Amnesty: U.S. drone strikes killed Pakistani grandmother, laborers
ISLAMABAD — U.S. drone strikes killed a Pakistani grandmother and 18 civilian laborers last year, Amnesty International said on Tuesday, Oct. 22, shedding new light on a major source of tension in U.S.-Pakistani relations.Islamabad publicly opposes drone attacks, saying they kill too many civilians in addition to their intended target...HRW: U.S. missile attacks killed civilians in Yemen
SANAA — U.S. missile strikes, including armed drone attacks, have killed dozens of civilians in Yemen as the United States tries to crack down on al-Qaeda in the country, Human Rights Watch said on Tuesday, Oct. 22.Human Rights Watch detailed, in a 96-page report, what it said were six "unacknowledged" U.S. military attacks on targets...
Iran nuclear deal may have started in Geneva
October 18th, 20130 GENEVA - Talks between Iran and world powers known as the P5+1 over Iran’s nuclear program wrapped up here Wednesday with expressions of encouragement and hope, a commitment to reconvene in just three weeks, and several welcomed “firsts”. Officials remained determinedly mum Wednesday about the much sought-after details of the...Poll: Westerners opposed to military intervention in Syria
BEIRUT - Over half of the people surveyed in an international Reuters/Ipsos poll are opposed to foreign military action against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and more are against their own countries intervening in the conflict.The poll, conducted in 15, mostly European countries, also found that only about a third of respondents held...U.S., Iran trade cautious overtures at U.N.
UNITED NATIONS — While the U.S. and Iranian heads of state have yet to meet, the 68th session of the United Nations General Assembly may mark a new era between the two countries.After more than 30 years of frozen U.S.-Iran relations, President Barack Obama announced Tuesday, Sept. 24, during his address to the world body that Secretary...Yemeni president reinstates hundreds of war sacked southern officers
SANAA — Yemen's president has ordered the reinstatement of hundreds of senior army and intelligence officers sacked after a 1994 civil war, to hasten reconciliation talks aimed at ending years of political turmoil in the U.S.-allied country.The officers are from the restive south of the Arabian peninsula country, which lost a 1994...
UN chief says strike on Syria illegal, Congress divided
September 6th, 20130 UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Tuesday, Sept. 3, that the use of force is only legal when it is in self-defense, or with Security Council authorization. His remarks appeared to question the legality of U.S. plans to strike Syria without UN backing.He also suggested that a U.S. attack could lead to further turmoil in...Yemeni PM escapes assassination attempt
SANAA — Unidentified assailants opened fire on the motorcade of Yemen's prime minister on Saturday, an aide said, in an apparent assassination attempt that underscored the volatility of the U.S.-allied Arab country. Basindwa.Ali al-Sarari, an adviser to Prime Minister Mohammed Salem Basindwa, said no one was hurt in the attack,...Syria, aided by Iran, could strike back at U.S. in cyberspace
If the United States attacks Syria, it will be the first time it strikes a country that is capable of waging retaliatory cyberspace attacks on American targets.The risk is heightened by Syria's alliance with Iran, which has built up its cyber capability in the past three years, and already gives the country technical and other support....
Uncertainty in Syria: UK backs down, U.S. hesitates… Russia and Iran warn of consequences
August 30th, 20130 The United Kingdom government motion on Syria intervention has been rejected by the British Parliament, on Thursday, Aug. 29, by a 285 to 272 margin after lawmakers refused an opposition Labour amendment calling for more information about the deployment of chemical weapons in Syria.British Prime Minister David Cameron has asserted that...Obama cancels meeting with Putin over Snowden
Washington — President Barack Obama has canceled a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow which was scheduled for September. The move comes after Russia’s recent decision to grant temporary asylum to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.The U.S. decision is seemingly a diplomatic snub to Russia amid heightened tensions...Report: Russia refuses a lucrative Saudi arms deal in exchange for dropping Assad
Moscow— Saudi Arabia has reportedly offered to buy arms worth up to $15 billion from Russia, and provided a raft of economic and political concessions to the Kremlin, in a bid to weaken Moscow’s support to Syrian President Bashar Assad. Russia refused the offer, according to Arab diplomats.The diplomatic initiatives were anonymously...Power confirmed as ambassador to the UN
WASHINGTON - Samantha Power easily won Senate confirmation as President Barack Obama's next ambassador to the United Nations on Thursday, August 1.The Senate voted 87-10, in favor of Power, a former White House national security staffer and former journalist, who won a Pulitzer Prize for her book "A Problem from Hell," a study of U.S....Russia grants Snowden asylum
MOSCOW - Russia granted American fugitive Edward Snowden one year's asylum on Thursday, Aug. 1, allowing the former U.S. spy agency contractor to slip quietly out of Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport, after more than five weeks in limbo, and angering the United States.The White House, which wants Snowden sent home to face trial for...Iraqi refugee repays Australian government for welfare assistance
AUSTRALIA — Sam Eisho, an Assyrian Iraqi refugee, who first settled in Australia in 1999, after fleeing Saddam Hussein’s regime, repaid the country’s government over $18,000, after becoming a successful businessman. Sam EishoEisho says that he felt it was his obligation to pay the government back the money in welfare assistance he......
Young Yemen multiplies without economic growth
SANAA - Yemen’s population is increasing at a rapid rate, straining the country’s dwindling natural resources and setting up its youth for a grim future, with few jobs and scant means to get by.Visiting a family planning clinic in downtown Sanaa, Layla waits for a routine birth control checkup. She believes she was 14 when she got...Misreading Iranian politics
This year’s Iranian presidential election is likely to produce a strong political figure who will have a significant impact on the Islamic Republic’s foreign and domestic policies, helping to ensure Iran’s continued internal development and bolstering its regional importance.Yet every four years, a combustible mix of pro-Israel......
Israel fears war of attrition in Golan
May 24th, 20130 Recent incidents in the Golan Heights continue to cast a shadow on the attitudes of Israeli leaders amid reports that Israel plans to carry out new strikes in Syria. These future attacks would be in fulfillment of Israel’s declared policy of preventing strategic weapons from being transferred through Syria to Hizbullah.The Israeli...UN asks Israel to stop violating Lebanon’s airspace
NEW YORK - The UN peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon has protested to Israel after it observed increased violations of Lebanese air space by Israel, which carried out raids in Syria to target what it claimed were Iranian missiles bound for Hizbullah.Intelligence sources said Israel on Friday and Sunday attacked Iranian-supplied...
Chemical Lie brings America closer to war in Syria
April 26th, 20130 WASHINGTON - Growing speculation that the Syrian regime is using chemical weapons is turning up the heat on President Barack Obama, who has warned such a move would be a game changer.The U.S. administration, both in public and in private, says it has not concluded that such arms -- of which President Bashar al-Assad's regime has a large...
Israeli army prepares for war on northern front
March 29th, 20130 TEL AVIV - An Israeli decision to transfer its military brigades from the Syrian border to the Lebanese suggests that Israel is preparing for a new war in the north.Israeli military sources told Haaretz that war exercises are currently focused on its northern front. With a Syrian army weakened, claimed Haaretz, the Lebanese border......
Past Netanyahu, Obama looks at Israeli people
March 19th, 20130 JERUSALEM - U.S. President Barack Obama arrives in Israel on Wednesday, his first destination abroad of his second term, to pay a visit to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu whose own second consecutive term will have started only 48 hours beforehand. No wonder that the true purpose of the U.S. President’s visit is defined as...New pope widely known as an advocate for the poor
The first Latin American pope, Argentina's Jorge Bergoglio, is a theological conservative with a strong social conscience, and a modest man who declined the archbishop's luxurious residence to live in a simple apartment and travel by bus.He was also the runner-up in the 2005 conclave that elected German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger to......
Sea of Venezuelans bid farewell to ‘El Comandante’
March 8th, 20130 CARACAS - Countless Venezuelans filed past the remains of President Hugo Chavez on Thursday, crying, making the sign of the cross and giving military salutes as an era ended and elections loomed in the oil-rich nation. Chavez.Chavez lay in state in a half-open casket in the Caracas military academy, with eyes closed behind a glass,...Carlos Slim holds top spot as billionaire numbers swell
Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim, Microsoft's Bill Gates and Zara fashion house boss Amancio Ortega of Spain topped the Forbes list of the world's billionaires.But Forbes cut a Mexican drug lord from the list, saying it could not contact him, and a Saudi prince blasted the magazine for under-reporting his fortune.Slim who is from Lebanese......