A distraught Afghan father buried his 12-year-old son Friday after the boy was shot in the head by NATO troops in the latest in a series of civilian deaths involving international forces. The NATO force admitted to the shooting late Thursday but said its soldiers had fired in self-defence after a civilian van had ignored verbal warnings to not approach a security cordon around a broken-down armoured vehicle. Confirming the killing, the Afghan interior ministry said the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) troops opened fire on a vehicle "which apparently tried to overtake the troops or may be the car was too close to the troops." But the boy's father, named only Zemarai, denied trying to overtake the convoy while driving seven of his relatives home after visiting family. He also said he had been several hundreds metres (yards) away and was not aware of warning shots, which troops are required to fire before taking aim....
http://news.yahoo.com
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Editor - 21:51:00 03-23-07
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 White House 'thwarted attempts by Defence Secretary to close Guantanamo' |
The US Defence Secretary has tried repeatedly to close America's controversial prison for terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, but has been thwarted by the White House, according to reports today. The New York Times reported that Robert Gates, who succeeded Donald Rumsfeld as Defence Secretary last December, has complained several times to the Bush Administration since January that the camp has attracted so much criticism abroad that any legal proceedings conducted there have lost their legitimacy. But his requests for its closure, and the transfer of trials of terror suspects to mainland America, have been refused in turn by the US Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales, Vice President Dick Cheney and President Bush himself, the newspaper said. Mr Gates, a former head of the CIA, has tried to strike a more moderate, less combative tone since succeeding Mr Rumsfeld last year and among his attempted reforms, the Times reported today, has been an effort to ...
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article1559041.ece
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Editor - 21:49:00 03-23-07
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| Shia factions clash as British troops pull out |
Gunmen took to the streets of Basra yesterday and shooting erupted between rival Shia factions two days after the British Army vacated a base in the centre of the oil-rich city.Fighters from the Mahdi Army, the militia of the fundamentalist cleric Hojatoleslam Moqtada al-Sadr, attacked the headquarters of the Fadhila party, which runs the city government, witnesses said. The shooting sparked heavy clashes in which the Fadhila governor’s house was torched.“Clashes took place between followers of Fadhila and the Sadr office,” Brigadier-General Ali Hammadi, the head of the Basra security committee, said.“We made contact with both sides to calm the situation, but unfortunately it got worse when a group of the Mahdi Army attacked the Fadhila headquarters, firing rocket-propelled grenades and rifles that set fire in two cars, in addition to causing some minor damage to the building.”...
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article1555535.ece
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Editor - 21:45:00 03-23-07
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| Friday: 5 GIs, 74 Iraqis Killed; 48 Iraqis Wounded |
At least 74 Iraqis were killed or found dead and 48 Iraqis were wounded. Several notable events also took place. An assassination attempt on Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Salam al-Zobaie killed nine people and injured the deputy prime minister. The US military reported on the deaths of five U.S. servicemembers, and Iran captured 15 British servicemen who were patrolling Iraqi waters. The U.S. military reported on the deaths of five servicemen: A Marine died during combat operations in Anbar province yesterday, while a bomb blast killed an American soldier in Baghdad. A soldier was shot dead in Balad on Wednesday, and a roadside bomb killed a servicemember on Tuesday. Another GI serving in Iraq died of injuries received in an accident on Wednesday.U.S. troops chasing gunmen accidentally killed a father and his two sons and injured their mother in Hibhib. Meanwhile, British troops in Basra killed a civilian and wounded two others during security operations there. ...
http://www.antiwar.com/updates/?articleid=10716
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Editor - 21:43:00 03-23-07
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| Rocketman takes to the skies A Swiss pilot has turned himself into a 'rocketman' by strapping a pair of wings and two jet engines to his back. |
Yves Rossy, 45, a former airforce fighter pilot, gave his carbon wings their first test flight in Spain. He said: "It is absolutely fantastic. Total freedom in 3 dimensions, so much speed and power, it was better than being a bird. "I have to jump from a moving plane as I can't really take off from an airfield like a real plane, I couldn't run that fast", he said laughing, and added: "I don't have an undercarriage either." To land he has to cut the engines and coast to the ground, using a conventional parachute at the last minute.Mr Rossy spent 5 years developing his 3 metre carbon fibre wings for his flying man project, then added 2 kerosene-powered jet engines to his original wing design. Handles are fixed onto the wings so that Yves can electronically manipulate the wingtips, giving him the freedom to decide when he wanted to either glide or dive. He said: "After I jumped my wings opened like a bird taking wing, I then glided down to 2500m, and ignited the kerosene engines....
http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_2254764.html
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Editor - 21:13:00 03-23-07
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| Documents Show Attorney General Alberto Gonzales Approved Firings of Several U.S. Attorneys |
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales approved plans to fire several U.S. attorneys in a November meeting, according to documents released Friday that contradict earlier claims that he was not closely involved in the dismissals. The Nov. 27 meeting, in which the attorney general and at least five top Justice Department officials participated, focused on a five-step plan for carrying out the firings of the prosecutors, Justice Department officials said late Friday. There, Gonzales signed off on the plan, which was crafted by his chief of staff, Kyle Sampson. Sampson resigned last week amid a political firestorm surrounding the firings. The five-step plan involved notifying Republican home-state senators of the impending dismissals, preparing for potential political upheaval and naming replacements and submitted them to the Senate for confirmation. ...
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=2978026
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Editor - 18:25:00 03-23-07
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