LA Times News

LA Times News

Conflict arises over diamonds from Zimbabwe

Posted: 19 Jun 2011 07:50 PM PDT

Human rights groups say diamonds from the Mugabe regime's Marange mine should be blacklisted as 'blood diamonds' but most nations that are part of the regulatory Kimberley Process balk at comparing a government to insurgents.

Human rights groups and Western countries fear that a new batch of what they consider to be "blood diamonds" is about to enter international markets, culled from vast deposits in Zimbabwe.

Syria planning change to constitution, Baath Party official says

Posted: 19 Jun 2011 06:58 PM PDT

The official contends the alteration will end the ruling party's monopoly on power, but activists and analysts say changing one preposition will, in reality, make no difference.

An impending proposal to amend Syria's constitution would end the ruling Baath Party's monopoly on political power while retaining its central role, a high-ranking official in Damascus said.

Fatah, Hamas delay unity talks

Posted: 19 Jun 2011 04:06 PM PDT

The summit was to have tackled serious issues in forming a Palestinian unity government, including naming leaders. Some observers say the delay casts doubt on the reconciliation effort.

A meeting between the top leaders of the Palestinian groups Fatah and Hamas to discuss forming a national unity government has been postponed until further notice, a Fatah official said Sunday.

Libya says 9 civilians killed in NATO airstrike

Posted: 19 Jun 2011 03:01 PM PDT

The incident gave supporters of Moammar Kadafi's regime a new rallying point against the international intervention in Libya's civil war.

Libya's government said NATO warplanes struck a residential neighborhood in the capital Sunday and killed nine civilians, including two children. Hours later, NATO confirmed one of its airstrikes went astray.

NATO admits it probably hit civilians in Libya

Posted: 19 Jun 2011 10:39 AM PDT

The Western alliance says a 'weapons system failure' may have led to the airstrike on an apartment building in Tripoli that killed nine and injured 18 civilians.

NATO officials admitted Sunday that the alliance was probably responsible for an airstrike in a densely populated Tripoli neighborhood that Libyan authorities said killed nine people and injured 18.

Protesters in Spain rally against austerity measures

Posted: 19 Jun 2011 08:25 AM PDT

Demonstrators resent wage cuts and tax hikes imposed to resolve a financial crisis that they feel was created by banks and developers.

Tens of thousands of Spanish protesters -- young and old, those with jobs and those without -- marched Sunday in Madrid to drive home their anger over high unemployment, bleak economic prospects and politicians they consider inept.

Ex-British envoy sees war as wrong focus in Afghanistan

Posted: 19 Jun 2011 12:46 AM PDT

Onetime diplomat Sherard Cowper-Coles says instead of pursuing a futile obsession with military supremacy, the U.S. and its allies should lay down arms and focus on a political deal with the Taliban.

From 2007 to 2010, Sherard Cowper-Coles served as Britain's ambassador and special representative to Afghanistan, giving him an inside view of the struggle on the battlefield and in the corridors of power to stabilize the war-torn country.

Libya blames apartment bombing on NATO

Posted: 18 Jun 2011 09:43 PM PDT

A residential building is hit in Tripoli; the final death toll is unclear. 'This was a purely civilian street,' one man says. There is no immediate word from NATO.

An apartment building in the middle of a densely populated Tripoli neighborhood was obliterated early Sunday, and Libyan officials blamed the explosion on a bombing raid by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.