The New Nation - Internet Edition

AFP, Washington

Israeli and Palestinian leaders Monday voiced hope that long frozen peace talks may soon be revived, as US President George W. Bush launched his biggest push yet to end the Middle East conflict.

Bush, who met separately with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, said he was hopeful the peace process could move forward after a seven-year hiatus.

"I'm looking forward to continuing our serious dialogue with you and the president of the Palestinian authority to see whether or not peace is possible. I'm optimistic, I know you're optimistic," Bush told Olmert at the White House.

He was speaking on the eve of Tuesday's US-hosted peace conference in Annapolis, Maryland, gathering more than 50 organizations and countries, including some 16 Arab nations.

Olmert praised Bush's initiative saying: "This time it's different because we are going to have lots of participants in what I hope will launch a serious process of negotiations between us and the Palestinians."

He added that after Tuesday's conference he hoped "we and the Palestinians will sit together in Jerusalem and work out something that will be very good and create great hope for our peoples." Abbas was also upbeat as he met Bush, who has worked hard to drum up support, particularly among Arab nations such as Syria and Saudi Arabia, for the Annapolis meeting.

Meanwhile, the US-championed Middle East peace summit hit an early snag Monday as Palestinian and Israeli negotiators struggled to agree on a written framework for future negotiations, officials said.

US President George W. Bush met with leaders from both sides in his Oval Office and later urged all parties to make the "difficult compromises" needed to midwife a Palestinian state living side by side at peace with Israel.

Bush, speaking on the eve of the high-stakes conference in Annapolis, Maryland, said he was "optimistic" about restarting peace talks after a seven-year freeze and reaffirmed what critics have called his wobbly personal stake in the effort.

AFP, Washington

US President George W. Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki vowed Monday to agree next year on the terms for what could be an open-ended US military presence in the war-torn country.

During a secure videoconference, the two leaders signed a non-binding statement of principles for the negotiations, setting a July 31, 2008 target date to formalize US-Iraq economic, political, and security relations.

Maliki announced in Baghdad that the accord sets 2008 as the final year for US-led forces to operate in Iraq under a UN mandate, which the new bilateral arrangement would replace. The current one-year UN mandate expires December 31.

Under the document signed and made public Monday, the new security pact would trigger the end of UN sanctions imposed after Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in 1990 and return full sovereignty to the government in Baghdad.

"All the justification created by the former regime is now over," Maliki said, a reference to Saddam Hussein, the dictator ousted by the March 2003 US-led invasion and later executed.

AFP, London

The general secretary of the ruling Labour party announced his resignation Monday over a secret party funding revelation, in the latest blow to Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Peter Watt admitted that he had failed to properly report a donation of nearly 400,000 pounds by a wealthy but secretive businessman, reported by newspapers over the weekend.

"Once I discovered this error, I immediately notified the officers of the (Labour party) National Executive Committee," he said in a statement. "I take full responsibility for the Labour Party's reporting obligations."

AFP, Saint Petersburg

President Vladimir Putin Monday accused the United States of trying to "discredit" Russia's parliamentary elections by pressuring foreign observers to abandon their monitoring mission.

Putin made the accusation as his government came under sharp criticism over the weekend jailing of opposition leader and former chess champion Garry Kasparov during protests dispersed by riot police ahead of Sunday's elections.

On a campaign swing through his home town of Saint Petersburg, he said monitors from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) cancelled a planned mission to Russia "on the recommendation of the American State Department."

AFP, Tehran

Iran has built a new longer-range missile named "Ashura" with a range of 2,000 kilometres, (1,240 miles), the defence minister announced on Tuesday, the Fars news agency reported. "The construction of the Ashura missile with a range of 2,000 kilometres is one of the accomplishments of the ministry of defence," Defence Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar was quoted as saying. The weapon's range is sufficient to put US bases in the Middle East and Iran's arch enemy Israel within reach. The missile is named after the holy Ashura mourning ceremony that marks the death of Shiite imam Hossein Iran in September unveiled a missile labelled Ghadr-1 (Power), which was said to have a range of 1,800 kilometres (1,100 miles). However Western experts cast doubt on how original this development was.

AFP, Sydney

Australian prime minister-elect Kevin Rudd said Tuesday he was working on fulfilling his campaign pledge to ratify the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, but a law expert said he could face problems. "There are a range of ways in which the ratification process can be transacted and I'm seeking further advice on that now," Rudd told a news conference. "I'm hoping to have a complete statement on that by the time cabinet is sworn in." Australia's ratification of Kyoto will leave the United States isolated as the only major country to have refused to sign up to the treaty, which is aimed at curbing the emission of greenhouse gases blamed for global warming. Rudd's predecessor John Howard, ousted in weekend elections, was a staunch ally of US President George W. Bush and made Australia a pariah state in the global climate change debate by also refusing to ratify Kyoto. Former US vice president Al Gore, who became an environmental campaigner and went on to win the Nobel peace prize, branded Howard and Bush the "Bonnie and Clyde" of climate change -- a reference to the notorious US bank robbers.

Reuters, Khartoum

Sudanese authorities began questioning a British teacher on Tuesday arrested for insulting Islam after her young students named a teddy bear Mohammad. Gillian Gibbons, a 54-year-old teacher at the Unity High School in Khartoum, was arrested on Sunday after complaints from parents. "She has been transferred for questioning," said one police official in the station where she was being held. The official said a decision was possible on Tuesday from the investigating authorities as to whether charges would be brought against Gibbons. If convicted of insulting Islam, she could be sentenced to 40 lashes, six months in prison or a fine, lawyers said. Teachers at the school said Gibbons had asked her class of 7-year-olds to choose their favorite name for the teddy bear and 20 of the 23 had voted for Mohammad.

AFP, Beijing

Officials from the five nations trying to end North Korea's nuclear ambitions arrived in Pyongyang on Tuesday to observe the disablement of the isolated state's main atomic facility, officials said. The delegation, including senior US diplomat Sung Kim, will visit the Yongbyon nuclear reactor, which is slowly being disabled in accordance with an agreement struck in February, they said. "We are pretty positive. I think we are making progress," Kim told journalists before departing Beijing along with officials from China, Japan, Russia and South Korea. The team of officials, the first multinational delegation to travel to North Korea as part of the disarmament process, is expected to stay there for three days.

Reuters, Paris

The number of police officers injured in clashes in Paris suburbs overnight reached about 60, police said on Tuesday, after a second night of violence. Police officers were hit with stones, petrol bombs and firecrackers that exploded over their heads during hours of skirmishes with rioters in the northern suburb of Villiers-le-Bel and nearby areas. The violence followed the deaths of two youths in a crash involving a police car. It revived memories of 2005 riots in France's poor, often ethnically diverse, housing estates. Despite appeals for calm from the crash victims' families, rioters torched a library, a tax office and damaged dozens of shops and businesses, police said.