Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas fired three security chiefs on Thursday after militants, defying his ceasefire with Israel, launched mortar bombs at Jewish settlements and gunmen raided a Palestinian jail. A Palestinian security official said Abdel-Razek al-Majaydeh, public security chief for the West Bank and Gaza, Palestinian Authority police chief Saeb al-Ajez and Omar Ashour, commander […]
Nearly two dozen Russian lawmakers who proposed that Jewish groups be outlawed must go on trial, human rights activists have said in a letter addressed to parliament and the prosecutor general’s office. The Russian nationalists’ demand could not go unpunished, and the 20 lawmakers in the 450 seat chamber must be stripped of their immunity […]
8.2: Time to close the day. Takknemlig for innspill/reaksjoner. Skal forsøke å svare mer. Men noen ganger er tonen slik at det ikke innbyr. En merkelig foreteelse: behovet for å veie fenomener på en verdiskala. Å stemple noe som godt eller dårlig. Dette er helt plagsomt i utenriksdekningen, som når Tveit, Waage og desslike skal […]
09.02: Det blir mye tjat, som dekker over det vesentlige, som dette: NATO officials last June agreed to form a mission in Iraq to train 1,000 Iraqi officers annually, but the alliance has not yet raised enough staff for formal training to commence. NATO has sent about 80 of a planned 300 military officers to […]
Northern Ireland’s ceasefire watchdog is set to blame the IRA for a massive bank robbery which has prompted a political crisis in the province, Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern said on Tuesday. A report by the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC) into the 26.5 million pound ($49.18 million) raid was presented to the Irish cabinet earlier […]
The Spanish government is starting a process of granting legal amnesty to up to 800,000 undocumented immigrants. The new rules apply to people living in Spain without legal residency or working papers. It is estimated that more than one million people live and work in Spain illegally. With out any legal status, they form the […]
Har Condi en god karma? Personlig utstråling teller. Det kan virke som om hun har en inoffensive måte å være på, som appellerer. Folk føler seg ikke truet av henne. Hun ruver ikke, forsøker ikke å blåse seg opp. Hun virker seriøs, opptatt av sak, ikke posturing. Det kunne virke som hennes ikke-provoserende måte å […]
An Iraqi group which claims it is holding an Italian journalist kidnapped in Iraq said on Monday it would release her soon because she was not a spy, a statement on an Islamist Web site said. «Since it has become absolutely clear that the Italian prisoner is not involved in espionage for the infidels in […]
The bulk of Arab intellectuals and journalists foresaw a minimal turnout and possibly devastating results, such as an outbreak of civil war between the Shiite and Sunni populations and the emergence of an Iranian-controlled Islamic republic of Iraq. (…) These writers were taught a hard lesson by the Iraqi voter turnout in a way that […]
Four Egyptian engineers working for Cairo-based Orascom Telecom were freed Monday by U.S. troops in Baghdad, where they had been kidnapped early Sunday, an Egyptian diplomat said. The four men, who worked for an Egyptian telecommunications firm, were freed when U.S. forces ambushed the kidnappers as they attempted to move the hostages from one place […]
