LA Times News

LA Times News

Rebels solidify their hold on Port Brega oil facility

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 07:37 PM PST

Opposition fighters say they drove Moammar Kadafi's forces back to another town. The Kadafi loyalists launched airstrikes on rebel targets but there were no casualties, residents say.

Libyan rebels solidified their hold on a key coastal oil complex Thursday by fortifying their positions a day after Moammar Kadafi's forces attempted to seize the nation's second-largest petroleum and natural gas facility.

U.S. gun-tracing operation let firearms into criminal hands

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 06:13 PM PST

A federal operation aimed at tracing weapons to Mexican drug cartels lost track of hundreds, including two guns found at the scene of a Border Patrol agent's killing in Arizona.

A federal operation that allowed weapons from the U.S. to pass into the hands of suspected gun smugglers so they could be traced to the higher echelons of Mexican drug cartels has lost track of hundreds of firearms, many of which have been linked to crimes, including the fatal shooting of a Border Patrol agent in December.

Kadafi forces show Libya's northwest under government control

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 05:30 PM PST

Government-run checkpoints have replaced those set up by rebels. Along the 110-mile stretch between Tripoli and the Tunisian border, there were few visible signs of the unrest reported in recent days.

A burned-out police station and the absence of the once-ubiquitous portraits of Col. Moammar Kadafi are evidence of what happened here recently. The camouflage-clad soldiers wielding AK-47s and glaring at passing motorists show who is in charge now.

Ivory Coast headed for civil war, analysts fear

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 05:54 PM PST

Six women protesting against incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo are killed as the postelection standoff between the two rival claimants to the presidency persists amid mounting violence.

A spasm of deadly violence in Ivory Coast, including the killings of six women who were shot Thursday as they demanded that the country's intransigent president step down, points to an irreversible slide back into civil war in the West African country, analysts say.

Obama, Calderon reach trucking accord at U.S. summit

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 06:37 PM PST

The accord comes at a sensitive time. Mexico President Felipe Calderon has said U.S. efforts in the fight against Mexican drug cartels haven't curbed U.S. demand or stemmed the flow of arms to Mexico.

President Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon announced Thursday that they had resolved a long-running dispute over the passage of trucks across the U.S.-Mexican frontier, offering a brief moment of harmony at a time of tensions over the flow of drugs and guns across the same border.

Key lawmakers back no-fly zone over Libya as Obama hesitates

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 05:43 PM PST

Liberals and conservatives in Congress say Western forces should protect Libyan rebels from Moammar Kadafi's air force. President Obama, however, appears to be sending contradictory messages.

President Obama's reluctance to use military force in Libya's civil upheaval is putting him at odds with key players in Congress and undermining White House efforts to be seen as backing political reform in the Middle East.

Allawi backing away from Iraqi government deal

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 04:53 PM PST

The Shiite leader says he won't head a strategic council intended to counterbalance the prime minister's power. His apparent wooing of the Sadr bloc casts doubt on the power-sharing agreement.

Former Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, whose Iraqiya party won the most seats in Iraq's elections last year, has refused to head a long-planned strategic council in parliament, saying Thursday that Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has broken promises about its role.

Libyan rebels honor 'martyrs'

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 03:55 PM PST

After the battle for Port Brega, rebels bury more fighters, including a man who had returned from Britain to check on family but was drawn into the fighting to protect a rebel-held oil town.

Khaled Zarok Attghdi did not intend to go to war after he returned home to Libya from Manchester, England, four days ago to check on family.

Obama keeps door open to military options in Libya

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 11:45 AM PST

President Obama, speaking at a news conference with Mexican President Felipe Calderon, says he is looking at the 'full range' of options to defend the Libyan people against attacks from Moammar Kadafi's forces. Obama also says the U.S. is asking Mexico to extradite the alleged killer of a Border Patrol agent.

WASHINGTON – President Obama says he is looking at the "full range" of military and non-military options to defend the Libyan people against attacks from the forces of Col. Moammar Kadafi, explicitly including the possibility of enforcing a no-fly zone over the country and not ruling out the possibility of air strikes.

India's top anticorruption official steps down

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 12:08 PM PST

Dogged by a 1992 kickback scandal, Polayil Joseph Thomas resigns after the Supreme Court rules his appointment to India's Vigilance Commission was illegal.

In a further blow to a government battered by accusations of graft, India's senior anticorruption official resigned Thursday after the Supreme Court ruled his appointment illegal because of his involvement in a 1992 scandal that is now a legal case .

3 Dutch military personnel held by Kadafi loyalists in Libya

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 09:09 AM PST

Dutch defense officials are in 'intensive diplomatic talks' to secure the release of three crew members of a military helicopter who were seized by forces loyal to Moammar Kadafi during an evacuation mission. They are reportedly being treated well.

Three crew members of a Dutch military helicopter have been held since Sunday by forces loyal to Libyan strongman Moammar Kadafi after being prevented from completing an evacuation mission, Dutch defense officials said Thursday.

Egyptian prime minister resigns; demonstrations for reform still planned

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 08:54 AM PST

Ahmed Shafik, who was appointed prime minister before President Hosni Mubarak's ouster, was criticized for seeming aloof to demands for change. Mass rallies to press for additional reforms are still planned for Friday.

The beleaguered prime minister appointed by ousted President Hosni Mubarak resigned Thursday as Egypt's revolutionary movement prepared for mass demonstrations against him.

Prime minister picked by Mubarak resigns

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 05:07 AM PST

Egyptian protesters saw Ahmed Shafiq as condescending toward the pro-democracy movement. Large rallies are planned for Friday as demonstrators say demands remain unmet.

The prime minister appointed by ousted President Hosni Mubarak resigned Thursday as Egypt's revolutionary movement prepared for mass demonstrations against him.

Frankfurt airport shooting suspect says he acted alone

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 04:47 AM PST

The German interior minister says the suspect, an Albanian from Kosovo, was apparently radicalized over the last few weeks. The attack left 2 dead and 2 wounded.

The suspect in the slaying of two U.S. airmen at the Frankfurt airport confessed to targeting members of the American military, a top security official said Thursday, in a case that German officials are treating as a possible act of Islamic terrorism.

Rebels repel Kadafi's forces in Port Brega

Posted: 02 Mar 2011 08:37 PM PST

Libyan men and boys rush to defend the oil and gas complex they've controlled since last month.

Rebel fighters firing from sand dunes repelled the first determined offensive by regime loyalists in eastern Libya on Wednesday during a fierce, daylong battle that appeared to reinvigorate a stalled drive to topple Moammar Kadafi.

U.S. wants to know who's in charge of Libyan revolution

Posted: 02 Mar 2011 09:29 PM PST

U.S. efforts to identify the leaders of Libya's revolution and their long-term goals yield no clear answers. The push comes as the U.S. is trying to determine how to provide humanitarian relief and whether to assist Moammar Kadafi's foes.

The Obama administration has emphatically called for Libyan dictator Moammar Kadafi to step down and has pledged assistance to the rebels seeking to overthrow him.