The New Nation - Internet Edition

AP, Baghdad

Mortar shells slammed into an Interior Ministry prison on Monday, killing at least seven inmates and wounding 23, officials said. A major oil refinery came under fire elsewhere in the capital, sending up billowing black smoke.

The mortar rounds hit a prison made up of several cell blocks, each containing prisoners accused of terrorism-related crimes or civil offenses, police said.

Police said American troops sealed off the area and were investigating the bombardment, which took place about 6:30 a.m. The U.S. military said it had no immediate information, and Iraqi Interior Ministry officials could not be reached for comment.

A hospital official said the inmates were still asleep when the mortars hit, one landing directly on a cell and two others nearby.

Elsewhere in Baghdad, a rocket or a mortar shell hit an oil refinery on Monday, police and an Oil Ministry spokesman said. The U.S. military confirmed an attack in the area.

Assim Jihad, a spokesman for Iraq's Oil Ministry, said a rocket or mortar shell landed on a storage tank around 6 a.m. He said no casualties were reported and the plant was still operating.

"The fire is under control and within a few hours it will be extinguished. This will not affect production," Assim told The Associated Press.

A police official said the fire was caused by a 120 mm mortar round.

The police and hospital officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release details of the attacks.

Meanwhile, the police chief of central Iraq's Babil province was killed in a roadside bombing on Sunday in the latest attack on leaders in governates south of Baghdad where a Shiite turf war is raging.

Major General Qais al-Mamoori was killed in the village of Al-Buajaj, near Babil's capital of Hilla, when a bomb struck his convoy, police Lieutenant Ali al-Shammari said. His driver and one bodyguard were wounded.

Mamoori is the third top Shiite official to be assassinated in the last four months in provinces south of the Iraqi capital and the second provincial police chief to be targeted amid intense rivalries within the Shiite factions.

Captain Muthanna Hassan, spokesman for Hilla police, confirmed that Mamoori had been killed in the attack.

Doctor Mohammed al-Saidi from Hilla general hospital said the police chief was brought alive to the facility but died on the operating table.

"After the attack he was brought to Hilla hospital and doctors started an emergency operation on him. But he died in five minutes," Saidi told AFP.

Another official from Hassan's office said police had sealed off the area where the attack took place. He added that Mamoori had recently been offered the job of adviser to the interior minister but had turned it down.

"He said he wanted to remain as the police chief. He was very popular with the people," the official said.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani hailed Mamoori as a courageous man not afraid to confront "terrorism".

"Iraq lost a courageous leader and an obedient son, a citizen who was fair, professional and always loyal to the constitution," Talabani said in a statement, adding that the police chief had sacrificed his life to improve security and confront terrorism.

AP, Islamabad

Pakistan's election campaign began in earnest Monday, a day after former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif dropped threats to boycott the balloting to protest President Pervez Musharraf's imposition of a state of emergency. Sharif embarked on a tour of the country to stump for his Pakistan Muslim League-N party, even though election authorities have rejected his own candidacy. The two-time prime minister was to address a rally Monday in the central city of Faisalabad and proceed to Multan, Rawalpindi, Quetta, Karachi and Peshawar in the coming days, party officials said. "We will sweep the elections if given a level playing field," said Sadiq ul-Farooq, a senior party leader. Greater participation will make the parliamentary elections look more open, bolstering Musharraf's democratic credentials, which took a hit over his Nov. 3 declaration of a state of emergency and his dismissal of independent-minded judges. But having powerful opponents like Sharif and another former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, in the field could siphon off votes and seats from Musharraf's party, weakening the U.S.-backed leader. While some smaller parties still say they won't participate in the Jan. 8 polls, the prospect of a general opposition boycott has collapsed with decisions by the two largest opposition groups to field candidates, opening the way for a three-corner fight for the right to form the next government.

Reuters, New Delhi

The communists have fired a fresh salvo at the government over a controversial nuclear deal with the United States, asking it to stop talks with a U.N. nuclear watchdog to clinch the pact or prepare for elections.

The new threat by the chief of the largest communist party, which shores up Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's coalition, is one of the most explicit in recent months and marked yet another turnaround in the stance of the left parties. "When they return after the talks, we will tell them that there is no need to proceed further," Prakash Karat, general-secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), told a party meeting, referring to negotiations between Indian experts and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

"They will have to close this issue by the end of December," Karat said in comments that were made late on Saturday and shown on Times Now TV channel on Sunday. "If they go ahead then we will have to prepare for elections." Singh's Congress party spokesman, Abhishek Singhvi, sought to downplay Karat's threat, saying that talks with the IAEA were being held with the full support of the communists.

The India-U.S. civil nuclear cooperation agreement aims to allow New Delhi to access American nuclear fuel and reactors by overturning a three-decade ban imposed after India conducted a nuclear test while staying out of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

It is seen as the centrepiece of a new, strategic relationship between Washington and New Delhi and hopes to help India meet its soaring energy needs.

But communist allies of Singh have rejected it, saying it compromises India's sovereignty and draws it into the geostrategic influence of the United States.

AFP, Manama

Iraq's National Security Advisor on Sunday called on Gulf states to form a regional security pact, which would include Iran, while he reassured the area's US allies that Baghdad is "heading West" in its foreign policies.

But Mouaffak al-Rubaie also criticised Saudi Arabia and Iran for what he called settling scores on Iraqi soil and called for regional reconciliation that put sectarian differences aside.

"It is extremely important to have a regional reconciliation rather than having this heightened sectarian tension in the region," he told delegates at a security conference held in the Bahraini capital Manama.

"That is why Iraq is looking seriously to call for a regional security pact like the good old (1954 anti-Soviet alliance) Baghdad Pact or a NATO-style pact, with a set agenda: counter terrorism, counter narcotics, counter religious extremism and counter sectarianism," he said.

The Iraqi official said security in the region was "indivisable. You cannot stabilise Iraq and destablise Iran, for example."

Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi meanwhile agreed that Iran should be included in any regional security arrangement.

"It is our destiny to live with Irant It is inevitable t that we should work on regional arrangements that lead Iran to be a source of good to the region and not a source of harm," he told reporters on the sidelines of the conference, which Iran decided at the last minute not to attend.

AP, Bangkok

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon warned Myanmar the international community was running out of patience with its authoritarian regime, saying Monday the junta must embrace democracy and stop inflicting suffering on its own people. "I know the international community is very much impatient, and our patience is running out," Ban told a news conference in Bangkok, Thailand.

"The people of Myanmar have suffered from isolation for such a long time and it's high time now that the Myanmar authorities and the people t enjoy democracy and freedom."

A U.N. human rights envoy said Friday that Myanmar's crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in September killed at least 31 people, twice the toll acknowledged by the junta. The envoy, Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, also said that 650 people remained in custody from the crackdown and another 74 people were missing.

The United Nations and governments around the world expressed outrage after the junta's troops opened fire on pro-democracy protests, which were led by Buddhist monks.

Reuters, Lisbon

Africa and Europe's first summit in seven years ended on Sunday without agreement on the key issue of trade, dealing a blow to efforts to forge a new economic partnership between the two continents.

More than 70 European and African leaders were also at odds on how to deal with Zimbabwe, which was singled out along with Sudan by German Chancellor Angela Merkel for not respecting human rights. The two-day summit ended with an ambitious action plan and a promise to meet again in 2010. But the world's largest trading bloc and its poorest continent were at loggerheads over trade, which would be the basis for future economies ties.

The EU is Africa's largest commercial partner, with trade totaling more than 215 billion euros ($315.2 billion) in 2006. But EU officials and businessmen fear growing Chinese investment in Africa could displace Europe from the top spot. Beijing held a summit for African leaders last year, wooing them with multibillion-dollar trade investment contracts.

The EU wants to replace expiring trade accords with so-called Economic Partnership Agreements or temporary deals, which anti-poverty groups have criticized for failing to provide protection for Africa's poor farmers and its fragile industry.

AP, Kabul

An Afghan army helicopter crashed in central Afghanistan on Monday because of bad weather, killing four people, officials said.

The Mi-17 helicopter went down near a field in Salar district of Wardak province, where the weather was foggy, the defense ministry said in a statement.

At least four people were killed, said Wardak provincial police chief Zafaruddin, who goes by only one name. The authorities recovered three bodies from the burning wreckage, he said.

Two helicopters were traveling from Kabul toward western Afghanistan when one of them crashed, Zafaruddin said.

The crash happened a day after U.S.-led coalition troops conducted an airstrike and subsequent operation targeting Taliban weapon smugglers in the Musa Qala district of Helmand province, leaving several militants dead and two civilians wounded, the coalition said in a statement.

AP, Lima

Former President Alberto Fujimori faces trial Monday on charges of using a death squad to kill leftist guerrillas and collaborators - a case stirring mixed emotions in a country where many admire him for defeating a bloody insurgency.

It is the first time in Peru's history that a former president faces a public trial for crimes committed during his administration - and one of the few cases of a Latin American leader being tried after leaving office.

Fujimori is charged with authorizing a death squad to kill nine students and a professor at La Cantuta University in 1992, and 15 people in a tenement in Lima's Barrios Altos neighborhood in 1991. If convicted, he faces up to 30 years in prison and a fine of some $33 million.

Reuters, Washington

Pakistan might welcome U.S. assistance in a military strike against al Qaeda, President Pervez Musharraf said in an interview aired on Sunday, but he rejected the idea of a unilateral U.S. decision to send troops into his country after militants. "Whatever intelligence we get on the terrorists, we jointly think of what kind of action is possible and whatever assistance we can get," Musharraf, a key U.S. ally in the region, said on CNN's Late Edition. "But it is the Pakistan forces who act t the prerogative must remain with Pakistan," he said in the interview, which was taped on Saturday. Musharraf balked at a recent statement by U.S. President George W. Bush, who said he would send U.S. forces after Osama bin Laden or other senior militants in Pakistan if he had reliable intelligence. "Frankly, I don't agree with that," Musharraf said, speaking from the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi. Musharraf, who called Bush a "great personal friend," has been under intense international scrutiny since he declared emergency rule in early November, suspending the constitution and deposing judges who threatened his political future.

Reuters, Tehran

Iran and a team from the U.N. nuclear watchdog started a fresh round of talks on Monday in Tehran to resolve doubts about the Islamic Republic's nuclear work, Iranian media reported. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) delegation arrived in Iran's capital on Sunday, less than a week after a U.S. intelligence report said Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003. Iran denies ever having had such a military program but welcomed the report that contradicted the U.S. administration's assertions that Tehran was actively working on a nuclear bomb. "The nuclear negotiations started on Monday morning and will last three days," the semi-official news agency Fars reported. Iran and the U.N. body agreed in August on a timetable to answer outstanding questions about nuclear activities which Tehran says are aimed at generating electricity. Previous rounds of talks dealt with centrifuges used to enrich uranium and other issues.

AP, Jerusalem

A key ally of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Sunday that Israel will hold on to all Jewish neighborhoods of Jerusalem but would have to relinquish Arab neighborhoods in a peace agreement with the Palestinians.

The comments by Vice Premier Haim Ramon appeared aimed at defusing U.S. criticism of an Israeli plan to expand one of its Jewish neighborhoods in east Jerusalem, the section Palestinians claim as capital of a future state. Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations are set to resume Wednesday under an agreement reached at last month's Mideast peace conference in Annapolis, Md. A senior Palestinian official charged Sunday that Israel is already negotiating in bad faith about Jerusalem, one of the touchiest issues on the table. "These statements place obstacles before any serious attempts by Palestinian negotiators on Jerusalem," Palestinian Foreign Minister Riad Malki said.

AFP, London

Britain will hand over Basra province to Iraqi control within two weeks, Prime Minister Gordon Brown said during a surprise trip to southern Iraq Sunday, his Downing Street office said. Addressing troops in the southern Iraqi city, Brown said that Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki was recommending "a move to provincial Iraqi control within two weeks", a spokesman in London said. "I have just talked to Prime Minister Maliki, and he has asked me to pass on his thanks to you for what you have done to help rebuild the democracy of Iraq," Brown said, according to the spokesman. "It's because of all the operations we have done over the past few months that the security situation has not only improved, but he is now recommending a move to provincial Iraqi control within two weeks."

AFP, United Nations

The number of children who die before their fifth birthday fell below 10 million in 2006, but much more still needed to be done, said a report by the UN's children's agency UNICEF released Monday. The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) report attributed the progress in children's mortality rates largely to improvements in healthcare.

By comparison, an estimated 20 million children under five were dying every year at the beginning of the 1960s. But UNICEF's executive director, Ann Veneman, pointed out that "much more must be done" and "if we do so, we can help create a better world for girls and boys, and for generations to come." More than 500,000 women still die every year, for example, as a result of complications during pregnancy and childbirth, about half of whom die in sub-Saharan Africa, the report said.