China to widen anti-graft inspections of armed forces
BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s powerful Central Military Commission will widen anti-graft inspections of the country’s armed forces, the Defence Ministry said on Thursday, as part of Beijing’s sweeping campaign to weed out corruption.
Israel says Hezbollah not interested in escalating violence
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel said on Thursday it received a message from the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah that it was backing away from further violence, a day after the worst deadly clashes in years erupted along the border.
Survivors say Iraqi forces watched as Shi’ite militias executed 72 Sunnis
BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Survivors tell the same story: they were taken from their homes by men in uniform; heads down and linked together, then led in small groups to a field, made to kneel, and selected to be shot one by one.
In France’s suburbs, state neglect breeds resentment
AULNAY-SOUS-BOIS, France (Reuters) – Soul-searching in France in the weeks since Islamist gunmen killed 17 people has centred on battling radical Islam and reinforcing the country’s secular tradition. In the “cités”, housing estates like those in which the gunmen grew up, this seems to many like seeking a scapegoat for decades of neglect.
Ambulance attacks open wound of Roma relations in Bulgaria
VRACHESH, Bulgaria (Reuters) – When Bulgarian doctor Irena Marinova arrived in an ambulance at the home of a pregnant Roma woman in November, she says she was beaten up by two men who accused her of being late.
North Korea ‘demanded $10 billion in cash and food’ for summit with South
SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea demanded $10 billion in cash and half a million tons of food in 2009 as a precondition of holding a summit with the South, former South Korean president Lee Myung-bak said, adding that he refused to pay anything for holdin…
Hostage in Sydney siege ‘killed by police bullet ricochet’
SYDNEY (Reuters) – One of the hostages held during a siege at an Australian cafe last month was killed by a ricochet of at least one police bullet that also injured three other hostages, an inquest into the deaths was told on Thursday.
Exclusive: New Iran U.N. envoy appointee expected to get U.S. visa – sources
UNITED NATIONS/ANKARA (Reuters) – Iran’s newly appointed U.N. ambassador is set to receive a U.S. visa so he can take up that key post, diplomatic sources said on Wednesday, likely removing a major strain on Tehran’s tense relations with Washington.
North Korea may be trying to restart nuclear reactor: U.S. think tank
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – North Korea may be trying to restart a nuclear reactor that can yield plutonium for atomic bombs, a U.S. security think tank said on Wednesday, citing new satellite imagery.
Rohingya refugees say traffickers in Malaysia abuse and kill
BUKIT MERTAJAM, Malaysia (Reuters) – Abul Kassim, a Rohingya asylum seeker, was snatched from his home in the northern Malaysian state of Penang on Jan. 12. The next morning, his beaten and bloodied body was found.
