regime" in an effort to normalize the situation in the mostly-Muslim north Caucasus territory.

Russian media quoted officials as saying 20,000 policemen and Interior Ministry troops would withdraw from Chechnya. Tight security restrictions such as curfews, roadblocks, spot searches and arbitrary detention mandated under the regime will now end.

Read Article Reuters

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Stockholm court jails The Pirate Bay founders for a year

2009-04-17T16:57:00.000-07:00

A Swedish court found four men guilty Friday of promoting copyright infringement by running The Pirate Bay, one of the world's top illegal filesharing websites, sentencing them to a year in prison in a landmark ruling.

The court also ordered the four -- Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm, Peter Sunde and Carl Lundstroem -- to pay damages of 30 million kronor (2.72 million euros, 3.56 million dollars) to the movie and recording industry, which hailed the conviction as a symbolic victory.

"The Stockholm district court has today convicted the four people charged with promoting other people's infringement of copyright laws," the court said in a statement.

"We are of course going to appeal," defence lawyer Per Samuelsson told Swedish Radio.

The effect the verdict will have on the website was not immediately known, but The Pirate Bay founders vowed to carry on.

Read Article AFP

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Obama Turns Attention to Latin America

2009-04-17T16:54:00.000-07:00

This week, President Obama made his first official visit to Latin America. He arrived Thursday in Mexico City and met with President Felipe Calderon. They discussed the drug war in Mexico, illegal immigration and the world recession. They also announced plans to cooperate in efforts to fight climate change and develop clean forms of energy.

Drug-related violence in Mexico has killed more than seven thousand people since the beginning of last year -- often with guns bought in the United States. The violence is now spreading over the border to American communities. This comes as American officials say Mexican organized crime groups are supplying drugs in a growing number of cities across the United States.

President Obama says the United States must reduce its demand for drugs and do its part to reduce the flow of guns and money to Mexico. Earlier this week, he used a law called the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act to target three Mexican drug organizations. The action will let the Treasury Department block or seize any of their money within reach of United States laws.

Read Article Voice of America

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Thailand protesters besiege ASEAN summit site

2009-04-10T18:39:00.002-07:00

Anti-government protesters broke through razor-wire barricades and a wall of riot police officers and soldiers Friday in a move to disrupt a summit of Asian leaders.

After a tense standoff that lasted for hours, the demonstrators pushed past police and raced to the entrance of the seaside hotel where regional leaders, some of whom had already arrived, are scheduled to meet. The protesters, wearing red shirts, occupied the lower steps and called for supporters from around the country to join them.

"There will be no negotiations," shouted one through a megaphone from atop a cargo truck outside the hotel. "This government is illegal. The prime minister came to power with assistance from the army. It was a 'silent coup.' "

Read Article Los Angeles Times

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After Italy's quake, Pope reflects on disasters

2009-04-10T18:39:00.001-07:00

Pope Benedict reflected on the tragedies and disasters that test faith during a Good Friday procession in Rome, just hours after Italians buried victims of the country's devastating earthquake.

The pontiff offered a special prayer for survivors of Monday's quake, asking that they find hope, despite a disaster that killed at least 289 people and left almost 40,000 homeless.

"We pray that even for them, on this dark night, a star of hope appears, the light of the risen Lord," said the pope, who soon plans to visit the disaster zone in the Abruzzo region.

He was presiding over the traditional Via Crucis (Way of the Cross) procession around Rome's Colosseum, commemorating Christ's crucifixion and death.

Attended by tens of thousands of people, the solemn, night-time ceremony is one of the main services before Easter, the climax of the Christian year.

Read Article Reuters

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Civilian died in Afghan crossfire, NATO says

2009-04-03T13:11:00.000-07:00

NATO-led troops killed 12 insurgents in a firefight Friday in Afghanistan, and a civilian caught in the crossfire was apparently killed by militants, NATO's International Security Assistance Force said.

The incident occurred south of Kabul in the eastern Afghan province of Logar, when Afghan security forces and ISAF troops were conducting an operation.

It comes as NATO members meet in Europe to discuss the fight against the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and as human rights groups this week urged NATO and the U.S. military to avoid civilian casualties and develop a well-coordinated condolence payment system for civilians victimized in the war.

Troops saw a large group of insurgents placing a roadside bomb. The militants retreated to a compound and attacked ISAF troops with small arms.

Troops surrounded the compound and urged them to surrender peacefully after it was cordoned off. It also asked the people in the compound to release women and children but no civilians left.

Read Article CNN

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Vatican rejects Belgian censure of pope on condoms

2009-04-03T13:09:00.000-07:00

The Vatican on Friday rejected a resolution passed by the Belgian parliament condemning Pope Benedict for saying that the use of condoms could worsen the spread of AIDS.

The pope's controversial remarks last month have provoked widespread criticism in the press and by health officials and politicians in Europe, but the Belgian move was the first time a country had ordered a diplomatic protest against the Vatican. The resolution passed by the Belgian parliament late on Thursday called on the Belgian envoy to the Vatican to lodge a protest over the pontiff's "unacceptable" comments.

It ordered the government to "react strongly against any state or organisation that in the future brings into doubt the benefit of using condoms to prevent transmission of the AIDS virus".

Chief Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said he was shocked.

Read Article Reuters

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Deadly clash in eastern Sri Lanka

2009-04-03T13:07:00.000-07:00

The defence ministry said the clash occurred in Ampara district near the town of Batticaloa, after officials received an "intelligence tip-off".

The army says it drove the rebels out of the east two years ago, but it admits pockets of resistance remain.

Most of the fighting in recent months has been in the north-east.
A BBC correspondent in eastern Sri Lanka says he has seen 11 bodies brought to the local police station, including three women.The defence ministry said a rebel explosives expert was also among the dead.

It says that in clashes on Thursday in the north-east - where the rebels are confined to a small coastal area - troops killed more than 45 rebels and destroyed a 130mm artillery gun in ground and air attacks.

Read Article BBC News

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NATO Leaders Gather for Summit

2009-04-03T13:06:00.000-07:00

Top European leaders pledged to support U.S. President Barack Obama's new Afghan strategy as they gathered in Germany for a NATO summit marking the alliance's 60th anniversary.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel assured Mr. Obama that her country will bear its share of responsibility in Afghanistan. Earlier, French President Nicolas Sarkozy endorsed the new U.S strategy, pledging to help Afghanistan in police training and reconstruction. British officials pledged to dispatch a number of additional troops, if other alliance members do the same. Spain also pledged a small additional contingent.

Earlier, addressing French and German students in the eastern French city of Strasbourg, Mr. Obama said he soon will lay out an agenda to seek a world without nuclear weapons. He said the spread of nuclear arms could lead to the extermination of any city on the planet. He said he will outline his proposals in Prague Sunday.

Read Article Voice of America

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African group rejects Madagascar's new leader

2009-03-19T11:38:00.000-07:00

A regional body comprised of several southern African nations is refusing to recognize Madagascar opposition leader Andry Rajoelina as the island nation's new president, an official said.

The Southern African Development Community group, which met Thursday in Swaziland, has "completely rejected the legitimacy" of Rajoelina, the organization's executive secretary, Tomaz Salomao, told CNN.

Madagascar's military handed over the country's reins to Rajoelina on Wednesday, ending a two-month political crisis. The former disc jockey-turned-mayor of the nation's capital city declared himself president of a transitional government, and was confirmed by Madagascar's high court. He is expected to be inaugurated on Saturday.

Read Article CNN

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Pope preaches to thousands at Cameroon mass

2009-03-19T11:35:00.000-07:00

Tens of thousands of people packed a soccer stadium in Cameroon Thursday, including President Paul Biya and his wife, for the first large-scale mass of Pope Benedict XVI's first visit to Africa.

Africa is the last continent that Benedict had left to visit, and one he could not avoid, said David Gibson, a biographer of the pope.

"He knows he has to do this. He knows Africa is the future of the (Roman Catholic) Church, as it is for all of Christianity," said Gibson. Christianity, like Islam, is on the rise in Africa and Latin America, even as the northern hemisphere tends to become more secular."

One in five of the world's Christians lives in Africa -- up from less than one in fifty in 1900, said Brian Grim, an editor of the World Religion Database. So Benedict is making the visit although travel "is not his cup of tea," Gibson said.

Read Article CNN International

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UN Rights Chief Accuses Sri Lanka And Tamil Tigers of Possible War Crimes

2009-03-13T18:59:00.002-07:00

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay accused the Sri Lankan military and Tamil Tiger rebels of actions that may constitute war crimes and violations of international human rights and humanitarian law. She said both parties are putting thousands of civilians at risk and is calling on them stop fighting immediately.

This is the toughest statement issued by the UN's top human rights official on the conduct of the war in Sri Lanka. Navi Pillay said she is extremely alarmed at the increasing number of civilians reported killed and injured in the conflict in northern Sri Lanka.

Her spokesman, Rupert Colville, said High Commissioner Pillay is very upset at the apparent ruthless disregard shown by y positions.

Read Article Voice of America

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Italy reports release of aid workers in Sudan

2009-03-13T18:59:00.001-07:00

The Italian foreign ministry said Friday that three foreign aid workers being held hostage in Darfur had been released but representatives for their aid organization could not confirm that they had been freed.

Representatives for Doctors Without Borders where the hostages worked said they have not been in touch with them since reports surfaced of their release late Friday.

Conflicting reports about the fate of the hostages added to the mystery of the kidnapping, which has raised fears about a backlash against foreigners in Darfur following an arrest warrant issued against the country's president for war crimes there.

There were also reports that a Sudanese guard initially abducted with the group and then thought to have been released was instead still with the three foreign aid workers.

Read Article Associated Press

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Brazil attacks church opposition to girl's abortion

2009-03-05T17:03:00.000-08:00

Brazil's health minister accused the Roman Catholic Church on Thursday of an "extreme" and "inadequate" position in opposing an abortion for a 9-year-old girl suspected to have been raped by her stepfather.

Doctors in the northeastern city of Recife performed the abortion on Wednesday after deciding that the girl could have died if her pregnancy with twins was allowed to continue. According to media reports, the girl was nearly four months pregnant.

The Catholic Church's archbishop for the area criticized the decision as against "the law of God" and excommunicated her mother, the doctors and other people involved in the abortion.

"I believe the position of the church is extreme, radical and inadequate," Health Minister Jose Gomes Temporao said on a government radio program.

Read Article Reuters

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Bomb kills 13 at livestock market south of Baghdad

2009-03-05T17:02:00.000-08:00

A car bomb tore through a crowded livestock market south of Baghdad on Thursday, killing at least 13 people in a mainly Shiite area that the U.S. military has described as one of the safest in Iraq.

The blast, which wounded 57 others, struck the market at the height of trading, scattering animal carcasses and human remains across the dirt.

"We had just started to have our breakfast in a tea shop inside the livestock market when we saw huge flames rising, and people started to run," Hussein Abdul-Kadir said. "We saw several bodies and carcasses, some burned and on the ground."

Abdul-Kadir, one of dozens of merchants, farmers, butchers and buyers at the market, said many people carried the wounded to their cars to take them to the hospital.

The attack — on the outskirts of Hillah, a city 60 miles south of Baghdad — was Iraq's deadliest in three weeks and underscored the dangers still facing this country as the Americans prepare to withdraw by the end of 2011.

Read Article Associated Press

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BOE’s King ‘Groping in the Dark’ as U.K. Expands Money Supply

2009-03-05T17:01:00.000-08:00

Bank of England Governor Mervyn King, criticized for his initial response to the credit crisis, is now embarking on one of the biggest risks in British economic history.

The central bank yesterday won authority to print as much as 150 billion pounds ($212 billion) and pump it into an economy facing its worst recession since World War II, after cutting interest rates close to zero. With markets clogged and economic activity shriveling, King can’t be sure the gamble will work.

“We’re groping in the dark,” said Willem Buiter, a former Bank of England policy maker and now a professor at the London School of Economics. “Ultimately, we’ll know it works if the economy turns around, and that we won’t know for a couple of years.”

Read Article Bloomberg

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No quick way to enforce ICC warrant for Bashir

2009-03-05T17:00:00.000-08:00

The International Criminal Court has ordered the arrest of Sudan's president, but even the court's most ardent supporters concede it will be a long time before he appears in the dock -- if he ever does.

As a legal expert for New York-based Human Rights Watch, Richard Dicker, noted this week, the "Achilles heel" of the ICC is that it has no police force to carry out its warrants.

Instead, the Hague-based ICC depends on governments, mainly those of the suspects it indicts, to enforce its wishes.

Of the four people -- all Congolese warlords -- surrendered to the ICC since it came into being in 2002, three were handed over by the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo and one by Belgium. Seven other people indicted before this week are still at large.

In a statement on Wednesday accompanying its warrant, the ICC directed its registrar to send Khartoum a request to arrest and surrender President Omar Hassan al-Bashir for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur.

Read Article Reuters

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Holocaust-denying bishop apologizes, but does not recant

2009-02-26T17:10:00.000-08:00

The Catholic bishop who caused outrage for denying the Nazis had systematically murdered millions of Jews in the Holocaust apologized Thursday for his statements.

"I regret having made such remarks," Bishop Richard Williamson said in a statement on a Catholic Web site where he has posted in the past. "If I had known beforehand the full harm and hurt to which they would give rise, especially to the Church, but also to survivors and relatives of victims of injustice under the Third Reich, I would not have made them."

He did not retract the comments or say he had changed his mind about the Holocaust.

Read Article CNN

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US cracks down on Sinaloa drug cartel as Mexico sends in the army

2009-02-26T17:09:00.000-08:00

One of Mexico’s most feared drug cartels has been brought to its knees in the US after a sweep of 755 arrests — 52 of them this week — according to Barack Obama’s new Attorney-General.

Eric Holder, appointed America’s law chief three weeks ago, said federal agents would continue their crackdown on Mexico’s cocaine, marijuana, Ecstasy and methamphetamine trade until all of the country’s ruthless and politically connected smuggling organisations were wiped out.

Within hours of the announcement, Mexico said that it was sending another 5,000 troops into the lawless border town of Ciudad Juárez, where 250 people have been murdered by cartel hitmen this month alone, and where a recent emergency meeting of top-level Cabinet ministers was disrupted by a bomb scare. Juárez is located directly across the border from El Paso, Texas.

Read Article Times Online

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Amsterdam plane crash investigators search wreckage for clues to disaster

2009-02-26T17:08:00.000-08:00

Investigators are sifting through the wreckage of a Boeing 737 that plummeted into a field near Amsterdam's Schiphol airport in an attempt to find clues to what caused the crash, in which nine people died and 86 were injured.

Dozens of safety officials and police worked overnight at the scene of the disaster in the hope of discovering evidence that could help explain why the pilot lost control of the Turkish Airlines plane seconds before it hurtled to the ground.

An airport spokesman confirmed today that three Britons were on board the flight. They are believed to be Susan Lord and her daughters Sofia and Lisa Labeij, who were travelling to the Netherlands with Jakavus Labeij, the girls' Turkish father. All are thought to have escaped without serious injury.

Read Article guradian.co

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Mutineers forced to surrender after massacre in Bangladeshi capital

2009-02-26T17:07:00.000-08:00

Details of a bloodbath in the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka, emerged yesterday in the wake of an uprising by paramilitaries who were finally forced to surrender by columns of advancing tanks.

One government source said 50 people had been killed, though the official toll was 11 last night, including an army major general and his wife murdered in cold blood by members of the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR), the border security force.

The onslaught began when the army officer corps dismissed appeals by the paramilitaries for more pay, subsidised food and holidays and refused to send them on lucrative UN peacekeeping missions.

The result was a bloody takeover of the BDR headquarters. A succession of officers were shot and children from the regiment's school taken hostage.

Read Article guardian.co

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Argentina expels Catholic bishop who questions Holocaust

2009-02-19T17:25:00.000-08:00

Argentina ordered a British bishop who has questioned the truth of the Holocaust to leave the country last night or face expulsion, reigniting a controversy which has dogged the Vatican. The interior ministry said Richard Williamson, a conservative Catholic who headed a seminary near Buenos Aires, had 10 days to leave.

The unexpected decision cited the bishop's Holocaust denial as well as his alleged failure to reveal "his true activity" in Argentina. He had apparently registered as an employee of a non-governmental group.

"The interior minister ... orders Richard Nelson Williamson to leave the country within 10 days or be expelled," the statement said. Jewish groups welcomed the move. Julio Schlosser, general secretary of the Jewish social welfare organisation Amia, said Williamson's views "affects the civic harmony and the social peace that this country needs so much".

Read Article guardian.co

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Moscow court acquits three defendants in Politkovskaya murder

2009-02-19T17:24:00.000-08:00

Attempts to find justice for murdered Russian investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya hit a brick wall Thursday when a Moscow jury acquitted all three defendants in the case.

The defendants, two Chechen brothers and a former police officer, were accused of being accomplices in the contract assassination. Critics have been crying foul since the trial opened last November, since neither the actual killer nor the alleged mastermind who ordered Ms. Politkovskaya’s death have ever been caught or even named by authorities.

Politkovskaya, a sharp critic of the Kremlin and tireless chronicler of Russian human rights abuses in Chechnya, was gunned down in the entrance to her Moscow apartment building in October 2006.

Lawyers representing Politkovskaya’s relatives and her former employer, the crusading Moscow weekly Novaya Gazeta, said they were not deterred by the verdict and would seek a fresh investigation.
“We want to see the real killer in the dock, and we will succeed,” lawyer Karina Moskalenko told journalists.

Read Article Christian Science Monitor

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Thailand’s Economy Probably Shrank for First Time in 10 Years

2009-02-19T17:23:00.000-08:00

Thailand’s economy probably shrank for the first time in almost ten years last quarter as exports plummeted and political protests hurt tourism.

Southeast Asia’s second-biggest economy contracted 2.8 percent in the three months ended Dec. 31 from a year earlier, according to the median forecast of 17 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. Gross domestic product last declined in the first quarter of 1999. The report is due on Feb. 23 at 9:30 a.m. in Bangkok.

Thailand may join neighbors Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Japan in recession as demand for the region’s goods dries up amid the deepening global slump. Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, facing opposition protests, said this week the $246 billion economy could contract in the nine months through June even as the government increases spending to support growth.

Read Article Bloomberg

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Iran slows atom plant growth but fuel stockpile jumps

2009-02-19T17:22:00.000-08:00

Iran has slowed the expansion of its uranium enrichment plant but has built up a stockpile of nuclear fuel, an International Atomic Energy Agency report said on Thursday.

The U.N. watchdog said Iran had increased the number of centrifuges refining uranium -- a process that can produce fuel for civilian energy or atom bombs -- by only 136 from 3,800 in November.

"We see the pace of installing and bringing centrifuges into operation has slowed quite considerably since August," a senior U.N. official said.

But Iran's reported stockpile of low-enriched uranium had risen to 1,010 kg from 630 kg in November and 480 kg in August. The heightened output rate suggested existing centrifuges were operating at higher capacity and more glitch-free than before.

Read Article Reuters

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Violence in Mexican Border Towns Impedes Missing Persons Search

2009-02-19T17:20:00.000-08:00

Mexican President Felipe Calderon's fight against drug trafficking cartels in his country has produced an unprecedented wave of violence, especially in Mexican border cities like Juarez, where more than 1,600 people were murdered last year. There are also many cases of people who have disappeared and, their friends and relatives fear they may never be found.

The violence in Juarez continues, despite government efforts to curb the power of the drug cartels. In recent days headless bodies have turned up on the streets and signs have been posted around town threatening local police who try to interfere with drug smuggling.

The climate of fear has complicated the work of El Paso resident Jaime Hervella, who helped found the cross-border Association of Relatives and Friends of Disappeared Persons several years ago and now finds himself mostly on his own.

Read Article Voice of America

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Indonesia hit by powerful earthquake

2009-02-11T14:09:00.000-08:00

A powerful earthquake struck off eastern Indonesia early Thursday, briefly triggering fears of a tsunami. There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the 7.0-magnitude quake struck at 1:34 a.m. (1734 Wednesday GMT, 2:34 p.m. Wednesday EST) about 195 miles (315 kilometers) from Manado, the northernmost city on Sulawesi island.

It was centered 21 miles (35 kilometers) beneath the ocean floor, the agency said.

Five aftershocks measuring more than magnitude 5 followed, the USGS said on its Web site.

The Indonesian Agency for Meteorology and Geophysics said in mobile phone text messages sent to reporters that the quake had the power to trigger a tsunami, but the warning was lifted about an hour later.

Read Article Associated Press

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More Australian arsonists hunted

2009-02-11T14:07:00.000-08:00

Australian officials suspect arsonists were responsible for starting fresh fires in Victoria, as a dozen bushfires continued to burn in the state.

State Premier John Brumby said he was aware of "several" fires being lit deliberately in the Beechworth area northeast of Melbourne late on Tuesday.

More than 180 people have been killed in fires since Saturday.

Bodies are still being retrieved, prompting police to bar residents from returning to some towns.

They said the sight of the burned bodies would be too distressing for residents.

Read Article BBC News

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28 die after bombers and gunmen launch daring attack on Afghan government

2009-02-11T14:05:00.000-08:00

Suicide bombers and gunmen launched co-ordinated attacks in Kabul this morning, leaving 28 people dead and 57 injured days ahead of a visit to the Afghan capital by the new US envoy.

The attacks began mid-morning in the crowded city streets when six gunmen, all wearing suicide vests, began assaults in an upmarket district that houses the ministries of Justice, Education and Finance.

Five gunmen succeeded in penetrating heavy security around the Ministry of Justice, killing employees and holding security forces at bay for several hours. Two suicide bombers also hit the Prison's Directorate on the north side of the city. A further gunman was shot outside the Education Ministry.

Read Article Times Online

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Coordinated Kabul assault shows Taliban strength

2009-02-11T12:52:00.000-08:00

Insurgents attacked three government offices in Kabul on Wednesday, killing at least 26 and wounding nearly 60. The assault was one of the most complex and daring to take place in the Afghan capital since 2001.

Five armed militants stormed the Ministry of Justice building, in a crowded section of downtown, killing some workers and taking others hostage. Afghan security forces exchanged gunfire for hours before freeing the hostages and killing all of the insurgents. At the same time, suicide bombers assailed a government prison affairs office in the north of the city, while a gunman opened fire outside the education ministry before being killed by police.

The attacks come as the Obama administration is reviewing US strategy in Afghanistan. US special representative Richard Holbrooke is due to visit Kabul Thursday from Pakistan as part of a South Asian tour, and President Obama is expected to decide within days whether to send as many as 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan.

Read Article Christian Science Monitor

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British bishop who denied scale of Holocaust loses job

2009-02-09T17:16:00.000-08:00

A British bishop who has questioned the truth of the Holocaust has been removed from the seminary in Argentina that he had directed for the past five years.

Richard Williamson caused outrage with his remarks, which surfaced shortly after the Vatican's recent decision to welcome him back into the Catholic church.

The decision to remove the cleric from the seminary was an attempt to smooth over frayed relations with the Vatican, a spokesman for Williamson's religious order said.

"I hope this move will cause the situation to calm a little and enable a dialogue to be reopened with the Pope," Father Christian Bouchacourt said.

Williamson is reported to have claimed in a television interview last month that historical evidence suggested there "were no gas chambers" and that only 300,000 Jews perished in Nazi concentration camps.

Read Article Guardian.co.uk

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Female suicide bomber kills at least 28 in Sri Lanka

2009-02-09T17:11:00.000-08:00

A female Tamil Tiger suicide bomber hiding among people fleeing Sri Lanka's war blew herself up on Monday, killing at least 28 civilians and soldiers and wounding 90, the military said.

The blast happened near Vishvamadu, a town in the north of the Indian Ocean island recently captured by soldiers battling to crush the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) separatists and end a 25-year-old war.

The United States in a statement condemned it as "an apparent effort to discourage Tamils from leaving the conflict area." The military said it was the third suicide attack in a week.

Read Article Reuters

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Fire guts part of a Beijing Olympics icon

2009-02-09T17:09:00.000-08:00

One section of the strikingly photogenic Beijing tower for the Chinese state broadcast network, CCTV, erupted in flames today -- Monday evening in China -- on the last night of celebrations marking the Lunar New Year.

The fire struck not the main, torquing CCTV tower, but an adjacent shorter structure, in which a 241-room Mandarin Oriental Hotel was due to open later this year. The entire complex, still under construction, was designed by Rem Koolhaas and Ole Scheeren of the Office for Metropolitan Architecture and was a star of television coverage of August's Beijing Olympics.

Although the larger tower was luckily spared, this is no minor loss.

Read Article Los Angeles Times

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Australia declares bushfire disaster a crime scene

2009-02-09T17:07:00.000-08:00

Australian police treated the country's entire bushfire disaster zone as a crime scene on Tuesday as investigators combed through a blackened wasteland to find clues to the culprits behind the country's deadliest fires.

Arson investigators began their work even as about 25 fires still raged across southern Victoria, including some of the hardest-hit areas north of Melbourne where so far 173 people have been confirmed dead, many burnt in cars and their own homes.

"All of the fires have been treated as a crime scene," a police spokesman said, adding that arson investigators from up and down the country were descending on the disaster zone. "We do believe they may have been lit deliberately, but we can't confirm it," the spokeswoman said.

Read Article Reuters

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German investigators to look for Nazi's body

2009-02-05T10:37:00.000-08:00

Germany will seek Egypt's permission to search for the body of top Nazi war criminal Aribert Heim after new information indicated the Austrian concentration camp doctor died in Cairo years ago, investigators said Thursday.

Heim, accused of carrying out gruesome experiments and murdering hundreds of Jews, has been pursued by German investigators for decades. Now it appears he lived in Egypt under an Arab name, learned Arabic and converted to Islam.

"He died in 1992, said Tarek Abdel-Moneim el Rifai, the son of Heim's dentist in Cairo. "I didn't know that he was a doctor and that he is the most wanted Nazi war criminal."

El Rifai said he didn't know Heim by his real name and that his family used to refer to him as "the German man."

He said he hadn't seen the man for 20 years. He remembered that he liked photography but never allowed himself to be photographed.

"The only thing I knew about him is that he fled from the Jews," el Rifai said.

Read Article Associated Press

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Getting serious in Pakistan

2009-02-05T10:35:00.000-08:00

UNUSUALLY, Pakistan may be about to give the world a pleasant surprise. Speaking to The Economist, a senior Pakistani official reinforced a recent impression that Pakistan has at last launched a serious investigation into last November’s devastating terrorist attacks in Mumbai, which India and Western governments have blamed on a banned Pakistani Islamist militant group, Lashkar-e-Taiba (LET).

The official said that Pakistani investigators had found new evidence to substantiate claims made in a dossier provided to them by India last month. India—as well as America and Britain—claims that the commando-style attacks on two hotels, a railway station and a Jewish centre in southern Mumbai, which lasted for three days and claimed over 170 lives, was plotted in Pakistan and launched from there.

Read Article Economist

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Spokesman says Vatican can't control its message

2009-02-05T10:34:00.000-08:00

The Vatican does not have control over its own communications and should improve the way it presents controversial statements, spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi told a French Catholic newspaper on Thursday.

Lombardi spoke to the daily La Croix after almost two weeks of heated debate over Pope Benedict's decision to lift the excommunications of four ultra-traditionalist bishops, one of whom has denied the Holocaust.

Jewish groups, Catholic bishops and German Chancellor Angela Merkel criticized Williamson's comments and many urged the Vatican to ensure the four bishops respect reforms of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965).

Read Article Reuters

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Key Tamil Tiger sea base 'falls'

2009-02-05T10:33:00.000-08:00

It says that about 15 rebel fighters - including three senior commanders - were killed in the fighting at Chalai.

There has been no independent confirmation of the report, and no comment from the rebels.

Earlier, the government said there would be no ceasefire with the rebels, despite international calls for talks.

Military spokesman Brig Udaya Nanayakkara said that with the capture of Chalai, the army had now brought almost all the rebel naval bases on the eastern coast under its control.

Read Article BBC News

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Gaza blockade: Israeli navy commandeers ship carrying aid

2009-02-05T10:31:00.000-08:00

Israel put some teeth into maritime quarantine of the Gaza Strip on Thursday when its navy on Thursday commandeered a ship that defied the blockade by entering the enclave’s territorial waters.

The confrontation was the latest in a string of attempts by international activists to test Israel’s lockdown of the Gaza Strip via the sea. The challenge focuses pressure on Israel to lift a months-long embargo on Gaza by blocking land and sea routes into the enclave of 1.5 million.

The question of how and when to lift the blockade is a key item of dispute in Egyptian mediated cease-fire talks, which are expected to come to a conclusion in the coming days. As a recent Monitor article explained, border crossings are the crux of any lasting cease-fire.

Bound with 60 tons of aid, human rights activists, and an Al Jazeera reporter, the vessel named “The Brotherhood” had set out from Tripoli, Lebanon, two days earlier. Israeli police spokesperson Mickey Rosenfeld said that two of the ship’s passengers were being taken into custody but could not comment on the fate of the remainder of the crew.

Read Article Christian Science Monitor

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Hungry caterpillars force Liberian emergency

2009-01-28T17:47:00.000-08:00

Liberia's president has declared a state of emergency after hordes of ravenous caterpillars infested the country.

Tens of millions of the worm-like larvae have appeared in the northern part of the country, where they are destroying green crops like cabbage and collard greens and contaminating the water supply, Liberian Information Minister Laurance Bropleh told CNN Wednesday from the capital of Monrovia.

"I am not aware that they have been here before, ever, and certainly not in this great number," Bropleh told CNN. "That is why it was so overwhelming initially when we first discovered it."

The state of emergency covers the three northern Liberian counties of Bong, Lofa, and Gbarpolu, Liberian officials said.

Read Article CNN.com

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Police: Child thrown from bridge critically hurt

2009-01-28T17:46:00.000-08:00

A young girl was near death after a man threw her 190 feet (58 meters) from a bridge into a river on Thursday in Australia's second largest city, police said.

Water police used a boat to rescue the girl, aged about 5, around 15 minutes after witnesses reported seeing her thrown from the busy West Gate Bridge in Melbourne, police spokeswoman Mia Paterson said.

"Witnesses have told police that a man was seen driving along the inbound lane of the West Gate Freeway when, just near the top of the bridge, the car stopped and it is believed the young child was thrown over," Paterson said.

The girl was flown by helicopter to a Melbourne hospital with "life threatening injuries," she said.

A man was arrested hours later, she said. No information on charges was immediately released.

Read Article Internation Herald Tribune

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Russia and China blame crisis on debt binge

2009-01-28T17:45:00.002-08:00

China and Russia blamed debt-fueled consumption on Wednesday for massive financial collapse and called for global cooperation to repair the world economy.

"The existing financial system has failed," Putin told business and political leaders holding their annual World Economic Forum in this Swiss ski resort.

Growth was based on greed where one center printed money without respite and consumed wealth, and another manufactured cheap goods and saved money, he said.

His clear swipe at the United States was echoed by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, who said the bad macroeconomic policies and unsustainable growth models of some countries "characterized by prolonged low savings and high consumption" were primary reasons for the crisis.

Read Article Reuters UK

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Obama speaks with president of South Africa

2009-01-28T17:45:00.001-08:00

President Barack Obama spoke by telephone with South African President Kgalema Motlanthe on Wednesday and discussed South Africa's role in helping to resolve the political crisis in neighboring Zimbabwe.

Obama also emphasized the importance of South Africa's leadership role as a "strong and vibrant" democracy in Africa, the White House said.

A continuing impasse over whether Zimbabwe's rival political parties will form a unity government has embroiled the country in a prolonged and violent political crisis that has devastated the once-prosperous nation. Half the population of Zimbabwe, formerly a food exporter, faces starvation and a cholera epidemic caused by the collapse of water services has killed nearly 3,000 people.

Read Article Associated Press

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US Says It Would Welcome Russian Missile Restraint

2009-01-28T17:43:00.000-08:00

The State Department said Wednesday a Russian decision to forego deployment of advanced missiles in its Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad would be a positive development. Russia had announced the move last November because of U.S. plans to put a missile-defense system in Europe to counter an envisaged Iranian threat.

Officials here say while Russian intentions with regard the Kaliningrad missiles are still not entirely clear, a decision by Moscow to shelve the announced deployment would be a positive development as the new U.S. administration settles into office.

Russia's Interfax news agency Wednesday quoted an unnamed Russian defense official as saying Moscow had suspended plans to put short-range Iskander missiles in Kaliningrad, because the Obama team is not pushing ahead with plans for the European missile-defense system.

Read Article Voice of America

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US 'welcomes' end of Russia-Ukraine gas dispute

2009-01-22T16:28:00.000-08:00

The United States said Thursday it "welcomes" the end to the gas dispute between Russia and Ukraine, and offered to help the European Union's efforts to enhance energy security.

"The United States welcomes the resolution of the gas dispute between Ukraine and Russia. We understand gas flows have been restored to European customers," said acting State Department spokesman Robert Wood.

Both Russian state-run energy giant Gazprom and its Ukrainian counterpart Naftogaz confirmed that gas flows had resumed after they signed a 10-year contract on Monday to end their dispute.

"This incident underscores the need for transparent, market-oriented arrangements for the sale and shipment of natural gas and the importance of diversifying energy supplies," Wood added in a statement.

"The United States stands ready to support European Union efforts to enhance its energy security."

The crisis erupted on January 1 when Russia cut gas to Ukraine's domestic market over unpaid debts and demands for a higher price in 2009.

Read Article AFP

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Two are sentenced to death over toxic milk scandal

2009-01-22T16:25:00.000-08:00

Two men are to be executed and one of China’s top dairy company bosses will spend the rest of her life in jail after at least six babies died and 300,000 fell ill after drinking infant milk powder that was deliberately tainted with an industrial chemical.

Outside the closed court distraught parents wept and railed against what they saw as the leniency of the sentence against the head of the dairy company Sanlu Group.

Some demanded that responsibility be laid on Communist Party officials, whom they blamed for assisting the cover-up and thus delaying a public announcement that Sanlu’s baby formula had been mixed with melamine. The nitrogen-rich chemical mixed into the milk fooled tests by appearing to boost the product’s protein content.

Read Article Times Online

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S. Korean President Reshuffles Cabinet

2009-01-19T10:23:00.000-08:00

President Lee Myung-bak of South Korea replaced his top economic aides on Monday in a cabinet reshuffle aimed at restoring public trust after popular criticism that his year-old government mishandled the economy during the global financial crisis.

Mr. Lee appointed Yoon Jeung-hyun, a former financial regulator, to head the Ministry of Strategy and Finance, replacing the unpopular incumbent, Kang Man-soo. He also replaced the chief of the main financial regulatory agency, the Financial Services Commission, and his top presidential economic aide.

The shake-up did not signal any major shift in Mr. Lee’s economic policy, market analysts said. Rather, it was aimed at giving Mr. Lee’s economic team a new face in the hope of regaining public confidence.

Read Article New York Times

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Israel to keep tight grip on Gaza reconstruction

2009-01-19T10:19:00.000-08:00

Israel intends to exert control over the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip following its 22-day offensive, and is seeking guarantees that no U.N. projects will benefit Hamas, officials said on Monday.

Israel, which declared a unilateral ceasefire on Sunday, retains full control over Gaza's commercial crossings, through which goods and other materials for rebuilding must pass.

Smuggler tunnels under Gaza's border with Egypt, which were used by Hamas and many ordinary Palestinians to get around the Israeli-led blockade, were heavily bombed during the war and are, at least temporarily, out of commission.

That gives Israel enormous power to shape the recovery effort, which will be largely financed by the international community. Preliminary estimates put the damage at nearly $2 billion. Saudi Arabia said it would donate $1 billion.

Read Article Reuters

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Bush awards medals to wartime allies

2009-01-14T11:28:00.000-08:00

Three former wartime allies were reunited at the White House for one last time on Tuesday when President George W. Bush awarded America's top civilian honor to the former prime ministers of Britain and Australia.

In his last days in office Bush presented Tony Blair and John Howard with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, hailing them as "the sort of guys who look you in the eye, keep their word, and tell the truth." Colombia's President Alvaro Uribe also received the award.

Bush called each of them "a true friend of the United States who met historic challenges with great tenacity and who provides a lasting example of statesmanship at home and abroad."

Blair and Howard were staunch supporters of the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq, sending troops to the country in the face of public opposition to the conflict.

Read Article CNN International

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Arab officials urge state spending during crisis

2009-01-14T11:12:00.000-08:00

Arab central bankers and finance ministers urged their governments on Wednesday to keep state spending high to shore up domestic economies amid a collapse in oil prices and recession across the industrialised world.

Some Arab states, including top oil exporter Saudi Arabia, already project budget deficits in 2009 as they seek to buoy their non-oil sectors after oil prices slumped below $40 a barrel, almost a quarter of a record July level.

Much of the Arab world, particularly in the Gulf, rely heavily on crude export revenues.

Read Article Reuters

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War in Gaza: Hopes rise for an end to conflict as death toll passes 1,000

2009-01-14T11:11:00.000-08:00

Hopes of a negotiated end to the Gaza war rose today as the death toll passed 1,000 and Hamas responded favourably to an Egyptian ceasefire plan.

Officials in Cairo said that they had forwarded that positive response to Israel. Having studied it Amos Gilad, Israel's top negotiator, is expected to fly to Cairo tomorrow. An Israeli foreign office spokesman said that meant there was "something to discuss".

Bernard Kouchner, the French foreign minister whose government helped Egypt devise the plan, said that the "outlines of a ceasefire have begun to appear", while Miguel Angel Maratinos, the Spanish foreign minister, said after meeting Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak that the warring parties were close to an accord.

Read Article Times Online

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Coalition forces kill 38 Afghan militants

2009-01-07T17:08:00.000-08:00

Troops in Afghanistan launched raids against militants over the last two days, killing 32 armed insurgents near the nation's capital and six militants in western Afghanistan, the U.S. military said in statements Wednesday.

Coalition forces targeting a Taliban roadside bomb cell killed the 32 armed insurgents in an operation on Tuesday in the Alishang District of Laghman province. The location is more than 60 miles northeast of Kabul, the nation's capital.

Troops detained one suspect and destroyed weapons caches that included explosives and roadside bombing materials. One female was counted among the dead.

"Removal of these militants and their weapon caches prevented countless roadside bombs while protecting more than 60,000 innocent Afghans of Alishang District from the Taliban's indiscriminate killing." said Col. Jerry O'Hara, a U.S. Forces-Afghanistan representative.

Read Article CNN International

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Engineers brave freeze to repair stricken West Coast Main Line

2009-01-07T17:06:00.000-08:00

Network Rail has been accused of ignoring warnings that it was rushing upgrade work to Britain's busiest railway after the latest in a series of faults on the line led to a sixth day of disruptions. Tens of thousands of rush-hour commuters were stranded at London's Euston station yesterday morning after another problem with overhead power cables closed the West Coast Main Line, which stretches from London to Glasgow.

Damage to power lines around Wembley, in north-west London, led to the immediate cancellation of all services from Euston until 10.10am yesterday. Several power failures have hit the line since the completion of a £9bn upgrade and the introduction of extra hourly services to Birmingham and Manchester last month.

Read Article The Independent UK

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Zimbabwe cholera fears grow as rains peak

2009-01-05T10:41:00.000-08:00

Zimbabwe's cholera epidemic, which has killed more than 1,600 people, could get worse as the rainy season peaks, its health minister said on Monday.

The outbreak has heightened the humanitarian crisis in Zimbabwe, where President Robert Mugabe and the opposition are deadlocked over a power-sharing deal and the veteran leader is resisting Western calls to step down.

The World Health Organisation said last week that cholera had killed 1,608 people of 30,365 reported cases and the infection rate showed no signs of slowing.

The water-borne disease has spread because of the collapse of health and sanitation systems.

The rainy season peaks in January or February and ends in late March.

Read Article Reuters South Africa

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Concerns of civilian deaths rise in Sri Lanka

2009-01-05T10:40:00.000-08:00

Sri Lankan forces overran another village Monday and moved closer to seizing a strategic base from the Tamil Tigers, but concerns are mounting for the hundreds of thousands of civilians living in the rebels' shrinking territory.

The government has chased the rebels out of much of their de facto state in the north in recent months — taking their administrative capital of Kilinochchi last week — but the offensive is complicated by the presence of an estimated 300,000 civilians in rebel territory.

The rebels now occupy a slice of jungle slightly larger than the city of Los Angeles.

As civilians increasingly get in the way of the battle, it could become difficult for the government to fight on without causing an unacceptable loss of life, human rights activists and some Western diplomats said.

Read Article Associated Press

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A Palestinian family huddles together in Gaza City

2009-01-05T10:39:00.000-08:00

The Israeli drones are driving me crazy. I go outside only to buy food, water, and medicine, or to recharge my cellphone at a nearby mosque that is powered by generators. Inside my Gaza City apartment, electricity and phone lines are out. Heat is a luxury. We sleep with the windows open in case an Israeli shell lands nearby, which would shatter the glass.

All around Gaza City, this coastal strip's largest urban area, fighting has intensified since Israel launched its ground invasion Saturday. So far, even though more than 530 Gazans have been killed and 2,000 wounded in the conflict, support for Hamas does not appear to be weakening.

At the long bread lines, customers listen to their transistor radios while they wait. When they hear of a Hamas missile striking Israel, cheering begins. Others lash out at Arab states because of their alleged cooperation with Israel, some trade stories about the wounded, the dead, and worsening life for Gazans since the start of the assault, now in its 10th day.

Read Article Christian Science Monitor

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Four dead in Afghan bomb attacks

2008-12-29T17:01:00.000-08:00

Bombings at a governor's compound and a bazaar in Afghanistan on Monday killed four civilians and wounded a few dozen others, the NATO command in the country said.

A car bomb targeting the compound of the Parvan provincial governor in eastern Afghanistan killed two civilians and wounded 16 others.

Two improvised explosive devices detonated at a bazaar in the southern province of Kandahar, killing two civilians, including a child. Twenty civilians and an Afghan border police officer were wounded in the incident, which occurred in the town of Spin Boldak.

The violence is the latest said to be spawned by the resurgent Taliban movement that once ruled Afghanistan.

The Taliban regime harbored the al Qaeda terror network before it was ousted from power by the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Read Article CNN International

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Six dead, two missing in Canada avalanches

2008-12-29T17:00:00.000-08:00

Searchers recovered the bodies on Monday of six of the eight snowmobilers missing since they were hit by a pair of avalanches in Canada's Rocky Mountains.

The two men still unaccounted for since Sunday's accident about 40 km (25 miles) south of Fernie, British Columbia, are believed buried in the snow, according to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

"There are six bodies recovered, and we're still looking for two more," said RCMP Cpl. Chris Faulkner, who acknowledged it was very unlikely the missing men were still alive.

Eleven snowmobilers were caught in two slides in Harvey Pass, a backcountry recreation area popular with local residents in southeast British Columbia. Three people dug themselves out and suffered minor injuries.

Read Article Reuters

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UN Officials Address Humanitarian Needs In Gaza

2008-12-29T16:59:00.000-08:00

United Nations officials said suffering stemming from Israeli air strikes in the Gaza Strip is being compounded by shortages of food, medical supplies, and other basic needs.

U.N. officials have expressed alarm at the number of civilian casualties that have been reported since Israel launched the attacks in Gaza. U.N. Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs John Holmes spoke at a news conference in New York.

"I think the scale of casualties on the Palestinian side reflects the fact that, however hard you try to target in circumstances such as those of Gaza with a large population in a small area, civilian casualties are almost impossible to avoid. And that is particularly true when so many locations are being targeted," he said.

Read Article VOA News

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