The New Nation - Internet Edition

2 US soldiers among 300 killed in Iraq unrest

AP, Baghdad

Two US soldiers among 300 people were killed in violence continues in Baghdad and Mehdi army gunmen impose control on Basra.

The U.S. military says two American soldiers have been killed by a roadside bomb in eastern Baghdad.

A statement says the Multi-National Division - Baghdad soldiers died at about 5:30 p.m. on Saturday. It gives no further details on the location. But the attack occurred in a mostly Shiite area that has seen fierce clashes this week.

An Associated Press count shows that at least 4,007 members of the U.S. military have died since the Iraq war started in March 2003, including the latest deaths. Violence continues in Baghdad and Mehdi army gunmen impose control on Basra.

More than 300 people have been reported killed and many hundreds wounded in the five days of fighting across southern Iraq and Baghdad. Health workers say hospitals are overflowing and understaffed in Sadr City and a ring of Iraqi and U.S. forces around the area makes it impossible to evacuate the wounded.

Reuters report adds: Iraqi authorities on Saturday extended a curfew in Baghdad indefinitely in an attempt to contain clashes between Shi'ite militants and Iraqi security forces that have threatened to spiral out of control.

But in an indication that the violence was set to continue, Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr ordered his followers not to lay down their weapons, defying a five-day-old crackdown by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, who has ordered them to disarm.

The latest violence has spread from the southern city of Basra through towns in Iraq's southern Shi'ite heartland and neighborhoods of Baghdad.

"Moqtada al-Sadr asks his followers not to deliver weapons to the government. Weapons should be turned over only to a government which can expel the (U.S.) occupiers," Sadr aide Hassan Zargani told Reuters by telephone.

Maliki has staked his authority on disarming Sadr's followers with a major military operation. But his forces have made little progress driving fighters from the streets and instead have provoked rebellion in towns across the south.

The prime minister initially gave Sadr's followers in Basra 72 hours to disarm, but with little progress on the ground he extended the deadline until April 8.

The curfew in Baghdad, imposed on Thursday, was due to expire early on Sunday.

"To defeat the terrorist groups, the outlaws and the criminal gangs and to preserve the souls of our citizens, we extended the curfew in Baghdad indefinitely for people, cars and motorcycles," said a statement from the Iraqi security forces.

In a sign of the escalating stakes, Maliki called Sadr's fighters "worse than al Qaeda," the Shi'ite government's hated Sunni Arab foes. Sadr's followers are fellow Shi'ites who helped install Maliki in power in 2006 and backed him until last year.

The fighting has all but wrecked a ceasefire Sadr declared last year, which U.S. commanders had credited for calming Iraq. Instead, U.S. troops have been drawn deeper into what started as an Iraqi-led operation. U.S. forces in Baghdad said they killed 48 militants in a series of gun battles and air strikes across the capital the previous day.

In Basra, U.S. warplanes have carried out air strikes directed by teams of U.S. or British troops on the ground.

A British military spokesman confirmed there were more U.S. air strikes in Basra on Saturday. At one house, a Reuters photographer filmed wrecked walls and blood pouring into a sewer after grieving relatives said a bomb had killed seven people.

Tens of millions switch off worldwide for 'Earth Hour’

AFP, Sydney

Tens of millions of people switched off lightbulbs this weekend as part of a global campaign to throw the spotlight on climate change, organisers of the Australian-led 'Earth Hour' initiative said.

From Sydney to Asia, Europe, Canada and the US, "many tens of millions" of people flicked the switch on Saturday night, plunging cities, towns and homes into darkness, chief of environmental group WWF-Australia Greg Bourne said.

The event, which was first held in Sydney last year, saw the lights dimmed in major cities at 8:00 pm local time, with skyscrapers, public monuments and private homes plunged into darkness.

Bourne said the response from around the world had been astounding.

While 26 cities are officially signed up for 'Earth Hour', Bourne said the campaign had already stretched well beyond that and that the intention was for the voluntary, 60-minute blackout to be even bigger in 2009.

"In pretty much every country in the world, someone has signed up. Whether it be one, two, three or 3,000 individuals," he told AFP.

"Basically every continent including Antarctica had some involvement and what I think will happen next year is that we will get deeper and deeper involvement in Asia, in Russia.

"We're pretty certain, that when we do it next year, China will become very much more involved," he added.

Earth Hour organisers asked governments, businesses and individuals to switch off the power for one hour on Saturday to save energy and thereby produce fewer greenhouse gases.

Bourne said the campaign was less about making a real reduction in energy usage, and more about increasing public awareness about energy efficiency.

He said indications were that the event had been a success in not only Sydney, where the Sydney Harbour Bridge and Opera House faded into relative darkness, but around the world.

"We had 2.2 million last year; I reckon by the time we finally count it up, we will have about 100 million people involved around the world," he said.

Energy Australia, which supplies much of Sydney's electricity, said a drop of about 8.4 percent in energy usage had been recorded in the city during the hour, equivalent to 1.6 million light bulbs being switched off.

Sadr orders militia to reject PM's call to surrender arms

AP, Baghdad

Anti-American Shiite militia leader Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his followers Saturday to defy government orders to surrender their weapons, as U.S. jets struck Shiite extremists near Basra to bolster a faltering Iraqi offensive against gunmen in the city.

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki acknowledged he may have miscalculated by failing to foresee the strong backlash that his offensive, which began Tuesday, provoked in areas of Baghdad and other cities where Shiite militias wield power.

Government television said the round-the-clock curfew imposed two days ago on the capital and due to expire Sunday would be extended indefinitely. Gunfire and explosions were heard late Saturday in Sadr City, the Baghdad stronghold of al-Sadr's Mahdi Army militia.

The U.S. Embassy tightened its security measures, ordering all staff to use armored vehicles for all travel in the Green Zone and to sleep in reinforced buildings until further notice after six days of rocket and mortar attacks that left two Americans dead.

Rice in Middeast to boost peace talks

AP, Jerusalem

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Sunday she expects Israel and the Palestinians to take "meaningful" steps to ease Palestinian economic woes and improve Israeli security during her latest Mideast mission aimed at reviving faltering peace talks.

Rice stressed that action on both issues was and critical to energizing languishing efforts to reach a peace deal by year's end that leads to the creation of a Palestinian state.

As she spoke before heading into a flurry of meetings with senior officials from both sides, Israeli officials said they would ease at least some restrictions on the movement of West Bank Palestinians as part of efforts to improve the Palestinian economy and bolster moderates.

"There is a shared responsibility here for an atmosphere and a reality that can lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state based on security for Israel and Palestinians alike and economic viability for Palestinians," Rice told a news conference with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.

Gaddafi warns US allies could suffer Saddam's fate

AFP, Damascus

Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi warned Arab allies of the United States that they could meet the same fate as former Iraq president Saddam Hussein, hanged in 2006 three years after the US-led invasion.

"A foreign force occupied an Arab country and hanged its president and we stood by and watched," he told an Arab summit in the Syrian capital.

Saddam was hanged in December 2006 after being sentenced to death for crimes against humanity over the mass killing of Shiites in the 1980s.

"How can they execute a prisoner of war and the president of a member of the Arab League?" Kadhafi asked. He said Saddam had been a friend of the United States during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s "before they turned against him and executed him."

"You could all suffer the same fate," he warned."Even you, even we, who are considered friends of America, one day (America) can give the green light for our own hanging," said the Libyan leader whose country resumed ties with the United States in 2004 after a 23-year break.

Israel opposing Palestinian state

AFP, Damascus

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas on Saturday accused Israel of splitting the Palestinian territories into isolated cantons to prevent the creation of a state despite its pledge to peace efforts. "Israel is continuing its aggression, its occupation, the construction of settlements and the Judaisation of Jerusalem," Abbas told the opening session of an Arab summit in Damascus. "The solution which Israel is designing consists of a group of cantons on a land separated by settlements, the separation wall and roadblocks," he said. "This type of solution only reinforces the occupation and colonisation and is aimed at preventing the creation of an independent Palestinian state," Abbas added.

Taliban welcome talks offer by new Pak PM

AFP, Khar

Pakistan's Taliban movement welcomed an offer by the new premier to hold talks with militants but urged Islamabad to abandon the US-led "war on terror," the movement's spokesman said. Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani Saturday urged militants to renounce violence and offered to hold talks with those who give up arms and join the new democratic era.

"We are ready to talk to all those people who give up arms and are ready to embrace peace," Gilani said to loud support from lawmakers while addressing parliament. Pakistani Taliban militants welcomed the move late Saturday.