The New Nation - Internet Edition

AFP, Colombo

International groups called for a UN human rights monitoring mission in Sri Lanka on Saturday as fresh clashes between troops and Tamil Tiger rebels left at least 25 dead, the government said.

Fighting across Sri Lanka's northern frontier left 24 rebels dead and injured 18 during 24 hours ending early Saturday, the defence ministry said, placing their own losses at one soldier killed and two injured.

There was no immediate word from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Independent verification of battlefield casualties are not possible and both sides are known to offer wildly contradictory figures. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch Saturday called for the United Nations Human Rights Council to monitor rights abuses in Sri Lanka.

They have called before for such a mission but said the need was more urgent than ever. The human rights situation in Sri Lanka "is rapidly deteriorating. In the last two weeks of November alone, more than 50 civilians have been killed in Sri Lanka," the Human Rights Watch said.

Since September, more than 20,000 people have been displaced by the escalation in fighting between both sides, the rights group said in an open letter ahead of a UN meeting on human rights in Geneva next week.

AFP, Kabul

Afghan and international forces are engaged in a massive operation to retake the strategically important town of Musa Qala which has been held by the Taliban for 10 months, NATO said Saturday.

Troops were dropped on the outskirts late Friday and overnight by a fleet of helicopters amid efforts to oust the rebels. The town, in Afghanistan's opium-producing heartland in the southern province of Helmand, was surrounded and air strikes were launched, Afghan defence ministry spokesman General Mohammad Zahir Azimi told AFP Friday.

AFP, Manama

US Defence Secretary Robert Gates on Saturday said Iran's foreign policy was a threat to the United States, the Middle East and all countries within range of missiles Tehran is developing.

"There can be little doubt that their destabilising foreign policies are a threat to the interests of the United States, to the interests of every country in the Middle East, and to the interests of all countries within the range of the ballistic missiles Iran is developing," Gates told a conference on regional security in Bahrain.

Iran is also "funding and training" militias in Iraq, supporting "terrorist organisations" such as Hezbollah and Hamas and developing "medium-range ballistic missiles that are not particularly cost-effective unless equipped with warheads carrying weapons of mass destruction," Gates added.

AFP, New Delhi

India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Friday accused the Hindu nationalist leaders of riot-scarred Gujarat state of fueling tensions with Muslims ahead of elections there. At least 2,000 Muslims were killed in widespread riots in the western state in 2002 after Hindu pilgrims were killed in a train fire. The state government and police allegedly supported the riots. Ahead of polls on December 11 and 16, the state's hard-line chief minister, Narendra Modi, has been accused of trying to score Hindu votes by justifying the alleged murder of a Muslim man by police in 2005. The state government "has sought to divide the people," Premier Singh told a news conference in Gujarat's Surat city. "I think that is a big handicap for Gujarat to move forward," the prime minister said, adding it was "not good for any political party to divide our country on communal lines."

AP, Mallipo Beach

Residents and emergency workers used buckets to remove dense crude oil from South Korea's western shore as the Coast Guard struggled in high waves and strong winds to contain the country's largest oil spill Saturday. The oil was reaching scenic and ecologically sensitive areas. At Mallipo - one of South Korea's best-known beaches - tides of dark sea water crashed ashore, while the odor could be smelled a half-mile away. Hundreds of troops, police and residents were engaged in cleanup efforts there. Oil was still trickling out of the tanker hit Friday, but Kim Woon-tae, a Coast Guard official, said the last of three holes would soon be sealed completely. The Coast Guard headquarters had said Friday that all three punctured containers on the tanker were plugged. The region is popular for its scenic beaches and is also the site of fish farms, a national maritime park and is an important rest stop for migrating birds.

AFP, Kuala Lumpur

Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has reportedly warned that ethnic Indian activists accused of having links with Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers could be held under internal security laws. Ethnic rights group Hindraf, which organised mass anti-discrimination protests in November that were broken up with tear gas and water cannon, has been accused of seeking support from the Tigers. Abdullah said he had ordered police to monitor Hindraf leaders and followers on suspicion of association with terrorists, and that they could be dealt with under the Internal Security Act (ISA) which allows detention without trial. "ISA is an option," the premier said according to the New Straits Times.

AP, Geneva

Myanmar's crackdown on pro-democracy protesters killed more than twice as many people as the junta has acknowledged, a U.N. investigator said Friday, citing at least 31 dead. Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, the U.N. human rights expert assigned to the country, said he documented 16 people killed in the September crackdown along with the 15 dead already reported by the government. But he said the actual death toll was likely much higher. "Several reports of killings indicate that the figure provided by the authorities may greatly underestimate the reality," he said. "There are a number of incidents where no names were reported but where there were allegations of groups of people reportedly killed, which have also been shared," Pinheiro said in a report released by the U.N. on Friday.