| Up to 15, mostly foreigners, killed in Kabul suicide attack Posted: 17 Jan 2014 03:08 PM PST By Jessica Donati and Mirwais Harooni KABUL (Reuters) - Up to 15 people, mostly foreigners, were killed on Friday when a suicide bomber blew himself up outside a popular Lebanese restaurant in the Afghanistan capital of Kabul, police said. Islamist Taliban insurgents claimed responsibility for the attack in the upscale Wazir Akbar Khan district, which hosts many embassies and restaurants catering for expatriates. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said its representative in Afghanistan was one of the dead, and the United Nations said four of its staff were unaccounted for. General Ayoub Salangi, an Afghan deputy interior minister, said between 13 and 15 people, mostly foreigners, were killed but their nationalities were not immediately clear. |
| Syria offers Aleppo truce as rebels argue over talks Posted: 17 Jan 2014 02:06 PM PST  By Thomas Grove and Dasha Afanasieva MOSCOW/ISTANBUL (Reuters) - The Syrian government, preparing for peace talks with rebels next week, handed the Russian co-sponsors of the conference a proposal on Friday for a ceasefire in Aleppo and an exchange of prisoners. The offer was dismissed by some of President Bashar al-Assad's disparate opponents, whose very attendance at the talks due to start on Wednesday in Switzerland remained in doubt, despite fresh assurances from Washington that negotiations would lead to Assad's departure from power. After nearly three years of war, and over 100,000 deaths, however, Assad's forces have been making gains, helped by in-fighting among the rebels as well as support from Iran and new arms and equipment from Russia. Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem, visiting Moscow, said he gave Russian officials a plan for a truce in Aleppo, Syria's biggest city, where government forces have been unable to dislodge rebels over the past year.
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| At least four killed in clashes across Egypt Posted: 17 Jan 2014 01:55 PM PST  At least four people were killed as clashes between Muslim Brotherhood supporters and police flared up across Egypt on Friday, security sources said. The violence erupted a day before Egyptian authorities are expected to announce official results of this week's referendum on a new constitution, part of an army-backed transition plan for the Arab world's most populous nation. Three people were killed in clashes in the Cairo area, the security sources said. Supporters of the Brotherhood also clashed with security forces in the city of Suez, MENA reported, as well as in Ismailia and a number of locations in the capital, security sources said.
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| EU ministers to back sending force to Central African Republic Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:41 PM PST  By Adrian Croft BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union foreign ministers are expected to agree on Monday to send up to 1,000 soldiers to help stabilize Central African Republic, the EU's first major army operation in six years, EU officials said on Friday. The intervention by the 28-nation bloc comes after a senior U.N. official warned on Thursday of the risk of genocide in Central African Republic without a more robust international response to communal bloodshed. Foreign ministers meeting in Brussels on Monday are set to approve the broad outline of a plan to send EU peacekeeping troops. Diplomats said the EU force could start arriving in Central African Republic by the end of February.
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| Ukraine leader, defying West, signs laws against protests Posted: 17 Jan 2014 01:08 PM PST  By Richard Balmforth KIEV (Reuters) - Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich on Friday signed into force a set of tough new laws that would ban virtually all forms of anti-government protests despite an outcry from Western governments which have criticized them as anti-democratic. The presidential website listed the laws, which were rushed through parliament by Yanukovich's supporters on Thursday. Yanukovich triggered major pro-Europe rallies in the former Soviet republic when he walked away from signing a landmark free trade deal with the European Union in late November in favor of closer economic ties with Russia, Ukraine's Soviet-era overlord. Several hundred protesters are still camped out in the main Independence Square and on the city's main thoroughfare.
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| Rwanda asks for U.N. report on Congo sanctions to be dismissed Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:46 PM PST  By Michelle Nichols UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Rwanda asked a U.N. Security Council sanctions committee on Friday to dismiss a report that says the defeated M23 rebels in Democratic Republic of Congo are still recruiting fighters in Rwanda and Congolese troops are involved in rights abuses. The confidential report by independent experts, seen by Reuters last month, also said it had "credible information that sanctioned M23 leaders are moving freely in Uganda and that M23 continued to recruit in Rwanda." [ID:nL2N0JV20N] The experts monitor U.N. sanctions on Congo and report on violations to a U.N. Security Council sanctions committee, which is made up of all 15 council members.
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| 3 UN staff killed in Kabul attack: Ban Posted: 17 Jan 2014 04:59 PM PST UNITED NATIONS (United States) (AFP) - UN leader Ban Ki-moon on Friday strongly condemned a suicide gun and bomb attack on a Kabul restaurant in which three UN staff were among at least 14 fatalities. A UN statement said other dead from the attack claimed by the Taliban were from international organizations. "Such targeted attacks against civilians are completely unacceptable and are in flagrant breach of international humanitarian law," Ban was quoted as saying by a spokesman. Ban condemned the attack "in the strongest terms," said deputy UN spokesman Farhan Haq. |
| Record-setting O'Sullivan reaches Masters semis Posted: 17 Jan 2014 03:46 PM PST  Reigning world champion Ronnie O'Sullivan took less than an hour to book his place in the semi-finals of the Masters tournament with a record-breaking 6-0 rout of Ricky Walden on Friday. O'Sullivan, 38, needed just 59 minutes to brush aside Walden at London's Alexandra Palace as he chases a fifth title in the prestigious event. Remarkably, after Walden had led in the opener with a break of 38, O'Sullivan's frame-winning response of 79 started a run of 556 points without reply. China's Ding Junhui held the previous record with 495 points without reply, against Stephen Hendry in the 2007 Premier League.
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| U.N. troops likely needed to save Central African Republic: EU aid chief Posted: 17 Jan 2014 03:33 PM PST By Michelle Nichols and Louis Charbonneau UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Central African Republic could still be saved from becoming another failed state like Somalia, but it probably will require the deployment of a strong United Nations peacekeeping operation, European aid chief Kristalina Georgieva said on Friday. Waves of attacks by Muslim and Christian militias have killed hundreds, if not thousands, in Central African Republic since rebels seized power in March 2012. A U.N. official warned on Thursday of the risk of a genocide. Georgieva, who has visited Central African Republic twice since the crisis erupted, told Reuters in an interview that initially people were wary of speaking out about the sectarian violence because they were concerned it would become a self-fulfilling prophecy, like "pulling the tail of the devil." France last year deployed some 1,600 troops to help a largely ineffective African peacekeeping force. |
| 'We're not all Eddie the Eagle', says surprise Scot Posted: 17 Jan 2014 03:20 PM PST  Berlin (AFP) - Unknown Scottish cross-country skier Andrew Musgrave won a sprint title in the Norwegian stronghold of Molde on Friday and insisted that not all British winter athletes are as hapless as 'Eddie the Eagle'.
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| Obama clips NSA's wings but bulk collection to continue Posted: 17 Jan 2014 03:06 PM PST President Barack Obama curtailed the reach of massive US National Security Agency phone surveillance sweeps Friday, but said bulk data collection must go on to protect America from terrorists. In a long-awaited speech designed to quell a furor over the programs exposed by Edward Snowden, Obama also said he had halted spy taps on friendly world leaders and proposed new shields for foreigners caught in US data sweeps. "Given the unique power of the state, it is not enough for leaders to say: trust us, we won't abuse the data we collect," Obama said at the US Justice Department. Obama's proposals represented a search for common ground between the intelligence community's resistance to reform and civil liberties advocates who view phone and Internet data trawling as a mass invasion of privacy. |
| Briton killed in Kabul restaurant attack Posted: 17 Jan 2014 03:04 PM PST  London (AFP) - A Briton was among at least 14 people killed in a Taliban attack on a popular restaurant in Kabul on Friday, the Foreign Office in London said.
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| Two Britons charged with Syria terrorism offences Posted: 17 Jan 2014 03:00 PM PST  Two British men were charged on Friday with travelling to Syria for the purposes of terrorism, police said, while another man was arrested on suspicion of attending a terror camp in the war-ravaged country. Yusuf Sawar and Mohammed Ahmed, both 21 and from Birmingham in central England, will appear in court in London on Saturday "charged with planning and travelling to Syria for terrorism", West Midlands Police said in a Twitter statement. Officers said the case was not related to the arrest on Friday afternoon of another man from Birmingham after he flew into London's Gatwick airport from Istanbul. The 21-year-old was arrested on suspicion of attending a terrorist training camp in Syria, police said.
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| PARIS MENSWEAR: Kanye West, gorilla fur hit Paris Posted: 17 Jan 2014 02:53 PM PST  PARIS (AP) — Fashions fade, controversy and celebrities are eternal. This mantra was on full display at Friday's fall-winter 2014 menswear shows in Paris — with Will Smith at Maison Martin Margiela, rapper Kanye West hobnobbing at Givenchy and a prominent fashionista causing a stir because she wore a real gorilla fur coat.
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| West Brom call for Anelka 'quenelle' decision Posted: 17 Jan 2014 02:48 PM PST  West Bromwich Albion called Friday on the Football Association to end the lingering uncertainty over Nicolas Anelka following the striker's controversial 'quenelle' goal celebration. The Baggies request for action came as a report on Friday suggested they risked losing a multi-million pounds shirt sponsor because of Anelka's gesture. Last week the FA said no decision on whether Anelka would face disciplinary action would be announced until Monday, January 20, at the earliest, a move which saw the English governing body criticised by anti-discrimination group Kick it Out for the time it had taken looking into the incident. If Anelka is banned, Albion could find themselves two forwards down following Friday's transfer of Shane Long to Premier League rivals Hull, and with little time to bring in a replacement before the January window shuts.
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| California governor declares drought emergency Posted: 17 Jan 2014 02:44 PM PST  By Sarah McBride SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - California Governor Jerry Brown declared a drought emergency on Friday, a move that will allow the parched state to seek federal aid as it grapples with what could turn out to be the driest year in recorded state history for many areas. The dry year California experienced in 2013 has left fresh water reservoirs with a fraction of their normal reserves and slowed the normally full American River so dramatically that brush and dry riverbed are showing through in areas normally teeming with fish. "We can't make it rain, but we can be much better prepared for the terrible consequences that California's drought now threatens, including dramatically less water for our farms and communities and increased fires in both urban and rural areas," Brown, a Democrat, said in a statement.
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| IMF representative killed in Kabul, Fund says Posted: 17 Jan 2014 02:38 PM PST  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund on Friday said its resident representative in Afghanistan was one of the victims of a suicide bombing attack in Kabul that killed up to 15 people. Wabel Abdallah, a 60-year-old Lebanese national, had been leading the IMF's office in the Afghan capital since 2008. He was killed in the Friday attack on a popular Lebanese restaurant. "This is tragic news, and we at the fund are all devastated," IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde said in a statement. (Reporting by Anna Yukhananov, editing by G Crosse)
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| Firefighters make progress controlling California blaze Posted: 17 Jan 2014 02:28 PM PST By Steve Gorman LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Firefighters battling a blaze sweeping across acres of dry brush for a second day in the foothills near Los Angeles gained significant ground on Friday, helped by diminishing winds that allowed most of the evacuated residents to return home. The blaze, which officials said started in a campsite on Thursday morning, has blackened more than 1,700 acres of drought-parched chaparral, destroyed five homes and damaged 17 other structures. After suppressing flare-ups overnight and making progress in efforts to encircle the flames, crews had managed to contain about 30 percent of the fire's perimeter, said Marc Peebles, a spokesman for the fire command. He said the hot, dry Santa Ana winds fanning the flames on Thursday had subsided by early Friday in the immediate area, helping some 1,100 firefighters consolidate their gains against the blaze. |
| Obama to attend EU-US summit in Brussels: EU source Posted: 17 Jan 2014 01:51 PM PST  US President Barack Obama will head to Brussels on March 26 to attend an EU-US summit, a European source told AFP Friday. The meeting is expected to give Obama the opportunity to mend ties with the 28-nation bloc, after tensions over revelations that Washington had carried out widespread spying -- including on its key European allies, the source said.
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| Iran slams US text on implementation of nuclear deal Posted: 17 Jan 2014 01:50 PM PST  Iran denounced Friday as "one sided" a text released by the United States summarising the implementation of the nuclear deal Tehran struck with world powers. "The White House statement is a unilateral and one-sided interpretation of the unofficial agreements between Iran and P5+1" major powers, foreign ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham said. In November, Iran agreed at talks in the Swiss city to roll back parts of its nuclear programme and halt further advances in exchange for the release of billions of dollars in frozen assets and limited relief from crippling sanctions.
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| Ukraine leader signs controversial anti-protest law Posted: 17 Jan 2014 01:46 PM PST  Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych on Friday signed into law strict curbs on protests condemned by the US and Europe and branded a power grab by the opposition. US Secretary of State John Kerry called the curbs anti-democratic and wrong, while EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said such actions "do not contribute to building confidence". Western rights groups had called on Yanukovych to veto the legislation, denouncing the bills as an attempt to impose a "dictatorship." The opposition has staged nearly two months of protests in response to Yanukovych's decision to ditch a key pact with the European Union in favour of close ties with Russia.
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| Urn containing Freud's ashes 'dropped during break-in' Posted: 17 Jan 2014 01:27 PM PST  A thief who tried to steal an ancient urn containing the ashes of Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, from a London crematorium dropped it while trying to climb over a gate, police said Friday. The burglar, who may have had an accomplice, forced a window at the Golders Green Crematorium on New Year's Eve, took the 4th-century BC urn from its plinth and left the building by the same means. "The suspect(s) attempted to leave the venue by climbing over a locked gate, in doing so they dropped the urn causing the damage," the Metropolitan Police said in statement. His wife Martha Freud's ashes were added after her death in 1951.
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| Canadian environment groups challenge oil pipeline approvals Posted: 17 Jan 2014 01:24 PM PST A coalition of environmental groups on Friday launched a legal challenge to the preliminary approval last month for Enbridge Inc's C$7.9 billion ($7.21 billion) Northern Gateway pipeline project, filing suit to prevent Canada's government from using the approval in its final decision on the line. The groups are objecting to the approval granted Northern Gateway last month by the Joint Review Panel. The panel, which held 18 months of hearings into Northern Gateway, concluded the project posed little risk to the environment provided Enbridge complied with 209 conditions attached to the approval. The final decision on whether the project can go ahead rests with the cabinet of Canada's Conservative government. |
| Jerusalem panel meets amid Israel-EU settlement row Posted: 17 Jan 2014 01:21 PM PST  Marrakech (Morocco) (AFP) - Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas warned on Friday against Israel using peace talks as a "cover" to expand settlements in the occupied West Bank. Abbas was speaking in Morocco at a meeting of the Al-Quds (Jerusalem) Committee amid heightened concern by Arab and Western nations over new Israeli settlements in the West Bank. The US-brokered peace talks must "not serve as a cover for the expansion of Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories," said Abbas.
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| Thousands of Afghans face cold, hungry winter as aid goes missing Posted: 17 Jan 2014 01:14 PM PST  By Jessica Donati and Mirwais Harooni HERAT, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Thousands of homeless Afghans are huddling on the sides of freezing roads this winter with little shelter and nothing to eat, not far from warehouses stuffed with food. The government's inability to help - through mismanagement, corruption, or factors beyond its control - threatens the future of a united Afghanistan after an April presidential election and the withdrawal of foreign combat troops by the end of this year. We are poor, we cannot afford this," said Ghollam Hassan, part of a cluster of people who have been living for weeks by the side of a road in Herat, one of Afghanistan's few relatively prosperous provinces near the border with Iran. So thousands of desperate people have abandoned their homes in dangerous provinces and flocked to Herat, many of them with just a blanket for shelter from Afghanistan's harsh winter.
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| Libya stay top as Congo shock Ethiopia Posted: 17 Jan 2014 01:00 PM PST  Libya remained top of Group C at the African Nations Championship courtesy of a 1-1 draw with Ghana on Friday, while Congo sent Ethiopia packing with a 1-0 win in Bloemfontein. Libya have four points from two matches after they beat Ethiopia 2-0 in their opening group game. Ghana also have four points and are second in the group after they defeated Congo by a lone goal in their first match. Congo are now third on the table on three points after they upset Ethiopia 1-0 in the late game.
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| Shells fired from Syria kill 8 in Lebanon Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:54 PM PST  Baalbek (Lebanon) (AFP) - Shells fired from war-torn Syria killed eight people, including five children, when they rained down on the Lebanese border town of Arsal on Friday, officials said. The attack was the deadliest on the Sunni town since war erupted in neighbouring Syria nearly three years ago. The deaths came as at least 20 rockets and shells launched from Syria hit border areas in the eastern Bekaa Valley, which has seen frequent Syria-related violence. President Michel Sleiman called on the army to "protect" border villages, while ex-premier Saad Hariri described the attack as a "massacre."
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| Rocket fire from Syria kills seven in Lebanese border town Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:54 PM PST By Rami Bleibel HERMEL, Lebanon (Reuters) - Rocket fire from Syria killed at least seven people in the Lebanese border town of Arsal and wounded 15 on Friday, Lebanon's state news agency said. At least 20 rockets launched from across the border struck Lebanese frontier areas, according to the Lebanese army, in further spillover from Syria's civil war, which has raised tensions across Lebanon. Lebanon, itself shattered by civil war from 1975 to 1990, has been struggling to keep itself out of the nearly three-year conflict raging in its much larger neighbor, where more than 100,000 people have been killed. But with sectarian sympathies aligning different Lebanese groups with Syria's warring parties, spillover has become increasingly frequent. |
| Trading violins for guns, Mexican vigilantes take on cartel Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:50 PM PST  He wants to fight a drug cartel that killed two of his nephews. His plight is like that of many in the Mexican state of Michoacan, where vigilante groups were formed last year to take on the cartel called the Knights Templar. In the past Efrain had already been forced to undertake the unpleasant task of playing with his mariachi band at parties thrown at the ranches of the drug traffickers. He guards a ranch in a region called Tierra Caliente, the epicenter of violence between the vigilantes and the cartel, which engages in kidnapping, extorsion and other crimes besides drug trafficking.
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| South Africa accuses 'satanic' drug firms of plotting 'genocide' Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:45 PM PST  South Africa's health minister accused multi-national drug companies of orchestrating a "satanic" and "genocidal" plot to rig patent laws, according to a newspaper interview published Friday. Commenting on pharmaceutical firm's efforts to scupper patent reforms that would lower the cost of some medicine with generic versions, Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi told the Mail & Guardian newspaper it was a conspiracy of "satanic magnitude". This is genocide," Motsoaledi said. "This document can sentence many South Africans to death."
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| Egypt Islamists, police clash ahead of vote results Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:43 PM PST  Clashes between Egyptian police and Islamists killed at least three people Friday, as the country awaited results of a constitutional referendum billed as a popular endorsement of president Mohamed Morsi's overthrow. The interim authorities trumpeted the Tuesday-Wednesday poll as a chance for voters to show their support for the army's overthrow in July, after massive street protests, of Egypt's first freely elected president. Flagship state-owned daily Al-Ahram hailed a 98 percent vote in support of the new charter drafted to replace the Islamist-inspired one adopted under Morsi in 2012. The Islamists, who boycotted the vote, described it as a farce and predicted it would culminate in the sort of massive electoral fraud that characterised Hosni Mubarak's three-decade rule, ended by the Arab Spring uprising of 2011.
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| Nigerian man whipped and fined for breaking gay laws Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:41 PM PST  Kano (Nigeria) (AFP) - A 20-year-old Nigerian man was flogged in public and fined after being convicted of breaking Islamic law banning homosexuality, an official said on Friday. Mubarak Ibrahim received 20 lashes with a horse whip before a large crowd outside the Sharia court in the northern city of Bauchi on Thursday. "The court ordered that (he) be given 20 strokes and ordered him to pay a 5,000 naira ($30) fine," Alhassan Zakari, an official with the Bauchi state Sharia Commission, told AFP. The conviction came after it was confirmed earlier this week that Nigeria's President Goodluck Jonathan had signed a bill outlawing gay marriage and same-sex unions.
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| Bone in box may be from England's King Alfred Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:39 PM PST  A team of archaeologists said Friday they may have found one of the bones of King Alfred the Great, who fought off the Vikings and laid the foundations for the English nation. Tests showed that a pelvic bone found in a box in a museum in Winchester, southern England, probably belongs to the ninth-century monarch or his son King Edward the Elder, they said. The find comes just months after researchers said they had found the remains of the 15th century King Richard III under another car park in the central English city of Leicester. Nick Thorpe of the University of Wincheter archaeology department said they were "extremely excited to have been able to plausibly link this human bone to one of these two crucial figures in English history".
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| Iraqi FM warns against 'poisonous' extremism in Syria Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:34 PM PST  Harran (Turkey) (AFP) - Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said Friday that efforts to stop the civil war in Syria must tackle the "poisonous" extremism and sectarianism threatening the region. But he warned that there would be no "magical solution" at next week's international Syria peace talks in Switzerland. "The whole region, every country will be affected unless some solution, or some collaboration (is reached) between all the countries, especially the neighbouring countries who are in the firing line," Zebari told reporters in Turkey. He spoke of the danger of the "poisonous" extremism and sectarianism spreading across the region from Syria, where regime forces are fighting increasingly divided rebel groups and Al-Qaeda-linked jihadists.
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| Iran says UN experts to inspect uranium mine this month Posted: 17 Jan 2014 12:26 PM PST  UN nuclear experts are to inspect Iran's Gachin uranium mine later this month for the first time in almost nine years, its Atomic Energy Organisation said on Friday. "The inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency will travel to Tehran on January 29 to visit Gachin mine," AEO spokesman Behrouz Kamalvandi told Iran's official IRNA news agency. Iran agreed a framework deal with the UN nuclear watchdog in November that includes six steps Tehran must carry out by February 11. "The agenda for negotiations between Iran and the IAEA which will take place on February 8 on how to implement the second phase is not clear yet," Kamalvandi said.
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