 A South African court has dismissed charges against eight suspected mercenaries accused of planning a coup in Equatorial Guinea in 2004. The judge in Pretoria said the state had not proved its case against the defendants - all South Africans. Their lawyers had said South African officials had tacitly backed the failed plot. The government denies this. The eight were among a group of men arrested in 2004 in Zimbabwe, allegedly on their way to Equatorial Guinea. They were said to be purchasing arms in preparation ahead of a coup against Teodoro Obiang Nguema, the president of the former Spanish colony. Sixty-one of the group returned to South Africa in 2005 after spending more than a year in a Zimbabwean prison. The alleged coup leader, British former SAS officer Simon Mann, remained in Zimbabwe, where he was convicted. He is serving a four-year prison term for buying weapons without a licence....
http://news.bbc.co.uk
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Editor - 09:37:00 02-23-07
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 White House resistant to changing war resolution |
The White House signaled resistance on Friday to any attempt by the U.S. Senate to revise the 2002 resolution that Bush used to go to war in Iraq with a document that would narrow the mission there and lead to U.S. troop withdrawals. Senate Democrats said they were working on a proposal to repeal the 2002 resolution in favor of narrower, binding authority that would restrict the military's role and prompt U.S. troops to start pulling out. The 2002 resolution gave Bush fairly wide latitude. It authorized him to use the U.S. armed forces "as he determines to be necessary and appropriate in order to defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq." White House spokesman Tony Fratto told reporters he would not discuss "hypothetical legislation" since Democrats have yet to introduce a formal proposal. He said officials would have to look at the wording of any new resolution. "We don't really know where they're going. ...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070223/pl_nm/iraq_usa_bush_dc
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Editor - 09:33:00 02-23-07
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| ElBaradei set to visit North Korea |
Chief U.N. nuclear inspector Mohamed ElBaradei on Friday said North Korea had invited him to visit within the next few weeks to discuss details of dismantling the country's nuclear program. ElBaradei, chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said he and North Korean authorities would discuss how to "implement the freeze of (nuclear) facilities" and "eventual dismantlement of these facilities." IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said ElBaradei probably would visit in the second week of March, after the agency board meets on North Korea and Iran, the other country of international nuclear concern. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, on an official visit to Austria and U.N. agencies in Vienna, said he hoped the invitation will translate into concrete steps in denuclearizing the Korean peninsula....
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/02/23/korea.elbaradei.ap/index.html?eref=rss_world
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Editor - 08:57:00 02-23-07
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| Court strikes indefinite holding of terror suspects |
Canada's Supreme Court struck down Friday a controversial anti-terror law that allows foreign suspects to be detained indefinitely on the basis of secret evidence. The court ruled unanimously that the government had broken Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms by issuing so-called security certificates to imprison people, pending deportation, without giving them a chance to see the government's case. "Before the state can detain people for significant periods of time, it must accord them a fair judicial process," Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin wrote on behalf of all nine judges. "The secrecy required by the (certificates) scheme denies the named person the opportunity to know the case out against him or her, and hence to challenge the government's case."...
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/americas/02/23/canada.terror.law.reut/index.html?eref=rss_world
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Editor - 08:43:00 02-23-07
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| Afghan warlords in amnesty rally |
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/2/hi/south_asia/6389137.stm
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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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