World
Pakistan's prime minister survived an apparent assassination attempt Wednesday when at least two shots hit his limousine as he drove toward Islamabad. Officials said Yousuf Raza Gilani was unhurt and brought to safety after the incident on the main highway leading into the capital. The incident adds to tensions as Pakistan's new civilian government is vowing to crack down on Islamic militants after ousting Pervez Musharraf from the presidency.
North Korea has begun reassembling its Yongbyon reactor, which can make material for atomic bombs in violation of US conditions for improved diplomatic relations, according to Japan's Kyodo news agency. North Korea said on Aug. 26 it would stop disabling its Soviet-era nuclear complex and accused the US of violating a disarmament-for-aid deal.
In a friendly-fire incident 30 miles north of Baghdad, US soldiers killed two Iraqi soldiers, two police officers, and two US-backed Sunni tribesmen early Wednesday in an inadvertent shootout. Iraqi forces at a checkpoint started shooting at approaching military boats on the Tigris River in Tarmiyah. They didn't realize the boats, which had their lights turned off, were American.
Ukraine President Viktor Yushchenko accused his rival, Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, and opposition parties of attempting a constitutional coup, during a live national broadcast Wednesday. Yushchenko's long-troubled government is on the verge of collapse after his allies in parliament pulled out of the ruling coalition with his Our Ukraine party and Tymoshenko's party passed a law curbing presidential powers and boosting those of the premier.
With the help of 4,000 troops, a new turbine for Afghanistan's most dangerous Taliban territory was successfully transported 110 miles to the site of the largest American aid project in the country, the Kajaki dam in Helmand Province. Soldiers from the US, Britain, Afghanistan, and several other countries escorted the turbine, which is needed to increase electrical generating capacity.
Cyprus leaders launched talks Wednesday seen as the best chance in decades to reunite the island, divided since 1974, and end a conflict threatening Turkey's EU membership hopes. The partitioned status of Cyprus is a problem for the EU. Represented in the bloc by its Greek Cypriots, the island has veto rights over the membership bid of Turkey, a key western ally in the Middle East.
The EU's Court of Justice overturned a 2001 EU decision Wednesday to implement a United Nations antiterror order to freeze the assets of a Saudi businessman and a Sweden-based charity suspected of funding Al Qaeda terror groups.
Weather data will help scan for nuclear tests and explosionsunder a tracking system unveiled this week by the UN weather agency and the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization. The system can detect radioactive particles in the atmosphere and trace them back to their point of origin.
The Philippine government disbanded a panel of negotiators Wednesday who were engaged in Malaysian-brokered peace talks with Muslim guerrillas, suspending a years-long peace process following fresh fighting in the country's south. But President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and her key aides stressed that the government was not permanently abandoning the idea of peace talks and will seek a new approach.
Israeli archaeologists unveiled a 2,100-year-old Jerusalem perimeter wall Wednesday. The structure at the southern edge of Jerusalem's Old City dates back to the Second Jewish Temple, which was destroyed by the Romans in AD 70.
