US and Iranian diplomats met in Baghdad for their first formal direct talks in more than a quarter of a century May 28, to discuss the security situation in Iraq. Washington’s ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker called the proceedings “businesslike.”… Read moreIran protests US spy networks to Swiss ambassador
Egyptian police arrested three Muslim Brotherhood candidates to the upper house of parliament as they campaigned in the Nile Delta province of Dakahlia May 27, bringing to 63 the number of Brotherhood members detained in the province since Egypt’s largest… Read moreEgypt: more arrests of Muslim Brotherhood
When Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI two years ago, we pointed out that he had been the Vatican’s pointman on dialogue with the “Traditionalist” schism that rejects the Vatican II reforms. Now it seems he may be ready… Read moreBenedict XVI moves to restore Latin Mass
Well said. Fortunately the Iraqwarit blog has liberated this text from the New York Times‘ elitist pay-per-view policy. From Paul Krugman‘s column, Memorial Day, May 28: Trust and Betrayal “In this place where valor sleeps, we are reminded why America… Read moreKrugman: Bush squanders soldier’s lives
Since his election as Nicaragua’s president last November, Daniel Ortega of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) has pledged to end his country’s participation in the IMF, weighed in for Iran’s right to nuclear power, and announced new drives for… Read moreDeja vu in Nicaragua: our readers write
Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez called on Pope Benedict XVI to apologize to the indigenous people of Latin America for his comments on the evangelization of the region. During an official visit to Brazil last week, the Pope defended the evangelization… Read moreChavez: Pope must apologize to indigenous peoples
Busloads of people surrounded the Salvador del Mundo monument in front of the Canadian Embassy in San Salvador today to protest the Canadian Government’s role Central American mining, and specifically in the 29 mining projects currently active in El Salvador…. Read moreCentral Americans protest Canadian mining cartel
Colombia’s lower house voted overwhelmingly May 23 to request President Alvaro Uribe “immediately remove for incompetence” Sergio Caramagna, head of the OAS peace mission in the country. Jose Castro Caycedo, the legislator who sponsored the resolution, told the Associated Press… Read moreColombia: paramilitary sex orgy revelations
New Delhi has rushed additional paramilitary forces to Assam following a bombing in Guwahati which left seven dead and 30 injured—apparently the work of the separatist United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA). Days earlier, the ULFA warned that it would… Read moreIndia: paramilitary troops to Assam after ULFA terror
A US delegation is headed for Kabul to persuade President Hamid Karzai to approve a program of glyphosate spraying over the opium-producing lands of southeast Afghanistan. The private contractor Dyncorp is to carry out the spraying in cooperation with a… Read moreAfghanistan: Karzai resists glyphosate
Jakob Kellenberger, head of the International Committee of the Red Cross, said May 24 he was not optimistic about a breakthrough in talks with Iraqi officials to gain access to up to 20,000 held in the country’s prisons. “We are… Read moreICRC still seeks access to Iraq’s prisons
Exiled Somali leaders in Eritrea issued a call to boycott a Mogadishu peace conference scheduled for next month, warning of further violence if it goes ahead. Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, leader of the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), and Sheikh Sharif… Read moreSomali Islamist leaders voice defiance from Eritrean exile
