Deutsche Welle English Service News 03. 10. 2005, 17:00 UTC ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Today's highlight on DW-WORLD:
Turkey Brings EU to "Edge of Precipice" With Turkey raising new obstacles and Austria holding out against an accord to clear the way for talks with Ankara, the European Union teetered on the brink of crisis Monday, and Turkey's EU hopes hung in the balance. To read this article on the DW-WORLD website, just click on the internet address below: http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,1564,1728385,00.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Germans have voted, but political parties are not scrambling to find a majority in parliament to form a governing coalition. Get all the news and background analysis on DW-WORLD'S election site: www.dw-world.de/election05 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- EU says deal reached on Turkey talks In Luxembourg EU foreign ministers appear to have reached a deal paving the way for accession talks with Turkey to begin. The opening ceremony had earlier been cancelled but a spokesman for the British EU presidency said a draft text on a negotiating framework had been sent to Ankara after Austria reportedly dropped its demands. The impasse revolved around Austria's insistence that the text be rewritten to include the prospect of Turkey being offered a special partnership instead of full membership. Ankara has threatened to boycott the talks if it is offered anything less than full EU membership. Photos of possible bombers released Police authorities in Indonesia have released photos of the severed heads of three men whom they accuse of being the suicide bombers responsible for Saturday night's bombings on Bali. Three bombs in the city of Kuta and a nearby beach resort killed at least 22 people and wounded more than 120. No one has yet claimed responsibility for the deadly blasts that have been condemned by governments around the world. Australian Prime Minister John Howard said that Indonesian democracy was the true target of the terrorist attacks. Three years ago, 202 people, including 88 Australian tourists, were killed in bombings in the same area. The Indonesian terrorist group Jemaah Islamiah was blamed for that attack. Police burst into Palestinian parliament Dozens of armed policemen have burst into the Gaza branch of the Palestinian parliament to protest the killing of one of their colleagues in clashes with the militant group Hamas. The police chanted slogans against the failure of the Palestinian Authority to bring the security situation under control. Hundreds of other police fired into the air outside the parliament building. The protest comes a day after fierce clashes between the police and Hamas gunmen left a police commander and two civilians dead. Croatia 'cooperating' with Hague court The chief UN war crimes prosecutor Carla del Ponte has said that Croatia is fully cooperating with her tribunal to locate and arrest ex-general Ante Gotovina. It's a key condition for the Balkan state to start delayed EU membership talks. Del Ponte gave the report at a meeting of the EU's task force, which gathers regularly to assess if the ex-Yugoslav republic is ready to start accession talks. Gotovina has been on the run since 2001 when he was indicted by the UN war crimes tribunal at the Hague for war crimes against ethnic Serbs at the end of the 1991-1995 Serbo-Croatian war. Hundreds reach Spanish enclave Hundreds of illegal African immigrants have managed to reach Spanish territory after breaking through a high-security fence separating Morocco from the Spanish enclave of Melilla. The Spanish Interior Ministry said 650 people had tried to cross over and 350 had succeeded. Officials said 135 people were injured. It comes after hundreds of Africans tried to get into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta last week. Five immigrants died during the attempt. Miers is Supreme Court nominee US President George W. Bush has officially nominated White House legal counsel Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court. If confirmed by the Senate she would replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. Miers, who is 60, was Bush's personal attourney in Texas before she became White House counsel. Schroeder to accept party decision German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder appears to be backing away from his insistence that he be the leader of a possible grand coalition between his Social Democrats and the conservative Christian Democrats. Schroeder told a commercial broadcaster that he would accept whatever decision his party made and would not stand in the way of a stable new government. It comes after the CDU, led by Angela Merkel, widened its slender lead in parliament over the SPD by one seat after winning Sunday's election in Dresden. The CDU now has 226 seats in parliament versus 222 for the Social Democrats. Germany held its general election two weeks ago but the vote was delayed in Dresden due to the death of a far-right candidate. Germany marks Unity Day anniversary Germany is marking the 15th anniversary of the country's reunification in 1990. Monday's ceremony in the city of Potsdam near the capital Berlin was attended by Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, President Horst Koehler and former German and Soviet leaders Helmut Kohl and Mikhail Gorbachev. The occasion comes amid uncertainty over Germany's political future with no decision yet on who will form the new government two weeks after general elections. The host of the Unity Day ceremony, Brandenburg state premier Matthias Platzeck, said the country must recall the spirit that all Germans felt in 1989 when the Berlin Wall fell and commit themselves to the future of Germany. French police arrest top ETA militants French police have reportedly arrested the suspected No. 2 of the Basque separatist group ETA's military wing along with two other suspected militants. ETA, classed as a terrorist group by Spain, the European Union and the United States, has been blamed for the deaths of over 800 people during its four-decade campaign for an independent state. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Time to play again! DW-WORLD's "Click Back" monthly review quiz for September is waiting for you and will test your knowledge of stories we've written. If you answer all questions correctly, you can also win a great prize. To play, please go to: http://www.dw-world.de/english ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For more information please turn to our internet website at http://dw-world.de/english Here you'll find out what's happening in Germany, Europe and the rest of the world. News and background reports from the fields of current affairs, culture, business and science. And of course the DW website also has information about DW-RADIO and DW-TV programmes: topics, broadcast times and frequencies. You can even listen to all programmes as audio-on-demand. Serbian News Network - SNN [email protected] http://www.antic.org/
