MOSCOW - Kazakhstan has suspended launches of the Russian Proton rocket at the Baikonur Space Center following a failed liftoff and loss of the payload, a Japanese communications satellite.
The Russian Proton-M rocket exploded 139 seconds after a pre-dawn liftoff from Kazakhstan’s Baikonur Space Center.
Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s special representative at Baikonur, Adilbek Bassekeyev, says a […]

IRBIL - An Iraqi appeals court on Tuesday [September 4th] upheld death sentences for Ali Hassan al-Majid, the man known as “Chemical Ali,” and two other lieutenants of Saddam Hussein. All were convicted of crimes against humanity for their roles in massacres of Kurds two decades ago.     
Nazreen Omar Hoffman was three months pregnant with her […]

WASHINGTON - Former Senator Fred Thompson has made it official. Thompson is now one of nine contenders seeking the Republican Party’s presidential nomination next year.
In keeping with the new style of politics for the 2008 presidential election, Thompson chose to announce his White House bid on an entertainment program, NBC’s The Tonight Show with Jay […]

CAPITOL HILL - The U.S. Senate has approved late Thursday a spending bill to fund State Department and other foreign operations activities. The vote was 81 to 12. But President Bush is expected to veto the measure because it also eased restriction on federal funds going to organizations that promote abortions in other countries.
The $34 […]

CAIRO - The Egyptian government has renewed a crackdown on suspected members and supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood, the banned Islamic organization that has long been the main opposition movement in the country. Some say the crackdown is a legitimate response to a security threat; others say it is simply to stifle dissent.
Egypt’s security services […]

KHARTOUM - U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says new peace negotiations aimed at bringing an end to the four-year-old conflict in Darfur will start October 27 in Libya. Ban made this announcement at the end of talks with Sudanese President, Omar al-Bashir in Khartoum.
Emerging from his meeting with Sudanese President, Omar Al-Bashir, U.N. Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon […]

JERUSALEM - Syria says it has fired on intruding Israeli aircraft.  The incident points to tensions between the two regional powers that have been simmering for months.
State-run Syrian television broke into its regular programming with a dramatic announcement.
It said that Syrian air defenses opened fire on Israeli planes that violated the country’s airspace.
A Syrian spokesman […]

WASHINGTON - Hailed as one of the century’s greatest tenors, Luciano Pavarotti died Thursday at his home in Modena, Italy, at the age of 71. He was considered one of the last in the line of classic Italian tenors, with musical ties to Enrico Caruso, the famous opera star of the early 1900’s. Pavarotti earned […]

WASHINGTON - Thousands of American Indians converged on Washington, D.C. recently to celebrate the song and dance of their native culture.  The National Museum of the American Indian organized the annual event called a powwow — a tradition dating back hundreds of years.  This year’s powwow was a symbol of the native people’s survival into […]

CAPITOL HILL - A group of civil rights leaders is urging the U.S. government to do more to protect the rights of minority voters in the United States. In testimony at a congressional hearing that marked the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1957, they argued the Bush administration has not done enough […]

HONG KONG - China’s government is scrambling to improve its product-safety image following yet another massive recall of Chinese-made products.  The latest case, announced by a major U.S. toy maker Tuesday, involves the recall of more than 700,000 toys tainted with excessive levels of lead.  
Mattel Incorporated and the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission say 675,000 […]

SEOUL - Japan and North Korea have opened rare one-on-one talks in Mongolia, as part of a broader diplomatic effort to end the North’s nuclear weapons programs. Although the two countries are seeking a normal relationship, some bitter issues from history pose major diplomatic challenges.
As talks between North Korea and Japan got under way Wednesday […]

CAPITOL HILL - A report released Tuesday by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), the investigative arm of Congress, says Iraq has failed to meet most of the benchmarks aimed at measuring political, economic and military progress.   The report is one of several to be released to Congress in the coming days as growing numbers […]

SYDNEY - President Bush says he is eager to talk to China’s president about trade and climate change - the two main issues at this year’s Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Australia. Mr. Bush will meet with Hu Jintao on Thursday, as regional leaders gather in Sydney for the annual APEC meeting.
President Bush says […]

CAIRO - Egyptian officials have told European politicians a peace conference that fails to achieve a breakthrough between Israelis and Palestinians will add to anger, frustration, and extremism in the Middle East. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is hosting a round of high-level talks in Alexandria in an apparent bid to reassert Egypt’s diplomatic role in […]

IRBIL - An appeals court in Iraq has upheld the death sentences of several former top officials of Saddam Hussein’s government. The best known is “Chemical Ali” who got his grim nickname for using poison gas against the Kurds during the 1980s. 
Chemical Ali’s real name is Ali Hassan al-Majid.  The latest court decision confirms the […]

JERUSALEM - Israel’s construction of a controversial separation barrier in the occupied West Bank has suffered a legal setback in the nation’s highest court. Israel says the barrier is a security measure, while Palestinians describe it as a land grab.
Israel’s Supreme Court has ordered the state to redraw the route of its West Bank separation […]

SYDNEY - President Bush has arrived in Australia to attend the 21-member Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. Mr. Bush will also hold a series of one-on-one meetings, starting with a session with Australian Prime Minister John Howard. 
The meeting with the Australian leader is likely to focus on Iraq.
John Howard has been a key U.S. ally throughout […]

ATHENS - Fire officials in Greece say wildfires that have swept through southern Greece over the past week have been brought under control. The fires have claimed at least 64 lives and burned numerous villages and thousands of hectares of forest.  Police have charged six people with deliberately setting fires, but environmentalists say the state […]

BEIRUT - Lebanon Defense Minister Michel al-Murr says that 222 Fatah al-Islam militants were killed and more than 200 others were captured during the 105-day siege of a Tripoli Palestinian refugee camp. He says the guerrillas were trying to set up an Islamic emirate. 
Defense Minister Michel al-Murr says the Fatah al-Islam militants were trying to […]

AL-ASAD AIR BASE, IRAQ - During a surprise visit to Iraq Monday, President Bush said if current trends continue it will be possible to begin withdrawing U.S. troops. The president made the comment during an unprecedented visit to Iraq with his secretaries of State and Defense, and his top military commanders.
President Bush said he was […]

BEIRUT - Authorities in Lebanon say they have identified the body of Chaker al Abssi, the leader of the Palestinian Fatah al-Islam group, that has been holed up inside a Tripoli refugee camp. The group held the camp for 105-days, until Sunday when Lebanese Army troops stormed the facility.
Lebanese danced and celebrated after yesterday’s victory […]

HONOLULU - President Bush’s surprise stop in Iraq marks the third time the president has managed to shroud his travel plans to a war zone in secrecy.
White House reporters had an inkling that something was about to happen as they boarded the press plane at a Washington area Air Force base for the long journey […]

JERUSALEM - Ancient artifacts are at the heart of a fresh dispute between Jews and Arabs at a hotly contested holy place in Jerusalem. The dispute points to the simmering religious tensions behind the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Israeli archaeologists accuse Islamic authorities of damaging artifacts from Biblical times at the al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.  The mosque sits […]

OSAKA - The United States has won three more gold medals and finished atop the medals standings at the World Athletics Championships in Osaka, Japan.
Before this championship, Bernard Lagat had not won a single world title, but now the Kenyan-born runner has two. Lagat won his second gold medal of the championships by outrunning Kenya’s […]