From Yahoo News Top Stories |
1 Buoyant Congress eyes new allies for coalition
By Krittivas Mukherjee, Reuters
Sun May 17, 9:57 am ET
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India's Congress party held talks Sunday to identify allies for a new stable coalition government after a sweeping election victory at a time of sagging economic growth and regional instability.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's coalition defied predictions of a tight election and was only about 12 seats short of an outright majority from the 543 seats at stake, according to election commission data.
In a country where unwieldy coalitions were becoming the order of the day and hobbling policy, the electoral verdict this time means Congress will call the shots in coalition building rather than being dependent on the goodwill of regional parties. |
2 Pakistan urges civilians to flee from Swat
By Kamran Haider, Reuters
Sun May 17, 11:49 am ET
ISLAMABAD (Reuters) – The Pakistani government on Sunday urged people stranded by a military offensive against Taliban militants in the Swat valley to try to get out.
Many civilians are believed to still be inside Mingora, the main town in Swat, after the army launched an offensive more than a week ago to stop the spread of Taliban influence.
"I appeal to the people of Mingora and other parts which are under aggression, as soon as they get an opportunity, the curfew is relaxed, they should come out," Interior Ministry chief Rehman Malik told reporters. |
3 Pakistani army closes in on Taliban stronghold in Swat
By Alamgir Bitani, Reuters
Sun May 17, 1:23 am ET
PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) – Pakistani soldiers are closing in on the main town in the Taliban bastion of Swat, the army said on Saturday, in an offensive that has driven more than a million people from their homes.
The army launched the offensive more than a week ago to stop the spread of Taliban influence after the collapse of a peace pact the United States had criticized as tantamount to "abdicating" to the militants.
Militant violence in nuclear-armed Pakistan has surged over the past two years, raising fears for its stability and alarming the United States, which needs Pakistani action to help defeat al Qaeda and bring stability to neighboring Afghanistan. |
4 Battle looms as Obama nears Supreme Court pick
By Caren Bohan, Reuters
1 hr 4 mins ago
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama hopes to tone down the partisan warfare that often surrounds selections to the Supreme Court, but that won't be easy with interest groups bracing for a fight over issues like abortion.
Obama has been weighing a short list of mostly women for a seat on the nine-member high court that decides such issues as abortion and the death penalty as well as business and property rights cases. The court's members are appointed for life but require Senate confirmation.
The pick, expected to be announced later this month, is unlikely to change the court's ideological makeup since Obama, a Democrat, is expected to pick a liberal in the mold of retiring justice David Souter. |
5 Suu Kyi defiant ahead of trial, protests planned
By Aung Hla Tun, Reuters
1 hr 19 mins ago
YANGON (Reuters) – Myanmar's pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi is in good health and ready to defend herself against new charges that have sparked international outrage against the country's military rulers, her lawyer said.
Activists planned protests at Myanmar embassies around the world on Monday, when the Nobel Peace laureate faces a prison court accused of breaking the conditions of her house arrest set to expire on May 27 after six years of detention.
The American intruder who triggered the case against Suu Kyi and her two female companions by sneaking into her lakeside villa in Yangon is also expected to stand trial on several charges. |
6 Outnumbered U.S. troops defend Afghan frontier
By Laurent Hamida, Reuters
Sun May 17, 4:46 am ET
KUNAR VALLEY, Afghanistan (Reuters) – Lieutenant Joshua Rodriguez, a U.S. platoon commander guarding the Afghan-Pakistan frontier, reckons he is lucky to be alive.
Two weeks after he set up an outpost with 20 Afghan soldiers and seven Americans overlooking a key Taliban smuggling route, some 80 insurgents attacked them hard at daybreak.
"We were very close, very close," he said, days after the fight, holding his fingers a fraction of an inch apart. |
7 Kuwait women enter parliament, deadlock may not end
By Rania El Gamal and Eman Goma, Reuters
Sun May 17, 11:13 am ET
KUWAIT (Reuters) – Women won four seats in Kuwait's parliament, a first in the Gulf Arab state's history, but with many of the same faces back, Saturday's election is unlikely to end a political deadlock that has delayed economic reforms.
Sunni Islamists lost some ground while Shi'ites and liberals made small gains, but analysts said the changes were not enough to end a long-running standoff between parliament and government that has pushed Kuwait from one crisis to the next.
"People voted for change because people are fed up with deadlocks. It is time to focus on our priorities inside the parliament," Aseel al-Awadhi, one of Kuwait's first women lawmakers told Reuters after her win. |
8 Emerging economies face acute disaster risks: U.N.
By Laura MacInnis, Reuters
Sat May 16, 8:06 pm ET
GENEVA (Reuters) – Natural disasters threaten to trigger widespread damage and distress in emerging economies, many of which are already on the brink because of the global recession, a United Nations body said on Sunday.
There are 1 billion people living in hazard-prone slums and shantytowns in developing countries, many of which overlooked safety standards in recent years of red-hot growth, according to the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction.
Crammed settlements with poor drainage systems are making floods more frequent and severe in many cities, particularly in Asia, where the ISDR said big swathes of commercial assets and infrastructure are also exposed to storms and earthquakes. |
9 AP IMPACT: Stress map outlines recession's stories
By TED ANTHONY, AP National Writer
Sun May 17, 11:35 am ET
Through the voices of its people, the map shouts. From Atlanta, Ga., listen to Marian Chamberlain — 65, jobless, and no longer eligible for unemployment: "I will never be able to retire."
From Shakopee, Minn., listen to Bruce Paul, 56, a vintage car mechanic laid off in January and unemployed for the first time since Richard Nixon was president. Today he and his wife spend their days in the public library to reduce energy costs at home. "You go out and they say, you know, you need a resume. And I say, `A resume? What's that?'"
From Broomfield, Colo., listen to U.S. Marine and construction worker Simon Todt, 27, a combat-arms specialist who returned from three tours in Iraq only to be laid off from his construction job in December. He smiles wanly as he sums up his situation: "There's not a big calling in the civilian world for explosives." |
10 Scientists now trying to outflank HIV/AIDS virus
By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID, AP Science Writer
39 mins ago
WASHINGTON – Like a general whose direct attacks aren't working, scientists are now trying to outflank the HIV/AIDS virus.
Unsuccessful at developing vaccines that the cause the body's natural immune system to battle the virus, researchers are testing inserting a gene into the muscle that can cause it to produce protective antibodies against HIV.
The new method worked in mice and now has proved successful in monkeys, too, they reported Sunday in the online edition of the journal Nature Medicine. The team is led by Dr. Philip R. Johnson of the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. |
11 These cars have got to go: Dealer cuts mean deals
By TOM KRISHER, AP Auto Writer
37 mins ago
DETROIT – At 789 Chrysler lots across America sit 44,000 potential bargains, cars and trucks that are stuck between shellshocked dealers and a troubled company that no longer wants their services.
The dealers have just a few weeks to sell the Chryslers, Dodges and Jeeps or risk losing thousands of dollars on them, giving people who want a car on the cheap a serious chance for a deal.
"You've got some very good negotiating power," said Dave Champion, director of automobile testing for Consumer Reports magazine. "(Dealers are) really looking to shift this inventory. It's just stacking up all around them." |
12 Stuck bolt, dead battery bedevil Hubble repairs
By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer
44 mins ago
HOUSTON – Spacewalkers' specially designed tools couldn't dislodge a balky bolt interfering with repairs Sunday at the Hubble Space Telescope, so they took an approach more familiar to people puttering around down on Earth: use brute force.
And it worked.
Atlantis astronaut Michael Massimino couldn't remove one bolt attaching a hand rail to the outside of a scientific instrument he needed to fix. The rail had to be removed or at least bent out of the way. And that was only the beginning of a hard-luck day. |
13 Rachel Alexandra adds her name to famous fillies
By BETH HARRIS, AP Racing Writer
Sun May 17, 12:34 pm ET
BALTIMORE – Rachel Alexandra joined an impressive list when she became the first filly in 85 years to win the second leg of the Triple Crown.
Now her next step will be closely watched.
By showing she could beat the boys after vanquishing her own gender, Rachel Alexandra may have earned an extended break. Or her one-length victory Saturday could set the stage for a rematch with Kentucky Derby winner Mine That Bird in the Belmont Stakes on June 6. |
14 WHO eyes swine flu transmission rates, new vaccine
By ELIANE ENGELER and MARI YAMAGUCHI, Associated Press Writers
24 mins ago
GENEVA – Health experts are looking very closely at the spread of swine flu among people in Spain, Britain and Japan, a WHO official said Sunday as Japan reported a one-day explosion of over 70 new cases, mostly among teenagers.
The swine flu epidemic is already expected to dominate the World Health Organization's annual meeting, a five-day event that begins Monday in Geneva and involves health officials from the agency's 193 member states.
WHO Director-General Dr. Margaret Chan will reveal experts' recommendations on the production of a swine flu vaccine sometime at the meeting. Pharmaceutical companies are ready to begin production, but many decisions have to be made first — such as how much vaccine to make, how it should be distributed and who should get it. |
15 Analysis: Democrats' security feud may cost them
By LIZ 'Sprinkles' SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer
Sun May 17, 5:48 am ET
WASHINGTON – Democrats just can't seem to get on the same page on national security — and it could cost them dearly on an issue Republicans have dominated for decades.
Increasingly, President Barack Obama and Democrats who run Congress are being pulled between the competing interests of party liberals and the rest of the country on Bush-era wartime matters of torture, detention and interrogation of suspected terrorists.
The Democratic Party's struggle over how to position itself on these issues is threatening to overshadow Obama's ambitious plans for energy, education and health care. It's also keeping the country looking backward on the eight years of George W. Bush's presidency, much to the chagrin of the new White House. And, it's creating an opening for an out-of-power GOP in an area where Democrats have made inroads. |
16 Obama taps potential rival for China envoy
By DARLENE SUPERVILLE, Associated Press Writer
Sun May 17, 3:43 am ET
WASHINGTON – With a reach across the political divide for Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman as ambassador to China, President Barack Obama may have sidelined for now a potentially formidable Republican moderate and possible White House challenger in 2012.
Yet Huntsman, who has upset the GOP's conservative base by supporting gay civil unions, may gain, too. The appointment, which requires Senate approval, gives him a chance to burnish his credentials and position himself as a viable presidential contender in 2016, if Obama appears to be a strong candidate for a second term in 2012.
John Weaver, a one-time senior strategist for John McCain's presidential campaign who now advises Huntsman, said the governor put country ahead of personal partisan interest. Huntsman was national co-chairman of McCain's failed bid against Obama. |
17 Norwegian wunderkind sweeps Eurovision
by Nick Coleman, AFP
Sun May 17, 7:25 am ET
MOSCOW (AFP) – Norway's Alexander Rybak swept the Eurovision Song Contest in Moscow with a brash performance of a folk-inspired ballad, sparking celebrations in his Scandinavian home country on Sunday.
The boyish 23-year-old, a classically trained musician born in Belarus, enchanted television viewers who gave him the most points ever awarded at Eurovision -- 387 -- for the song "Fairy Tale," which he penned himself.
Runners up Iceland and Azerbaijan trailed far behind in the annual contest that pitted 25 European countries against each other in the final. |
18 US uptick doesn't mean crisis is over: top US economist
AFP
Sat May 16, 6:16 pm ET
FLORIANOPOLIS, Brazil (AFP) – A few recent glimmers of economic hope emerging in the United States do not mean the global crisis is over, a top economist who advises US President Barack Obama said Saturday.
The crisis "is certainly the worst that I have seen in my career," Martin Feldstein, a 69-year-old Harvard economist and member of Obama's Economic Recovery Advisory Board told a world tourism conference in Brazil.
"The evidence simply doesn't support" the conclusion that the United States is on its way to a sustained recovery, said the academic, who also served as an advisor under former presidents Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. |
19 Hubble gets new gyroscopes in space fix-it struggle
by Mark Carreau, AFP
Fri May 15, 10:45 pm ET
HOUSTON, Texas (AFP) – Two US astronauts struggled to refurbish the Hubble Space Telescope's pointing and power systems, on a marathon spacewalk to equip the 19-year-old observatory with new gyroscopes.
In a spacewalk which stretched to seven hours and 56 minutes, Mike Massimino and Mike Good successfully installed new gyroscopes and new batteries on the revolutionary stargazer.
Their persistence with the installation of a half-dozen new gyroscopes, the highest priority of an 11-day mission to extend operations of the telescope by five years, paid off. |
20 Islamist insurgents seize key Somali town
by Mustafa Haji Abdinur, AFP
2 hrs 15 mins ago
MOGADISHU (AFP) – Islamist insurgents captured a key Somali town on Sunday after days of battling to topple the country's fledgling government, dealing a heavy blow to moderate President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed.
The anti-government Islamist fighters seized Jowhar and took full control in just under two hours of heavy fighting, local residents said.
Jowhar, 90 kilometres (55 miles) north of the capital, is President Ahmed's hometown and a strategic location. |
21 Bloody urban battles could lie ahead in Pakistan
By ASIF SHAHZAD, Associated Press Writer
Sun May 17, 11:40 am ET
ISLAMABAD – Pakistani security forces fought Taliban militants on the outskirts of the main city in the northwest's Swat Valley and entered two other Taliban-held towns there, the army said Sunday, foreshadowing what could become bloody urban battles.
A top government official said the offensive near Afghanistan had already killed more than 1,000 Taliban fighters, while a group of pro-government religious leaders endorsed the operation but condemned U.S. missile strikes in the northwest.
The developments underscored Pakistan's resolve and frustration in its battle against militancy. |
22 India election paves way for economic reform
By ERIKA KINETZ, Associated Press Writer
Sun May 17, 10:56 am ET
MUMBAI, India – India Inc. breathed a huge sigh of relief Sunday, a day after the ruling Congress Party won one of the most definitive electoral victories in nearly two decades of fractious coalition politics.
Congress' victory — and the near-collapse of India's once-powerful communist parties — means key reforms in insurance, pension funds, banking and retail are now likely to get enacted.
But that doesn't translate into a mandate for sweeping pro-market liberalization, analysts say. |
23 Lawmakers call for British speaker's resignation
By JENNIFER QUINN, Associated Press Writer
Sun May 17, 12:52 pm ET
LONDON – In a sharp break with tradition, the leader of a British political party on Sunday urged the speaker of the House of Commons to resign due to his handling of the expenses scandal that has rocked Britain.
Citing a lack of leadership, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg said speaker Michael Martin should step down from the powerful post. The Sunday Times said Martin would face a no-confidence vote in the Commons this week.
"He has proved himself over some time now to be a dogged defender of the way things are, of the status quo. And what we need very urgently is someone ... who will lead a wholesale radical process of reform," Clegg told the BBC. |
24 Islamic Idol: Music spreading message of faith
By HADEEL AL-SHALCHI, Associated Press Writer
Sun May 17, 10:47 am ET
CAIRO – Flames burst from the stage for a grand entrance, and fake fog swirls around a young man in a white robe. He clutches the microphone, gazes seriously into the camera and then, accompanied only by drums, he sings.
"I accept Allah as my God, His religion as my religion, and His Messenger as my Messenger," he intones, as the audience, divided into men's and women's sections, claps along with the rhythm.
The singer is a contestant on a new Islamic version of "American Idol," launched to promote and drum up talent for one of the Arab world's newest Islamic pop music video channels. |
25 Hanoi pol seeks to silence noisy wartime relic
By BEN STOCKING, Associated Press Writer
Sun May 17, 12:53 pm ET
HANOI, Vietnam – Each day at around 4 p.m., Hoang Thi Gai tries to lull her five-month-old grandson to sleep so that she can prepare supper. About 15 minutes later, a loudspeaker starts blaring just outside her Hanoi home.
"He starts screaming and crying and his face turns purple," said Gai, 61. "My dear boy hasn't been able to adapt."
As signs of the Vietnam War fade away in this rapidly modernizing country, one relic is hard to miss: a nationwide network of loudspeakers from which the communist government blasts propaganda at dawn and dusk, 30 minutes at a stretch, whether the public likes it or not. |
26 Lawyer says Suu Kyi innocent of charges in Myanmar
Associated Press
Sun May 17, 7:57 am ET
YANGON, Myanmar – Detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi is innocent of charges leveled against her by Myanmar's ruling military, her lawyer said Sunday, as she prepared for the start of her trial Monday facing five years in notorious Insein prison.
Suu Kyi is accused of violating the terms of her house arrest by being visited by an American man who swam across a lake to her home earlier this month.
"After listening to the sequence of events, it is very clear that there is no breach of conditions of her restrictions," lawyer Kyi Win said after visiting the Noble Peace Prize laureate, who is being held at Yangon's Insein prison. |
27 Fear of Taliban influx in largest Pakistani city
By ASHRAF KHAN and NAHAL TOOSI, Associated Press Writer
Sat May 16, 11:04 pm ET
KARACHI, Pakistan – Taliban fighters seeking money, rest and refuge from U.S. missile strikes are turning up in increasing numbers in Pakistan's largest city and economic hub, Karachi, according to militants, police officials and an intelligence memo.
The Taliban presence in this southern port city, hundreds of miles away from the Islamist extremists' strongholds in the northwest, shows how quickly their influence is spreading throughout the nuclear-armed nation.
Karachi is especially important because it is the main entryway for supplies headed to U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, as well as the city most critical to Pakistani commerce. Few believe the Taliban could actually take over this diverse metropolis of more than 16 million, but there is fear that they could destabilize it through violence and rock the already shaky national economy. |
28 French doctors say ex-Guantanamo inmate is OK
By JENNY BARCHFIELD, Associated Press Writer
Sat May 16, 4:08 pm ET
PARIS – French doctors for a former Guantanamo Bay prisoner who recently ended a more than two year hunger strike have said he's in stable condition, the man's lawyer said Saturday.
Robert Kirsch, a Boston attorney representing Lakhdar Boumediene, said the 43-year-old Algerian is resting at a medical facility in France and is expected to be discharged sometime next week. Boumediene arrived in France on Friday, after being held for seven years in at the U.S. camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
French authorities agreed to take him in a gesture to President Barack Obama, who has promised to close the prison camp by January and faces the thorny problem of where to send dozens of prisoners who fear mistreatment if returned to their homeland. |
29 Suu Kyi defiant ahead of trial, protests planned
By Aung Hla Tun, Reuters
Sun May 17, 2:03 pm ET
YANGON (Reuters) – Myanmar's pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi is in good health and ready to defend herself against new charges that have sparked international outrage against the country's military rulers, her lawyer said.
Activists planned protests at Myanmar embassies around the world on Monday, when the Nobel Peace laureate faces a prison court accused of breaking the conditions of her house arrest set to expire on May 27 after six years of detention.
The American intruder who triggered the case against Suu Kyi and her two female companions by sneaking into her lakeside villa in Yangon is also expected to stand trial on several charges. |
30 Darfur rebels say Sudan army base seized
By Andrew Heavens, Reuters
Sun May 17, 2:22 pm ET
KHARTOUM (Reuters) – Darfur's rebel Justice and Equality Movement said on Sunday it had seized a Sudanese government military base close to the border with Chad, stoking tensions after a series of clashes in the area.
Joint U.N.-African Union peacekeepers in Darfur confirmed Sudanese government soldiers were attacked on Saturday afternoon in the town of Kornoi, which is on a key road in North Darfur, and condemned the violence. No one was immediately available to comment from the Sudanese army.
The report was the latest sign of growing insecurity in remote North Darfur that has been worsened by deteriorating relations between Sudan and its neighbor Chad. |
31 U.N. sees not yet time for Somalia blue-helmet force
By Patrick Worsnip, Reuters
Sat May 16, 11:36 am ET
ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) – The U.N. Security Council does not think conditions are yet right to send a peacekeeping force to Somalia but will step up support for African Union (AU) troops there, a senior Western envoy said on Saturday.
The Council, which has long been urged by African states to send blue-helmets to the turbulent Horn of Africa country, promised early this year to decide by June 1 whether to do so.
But after an annual meeting between the Council and the AU's Peace and Security Council, Britain's U.N. Ambassador John Sawers said: "The analysis of most members of the Council is that the conditions for that at present don't exist." |
32 Obama seeks 'common ground' on abortion
by Mira Oberman, AFP
53 mins ago
SOUTH BEND, Indiana (AFP) – President Barack Obama sought "common ground" in the culture war over abortion, in a politically thorny address Sunday at one of the top Catholic universities in the United States.
Obama delivered the commencement address for graduating students and received an honorary degree at the University of Notre Dame; his being honored ignited controversy there over whether elected officials who do not agree with church teachings should be honored by religious schools.
Referring to those who support the legal right to abortion, as does Obama, and those who oppose it, as Catholic teaching does, the president said: "at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable." |
33 Darfur rebel chief surrenders to war crimes court
by Marie-Laure Michel, AFP
59 mins ago
THE HAGUE (AFP) – A Darfur rebel accused of leading a deadly attack against peacekeepers in the conflict-torn region surrendered on Sunday to the International Criminal Court to face war crimes charges, the court said.
Bahr Idriss Abu Garda, who led a splinter faction of the anti-government Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), will be the first to appear before the ICC over a long-running probe into the Darfur conflict, the court prosecutor said.
The court has issued three arrest warrants in connection with the Darfur investigation, including for Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir, who has refused to cooperate. |
34 EU budget chief poised to become Lithuania's new president
by Marielle Vitureau, AFP
58 mins ago
VILNIUS (AFP) – EU budget chief Dalia Grybauskaite looked set to become the first female president of recession-hit Lithuania with a resounding election score Sunday, but her victory hinged on voter turnout.
Figures from more than half of Lithuania's polling stations, issued by the national electoral commission, indicated she had won hands down with 66.33 percent of the vote, ahead of Social Democrat Algirdas Butkevicius who scored 12.54 percent.
The numbers upheld the trend shown in exit polls, which had predicted 67.9 percent for Grybauskaite, an independent, and 11.8 percent for Butkevicius. |
35 Medvedev stresses concern on NATO moves near Russia
by Anna Smolchenko, AFP
Sat May 16, 11:43 am ET
BARVIKHA, Russia (AFP) – President Dmitry Medvedev stressed concern Saturday about NATO moves near Russia and called on the bloc to return to principles pledged with Moscow in 2002 to improve security across Europe.
"Certain things that are happening cannot but worry us," Medvedev told a joint news conference alongside visiting Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, referring to activities like NATO's current exercises in Georgia.
Medvedev called on the alliance to return to the "principles that were agreed at the Pratica di Mare summit regarding mutual relations between Russia and NATO." |
36 Chad president vows to wipe out rebels 'in pay of Sudan'
by Ali Abba Kaya, AFP
Sat May 16, 4:02 pm ET
NDJAMENA (AFP) – Chad's president vowed Saturday to wipe out rebels he says Sudan backs after Khartoum accused his country of more air strikes on its territory, escalating a conflict between the neighbours.
As the UN called for talks and Sudan accused its longtime rival Chad of mounting a second series of air strikes over the border, President Idriss Deby Itno's comments raised the possibility of fresh violence.
"We have used our right to pursue and that right to pursue will continue with the support of the Chadian people," the president told journalists. |
37 Moscow police arrest 40 at Eurovision gay protest
AFP
Sat May 16, 2:14 pm ET
MOSCOW (AFP) – Russian police arrested about 40 people at a gay rights protest Saturday just hours before the Eurovision Song Contest final was to start in Moscow.
Protest organisers called for musicians to show solidarity by boycotting the contest, which Russia is hosting for the first time this year.
Riot police moved in swiftly after about 15 protestors shouted "Homophobia is the shame of Russia!" and "Equal rights for everyone!" near Moscow State University in the southwest of the city, an AFP journalist said. |
38 Nigeria's MEND declares 'all-out war' in Niger Delta
by Helen Vesperini, AFP
Fri May 15, 4:18 pm ET
LAGOS (AFP) – The rebel Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) Friday declared "all-out war" in Nigeria's southern oil region, blaming the security forces for the death of one of their hostages.
The group also alleged the army had deliberated targeted civilians in its latest attacks.
Nigeria's military denied both accusations. |
39 Iraqis shrug off concerns over photos of U.S. abuse
By Jack Dolan and Sahar Issa, McClatchy Newspapers
Fri May 15, 4:37 pm ET
BAGHDAD — As President Barack Obama argues that releasing photos of U.S. soldiers abusing detainees could incite violence against American troops abroad, one prominent Iraqi leader called for their publication while others cast doubt on the U.S. administration's dire warnings.
Far from dominating the news the way it did in Washington on Wednesday, the photo controversy has attracted almost no attention from Iraqi news media. Even in Baghdad neighborhoods known as insurgent hotbeds, residents reacted to news of the photos with a collective shrug.
Mohammed Al Darraji , 32, who lives in Sadr City, the sprawling, impoverished Shiite Muslim neighborhood that saw some of the bloodiest clashes between local militias and U.S. forces, was unfazed. |
40 Islamist offensive leaves West's Somalia strategy in tatters
By Shashank Bengali, McClatchy Newspapers
Fri May 15, 4:00 pm ET
NAIROBI, Kenya — A major offensive by Islamic rebels has brought Somalia's internationally backed government close to collapse and renewed the possibility that a militant Islamist regime that allegedly has ties to al Qaida could seize control of the East African nation.
That would be a devastating blow to U.S. counter-terrorism and anti-piracy efforts in East Africa , where al Qaida operatives bombed the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. American intelligence officials accuse the rebels' spiritual leader, Sheik Hassan Dahir Aweys , of helping to shelter suspects in those attacks, and since 2007 U.S. forces have launched airstrikes at terrorist targets in Somalia .
After a week of heavy mortar and rocket attacks that have left at least 135 people dead and sent tens of thousands fleeing, the insurgents have moved to within a half-mile of the hilltop presidential palace in Mogadishu , the Somali capital, which is being guarded by African Union peacekeepers with tanks and armored vehicles. |
41 Taliban seem to abandon guerrilla tactics in Pakistan conflict
By Saeed Shah and Nancy A. Youssef, McClatchy Newspapers
Fri May 15, 6:22 pm ET
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Taliban insurgents in Pakistan's Swat valley may be preparing to fight the army on the streets of the scenic district's main city, as soldiers and guerrillas adopt surprising conventional war tactics.
The army appears poised to enter Mingora city, lifting a curfew Friday to allow thousands of its remaining residents to flee. Whereas classic guerrillas would melt away into the hills, the Taliban in Mingora, puzzlingly, seemed to be waiting to take on the advancing troops.
The Pakistan army itself hasn't committed the number of troops that experts think would be required for counterinsurgency operations, and the high level of Taliban deaths the military has claimed would be unlikely if the Islamic extremists were using guerrilla tactics. |
42 Iraq's once-envied health care system lost to war, corruption
By Corinne Reilly, McClatchy Newspapers
Sun May 17, 6:00 am ET
BAGHDAD — Dr. Zinah Jawad leans over her patient and peers into his glazed eyes. It doesn't look good, she said, shaking her head.
The man had arrived at Baghdad Teaching Hospital's emergency department a few hours earlier with a high fever and dizziness. Now he lies shaking, sweat soaking his dirty clothes.
The Teaching Hospital's emergency room is cleaner than most in Baghdad . In fact, it's widely considered the best in the Iraqi capital. Still, flies buzz overhead, and on busy days there aren't enough beds or oxygen tanks. Across the room, a crude sign made with binder paper and tape marks the department's two-bed cardiac unit, which lacks a reliable defibrillator. |
43 A Video from the Grave Sends Guatemala into Crisis
By EZRA FIESER / GUATEMALA CITY, Time Magazine
Thu May 14, 6:20 pm ET
When Rodrigo Rosenberg turned up dead on Mother's Day in an upscale neighborhood in Guatemala City, his murder was seen as little more than another execution-style shooting in one of Latin America's most dangerous countries. Now, after a video emerged in which Rosenberg accused Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom of orchestrating the murder, the killing has sparked civic unrest that threatens to topple the President of this fledgling democracy. |
44 Terrorism-Linked Charity Finds New Life Amid Pakistan Refugee Crisis
By OMAR WARAICH / MARDAN, Time Magazine
Thu May 14, 5:20 pm ET
Just five months after Pakistan banned Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) over its links to the terrorist organization blamed for last November's Mumbai massacre, the Islamist charity group's flags are flying high over a relief effort for refugees fleeing the fighting in the Swat Valley. The banned group's signature black-and-white banner bearing a scimitar flew in the heart of Mardan as tens of thousands of refugees poured into the northwest garrison town, fleeing the military campaign to oust the Taliban from Swat and its surroundings. |
45 Tiananmen Ghosts: The Secret Memoir of a Fallen Chinese Leader
By ADI IGNATIUS, Time Magazine
Thu May 14, 11:00 am ET
When the tanks and troops blasted their way into Beijing's Tiananmen Square 20 years ago, crushing the student-led protest movement that had captivated the world, the biggest political casualty was Chinese Communist Party chief Zhao Ziyang, the man who had tried hardest to avoid the bloodshed. |
46 Firing Line: Tough New German Gun Laws Could Ban Paintball
By TRISTANA MOORE / BERLIN, Time Magazine
Fri May 15, 12:05 am ET
To its fans, paintball may seem like a harmless enough sport, a game of skill and tactics in which teams of players shoot colored paint pellets at one another. But under controversial new gun laws and other measures being considered by the German government, games that are deemed to "simulate the killing" of your opponent - which, according to some, could include paintball - may be banned. |
47 Can Formula One Run Without Ferrari?
By ADAM SMITH / LONDON, Time Magazine
Sat May 16, 8:00 am ET
Formula One is all about twists and turns on the track. But now it's the offtrack maneuvers that are revving up drama. Talks in London among the teams and authorities in motor sport's blue-ribbon championship ended without agreement Friday, failing to settle an ugly row over plans by the FIA, Formula One's governing body, to impose a voluntary $60 million budget cap on teams next year. Those who accept it will then have greater technical freedom to upgrade their cars beyond the current tight bounds. |
48 A Race Against Time in Pakistan's War on the Taliban
By OMAR WARAICH / ISLAMABAD, Time Magazine
Sun May 17, 1:45 am ET
An airborne camera slowly pans over a range of thickly forested and jagged mountains. "This is the area of Piochar," says Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, citing the suspected hideout of the Swat Valley's Taliban leadership. The camera stops, and zooms in as crosshairs appear on the screen. "This is a training camp," adds the military's chief spokesman. "If you look, you can see where [the Taliban fighters] practice firing, where they live." Small, blurred makeshift battlements are faintly visible. There is a short sharp burst of fire from the fighter jet on which the camera is mounted, leaving a column of smoke rising from the target. |
49 Ready for a Fight: Russia's New Security Policy
By JOHN WENDLE / MOSCOW, Time Magazine
Sun May 17, 10:05 am ET
Diminishing supplies of oil and natural gas will push countries into violent competition, the Kremlin predicted in a long-awaited national security strategy paper released this week. The document foresees these struggles playing out in the Arctic as well as the Middle East, the Barents Sea, the Caspian Sea and Central Asia - and states that Russia is prepared to fight for its share of the world's resources. |
25 More Stories from Saturday at DocuDharma
Green Diary Rescue & Open Thread is posted and includes the story The United States is Not Carbon Flat.