Middle Orient News

BAGHDAD (Reuters) — President George W. Bush said during a surprise trip to Baghdad on Tuesday he was encouraged by Iraq’s new government but warned of difficult times ahead, as Al Qaeda in Iraq vowed retaliation for the death of its leader.

BRUSSELS — Still ruffled by the furor over the Prophet Mohammad cartoons, the European Union is refining a communication strategy in an effort to help stop disenchanted Muslim youths turning to terrorism.

RIYADH — A stock market crash and an invigorated Islamist lobby appear to have stymied progress on political reforms in ultraconservative Saudi Arabia, analysts and diplomats say.

CAMP GOUROUKOUN, Chad (Reuters) — Mohammad Ibrahim, 18, waited patiently in the boiling sun to show United Nations Security Council ambassadors the welts burned into his back and head by Sudan’s marauding Janjaweed Arab militiamen.

MOGADISHU (Reuters) — More than 1,000 Islamist fighters deployed to a strategic camp north of Mogadishu on Sunday, witnesses said, sparking fears of a new offensive against warlords.

BAGHDAD (AP) — The American military flew in two forensic specialists Saturday to examine the body of slain Al Qaeda chieftain Abu Mussab Zarqawi “to see how he actually died” in an effort to reconstruct the last minutes of his life, a US general said.

BAGHDAD (AP) — Sunni Arab insurgents on Saturday displayed the videotaped beheading of three men — alleged members of a Shiite death squad — signalling their determination to fight on despite the  death of Abu Mussab Zarqawi.

 The Iraqi prime minister has announced the killing of al-Qaeda chief in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.   Nuri al-Maliki announced the killing of Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the head of an organisation known as al-Qaeda in the Land of Two Rivers, at a news conference in Baghdad broadcast live by Iraqi state and …

Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s older brother says the family had anticipated the death of the al-Qaeda in Iraq leader for some time.

DAMASCUS (AP) — Syria’s state-run media on Saturday implicitly blamed the recent militant attack in Damascus on the United States, Israel and their supporters in the region.