World

Suicide Car Blast Kills 41 in Afghan Capital

Posted by Jeff from New York Times

A huge blast from a suicide car bomb at the gates of the Indian Embassy in Kabul killed 41 people and wounded more than 130 on Monday in the latest sign of a sharp deterioration in Afghanistan, where combat deaths have surpassed Iraq's in the past two months.

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Will the U.S. Support Terrorists to Destabilize Iran?

Posted by Shemuses

All attempts to justify a military attack on Iran have failed and the US is now looking at supporting fringe and terrorist groups to destabilize the country. It won't work, says NAM contributing writer, William O. Beeman, but it will destabilize the region for years to come. Beeman is Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota. He is President of the Middle East Section of the American Anthropological Association. The second edition of his book, The "Great Satan" vs. the "Mad Mullahs": How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other, has just been published by the University of Chicago Press.

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Change is in the Eye of the Beholder

Posted by Shemuses

Arab youth in the Middle East remain skeptical about change with the next US administration. As a television series backed by elder US diplomats attempts to change Arabs' perception of the US, casual conversation with a few Egyptian friends reveals that even those intimately familiar with this country still harbor skepticism of America and its relationship with Israel.

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Castro urges Farc to free hostages

Posted by Shemuses from Al Jazeera

Fidel Castro has called on Columbia's Farc rebels to release its remaining hostages. The former Cuban president's comments follow the rescue of Ingrid Betancourt, the French-Colombian politician, and 14 others on Wednesday. In an internet article posted on Saturday, Castro said he was against kidnapping and holding prisoners in the jungle. But he also said the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc) should not lay down their weapons, warning that as a rule, fighters who have done so over the past half-century "did not survive to see the peace".

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Climate-change goals fall short at G8

Posted by Shemuses from Globe and Mail

Hopes have dimmed for stronger action on climate change - a central goal of this week's G8 summit in Japan - with countries such as the United States and Canada resisting calls for the group to set hard midterm targets for reducing emissions. There's a sense here that, besides some modest steps, leaders are already looking beyond this summit to next year's UN climate-change talks, and the successor to U.S. President George W. Bush.

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Ransom claim in Ingrid Betancourt release | World news | guardian.co.uk

Posted by okami from Guardian UK

Ingrid Betancourt arrived in France today after being held captive for six years in the Colombian jungle, amid claims that a ransom was paid to free her.

The Colombian government said that she was freed in an audacious operation after the military tricked Farc into handing the French-Colombian politician over without a shot being fired.

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Mexico Cracks Down on Cubans

Posted by Shemuses

For the first time, Mexican immigration authorities have launched raids on safe houses where Cubans await transportation to the U.S. border. In the first such raid, reported widely throughout Mexico on July 2, 20 Cubans were arrested in Cancun. Once Cubans present themselves to U.S. officials on the border, they are automatically granted asylum in the United States. Mexicans are angered at the disparate U.S. laws that give Cubans permanent residency while Mexicans attempting to enter the United States are deported. Mexico's President Felipe Calderon has also ordered Mexico's Navy to increase patrols in the Yucatan Channel, the body of water that separates Cuba and Cancun.

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