Briefly: Ethnic fighting leaves 13 villagers dead
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan
Ethnic fighting leaves 13 villagers dead
Fighting across Afghanistan left 13 people dead, including nine tribesmen killed by suspected Taliban rebels, while the commander of a NATO-led force expressed confidence that security would be tight for approaching parliamentary elections.
The nine ethnic Hazaras were killed when rebels raided their village Monday in central Uruzgan province, Governor Jan Mohammed Khan said.
Then Wednesday, other residents of the victims' village raided a nearby ethnic Pashtun hamlet, killing four people, he said.
Today in Asia - Pacific
The Taliban consists mostly of Pashtuns, the dominant ethnic group in southern Afghanistan, and the families of the nine Hazaras mistakenly thought the attackers had been from the nearby Pashtun village, Khan said.
Meanwhile, Lieutenant General Ethem Erdago told a news conference he is "sure there will be no problem with security" for elections Sept. 18, when NATO plans to boost forces by 3,000 troops. (AP)
COPENHAGEN
Dane held after threats to blow up mosques
A 35-year-old Dane on Thursday was ordered detained for four weeks for allegedly threatening to blow up mosques in Denmark and Sweden.
The police say the man, who was not identified, made the threats in an e-mail sent Monday to a local newspaper, Jyllands-Posten. They say they traced the e-mail to a computer at the man's home in the northwestern city of Aarhus.
Joern Mikkelsen, editor-in-chief of the paper, said the threats were "fierce." The man denies the allegations. (AP)
BERLIN
Germany looks at case of kidnapped cleric
German prosecutors said Thursday they have launched a preliminary investigation into whether purported CIA operatives who kidnapped an Egyptian radical Muslim cleric in Italy touched German soil while passing through Ramstein Air Base in western Germany.
Eberhard Bayer, a prosecutor in Zweibrücken, said Thursday his office is examining the route taken by those who abducted Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr. The cleric was allegedly snatched on a Milan street on Feb. 17, 2003, and flown from Aviano Air Base to Ramstein and then on to Egypt.
Bayer said prosecutors are investigating an unknown number of persons for illegal restraint, constraint, and abduction. (AP)
DAKAR
French charity airlifts emergency aid to Niger
The French charity Reunir airlifted emergency food supplies to Niger on Thursday where aid workers have been calling for months for help to save thousands of children from starving, the United Nations World Food Program said.
Relief groups are beginning to expand operations in Niger to help some of 3.6 million people facing severe food shortages, following increasingly urgent appeals from the few aid workers present since harvests failed in October.
Niger's government and aid workers say donor countries could have averted the crisis by reacting to calls for help issued immediately after drought and locusts ravaged harvests last October. (Reuters)
ZAGREB, Croatia:A 27-year-old Dutch tourist was seriously injured in a landmine explosion on the southern Croatian island of Vis, the police said Thursday. The unidentified man stepped on the mine Wednesday on the island's mountain of Hum. His left lower leg had to be amputated. The accident occurred in an area which has not been marked as a minefield. (AFP)
NAIROBI: The police used tear gas to disperse hundreds of demonstrators Thursday in Kenya's capital for a third day of protests over proposed constitutional amendments that critics say leave the president with too much power. (AP)
LONDON: In a bid to keep infection rates down, visitors from six countries who go to Britain for more than six months will be screened for tuberculosis before entry, the British government said Thursday. Screening will begin by the end of the summer in Bangladesh, Tanzania, Sudan and Thailand, which also processes visitor applications from Cambodia and Laos. (Reuters)
STRASBOURG: Vandals have desecrated graves on a Christian cemetery in eastern France for the third time in just over a year, smearing graffiti including reversed swastikas on tombstones, the police said Thursday. Fourteen tombstones were daubed with swastikas Tuesday night on a cemetery in Niederhaslach that was desecrated twice last year. (Reuters)