 Around 25,000 people have rallied in the Afghan capital Kabul, calling for a proposed war crimes amnesty for former military commanders to be made law. The protesters, who gathered in a stadium, included ex-mujahideen and several top government officials. The upper house of parliament has passed the controversial bill but it has yet to be signed by the president. Tens of thousands of people were killed and tortured during decades of war and unrest in the country. If the bill were to become law, those who led fighting first as leaders of the anti-Soviet resistance during the 1980s and then during the 1992-1996 civil war would be immune to prosecution for war crimes. International rights groups and the UN have voiced opposition to the proposal, saying justice must be done. The protesters, waving placards with pictures of political leaders, gathered in the city's Ghazi football stadium, where people were executed and tortured during the Taleban era....
http://news.bbc.co.uk
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Editor - 08:39:00 02-23-07
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 Mexican anger over US 'trespass' |
Mexico's parliament has condemned what it says is a border violation by US workers building a controversial barrier between the two countries. Legislators say workers and equipment building a section of the barrier have gone 10 metres (yards) into Mexico. The alleged border violation comes ahead of a high-level meeting in the Canadian capital Ottawa. US, Mexican and Canadian foreign ministers are to discuss border security and trade issues. Mexican legislators said they had photographs and video, taken on Monday, of the workers and heavy-duty construction equipment that showed them about 10 metres inside Mexico near the border city of Agua Prieta and the town of Douglas, Arizona. The Mexican Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa said she had complained to the US authorities and that the men and equipment had been withdrawn....
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6390291.stm
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Editor - 08:37:00 02-23-07
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| Shell, Repsol, Total, Defy U.S. to Seek Iran Deals |
Bush's campaign to turn Iran into an economic pariah is being rebuffed from Spain to Malaysia as countries and companies pursue long-term agreements to tap into the world's second-largest reserves of oil and gas. Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Europe's largest oil company, and Spain's Repsol YPF SA which last month signed a new agreement on a three-year-old gas production project, estimated at more than $10 billion are among those who can ill afford to give up oil and natural-gas projects in Iran, said James Bell, president of Gas Strategies, a London-based consulting firm. `Companies who want a piece of the action in Iran have no choice but to stay in the long, patient waiting game,'' Bell said in a telephone interview. U.S. officials have issued explicit warnings against such deals and even threatened to use a 1996 law to levy penalties against foreign companies that do business both in the U.S. and in Iran, now ...
http://Bush's campaign to turn Iran into an economic pariah is being rebuffed from Spain to Malaysia as countries and companies pursue long-term agreements to tap into the world's second-largest reserves of oil and gas. Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Europe's largest oil company, and Spain's Repsol YPF SA which last month signed a new agreement on a three-year-old gas production project, estimated at more than $10 billion are among those who can ill afford to give up oil and natural-gas projects in Iran, said James Bell, president of Gas Strategies, a London-based consulting firm. `Companies who want a piece of the action in Iran have no choice but to stay in the long, patient waiting game,'' Bell said in a telephone interview. U.S. officials have issued explicit warnings against such deals and even threatened to use a 1996 law to levy penalties against foreign companies that do business both in the U.S. and in Iran, now ...
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Editor - 08:20:00 02-23-07
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| Lawmaker drops effort to ban spanking in Calif. Assemblywoman narrows her previous proposal, which was heavily ridiculed |
A Democratic lawmaker has abandoned her heavily ridiculed campaign to make spanking a crime, acknowledging that the idea would get whacked even in California’s sometimes whimsical Legislature. Instead, San Francisco Bay area Assemblywoman Sally Lieber introduced a more narrow bill on Thursday she said would help district attorneys more easily prosecute parents who cross the line from punishment into physical abuse. Lieber is seeking to classify a laundry list of physical acts against young children, including hitting with a belt, switch or stick, as unjustifiable and grounds for prosecution, probation or a parental time-out — a class on nonviolent parenting. ...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17295901/
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Editor - 08:05:00 02-23-07
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| 46 of 49 nations adopt cluster bomb declaration Statement draws support despite opposition from U.S., China and Russia |
A declaration calling for a 2008 treaty banning cluster bombs was adopted Friday by 46 out of 49 nations attending a conference in Oslo, officials for the Norwegian government and two non-governmental groups said. Norway’s deputy foreign minister Raymond Johansen said Poland, Romania and Japan did not approve the final declaration. Officials for Human Rights Watch and the Cluster Munition Coalition also said those three countries dissented. The gathering was snubbed by some key arms makers — including the U.S., Russia, Israel and China — but organizers said other nations needed to forge ahead regardless to avoid a potential humanitarian disaster posed by unexploded cluster munitions. A declaration presented on the last day of the meeting urged nations to “conclude by 2008 a legally binding international instrument” to ban cluster bombs....
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11125857/
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Editor - 08:02:00 02-23-07
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| Taliban threatens 'bloodiest year' as UK boosts troops |
The Taliban today threatened the deadliest year yet for foreign troops in Afghanistan as the government prepared to announce the deployment of 1,000 more British troops to the country. "This year will prove to be the bloodiest for the foreign troops. It is not just a threat: we will prove it," the senior Taliban commander Mullah Dadullah told the Reuters news agency via satellite phone, adding that militants would be armed with shipments of new guns. "The Taliban's war preparations are going on in caves and in mountains. Our 6,000 fighters are ready for attacks on foreign troops after the change in weather and as it becomes warmer," he said. The defence secretary, Des Browne, is expected to announce the deployment officially on Monday. But the Northern Ireland secretary, Peter Hain, confirmed today that the government was thinking of sending more troops to the country...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,,2020034,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=12
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Editor - 08:00:00 02-23-07
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