Iraq’s parliamentary election will take place on 21 January 2010, the country’s electoral commission has announced.
This comes a day after the Iraqi parliament approved a crucial election law after weeks of deadlock.
Officials said the law was passed too late for the original intended poll date, 16 January, to be kept to.
Faraj al-Haidari, the head of [...]
Nine ethnic Uighurs have been executed for their involvement in July’s deadly ethnic rioting in China’s northwest Xinjiang region, according to local media.
The executions followed a final review of the verdicts by the supreme people’s court as required by law, the state-run China News Service reported on Monday.
“The first group of nine people [...]
Hezbollah – a powerful Shia political and military organisation – says the opposition alliance it leads agreed to the move after talks on Friday.
The governing coalition is believed to have agreed to a number of concessions, ending the deadlock that has existed since June’s parliamentary elections.
Mr Hariri is expected to formally announce the deal shortly.
The [...]
PRLog (Press Release) – Nov 04, 2009 – On Tuesday, November 3rd, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced new aid funds for Muslim communities around the world.
Following up on President Barack Obama’s promise to improve U.S.-Islamic ties, Clinton outlined specific projects toward that end. U.S. aid will support Middle East business and job creation, help civil [...]
The president of Yemen has ruled out a truce in the escalating conflict with Houthi fighters in the north.
Ali Abdullah Saleh said on Saturday that the Yemeni military would not ease their attacks on the Houthis “until we bring this tyrannical, traitorous and mercenary group to an end”.
“The war just started two days ago, [...]
A Russian human rights group says Chechen security officers have kidnapped the head of a rights group in Moscow and flown him to Grozny, Chechnya’s capital.
The Memorial group said Arbi Khachukayev, who heads Law, an organisation critical of Chechnya’s Kremlin-backed leader, was detained on Thursday and bundled onto a flight.
Chechnya’s interior minister said Khachukayev was [...]
Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, has said he will not seek re-election at presidential elections he has called for January saying he had had enough after years of frustration fighting for an independent homeland.
“I have told our brethren in the PLO [Palestine Liberation Organisation] … that I have no desire to run in the forthcoming [...]
The United Nations General Assembly is debating a UN-sponsored report which says Israel committed war crimes during its military assault on the Gaza Strip.
The Goldstone report, which accuses both Israel and Hamas of war crimes, has already been endorsed by the UN Human Rights Council, which sponsored the fact-finding commission.
The draft under debate [...]
Security forces in the Chinese province of Xinjiang have said they will “strike hard” against crime and disorder.
Officials vowed to “root out” crime and “change the face of the public security” in the western province, after deadly unrest earlier this year.
Nearly 200 people died in July’s rioting between ethnic Uighurs and members of the majority [...]
Hamid Karzai, the re-elected Afghan president, has vowed that his government will represent all his countrymen.
“Today I would like to say that no one will see themselves distant in this process and all of us will be a part of the Afghanistan government,” he said in a low-key victory speech on Tuesday.
Afghanistan’s Independent Election Commission (IEC) [...]