Afghan civilian deaths alarm UN
- Details
- Written by Alix Kroeger, BBC News, Kabul Alix Kroeger, BBC News, Kabul
- Published: 20 November 2007 20 November 2007
- Hits: 7235 7235
Speaking at the end of a six-day visit to the country, Louise Arbour said the casualties were eroding public trust.
She also called for greater safeguards in the way Nato-led forces transferred their detainees into Afghan custody.
Earlier, Oxfam said half of the 1,200 civilian deaths this year were caused by international and Afghan troops.
The Middle East has had a secretive nuclear power in its midst for years
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- Written by George Monbiot George Monbiot
- Published: 19 November 2007 19 November 2007
- Hits: 6922 6922
When will the US and the UK tell the truth about Israeli weapons? Iran isn't starting an atomic arms race, it's joining one . . .
George Bush and Gordon Brown are right: there should be no nuclear
weapons in the Middle East. The risk of a nuclear conflagration could
be greater there than anywhere else. Any nation developing them should
expect a firm diplomatic response. So when will they impose sanctions
on Israel?
Read more: The Middle East has had a secretive nuclear power in its midst for years
UN aid chief attacks new Israeli checkpoint plan
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- Written by Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem
- Published: 19 November 2007 19 November 2007
- Hits: 6833 6833
The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees launched a scathing attack today on a new Israeli plan for a system of checkpoint terminals across the occupied West Bank.
{josquote}"An
insidious new regime to limit freedom of movement is threatening to
further stifle economic activity and smother social interaction between
villages and towns in the West Bank"{/josquote}
Karen
AbuZayd, head of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), said Israeli
authorities had told them of plans to install six specially built
terminals to check people and cargo, including aid deliveries.
She said it would hamper the agency's work and dramatically raise costs.
"An insidious new regime to limit freedom of movement is threatening to further stifle economic activity and smother social interaction between villages and towns in the West Bank," AbuZayd said today at a meeting of UNRWA donors in Amman, Jordan.
Israel 'will halt new settlement' before peace summit
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- Written by Haroon Siddique and agencies Haroon Siddique and agencies
- Published: 14 November 2007 14 November 2007
- Hits: 6709 6709
[The settlement projects are so ingrained in Israeli behavior, including deep levels of support from within the government to support new illegal settlement outposts and illegal settlement expansion, that you need to suspend disbelief and add a lot of quotation marks around the words "settlement freeze." - editor ]
Israel will announce a freeze in West Bank settlement construction prior to peace talks with the Palestinians in the US, it was reported today.
But the moratorium would probably exclude large settlement blocs that Israel wants to retain in a final peace agreement, the Israeli paper Haaretz said.
The Palestinians are demanding that all of the West Bank, which Israel captured in the 1967 six-day war, be included in a future state.
The Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, sent top officials to Washington yesterday to work out exactly what the settlement freeze would entail, Haaretz reported.
Read more: Israel 'will halt new settlement' before peace summit
FBI finds Blackwater Iraq shootings unjustified, report says
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- Written by Associated Press Associated Press
- Published: 14 November 2007 14 November 2007
- Hits: 7849 7849
Citing civilian and military officials briefed on the case, the New York Times reported on its website last night that the US justice department was reviewing the findings of the FBI, which was continuing to investigate the incident in Baghdad on September 16.
No evidence supported assertions by Blackwater employees that they were fired upon by Iraqi civilians, the Times reported.
Read more: FBI finds Blackwater Iraq shootings unjustified, report says