The New Nation - Internet Edition

US troops to leave Iraq by 2011

Reuters, Baghdad

Washington and Baghdad have reached a final agreement after months of talks on a pact that would require U.S. forces to withdraw from Iraq by 2011, U.S. and Iraqi officials said on Wednesday.

The bilateral pact replaces a U.N. Security Council resolution enacted after the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 and will give Iraq's elected government authority over the U.S. troop presence for the first time.

Iraq said it had secured the right to prosecute U.S. soldiers for serious crimes under certain circumstances, an issue both sides had long said was holding up the pact.

The agreement was submitted to Iraqi political leaders for approval, a first step toward ratifying it in the Iraqi parliament, Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said.

In public, U.S. officials were subdued. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said: "Nothing is done until everything is done. Everything isn't done. The Iraqis are still talking among themselves. We are still talking to the Iraqis."

But a senior U.S. official in Washington, who asked not to be named, confirmed that the final draft had been agreed by both sides and would require U.S. troops to leave by the end of 2011, unless Iraq asks them to stay longer.

The administration of U.S. President George W. Bush has long resisted committing to timetables for withdrawing from Iraq.

Dabbagh said the agreement envisions U.S. forces withdrawing from Iraqi towns and villages by the middle of next year, and withdrawing completely from the country within three years. For them to stay longer, a new pact would need to be agreed.

"The withdrawal is to be achieved in three years. In 2011, the government at that time will determine whether it needs a new pact or not, and what type of pact will depend on the challenges it faces," he told Reuters.

Either side can withdraw from the pact with a year's notice.

The inclusion of a 2011 deadline could have political ramifications in the United States, weeks before a presidential election. Democrat Barack Obama wants to withdraw combat troops by mid-2010, while Republican John McCain opposes deadlines.

On the immunity of U.S. forces, Dabbagh said: "Inside their bases, they will be under American law. Iraqi judicial law will be implemented in case these forces commit a serious and deliberate felony outside their military bases and when off duty."

A U.S.-Iraqi committee would determine which cases fit the description, he said.

The senior U.S. official confirmed a compromise had been reached on the immunity issue but gave no further details.

A senior Iraqi government source who asked not to be named called the immunity compromise a victory: "What has been given to the Iraqi side in this deal has never been given to another country. That is what makes this deal special," he said.

Immunity is politically sensitive in Iraq after a number of cases in which Iraqis say the U.S. military dealt too leniently with troops accused of killing or abusing Iraqi civilians.

The United States has similar "status of forces" agreements with more than 100 other countries. It allows NATO allies to prosecute U.S. soldiers for crimes unrelated to their military duties, but usually maintains greater protections elsewhere.

Among other affects of the end of the U.N. mandate, the U.S. military will no longer be able to hold prisoners without charging them with crimes under Iraqi law. U.S. forces now hold 18,000 prisoners, few of whom have been charged.

The pact's fate in the Iraqi political arena is still far from certain. It must be approved by a council of Iraqi political leaders, the cabinet and the parliament.

Most major political groups say they accept the idea of a U.S. presence as long as it is temporary. An exception are followers of anti-American Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

"As long as there is one American soldier on our land, we will not accept any pact and we will not vote for any agreement," said Ahmed al-Masoudi, a Sadrist lawmaker.

The pact will not require approval by the U.S. Congress.

China vows to help cash-strapped Pakistan

AFP, Beijing

China vowed Thursday to do what it could to help cash-strapped Pakistan avert financial disaster as Islamabad's leader continued an official visit aimed at rustling up crucial Chinese investments.

The promise came ahead of a meeting in Beijing between Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and Pakistani president Asif Ali Zardari, who is on his first official visit abroad after being elected in September. "As a long friend of Pakistan, China understands it is facing some financial difficulties," foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters.

"We're ready to support and help Pakistan within our capability." Zardari met his Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao on Wednesday in a meeting in which the two sides pledged to strengthen decades-old ties and signed 11 bilateral agreements, one on unspecified economic co-operation. The Financial Times newspaper has reported, without citing sources, that Zardari would seek a soft loan of between 500 million and 1.5 billion dollars from China to help Pakistan avoid looming bankruptcy.

However, Qin offered no specifics on the form that Beijing's financial help would take.

Pakistan's ambassador to China, Masood Khan, said earlier this week in an interview with Pakistan television station Geo an agreement on a civilian nuclear pact with China could be reached during the trip. But Qin declined to give any details on the agreements made so far. "I'm not aware of the specifics of the deals signed," he said.

China's foreign ministry had earlier confirmed the nuclear issue would be discussed but gave no specifics. Zardari inherited nearly empty government coffers and huge security problems from Islamic extremists. The global financial crisis has pushed Pakistan closer to the brink and reports, denied by Islamabad, have said the country faced bankruptcy as soon as February.

If a nuclear agreement were signed, it would come after the United States last week agreed with India, Pakistan's rival, to allow sales of civilian nuclear technology to New Delhi for the first time in three decades.

China has long been one of Pakistan's closest regional partners, with Beijing looking to Islamabad as a counterbalance to India.

North Korea threatens to freeze ties with South

AP, Seoul

North Korea threatened Thursday to cut all ties with South Korea, saying the new conservative government is a U.S. toady engaged in reckless confrontation with its neighbor.

North Korea has been unhappy with South Korea's new President Lee Myung-bak, who took office in February with a pledge to get tough on the rival state. By contrast, Lee's two liberal predecessors had aggressively sought reconciliation by providing massive aid to the impoverished nation.

The North's warning, issued in a commentary carried in the North's main Rodong Sinmun newspaper, said if the South "keeps to the road of reckless confrontation with the (North), defaming its dignity despite its repeated warnings, this will compel it to make a crucial decision including the total freeze of the North-South relations."

That means Pyongyang could terminate civilian exchanges with the South, including a tourism program and a joint factory park.

North Korea already has suspended all government-level dialogue and exchanges, though the sides met as part of broader international negotiations on Pyongyang's nuclear programs. It has also rejected a food aid proposal and dialogue offers from the South, saying those offers lacked sincerity.

The North made a similar threat during military talks with the South earlier this month, saying it would expel South Koreans from the tourism and industrial projects if propaganda leaflets critical of Pyongyang keep arriving over the border.

South Korea played down the threat.

"It does not mean the North will take steps immediately," said Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Ho-nyeon. "We will monitor the situation regarding this, and there is no change in the government's intention to improve South-North relations through dialogue."

North Korea has branded the South's president a "traitor," "pro-American sycophant" and "despicable human scum."

"The Lee group is becoming more frantic in its racket of confrontation with the (North) in league with outside forces," Thursday's commentary said, calling Lee "so hell-bent on sycophancy towards the U.S. and confrontation with fellow countrymen."

The warning came days after North Korea resumed a stalled nuclear disarmament process after the United States removed it from a terrorism blacklist, and amid lingering questions about the health of the North's leader Kim Jong Il.

"The North is putting strong pressure on our government as its relations with the United States are improving and its negotiating power is gaining strength," said Hong Hyun-ik, an expert at the security think tank Sejong Institute. "It's a sort of brinksmanship strategy."

Suicide attack kills 4 at Pakistani police station

AP, Islamabad

A suicide car bomber attacked a police station in northwest Pakistan on Thursday, killing four security officers - the latest in a series of blasts that are eroding confidence in the nuclear-armed country.

The attacker struck in the picturesque mountain valley of Swat, one of several regions where government forces have been struggling to defeat well-organized Taliban militants.

Police said insurgents opened fire on their station in Mingora, Swat's main town, after midnight with guns and at least two rockets before the man drove an explosives-laden vehicle into police compound.

District police chief Dilawar Bangash said one officer and three paramilitary troops died and another 26 people were injured, many of them seriously. The police station and several shops were badly damaged, he said. Security forces backed by tanks and warplanes have been battling militants in Swat for more than a year. They opened a second major front in the nearby tribal region of Bajur in August.

U.S. officials, who blame militants based in Pakistan for the escalating insurgency in neighboring Afghanistan, have applauded the crackdown and called for its expansion to more areas of the lawless frontier zone.

However, there are doubts about whether Pakistani security forces can defeat the militants without inflicting heavy civilian casualties and eroding support for the country's pro-Western government.

Officials and analysts suspect that al-Qaida is regrouping in the border zone and may again be plotting terror attacks in the West. The area is seen as a possible hiding place for Osama bin Laden.

Police said Wednesday that Pakistani intelligence agents had re-arrested an American detained and then released after he tried to enter Pakistan's tribal areas close to the Afghan border earlier in the week.

U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said American officials have visited and spoken with the man, identified by police as Jude Kenan, and were trying to assist him.

Russia-Georgia talks suspended until Nov

Reuters, Geneva

Talks to ease the conflict over Georgia's Moscow-backed breakaway regions were suspended until next month on Wednesday after diplomats failed to get Russia and Georgia to agree on who was allowed to take part.

The sticking point was whether representatives from South Ossetia and Abkhazia should be allowed to participate and how.

Russia and Georgia fought a five-day war in August and remain at odds over the two breakaway Georgian provinces that Moscow recognizes as independent states under its protection.

"The Russians and the Georgians were not in a formal meeting at the same time, they weren't in the same room at the same time," U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Daniel Fried told a briefing. The United States, which sees Georgia as an ally in the volatile Caucasus region, also took part in the talks.

Pierre Morel, the EU special envoy for Georgia, said new talks had been provisionally set for November 18 in Geneva.

The European Union, United Nations and Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) had organized the one-day meeting, which they had hoped would lead to talks every two weeks to build confidence and help resolve the conflict.

The talks were due to deal with compliance with the ceasefire, security issues, the return of internal refugees and human rights, a U.S. statement said. Russian and Georgian officials said they were willing to return for another attempt at discussions, but it is clear the organizers have their work cut out to get them to sit down and talk to each other.

"There are always difficulties when you start such a process," Morel told a separate briefing.

Feverish diplomatic efforts to find an acceptable format for the talks included a news blackout and a ban on photographers from taking pictures of the delegations as they entered the U.N. European headquarters in Geneva.

Heavy fighting kills 49 rebels in Sri Lanka

AP, Colombo

Government forces pounded rebel defenses with airstrikes and ground assaults as heavy fighting across northern Sri Lanka killed 49 Tamil Tiger fighters and seven soldiers, the military said Wednesday.

The new fighting came as soldiers closed in on the rebels' administrative capital of Kilinochchi in a campaign aimed at routing the guerrillas and ending a 25-year-old war that has killed more than 70,000 people.

Out of the newly reported battles, the worst took place Tuesday in Kilinochchi where 39 rebels and six soldiers died, military spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara said.

The army has said its forces are about 1 mile from the outskirts of Kilinochchi.

Scattered battles in Vavuniya, Mannar and Mullaitivu killed 10 rebels and a soldier Tuesday, Nanayakkara said.

On Wednesday, air force jets bombed a group of rebels who were building an earthen embankment as a defense against advancing government forces in Mullaitivu, said air force spokesman Wing Commander Janaka Nanayakkara.

He said the attacks were successful, but details of damage and casualties were not immediately available. With nearly all communications to the north severed, a rebel spokesman could not be contacted for comment.

Independent verification of the military's claims is nearly impossible because most journalists are banned from the war zone. Both sides routinely exaggerate enemy losses and underreport their own.

Fighting has escalated in recent months, with the military capturing a series of rebel bases and large chunks of territory. Officials have pledged to crush the guerrillas by the end of the year.

The rebels have been fighting since 1983 to create an independent homeland for the country's ethnic minority Tamils, who have faced marginalization by successive governments controlled by ethnic Sinhalese.

Thailand-Cambodia agree to stop fighting

AP, Preah Vihear

A Cambodian army official says Thai and Cambodian military commanders have agreed to stop fighting a day after a deadly gunbattle between troops at a disputed border.

The two sides held talks in Thailand's Sisaket province across the border from Cambodia a day after a clash between Thai and Cambodian troops that killed at least two Cambodian soldiers and wounded 10 from both sides. The commander, Maj. Gen. Srey Doek, declined to give details of the talks. He said the two sides planned to continue negotiations, indicating that matters still needed to be resolved in a decades-long border dispute.

Wednesday's clash was the first deadly fighting since tension flared four months ago in a long-standing dispute over land near the 11th century Preah Vihear temple.

They began talks around 11:00 am (0400 GMT) in Thailand to discuss troop levels and weaponry, as both governments said they were seeking to calm the situation and mend relations.

Gunfights broke out Wednesday in a number of small plots of disputed land near the 11th century Preah Vihear temple, a UN World Heritage site on Cambodian territory and the focus of months of tensions.

"My government still sticks to negotiation, although the clash was not serious," Thai Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat told reporters. Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Namhong said the situation along the border had eased since Wednesday and that diplomats from both countries met in Bangkok shortly after fighting erupted.

"The Thai ministry of foreign affairs asked the Cambodian embassy in Thailand for a meeting and there was a good conversation," Hor Namhong said.

Two Cambodian soldiers were killed in Wednesday's clashes and several from each side were wounded. Thailand's foreign ministry said Thursday seven of its soldiers were hurt.

A third Cambodian soldier who had already been ill died early Thursday of smoke inhalation from repeatedly firing his rocket-launcher, said Cambodian Major Meas Yeoun.

The United States and United Nations have called for restraint and Lieutenant General Surapol Puanaiyaka, of Thailand's top security body the National Security Council, said there was little danger of outright war.

"I am confident that the situation will not blow out of hand or escalate into full-scale warfare," he said.

The situation on the border appeared calmer Thursday as soldiers smiled and exchanged cordial words, an AFP correspondent there said, but civilians have fled the area and Thai expatriates and tourists are leaving Cambodia.

Some 432 Thais who were in Cambodia when the border fighting broke out returned to Thailand after the Bangkok government appealed for anyone not on urgent business to leave, an official said.

"We have convinced them to return on a Thai Airways flight," said foreign ministry spokesman Tharit Charungvat.

Cambodian riot police were deployed Wednesday in front of the Thai embassy in Phnom Penh, which was set on fire by anti-Thai rioters in 2003.

Cambodian interior ministry spokesman Khieu Sopheak said undercover police were monitoring Thai businesses to ensure their safety.

"We're protecting all Thai businessmen and citizens in Cambodia in case our people get furious and do something wrong that would not benefit either side," Khieu Sopheak told AFP.

Cambodian and Thai officials have disputed who started Wednesday's clashes.

The Cambodian army has said it is holding 13 Thai soldiers after they surrendered in a disputed area during fighting but Thai military and foreign ministry officials denied any of their troops had been captured.

The stand-off first flared in July after Preah Vihear was awarded World Heritage status by the UN cultural body UNESCO, angering some Thai nationalists who claim ownership of the site.

US missile attack kills one in Pakistan

Reuters, Dera Ismail Khan

A suspected U.S. drone fired at least one missile on Thursday into a Pakistani region on the Afghan border regarded as a militant haven, Pakistani intelligence agency officials said.

The missile hit a house in the village of Sam in South Waziristan, in an area known as a stronghold of Baitullah Mehsud, head of Pakistani Taliban militants.

"There may be casualties, we are checking," said an intelligence official, who declined to be identified.

U.S. officials say al Qaeda and Pakistani Taliban militants operate out of safe havens in northwest Pakistan, training for an intensifying insurgency in Afghanistan that has helped make that country deadlier now than Iraq for U.S. troops.

U.S. impatience has been growing over what Washington sees as Pakistan's failure to eliminate the militant threat in the sanctuaries in the remote ethnic Pashtun regions.

U.S.-operated pilotless drones have stepped up strikes in Pakistan since the beginning of September, firing missiles at suspected militants 11 times and killing dozens of people, most of them militants, Pakistani security officials have said.

Another intelligence official said two missiles were fired on Thursday.

"Drones are still flying in the area. No one is going close as they fear more missiles could be fired," the second official said.

A resident of Sam said by telephone two big explosions had shaken the village.

The first intelligence official said militants had cordoned off the area and were not letting anyone approach.

British soldier killed in Afghanistan

AFP, London

A British soldier who died in an explosion while serving with NATO-led troops in Afghanistan is expected to be named on Thursday.

The soldier, from D Squadron Household Cavalry Regiment, was killed while on routine patrol about 23 kilometres (14 miles) north of Forward Operating Base Delhi in Helmand province, in the south of the country on Wednesday.

He was the 121st British fatality in Afghanistan since the US-led invasion in 2001, the ministry said.

"We are deeply saddened by this loss and our thoughts are with his family and his Unit at this tragic time," said forces spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Woody Page, adding that the soldier's next of kin had been informed.

Helmand, the main source of Afghanistan's opium output, is in the grip of a Taliban-insurgency launched after it was toppled from government in a US-led invasion in late 2001.

Britain has 7,800 troops in Afghanistan as part of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and US-led operations.

Israelis kill 2 Palestinians

AP, Jerusalem

Israeli and Palestinian officials say troops shot and killed a Palestinian as he was preparing to throw a Molotov cocktail at Israeli soldiers in the West Bank village of Kufr Malik.

The Israeli military says he was one of three men an army patrol spotted carrying firebombs. The military says the man ignored warning fire before he was shot. The other two escaped.

Palestinian medics say the dead man's name was Aziz Yousef, 20, and that his body was handed over by Israeli officials before dawn on Thursday.

During the night, another alleged firebomber died in a Ramallah hospital after being shot Wednesday during what the military says was a mob attack on an army position in the nearby Jelazoun refugee camp. Hospital staff named him as Mohammed Ramahi, 21.

International effort in Afghanistan falling short: Gates

AFP, Washington

The international effort in Afghanistan is falling short, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned Wednesday, stressing the need for a better integrated approach to stabilizing the country.

"These efforts today, however well-intentioned and even heroic, add up to less than the sum of the parts," said Gates in a speech prepared for delivery to the US Institute for Peace.

His remarks came amid growing US fears that an upsurge of insurgent violence and corruption in Afghanistan is threatening the viability of an already weak central government. "To be successful, the entirety of the NATO alliance, the European Union, NGOs, and other groups-the full panoply of military and civilian elements-must better integrate and coordinate with one another and also with the Afghan government," he said. "Afghanistan is the test, on the grandest scale, of what we are trying to achieve when it comes to integrating the military and civilian, the public and private, the national and international."

But Gates complained that allied nations were unable to provide "the quantity and types of forces needed for this kind of fighting."

NATO forces, meanwhile, are hamstrung by caveats that nations have placed on the use of the military forces that they have provided, he said.

"An enduring requirement is the ability to rapidly train, equip, and advise Afghan security forces, as we are doing to improve the size and quality of Afghanistan's army and police," he said.

"Until recently, this capacity did not exist within most Western governments or militaries outside their Special Forces."

Gates called for a concerted development strategy that persuades and inspires the public to counter Taliban influence through intimidation.

"As one USAID contractor who worked in Afghanistan put it, we need to show the citizenry that we are 'fully committed to making a difference, rather than working disconnectedly on "one-off" projects'."

Gates' speech was the latest in a series advocating a more intelligent use of non-military instruments of power to deal with instability in poor and failing states.

Tamil MPs' quit threats a 'farce’, says Jayalalithaa

Reuters, Chennai

The leader of the opposition in Tamil Nadu said threats by lawmakers to bring down the central government unless India stopped an escalating war in Sri Lanka were farcical.

"It's a farce t to call for a ceasefire, as India cannot stop a civil war in another country," J. Jayalalithaa said in a statement late on Wednesday that reflected a common view that the threat would not be carried out. M. Karunanidhi, chief minister of Tamil Nadu and leader of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam party (DMK), a key national ally of the ruling Congress party, said this week around 39 lawmakers would quit in two weeks unless India intervened in Sri Lanka. His comments echoed increasing concern from the government's southern allies in Tamil Nadu, where the mainly Tamil population takes the view that Sri Lankan government troops are wiping out Tamils on the island. The lawmakers' resignation could force a vote of confidence in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government, but with an election due by May 2009, analysts said the threat may be more about making political noise for their local constituencies.

"There will be a lot of pressure put on the government but the members of parliament are unlikely to resign and I don't see the government falling over the issue," C. Uday Bhaskar, a strategic analyst said.

Under pressure from his allies, Singh already said this week that India was concerned at the rising hostilities in Sri Lanka and called for a negotiated political settlement. More of the same may be enough to appease the lawmakers.

"The government will tide over this crisis and we could see more strong statements from the government on the conflict in Sri Lanka," Bhaskar said.

Sri Lankan troops stepped up their offensive against Tamil Tiger rebels fighting for a separate homeland this year and the government says its forces have killed thousands of the rebels since January.

India sent peacekeepers to the Island nation in 1987, only to withdraw them after losing more than 1,000 men in battle and facing allegations of human rights violations. India has since said it does not want to get involved in Sri Lankan politics.

The Tigers have waged war since 1983 to create a homeland for Sri Lanka's minority Tamil people, and in doing so landed on U.S., E.U. and Indian terrorism lists for widespread bombings and assassinations of rivals, including Tamils.

In 1991, they were charged with killing India's former Prime Minister and Congress party leader Rajiv Gandhi.

Mugabe could back down on key cabinet posts

Reuters, Harare

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe could back down on the allocation of key ministries to his ruling ZANU-PF party to save a power-sharing deal with the opposition, state media reported Thursday.

"There could be some changes to the list (of ministry allocations) gazetted last week as the parties find each other and make compromises for the sake of progress," the state-run Herald newspaper quoted a ZANU-PF official saying.

Azerbaijan’s president re-elected by landslide

AP, Baku

The president of oil-rich Azerbaijan has been re-elected to a second five-year term by landslide, according to early official returns released Thursday. With 70 percent of precincts counted, Ilham Aliyev won 89.04 percent of Wednesday's vote, Central Election Commission chief Mazahir Panahov said.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which sent more than 400 election observers, has criticized the government for election campaign irregularities, including a ban on public opposition meetings and apparent efforts to coerce students and government workers into attending pro-Aliyev rallies. Aliyev, who has led oil-rich Caspian nation since 2003 succeeding his late father, faced six opponents in Wednesday's vote, none of whom was considered a true challenge. Aliyev's rivals rushed to congratulate him on the victory after the early returns were announced. "These elections have opened a new stage in the country's development and open a new chapter in relations between the government and the opposition," said one of them, Iqbal Aga-Zade. The top five opposition parties all boycotted the ballot, claiming official fraud and pointing at a history of closing independent media and imprisoning opposition figures.

But despite the lack of suspense, the mood in the capital was buoyant, in marked contrast to the violence that marred the aftermath of the 2003 presidential elections.

Hundreds of the president's jubilant supporters streamed into the streets shortly after polls closed at 7 p.m. local time Wednesday and celebrated his victory late into the night. Caravans of cars flying Azeri flags and bearing portraits of the president clogged traffic near the boardwalk along the Caspian Sea.

Ancient history gets in the way of Beirut's modern towers

AFP, Beirut

Ancient history is getting in the way of construction in Beirut's building boom as new archaeological discoveries delay the springing up of long-planned high rises.

And the delays can be long, frustrating and expensive.

Construction on a luxury 23-storey residential building in the heart of the Lebanese capital, for example, has been stalled for 15 months after excavators stumbled on a 2,000-year-old Roman bath house.

"Imagine a developer waiting a year and three months without any progress being made on his building," says Samir Bey of Saifi Crown real estate development company that owns the 1,144 square metre (12,313 square foot) plot of land. This latest discovery of the ancient bath house is considered "a peripheral archaeological site for Beirut. It is not a landmark," says archaeologist Asaad Seif of the Directorate General of Antiquities (DGA).

The price of expropriating the site, located next door to a trendy Beirut restaurant, was too high and the action deemed unnecessary, he told AFP.

Instead, archaeologists and architects came together to devise a plan which would allow the preservation of the artifacts and at the same time permit the tower construction to proceed.

Under the plan, the three-roomed bath house is being taken apart piece by piece and will then later be rebuilt in its original form on the ground floor of the tower when it goes up.

"We are preserving it, but we are preserving it in a different way," says Seif.