The New Nation - Internet Edition

AP, Vatican City

Pope Benedict XVI urged the faithful to set aside time in their lives for God and the needy, as he ushered in Christmas early Tuesday by celebrating Midnight Mass in St. Peter's Basilica.

Echoing a theme he has raised about an increasingly secular world, Benedict said that many people act as if there is no room for spiritual matters in their lives.

"Man is so preoccupied with himself, he has such urgent need of all the space and all the time for his own things, that nothing remains for others, for his neighbor, for the poor, for God," he said.

Benedict also use the homily to link the Christmas message to the church's growing environmental concerns, referring to early theologians who interpreted Christ's role as also a healer of the Earth and universe.

"He came to restore beauty and dignity to creation, to the universe: This is what began at Christmas and makes the angels rejoice. The Earth is restored to good order by virtue of the fact that it is opened up to God t Thus Christmas is a feast of restored creation."

Under Benedict, the Vatican has been taking steps toward greater environmental action, a key element of which has been its involvement in reforestation project aimed at offsetting its carbon emissions.

In a homily delivered in Italian in front of thousands packing the basilica, Benedict asked the faithful to make room for God, as well as the less fortunate, in their lives.

"Do we have time for our neighbor who is in need of a word from us, from me, or in need of my affection? For the sufferer who is in need of help? For the fugitive or the refugee who is seeking asylum? Do we have time and space for God?"

Benedict drew parallels between what he perceives as modern society's refusal of God and the story of how Jesus was born in a manger because there was no space for his family at a nearby inn.

"In some way, mankind is awaiting God, waiting for him to draw near. But when the moment comes, there is no room for him," he said.

But the message of Jesus' birth, which is marked on Christmas, is also that "God does not allow himself to be shut out," Benedict said. "He finds a space, even if it means entering through the stable; there are people who see his light and pass it on."

Earlier, as Midnight Mass began, Benedict blessed the crowd of pilgrims, Romans and tourists, as he walked in a procession up the main aisle to the central altar, which was decorated with red poinsettia flowers.

As a choir sang, Benedict sprinkled incense on the altar under Bernini's massive bronze baldachin before opening the service with the traditional wish for peace in Latin: "Pax vobis" ("Peace be with you"). The faithful responded: "Et cum spiritu tuo." ("And also with you.")

Four children, some in native costume from their countries, brought flowers to the altar, placing them near a statue depicting baby Jesus as Benedict, dressed in white and gold-colored robes, joined a choir in a hymn.

For those unable to get into the midnight service there were giant screens set up in St. Peter's Square, which was made festive with a twinkling Christmas tree and the Vatican's Nativity scene.

Retuers, Baiji

The death toll in a suicide truck bombing in the northern Iraqi city of Baiji killed at least 22 people and wounded 70 on Tuesday, an Iraqi police official said.

Police had earlier put the death toll at 10. The bomber targeted a joint checkpoint manned by Iraqi security forces and armed volunteers who are working with the U.S. military.

The bomber blew up the truck, which was full of cooking gas cylinders, at the checkpoint manned by Iraqi soldiers and members of a local group fighting Al-Qaeda, the official from the joint Iraqi-US security coordination centre in Tikrit said.

A medic from the Baiji hospital confirmed the attack.

The security official said the attack took place at around 9:30 am (0630 GMT) in an area called Al-Ghaz near the northern outskirts of Baiji and close to the oil refinery from where fuel products are distributed across Iraq.

In the past few months insurgents have stepped up attacks in northern Iraq after being pushed out of western and central regions of the country following a series of military assaults.

US and Iraqi forces are currently involved in a massive military sweep in the northern provinces of Salaheddin -- which includes Baiji -- Nineveh and Kirkuk.

AFP, Jerusalem

Israeli and Palestinian negotiators made no headway on Monday in the second round of talks since the relaunch of the Middle East peace process, with the issue of Israeli settlements overshadowing the talks, officials said. Teams headed by Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Palestinian ex-premier Ahmed Qorei huddled for several hours late in the day at a Jerusalem hotel in what senior negotiator Saeb Erakat said was a "very difficult" encounter.

"Without a stop to settlement activity we cannot begin the final negotiations and we refused to start negotiations on final issues until this happens," Erakat told AFP.

A senior aide to Livni told AFP that during Monday's talks "the Palestinians demanded a total settlement freeze, while the Israeli side demanded the Palestinians implement their commitment to crack down on militant groups and improve security in the West Bank as well as Gaza."

The day before, officials said that Israel earmarked budget funds to expand two settlements in occupied Palestinian territory next year -- the second expansion since peace talks were revived at a US conference in November.

The Palestinians slammed the move, warning that continuing Israeli settlement activity could derail the relaunched peace efforts.

AP, Sukkur

Pakistan's opposition leaders fanned out across the country Monday, lashing out at President Pervez Musharraf and telling thousands of people at raucous political rallies to vote for change.

The Jan. 8 parliamentary election could be a crucial step in restoring democracy here after a six-week state of emergency ended on Dec. 15. It will also have deep implications for the future of Musharraf's administration, seen as a key U.S. ally in the war on terrorism.

Former Prime Ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, who both returned from exile to lead their opposition parties' campaigns, have pledged to work together in hopes of loosening the former army chief's grip on power.

Speaking to 3,000 people in the town of Sukkur, in Bhutto's home province of Sindh, Sharif accused Musharraf of presiding over a worsening economy and sparking violent confrontations across the Islamic country.

"The country is soaked in blood and fire from Khyber to Karachi," said Sharif, who has been banned from running for office himself, but was addressing voters on behalf of his party's candidates.

AFP, Colombo

At least 13 Tamil Tiger rebels were killed on Christmas Eve in heavy clashes with Sri Lankan security forces in northern Sri Lanka, the defence ministry said Tuesday.

Six members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) were killed in a confrontation in the district of Mannar on Monday while another five were killed in three separate clashes, the ministry said.

Two more Tigers were shot dead on the same day in the Jaffna peninsula along a de facto border separating rebel-held territory, the ministry said.

The ministry also raised the estimate for the number of guerrillas killed in a clash three days ago to 22 from an earlier estimate of eight.

The claim of more rebel casualties brings the number of Tamil fighters killed since December 1 to at least 412, according to the defence ministry.

This compares with a handful of government troops reported dead.

Both sides make sharply differing claims about casualties and independent verification is rarely possible, because the press is barred from front-line and rebel-held areas.

Tens of thousands of people have died on both sides since the LTTE launched its armed struggle for a Tamil homeland in the majority Sinhalese nation in 1972. A Norwegian-brokered 2002 truce began to unravel in December 2005.

AFP, Bethlehem

The Catholic leader in the Holy Land again called for peace in the Middle East on Tuesday as he addressed thousands of Christians gathered at the traditional site of Jesus's birth. "This land of God cannot be for some a land of life and for others a land of death, exclusion, occupation, or political imprisonment," Latin Patriarch Michel Sabbah said in a sermon for the Christmas midnight mass. "All those whom God, the lord of history, has gathered here must be able to find in this land life, dignity and security," he said, addressing thousands of Christians from all over the world in a sermon delivered in his native Arabic. Sabbah, who last week said that peace in the Middle East depended on Israel, reiterated that message in a less direct way on Tuesday.

AFP, Beijing

China and India wrapped up their first-ever joint military exercises with a drill in which they "wiped out" a group of supposed terrorists along their border, state press reported.

In the mock scenario, 56 members of an unnamed international terrorist organisation had taken hostages after establishing a training base along the two nations' border, according to the Xinhua news agency. "The finale manoeuvre involved establishing a joint command postt before wiping out a group of 'terrorists' and rescuing 'hostages'," Xinhua said. The three-hour drill was the culmination of five days of exercises between about 100 troops from each of the two nations' militaries in southwest China's Yunnan province, which borders India. Chinese officials had initially said the exercises were meant to last for nine days. However the Xinhua report said they were only a five-day operation, without giving a reason for the different timeframe.

Reuters, New Delhi

Stung by its big loss to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in elections in Gujarat, Congress is expected to switch to damage-control and populism ahead of national elections due in 2009.

That could mean dumping a historic nuclear deal with the United States, delaying a much-needed increase in fuel prices and presenting a budget filled with sops to woo voters and cement ties with coalition allies, analysts said. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, whose reformist agenda had already been sidelined by pressure from the government's communist allies, will be further weakened, with his party more worried about returning to power than running the country. "There is only one way to describe this and that is, it is a big setback for Congress," said N. Bhaskara Rao, a political analyst at New Delhi's Centre for Media Studies. "It is a setback to the nuclear deal as the prime minister's hand is much weaker." "They will reconsider their priorities, there will be realignment in terms of coming closer to their allies and it will rain sops to catch voters," he said.

AFP, Tashkent

Uzbekistan's President Islam Karimov won another landslide victory, election officials said Monday, but former Soviet states and Western observers were split over whether the vote had been fair. Karimov won a new seven-year term with 88.1 percent of the vote in Sunday's elections, the Central Election Commission said, compared with 91 percent in 2000. While Russia's President Vladimir Putin and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) welcomed the result, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said it had not met democratic standards. Karimov, who has led Uzbekistan for 18 years, faced three opponents, each of whom were credited with three percent of the vote. The 69-year-old leader had banned independent media and political parties.