 | | | | | | | Newsletter | 02.02.2009, 17:15 UTC | | | Newsline | | | World news: international | | | | | | | | | News | | | | | Current Article | | | | Sarkozy to receive Abbas for Gaza talks
French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas are set to meet in Paris for talks on the Gaza crisis. The French Premier earlier received the new US Middle East envoy George Mitchell, while Abbas was in Cairo for talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. However, international mediation efforts to secure a durable truce in Gaza were being disrupted by violations of an informal ceasefire on both sides. On Monday, an Israeli airstrike killed one Palestinian and wounded at least three others in the southern town of Rafah. The Israeli military said the attack targeted militants who had fired several mortar rounds from the Hamas-ruled enclave. Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had previously threatened “harsh and disproportionate” retaliation for attacks on Israel. |  | | Wen wraps up European tour with visit to Britain
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao has wrapped up his tour of Europe with a visit to Great Britain. Speaking at a joint press conference with Prime Minister Gordon Brown in London, Wen called for strong and effective stimulus plans to boost economies hit by the global financial crisis. Brown said Britain was planning on doubling its exports to China by about 5 billion euros within 18 months. The two leaders called for the resumption of the Doha trade talks and also discussed the upcoming meeting in London of the Group of 20 major industrialised and emerging countries. Wen's European tour, which saw him sign trade deals worth almost 2 billion euros, took him to Germany, Spain, Brussels and the World Economic Forum at Davos, Switzerland. | | | French PM outlines stimulus plan measures
French Prime Minister Francois Fillon has outlined measures included in the government's 26-billion-euro stimulus package. Speaking in the southern city of Lyon, Fillon said some 11 billion euros would go to struggling enterprises. Another 11 billion euros targeted state-funded projects, and 4 billion euros would go to large state-owned companies to upgrade the country's infrastructure. Earlier on Monday, Finance Minister Christine Lagarde announced that the French economy had shed 45,000 jobs in December, following the loss of 65,000 jobs in November. | | | Steinmeier and Clinton to discuss foreign policy in Washington
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier is to hold talks with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Washington on Tuesday. A foreign ministry spokesman said the meeting would focus on a broad range of trans-atlantic issues, including the global economic crisis as well as the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan. Another issue was expected to be whether Germany will agree to take in detainees released from the US prison camp at Guantanamo in Cuba. The US, which is looking to close the camp by the end of the year, has made no formal request to Germany. The government in Berlin is divided on the issue. | | | Mugabe agrees visit by UN humanitarian team
President Robert Mugabe has agreed to allow a top-level United Nations team to visit Zimbabwe to find ways of curbing a cholera epidemic and a hunger crisis. UN chief Ban Ki-moon told reporters that he met Sunday with Mugabe on the sidelines of the African Union summit in the Ethiopian capital. The meeting came three days after the country's main opposition agreed to form a unity government with Morgan Tsvangirai serving as prime minister. The UN says the cholera epidemic has killed more than 3,000 people in Zimbabwe, while seven million people -- more than half the population -- need emergency food aid. | | | EU presses for the release of all hostages in Colombia
The European Union has demanded that left-wing FARC rebels in Colombia release all hostages. EU Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said the recent freeing of four hostages had to be followed up immediately by further steps. Ferrero-Waldner said the kidnappings were a clear violation of human rights. FARC is holding 700 hostages. The FARC rebels have promised to free two politicians by Wednesday. They were kidnapped in 2001 and 2002. In 2008 Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt and 14 other hostages were freed by the Colombian army from a rebel camp in the jungle. | | | NKorea vows to keep nuclear arsenal
North Korea's military is threatening to keep its nuclear weapons until the United States removes its nuclear threat from the southern part of the Korean peninsula. The North has accused the US of secretly deploying nuclear weapons in the South, a claim that both Seoul and Washington officials have denied. The North Korean threat comes just three days after Pyongyang announced it would scrap a non-aggression pact and all other peace accords with South Korea. The North's recent policy shift constitutes a severe blow to stalled disarmaments talks. A six-nation deal signed in February 2007 offers the North energy aid, normalised ties with Washington and a permanent peace pact if it dismantles its atomic plants and hands over all nuclear weapons and material. | | | | | |  | | |  Up-to-date news at DW-WORLD.DE | | | | | | |  | | | Note
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Israel Conducts Retaliatory Airstrikes on Gaza Tunnels, Police Post
