President orders inquiry into fire on board vessel docked in Arctic but officials play down any fears of radiation leak The Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, has ordered an investigation after a nuclear submarine caught fire during repairs in the Arctic, injuring at least nine people. The blaze, believed to...
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US ‘deeply concerned’ after Egyptian forces raid NGO offices in Cairo
State Department urges government to ‘resolve this immediately’ as US-Egyptian relations threaten to sink to new low Relations between Egypt’s military rulers and the United States threatened to hit a new low after Egyptian security forces launched unprecedented armed raids on a series of high profile human rights and...
Turkish air strikes kill dozens of villagers
Turkey’s government forced to admit victims of bombing were not Kurdish separatist fighters The donkeys had been sent across Turkey’s south-eastern border with Iraq to ferry vats of smuggled diesel and cigarettes. On Thursday when they came back it was with bodies wrapped in carpets lashed to their sides:...
Human rights groups challenge leadership of Arab League’s Syria mission
Doubts raised after Sudanese general says situation in Homs is ‘reassuring’ despite footage of monitors witnessing casualties The judgment of an Arab League observer mission in Syria has been called into question after its leader, the Sudanese general Mustafa al-Dabi, described the situation in the opposition stronghold of Homs...
North Korea bids farewell to Kim Jong-il
State TV shows procession moving through Pyongyang against backdrop of snowfall and clearly audible outpouring of grief Tens of thousands of people have endured freezing temperatures in Pyongyang to bid farewell to the former North Korean leader Kim Jong-il in a meticulously-choreographed funeral designed to cement his legacy and...
Assad crackdown intensifies as Arab League monitors arrive in Syria
Activists say government forces have killed several hundred civilians since agreeing to the Arab plan to stop bloodshed The Arab League sent monitors to Syria on Monday even though President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has intensified its crackdown in the week since agreeing to the Arab plan to stop the...
Sakineh Ashtiani could be hanged in Iran
Judiciary officials exploring whether woman whose sentence to death by stoning was suspended can be hanged instead An Iranian woman whose sentence of death by stoning for adultery provoked an international outcry could be executed by hanging instead, the country’s judicial authorities have indicated. Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, a 44-year-old...
Nigerian churches hit by Christmas Day bombs
At least 35 people killed in explosion in Catholic church in Abuja suburb, while a second explosion rocked a church in Jos A militant Islamist group has claimed responsibility for a series of co-ordinated attacks on Christmas Day services at churches in Nigeria, one of which killed at least...
Egyptian judge frees anti-junta blogger
Alaa Abd El Fattah was detained for two months, pending investigation into charges that he incited violence against military One of Egypt’s most prominent revolutionaries has been released from jail after almost two months during which he missed the birth of his first child. An Egyptian investigative judge ordered...
Anti-Putin protests draw thousands to Moscow
Opposition activists claim 80,000 attend demonstration over vote-rigging claims, as Gorbachev calls on Putin to resign Tens of thousands have taken to the streets of Moscow to protest against allegedly fraudulent elections, as opposition leaders issued scathing personal attacks on Vladimir Putin in the hope of preventing his return...