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Japan builds steel wall to stop toxic water flow into sea
Mall shootout leaves 6 dead
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Gaddafi forces push towards Ajdabiyah
Tripoli, April 9 After forcing the rebels to retreat from the oil town of Brega, Gaddafi's tanks and heavy artillery are pushing ahead to retake Ajdabiyah which lies midway between Brega and Benghazi. On the western front, Libyan rebels claimed to have pushed back an advance by Gaddafi's forces into Misurata, with five people killed in the fighting for the besieged city. Fierce street fighting was witnessed as Gaddafi's forces mounted an assault on the eastern part of the port city that is the only major rebel stronghold in the west of the country. Reports from the east said rebel fighters came under heavy artillery fire from the advancing government forces in of Ajdabiyah. The last few weeks have seen a military stalemate grow in the east with both sides advancing and retreating across enemy lines. Coming under heavy shelling, the rebels had retreated from the outskirts of Brega and were struggling to hold their ground. In Ajdabiyah as well, intense artillery fire was making lives difficult for the rebels. — PTI
VIOLENCE CONTINUES TO ROCK ARAB WORLD
Security forces killed 37 in Syria, claims rights group
Beirut: A Syrian rights group accused the state security forces today of committing a crime against humanity, saying they had killed at least 37 persons during yesterday’s demonstrations across the country. The National Organisation for Human Rights said 30 persons were killed in the southern city of Deraa, the centre of protests. Three more persons died in the central city of Homs and three in Harasta, a Damascus suburb, as well as one in Douma. — Reuters
In Yemen, death toll up
Sanaa: Protesters kept up the heat on President Ali Abdullah Saleh today as deaths mounted in the flashpoint city of Taez, even as a dissident general denied aiming to replace the Yemeni leader. — PTI
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In France, burqa ban takes effect tomorrow
While some other countries and territories have drawn up bans on the burqa and the niqab, France — home to Europe's largest Muslim population — will be the first to risk stirring social tensions by putting one into practice. The law comes into effect at an already fraught moment in relations between the state and France's Muslim minority, with President Nicolas Sarkozy accused of stigmatising Islam to win back votes from a resurgent far right. French officials estimate that only around 2,000 women, from a total Muslim population estimated at between four and six million, wear a niqab or a burqa, full-face veils that are traditional in parts of Arabia and South Asia. But many Muslims and rights watchdogs accuse Sarkozy of targeting one of France's most vulnerable and isolated groups to signal to anti-immigration voters that he shares their fear that Islam is a threat to French culture. Other critics worry the law may be hard to enforce, since it had to be drawn up without reference to religion to ban any kind of face covering in public and since police officers will not be allowed to remove women's head coverings. Many supporters of the law have defended it as a measure not designed to harm Islam, but to support a woman's right to walk unveiled. — AFP
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Japan builds steel wall to stop toxic water flow into sea
Tokyo/Fukushima, April 9 In the first high-level visit to the crippled plant in Fukushima prefecture, Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Banri Kaieda met workers trying to stabilise the facility, which was damaged by the March 11 quake and tsunami that left nearly 30,000 persons dead or unaccounted for. The minister also met Fukushima Governor Yuhei Sato. The plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), also continued to pump nitrogen, an inert gas, into the No.1 reactor to prevent more hydrogen blasts at the facility, which was rocked by two such radiation-leaking explosions last month. The engineers launched the task of building a 120-metre wide wall of steel sheets to form a 'silt curtain' for the radioactive material.
— Reuters
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Mall shootout leaves 6 dead
AMSTERDAM: Six persons were killed and at least 13 injured in a shooting incident at a shopping mall in the Dutch town of Alphen aan den Rijn on Saturday. “A man with an automatic weapon, whose identity we cannot reveal, started shooting and killed five persons and then himself," said Mayor Bas Eenhoorn. Eenhoorn called the shooting "unprecedented." —
Reuters
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Muammar Gaddafi's forces today pushed ahead towards the eastern town of
Ajdabiyah, the gateway to the opposition stronghold of Benghazi.
Cairo: At least two persons were killed and scores wounded today when Egyptian military stormed the capital’s Tahrir Square to clear the protesters, signalling that the bonhomie between them had turned sour in just over two months.The Army opened fire after demonstrators burnt cars. — PTI
Paris, April 9