Iran’s street protests in the wake of a disputed presidential election spread from Tehran, the capital, to a string of big cities across the country, but then seemed to subside after the authorities cracked down, leaving at least 20 people dead... With American troops due to withdraw from all Iraqi towns at the end of the month, insurgents carried out a campaign of bombings... Somalia’s fragile government called in vain on its neighbours, Ethiopia and Kenya, to send troops to help it resist a growing jihadist insurgency bolstered by al-Qaeda-linked fighters from Pakistan and Afghanistan... Democrats working on America’s climate-change legislation in the House struck a deal that gives the Department of Agriculture the authority to supervise efforts to reduce carbon emissions by farmers... Mark Sanford, the Republican governor of South Carolina, caused a stir when he disappeared for five days... Antonio Villaraigosa ruled himself out of the running for governor of California... Two Metro trains collided in Washington, DC, killing nine people, the worst-ever accident on the city’s network... At least 80 people were killed in an attack by an unmanned American aircraft in the tribal areas of Pakistan... America reached an agreement with Kyrgyzstan that will allow American armed forces to continue using the Manas air base, their only base in Central Asia, to support operations in Afghanistan... An American journalist from the New York Times and an Afghan colleague were reported to have escaped after seven months as prisoners of the Taliban, who took them hostage in Afghanistan... Formal charges were announced against Liu Xiaobo, one of China’s most prominent dissidents, who was detained last December after the publication of a charter calling for political reform... An American navy ship continued to track a North Korean vessel believed to be carrying weapons to Myanmar in breach of UN sanctions... A conservation group reported that 30% of the world’s species of sharks are under threat of extinction because of overfishing... A battle between FARC rebels and security forces in Colombia’s Cauca province killed at least 25 rebels and seven police officers... The United States and Venezuela decided to reinstate their ambassadors... In a rare address to both houses of France’s parliament, President Nicolas Sarkozy lent weight to a possible ban on the Islamic burqa, saying that such garments were “not welcome on French territory”... Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, the president of Ingushetia, a Russian republic in the north Caucasus, was almost killed in an assassination attack by a suicide-bomber... Russia’s Supreme Court ordered a retrial of three men acquitted of being accomplices in the murder of Anna Politkovskaya... A former prime minister of Kosovo, Agim Ceku, was arrested in Bulgaria. He is wanted by Serbia on war-crimes charges... Sex scandals continued to swirl around Italy’s prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi... Two tonnes of rare whale meat were distributed in Greenland as part of celebrations to mark the start of an era of self-government. After nearly three centuries of rule by Denmark, Greenland’s 56,000 people will gradually take control of most domestic affairs, although defence and foreign policy remain in Danish hands. Greenlandic is now the official language.
During a visit to Brussels to revive Ankara's deadlocked EU accession talks, Turkish Premier Erdogan expressed frustration at his country’s lack of progress over meeting key EU demands to implement political reforms. Erdogan told journalists that plans to change the constitution, key to keeping Turkey's bid for EU membership on track, are a "waste of time" as long as opposition parties keep blocking all efforts in parliament. Erdogan's comments were the clearest sign yet that his government could ditch its long standing goal of joining the 27-nation bloc. Most Europeans oppose Turkey's entry bid because it is a Moslem country, poor, and situated mostly in Asia Erdogan promised after March local elections to renew efforts to revamp the 1982 constitution, drawn up under military rule, which would go a long way towards removing one of the major obstacles in Ankara's EU path. "All parties should be involved in efforts to reform the constitution, but the main opposition party rejects and blocks all efforts. So as long as we are faced with such an approach these efforts are nothing but a waste of time. We will have to continue with the present constitution," Erdogan said ahead of talks with EU officials in Brussels. The process has also been slowed by Ankara's refusal to recognize EU member Cyprus. On Thursday European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said Cypriots should seize a “historic chance” to reunite the Mediterranean island. Cyprus was divided in a Turkish invasion in 1974. EU heavyweights Germany and France have been especially vocal in their opposition to full membership and instead have proposed a lesser alternative, which they have dubbed a "privileged partnership."
Bulgaria on Thursday released former Kosovo premier Agim Ceku, arrested on a warrant from Serbia, where he is wanted on war crimes charges. Ceku walked free after a prolonged hearing into whether or not Sofia should extend his detention. He was initially held in custody only for a period of 72 hours. Serbia's Justice Ministry official Slobodan Homen said the decision to release Ceku from detention was a "political one." "Once again, politics overcome international law," Homen told state-run Tanjug news agency. He added that Ceku would be "sooner or later available to Serbia's justice... Our ministry is still awaiting official information from our Bulgarian counterparts and an explanation why Ceku has been released," Homen said. Ceku was detained on an Interpol arrest warrant at the Gyueshevo border checkpoint near Kyustendil on Tuesday night, while he was entering Bulgaria from Macedonia. Kosovo's prime minister for the two years leading up to the disputed territory's unilateral declaration of independence from Serbia in February 2008, Ceku is wanted by Serbia for war crimes allegedly committed during the 1998-1999 war in then Serbian-ruled Kosovo. Ceku's detention in Bulgaria was not the first time an Interpol warrant initiated from Serbia caught up with him. He was detained in Colombia last month, and in Slovenia and Hungary in 2003 and 2004 respectively. Serbia's claim to have him extradited was meanwhile backed Thursday by Amnesty International that "called upon the Bulgarian authorities to extradite promptly Agim Ceku to Serbia... to face trial on war crimes charges."
Cyprus stopped two boats planning to carry aid to the Gaza Strip in defiance of an Israeli blockade from leaving port on Thursday, officials said. The US-based Free Gaza Movement had been planning to take 33 activists to Gaza with medical supplies and cement, a material that Israel does not allow into the Palestinian territory devastated by a short war that ended early this year. The Free Gaza Movement started sending regular aid voyages from Cyprus to Gaza in August 2008, but one of its boats was involved in a collision with an Israeli vessel in December, and was turned back on another mission in January. Israel tightened a blockade on Gaza in 2007 after the Islamist group Hamas took control of the enclave, a tiny sliver of territory home to some 1.5 million people. Israel bans imports of cement, steel or other building supplies to Gaza, saying militants could use them for military purposes. One of the vessels was to carry 15 tons of cement.
U.S. President Barack Obama would do well to ditch the idea of Ukrainian admission to NATO — for the sake of NATO and, above all, Ukraine. It is also a major irritant in U.S.-Russian relations, which have gone seriously awry since the halcyon days of President Ronald Reagan and Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev. Ukrainian accession to the military alliance would signal America’s definitive rejection of the Reagan-Gorbachev quest for stability in the heart of Europe, based on a concert of the pan-European states, great and small. Instead, the United States appears intent on ringing down a new Iron Curtain across Europe in the form of a nuclear tripwire stretched between Russia and Ukraine. If it were to join NATO, Ukraine would be enlisting in a crusade to encircle a fraternal nation, a co-inheritor of Saint Vladimir, Grand Prince of Kyiv, with a view to its ultimate dismemberment (remember the fate of Serbia.) Ukraine seeks to bolster its sovereignty vis-a-vis Russia, and understandably so. But is it really in Ukraine’s interest to provoke Moscow in this way? Last August, Georgia and Russia went to war over South Ossetia. Had Ukraine and Georgia been NATO members at the time (as they and the U.S. had hoped), they might well have found themselves at war with Russia by virtue of Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty, which holds an attack against one to be an attack against all. Rather than face off with a fraternal Orthodox state across a nuclear tripwire, Kyiv would be better advised to drop its NATO bid. A more attractive option would be membership in the European Union. If Obama would be willing to take advice from an old Reaganite and veteran of the climactic years of the Cold War, one eager to preserve Reagan’s greatest legacy— the overcoming of the division of Europe into hostile camps -- I would advise this: Mr. Obama, tear down this wall! Before it ever gets built.
is much to be said for moral clarity. Greece is insisting that the British Museum surrender the marble sculptures that Lord Elgin took down from the Parthenon and carted away in the early 1800s. Anything less, it says, would “condone the snatching of the marbles and the monument’s carving-up 207 years ago.” The Greek demand for ownership will arouse widespread sympathy, even among those who accept the British Museum’s claim to the marbles. With the opening of an impressive new museum in Athens (see article), the sculptures from the Parthenon now have good cause to be reunited, if only for artistic reasons. But sometimes clarity is self-defeating. A previous Greek administration was willing to finesse the question of ownership and co-operate with the British Museum over a joint display of the marbles. By hardening its position, the Greek government risks driving museums everywhere into clinging to their possessions for fear of losing them. If the aim is for the greatest number of people to see the greatest number of treasures, a better way must be found. The choice is between the free circulation of treasures and a stand-off in which each museum grimly clings to what it claims to own. Instead of grandstanding, the Greek culture minister should call the British Museum’s bluff and ask for a loan. The nervous British would then have to test the waters by, say, sending to Athens a single piece of the Parthenon frieze. If that piece were to be seized, then so be it. But if on the due date, the Greeks surprised everybody and returned the sculpture, then the lending programme would surely be expanded. By taking small steps, the Greeks may yet encourage the British to make the big leap.
The spiritual leader of the Orthodox Church in America offered to begin talks aimed at full communion with the new Anglican Church in North America, then named a series of obstacles whose removal could tear apart the hard-won unity among the 100,000 theological conservatives who broke from the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada. "What will it take for a true ecumenical reconciliation? Because that is what I am seeking by being here today," Metropolitan Jonah said. The Orthodox Church in America is a self-governing daughter of the Russian Orthodox Church. Metropolitan Jonah, who was elected last year in Pittsburgh, is a convert who was raised as an Episcopalian. He spoke with humor about both traditions, warning, "I'm afraid my talk will have something to offend just about everybody." Although there is a global Anglican-Orthodox dialogue with participants from the Episcopal Church and the Orthodox Church in America, there is no dialogue or relationship between any Orthodox jurisdiction in the U.S. and the Episcopal Church itself. Metropolitan Jonah named several issues that he said the two churches needed to "face head on" and resolve before they can achieve full communion. Among the most volatile on his list were the Calvinist theology taught by many evangelical Anglicans and the ordination of women as priests, which the new church allows each of its dioceses to accept or reject. "Calvinism is a condemned heresy," he said, to a smattering of applause from some Anglo-Catholics in the new church. "For ... intercommunion of the Anglican Church and the Orthodox Church, the issue of ordination of women needs to be resolved," he said, again to applause from many of the same people. "I believe women have a critical role to play in the church, but I do not believe it is in the [priesthood or as bishops]," he said. "Forgive me if this offends you." He called for an effort to "creatively come together to find the right context for women's ministry in the church."