JERUSALEM, May 9: Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, battling to overcome his party’s rejection of a US-endorsed......more

US soldier killed
in mortar attack
in north Iraq

BAGHDAD, May 9: One US soldier was killed and another wounded in a mortar attack on a military base in the northern...more

One killed in train
derailment in central
Iran, 14 injured

TEHARAN, May 9: One worker was killed and 14 others injured in central Iran when the locomotive of a train was......more

Grozny blast hurts Russian
General-Interfax

MOSCOW, May 9: The General in charge of Russian troops in Chechnya was injured in an explosion at a stadium in....more

COLOMBO, May 9: In a U-turn in its approach to the peace talks, Sri Lankan President Chandrika Kumaratunga’s party......more

Blast hits grozny
stadium, dead
reported-agency

MOSCOW, May 9: An explosion during victory day celebrations at a stadium in grozny in Chechnya killed and injured......more

Sporadic clashes in
Sadr’s Baghdad
stronghold

BAGHDAD, May 9: Shi’ite fighters loyal to rebel cleric Moqtada-al-Sadr clashed sporadically......more

Malaysian leader says
Iraq prison abuse must
never happen again

KUALA LUMPUR, May 9: Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi today demanded...more

Sharon cancels US trip after Gaza plan setback

JERUSALEM, May 9: Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, battling to overcome his party’s rejection of a US-endorsed Gaza pullout, announced today he had cancelled a visit to Washington next week.

Political sources said Sharon told his cabinet he would present a new withdrawal proposal for its approval in three weeks.

"The Prime Minister has decided not to go to Washington. He will be having consultations here in Israel regarding the disengagement plan," his office said, referring to the initiative voted down by the right-wing Likud a week ago.

Sharon had been scheduled to address a policy conference of the American Israel public affairs committee, a pro-Israeli advocacy group on May 17, and aides said last week a meeting with US President George W Bush was likely.

But with the fate of the Gaza plan still unclear and an Arab world seething over what it sees as Bush’s pro-Israeli slant and US abuse of prisoners in Iraq, the timing for talks with Sharon may not have been right.

Bush last met Sharon at the White House on April 14, voicing strong support for the Prime Minister’s unilateral proposal to evacuate all Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip and four of the 120 in the West Bank.

The President enraged the Arab world by announcing at a news conference with Sharon that Israel could not be expected to vacate all its large West Bank settlements or re-admit Palestinian refugees under any final treaty.

Last week, in an effort to reassure Arab allies, he told Jordan’s King Abdullah that Washington would do nothing to prejudice final-status talks between the middle east foes and said he would expand dialogue with Palestinians.

Sharon has vowed to press ahead with "disengagement" from the Palestinians, sending conflicting signals as to how close he would stick to the original blueprint.

"It will take me another three weeks to put the plan together and then I will present it to the Government," a political source quoted Sharon as telling the cabinet.

Sharon has said the pullout would boost Israeli security after more than three years of violence. Opponents of the move say leaving gaza would only "reward terror".

Palestinians fear Sharon’s plan is a ruse to annex large tracts of West Bank land they want for their state. Israel captured the West Bank and Gaza in the 1967 Middle East war.

Bush further riled Palestinian leaders on Saturday by telling an Egyptian newspaper that a 2005 target date, set by an internationally-backed peace "road map", for the creation of a Palestinian state may no longer be realistic.

But he added the United States was committed to the road map and he would make this clear in a letter to Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie.

The road map charts reciprocal steps towards the establishment of a viable Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip in 2005, including demands the Palestinians halt militant violence and Israel freeze settlement construction.

Qurie is scheduled to meet Bush’s top Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice in Germany in mid-may for what would be his highest-level session with US officials since taking office in late 2003.

Rejecting Bush’s view, Palestinian President Yasser Arafat said the creation of a state by 2005 was "more than realistic", while Qurie called for stepped up peace negotiations with Israel to meet next year’s deadline. (AGENCIES)

US soldier killed in mortar attack in north Iraq

BAGHDAD, May 9: One US soldier was killed and another wounded in a mortar attack on a military base in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul a US military statement said today.

The fatality brought to 559 the number of US military personnel killed in action in Iraq since the invasion of the oil-rich country 14 months ago. (AGENCIES)

Sporadic clashes in Sadr’s Baghdad stronghold

BAGHDAD, May 9: Shi’ite fighters loyal to rebel cleric Moqtada-al-Sadr clashed sporadically with US forces in Baghdad’s Sadr city suburb today, witnesses said.

They said Mehdi army militiamen fired several mortar bombs at a Government building and were engaged in brief gunbattles with American soldiers in different parts of the neighbourhood.

There was no immediate word on casualties.

Mehdi gunmen took to the streets a day after US tanks and armoured vehicles briefly circled Sadr’s offices in the area and arrested four aides in a move to step up pressure on the militia leader holed up in the holy Shi’ite city of Najaf to the south.

The US military has stepped up operations against Sadr in recent days, putting pressure on the mehdi army in Najaf and nearby Kerbala, where the militia took control of the central areas.

Sadr launched an uprising against the US-led occupation a month ago in the south, where Shi’ites dominate. The mehdi army also battled US troops in Sadr city.

The former Saddam city was renamed last year in honour of Sadr’s father, a well-respected Ayatollah killed during Saddam Hussein’s rule. (AGENCIES)

Fresh charges of prisoner abuse hit UK troops

LONDON, May 8: British troops faced fresh accusations today that they abused prisoners in Iraq, with one detainee saying he was viciously beaten by laughing soldiers.

Separately, a newspaper said a fourth British soldier, attached to a regiment already under a cloud, had came forward with charges of ill-treatment, potentially drawing Washinghton’s closest ally deeper into an abuse scandal that has rocked the United States.

In a witness statement obtained by the independent newspaper, Iraqi engineer Kifah Talah said he suffered renal failure after he was beaten by British soldiers over three days in September 2003.

His statement will be presented to the High Court in London next week as part of a compensation claim against Britain by the families of Iraqis who say their relatives were unlawfully killed by British troops.

"The soldiers would surround us and compete as to who could kick-box us the furthest," Talah said in the statement quoted in Saturday’s independent. "The idea was to try and make us crash into the wall.

"The soldiers appeared to be thoroughly enjoying themselves as the beating was accompanied by loud laughter," Talah said.

One of the men arrested with him, hotel receptionist Baha Mousa, died of his injuries, Talah said. His evidence has been corroborated by Mousa’s father Daoud Mousa, who says his son was tortured to death.

Mousa’s case is also part of next week’s High Court action.

Charges of abuse by British soldiers have made headlines since last week, when the daily mirror printed pictures apparently showing a soldier urinating on a hooded prisoner and beating him with a rifle butt.

The authenticity of those pictures has been questioned.

The mirror, which opposed the war in Iraq, on Saturday printed a new picture on its front page showing a British soldier taking what it called a "trophy photograph" of an Iraqi man with bloodied teeth in the back of a military vehicle.

The picture came from another soldier who said he took the photo late last year after witnessing the man being beaten in Basra, where most British soldiers deployed in Iraq are based.

The soldier, who according to the mirror is still serving in the military, was too frightened to go to the military police.

A Ministry of Defence (MoD) spokesman said if soldiers witnessed mistreatment they should tell the authorities.

"If individuals have allegations or evidence of mistreatment of prisoners then they should be brought to the proper authorities, the royal military police," the spokesman said.

The MoD is investigating allegations by another British soldier who has said he saw his comrades beating four Iraqi prisoners.

The fresh allegations came as US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld offered his "deepest apology" to the victims of abuse in Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. (AGENCIES)

US Jury awards 15 mln in Singapore air crash

LOS ANGELES, May 8: The children of a couple killed in a 2000 Singapore airlines crash in Taiwan were awarded 15 million by a federal court jury in Los Angeles, the first US court verdict stemming from the accident.

Sidney and Christina Wu won the judgement yesterday after a three-day trial in their wrongful death lawsuit over Singapore airlines flight sq006, which crashed at Chiang Kai Shek international airport on Oct 31, 2000.

A representative of Singapore airlines was not immediately available to comment on the verdict.

"My sister Christina and I would like to thank the jury for its verdict as it gives us some closure in the four-year-long nightmare that we’ve endured because Singapore airlines didn’t do the honorable thing by our family," Sidney Wu, 32, said in a written statement.

"Our hearts go out to all the other crash victims that Singapore airlines continues to stonewall, and we hope that our case will give them the fortitude to endure, knowing that they can have faith in the American jury system," he said.

Though the crash occurred in Taiwan, the wus were able to sue in the United States because Singapore airlines does business in America.

Their parents, Richard and Cindy Ying Wu, were among 83 people killed in the crash.

Singapore Airlines Ltd. Sial.Si is 57 percent owned by the Singapore State Government investment agency Temasek holdings. (AGENCIES)

US soldier charged with abusing Iraqi prisoners

MIAMI, May 8: A US soldier photographed holding a naked prisoner on a leash at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq was charged on Friday with abusing prisoners, military officials at the north Carolina base where she is stationed said.

Pfc Lynndie england faced four charges — conspiring to maltreat prisoners, assaulting detainees on multiple occasions, committing acts "prejudicial to good order and discipline," and committing an Indecent act, officials at Fort Bragg said in a news release.

England, a pregnant 21-year-old army reservist with the 372nd military police company, served in Iraq and was recently sent to Fort Bragg in Fayetteville, north Carolina.

The charges against her were referred for an Article 32 hearing, the military equivalent of a grand jury hearing, to determine if she should face court-martial, Fort Bragg officials said.

England, a human resources administrator, is not in detention and is performing duties at a headquarters company for a military police brigade at the base, the officials said.

As the Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal made headlines in the last week, photographs of England inside the Abu Ghraib prison have been widely shown in the news media. One showed her giving a thumbs-up sign in front of naked prisoners. Another showed her holding a leash attached to a naked, prostrate prisoner’s neck.

If convicted at a court-martial, penalties could include reprimand, pay forfeiture, confinement and a punitive discharge, Fort Bragg officials said. (AGENCIES)

Oregon ex-Governor admits sex with 14-year-old

PORTLAND, OREGON, May 8: Former US Secretary of Transportation and Oregon Governor Neil Goldschmidt on Friday admitted having a sexual relationship with his children’s baby sitter, 14-year-old girl, when he was Mayor of Portland three decades earlier and quit the remaining two public posts he had.

A local newspaper, the Willamette week, triggered the confession with a story detailing Goldschmidt’s relationship between 1975 and 1978 with the daughter of a Goldschmidt staff member who lived in his neighborhood and babysat his two young children.

Goldschmidt, a powerful local politician who served as US transportation secretary from 1979 to 1981, resigned as president of Oregon’s board of higher education and chairman of the company expected to succeed enron corp. Enrnq.Pk as the owner of Portland general electric.

Now 63, Goldschmidt told the Oregonian newspaper that he felt "enormous guilt and shame" over what he called a nine-month relationship. The woman claimed the consensual affair lasted until she was 17, according to court documents, obtained by reuters, from an unrelated rape trial in seattle.

After she sued him in 1994, Goldschmidt to set up a 250,000 fund for her benefit, Willamette week reported, describing the woman as bright, talented and beautiful, but suffering from a severe lack of confidence and unable to hold a job.

Current Gov Ted Kulongoski, who chose Goldschmidt, his former mentor, to run the higher education board, said he was surprised and saddened by the news.

"There is no excusing his actions," Kulongoski said in a prepared statement. "My heart goes out to the woman who has had to address this issue in her life for the past 30 years. This is not the conduct the public expects from its public officials."

Under Oregon law at the time of the affair, sex with someone younger than 16 was deemed third-degree rape, but the statute of limitations in this case has long expired.

Rumors of marital infidelity swirled around Goldschmidt for years and the breakup of his first marriage coincided with his decision not to run for reelection as Governor after his term ended in 1991.

"If people work hard enough, I think you’ll find indiscretions," he told the Oregonian. "But nothing as ugly as this." (AGENCIES)