shameen Baghdad, August 18: Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is to visit Damascus for talks on security on Tuesday after the top US general in Iraq said Syria’s role in allowing fighters to enter the country remained a concern.
Maliki’s trip, which will include a meeting with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, comes just days after a senior US military delegation visited Syria to discuss regional security issues, reportedly including Iraq.
Jerusalem, August 18: Support among Palestinians for president Mahmud Abbas and his secular Fatah party is greater than that for his Islamist Hamas rivals, according to the results of a poll released on Monday.
The survey carried out by the Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research (PSR) found that 52 percent of Palestinians would vote for Abbas to remain president, up three percentage points from three months ago.
Abu Dhabi, August 18: Barack Obama was bidding Tuesday to breathe new life into his Mideast peace push, looking to Egyptian leader Mubarak help break a deadlock between Israel and Arab states.
It will mark the longtime US ally’s first White House summit in five years, turning a page on a tense relationship with former president George W. Bush who pushed him to release political prisoners and hold free elections.
New York, August 18: A U.S. Army captain has been charged with accepting tens of thousands of dollars in bribes while he was stationed in Iraq to steer more than $500,000 in contracts.
The charges were filed Monday against 38-year-old Bryant Williams, of Clarksville, Tennessee.
An indictment in federal court in Manhattan says Williams accepted the bribes while he was in Baghdad from 2005 to 2006.
Baghdad, August 18: America’s top commander in Iraq said Monday he wants to deploy U.S. soldiers alongside Iraqi and Kurdish troops in a disputed swath of northern territory following a series of horrific bombings by insurgents hoping to stoke an Arab-Kurdish conflict.
Sanaa, August 18: A US Congress delegation led by Senator John McCain on Monday held talks with Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh on cooperation between the two countries, Yemen’s state news agency Saba said.
Latest developments at the regional and international levels as well as US business in Yemen were also on the agenda.
The delegation also met with government officials and left Sanaa after the one-day visit.
–Agencies
Washington, August 18: Hosni Mubarak on Monday put the onus on Israel to break a deadlock with Arab nations as he held talks with a US administration under pressure to launch a new peace push.
Mubarak met for more than an hour Secretary of State Hillary Clinton a day ahead of a summit with President Barack Obama. It will be the first White House meeting in five years for Mubarak, who had tense relations with former president George W. Bush.
Kabul, August 18: A roadside bomb in southern Afghanistan killed a U.S. service member, while an American civilian working for the military died after insurgents attacked a patrol in the east, officials said.
In Kabul, two mortar rounds were fired early Tuesday near the presidential palace in Kabul, the U.S. military said. U.S. spokeswoman Capt. Elizabeth Mathias had no details of damage or casualties from the attack, which occurred two days before presidential elections.
Taiwan, August 18: Taiwan’s vice foreign minister resigned on Tuesday amid rising criticism over the government’s slow response to Typhoon Morakot, which claimed about 500 lives on the island and caused an estimated $1.5 billion in damage.
The resignation of Andrew Hsia — which still needs to be approved by the Cabinet — came 10 days after Morakot hit. The move was linked to the ministry’s delay in requesting foreign aid after the storm hit, said a foreign ministry official on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak to the press.
New Jersey, August 18: In sheer fan numbers, Shah Rukh Khan is one of the most recognizable movie stars in the world.
In nearly every country he travels to, Khan is given a red-carpet welcome and swarmed by thousands of adoring fans.
But the 44-year-old megastar of Bollywood, as Mumbai’s film industry is known, wasn’t recognized at Newark Liberty International Airport on Friday. He was detained by U.S. immigration officials for more than an hour and held for questioning.
Islamabad, August 18: Intelligence officials say security forces are holding the Pakistani Taliban’s top spokesman after capturing him near the Afghan border.
The three officials said Tuesday that Maulvi Omar was seized from a village in the Mohmand tribal region Monday night as he was traveling in a car with two of his associates.
They said local tribal elders assisted troops in locating Omar, who became prominent in recent years as spokesman for the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, calling journalists to claim responsibility for dozens of terrorist attacks inside Pakistan.
Sydney, August 18: Australia on Tuesday said China downgraded an official visit this month in protest over Canberra’s decision to give a visa to exiled Uighur leader Rebiya Kadeer, expressing “regret” over the move.
A spokesman for Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said Vice-Foreign Minister He Yafei pulled out of the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) and was replaced by a more junior envoy.
“We regret that the Chinese government has felt obliged to take these steps, since the government’s position on the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region is clear,” he added.
Kabul, August 18: The threat of violence looms over the Afghan presidential election on Thursday. And not just from Taliban militants.
Abdullah Abdullah, a former foreign minister who is President Hamid Karzai’s top rival, told a crowd of flag-waving supporters in Kabul on Monday that he will win the election — “if they don’t steal your votes,” confident rhetoric that analysts say could stoke a violent backlash if his supporters believe they’ve been cheated.
Seoul, August 18: Kim Dae-Jung, who spearheaded South Korea’s struggle for democracy and went on to win the presidency and the Nobel peace prize, died on Tuesday aged 83.
An official at a Seoul hospital treating Kim for pneumonia confirmed the death. Local media reports said he died of heart failure.
In his final year, Kim saw his efforts unravel as relations with the North headed back into the freezer under the South’s current conservative President Lee Myung-bak.
Mogadishu, August 17: Suspected Islamist insurgents stormed a UN aid compound in southern Somalia overnight, witnesses said on Monday, but UN guards fought back and killed three of the attackers in a gun battle.
One UN official said about 10 heavily-armed men attacked them in Wajid, 70 km (40 miles) northwest of Baidoa town, at a compound used mostly for storing humanitarian supplies.
“After several minutes shooting our security guards repulsed the attackers and killed three of them,” the official said, adding that one UN security guard was injured.
Beijing, August 17: Hundreds of villagers broke into a smelting plant in north China blamed for the lead poisoning of more than 600 children, smashing trucks in protest, state media reported on Monday.
Around 100 policemen were deployed after the villagers in Shaanxi province’s Changqing township destroyed fencing around a special plant railway to gain access to the facility, the official Xinhua news agency said.
At least 10 trucks were damaged, the report said.
A policeman in Changqing township, who refused to be named, said that the villagers had dispersed.
Manilla, August 17: The economies of most South Pacific islands are expected to contract this year due to weak tourism and remittances, the Asian Development Bank said on Monday. Bureau Report
The global economy is showing signs of stabilizing, but the full impact from the downturn in the US, Australia and New Zealand has yet to hit 14 island nations in the region monitored by the Manila-based lender.
New Delhi, August 17: Asking north-eastern states to develop a proactive police force rather than relying on Central security forces, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Monday said the situation in Assam, Manipur and Nagaland remains “problematic and worrisome”.
“There is need in the Northeast for more emphasis on pro-active state police forces rather than exclusive reliance on Central paramilitary forces and Army. The resources for policing need to be enhanced substantially,” Singh said.
New Delhi, August 17: Delhi’s most talked about cricketer and former India vice-captain, Virender Sehwag’s dare devilry has not gone down well with Delhi & District Cricket Associations’ chief patriarch Sunil Dev.
Recating to Sehwag’s allegations of corruption in DDCA, its secretary Sunil Dev asked Sehwag to concentrate on his job. “We have given Sehwag all he wanted and it is not his business to comment on the happenings of association. If he wants to get involved in DDCA matters then he must quit the game first.”
New Delhi, August 17: Cautioning that withdrawal of CRPF deployed for counter-insurgency operations in sensitive districts would leave a vacuum that could be exploited by insurgents, Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Monday sought an “immediate replacement” for the paramilitary forces in the state.
Bangalore, August 17: India has completed the design of Chandrayaan-2, its next mission to the moon this time in collaboration with Russia — that would have a lander and rover which can collect samples of the lunar soil and analyse them and send back the data.
“Right now, the design has been completed. We had a joint review with Russian scientists here,” chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation, G Madhavan Nair, said.
New Delhi, August 17: Congress is keeping NCP guessing on their pre-poll alliance in Maharashtra with no decision taken over it even today during a meeting of senior party leaders chaired by Congress President Sonia Gandhi here.
“No decision on alliance with NCP has been taken,” Mumbai Congress President Kripashankar Singh, who attended the crucial meeting said.
Currently, there are both pro- and anti-alliance views within the party with former state Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh batting strongly for no pre-poll truck with NCP.
New Delhi, August 17: A celestial show greeted skygazers at the break of dawn on Monday with Venus and Moon coming together in the eastern sky for a conjunction.
The phenomenon was seen in the early morning sky during which the thin waning crescent Moon poised directly above Venus, popularly known as Goddess of Love, Director of Science Popularisation Association of Communicators and Educators (SPACE) C B Devgun said.
London: The British Government has written to senior neurologists to warn them that the new swine flu vaccine may trigger a deadly brain disorder called Guillain-Barre syndrome.
Medical experts have been asked to look out for cases of Guillain-Barre syndrome, which can paralyse its victims, once the national vaccination programme begins.
In its letter, the Health Protection Agency refers to the use of a swine flu vaccine in the US in 1976, when 25 people died from the syndrome, while just one died from flu.
New Delhi, August 17: A Delhi court on Monday convicted four members of prestigious President’s Bodyguards (PBG) in the six-year-old Buddha Jayanti Park gang rape case.
Harpreet Singh and Satyender Singh have been found guilty of raping a 17-year-old student of a Delhi University college while two others — Kuldeep Singh and Manish Kumar — were convicted for helping them in commission of the offence.
Additional Sessions judge SK Saravaria posted the matter for hearing on August 22 on the quantum of sentence against the accused.