Islamic World

Kandhar, July 06: A suicide car bomber killed at least two civilians in an attack outside a major international military base on Monday in Afghanistan’s southern Kandahar province, a Taliban stronghold, Army officials said.

The bomber apparently targeted a group of Afghan soldiers and truck drivers providing supplies for foreign troops at the sprawling Kandahar air field south of Kandahar city.

“It was a suicide car attack which killed two truck drivers and wounded 10 more of them, along with two (Afghan) Army soldiers,” said General Sher Mohammad Zazai in Kandahar.

Tehran, July 06: Iranian Minister of Science, Research and Technology Mohammad-Mehdi Zahedi has condemned the scientific apartheid imposed by certain Western states.

“Certain European countries have created a kind of scientific apartheid. They do not permit researchers of other states do research in specific courses,” Zahedi told IRNA on the sidelines of the UNESCO’s World Conference on Higher Education 2009 in Paris on Sunday.

“We regard this approach as a kind of discrimination and call for a fight against it,” he added.

Kabul, July 06: At least two Nato soldiers have been killed in southern Afghanistan’s Helmand province, as thousands of US marines moved deeper into the province to tackle Taliban fighters.

The British defence ministry confirmed on Sunday that two of its soldiers had died in separate incidents in Gereshk district the previous day.

One of the soldiers died in a rocket-propelled grenade attack and the other when a suspected roadside bomb exploded, the ministry of defence said.

Washington, July 06: Admiral Michael Mullen expresses his satisfaction over a new wave of extra troops deployed to Afghanistan, saying that they can seize areas currently under Taliban control.

The US chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff told CBS in an interview that with the new deployments the troops can defeat the insurgents across the war-torn country.

“We have enough forces there now not just to clear an area but to hold it. So we can build after. That’s really the strategy,” Mullen said.

Dubai, July 06: Saturday was special for 27-year-old Malek Yousef Iqbal. The Pakistani national — disabled waist-down — finally got a driver’s licence.

Iqbal, a finance manager in the Dubai-based Jacob Fleming Group, is the first to get a licence in Dubai under the Disabled Driving Training Programme launched by Emirates Driving Institute in April.

Indeed, the story of Iqbal, left disadvantaged by a post-polio syndrome when he was just seven months old, is inspiring.

Tehran, July 06: Iran on Sunday freed a British-Greek journalist and police said they had let go most other people detained in election protests but fresh challenges were made to the outcome of the presidential vote.

Washington Times reporter Iason Athanasiadis-Fowden “who was arrested for activities contradictory to journalism and in connection with the recent street riots was freed today,” foreign ministry spokesman Hassan Ghashghavi told the ISNA news agency.

Abu Dhabi, July 05:) Paleontologists Sunday announced that they found an eight-million-year-old fossilised remains of an elephant, a hippo and a giant ostrich in western Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Archaeologists from Yale University and Abu Dhabi’s Authority on Culture and Heritage (AUCH) have been studying fossilised remains from the Miocene Era, some six-eight million years ago, the AUCH said in a statement.

Tehran, July 05: A pro-reform clerical group protested against the official results of Iran’s June 12 presidential election, in a statement made available to AFP.

Blasting the official electoral watchdog, the Guardians Council, the Assembly of Qom Seminary Scholars and Researchers said it no longer had the “right to judge in this case as some of its members have lost their impartial image in the eyes of the public.”

Kabul, July 05: Two British soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan’s southern province of Helmand, where US forces are carrying out a major offensive against the Taliban.

Britain’s Ministry of Defense said Sunday that the two were killed in separate attacks which took place during an operation near Gereshk in Helmand Saturday night.

While the first soldier –from 2nd Battalion The Mercian Regiment– was killed by a rocket-propelled grenade, the second –from The Light Dragoons– was killed in a roadside bomb explosion.

Tehran, July 05: Hundreds of anti-Iran demonstrators have gathered in the European quarter of Brussels to protest the recent Iranian presidential election and its aftermath.

The protestors — mostly Iranians traveling from neighboring countries such as Germany and the Netherlands– called the recent election as a complete sham and demanded a re-run.

Some wore T-shirts marked “Where Is My Vote?”, others carried banners that read “Stop Death and Terror in Iran” and “Revolution is the Only Solution”, AFP reported

Tehran, July 05: The main Iranian Opposition candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi has issued a new 25-page report detailing alleged fraud and irregularities in last month’s presidential election.

The report has been prepared by the Committee for the Protection of Votes, which is run by Mr Mousavi’s campaign office.

It accuses President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of abusing state machinery during the campaign and handing out cash to secure the votes of working-class Iranians.

Makkah, July 05: Cases of sexual harassment usually involve men as the perpetrators and women as the victims. The tables are, however, turning, as men report increasing incidence of women harassing them, usually in the workplace.

Muhammad Naif, a young Saudi who works at a store, said a woman entered his shop and asked for his number before leaving. “I gave her the shop’s card, which had a landline number on it. She then asked me to write my name on the back, which I did. She then left,” said Naif, adding that the woman began ringing him at work everyday.

Jeddah, July 05: A three-day workshop began at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI) on Saturday with 33 government departments and the Human Rights Commission participating to discuss ways of making existing public and private buildings disabled-friendly.

Muhammad Al-Fadhl, chairman of the JCCI board of directors, expressed the chamber’s readiness to cooperate with all concerned departments to cater to the needs of the disabled.

Riyadh, July 05: Saudi petrochemicals producers said yesterday they would seek duties on imports from China after Beijing began a dumping probe on petrochemical products from Saudi Arabia and three other countries.

Abdul Rahman Al-Zamil, chairman of the executive council of Saudi Export Development Center (SEDC), said China had no grounds to pursue the dumping investigation on imports of methanol and butanediol (BDO) it launched in late June.

Abu Dhabi, July 05: A United Arab Emirates (UAE) based charity plans to build an orphanage in the southern Indian state of Kerala, WAM news agency reported.

The UAE Red Crescent Authority (RCA) will build a three-storey orphanage in the state. The project is part of its efforts to deliver social care to orphans, which are one of the most vulnerable segments in the community.

A visiting team of the RCA laid down the foundation stone of the facility that will accommodate 150 orphans who will also be imparted educational and professional training.

Tehran, July 05: A top aide to Iran’s supreme leader has described the country’s main opposition leader as a US agent and has called for him to be tried for crimes against the nation.

While hardline figures had previously demanded that Mir Hossein Mousavi be prosecuted for describing Iran’s 12 June elections as fraudulent and leading demonstrations, this is the first public declaration claiming that Mr Mousavi is a foreign agent.

Tehran, JUly 05: Iran has said it will release the eighth of nine British embassy employees detained in Tehran today, Foreign Secretary David Miliband revealed.

But he vowed to continue to fight for the freedom of the remaining detainee who is facing a possible trial on charges Mr Miliband insisted had “absolutely no substance”.

The staff were arrested last weekend amid rapidly-deteriorating relations with Iran since the disputed re-election of president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the street protests that followed.

Tehran, July 05: The son of an Iranian revolutionary icon called on parliament to dismiss president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from his post, as the country’s conservative political establishment upped pressure Sunday on the reformists.

Ali Reza Beheshti, 47, a close Mousavi ally and son of one of the main leaders of the 1979 Islamic revolution, urged the parliament to reverse the election results, saying that “people expect their representatives to represent them and not to defend authorities by any means.”

Tehran, July 05: Iranian parliament speaker Ali Larijani has met with President Ahmadinejad on Saturday to congratulate his re-election as the country’s president.

Parliament members congratulated Ahmadinejad’s re-election and renewed their support for him in an earlier meeting with the president on June 22.

Larijani did not participate in the meeting.

Tehran, July 05: Iran takes a swipe at the Baghdad government, saying it has failed to secure the release of the Iranian diplomats taken hostage by US forces in Iraq two years ago.

Iranian Foreign Ministry, Manouchehr Mottaki, said Sunday that Iraqi government is not doing nearly enough to fulfill its promises regarding the fate of the abducted Iranian diplomats.

“We are seriously disappointed with Iraq’s failure in freeing the Iranian diplomats and facilitating their immediate return to their country,” said Mottaki.

Jerusalem, July 05: The United States has forced an Israeli defence firm to back out of a multi-billion dollar tender to sell new multi-role fighter planes to the Indian Air Force, a newspaper has claimed.

Under pressure from the Pentagon, the Israeli Defense Ministry has ordered Israel Aerospace Industries to back out of the deal as America expressed concern that its technology, used by Israel, would be integrated into the Gripen jets to be offered to India, ‘The Jerusalem Post’ reported.

Tehran, July 05: An advisor to Iran’s president says twenty three new Special Economic Zones (SEZ) will be inaugurated across the country this week.

“The plan to establish the Special Economic Zones was presented to the parliament last year and it was approved by lawmakers last month,” Mahmoud Salahi, who advises President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on SEZ affairs, said.

“Most of these zones are located in the less privileged areas of Iran such as Mehran in the Western province of Ilam and Namin in Ardebil Province,” IRIB quoted Salahi as saying.

Tehran, July 05: Iran has hailed the formation of a national unity government in Lebanon, expressing its full support for improving relations between all Lebanese rival parties.

In a meeting with Lebanese prime minister-designate Saad Hariri on Saturday, the Iranian envoy to Beirut Mohammad Reza Sheibani said Tehran has always supported the establishment of a national unity government in Lebanon.

During the one-hour meeting in Qoraytem, the two sides discussed Lebanon’s internal political developments along with a whole range of regional and international issues.

Tehran, July 05: Head of Iran’s Council of Experts Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani has praised the high turn-out in Iran presidential election but criticized later events.

“People from across the country created a very positive and epic scene by showing up at the polls, but unfortunately the events that followed and the problems that were created for some turned bitter,” Hashemi-Rafsanjani said.

“I do not believe that any alert conscience to be content about the circumstances that have unfolded,” he added.

Jeddah, July 05: One thousand couples got married in one night as part of the tenth mass wedding ceremony at Al-Harthi Center for Exhibitions and Ceremonies here on Saturday.

On behalf of Prince Khalel Al-Faisal, Emir of Makkah Region, the ceremony was patronized by Prince Mish’al Bin Majed, Governor of Jeddah.

About 5,000 people attended the mass wedding ceremony which was organized by the Charitable Society for Assisting the Youth for Marriage and Family Consulting.