The New Nation - Internet Edition

46 killed in Sri Lanka fresh fighting

AFP, Colombo

Sri Lankan security forces killed at least 44 Tamil Tiger rebels for the loss of two of their own soldiers in fresh ground battles in the island's embattled north, the defence ministry said Saturday.

The rebels from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) were killed in separate clashes on Friday in the northern district of Vavuniya and Mannar, the ministry said, adding that at least 30 rebels were also wounded.

The ministry said 25 bodies of Tiger fighters killed in previous fighting was returned to the rebels on Friday through the Red Cross.

"Advancing army battle formations have inflicted decisive blows on the LTTE during multi-pronged attacks," the ministry said.

In the latest fighting, army troops took control of Andankulam town in Mannar district after a battle that killed 28 rebels and one soldier Friday, said military spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara.

The town's capture came a day after the troops seized a key supply base in Vavuniya district that had been used to replenish the Tamil Tigers' front-line troops.

Nanayakkara said the capture of the base and town were strategically important for government troops to gain control of rebels' northern strongholds.

Other battles on Friday killed 12 rebels and one soldier in the Welioya region, while in the northern Jaffna peninsula a soldier died in a roadside bomb blast blamed on rebels, Nanayakkara said.

The military says fighting over the past week has killed 220 rebels and 22 soldiers. Analysts accuse both sides of exaggerating enemy losses and underreporting their own casualties.

Rebel spokesman Rasiah Ilanthirayan was not immediately available for comment.

It was not possible to independently verify the military's claims because journalists are banned from the northern jungles where much of the fighting takes place.

The Tamil Tiger rebels have fought since 1983 to create an independent state for ethnic minority Tamils, who have been marginalized by successive governments controlled by ethnic Sinhalese. More than 70,000 people have been killed in the conflict.

The government vows to capture rebel-held territory and to crush the insurgents by 2009 but diplomats and other observers say the army has faced more resistance than expected.

There was no immediate word from the Tigers on the latest fighting.

The defence ministry claims raise the number of rebels reported killed by government troops since the beginning of the year to 4,545, against the loss of 416 soldiers.

Government figures cannot be independently verified as journalists are barred from visiting frontline areas.

Pakistan to attack Taliban stronghold

AP, Peshawar

Pakistan is preparing a military operation against Taliban militants who have been threatening the main city in the country's volatile northwest, the army's spokesman said Saturday.

Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas told The Associated Press that the army is readying the paramilitary Frontier Corps to target militants in the Khyber tribal region, next to Peshawar. Khyber is also a key route for moving U.S. military supplies into neighboring Afghanistan.

"The operation is imminent," he said. There has been growing concern about the threat posed by Islamic militants to the city with a burgeoning Taliban movement thriving in the region.

Mahmood Shah, a former security chief in Pakistan's tribal regions, said the Taliban control the country's entire tribal belt and "everyone now is waiting for some action from the federal government."

"The situation is such that (the Taliban) are all around Peshawar. They are on our doorstep," Shah said. "The situation is like water flowing into a field and until you have some obstruction to stop it you will drown. We are drowning."

In a sign of expected resistance, a Taliban-linked group said an offensive in the area would only create more problems.

"If the government thinks there is any issue to address, that should be resolved through talks, not by the use of force," said Munsif Khan, spokesman for the Vice and Virtue Movement. "We are ready for talks with the government." Vice and Virtue, led by militant leader Haji Namdar, is suspected of carrying out operations against coalition soldiers across the border in Afghanistan. Namdar has sought to impose his own strict brand of Islamic law in the region. However, he is at odds with Baitullah Mehsud, who is seen as the leader of the Taliban in Pakistan.

Menghal Bagh's fighters have waged attacks in Peshawar in what provincial officials say was an attempt to intimidate the population and show the group's ability to wield influence outside the tribal regions. Bagh's followers have also been blamed for threatening convoys of supplies bound for coalition forces in Afghanistan. Two weeks ago, a Taliban force from Khyber sent its militants into Peshawar and kidnapped 16 Christians who were later released.

A round-the-clock curfew has been imposed in the Bara area, which starts on the outskirts of Peshawar, and heavy contingents of troops have been deployed, blocking the main road into Khyber, said Mujeeb Khan, a senior local official.

"All bazaars are shut and residents have been asked not to come out of their homes," he said.

Abbas declined to give further details of the military deployment, citing operational security.

Rice calls on North Korea to come clean on uranium

Reuters, Seoul

North Korea did not answer U.S. suspicions of enriching uranium and proliferating technology when it released an inventory of its nuclear plans this week, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Saturday.

On Thursday, secretive North Korea delivered a long-delayed list of its nuclear activities, as it was required to do in a six-way disarmament-for-aid deal. The inventory mostly outlined Pyongyang's program to produce arms-grade plutonium.

"Thus far we don't have the answers we need on either," Rice said in a joint news conference with South Korean Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan.

North Korea has denied U.S. accusations of proliferating technology to the likes of Syria and having a clandestine program to enrich uranium for weapons.

"At end of this, let me just emphasize again, at the end of this we have to have the abandonment of all programs, weapons and materials," Rice said.

She called on the North to live up to its obligations under the deal it reached with China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States.

In a symbolic move to show its commitment to the international nuclear deal, North Korea toppled the cooling tower at its plutonium-producing reactor on Friday.

In its first reaction since submitting the declaration, North Korea later on Friday welcomed U.S. moves to drop it from a terrorism blacklist and called on Washington to halt its hostile policy toward it.

Officials involved in the nuclear talks are hoping to soon convene a new session that will look at verification steps and the scrapping of the North's nuclear weapons program in exchange for massive aid and an end to its status as a global pariah.

Responding to the opening by Pyongyang, the United States moved on Thursday towards taking the North off its list of state sponsors of terrorism and issued a proclamation lifting some sanctions under the Trading with the Enemy Act.

Once it is removed from the list, North Korea, which tested a nuclear device in October 2006, will be able to better tap into international finance.

Japan PM urges all major emitters to tackle climate change

AFP, Tokyo

Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda Saturday urged all major greenhouse gas emitters to tackle climate change as he sought to galvanise efforts ahead of July's G8 summit.

"It is necessary for all major emitters to participate in efforts" to fight climate change, he said, speaking in front of lawmakers from the world's eight most industrialised nations as well as five major emerging economies.

Climate change "is a borderless problem. It will remain unresolved if only some countries participate, even if they do their best," he added at a forum on climate change where former British PM Tony Blair was also present.

Fukuda was speaking ahead of the July 7-9 G8 summit to be held in the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido, where climate change and global warming are expected to be major topics for discussion.

"At the Hokkaido summit I would like to deepen common recognition (with counterparts) over climate change and send out a powerful message that we will work together," he said.

Blair, who works with the non-profit Climate Group, also urged the world's biggest emitters to reach an agreement over a proposal presented during last year's G8 summit in Germany to halve global greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

"If you can't get agreement amongst the major countries you're not going to get an agreement," he said.

"But I think and hope we will this year get agreement on an essential shared vision around 2050. I believe that is possible," Blair added.

The G8 includes Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United States.

Japan has also invited Australia, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, South Korea and South Africa to a parallel summit on climate change on July 9.

Iran Revolutionary Guards chief in new warning to Israel

AFP, Tehran

The chief of Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards has issued a new warning against Israel not to attack it, saying the Jewish state is well within range of its missiles, a newspaper reported on Saturday.

"This country (Israel) is completely within the range of the Islamic republic's missiles. Our missile power and capability are such that the Zionist regime-despite all its abilities-cannot confront it," General Mohammad Ali Jafari told the conservative daily Jam-e Jam.

"There is the possibility that by attacking Iranian nuclear sites the enemy wants to delay our nuclear activities, but any interruption would be very short since Iranian scientific ability is different from that of Syria and Iraq."

His comments came after US media reported that more than 100 Israeli warplanes staged a training exercise with Greece earlier this month to prepare for a possible long-distance strike-a manoeuvre seen as a warning to Tehran.

Iran has defied UN sanctions and international demands by pressing ahead with its disputed uranium enrichment programme, which both Washington and Israel fear would be used to build a nuclear weapon.

The authorities in Tehran deny seeking to manufacture an atomic bomb, and say the country's nuclear ambitions extend only to generating electricity for a growing population.

Israeli Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, a former defence chief, said in an interview published in the Russian press on Wednesday that Iran would be "annihilated" if it tried to attack Israel.

But, he said, "we are not planning any attack against Iran."

Last Sunday Iran's defence minister dismissed reports that Israel had conducted a dry run for air strikes against its nuclear drive as "psychological operations," but warned of a limitless response to an attack.

"Iran will not begin any conflict but will punish any aggressor with force. With determination and using all the options-without limit in time and space-we will give a destructive response to any hostile action," Mostafa Mohammad Najar said.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has repeatedly threatened Israel and played down the Holocaust.

Protest over land for shrine in Kashmir

AFP, Srinagar

Shops, offices and banks shut for the sixth consective day on Saturday in Indian Kashmir as protests over provision of land to a Hindu pilgrim body deepened.

Three Kashmiris have died in police fire this week and nearly 240 have been injured in clashes, evoking memories of widespread anti-India protests that swept the region after a separatist insurgency broke out in 1989.

Daily life has halted in the main city of Srinagar since the protests began on Monday. Protesters have been setting fire to roadside bunkers, destroying government property and hoisting green Islamic flags.

Protests have spread to other parts of Muslim-majority Kashmir valley.

On Friday, tens of thousands of people poured onto the streets of Srinagar in some of the biggest pro-freedom protests in almost two decades.

Police braced for fresh protests on Saturday as scores of youth raised roadblocks by burning tyres and held noisy roadside demonstrations, AFP reporter and photographer said.

"People have every right to register their protest but it should be within the ambit of law," Srinagar police chief Syed Mujtaba told reporters.

The unrest was sparked by a state government decision last week to transfer some land to a Hindu trust for the construction of accommodation for tens of thousands of Hindu pilgrims making an annual pilgrimage to a mountain grotto.

Separatists say it is a ploy to settle Indian Hindus in Kashmir.

Officials dismiss the allegations, arguing that New Delhi has never tried to encourage Hindu migration to the disputed region. The Indian constitution also prohibits outsiders from buying land in Kashmir.

Tensions have remained high despite a promise by the state's chief minister that no construction activity would be permitted until further notice.

Zimbabwe counts votes

Reuters, Harare

Votes were being counted on Saturday in Zimbabwe's single candidate presidential election and state media predicted a landslide victory for President Robert Mugabe despite reports of low turnout in many areas.

The decision to go ahead with the poll after the withdrawal of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai because of violence against his supporters was condemned around the world and the poll was widely dismissed as illegitimate.

The U.N. Security Council unanimously expressed deep regret and said a free and fair vote had been impossible.

First results from Friday's election were expected from 0800 GMT, electoral officials said.

Tsvangirai won the first round on March 29 but pulled out of the run-off and took refuge in the Dutch embassy because of state-backed violence he said had killed almost 90 of his followers. He said millions of people stayed away from polling stations despite systematic intimidation.

Many Western leaders urged the African Union to take action at a summit in Egypt on Monday, saying Mugabe's 28 years in power had to end because the political turmoil and economic meltdown in Zimbabwe threatened regional security.

Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) said it would lobby African leaders at the summit.

"The summit has to take a firm position on the transition we seek. It's now a matter of peace and security. We hope the matter gets the urgent attention it deserves.

We should not wait for rivers of blood and the complete breakdown of order," MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa said. The state-run Herald newspaper said there was a record turnout and the election was peaceful.

"Initial reports from polling stations countrywide indicate that this would be the biggest turnout Zimbabwe has ever had, which is a slap in the face for detractors who claimed this was a 'Mugabe election'," said the paper. It gave no turnout figure.

Chamisa said Mugabe's ZANU-PF planned to continue a violent crackdown to decimate the MDC. "They stole this election, now they are going to spill more blood. Our hope is that regional and international bodies take decisive action to stop this madness," he said.

He added that security forces planned to launch "Operation Red Finger" to track down people who abstained. Voters had their little finger dyed with ink.

Tsvangirai said on Friday: "What is happening today is not an election. It is an exercise in mass intimidation with people all over the country being forced to vote."

The MDC said it extended its parliamentary majority from the first elections in March after Mugabe's information minister, Sikhanyiso Ndlovu, lost his seat in one of three parliamentary elections held at the same time as the presidential run-off.

African and local election monitors said there had been a low turnout on Friday.

A witness in Chitungwiza township, south of Harare, told Reuters voters were forced to hand the serial number of their ballot paper and their identity details to an official from Mugabe's ZANU-PF party so he could see how they voted.

The Zimbabwe Crisis Coalition rights group said village heads had "assisted" teachers to vote in some rural areas after forcing them to declare they were illiterate.

The top permanent official of the African Union said there could be no immediate solution to the problem of Zimbabwe.

"I am convinced it will be solved in a credible way. But please give us time to solve it with our heads of state," AU Commission chairman Jean Ping said at a foreign ministers' meeting ahead of Monday's summit in Sharm el Sheikh.

Some Western diplomats said the Security Council text was far too weak. It was watered down from a much tougher version and was backed by the whole 15-nation council, including South Africa, China and Russia-all of which had been long opposed to any discussion on Zimbabwe.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the United States was working with other U.N. members on a resolution to send "a strong message of deterrence" to Mugabe's government over the violence.

Suspected smugglers kill six Afghan mine guards

AFP, Kabul

Six security guards were killed and three injured when gunmen attacked their posts near a mine in the eastern Afghan province of Khost, a local official said Saturday.

The guards were from a private Afghan security company and were hired by the government to secure a chromate mine in the province's Spera district, provincial spokesman Khaibar Pashtun said.

"Six guards were killed and three others were injured" late on Friday, Pashtun said. "We believe the killers were chromate smugglers."

Afghanistan has rich deposits of minerals including precious stones, which in most areas are explored illegally.

Pashtun said that smugglers used to explore chromate from the district before a government ban in recent years.

Guatemala minister and deputy die in chopper crash

Agency

Guatemala's Interior Minister Vinicio Gomez and deputy minister Edgar Hernandez were among four people killed in a helicopter crash, a presidential spokesperson said.

"We have confirmation the deceased in the accident were minister Gomez and deputy minister Hernandez, another yet unidentified person and the helicopter pilot," the spokesperson told AFP.

The helicopter was traveling to northern Peten department on Friday for a regional security meeting when it crashed at Purulha, in Alta Verapaz department, the official said.

A local fire service spokesman said the helicopter lost contact with air traffic control at around 1:58 pm (1958 GMT).

The cause of the crash was under investigation, he added.

© 2008 AFP

This story is sourced direct from an overseas news agency as an additional service to readers. Spelling follows North American usage, along with foreign currency and measurement units.

Seven killed in Sudan cargo plane crash

AFP, Khartoum

A cargo plane crashed mid-flight in Sudan on Friday, killing seven crew members, including five foreigners, in the third fatal aviation accident to blight the African country in the past two months.

Civil Aviation Authority spokesman Abdel Hafiz told AFP that the Juba Cargo company plane crashed an hour and 10 minutes after take off from Khartoum, bound for the southern Sudanese capital Juba, apparently owing to bad weather.

"One person survived out of eight (crew members). His name is Mohamed Hamza, a Sudanese. Two Sudanese were among the dead (along with) four from Ukraine and one from Armenia," Hafiz said. The plane took off at 5:55 am (0255 GMT) and came down north of Malakal, the capital of Upper Nile State. "A thunderstorm hit the plane, as the survivor said, one of the crew. This apparently is the cause. The survivor is not injured but was taken to hospital (for a check-up)," Hafiz told AFP. The dead were evacuated and flown back to a Khartoum hospital morgue where police told bereaved relatives that they could not claim the bodies until Saturday, said an AFP photographer. The Sudan Media Centre (SMC) website, which is considered close to the intelligence services, said the Antonov 12 had only recently returned to Sudan after undergoing major maintenance in the United Arab Emirates.

It confirmed that one Armenian, four Ukranians, the Sudanese pilot and another Sudanese were killed, and quoted the survivor-an air operations officer-as saying that the plane was hit twice by lightning.

An hour and 10 minutes after take off, the pilot contacted the control tower of Khartoum airport and requested permission to fly at a lower altitude because of poor weather conditions, but then suddenly communication was lost, SMC said.

The website quoted Major General Abdubaker Jafar, general manager of the Civil Aviation Authority, as praising the authorities for accessing the wreckage by mobilising three helicopters operated by companies in the region.

Sudan has a poor aviation record and the crash was the third fatal aviation accident in Africa's biggest country since May.

On June 10, a Sudan Airways A310 carrying 214 people burst into flames after landing at Khartoum international airport, killing at least 30 people.

Airport authorities said an engine caught fire, spreading to the fuselage, while survivors said weather conditions at the time of the landing were poor, owing to a sandstorm followed by heavy showers.

This week Sudan Airways was granted a one-month reprieve from the Civil Aviation Authority over its flight worthiness after an initial announcement that it had been grounded for not meeting international standards.

In May, south Sudan's defence minister was killed in a plane crash along with at least 22 other people, most of them senior members of the southern former rebel leadership.

In July 2003, 115 people were killed when a Sudan Airways Boeing 737 was destroyed in a ball of fire as it attempted to land at Port Sudan after apparently suffering an engine problem soon after takeoff.

After that crash, the Khartoum government said the Sudanese air fleet was growing old as it was unable to buy spare parts for its US-made aircraft due to economic sanctions imposed by Washington.

Washington, which has placed Khartoum on a blacklist of countries supporting terrorism, says the sanctions do not prevent the delivery of spare parts for aircraft if they are requested.