News Archive - 1 August 2011

>DUBAI (Reuters) - Arabs reacted strongly on Monday to the deaths of dozens of Syrians in Hama at the hands of the Syrian army but most Arab governments kept silent, apparently fearing the power of protest movements that have spread throughout the region this year. "It's no longer possible to...

>Officials in Maku, a city in Iran's West Azerbaijan province, said the militants had crossed the border from Iraq to blow up the pipeline and that at least one was a Turkish citizen."'Jamil', a Turkish national and head of this terrorist group, was killed along with two others," Maku...

>MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) - Attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq by Iran-backed militia have fallen sharply thanks to U.S. and Iraqi military operations and diplomatic engagement with Tehran by Baghdad, top U.S. military officials said Monday. The upbeat assessment signals a shift from only three weeks ago...

> * Indian buyer made test payment via Turkish bank * But central bank chief says Turkey not involved (Adds Iranian ambassador confirming talks with Turkey) TEHRAN, Aug 1 (Reuters) - Iran will recover billions of dollars' worth of debt for oil exports to India without the help of Turkey,...

Adm. Eric T. Olson speaks Wednesday at the Aspen Security Forum. ASPEN — The commander of U.S. Special Operations told an Aspen audience Wednesday that “dozens” of missions similar to the one that took out Osama bin Laden are undertaken each night.

Tehran, July 31 (KCNA) -- Speaker of the Iranian Majlis Ali Larijani at a ceremony on July 25 bitterly chided the plots of the U.S. and the West against Islam.

Monday August 1, 2011 Once again, many Americans are probably wishing they had the option of bringing down their government or removing disappointing officials mid-term. If that were the case, both sides in the "historic" debt reduction/extension talks might today be targets of no-confidence votes.

Tehran, July 31 (KCNA) -- Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi at an interview with a news agency on July 28 re-clarified the government's stand to continue pushing forward its nuclear development for peaceful purposes.

Family, friends and supporters of the two hikers detained in Iran on espionage charges gathered in the street in front of the Iranian Mission in New York City early in the afternoon on July 29.

Today’s topics: Ethical oil, U.S. debt deal, endless Expos … and more

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has extended his congratulations to the Emir of Qatar Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani on the occasion of the holy month of Ramadan.

The US House of Representatives clear crucial bill to ward of massive debt default • Rep. Gabrielle Giffords returned to Congress for first time since she was shot in the head - in time to vote for bill • Israeli woman injured by Qassam missile fired from Gaza which exploded...

Current political debate and radio talkback exchanges - about asylum seekers, about the carbon tax or the influence of the Greens - is characterised by abuse.

InterMat has learned that Cal Poly head wrestling coach Brendan Buckley plans to announce the addition of 2004 Olympic silver medalist Jamill Kelly to his coaching staff.

SYDNEY, Aug 2, 2011 (AFP) - - Australia said Tuesday it will film the first group of boat people being sent to Malaysia under its new refugee swap deal and post the video on YouTube to discourage others from making the dangerous trip.

AMMAN - Jordan is to import heavy oil from Iraq starting September as energy officials in Amman search for alternative energy sources in light of disrupted natural gas supplies from Egypt.

MOSUL, Iraq -- Attacks by insurgents using what American analysts say are advanced Iranian weapons have dropped significantly over the last few weeks, senior American military officials said Monday, citing a two-track campaign of allied raids on Iranian-backed militants and official Iraqi protests to Tehran.

Australia's government plans to post video on YouTube and Facebook of the first group of asylum seekers sent to Malaysia under a pact between the countries to swap refugees, in an attempt to deter others from taking dangerous boat journeys to Australia.

Accuvant Labs' Charlie Miller talks to Tom's Hardware about the Defender's Dilemma, the security of data in the cloud, looking for vulnerabilities in notebook batteries, and the ramifications of using Apple's iPad in an enterprise environment.

Anti-censorship software would make it harder for censors to track—and block—undesirable communications. A new approach to overcoming state-level Internet censorship relies, ironically enough, on a technique that security experts have frequently associated with government surveillance. Current anti-censorship technologies, including the services Tor and Dynaweb , direct connections to restricted ...

MOSCOW -- Almost exactly three years after the brief war between Russia and Georgia, Washington and Moscow are trading challenging statements over its unresolved legacy, in another sign that the "reset" of relations between the two cold war enemies is coming under pressure.

SILIVRI, Turkey -- The retired men in this town of rolling hills, red shingles and resentment of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan paused their card game to voice their fears over the protest resignations of most of Turkey's military command, an event that underlined Mr. Erdogan's stamp on an era...

Viet Nam won three golds, four silvers and one bronze to be ranked second at the 6th World Taekwondo Poomsae Championships which wrapped up in Russia on Sunday.

The recent confrontations in the Al-Arish region in the Sinai desert, which left 5 dead and 18 others injured, has plunged the revolution of the Egyptian youths into a cloud of suspicion.

The second World Vovinam (Vietnamese martial arts) Championships ended in Ho Chi Minh City on Saturday evening with acknowledgement of improvements that will make the sport more popular.

Iran stops Canada 3-0 in national squad’s first game at men’s world junior volleyball championships

MUMBAI (Reuters) - The rupee should weaken on Tuesday, weighed down by lower regional equities and dollar demand from oil refiners to settle dues to Tehran.

The Iranian national freestyle wrestling team has won the title of the 20th Ziolkowski International Wrestling Tournament, which was held in Poland.

I just read yet another article about how the oil and gas companies are once again making huge profits that go largely untaxed.

source: Joey Villar | philstar.com Smart Gilas Pilipinas will have a glimpse of what 7-2 Hamed Haddadi is really made of as the Memphis Grizzlies center is reportedly playing for Iran in the William Jones Cup set Aug. 6-14 in Chinese Taipei. “Yes he is playing in the Jones...

Nation-building efforts in Afghanistan face a major turning point. The administration of US President Barack Obama has started withdrawing troops stationed in Afghanistan. European and other countrie .....

AFC has announced the participating teams and format of competition for the Qualifying Round of the AFC Futsal Championship UAE 2012.

The Iranian courts released edited video clips Monday of the two UC Berkeley graduates charged with spying during their four-hour court hearing the day before.

Niterói, Brazil, August 1, 2011 – Iran and Canada began their participation in the FIVB Volleyball Men´s Junior World Championship Brazil 2011 on Monday at the Niteroi venue. Even though Canada had many family and friends attending for support, Iran won 3–0 (25-19, 25-19, 25-20).

Bahrain’s English coach Peter John Taylor has tamped down media suggestions that the West Asians are favourites to advance out of their group into the 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifiers final round.

National football team coach Wim Rijsbergen has sent for four additional players to undergo selection ahead of Pre-World Cup 2014 [...]

AT least four killed as president Bashar al-Assad responds to protests with violence

March 5 in Sochi, Moscow took place, initiated another round of negotiations the presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia. It was the first this year and eighth in the trilateral meeting between the presidents of Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Christopher Rueth blew off college for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: a $100,000 grant to work on wireless Internet technology. The 17-year-old San Diego native is part of the 20 Under 20 grant program started by Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal and an early Facebook investor. The business magnate is now paying ...

With this summer’s debt-ceiling fiasco, it is clearer than ever that Washington’s leadership is not what it used to be. For that reason, there is a greater need for the U.S. to act in concert with other major powers to solve international problems.

The rupee gained on Monday as the US debt deal on late Sunday evening stoked risk appetite and propelled equity markets higher globally along with most Asian currencies, but dollar buying for Iran oil dues capped the rupee's rise.

Famine drives families to the capital despite the dangers there.

European and Asian financial markets rallied early Monday, setting a tone for a stronger opening on Wall Street. read more

Young love has landed two teenagers in trouble, with the girl's uncle visiting her in jail to promise that her family will kill her.

Letters from Daily News readers.

A spokesman for Russia’s Foreign Ministry bristled at a resolution in support of Georgia, saying that it “leaves the impression of a broken record.”

On 2 August 1990, Saddam Hussein's Iraqi forces, battle-hardened by eight years of war with Iran, crossed the border with Kuwait and swiftly overran its meagre armed forces.

Islamaphobic blogger Pamela Geller has been one of the most strident voices against the so-called "Ground Zero mosque," and even organized an anti-Islamic bus ad purchased with donations from readers of her blog, Atlas Shrugs. Given her prominence in the bigoted 'Muslim Go Home!' movement, it's no surprise that...

It might seem frivolous, indeed distasteful, to talk about a woman blinded by an acid attack in Tehran in the same breath as a fortunate batsman at a cricket match in Nottingham. But not only is it fruitful to do so, it is precisely the juxtaposition of the trivial and...

SINGAPORE: Less than six months after the Singapore Hockey Federation (SHF) revealed their target for the men to qualify for the 2020 Olympics, the boys they have entrusted to fulfil the ambition have started to show results.

Scott Pelley spoke with Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-Ohio) on why a "grand bargain" debt deal never came to fruition.

By Colbert I. King “So for Colbert King to say, ‘Rush Limbaugh, his biggest concern was Republicans should do nothing to help Obama.’ Damn right. Damn right. Helping Obama hurts the country.” — Rush Limbaugh, radio talk show host, July 25 Rush Limbaugh was responding to my observation...

FLAVIO Paixao, who was one half of the Portuguese twins that played for Hamilton Accies in the SPL for the last two seasons before being released in the summer, has found a ne

Scott Pelley spoke with Vice President Joe Biden on if Washington has lost its ability to make deals and compromise.

Recent budget trends and the behavior of other countries suggests we're giving the Pentagon too much money

Probably the ugliest side effect of the mass death of news outlets is the salacious schlock the surviving outlets resort to in order to retain their fans. "If it bleeds, it leads" has always been a go-to saying for news outlets hoping grotesqueness will drum up readers, viewers or listeners,...

“The most important story of the early twenty-first century is the epic convulsion across the Islamic world.”

The Finance Department is still scrambling to secure its computer system after January's unprecedented cyber theft of classified federal data.

that in 2011 Turkey will try to increase trade with Iran to $ 20 billion, whereas in 2009 its volume was only 5.5 billion dollars more, Turkey has decided to increase – from two to four – the number of crossing points on border with Iran, which once again...

BAGHDAD — Iraq declared a government holiday Monday after temperatures soared above 120 degrees in the midst of a summer electricity crisis that has sparked public protests.

BAGHDAD, Aug. 1 (UPI) -- June was a bad month for U.S. military personnel in Iraq, with 15 killed, mostly by Iranian-supplied weapons, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said.

Iranian security forces killed three people Monday and arrested four others they suspected of being behind a pipeline blast which halted gas exports to Turkey last week, Iran’s student news agency ISNA reported.

The protest movements that have swept through the Middle East and Northern Africa since December last year have collectively overturned the landscape of the Arab world.

Scott Pelley asks House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, if Republicans would back raising taxes to increase revenue.

Have you noticed that in Afghanistan every year is the decisive year?

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki held out hope Monday that his country's political leaders will decide within a day whether to ask U.S. troops to stay in Iraq beyond 2011.

The Washington Times published an article Azerbaijan's Afghan contribution by a senior researcher of the program in Russian and Eurasian Studies and International Energy Policy at the Heritage Foundation's Ariel Cohen and a participant in the program "Young Leaders" at the Heritage Foundation, Robert Nicholson.

The German weekly Der Spiegel has reported that Israel was behind the assassination of Iranian scholar Dariush Rezaeinejad.

The deep cuts in defense spending envisioned in the just-announced debt ceiling deal [1] raise a fundamental question for Americans: Will we let a deal stand that promises to end American security as we know it?

JOHOR BARU: Thirty-four students who attended a motivational camp at Kluang Prison walked out terrorised instead.

“So for Colbert King to say, ‘ Rush Limbaugh , his biggest concern was Republicans should do nothing to help Obama.’ Damn right. Damn right. Helping Obama hurts the country.”— Rush Limbaugh , radio talk show host, July 25

EDITOR'S NOTE: BP Ledger carries items for reader information each Monday from various Southern Baptist-related entities, and news releases of interest from other sources. The items are published as received.

The cooperation of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation “Faction” (ARF) with the Palestinian Fatah movement may be beneficial for both the Armenians and for the Palestinian Arabs.

NEW YORK, Aug. 1, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Hudson Institute and the Touro College Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust today announced an historic conference targeting manifestations of racism, anti-Semitism and other forms of intolerance at the United Nations. The...

AFP/Quetta Two children were killed in an explosion yesterday in Pakistan’s southwestern province of Baluchistan, which borders on Afghanistan and Iran, police said.

Retrospectively, it was all so simple, natural and matter of fact being on a boat restaurant in Belgrade, sitting with, laughing, drinking a two hundred bottle of wine and chatting about war and peace while Ratko Mladic held my hand.

I’m always amazed when relatively minor events somehow conspire to change the course of history. In this example a lousy brush fire may be the catalyst for an unwinding of the EU.

Today we are premiering FILTER Magazine’s new “Rock Central Asia” blog. Over the next weeks, we will take you behind the scenes of the evolution of Sound Central: Afghanistan & Central Asia’s first rock music festival , the world’s first “stealth” rock festival taking place in Kabul and New York...

In 2008, the Hoover Institution acquired millions of documents on Saddam Hussein's government – and now scholars are beginning to tell the story of the regime.

The high walls and barbed wire of a prison would seem to make security an open-and-shut case, but new research shows that hackers can exploit high-tech prison security systems to spring convicts from behind bars.

Our story and picture on page 4 of our issue on July 30, 2011 was inadvertently captured Iraq assures support for SL’s economic development programme. It should read as Iran assures support for SL’s economic development effort.

Economic Development Minister Basil Rajapaksa and First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Acting Deputy Minister for Economic Affairs of the Islamic Republic of Iran Seyyed Amir Mansour Borghai participated as the chief guests of the opening ceremony of new housing scheme of the Kankeyanodai Village, Manmunaipattu DS Division in...

CHICAGO : US wheat futures rose Monday, following a sharp rally in the corn market amid renewed concerns about US crop development, traders said. The US Agriculture Department said weekly wheat export inspections were 16.2 million bushels, below forecasts for 20 million to 25 million.

As Ramadan begins and the Islamic world starts its month of fasting, two historic events are pointing in the same direction: The era of Jacobin secularism in Middle Eastern government is over.

Though they've now spent exactly two years in an Iranian prison, Berkeley grads Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal had their final hearing yesterday in the trial that's been ongoing since February in an Iranian court. The hearing ended without a decision from the court, but rather with an announcement that...

LONDON, Aug 1 (Reuters) - Turkey must improve border security before it is allowed to join the European Union, British lawmakers said on Monday, voicing concern about security risks and illegal immigration from neighbouring Iraq, Iran and Syria.

Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has issued a harsh warning to Turkey to end activities in Syria.

Perm City Duma supported the city administration to organize a specially protected areas (PAs) of local importance – “Novokrymsky pond.” The initiative on the organization of Deputies of the Kirov district of Perm, told reporter February 2 BakuToday the press service of the Administration of Perm.

The impending limit on federal borrowing has triggered more than a few proposals for slashing future government outlays.  Most Americans recognize that they no longer can afford Washington's corral full of Sacred Cows.But many conservatives, who otherwise shout most loudly for fiscal responsibility, believe in Big Government for...

Tajikistan’s “multi-vector” foreign policy is testing the Kremlin’s patience. Russia is trying to bolster its influence in Dushanbe by pressing for the return of Russian border troops, but Tajik leaders are rebuffing Moscow’s embrace.

The Islamic Republic of Iran's Navy warship fleet has thwarted four attempts by pirates to hijack an Iranian commercial ship in the Red Sea.

As promised here are some more gems that came out of the Aspen Security Forum. I’ve already talked about the comments of Pakistan’s Ambassador and a little bit about Admiral Blair’s comments, more to follow on that but I’d like to start out talking about the ...

LONDON, Aug. 1 (UPI) -- There are concerns about the security of the Turkish border in the event Ankara secures membership to the European Union, London said.

It can't be easy for a wrestler from Northern Michigan University to go viral, but Ellis Coleman did just that at the Junior World Championships when he pulled off one of the more ridiculous wrestling takedowns you'll ever see.

TEHRAN, Aug. 1 (MNA) -- Russian Security Council Secretary Nicolai Patrushev is scheduled to pay a visit to Tehran on August 15, reportedly to discuss the “step-by-step” approach toward Iran’s nuclear program.

Iraqi refugees have put their lives on the line for America. We owe them freedom and safety in retur

Countries including China, India and Iran are engaged in a new race to explore space. Efforts include building research centers, rockets, satellites and lunar rovers.

Magkakaroon ng tsansa ang Smart Gilas Pilipinas na makita kung anong lakas mayroon ang 7-foot-2 na si Hamed Haddadi ng Memphis Grizzlies sa inaasa­hang paglalaro nito para sa Iran sa R. William Jones Cup na nakatakda sa Agos­to 6-14 sa Chinese Taipei.

An Iranian man convicted of disfiguring a woman's face with acid has been spared eye-for-eye punishment.