Abdullah Gul

ANKARA, Turkey, Nov. 6--Turkey’s president said Tuesday his country “has decided“ on how to proceed against Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq and had informed the United States.
The US and Iraq have been pressing Turkey to avoid a major cross-border attack on Kurdish Workers’ Party, or PKK, rebel bases in northern Iraq out of fear such an incursion would bring instability to what has been one of the calmest areas in Iraq, reported AP.
President Abdullah Gul did not specify what decision had been made regarding an attack, but made clear that Turkey feels that the PKK is leading to instability in the region itself.
“Iraq’s stability cannot be limited to fighting terrorism in Baghdad or other regions,“ he said. “The terrorist organization in the north is also disrupting Iraq’s stability.“
The comments come the day after President Bush met in Washington with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and promised him that the United States would share military intelligence in the hunt for PKK rebels.
Gul said part of Erdogan’s goal in his trip was to share with the United States the decision that the country has made on how to deal with the rebels.
“Turkey had made its preparations and had decided what to do on the issue before the prime minister left,“ he said.
PKK rebels have killed more than 40 Turks in hit-and-run attacks over the past month, mainly soldiers, raising the public pressure on Erdogan to retaliate.

BEIRUT, Lebanon, Nov. 6--Thousands of Hezbollah fighters staged secret military maneuvers without weapons or uniforms near Israel’s border in southern Lebanon, a pro-Hezbollah Lebanese newspaper reported Monday.
The Lebanese government downplayed the report as probably just a simulation.
Al-Akhbar, a pro-Hezbollah newspaper, said Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah personally supervised the maneuvers, which it reported were carried out in the last three days and were the biggest ever staged on Israel’s border by the Shiite Muslim militant group, AP reported.
Hezbollah officials declined to comment. However, a Hezbollah legislator, Hassan Fadlallah, said it was only “natural“ that the group be fully ready to confront any possible Israeli attack.
“Clearly, we will not let Israel carry out aggression against Lebanon and we sit still,“ he told Lebanese Broadcasting Corp. television, referring to the increased Israeli military flights over southern Lebanon in recent days.
Prime Minister Fuad Saniora, speaking to AP Television News at government headquarters, said authorities checked with military and police units as well as UN peacekeepers and “they confirmed nothing on the ground really happened.“
“It was, let’s say, a simulation probably, in an operation room, on the desk, probably they did such a thing,“ he said. “This has been confirmed by all the sources.“
He noted there was no statement issued by Hezbollah confirming the reported maneuvers.
The alleged maneuvers came a few days after Israel held major military exercises in the north of the country near the Lebanese border.
The Israeli action was interpreted by some Lebanese media as preparation by the Israel for a possible new war with Hezbollah.

NABLUS, Occupied Palestine, Nov. 6--Israeli troops arrested a political leader and an MP from the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas in separate raids in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday, security officials said.
Troops picked up Maher Al-Kharraz, a Hamas political leader, and six other wanted suspects during an operation in the northern West Bank, Palestinian security officials said.
An Israeli army spokesman said six wanted operatives were detained in Nablus in the northern West Bank, AFP reported.
In Hebron, in the south, troops arrested Hamas lawmaker Hatem Qafisheh, Palestinian security officials said.
Israel had released the MP earlier this year after holding him for six months without pressing charges.
In May, the United States voiced concern over Israeli arrests of 33 Hamas leaders in the West Bank, including elected government and parliament members.
Last year, Israel arrested more than 60 Hamas officials in a massive crackdown after Palestinian militants captured an Israeli soldier and killed another two in a cross-border raid from the Gaza Strip.
About 30 of the officials remain in detention.

African children pose at an orphanage in the Chadian town of Abeche, Nov. 5.

KHARTOUM, Sudan, Nov. 6--The top UN humanitarian official in Sudan, Ameera Haq, condemned European aid workers who tried to take 103 African children from Chad to Europe, saying it contravened UN principles.
The French charity Zoe’s Ark arranged the operation, telling European foster families that they were bringing orphans from Sudan’s Darfur region, which borders Chad, reported Reuters.
But UN and Chadian officials said most of the children were from the Chad side of the border with at least one family member they considered a parent.
“I strongly condemn the actions of the organization ... attempting to remove children from Chad,“ Haq said in a statement issued late on Monday.
“Such actions contravene all international laws and standards on the movement of children and infringe on the humanitarian principles we stand for as the United Nations.“
Relations are tense between the Sudanese government and aid agencies involved in the world’s largest aid operation, helping more than 4 million people in Darfur.
Many in the aid community feel the actions of Zoe’s Ark could make their work harder, increasing suspicion of foreigners working in Sudan.
“In Chad and in Sudan, the UN and national and international organizations have been effectively responding to humanitarian needs,“ Haq added.
“We must continue to work together with partners in government to ensure that advances in child protection, health and education are not derailed by the actions of an individual organization.“
Almost 300,000 Darfuri refugees fled across the long and porous border to Chad after mostly non-Arab rebels took up arms against central government in early 2003, accusing it of neglect.
The violence has also bled across the frontier, with the spread of arms feeding a low-level insurgency in Chad’s east.

VATICAN CITY,
Nov. 6--King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia had a historic audience on Tuesday with Pope Benedict XVI on the first official visit to the Holy See by a monarch from the ultra-conservative Muslim kingdom.
The two octogenarians met for half an hour, conversing through interpreters, AFP reported.
Abdullah offered the 80-year-old Benedict a gold sword encrusted with stones and accepted a 16th-century engraving of the Vatican from the pope.
Afterward the 84-year-old Saudi monarch, who was accompanied by a 12-strong delegation, met with the Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone.
Abdullah had arrived in Rome late Monday following visits to Geneva and London.
The Holy See does not have diplomatic ties with Saudi Arabia, which is home to Islam’s holiest shrines in Mecca and Medina and applies a rigorous doctrine of Sunni Islam known as Wahhabism.
Foreign Minister Saud Al-Faisal came to Rome in September to pave the way for the meeting, which had been expected to focus on the rights of Christians in Saudi Arabia and Islamic-Christian relations in general.
Abdullah’s visit comes as relations between the Vatican and the Muslim world have eased since the crisis provoked in September 2006 when Benedict appeared to link Islam with violence in a speech at Regensburg University, Germany.

BEIJING, Nov. 6--China and the US will set up a military hotline, hold high-level nuclear strategy talks and increase joint exercises, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates and his Chinese counterpart, General Cao Gangchuan, said.
According to Bloomberg, the two officials announced the moves today after a meeting in Beijing in which Gates said he pressed Chinese officials, with mixed results, to be more open about the nature and goals of their military modernization program.
Gates said the Chinese agreement to deepen discussions on strategic modernization and nuclear strategy “will provide the opportunity, at least, for us to address the issues of transparency that we have discussed in the past.“
The limits of this transparency were highlighted when Gates asked his hosts for an explanation of the shooting down in January of a low-earth-orbit weather satellite, which triggered worries that China could target US military satellites.

TBILISI, Georgia, Nov. 6--Thousands of opposition supporters protested for a fourth straight day in Georgia’s capital, briefly encircling parliament and President Mikhail Saakashvili’s office and chanting for him to step down.
Some 20,000 people gathered in front of the parliament building as the standoff persisted in the former Soviet republic, with Saakashvili facing the stiffest challenge since his election following the Rose Revolution four years ago, AP said.
Opponents of Saakashvili--many of them former allies--have led daily rallies on the capital’s main thoroughfare since Friday, when more than 100,000 demonstrated.
Protesters initially demanded the president annul a decision to move next year’s parliamentary elections back by several months and reform the election system, but now they are also calling for his resignation.