Islamist protesters in Indonesia rallied outside the country’s only synagogue, demanding its closure and expulsion of the Jewish community in response to Israel’s offensive in the Gaza Strip.
Pakistani interior minister chief Rehman Malik boasted at an Islamabad press conference that authorities have arrested more than 120 in a crackdown on groups allegedly linked to the Mumbai attacks.
Brazil agreed to provide helicopters and other assistance to Bolivia to combat drug trafficking, taking up slack following the ouster of the US DEA from the Andean country last year.
Mexican officials denied claims in a US Joint Operations Command report that country is in danger of becoming a “failed state”—while Barry McCaffrey, Newt Gingrich and others called for beefing up military aid to fight Mexico’s cartels.
Israeli strikes set a UN aid compound, media buildings and a hospital ablaze as tanks rolled deep into Gaza City and diplomats struggled to find a way to halt the offensive that has now killed 1,075.
Bolivian President Evo Morales announced he is breaking diplomatic ties with Israel in protest against its offensive in Gaza, and that he would seek to have Prime Minister Ehud Olmert charged with “genocide.”
The US Navy’s Combined Task Force 151 is leading a 20-nation force against Somalia’s pirates—who claim to be protecting the Horn of Africa coast from illegal toxic waste dumping by European firms.
CIA director Michael Hayden said Pakistan’s border zone is “no longer a safe haven for al-Qaeda”—days after hundreds of militants attacked a Frontier Corps base, sparking a fierce gun battle that left many dead.
Militant attacks are reported from both the Pakistani and Iranian sides of the divided Baluchistan region. An armed attack on Pakistani police in Quetta follows a suicide attack on an Iranian police post in Saravan.
Jinous Sobhani, secretary of the Defenders of Human Rights Center in Tehran, was one of six followers of the Baha’i faith detained by Iranian authorities. Computers, files and literature were confiscated in the raids.
In the lead-up to Iraq’s provincial elections, there is growing anger that the draft version of the election law has weakened provisions to set aside seats for women.
Now relegated to the back pages, near-daily rocket and suicide attacks continue to claim lives in Baghdad and central Iraq. Several civilians have been killed in attacks this week alone.
