The New Nation - Internet Edition

Left-wing parties storm out of Indian coalition

AFP, New Delhi

A bloc of Indian left-wing and communist parties announced Tuesday they were pulling out of the country's coalition government in protest against a nuclear energy deal with the United States.

The decision, however, is not expected to cause the collapse of the Congress-led government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who last week managed to secure the support of a regional party.

Top Marxist leader Prakash Karat told reporters that the "time has come" for the political left to bail out of the coalition in the wake of Singh's decision to push ahead with implementing the controversial nuclear energy deal.

"We have decided to ask the president for an appointment so that we can formally withdraw support tomorrow," Karat said.

Singh and US President George W. Bush in 2005 unveiled the agreement to share civilian nuclear technology-a deal that when finalised would see India entering the fold of global nuclear commerce after being shut out for decades.

Singh argues the pact is crucial for India's energy security.

But the four-member bloc of left-wing parties, who have 59 seats in the 545-member parliament, insist the deal would bind India too closely to the United States, and have threatened repeatedly to force early elections if it moves forward.

They say the deal runs counter to India's status as a figurehead in the non-aligned movement.

They also believe that allowing UN inspections of the country's civil nuclear programme-as demanded by the Americans-would harm India's strategic weapons programme.

The White House warned Tuesday that time was running short to ratify a landmark US-India civilian nuclear agreement during Bush's term, which ends in January.

Speaking on the eve of Bush's talks at this mountain resort with Singh, spokeswoman Dana Perino said the US Congress had a heavy workload and "a limited number of legislative days."

Perino brushed aside a question about whether Singh was expected to announce that he is ready to move ahead with the agreement, saying it was "premature to say" before the leaders met on the margins of a rich nation summit.

"But obviously we've maintained a strong commitment to carrying through on our side of the deal, and obviously India has had a lot of discussion among its political parties," she told reporters.

"It's been a long road, and there's been a healthy debate," Perino said.

"We'll have to see what he's able to bring on the India civil nuclear agreement," she said. "It could be that he's ready to move forward-but it also could just as likely be that they have a little bit more work to do."

"But we obviously recognise as well that we have a limited number of legislative days for our congress to get a lot of work done," said the spokeswoman.

Iran to retaliate if US attacks N-sites

AFP, Tehran

Iran would attack Israel and the US navy in the Gulf as its first response to any American attack over its nuclear programme, an aide to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Tuesday.

"The first US shot on Iran would set the United States' vital interests in the world on fire," said Ali Shirazi, a mid-ranking cleric who is Khamenei's representative to the naval forces of the elite Revolutionary Guards.

"Tel Aviv and the US fleet in the Persian Gulf would be the targets that would be set on fire in Iran's crushing response," he said, according to the Fars news agency.

The United States and its top regional ally Israel have never ruled out attacking Iran over its nuclear drive, which the West fears could be aimed at making nuclear weapons.

It emerged last month that Israel had carried out manoeuvres in Greece that were effectively practice runs for a potential strike against Iranian nuclear facilities.

Shirazi said "the Zionist regime is pressuring the White House leaders to plan a military assault on Iran" and Iran would react "if they commit such a stupidity."

It was not clear if he was referring to Tel Aviv as a city or shorthand for the Jewish state as a whole, which the Islamic republic does not recognise.

Russia, US at odds over NATO, missile shield

AP, Rusutsu

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Tuesday that his meeting with President Bush at a summit of the Group of Eight industrial powers resulted in no progress toward bridging deep disagreements between the former Cold War foes.

While some of the countries' interests coincide, "there is no particular progress" on the differences, Medvedev said. "We continue to exchange opinions."

Deeply wary of creeping Western clout in former Soviet republics and satellite states, Russia adamantly opposes the Bush administration's plans to deploy missile defense installations in Central Europe and its backing for pushes by Georgia and Ukraine to join NATO.

Medvedev said Russia wants good relations with Bush's successor in the White House, and that he and Bush agreed the U.S. election campaign should not disrupt their contacts.

Medvedev met with Bush on Monday on the sidelines of a G-8 summit that was the new Russian president's first and the outgoing U.S. leader's last.

Medvedev has pledged continuity in Russia's foreign policy but has tended to assert Moscow's position in less confrontational language than Putin.

At 100 days, Pak government in disarray

AP, Islamabad

What a difference 100 days make. Pakistan's new coalition government came to power after February's elections on a wave of public sympathy and hope. The two main parties pledged to work together on a range of issues, including the quick restoration judges fired by common rival President Pervez Musharraf.

But some 100 days after formally taking charge, the coalition is in disarray. The second-largest party left the Cabinet amid disputes over the judges and the fate of Musharraf, the former army chief who had dominated Pakistani politics since seizing the reins in a 1999 military coup.

Multiple power centers have emerged since the new civilian administration took over, making it unclear who is in charge. Critics worry the wrangling is distracting political leaders from tackling the sinking economy and relentless militancy in the South Asian nation of 160 million.

"The kind of coherence and focus and directness that we were expecting would emerge with a common sentiment for the restoration of democracy has not really come about," political analyst Rasul Bakhsh Rais said.

Upon becoming prime minister in March, Yousuf Raza Gilani laid out a series of broad goals for the first 100 days. Tackling terrorism was the top priority.

Israel signs prisoner swap deal with Hezbollah

AFP, Jerusalem

Israel signed an undertaking in front of UN officials on Monday to go ahead with a proposed prisoner swap with Shiite militant group Hezbollah, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's spokesman said.

"The Israeli pointman Ofer Dekel signed in the presence of the UN officials the arrangement proposed by the UN," spokesman Mark Regev said. Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah said last Wednesday that the proposed exchange would take place within two weeks.The Israeli cabinet approved the deal last month under which it is to release five Lebanese prisoners, the remains of Hezbollah fighters and an undetermined number of Palestinians in exchange for the bodies of soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev.

The pair were captured, badly wounded, by Hezbollah in a cross-border raid on July 12, 2006 that sparked a devastating 34-day war in Lebanon that killed more than 1,200 people in Lebanon, mostly civilians, and 160 Israelis, mostly soldiers.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told his cabinet the two soldiers were dead.

But Nasrallah said that "so far Hezbollah has not handed over any information about the fate of the two soldiers. Anything said in Israel is mere speculation.

England church backs women bishops, risks division

AP, London

The Church of England's ruling body voted its support Monday for women to become bishops, a move that risks further division because it lacked accommodation for traditionalists opposed to the idea.

The decision after hours of debate among leaders of the British church came even as the Anglican church worldwide wrestles with the more contentious issues of a gay clergy and the blessing of same-sex marriages.

One bishop broke down in tears at the meeting of senior British church leaders in York, in northern England, as he described his distress at the church's lack of willingness to accommodate the traditionalists.

"I feel ashamed," said the Right Rev. Stephen Venner, Bishop of Dover, who is in favor of women bishops. "We have talked for hours about wanting to give an honorable place to those who disagree. We have been given opportunities for both views to flourish. We have turned down every, almost realistic opportunity for those who are opposed, to flourish."

More than a dozen other Anglican churches around the world have authorized women to serve as bishops. The Episcopal church, the Anglican body in the U.S., is led by a woman, the Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori.

Iraq demands pullout timetable in US defence pact talks

AFP, Baghdad

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said on Monday he is negotiating a deal with Washington that will for the first time set a timetable for a withdrawal of foreign forces as part of a framework for a US troop presence into next year.

The White House, however, said no "hard date" for the withdrawal of US forces was contemplated and US officials suggested that any timetable would be dependent on conditions on the ground.

Nevertheless, it was the first time that Baghdad's Shiite-led government has made a timetable for a US pullout a condition for a promised new agreement with the United States for a troop presence into 2009.

"The direction we are taking is to have a memorandum of understanding either for the departure of the forces or to have a timetable for their withdrawal," a statement from Maliki's office quoted him as telling Arab ambassadors to the United Arab Emirates."The negotiations are still continuing with the American side, but in any case the basis for the agreement will be respect for the sovereignty of Iraq," he added.

US President George W. Bush has repeatedly refused to set a timetable for a US withdrawal, and administration officials linked any change to conditions on the ground.

"It is important to understand that these are not talks on a hard date for a withdrawal," said White House spokesman Scott Stanzell.

Iran stages war games, rejects nuclear demand

AFP, Tehran

Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards have embarked on a new round of war games to sharpen their combat readiness, amid continued tensions over the Iranian nuclear drive, the Fars news agency reported.

"The Great Prophet Manoeuvres III are being held by the missile divisions of the Revolutionary Guards air force and its naval vessels," the agency reported late on Monday. The aim of the war games is "improving the combat capability of the missile and naval units," it added. The Revolutionary Guards are Iran's ideological army who have their own ground forces, navy and air forces which operate in parallel to the regular armed forces.

The Guards are also responsible for Iran's most significant ballistic missiles including the Shahab-3 longer range missile, whose range has Israel and US bases in the Gulf within reach.

Assad wants French role in Syria-Israel talks

AFP, Paris

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, expected in Paris this weekend, has welcomed a "break" in France's policy toward Damascus and invited Paris to play a role in possible direct negotiations with Israel.

In an interview published in French newspaper Le Figaro Tuesday, Assad said: "We are witnessing a break between the current policy of France and the policy of the past.

"This new policy is more realistic and better suited to the interests of both our countries. It is a solid basis to renew healthy relations."

French President Nicolas Sarkozy invited Assad along with some 40 foreign leaders for the launch Sunday of a new Union for the Mediterranean, aimed at boosting cooperation between European Union and southern Mediterranean states.