World Digest
Afghanistan freed of terror, Karzai says

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Karzai, the winner of Oct. 9 elections which made him the country's first democratically elected leader, told CNN in an interview that his government was working around the clock to free the hostages and said he was not concerned about the spillover of "copycat terrorism" from Iraq.

"In my opinion, and also in the opinion of many, many Afghans, events in Afghanistan have proven that terrorism has no place in here, that it's defeated, that it's gone," he said. "The remnants of terrorism that might come and try to explode bombs or assassinate people, that's something that we will have to fight for a long time in Afghanistan and in the region and in the rest of the world."

Two of three U.N. workers kidnapped in Afghanistan called home to reassure relatives they are all right, as negotiators tried yesterday to secure their release after 12 days in the hands of Taliban-linked militants.

Tokyo

Japan's navy on alert for foreign submarine

Japan's navy forces went on alert early today after a foreign submarine was briefly spotted in its territorial waters, the government's top spokesman said.

The sub's country of origin and other details could not immediately be determined.

A reconnaissance aircraft confirmed the submarine had entered Japanese territorial waters near the Sakishima islands in southern Okinawa prefecture but that it later left, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda said.

In December 2001, Japanese Coast Guard patrol boats sank a suspected North Korean spy ship in a gunbattle off southwestern Japan.

Bangkok, Thailand
 
Buddhist laborer slain by suspected militants

Suspected Islamic militants beheaded a Buddhist laborer in Thailand's tumultuous south, police said yesterday, the second such killing in retaliation for the deaths of 85 Muslims at the hands of security forces last month.

At least 85 Muslim protesters died Oct. 25 when security forces cracked down on a violent demonstration outside a police station in Narathiwat province. Most of the victims suffocated or were crushed after they were arrested and crammed into army trucks.

A deadly separatist insurgency has simmered for years in the Muslim-majority southern provinces, where Muslim residents cite discrimination and heavy-handed tactics by officials leading the predominantly Buddhist country.

Nyala, Sudan

Officials take steps to end Darfur conflict

With violence increasing and political pressure mounting to end conflict in Sudan's Darfur region, the government agreed yesterday to halt military flights over the region and signed a separate agreement to allow free access to aid for the nearly 2 million people displaced by the violence.

At peace talks in the Nigerian capital of Abuja, the government agreed to disarm allied militia fighters known as the Janjaweed. In security agreements signed by the government and rebel parties, both sides agreed to reveal the location of their forces to African Union cease-fire monitors in a war that the United Nations has called the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

Sudan's decision comes 10 days before a meeting of the U.N. Security Council, which could have imposed sanctions on the country's oil industry or taken other punitive measures because of the worsening security situation on the ground in Darfur.

Bogotá, Colombia

Top drug cop resigns over property scandal

Colombia's top anti-drug official resigned yesterday, two weeks after facing accusations that he rented out luxury properties seized from drug smugglers at below-market prices.

Luis Alfonso Plazas, who worked closely with U.S. anti-drug agencies operating in Colombia, was accused during a Senate debate of approving the lease of confiscated properties at low prices that brought little gain to the state.

In a related development, Gilberto Rodriguez Orejuela, said to have controlled 80 percent of the world cocaine supply in the 1980s and 1990s, will be sent to face charges in the United States under an extradition order signed by Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, a government spokesman said yesterday.

Dublin, Ireland

Lesbians wed in Canada seek Irish recognition

A lesbian couple who wed in Canada can seek to have their union legally recognized in Ireland, a judge ruled yesterday.

High Court Justice Liam McKechnie said lawyers representing Ann Louise Gilligan and Katherine Zappone had presented an arguable case that Ireland's tax collection agency should allow them to file as a married couple rather than as two single people, which involves paying more tax.

The couple were married in British Columbia in September 2003 within months of the legalization of same-sex marriage there.

Also

A fire swept through a farmhouse west of Niagara Falls on Monday night, killing a woman and her seven children, officials said yesterday.

French President Jacques Chirac finally phoned President Bush yesterday to congratulate him a week after his re-election as U.S. president, and his Foreign Minister Michel Barnier called for better transatlantic ties.

A magnitude 5.3 earthquake rocked northern Japan early today in the Niigata prefecture area still recovering from a stronger tremor last month that killed 39 people. One person was injured in the latest quake. The magnitude 6.8 earthquake on Oct. 23 was the deadliest quake to hit Japan since 1995, when a magnitude 7.2 quake killed 6,000 people in Kobe.