Archive for the ‘World’ Category

 
Israelis are feeling that they finally have support when it comes to Iran, as sanctions introduced by the European Union this week include a ban on oil imports from the country.  (more…)

Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan has challenged Boko Haram to identify themselves and state clearly their demands as a basis for talks.

"If they clearly identify themselves now and say this is the reason why we are resisting, this is the reason why we are confronting government or this is the reason why we destroy some innocent people and their properties ... then there will be a basis for dialogue," said Jonathan on Thursday.

"We will dialogue, let us know your problems and we will solve your problem but if they don't identify themselves, who will you dialogue with?"

In an interview with Reuters at the presidential villa in the capital Abuja, Jonathan said there was no doubt that Boko Haram had links with other jihadist groups outside Nigeria.

The group killed more than 500 people last year and more than 250 in the first weeks of 2012 in gun and bomb attacks in Africa's top oil producer, Human Rights Watch said this week.

Boko Haram threats

Suspected Boko Haram leader issues new threats in a message posted on YouTube [AFP]

Meanwhile, in a message posted on YouTube the purported leader of the group issued new threats while also saying last week's attacks in Kano were over the torture of its members.

Syrians urge Russia to stop its vetoes of UN proposals for action against the Syrian government's crackdown [Reuters]

The Arab League chief has reportedly said that a peace plan that aims to end Syria's political crisis will be submitted to the United Nations Security Council early next week.

Nabil Elaraby, the secretary-general of the Arab League, told reporters in Cairo on Thursday that the meeting with UN officials will be held on Monday in New York.

The plan calls for President Bashar al-Assad to hand power to his deputy and clear the way for a unity government within two months.

Elaraby and Sheikh Hamad bin Jasem Al Thani, Qatar's prime minister who heads the league's Syria committee, would depart for New York on Saturday.

Al Jazeera's Zeina Khodr, reporting from Beirut, said endorsement from the UN would "embolden" activists inside Syria.

"[The Arab League] is hoping that there will be a vote later in the week."

She also said that Russia, a veto-wielding member of the UN Security Council, wants dialogue, a peaceful resolution to Syria's crisis and is opposed to any military intervention, such as that which occurred in Libya.

Assad and his government have fiercely rejected the Arab League proposal, accusing the league of being part of a "conspiracy" against Syria.

The Arab League has been pushing for a UN Security Council resolution to end the Syrian government's violent crackdown on protesters, which has killed thousands of people since demonstrations calling for reform began in March.

Al Thani told Al Jazeera on Tuesday that elevating the Syria issue to the UN was "the only option".

Elaraby's latest announcement on Syria came after Gulf Arab observers, deployed to Syria as part of a previous Arab League initiative, began to pull out of Syria on Wednesday after their governments said they were "certain the bloodshed and killing of innocents would continue".

"The departure of the GCC [Gulf Co-operation Council] countries will not have an impact on the mission's work. We are all professionals here and we can do the job," said Al Thani.

 
Jews and Christians world over donate generously to the Israeli cause, (more…)

The Keystone XL pipeline was supposed to transport crude oil from Alberta in Canada to Texas in the US [Reuters]

US President Barack Obama has rejected the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada, saying he could not vouch for its safety by a deadline despite intense election-year pressure.

The rival Republican Party had forced Obama to make a decision on whether to approve the 2,700 km route through the Great Plains to Texas, forcing him to choose between environmentalists and industry.

The Obama administration said on Wednesday that company TransCanada could resubmit the Keystone XL project but that officials were not able to assess its plan by a February 21 deadline put into law by Republicans in Congress.

TransCanada has said that it would re-apply.

"This announcement is not a judgment on the merits of the pipeline, but the arbitrary nature of a deadline that prevented the State Department from gathering the information necessary to approve the project and protect the American people," Obama said in a statement.

"I'm disappointed that Republicans in Congress forced this decision, but it does not change my administration's commitment to American-made energy that creates jobs and reduces our dependence on oil," said Obama, who initially hoped to make a decision after the November election.

The pipeline has turned into a major issue in US politics, with environmentalists waging months of street protests against it and the oil industry funding an advertising blitz saying the project would immediately create shovel-ready jobs amid a weak economy.

'Profound disappointment'

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper expressed "profound disappointment" to Obama over the rejection, telling him in a telephone call that he had hoped this project "would continue given the significant contribution it would make to jobs and economic growth" in both countries.

 
In what is quickly becoming a trend of protests throughout Israel (beginning with the tent protests which started in Tel Aviv last summer, and including the current gender equality campaign) another voice is now calling for attention. (more…)

 
A continuing spate of hate crimes claimed two Arab owned vehicles in Jerusalem this week, which were torched while parked overnight.  (more…)

TUNIS, Tunisia (AP) -- A middle-aged man with a history of mental illness set himself on fire Saturday in northern Tunisia, two days after a similar case in the south.

Hedia Khemiri of Bougatfa hospital says 50-year-old Daoud Bouhli poured gasoline over himself and then ignited it in front of Bizerte town hall in the country's north.

Self-immolation has enormous resonance in the country that last year overthrew its long ruling dictator in an uprising sparked by fruit vendor Mohammed Bouazizi setting himself on fire after being harassed by police.

His actions set in motion a number of similar incidents across North Africa and self-immolation became a symbolic protest for people who had lost all hope, and were usually unemployed.

A year after the uprising, Tunisia has elected a new government but still suffers from serious unemployment and a flagging economy as tourists stay away and labor unrest strikes industries.

On Thursday, Ammar Gharsalli, a 45-year-old father of three, set himself on fire in front of the town hall in Gafsa - a center for phosphate mining in southern Tunisia.

 
TEL AVIV – President Barack Obama and his NATO partners remain delusional and are now probably quaking in their designer shoes over a potential military confrontation with the Big Russian Bear. (more…)

Tens of thousands of villagers in South Sudan are hiding in the bush, waiting for United Nations and government troops to stop a tribal conflict, which officials fear may have left scores of people dead over the weekend.

Armed youths from the Lou Nuer tribe marched on the remote town of Pibor in Jonglei state, home to the rival Murle people, who they blame for cattle raiding.

On Tuesday morning, the government claimed that the South Sudanese army was in "full control" of Pibor, and that Lou Nuer tribesmen were vacating it.

"Pibor is under the full control of the government, and the Lou Nuer have been ordered to return to their homes, and they are starting to do so," Barnaba Marial Benjamin, the country's information minister, said.

Thatched huts have been burned and, according to Parthesarathy Rajendran, the head of Doctors without Borders (known by its French name Medicines sans Frontieres, or MSF) in South Sudan, thousands have been displaced, including his own staff.

"Many of our staff are in the bush and we also heard an MSF clinic has been damaged and looted," he told Al Jazeera.

"MSF is the only medical health care in the whole region, and the population is very vulnerable for all kinds of medical issues. So we are very concerned about those fleeing into the bush. They don't have access to water, medical care or food."

The government and the UN, which has said the violence could lead to a "major tragedy", were strengthening their forces in the area.

"We are worried about their conditions. They are without water, shelter and food. They are hiding in the bush. I think it
is between 20,000 and 50,000. This is an estimate only," Lise Gande, UN humanitarian co-ordinator for South Sudan, told the Reuters news agency.

Grande said on Sunday that the number of government forces heading to Pibor was estimated at 3,000 troops and 800 police.

'Village deserted'

Al Jazeera's Haru Mutasa, reporting from a village belonging to the Murle tribe, said the situation was tense, with deserted streets.

"All you see is soldiers and guns, lots and lots of guns," she said. "It doesn't feel like a normal place. The UN here is trying by all means to reassure the few that are left that it's safe to return."

She reported there was particular concern for those who had fled the violence and were currently in the bush. "They have no food and no water, and the longer they stay out there the concern is that they could start dying," she said.

Reverend Mark Akec Cien, head of the Sudan Council of Churches, an umbrella organisation with members across the area, said they had reports of many killed and wounded in the clashes.

Egyptians have flocked to the polls for the third round of the country's parliamentary election, the first election since the uprising that unseated Hosni Mubarak from the presidency in February last year.

Queues began to form around schools that had been turned into polling stations at 8am local time (06:00 GMT) on Tuesday. Al Jazeera's correspondents in El-Arish and Shubra El-Khaima reported good voter turnouts.

The final round takes place over two days in the Nile Delta provinces of Qaliubiya, Gharbiya and Daqahliya; the New Valley province; the southern governorates of Minya and Qena; the border province of Matruh; and in North and South Sinai.

The run-up to this round of polls has been overshadowed by the deaths of 17 people last month in clashes between the army and protesters demanding the ruling military step aside immediately.

But the military generals have insisted the election process will not be derailed by violence.

Islamist groups came late to the uprising but have so far won the biggest share of seats in the previous rounds of the first free and fair elections in six decades.

 
Israel has long expressed concern over Iran’s ongoing nuclear enrichment program, and the failure of other nations to intervene. (more…)

The war games aim to display Iran's military capabilities amid increasing pressure over its atomic programme [Reuters]

Iran has successfully produced and tested fuel rods for use in its nuclear power plants, state television reported.

The rods were made with uranium ore deposits mined in Iran and have been inserted into the core of Tehran's research nuclear reactor, the Iranian Atomic Energy Organisation said on Sunday.

Nuclear fuel rods contain small pellets of fuel, usually low-enriched uranium, patterned to give out heat produced by nuclear reaction without melting down.

Iran said last month that it planned to insert domestically produced uranium fuel into the Tehran research reactor, which produces isotopes for medical purposes and currently runs on a nearly depleted stock of nuclear plates bought from Argentina in 1993.

"This great achievement will perplex the West, because the Western countries had counted on a possible failure of Iran to produce nuclear fuel plates," the newspaper said.

The Tehran reactor requires uranium enriched to 20 per cent, a far higher level than that needed for Iran's Russian-built nuclear power plant in Bushehr, on the Gulf coast, which uses Russian fuel that is returned when spent.

The atomic energy organisation did not specify the level of enrichment of the trial fuel rod but Iran's programme to enrich uranium to the higher level has been at the centre of growing Western concerns about the goals of its nuclear programme.

John Large, an independent nuclear consultant, told Al Jazeera the reported developments would mean that Iran "can now produce key radioactive elements" and has moved "steps forward on the nuclear path".

An advisory body to the Arab League has called for the immediate withdrawal of the group's observer mission in Syria, saying its monitors are inadvertently helping the government cover up continued violence.

The Arab Parliament, an 88-member advisory committee of delegates from each of the League's member states, said on Sunday that the violence in Syria was continuing to claim victims despite the presence of Arab League monitors.

The monitors are on a month-long mission to ensure the government of President Bashar al-Assad complies with the terms of the League's plan to end the crackdown on dissent.  

But the parliament called on the League's Secretary-General Nabil Elaraby to convene a meeting of Arab foreign ministers to adopt a resolution to withdraw the mission immediately.

"For this to happen in the presence of Arab monitors has roused the anger of Arab people and negates the purpose of sending a fact-finding mission," Ali al-Salem al-Dekbas, the Arab Parliament's chairman said.

"This is giving the Syrian regime an Arab cover for continuing its inhumane actions under the eyes and ears of the Arab League," he said.

The Arab Parliament was the first body to recommend freezing Syria's membership in the organisation in response to Assad's crackdown.

An Arab League official, commenting on the parliament's statement, told the Reuters news agency that it was too early to judge the mission's success, saying it was scheduled to remain in Syria for a month and that more monitors were on their way.

Contradictory statements

In yet another sign of cracks among the observer mission, disputes emerged on Sunday over the reported appearance of government snipers across Syria.

Activists have accused the government of posting snipers on rooftops as part of their brutal crackdown on dissent, in which government forces have also been accused of firing tear gas, stun grenades and on Friday "nail bombs".

In a video released by activists, a man wearing an orange vest with the Arab League logo said in Deraa: "There are snipers; we have seen them with our own eyes."

"We ask the authorities to remove them immediately; if they don't remove them within 24 hours there will be other measures," the unnamed speaker in the video, which was dated Friday, told a crowd of people.

But veteran Sudanese military intelligence officer General Mohammed Ahmed Mustafa al-Dabi, who is heading the observer mission, said the official seen in the video was making a hypothetical remark.

"This man said that if he saw - by his own eyes - those snipers he will report immediately," Dabi told the BBC's Newshour programme. "But he didn't see (snipers)."

Divisions within opposition

Amid the controversy, divisions within Syria’s opposition hoping to topple Assad hampered efforts towards a transitional plan for a new Syria.

The Syrian National Council (SNC), the leading opposition group in exile, on Sunday quashed reports that it signed a deal with the National Co-ordination Committee (NCC), a group whose majority is inside Syria and which had disagreed with the SNC's earlier calls for foreign intervention.

JERUSALEM (AP) -- Israeli Holocaust survivors and political leaders expressed outrage Sunday over a Jerusalem demonstration in which ultra-Orthodox Jews donned Star of David patches and uniforms similar to those the Nazis forced Jews to wear during World War II.

Thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews gathered Saturday night to protest what they say is a nationwide campaign directed against their lifestyle. The practices, which call for strict separation of the sexes, are rejected by mainstream Israelis as religious coercion.

Ultra-Orthodox extremists have been under fire for their attempts to ban mixing of the sexes on buses, sidewalks and other public spaces. In one city, extremists have jeered and spit at girls walking to school, saying they are dressed immodestly. These practices, albeit by a fringe sect, have unleashed a backlash against the ultra-Orthodox in general.

At Saturday's protest, children with traditional sidelocks wore the striped black-and-white uniforms associated with Nazi concentration camps. One child's hands were raised in surrender - mimicking an iconic photo of a terrified Jewish boy in the Warsaw Ghetto.

Israel's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial called the use of Nazi imagery "disgraceful," and several other survivors' groups and politicians condemned the acts.

Six million Jews were killed by German Nazis and their collaborators during World War II. About 200,000 aging survivors of the Holocaust live in Israel.

 
It has been 3 Years since Operation Cast Lead, a 3 week offensive in Gaza which began in late 2008 and ended in January of 2009.  (more…)

Banking is inarguably the most prominent component of a country’s economic construct. (more…)

Local officials said the victims may have been mistaken for Kurdistan Workers' Party fighters [AFP]

A Turkish air raid that killed at least 35 people in a Kurdish-dominated village in the country's southeast mistakenly hit a group of smugglers rather than separatist fighters as was intended, the ruling party says.

Huseyin Celik, a spokesman for the ruling Justice and Development Party, said that those killed in the strike on Thursday "were not terrorists" and that officials are now investigating possible intelligence failures which led to the incident.

He expressed regret for the deaths and suggested that the government could compensate the victims.

"If it turns out to have been a mistake, a blunder, rest assured that this will not be covered up," he told reporters, adding that it could have been an "operational accident" by the Turkish military.

The air strike prompted a protest by about 2,000 ethnic Kurds in Istanbul, which was broken by police using tear gas and water cannon. Several hundred of the protesters had thrown stones at the police and smashed vehicles during the demonstration in the city's main Taksim square.

Ertugrul Kurkcu, a member of parliament for the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) told Al Jazeera that the air strike was an "inhuman" and "unacceptable" act, and that it was "part of the government's crackdown project on the Kurdish movement".

"What I saw today in the heart of Taksim [square] was a great rage and great hatred not only against the government but also against the society as a whole. These kind of attacks ... make it almost impossible to bring together the people of different ethnic origins, particularly the Kurds," he said.

Strike killed 'smugglers'

Local security officials said earlier on Thursday that they had found the bodies of the victims at Ortasu village in Sirnak province.

Ertan Eris, a local councillor belonging to the BPD, said that the victims were smuggling gas and sugar into Turkey from northern Iraq and may have been mistaken for Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) fighters.

Celik also suggested that the victims had been involved in smuggling.

The strike took place near the country's border with the Kurdistan area of Iraq

A crisis centre was set up in the area following the strikes, and prosecutors and security officers have been deployed, the Sirnak provincial government said in a statement.

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) -- Turkish warplanes aiming for suspected Kurdish rebels hiding in Iraq instead killed 35 civilians - most of whom are believed to be cigarette smugglers, a senior official said Thursday.

It was one of the largest one-day civilian death tolls incurred during Turkey's 27-year-old drive against militant Kurds seeking autonomy in the country's southeast. It also is the latest instance of violence to undermine the Turkish government's efforts to grant cultural and other rights to aggrieved Kurds.

Huseyin Celik, a spokesman for Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's ruling party, said authorities were still trying to identify the dead, but that most were youngsters from an extended family in the mostly Kurdish-populated area that borders Iraq.

"According to the initial information, these people were not terrorists but were engaged in smuggling," Celik said. All of the victims were under the age 30 and some were the sons of village guards who have aided Turkish troops in their fight against rebels, he said.

Celik suggested Turkey was ready to compensate the victims. "If there was a mistake, if there was a fault, this will not be covered up, and whatever is necessary will be done," he said.

Earlier, the Turkish military confirmed the Wednesday night raids, saying its jets struck an area of northern Iraq frequently used by rebels to enter Turkey after drones detected a group approaching the often unmarked mountainous border.

Border troops had been placed on alert following intelligence indicating that Kurdish rebels were preparing attacks in retaliation for a series of recent military assaults on the guerrillas, the military said.

Protests have continued throughout the country to mark the monitors' visit

Arab League monitors overseeing compliance with a peace plan for Syria have been visiting the capital, Damascus, and other cities but killings show no sign of abating.

Activists say at least 29 people were killed by security forces on Thursday, mostly in areas where monitors are visiting, including a Damascus suburb.

The activists have called for massive street protests on Friday.

The UN says more than 5,000 civilians have died in 10 months of unrest.

The Arab League peace plan calls for a complete halt to the violence, the withdrawal of all armed forces and the release of all detainees.

However, after two days of monitoring, more questions were being asked about the head of the Arab League mission, Sudan's Gen Mustafa al-Dabi, who Amnesty International said was responsible for "torture" and "disappearances" in 1990s Sudan.

After starting in the flashpoint city of Homs on Tuesday, the Arab League monitors have moved to Idlib in the north, Deraa in the south, and Damascus.

Activists have reported violence and killings in all those areas.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least three people were killed when security forces opened fire outside a mosque in Douma, a suburb of the capital.

Monitors were arriving at the city hall there when security forces fired on "tens of thousands" of protesters outside the Grand Mosque, the UK-based group said.

It reported more deaths in other suburbs of the capital, Aarbin and Kiswah, as well as in Idlib and the central city of Hama.

Casualty figures and other information are hard to verify as most foreign media are barred from Syria.

The BBC's Jim Muir, in neighbouring Lebanon, says that far from diminishing the violence, it seems the presence of the observers may actually be causing it to increase, because of the large number of people they are attracting who are desperate to vent their grievances.

One activist in Hama told Reuters: "People really hope to get to reach them. We do not have much access to the team. The people stopped believing anything or anyone now. Only God can help us now."

Our correspondent says virtually none of the peace plan's objectives have yet been met, although Syria on Wednesday did release 755 of the 14,000 people the UN says have been detained during the uprising.

Activists have been using social media to call for massive protests on Friday - the traditional day of demonstration.

Arab League observers in Syria are preparing to visit more cities that have been at the heart of the anti-government uprising, amid accusations by opposition activists that the mission is not doing enough to stop the violence in the country.

Monitors were working in the Damascus suburbs, Syrian state television reported, as activists said that 24 people were killed across the country on Thursday.

The observers were also due to go on to the city of Deraa, the cradle of the uprising, as well as Hama, which have experienced massive protests followed by a brutal crackdown, and Idlib, which witnessed clashes between army forces and military deserters.

The Arab League mission got off to a controversial start when its leader, Mustafa al-Dabi, said he had seen "nothing frightening" on his first trip to Homs on Tuesday, the deadliest city in uprising.

During their second visit to the central city on Wednesday, the monitors faced angry crowds, gunfire and explosions, as fresh violence flared just a few miles away from where they were gathering accounts about the government's crackdown on dissent.

One of the monitors who spoke to Al Jazeera from Syria on the condition of anonymity said the situation in Homs is "very dangerous" and that it is under constant shelling.

He said that some areas are under the control of the so-called Free Syrian Army, a group of soldiers who defected from the regular army to side with pro-democracy protesters.

Activists sceptical

Against this backdrop of violence, some activists called the Arab League mission a farce and accused the government of President Bashar al-Assad of trying to bide time and avoid more international condemnation.

Speaking to Al Jazeera, Hadi Abdullah, an activist in Homs, said that the mission experienced first hand the crackdown on protests, but he is suspicious it will report what it saw or act upon it.

"The observers saw a lot of violence in the city. They saw how security forces shoot at protests. They also saw the bodies of dead people," he said.

"The monitors also saw destruction in the city. One of the observers asked residents of Baba Amr neighbourhood ‘how can you live in this place."

Another activist, Aram al-Dumi, from Douma, told Al Jazeera that there is a lack of coordination between activist and the observers.

"The delegation is relying solely on street signs when visiting the cities, they should rely on satellite images in order to locate the areas.

"There has been reports of security forces changing the street signs, this has been the case in Douma, today we went to the grand Mosque square after a funeral procession to demonstrate and greet the observers but the army fired at us."

Observers plan to visit protests hubs in the country

In Baba Amr, residents refused to allow observers in because they were accompanied by an army officer, the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The standoff only ended when the officer withdrew.

"We want to fully co-operate with the mission," Abdullah, the activist, said. "But we believe the officer that was accompanying the mission was responsible for massacres in the city."

Activists also charged that the army had pulled back heavy armour from Baba Amr in advance of the monitors' visit, accusing the government of deception.

Al-Dabi, the mission head accused by activists of undermining the situation in Homs, has said the 20 observers will remain in Homs "for a long time".

Mr Monti said Italy had "dug in its heels" to avoid a debt crisis

Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti has called for a "united response" to the eurozone debt crisis, as he announced plans to get Italy out of recession.

He added that despite the two recent successful Italian bond auctions, he did not think that the phase of financial turbulence had finished.

On Thursday the government raised about 7bn euros ($8.96bn; £5.86bn) of debt.

Interest rates on Italian 10-year bonds remained high at 6.98%, a barely sustainable level.

Mr Monti, speaking at the prime minister's traditional end-of-year press conference, stressed that problems for Italy on the markets were linked to wider difficulties on the European level which required a "united, joint and convincing response" that could also boost growth.

He said his new government was working intensively on preparing a package of measures to get the Italian economy moving again. He will present details of his economic plan to EU leaders on 23 January.

The plan would focus on boosting competition and liberalising the Italian jobs market, Mr Monti said.

He said Italy had been sliding towards a debt crisis like the one seen in Greece, but had "dug in its heels" at the precipice and did not fall.

"We're not very close to Greece's situation," he said. "We were heading south-east [toward Greece] and we put on the brakes."

He added that until the government took action, "there were many vultures circling in the skies of the European and international markets".

Italy is the eurozone's third largest economy, but investors worry about its mix of low growth, high debt and spiralling borrowing costs.

It is feared the country might need a bailout like fellow eurozone members Greece, Ireland and Portugal.

Nouri al-Maliki, Iraq's prime minister, has called on authorities in the autonomous Kurdish region to hand over Tariq al-Hashimi, the country's vice president who is wanted on allegations of running a death squad.

"We call for the government of the Kurdistan region to take its responsibility and hand over Hashimi to the justice system," Maliki told a news conference in Baghdad on Wednesday. "We do not accept any interference in Iraqi justice."

Maliki also rejected Hashimi's calls for Arab League representatives to monitor the investigation and any questioning, telling reporters, "This is a criminal case, and there is no need for the Arab League and the world to have a role in this".

Follow in-depth coverage of the nation in flux

Officials issued the warrant for Hashimi's arrest on Monday, after earlier banning him from leaving the country. The accusations date back to the height of the war in 2006 and 2007, when neighbours turned on neighbours and whole sections of Baghdad were divided along sectarian lines.

Hashimi has rejected the charges against him, while the US has urged calm in a row that has raised questions about the stability of the country and reignited sectarian tensions just days after the final withdrawal of US troops.

Joe Biden, the US vice president, who visited Iraq earlier this month ahead of the pullout, said the US was monitoring conditions in Iraq closely and remained committed to a long-term strategic partnership.

"The vice president also stressed the urgent need for the prime minister and the leaders of the other major blocs to meet and work through their differences together," the White House said in a statement.

The latest intrigue has raised suspicions that Maliki, a Shia, ordered the arrest of the vice president as part of a campaign to consolidate his hold on power.

Northern safe haven

Kurdish leaders have been trying to work out a solution, sheltering Hashimi from arrest in their semi-autonomous region in northern Iraq.

It is unlikely they will agree to hand over the vice president, said Al Jazeera's Omar al-Saleh, reporting from the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.

"Kurdish officials in the region said that they will never hand the vice president back to Baghdad because, as things stand now, he is a suspect and he's not convicted of any crime. And he came in his capacity as vice president of this country, so he is a guest in other words," our correspondent said.

The BBC's Jim Muir: "It certainly seems there is a big flare-up of violence"

Syria's main opposition coalition has called for emergency meetings of the UN Security Council and the Arab League to discuss the intensifying violence in the north-west of the country.

The Syrian National Council, which is based outside Syria, says about 250 people have been killed since Monday.

A human rights group has accused the Syrian authorities of carrying out an "organised massacre" in Idlib province.

Arab League monitors are due in Syria on Thursday under a peace initiative.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon was "extremely concerned about the escalating crisis and the mounting death toll in Syria", his spokesman said.

He urged the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to give its "full co-operation" to the Arab League plan.

Washington said it was "deeply disturbed" by the reports of escalating violence.

White House spokesman Jay Carney said the Assad regime had "flagrantly violated" its earlier pledges to end violence.

The latest wave of violence is taking place in the Jabal al-Zawiya area, not far from the border with Turkey.

Journalist Javier Espinosa went undercover with the Free Syrian Army and said they were poorly equipped

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, based in London, said that on Tuesday security forces killed more than 110 people, most of them army defectors, around the village of Kansafra.

The previous day, up to 70 defectors were shot dead when they attempted to flee a nearby base, it added.

The Observatory also said that on Wednesday, at least 22 people - six army deserters, a civilian and 15 members of government forces - were killed in clashes in the southern Deraa province.

Another activist organisation, the Local Co-ordination Committees, said 15 people had been killed so far on Wednesday, in Hama, Idlib, Homs and Deraa.

Journalists are not allowed to report freely in Syria so details are hard to verify.

The Syrian National Council (SNC), which is the main opposition umbrella group, said on Wednesday that it wanted the UN Security Council to declare a "protected zone" in the areas under attack by the army.

It also urged both the Security Council and the Arab League to act to protect people in those areas.

France, which is a permanent member of the Security Council, has backed the call for action.

"There was a massacre of an unprecedented scale in Syria on Tuesday," said French foreign ministry spokesman Bernard Valero.

"It is urgent that the UN Security Council issues a firm resolution that calls for an end to the repression."

The fighting involves armed opposition groups, made up largely of army defectors, who have been taking on the Syrian security forces.

Reports from Idlib province suggest that army reinforcements are arriving and that clashes are continuing, with the number of casualties rising.

The BBC's Jim Muir, who is monitoring events from neighbouring Lebanon, says it may be no coincidence that the surge in violence comes ahead of the arrival of Arab League monitors.

He says the Syrian authorities might be "clearing up unfinished business" ahead of the arrival of the monitors, with reports suggesting the security services are acting against army deserters and civilians trapped in a valley.

Syria's armed forces said they were ready to repulse any foreign aggression

The late Kim Jong-il, left, has been grooming his son Kim Jong-un, right, as his heir since 2009 [EPA]

China has thrown its diplomatic weight behind North Korea in the aftermath of Kim Jong-il's death by telling Russia and Japan that peace and stability in the Korean peninsula is in the interests of all parties in the region.

Yang Jiechi, China's foreign minister, spoke with his Russian and Japanese counterparts on Wednesday to discuss the situation in North Korea amid international concern over the possible consequences of Kim's death for the peninsula's fragile balance of power.

Yang told Koichiro Gemba, his Japanese counterpart, that "preserving the peace and stability of the Korean peninsula is in the common interests of all sides," according to a report by China's Xinhua news agency.

"China is willing to work with Japan to continue making efforts to together protect the peace and stability of the peninsula and the region," Yang said.

Yang has already made similar overtures in phone calls to Kim Sung-hwan, South Korea's foreign minister, and to Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state.

Beijing's comments underscore its desire to avoid uncertainty over North Korea after the death of Kim, whose successor-son, Kim Jong-un, is an untested and largely unknown leader in his late twenties.

Largely ostracised by the West over its nuclear programme, China is North Korea's only major economic and diplomatic supporter

Al Jazeera's Melissa Chan reporting from Beijing, the Chinese capital, said: "China is concerned that the succession plan in North Korea goes smoothly, there is a strong show of support from the Chinese leadership to support North Korea."

The situation in North Korea is also likely to be discussed when Yoshihiko Noda, the Japanese prime minister, visits Beijing over the weekend.

 
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently commented that the status of Israel as a democracy is in danger, due mostly to its increasingly worrisome treatment of women. (more…)

A man decorates the house of a Palestinian prisoner set to be freed in the West Bank city of Bethlehem [AFP]

Israel has released 550 Palestinian prisoners in the second stage of a deal with Hamas, with nearly all of the prisoners passing through a crossing into the West Bank where they were greeted by thousands of Palestinians.

Though Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, had reached the deal with Israel, most of the crowd on Sunday waved flags from the rival Fatah faction of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, the dominant party in the West Bank.

Hours before the release got underway, hundreds of Palestinians clashed with Israeli soldiers at a West Bank checkpoint. They were among the crowd gathered at Beitunia, southwest of Ramallah, anxiously awaiting their relatives who were being freed.

Tempers ran high and when youths began pushing the nearby security fence and throwing rocks, soldiers fired tear gas and stun grenades, witnesses said.

Sunday's release completes the Egyptian-brokered deal to exchange a total of 1,027 prisoners for Gilad Shalit, who was captured by Gaza fighters in June 2006. Shalit returned home on October 18 when Israel freed the first batch of 477 prisoners.

Al Jazeera's Cal Perry, reporting from Ramallah where thousands had gathered to greet the prisoners, pointed out that Sunday's group was "very unlike" the first round of released prisoners.

"That batch was released after very, very difficult negotiations [with Hamas]. This was a list picked by the Israelis," said Perry.

'Great achievement'

The prisoners that Israel freed in the first round included dozens of fighters serving life sentences for involvement in deadly attacks. Their releases set off ecstatic celebration in the Palestinian territories, particularly Hamas' Gaza stronghold.

In Gaza, Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said the movement welcomed the release of all prisoners, regardless of their political affiliation.

A boat believed to be carrying more than 250 migrants, many of them from the Middle East, has sunk off Indonesia's main island of Java, rescuers say.

The vessel, which survivors said was headed for Christmas Island, an Australian territory in the Indian Ocean, went down in bad weather and heavy seas about 40 nautical miles off the coast of Java on Saturday.

Police blamed the accident on overloading, telling the country's official news agency Antara that the vessel appeared to have been carrying more than twice its capacity.

So far only 33 people have been rescued, Sahrul Arifin, the head of emergency and logistics at the East Java Disaster Mitigation Centre, said.

Bad weather and waves of up to five metres hampered rescue efforts on Sunday, with 300 rescuers including navy and police officers deployed to comb the sea for bodies.

The survivors are being kept at a community hall near Prigi beach, 640km southeast of Indonesia's capital Jakarta.

Survivors interviewed by the AFP news agency and local officials said that most of the passengers came from Afghanistan or Iran, and they had paid agents between $2,500 and $5,000 to seek asylum in Australia.

Some claimed to be Iraqi, Pakistani, Turkish or Saudi nationals, and that their papers were lost at sea.

Al Jazeera’s Step Vaessen, reporting from Jakarta, said that "chances of finding any more survivors was getting slimmer by the hour".

One of the survivors, Esmat Adine, told Antara that the vessel began rocking from side to side, which triggered widespread panic.

"The passengers were very tightly packed, and therefore had nowhere to go," said the 24-year-old Afghan migrant.

"That made the boat even more unstable and eventually it sank," he added.

'Overcrowded boat'

Adine said that he and others survived by clinging on to parts of the broken vessel until they were picked up by the local fishermen.

He estimated that more than 40 children were on the ship. It was not immediately clear if any were rescued.

MOSCOW (AP) -- Mikhail Prokhorov, one of Russia's richest tycoons and New Jersey Nets basketball team owner, says he will challenge Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in next March's presidential election.

While he was cautious not to cross Putin's path in the past, Prokhorov may pose a serious challenge to Putin, whose authority has been dented by the Dec. 4 parliamentary election and massive protests against vote fraud.

Prokhorov said Monday that a decision to run for president was "the most important decision" in his life.

Syrians are casting ballots in local elections, but turnout is expected to be low after activists called for a boycott of the polls.

The SANA state news agency showed pictures of people voting and reported that voters had "flocked" to the polls on Monday.

Almost 43,000 candidates are standing for 17,588 seats in the country's 1,337 administrative units.

Meanwhile, the Syrian Revolution General Commission said six people had been killed in protests on Monday.

The elections and deaths come a day after, hundreds of army defectors in the south have fought with loyalist forces in one of the biggest armed confrontations in the nine-month uprising.

Earlier on Sunday, troops from the 12th Armoured Brigade, based in Isra, 40km from the border with Jordan, stormed the nearby town of Busra al-Harir, the Reuters news agency reported.

Al Jazeera's Nisreen El-Shamayleh, reporting from near the Jordan-Syria border, said that the clash started when "tens of tanks mounted with machine guns opened fire in that area earlier on Sunday morning to try to put an end to a general strike" called for by the opposition.

The sound of explosions and heavy machine guns was heard in Busra al-Harir and in Lujah, an area of rocky hills north of the town, where defectors have been hiding and attacking military supply lines.

At least 26 people were killed by government troops on Sunday, including a woman and four children, activists said. Nine of them were killed in the city of Homs, six in Hama, three in Deraa, two in Idlib and another two outside of Damascus.

At least five Syrian soldiers, including a military officer, were also reportedly killed.

In another development likely to raise international pressure on President Bashar al-Assad, French Foreign Minister
Alain Juppe said on Sunday that Paris believed Syria was behind attacks that wounded French peacekeepers in neighbouring Lebanon on Friday.

Meanwhile, the opposition across Syria launched an indefinite general strike on Sunday as part of the first phase of a civil disobedience campaign to pile pressure on Assad to quit.

General strikes

Opposition activists said they had shut down much of the capital and other towns with a strike, the biggest walkout by
workers since the protest movement demanding Assad's removal erupted in March.

The Local Co-ordination Committees (LCC), a Syrian rights group, organised the civil disobedience campaign, including the closure of shops and universities in protest, as well as sit-in demonstrations across the country. 

The US military has left a Pakistani airbase as tensions with Islamabad continue to remain high [AFP/ISPR HANDOUT]

Pakistan may continue a suspension of NATO supply routes into Afghanistan for several weeks, the country's prime minister has said.

Speaking to the BBC, Yousuf Raza Gilani also refused to rule out closing Pakistani airspace to the US military.

Pakistan suspended the passage of NATO supplies on routes that run through the country into Afghanistan in protest against a strike by NATO forces on Pakistani border posts last month that killed 24 soldiers, an attack the government termed "a deliberate act of aggression".

Gilani said that there was a "credibility gap" in the relationship with the US. His government is currently carrying out a review of Pakistan's "terms of engagement" with Washington.

"[The suspension of supplies] has already entered its 17th day. Hundreds, if not thousands, of containers are parked on the borders, whereas many more are now waiting at the Karachi port," Al Jazeera's Kamal Hyder, reporting from Islamabad, said.

"The chief minister of Balochistan province is even warning that he wants all these tankers and containers to go back, because they're coming under attack: they're sitting ducks.

"This is indeed a serious crisis, because most of the aviation fuel which is going into Afghanistan is going through strategic corridors, which both go through Pakistan.

"One is at Chaman, from where the cargo moves to Kandahar, and the other [through Torkham] to Kabul."

On Sunday, armed men killed the driver of a truck carrying NATO supplies and torched his, and six other vehicles, all of which were carrying oil for NATO troops in Afghanistan, police said.

The convoy was attacked while returning to the port city of Karachi from the Afghan border at Chaman.

Police said that "around eight gunmen" approached the convoy, ordered it to stop and started firing on the tankers.

"A driver of one of the tankers was also hit by a bullet and was killed instantly. The attackers later put the tankers on fire and escaped," said Inayat Bugti, a local police official.

Drone controversy

On Sunday, the US vacated the Shamsi air base in Pakistan's Balochistan province after a 15-day ultimatum given by Islamabad following the NATO air raid.

Protests in Russia are taking place against Vladimir Putin's 12-year rule amid signs of swelling anger over a poll won by his ruling United Russia party with the alleged help of widescale fraud.

More than 20,000 people have already gathered on a square across the river from the Kremlin on Saturday, after receiving permission from the Kremlin for the event.

Authorities had detained about 1,600 activists over the past few days who had joined unsanctioned rallies against the December 4 vote.

The opposition is also organising rallies in at least 14 other major cities in a rare outpouring of mistrust in a system put in place by Putin when he first became president in 2000.

Protests have already begun elsewhere, with several hundred marching in Vladivostok, seven timezones to the east of Moscow.

A 30,000-strong demonstration would be the largest to hit the Russian capital in 20 years, in what some see as the first warning bell for the former foreign agent and his secretive inner circle of security chiefs.

Al Jazeera’s Neave Barker, reporting from Moscow, said:  "Troops from the interior ministry and water cannons are also on standby in Moscow.

"I do think, that if the protestors try and widen the rally, then there could well be a clampdown."

The authorities' decision to permit Saturday's rallies to go ahead nationwide is a first for the Putin era and suggests the Kremlin would prefer to avoid street battles between protesters and the riot police.

The head of the Democratic Republic of Congo's (DRC) electoral commission has called for calm following the victory of Joseph Kabila, afer disputed provisional results gave the incumbent president 59 per cent of the votes in last week's poll.

"[The results] are no reason to whip up the population against the established order to contest the results, or to
settle scores," said Daniel Ngoy Mulunda.

Opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi, who won 32 per cent of the 18 million votes cast according to the official tally, rejected Friday's result and proclaimed himself the rightful president of the country.

Clashes broke out between tire-burning protesters and security forces in the capital, Kinshasa, following the results, as fears mounted that a post-election dispute would reignite conflict in the war-scarred central African state.

Gunshots rang out in the eastern neighbourhood of Limite and in the central area of Bandale, where protesters also threw stones at a heavy contingent of armed police, who fired tear gas to disperse them.

In an interview on RFI radio, Tshisekedi said: "I consider these results a real provocation of the Congolese people.

"As a consequence, I consider myself, from today, the elected president of the Democratic Republic of Congo."

To his supporters, whom he calls "fighters", he said: "I urge you to stick together as one man behind me to face the events that will follow."

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon also urged Congolese to avoid violence over the results.

Syrian forces have killed at least 30 people, including three children, after firing on anti-government demonstrations across the country during a planned national strike, activists have said.

Two boys, ages 10 and 12, were hit by stray bullets near government checkpoints on Friday in Homs, Syria's third-largest city and a hotbed of opposition to the regime, according to the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Another activist group, the Syrian Revolution General Commission, said three defected soldiers had also been killed there.

Activists dubbed Friday the day of the "Dignity Strike" and had hoped to stage a mass display of civil disobedience. There were also reports of violence and arrests in Aleppo and Damascus, the capital.

Rami Abdul-Rahman, the head of the observatory, said the 10-year-old was shot as he crossed the street in the Bab Sbaa neighbourhood and the 12-year-old was struck as he walked in a crowd exiting a mosque.

Warning of 'massacre'

Riot police were deployed in Kinshasa as the announcement of the election winner was pushed back on Thursday [AFP]

Joseph Kabila, the incumbent president of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has been declared the provisional winner of the country's presidential poll, the DRC election commission has announced.

The provisional results were announced on Friday, after several days of unplanned delays.

Kabila won 48.97 per cent of the 18.14 million ballots cast, with veteran opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi winning 32.3 per cent, election commission chief Daniel Ngoy Mulunda announced. Voter turnout was 58.8 per cent, he said.

In a statement sent to the AFP news agency, Tshisekedi rejected the election result and proclaimed himself the rightful president of the country.

"I consider this [result] declaration a outright provocation to our people and I reject it in full. As a result, I consider myself from this day on as the elected president of the Democratic Republic of Congo," the statement read.

He called on the international community to "find a solution to this problem [and to] take all possible measures so that the blood of the Congolese people is not spilled again".

To his supporters, whom he calls "fighters", he said: "I urge you to stick together as one man behind me to face the events that will follow."

The results are line with preliminary results that had been released by the commission on Friday, which had indicated that Kabila held an unassailable lead, reported Al Jazeera's Yvonne Ndege from Kinshasa, the country's capital.

The opposition had earlier rejected those partial results, and threatened "serious unrest" across the country if President Kabila was declared the winner, Ndege reported. Plumes of black smoke were visible over the city after the decision was announced, as opposition supporters burned tyres in parts of the capital.

A spokesman for Tshisekedi told the Reuters news agency that the result was "totally unacceptable".

"You can just look around Kinshasa or the rest of the country to see how many people are against these results. The population is totally disoriented," Alexis Mutanda told Reuters, minutes after the election commission issued the results.

Kikaya bin Karubi, the Kabila government's ambassador to Britain and a senior party member, said that he was "overjoyed" with the win.

"We have proven to the world that we can finance and organise elections," he said. "We are very happy and we are ready to continue the work rebuilding the country." 

In the tightly controlled pro-Kabila downtown neighborhood in Kinshasa, near the election commission, people hung out of balconies cheering after the results were released.

Police in riot gear in trucks stood at attention.

In the Limite neighbourhood of the capital, where the 78-year-old Tshisekedi lives, the mood was dark.

"This is a total disaster," said Fabien Bukasa, a Tshisekedi supporter. "We are thinking about what to do. We do not know what will happen."

Repeated delays

"There is a lot of confusion regarding why results were delayed on Thursday," Al Jazeera's Azad Essa, reporting from Kinshasa, said.

"Official reasons are seen as a glaze over the real internal wrangling over results reportedly taking place within the commission itself."

The commission has said the delay was due to double-checking of figures against tally sheets from polling stations to avoid mistakes.

Kinshasa remained quiet but tense on Friday morning. Roads were relatively empty with most people still at home or in their townships.

President Kabila, in power since 2001, will now serve out another five-year term if the results are ratified by the country's apex court. He was expected to hold on to his position, having run against a divided opposition field of 10 candidates in the single-round race.

Fraud allegations

Although international observers said the November 28 vote was flawed, they have stopped short of calling it fraudulent.

Most say the irregularities were not widespread enough to have caused a change in outcome.

The European Union has said that 26 of its 27 member countries are open to joining a new treaty tying their finances together to solve the euro crisis. Only Britain remains opposed, creating a deep rift in the union.

In marathon overnight talks, the 17 countries that use the euro gradually persuaded nearly all the others to consider joining the new treaty they would create. Some of those countries may face parliamentary opposition to the treaty, which would allow for unprecedented oversight of national budgets.

"Except for one, all are considering participation," EU President Herman Van Rompuy told reporters after the summit ended. "I'm optimistic because I know it is going to be very close to 27."

A document released near the end of a high-stakes EU summit on Friday said the leaders of nine of the 10 EU countries that don't use the euro "indicated the possibility to take part in this process after consulting their parliaments where appropriate."

"This is the breakthrough to the stability union," Angela Merkel, the German chancellor told a press conference after the summit.

Britain will not be excluded from the European Union despite vetoing a treaty aimed at saving the euro, but its relationship with the bloc has changed, Prime Minister David Cameron said Friday after the summit.

"We are not being excluded, we are in the European Union, we're a leading member of the single market," Cameron told British broadcasters.

Diplomatic tensions

French President Nicolas Sarkozy said the 17 nations that are in the eurozone would now press ahead to approve an inter-governmental treaty among themselves, setting a March deadline.

The key item on the agenda during overnight talks was a Franco-German plan on a tighter fiscal controls with automatic penalties for eurozone nations that overspend.

Earlier, David Cameron, the British prime minister, said: "What is on offer isn't in Britain's interests so I didn't agree to it. Of course we want the eurozone countries to come together and to solve their problems. But we should only allow that to happen inside the European Union treaties if there are proper protections for the single market and for other key British interests. Without those safeguards, it is better not to have a treaty within a treaty but to have those countries make their arrangements separately."

Al Jazeera's Tim Friend reported from Brussels that while there are wide differences of opinion amongst other EU members, they are broadly united in their support for the initiative. Britain is perceived as being increasingly isolated in its position.

"Everyone is trying to be as diplomatic as possible, but when you have talks going into the early hours of the morning, strains will show," Friend reported.

Al Jazeera's Jacky Rowland reported from the summit that the reaction to Britain's veto was "angry, annoyed, yes, but hardly surprised".

"All the indications all along from David Cameron were that he wasn't going to sign anything which gave more power to Europe," she said.

The French president's comments that it was unfair for UK to expect exemptions from the rules, and that it was precisely the lack of adequate regulation that had led to the financial crisis, is one that many ordinary Europeans are likely to agree with, Rowland noted.

VIENNA (AP) -- European Union "negligence" is to blame for the financial crisis roiling the continent, said Turkey's president Friday, contrasting the EU's malaise with his country's economic and political dynamism.

Gul also called for a revamping of the U.N. Security Council, suggesting its permanent members no longer reflected the shift in influence from the postwar equation when the five nuclear powers effectively steered world policy. His comments, to the World Policy Conference's three-day session, were a restatement of Turkey's claim to prominence - in the Middle East, the Mediterranean, and beyond.

His blunt criticism of the EU - a group Turkey has been prevented from joining mainly due to years of German and French opposition - also suggested that the Turkish government was increasingly disenchanted with the failure of its efforts.

Sentiment has been growing in Ankara to give up on EU membership hopes - fueled by the eurozone's struggles to get a handle on the immense debts of member countries that threaten the future of their common currency.

Some progress appeared to be made Friday, with the EU saying that 26 of its 27 member countries are open to joining a new treaty tying their finances together to solve the euro crisis. But while Gul wished the EU good luck, his comments brimmed with self-satisfaction as he compared Turkey's robust economic state to that of some of the European countries most at risk.

"At a time when euro member states are not able to abide by the criteria that they put for themselves, we are at the stage where we can meet those criteria," he said, noting that Turkey's budget deficit was at only 2.5 percent - well below the benchmark set for themselves by eurozone nations.

 
According to Transparency International Mexico ranks 89^th out of 180 countries surveyed in terms of corruption. Does this mark President Calderon’s Mexico as a failed state or just a troubled state? (more…)

Twin blasts targeting Shia sites on the holy day of Ashoura left 59 people dead on Tuesday [Reuters]

The Afghan government says 19 civilians have been killed in a roadside bomb attack in southern Afghanistan, bringing the death toll to 78 in two turbulent days of violence.

Mohammad Ismail, provincial security force commander, said a minivan was hit by the bomb on while driving through Helmand province on Wednesday, and that women and children were among the dead. 

"Nineteen people including seven women and five children have been killed in today's IED [improvised explosive device] attack," said Ismail. "The seven women are from the same family."

Ismail added that five others were wounded and being treated at a NATO base.

The blasts came as the civilians travelled from provincial capital Lashkar Gah to Sangin district, historically one of the most troubled in Afghanistan.

Parts of Helmand remain highly unstable although Lashkar Gah is under the control of Afghan forces and three other districts are due to transition from NATO to Afghan security control within weeks.

The deaths came the day after 59 people died in two blasts at Shia shrines.

Ashoura massacre

At least 55 people were killed in a blast in Kabul on Tuesday while commemorating the Shia holy day of Ashoura. A second near-simultaneous strike killed four people and injured 21 in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif as a convoy of Shias was driving past.

It was not immediately clear who carried out the attacks but suspicion centred on Sunni armed groups based in neighbouring Pakistan.

France and Germany agreed on a series of reforms to address the eurozone sovereign debt crisis [Reuters]

The leaders of France and Germany will not leave the negotiating table until a "powerful deal" to bolster the eurozone is agreed, France's finance minister said as the threat of a British veto of proposed changes to the European Union treaty clouded preparations for this week's crucial summit in Brussels.

Francois Baroin reiterated France's commitment to saving the single currency bloc as he held talks in Paris on Wednesday with Timothy Geithner, the US treasury secretary.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the leaders of the eurozone's largest economies, said earlier this week they wanted a new treaty by March to tighten fiscal rules for member states and impose automatic punishments on governments that overspend.

"Neither Nicolas Sarkozy nor Angela Merkel will leave the negotiating table of this summit until there is a powerful deal," Baroin told Canal+ television.

Geithner also expressed US support for the Franco-German plan, saying: "I have a lot of confidence in what the president of France and the minister are doing, working with Germany to build a stronger Europe."

But David Cameron, the British prime minister, earlier threatened to block any treaty changes designed to save the euro if London's demands for the protection of the UK's huge financial sector and the single market were not met. The UK is a member of the EU, but not of the 17-nation single currency bloc.

His statement appeared to increase the likelihood that France and Germany would end up pushing for an agreement between just the 17 nations who use the euro and not all 27 EU states.

For the EU treaty to be reformed to allow greater eurozone integration, all members of the bloc must agree.

'Defending British interests'

Cameron's remarks are likely to anger under-fire eurozone leaders as they scramble to come up with a convincing rescue plan after the Franco-German proposal was overshadowed by credit ratings agency Standard & Poor's threat of a sweeping eurozone downgrade.

In a rare triumph of human rights in Afghanistan, a young woman who was jailed for “zina” (adultery) has been pardoned by President Karzai. (more…)

Ten people have been killed by security forces in Syria, activists say, as the government has just hours to agree on a new Arab League deadline to allow observers in to monitor the country's unrest or face further sanctions.

Syria signalled on Sunday that it might still be willing to comply with the Arab League's plan but was negotiating some details.

"Messages are being exchanged between Syria and the Arab League to reach a certain vision that would facilitate the mission of observers in Syria, while preserving Syrian interests and sovereignty," Foreign Ministry spokesman Jihad Makdissi said in Damascus.

Syria's failure to meet an earlier deadline on November 25 to allow observers saw the imposition of a raft of measures aimed at halting the authorities' violent crackdown on dissent. Measures including a ban on dealings with the country's central bank and a freeze of Syrian government assets were imposed immediately.

Arab ministers have continued to meet to work out enforcement of the existing sanctions package.

Turkey also imposed sanctions on Syria last week, including a freeze on government assets and suspension of all financial dealings with Syria.

The state-run SANA news agency reported on Sunday that the Syrian government had decided to retaliate by suspending a free trade agreement which allows Turkish imports into Syria tax-free and by introducing a 30 per cent tariff on all Turkish goods.

Violence reported

SANA also reported that a funeral procession was held on Sunday for 13 soldiers who were killed by "terrorists".
 
"The martyrs were targeted by the armed terrorist groups while they were in the line of duty in Damascus countryside," the agency said.

President Bashar al-Assad's government says authorities are fighting foreign-backed armed groups who have killed more than 1,100 soldiers and police in an attempt to spark civil war.

PARIS (AP) -- Former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega will be extradited to his homeland in the next few weeks, the French Justice Ministry said Thursday.

France and Panama have been working out the details of the extradition, Justice Ministry spokesman Bruno Badre told The Associated Press by telephone. A French court ruled on Nov. 23 that Noriega can be handed over to serve time for past crimes, more than 20 years after being ousted and arrested in a U.S. invasion.

Badre said "the judicial conditions have now been filled" for extradition and "this will occur in the next few weeks."

The elderly former strongman has been behind bars in Florida, on drug charges, and in France, for money laundering. Panama wants Noriega returned to serve prison terms handed down after he was convicted in absentia for embezzlement, corruption and murder.

The court decision came after months of legal procedures. Friends and foes alike feared that Noriega might die in a French prison - notably Panamanians who fought against human rights abuses during his 1983-1989 regime.

Noriega, a one-time CIA asset, turned into an embarrassment for the U.S. after he sidled up to Colombia's Medellin drug cartel and turned to crime.

ISLAMABAD (AP) -- Al-Qaida claimed responsibility Thursday for the kidnapping of a 70-year-old American aid worker in Pakistan in August, and issued a series of demands for his release.

In a video message posted on militant websites, al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri said Warren Weinstein would be released if the United States stopped airstrikes in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen. He also demanded the release of all al-Qaida and Taliban suspects around the world.

"Just as the Americans detain all whom they suspect of links to al-Qaida and the Taliban, even remotely, we detained this man who is neck-deep in American aid to Pakistan since the 1970s," al-Zawahri said, according to a translation provided by the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors militant messages.

Weinstein was abducted by armed men from his house in the eastern city of Lahore on Aug. 13. Police and U.S. officials have not publicly said who they believed was holding him, but Islamist militant groups were the main suspects.

Weinstein, who has a home in Rockville, Maryland, worked in Pakistan for several years and spoke Urdu.

Activists reported that at least 23 people were killed across the country on Thursday [Reuters]

The United Nations says the death toll in Syria’s nine-month-old uprising has reached "much more" than 4000, characterising the situation as a civil war.

Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, gave the latest figure on Thursday, a day before the global body is due to hold an emergency meeting on the crisis in the country.

"We are placing the figure at 4,000. But the information coming to us is that it's much more," she said during a conference in Geneva.

"I have said that as soon as there were more and more defectors threatening to take up arms, I said this in August before the Security Council, there was going to be a civil war.

"At the moment that's how I am characterising this."

Later in the day, Rupert Colville, Pillay's spokesperson, said Syria is on the cusp of civil war, clarifying the human rights chief's earlier remarks.

"It is definitely heading that way, with more and more reports of armed resistance to the government forces. It is on the cusp, but in these circumstances it is hard to say definitively at what point it becomes civil war."

In its report on Monday, the UN Independent Commission of Inquiry said Syrian forces had committed crimes against humanity, including the murder and torture of children, following orders from the highest levels of President Bashar al-Assad's government.

A previous toll issued by the UN earlier this month put the number of estimated deaths at 3,500.

On Thursday, the Local Co-ordination Committees activist network reported that at least 23 people were killed across the country, including two children. Most of the dead were in the central province of Hama.

Tightened sanctions

In a separate development, the European Union tightened sanctions against Syria's energy and financial sectors in response to Assad's crackdown on dissidents.

"The EU reiterates its condemnation in the stronget terms of the brutal crackdown by the Syrian government which risks taking Syria down a very dangerous path of violence, sectarian clashes and militarisation," the foreign ministers said in a statement after talks in Brussels.

The sanctions target "the energy, financial, banking and trade sectors and include the listing of additional individuals and entities that are involved in the violence or directly supporting the regime".

Diplomats said the measures include bans on exporting gas and oil industry equipment to Syria, trading Syrian government bonds and selling software that could be used to monitor Internet and telephone communications.

They also added that 12 more individuals and 11 more entities to a blacklist of people and companies hit by assets freezes and travel bans over the government's crackdown on protesters.

In response, Syria suspended its participation in the Mediterranean Union, Syrian state media said.

"Syria is suspending its membership in the Mediterranean Union in response to European measures taken against it," a statement carried by the official SANA news agency said.

The Mediterranean Union, an initiative of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, was inaugurated in 2008 to bolster cooperation between Europe, the Middle East and North Africa.