DEUTSCHE WELLE/DW-WORLD.DE Newsletter English Service News 20.02.07, 17:00 Uhr UTC
'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' Learn a quirky, interesting or funny German word each week. Visit www.dw-world.de/english for this week's new word. '''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' Today's highlight on DW-WORLD: Iran Sets Preconditions for New Nuclear Talks President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has rejected a looming UN deadline for Iran to suspend uranium enrichment. He said Iran would only halt the sensitive nuclear activity if the West suspended its own nuclear programs. To read this article on the DW-WORLD website, just click on the internet address below: http://newsletter.dw-world.de/re?l=evuil9Ifcha79I0&req=l%3Devuil8Ifcha79I0 '''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' Pakistan FM visits India after train bombing Pakistan's foreign minister has visited Pakistani survivors of Sunday's train bombing in India. Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri said that New Delhi and Islamabad needed to cooperate better to end attacks like the blasts on a trans-border train that left at least 66 people dead. Kasuri arrived in India on Tuesday for scheduled talks with his Indian counterpart on ways to advance the peace process between the two neigbours. Earlier, Indian police said they were questioning a Pakistani man over his links to blasts and a fire aboard the so-called ''Friendship Express'' headed for Pakistan. Police also released sketches of two men believed to have jumped off the train prior to the explosions. Both Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf have condemned the attacks. Rice and Abbas hold separate talks in Amman US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has held talks with Jordanian King Abdullah II in Amman on ways to revive the Middle East peace process. She was also due to hold talks with security and intelligence officials from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates to discuss the formation of a Palestinian unity government. Monday's three-way meeting between Rice, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli premier Ehud Olmert ended without any tangible progress although the Israeli and Palestinian leaders did however agree to meet again. On Wednesday the Middle East quartet will meet in Berlin. Iran sets conditions ahead of UN deadline On the eve of a UN Security Council deadline Iran has signalled that it's prepared to halt its uranium enrichment programme, provided that Western nations do the same. In a speech in northern Iran President Ahmadinejad said that negotiations could then be held under a fair atmosphere. The Security Council voted unanimously in favor of imposing limited sanctions on Iran after it ignored earlier demands to halt enrichment. Iran faces the prospect of additional sanctions unless it stops enrichment by the end of a 60-day period that ends on Wednesday. Enriched uranium is used to fuel nuclear reactors and to make nuclear weapons. The US and its allies believe that Iran is using its nuclear program as a cover to produce an atomic weapon. Iran has repeatedly denied the allegations. EU agrees tough targets for emissions cuts European Union environment ministers have agreed on tough mandatory targets for slashing greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. German environment minister Sigmar Gabriel, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, said all 27 EU environment ministers have, in principle, backed a proposed unilateral 20 percent cut in EU emissions by 2020 from 1990 levels. They also agreed on an even more ambitious target of a 30 per cent cut in carbon dioxide emissions by 2020 provided other industrial nations joined in. Villepin: 10,000 Airbus jobs at stake French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin has confirmed that Airbus, the joint European planemaker, is planning 10,000 job cuts. He told French radio that he'll hold talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin on Friday over the crisis facing the consortium which has assembly plants in France and Germany. Airbus' parent firm EADS has delayed a restructuring announcement that had been due this Tuesday. Airbus has 56,000 staff, 23,000 of them in Germany. Thailand arrests 3 Muslims after bombings Thai security forces have arrested three Muslim men in connection with a series of bombs and shootings that killed eight people at the weekend. Military officials told a news conference that all three had confessed and had now been charged. The suspects are believed to have received "intensive military training" from a militant group called RKK. More than 2,000 people have been killed in three years of separatist unrest in Thailand's three southernmost provinces of Narathiwat, Yala and Pattani, populated mainly by ethnic Malay Muslims. Fiji's ruler rejects prompt elections Fiji's military ruler Frank Bainimarama has dismissed a quick restoration of parliamentary rule by saying he will call elections in 2010. This follows the leaking of a report for the 16-nation Pacific Forum compiled by a so-called eminent persons group of senior and retired Pacific region officials. It calls on Bainimarama to hand back the prime ministership to a civilian. New Zealand's Prime Minister Helen Clarke says the advisors' report concludes that the Fijian coup was "not constitutional". And, she says, its authors have recommended elections within the next 18 to 24 months. The report goes to a summit of Pacific Forum foreign ministers in March. Fiji's military seized power in December, accusing elected premier Laisenia Qarase of letting corruption flourish in government. NATO raids homes of Karadzic's son and daughter NATO troops have raided the homes of the son and daughter of fugitive Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect Radovan Karadzic. A NATO spokesman said Sonja and Sasa Karadzic were questioned about the whereabouts of their father. The raids in the Bosnian town of Pale, which is some 15 kilometres east of Sarajevo, followed intelligence reports that the two were involved in their father's support network. It's not the first time the two have been interviewed in the hunt for their father, who the UN war crimes court has indicted for genocide during the Bosnian war from 1992 to 1995. Group claiming to be KLA says it bombed UN vehicles A group claiming to be the Kosovo Liberation Army has said it was responsible for a bomb attack that damaged three UN vehicles. No one was injured in Monday's bombing, but it has increased tensions amid ongoing negotiations on the Serbian province's future status. The former guerilla group fought against Serb forces in the 1990s. In a statement the attackers said the bombing was in retaliation for the deaths of two Albanian protesters. Prime Minister Agim Ceku, once a leader of the KLA, condemned the attack as an act of those opposing the process of Kosovo's independence. Mortar blasts rock Mogadishu, ten killed Heavy shelling in the Somali capital Mogadishu has left at least ten people dead. This constitutes some of the heaviest fighting since the government, backed by Ethiopian forces, took Mogadishu from an Islamist group late last year. The Somali and Ethiopian forces came under fire on Tuesday morning and responded with mortar fire in various parts of the capital. Dozens of Somalis have been killed during attacks this year. The African Union is planning to send a peacekeeping force to replace the Ethiopian soldiers, who have started to withdraw. EU ministers back Hungarian GMO ban EU environment ministers have again voted against a genetically modified type of maize. In a majority vote, ministers have rejected a European Commission recommentation that Hungary be forced to lift a ban it imposed in 2005 on a maize seed marketed by the US giant Monsanto, called MON 810. The ministers, meeting in Brussels, failed to agree on whether to authorise imports from Australia of carnations whose colour, mauve, is achieved through genetic change. 'Scream' heist back in court as appeal opens An appeals trial into the theft of the expressionist masterpiece "The Scream" has opened in Oslo as prosecutors seek to convict five men they believe carried out the robbery and harboured the stolen artworks. "The Scream", along with another Edvard Munch painting, "Madonna", were snatched from Oslo's Munch Museum in August 2004 in a daytime raid by two armed and masked robbers. Oslo police recovered the works in August last year. The circumstances of their recovery and whereabouts while stolen remain shrouded in mystery. '''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' We want to hear from you! Send your thoughts and comments on any DW-WORLD.DE article to [EMAIL PROTECTED] '''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' For more information please turn to our internet website at http://newsletter.dw-world.de/re?l=evuil9Ifcha79I1&req=l%3Devuil8Ifcha79I1 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. 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