BAGHDAD (AFP) - Iraqi Electricity Minister Karim Wahid offered to resign on Monday after a wave of bloody street protests demanding his dismissal over harsh power rationing in the scorching summer heat.
"I declare with courage that I offer to resign from my post," Wahid told state television. "I am ready to do whatever the prime minister (Nuri al-Maliki) wants me to do in order to serve t [...]
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel should launch a pre-emptive strike to prevent arch-foe Iran from going nuclear, a former head of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency said on Monday.
"I am of the opinion that, since there is an ongoing war, since the threat is permanent, since the intention of the enemy in this case is to annihilate you, the right doctrine is one of pre-emption and not of retaliat [...]
BEIRUT (AFP) - One of two aid boats planning to sail to Gaza from Lebanon has received the green light to depart for Cyprus on the first leg of a trip that aims to break Israel's blockade, organisers said on Monday.
"The (Lebanese) transport minister has tentatively agreed to allow us to sail to Cyprus on condition our boat meets standard sailing criteria," Thaer Ghandour of local non-gov [...]
ISLAMABAD (AFP) - Pakistan's Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani Monday said that his country would abide by US sanctions on Iran which could hit a 7.6-billion-dollar gas pipeline project.
"Pakistan as a member of the international community will follow any sanctions imposed by the US," Gilani told reporters in southern Sindh province in response to a question.
US special envoy to Pakistan [...]
BEIRUT (AFP) - The head of the UN refugee agency on Monday called for Iraq to form a new government on a non-sectarian basis to encourage the return of Iraqis who have fled the war-torn country.
"We hope the next government (of Iraq) will gather Iraqis around a real work programme and on a basis that isn't confessional," UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres said during a vis [...]
BEIRUT (AFP) - Lebanon approved Monday a plan to reform the country's electricity sector, a major worry for citizens and the government respectively over blackouts and costs, state media reported.
The reform plan "gives priority to traditional energy sources that are least harmful to the environment, mainly gas and renewable energy," the official news agency ANI said.
It covers the estab [...]
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel's decision to ease its blockade of Gaza has drawn criticism from Palestinians who say it does not go far enough and Israelis who fear it will strengthen the territory's Hamas rulers.
Western governments, however, including the United States, have hailed the move as a step in the right direction.
Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, whose authority has been confine [...]
NASIRIYAH, Iraq (AFP) - Hundreds of angry protesters hurled stones at provincial council offices in southern Iraq on Monday, wounding 17 police amid growing rage over power rationing in the summer heat, a police official said.
The police, who included a lieutenant colonel, were all admitted to hospital after the frenzied protest outside the Dhi Qar provincial headquarters in the city of N [...]
BAGHDAD (AFP) - Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari warned on Monday that prolonged "bickering" over who should be the war-torn country's prime minister is angering the public and risks stoking deadly street riots.
With no new government in sight almost four months after an inconclusive general election, Zebari told AFP that a frenzied protest over electricity rationing in which a man w [...]
TEHRAN (AFP) - Iranian police have issued warnings to 62,000 women who were "badly veiled" in the Shiite holy province of Qom as part of a clampdown on dress and behaviour, a newspaper said on Monday.
Around "62,000 women were warned for being badly veiled" in the province of Qom, Tehran Emrouz newspaper quoted provincial police chief Colonel Mehdi Khorasani as saying.
It was unclear whe [...]
Passengers jump out of plane in India after bad landing
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