PATNA: Fifteen female foetuses have been found in jars left on a rubbish dump, Indian police said on Monday, days after census data showed the ratio of girls to boys is at the nation's lowest level since 1947. The foetuses were recovered Sunday from a dump near a private nursing home in Kishanganj town in the impoverished eastern Indian state of Bihar after they were spotted by children playing cricket, according to police. Kishanganj lies 400 kilometres (280 miles) from Patna the capital of Bihar. They were discovered in plastic jars "containing chemical water" and appeared to be...
Published On: 2011-04-04

BREGA: Libyan rebels on Monday took back much of a strategic oil town that has repeatedly changed hands in weeks of battles with Moammar Gadhafi's forces along the nation's northern coast. There were bursts of artillery and shelling from Gadhafi's forces in the west as rebels pushed into eastern sections of the town. Women and children were seen fleeing Brega as the battle raged. "New Brega is under control of our forces and we are mopping up around the university," said Lt. Muftah Omar Hamza, a former member of Libya's air force who had a satellite phone and a GPS around his neck....
Published On: 2011-04-04

JALALABAD: A "rogue" Afghan border policeman shot dead two foreign soldiers on a training mission on Monday, and hundreds of people turned out on the streets for a fourth day of protests against the burning of a Koran by a fundamentalist U.S. pastor. Up to a thousand angry residents in eastern Jalalabad city blocked the main highway to Kabul and set alight effigies of the pastor who presided over the Koran burning, said Ahmad Zia Abdulzai, spokesman for the provincial governor. Hundreds held peaceful protests in neighboring Laghman and nearby Paktia provinces. In southern Helmand p...
Published On: 2011-04-04

DERA ISMAIL KHAN:Intelligence officials and a local resident say the bullet-riddled body of a Pakistani tribal elder has been found, six weeks after his abduction. Sardar Amanuddin had urged displaced members of the Mehsud tribe to return to South Waziristan, a tribal area where the army has battled the Taliban. The Taliban had warned the tribesmen against coming back. Amanuddin's body was found Monday near Wana, the main town in the tribal region. Intelligence officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. Shopkeeper Jan Aalam, who works ...
Published On: 2011-04-04

SANAA: Yemeni troops opened fire on crowds of protesters demanding the ouster of President Ali Abdullah Saleh, killing six and wounding more than 30 on Monday in the second straight day of clashes in a southern city, witnesses and medical officials said. The bloodshed in the city of Taiz further stoked the more than month-old uprising against Saleh's 32-year-rule. The opposition has been holding continual protest camps in main squares of cities around the country, and on Monday new demonstrations in solidarity with the Taiz protesters erupted in several places. The violence began when thousa...
Published On: 2011-04-04

ASTANA: International monitors sharply criticized Kazakhstan's presidential election Monday, citing numerous cases of ballot box-stuffing, voter intimidation and a lack of transparency. Kazakhstan election officials said President Nursultan Nazarbayev won an overwhelming 95 percent of the vote in Sunday's election against three nominal candidates. His crushing win was expected, but the astonishingly high 90 percent turnout figure surprised many for opposition politicians had refused to take part in the vote and called for a boycott. "We have regrettably to conclude that the elections we...
Published On: 2011-04-04

CAIRO: Gunmen abducted the 12-year-old grandniece of the late Egyptian leader Anwar Sadat but released her nearly 24 hours later for 5 million pounds (about $840,000) in ransom, security officials said Monday. The girl, sixth-grader Zeina Effat Sadat, was kidnapped on her way to school Sunday morning in the upscale Cairo suburb of Heliopolis, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. They said the kidnappers were in two cars and drove the girl through three Nile Delta provinces north of the Egyptian capital before they rele...
Published On: 2011-04-04

ROME: The Italian foreign minister says Italy has recognized the opposition Libyan National Transitional Council as the only legitimate voice in Libya. Foreign Minister Franco Frattini also said Monday that the departure of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi is a precondition to any solution to the conflict in the north African country and former Italian colony. Frattini spoke after talks in Rome with the interim council's foreign envoy. THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below. ROME (AP) — Italy's foreign minister says proposals...
Published On: 2011-04-04

NORTHERN OUTSKIRTS OF ABIDJAN: Armed and ready, hundreds of troops loyal to Ivory Coast's Alassane Ouattara are waiting to launch what they say will be the final assault on Abidjan. And waiting... "Today's the big day," a fighter who called himself Don told Reuters at a base camp just north of the economic capital on Sunday, one of hundreds of pro-Ouattara troops massed there. He was wrong. The big push to unseat incumbent Laurent Gbagbo did not materialize, even though his commanding officer, Issiaka "Wattao" Ouattara, had also signaled earlier that Sunday was the day. ...
Published On: 2011-04-04

YANGON: Nearly 700 fishermen from Myanmar are missing after a three-day burst of unseasonable storms that ripped apart rickety fishing boats in the Andaman Sea, news reports said Monday. Rescued fishermen gave harrowing accounts. Some told local media they held on for days to broken bamboo rafts before being rescued by offshore oil companies, Thai fishing boats or Myanmar naval boats. The Weekly Eleven news journal reported that 15,583 fisherman were rescued after the March 14-17 storms whipped up 70 mph (112 kph) winds, battering fishing rafts and trawlers, and sweeping thousands of fisherm...
Published On: 2011-04-04