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India:
The bodies of two people are seen inside a police
car at one of the sites of a series of bomb blasts
which tore through crowded markets in the
northwestern Indian city of Jaipur on May 13, 2008.
A series of seven bombs tore through crowded markets
in the Indian tourist city of Jaipur late May 13,
killing at least 80 people and wounding 150 in what
police said was a terror attack.
l
AFP Photo |
Seven
bombs kill 80 in Indian tourist city
AFP, Jaipur
Seven near-simultaneous bomb blasts tore through crowded
markets in the Indian tourist city of Jaipur Tuesday,
killing at least 80 people and wounding 200 in what police
said was a terror attack.
"We have information that 80 people have died," Rajasthan
state home minister Gulab Chand Kataria told reporters.
"One suspect was detained and is being investigated," he
added in Jaipur, the state capital.
One of the explosions went off near a packed Hindu temple,
leaving pools of blood outside in the street and cycles
and rickshaws in a mangled heap, television pictures
showed.
Among the 80 dead were a 10-year-old boy at the Hanuman
(monkey god) temple, a bride in a bright red saree still
wearing marriage bangles and a young man covered in blood
who was left hanging over the twisted wreckage of a
bicycle rickshaw, the Press Trust of India said.
Shopping bags, bloodied sandals and shoes were strewn
around Johri bazaar, one of the hit markets, which
security forces cleared quickly for fear of further
blasts.
One live bomb was found attached to a bicycle at one of
the explosion sites and was defused, police said.
Government officials usually blame Islamic militants based
in Pakistan for such attacks, which have plagued India in
recent years.
Junior home minister Shriprakash Jaiswal told reporters,
"The people responsible for these attacks have foreign
connections," but he refused to point a finger directly at
traditional foe Pakistan.
Press Trust of India, which said 200 had been injured,
quoted a statement from Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf
Raza Gilani saying his country, "condemns all acts of
terrorism and reaffirms its firm commitment to fight this
scourge together with the international community."
Police said seven blasts occurred within minutes of each
other during the evening in crowded markets of old walled
Jaipur, about 260 kilometres (160 miles) from New Delhi.
"It's a terror attack. There was no (intelligence) report
of this," police director general A.S. Gill told
reporters.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh condemned the blasts and
appealed for calm, while the United States immediately
condemned the wave of bombings.
"We're still collecting some information about this. But
given the facts that we know now, quite clearly these
bombs were intended to claim innocent life and it's
something that we very clearly condemn," US state
department spokesman Sean McCormack said.
Historic Jaipur, which has a population of more than two
million, is one of India's top tourist resorts and a
favourite attraction for foreigners.
Jaipur is popularly known as the 'pink city' because of
the ochre-pink hue of its hill top forts, Hindu
maharajah's palaces and crenellated city walls.
State borders were sealed and a high alert sounded in
Rajasthan state and neighbouring areas, police said.
150 rebels killed in Afghan operation
AFP, Kandahar
International and Afghan troops forged ahead with an
offensive against the Taliban near the Pakistan border on
Tuesday, with a governor insisting 150 rebels had been
killed in the past week.
US Marines and British troops under NATO command launched
a significant new operation two weeks ago in Garmser
district in southern Helmand province, a key battleground
for a Taliban-led insurgency and an opium-producing
centre.
Soldiers in a separate US-led coalition have also reported
several engagements in the area in the past week. They
said Tuesday they had killed a dozen rebels in Garmser on
Monday.
The international forces helping Afghanistan fight an
insurgency led by the Al-Qaeda-backed Taliban normally do
not issue death tolls from their engagements, saying they
want to avoid a "body count."
But Helmand governor Gulab Mangal told AFP on Tuesday that
150 Islamic rebels, most of whom he said were
Al-Qaeda-linked Arab and Pakistani fighters, had been
killed in military action in Garmser in the past week.
"In the past seven, eight days, we have killed about 150
insurgents, most of them foreign fighters," he said,
citing "intelligence."
"We have intelligence reports that more than 500 enemy
fighters, most of them foreign terrorists, are in the
district," he said. "The operation will continue until the
district is cleared of these destructive elements."
The Afghan army, operating with some of the international
deployments, could not be reached for comment. NATO's
International Security Assistance Force could not verify
the numbers. "The Marines continue to gain ground down in
Helmand," ISAF Major Martin O'Donnell told AFP, adding
that he could not comment on death tolls.
The Marines said: "While we are continuing operations to
clear the Taliban from the Garmser district, it is not
ISAF nor US Military policy to comment on enemy casualties
as we do not consider this a reliable measure of success."
Information is difficult to independently confirm in
Garmser, a remote desert province where there are few
roads and government authority is limited.
The military says Garmser is a rebel gateway into
Afghanistan, bring fresh recruits and weapons from
Pakistan where extremist rebels are said to have bases.
Pakistan facing crisis as Sharif’s party quits cabinet
AFP, Islamabad
Pakistan faced a new political crisis on Tuesday after
former premier Nawaz Sharif pulled his party's ministers
out of the country's six-week-old coalition government,
officials said.
The nine ministers from Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz
(PML-N) stepped down after the coalition failed to meet a
Monday deadline on how and when to reinstate judges sacked
by President Pervez Musharraf last year.
The eventual reinstatement of the judges is likely to
cause a major headache for embattled former army chief
Musharraf, a key US ally, who considers them hostile to
his rule.
The ministers had submitted their resignations to Prime
Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, PML-N spokesman Siddiqul
Farooq said, insisting they would only return if the
Pakistan People's Party took "concrete" steps to resolve
the issue. "If the PPP takes concrete steps to restore the
judiciary to the position of November 2 (before emergency
rule), we will revert to our party's central working
committee to seek advice given the changed circumstances,"
he told AFP.
"Our ministers may rejoin the cabinet if so advised." The
move is likely to trigger political uncertainty, although
Sharif insisted on Monday that his party would continue to
support the government of Gilani, who had not yet accepted
the resignations, according to state media.
The Pakistan People's Party (PPP) of slain former premier
Benazir Bhutto, the senior partner in the coalition that
swept into power following February general elections,
said it hoped the PML-N ministers would soon return.
"Let's wait and try to resolve the matter," Gilani told
the outgoing ministers, saying Pakistan was in the grip of
a "serious crisis."
"We are determined to take the nation out of the crisis,
with the cooperation of our allies," state media quoted
him as saying, appealing to the judiciary to show "some
flexibility" to stave off political upheaval.
Gilani also spoke to Sharif by telephone, who told him
that the decision to pull his party from government was
"painful," and that he would continue to cooperate with
the government.
Musharraf, who came to power following a coup in 1999,
deposed chief justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry and
dozens of other judges in November when it appeared they
might overturn his re-election as president the month
before. The judges were also to rule on a decree issued by
Musharraf granting amnesty to political leaders charged
with corruption. PPP co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari,
Bhutto's widower, himself is a beneficiary of the law.
Sharif and Zardari agreed in March to restore the judges,
but differences quickly arose over how to put them back on
the bench. A series of crunch talks between the two sides
failed to resolve the stalemate.
"We have no differences with the PML-N over the
restoration of the judiciary. The only point of
disagreement is the method of restoration,"
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Myanmar:
Survivors of the cyclone Nargis queue behind a truck
in hope to get relief food in Bogalay on May 13,
2008. The United Nations warned on May 13 that
Myanmar may face a "second catastrophe" after its
devastating cyclone, unless the junta immediately
allows massive air and sea deliveries of aid.
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AFP Photo |
UN warns of ‘second catastrophe’ in Myanmar
AFP, Yangon
The United Nations warned
Tuesday that Myanmar faced a "second catastrophe" after
its devastating cyclone, unless the junta immediately
allows massive air and sea deliveries of aid.
But Myanmar's military rulers again rejected growing
international pressure to open the door to a foreign-run
relief effort, insisting against all the evidence that
they could handle the emergency alone.
The United Nations aired its "increasing frustration" at
not being able to bring more help to 1.5 million of the
neediest survivors, and said the crisis in the country's
remote, flooded south posed an "enormous logistic
challenge."
It requires "at least an air or sea corridor to channel
aid in large quantities as quickly as possible," said
Elisabeth Byrs, spokeswoman in Geneva for the UN's
emergency relief arm. "We fear a second catastrophe." But
the junta said Tuesday that the needs of the people after
the storm, which has left around 62,000 dead or missing
since ripping through the southern Irrawaddy delta on May
3, "have been fulfilled to an extent."
"The nation does not need skilled relief workers yet,"
Vice Admiral Soe Thein said in the New Light of Myanmar
newspaper, a mouthpiece for the military, which has ruled
the nation with an iron grip for nearly half a century.
Although aid flights are increasing, there are serious
bottlenecks in getting supplies to the delta.
Many survivors said they had still not received help from
the government 10 days after the disaster, and could not
understand why their leaders have snubbed offers of help
that have poured in from around the world.
Aid agencies warn that as every day passes without
sufficient food, water and shelter, more are at risk of
joining the staggering death toll, estimated by the UN at
100,000.
The World Health Organisation said it had dispatched
supplies of body bags, as experts warned that corpses were
going uncollected and that the putrefying remains pose a
major health risk. Heavy rains overnight deepened the
misery for many, seeping through the flimsy plastic
sheeting of makeshift shelters of tens of thousands of
people whose homes were sunk or blown away in the storm.
"These new rains are bringing us more misery," said Taye
Win, a survivor sheltering at a monastery outside the
country's main city Yangon.
Sri Lankan govt needs to act
quickly to consolidate east
AFP, Colombo
The Sri Lankan government may be celebrating a key
election victory in the ethnically-mixed east but it is
still a long way from winning over the island's Tamil
minority, analysts and observers say.
The polls on Saturday saw voters in the east give
President Mahinda Rajapakse's ruling coalition control
over a new provincial council designed to give more
autonomy to the area and address the root cause of civil
war.
To win the polls, the president allied himself with the
Tamil People's Liberation Tigers (TMVP), a controversial
grouping of defectors from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil
Eelam (LTTE) -- the main rebel group.
Unlike the LTTE, which is fighting for a separate
homeland, the TMVP says it trusts the government to
devolve more power to Tamils, many of whom complain of
discrimination by the island's majority Sinhalese
community.
"The challenge now for the government is to show the
Tamils that it is sincere with mass development," said
Dharmalingam Sithadthan, who leads a Colombo-based Tamil
party.
But he said the catch was that the TMVP remained very much
a militia-albeit a pro-government one-and the government
needed to accept that many Tamils in the east supported it
out of fear.
"As long as they (TMVP) have the gun, Tamil people had no
choice but to vote for the TMVP. Whoever had the weapons,
won the elections," Sithadthan told AFP. "The LTTE created
the fear psychosis. Now you have another group that has
taken over and is doing the same thing."
Parts of the east were under LTTE control prior to a major
government offensive last year.
Rajapakse formally revoked a moribund truce with the
rebels in January, and government troops are currently
pushing into the north, part of which is in rebel hands.
The president has hailed the provincial council election
win as "a clear mandate for peace through the defeat of
terrorism, the strengthening of democracy and the
development of the country."
But others remain unconvinced. "The government is showing
the win as show of faith from eastern Tamils to carry on
with their military strategy," said political columnist
Dilrukshi Handunetti.
"But they (voters) have endorsed the government's promises
under the shadow of the gun. Its not a legitimate
victory," she said of the polls, the first in the region
in 20 years and touted as proof normality has returned to
the once war-ravaged, tsunami-hit region.
Philippines urges removal from UN child soldiers
list
AFP, Manila
The Philippines has urged its removal from the UN's list
of countries with child soldiers, stressing that it
condemns the practice by various rebel groups, the foreign
department said Wednesday.
Hilario Davide, Manila's envoy to the UN, made the call
during a meeting of the UN Security Council Working Group
on Children and Armed Conflict in New York on May 8, it
said.
Davide said the Philippines has put in place a "legal
firewall for the protection of children" and advised the
UN to focus on countries "facing worse circumstances"
involving child soldiers.
"The Philippines condemns non-state actors in the country
who recruit, abduct, and use children, yet deny their
illegal and unjustifiable deeds," Davide said.
The Philippines was listed in 2005 through a Security
Council resolution over reports that the communist New
People's Army (NPA), the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF)
and the Abu Sayyaf used children as combatants.
The communist rebels admitted using children in non-combat
duties, although there have been cases of NPA child
soldiers arrested by military intelligence. Children are
also often seen in MILF training camps in the southern
island of Mindanao.
Radhika Coomaraswamy, the UN's special representative for
children in conflict, said the Philippines' listing was
not meant to embarrass the country, but to acknowledge
that the problem exists.
Coomaraswamy cited a United Nations Children's Fund
(UNICEF) study saying that the MILF adopts orphans to
train as fighters, while the NPA is known to employ
children as porters, cooks and couriers.
The 12,000-strong MILF has been waging a rebellion since
1978 for an independent Islamic state in Mindanao. Talks
with the group were suspended last year. The NPA meanwhile
has been waging a low-intensity Maoist insurgency since
1969.
More than 250 dead in rebel attack on Khartoum
AFP, Khartoum
Almost 100 Sudanese soldiers were killed along with at
least 91 Darfur rebels and 34 civilians in several days of
fighting during an unprecedented assault on Khartoum, the
army said on Tuesday.
An army spokesman giving official casualty figures for the
first time said that the army had been battling the rebel
force since Wednesday as it headed from the western region
of Darfur to the capital in at least 150 vehicles.
The assault by the Justice and Equality Movement, the most
powerful of the rebel groups in Darfur, saw the insurgents
reach Khartoum's twin city of Omdurman on Saturday with
the declared intent of toppling the regime.
"Ninety-seven Sudanese security forces were killed,
including four officers, in Omdurman and other battles,"
the spokesman told reporters, asking not to be named.
He said that 91 rebels, which he referred to as "Chadian
forces" following allegations of Ndjamena's involvement,
were killed in Omdurman and "a lot more" in battles
outside the city.
He said that 34 civilians were killed in the fighting in
Omdurman, just across the Nile from the seat of power in
Khartoum, including two Egyptians and two Senegalese. He
could not say how many civilians were wounded.
The army captured 68 rebel vehicles and destroyed 75, he
said, some of them outside the capital and Omdurman.
He said that two Sudanese soldiers were still missing. He
said he had no figures on how many had been wounded.
Meanwhile, the UN Security Council on Tuesday condemned a
deadly weekend rebel attack on Khartoum that killed more
than 200 people and called on all sides to cease
hostilities.
"The Security Council strongly condemns the attacks of 10
May perpetrated by the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM)
against the Sudanese Government in Omdurman, and urges all
parties to cease violence immediately," said British
ambassador John Sawers, whose country holds the rotating
presidency this month.
The 15-member body also "urges restraint by all parties,
and in particular, warns that no retaliatory action should
be taken against civilian populations, or that has an
impact on stability in the region," the council's
declaration said.
Ninety-seven Sudanese soldiers were killed along with at
least 91 Darfur rebels and 34 civilians in several days of
fighting during an unprecedented assault on Khartoum, the
army said on Tuesday.
The assault by the JEM, the most powerful of the rebel
groups in Darfur, saw the insurgents reach Khartoum's twin
city of Omdurman on Saturday with the declared intent of
toppling the regime.
Khartoum has accused neighboring Chad of backing the
rebels and severed ties after Saturday's attack. Chad had
denied any implication and closed its porous border with
Sudan on Monday.
Relations have been tense between the two countries since
2003 when war broke out in Darfur, sending hundreds of
thousands of desperate refugees fleeing across the Chadian
border.
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UNITED STATES: Democratic presidential
hopeful Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) addresses a
primary night rally at the Charleston Civic Center
May 13, 2008 in Charleston, West Virginia. Clinton
cruised to a crushing win over Barack Obama in West
Virginia's primary, but the win was not sufficient
to upset the mathematical equation in the race,
which Obama leads by every metric -- pledged
delegates, party insiders or superdelegates, the
popular vote and nominating contests won.
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AFP Photo |
Hillary wins West Virginia, vows not to quit
AFP, Charleston
Hillary
Clinton scored a crushing win over Barack Obama in West
Virginia's primary Tuesday and vowed to fight on, despite
doing little to loosen his stranglehold on the Democratic
White House race.
Clinton piled up a two-to-one winning ratio over Obama as
votes were counted, in a contest which highlighted
African-American Obama's struggle to win white, working
class voters who will play a key role in November's
general election.
"You will never quit, and I won't either," Clinton told
cheering supporters at her victory rally here.
"There are some who have wanted to cut this race short,"
Senator Clinton said.
"I am more determined than ever to carry on with this
campaign until everyone has had their chance to make their
voices heard," she said, in a apparent hint she will carry
on through the five remaining nominating contests.
With 56 percent of the votes in, Clinton led Senator Obama
by 65 percent to 28 percent in the poor, mountainous
state.
But with only 28 of the 2,025 pledged delegates needed for
the nomination, the West Virginia contest was not
sufficient to upset the mathematical equation in the race,
which Obama leads by every metric-pledged delegates, party
insiders or superdelegates, the popular vote and
nominating contests won.
Clinton was conciliatory towards her rival, saying "I
deeply admire Senator Obama," adding that she would
support the nominee of her party in November.
But she also bluntly stated her belief that she was the
best candidate to lead the Democrats against Republican
John McCain in the November presidential election.
"I am in this race because I believe I am the strongest
candidate to lead our party in November of 2008, and the
strongest president to lead our nation starting in January
of 2009."
Obama had already conceded the primary and was in the
general-election battleground of Missouri as results came
in, as he geared up for a contest with McCain.
Clinton meanwhile fired off a fundraising appeal within an
hour of polls closing, underscoring her desperate need for
cash to carry on.
Exit polls cited by MSNBC showed that Clinton won white
voters by 68 percent to 28 for Obama, and won 72 percent
of those earning less than 50,000 dollars, compared to her
foe's 24 percent.
China quake toll soars as full horror begins to emerge
AFP, Dujiangyan
The full horror of the devastating China earthquake began
to emerge Wednesday as rescuers discovered whole towns all
but wiped off the map, pushing the death toll well above
20,000.
Military and police teams punched into the heart of the
disaster zone, with 100 troops parachuting into a county
that was previously cut off while planes and helicopters
air-dropped emergency supplies.
But the message that came back from this mountainous
corner of southwestern Sichuan province was that town
after town was flattened by the 7.9-magnitude quake that
struck two days ago. The death toll has soared well above
20,000, but that toll is rising by the hour as more
information comes in from stricken communities.
"The losses have been severe," Wang Yi, who heads an armed
police unit sent into the epicentre zone, was quoted as
saying by Sichuan Online news site.
"Some towns basically have no houses left. They have all
been razed to the ground."
At least 7,700 people died in the small town of Yingxiu
alone, state media cited a local government official as
saying, with only 2,300 surviving.
Across Sichuan, countless thousands more people are
missing or buried under the rubble of shattered homes,
schools and factories.
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said 100,000 military personnel
and police had been mobilised, indicating the epic scale
of the country's worst earthquake in a generation.
The air drop started with planes and helicopters flying
dozens of sorties, dropping tonnes of food and relief aid
into the worst-hit zone, most of it cut off from the
outside world by landslides and road closures.
The destruction around the epicentre in remote Wenchuan
county is massive, with whole mountainsides sheared off,
highways ripped apart and building after building levelled.
Rescue teams have been seen pulling bodies and badly
injured survivors out of the ruins.
As well as Yingxiu, CCTV television said air drops were
also made in nearby Mianyang-where the death toll jumped
to nearly 5,500 -- as well as Mianzhu and Pengzhou.
Helicopters also flew to Wenchuan with food, drinks,
tents, communications equipment and other supplies.
The rescue effort has been badly disrupted since Monday by
heavy rain, and the Meteorological Authority forecasting
more later in the week, raising the risk of fresh
landslides.
Lebanon army ready to use force to halt fighting
AFP, Beirut
A precarious calm returned to Lebanon on Tuesday after the
army warned it was ready to use force to restore order
after six days of sectarian bloodshed that have shaken the
nation.
US President George W. Bush, on the eve of a trip to the
Middle East, warned Iran and Syria that the international
community would not allow Lebanon to fall under foreign
domination again and vowed to shore up the Lebanese
military.
The fighting, which has left at least 62 people dead and
close to 200 wounded, is the worst sectarian unrest since
the 1975-1990 civil war and has stoked fears the country
was headed for another all-out conflict.
After being ordered not to intervene to protect its
neutrality in deeply divided Lebanon, the army said it was
prepared to resort to force to disarm gunmen and bring an
end to the violence between supporters of the
Western-backed government and Hezbollah-led opposition
fighters. No major incidents were reported on Tuesday
although fierce battles had erupted briefly overnight in
northern port city of Tripoli.
In Beirut, the situation was calm, schools reopened and
traffic was slowly returning to normal although some
stores remained shut.
Several highways were still blocked by Hezbollah-led
Shiite protests including the one to Lebanon's only
international airport which remained closed to normal
flights, forcing most of those wishing to leave to do so
by road to Syria or by boat to Cyprus.
"The civil disobedience campaign will only end when Prime
Minister Fuad Siniora officially rescinds his decisions
and when his camp returns to the negotiating table," an
official with Hezbollah ally Amal told AFP.
That brought a sharp response from the leader of the
pro-government bloc in parliament, Saad Hariri, who vowed
not to negotiate "with a pistol aimed at our heads. This
will not happen even if they fire at us," he insisted.
The latest unrest, which dramatically raised the stakes in
an 18-month standoff between the majority and the
opposition, erupted after a government crackdown against
Hezbollah which the powerful militant group said amounted
to a declaration of war.
Zimbabwe violence could reach crisis levels: UN
AFP, Harare
The UN warned
on Tuesday that post-election violence in Zimbabwe was
rising to near crisis levels ahead of a planned
presidential run-off, with opposition supporters bearing
the brunt of attacks.
As opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai prepared to return
home to contest the election against President Robert
Mugabe, his hopes the ballot would be held later this
month in a peaceful atmosphere appeared to be wishful
thinking.
With Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change claiming
32 of its supporters have been killed since voting on
March 29, the United Nations resident representative in
Zimbabwe said most of the violence was directed against
followers of the opposition, although the MDC was not
blameless.
"There is an emerging pattern of political violence
inflicted mainly but not exclusively on rural supporters
of the MDC," Agustino Zacarias told reporters, adding that
there were "indications that the level of violence is
escalating ... and could reach crisis levels."
Announcing plans to return home this week, Tsvangirai said
at a news conference on Saturday that he would only
participate in the run-off if there was a complete end to
unrest. He also called for a revamp of the electoral
commission and the deployment of international
peacekeepers and foreign observers, but these demands have
been brushed aside by the government.
"The United Nations country team urges all political
leaders across the political divide to unequivocally
renounce politically-motivated violence," added Zacarias,
a Mozambican diplomat.
Keen to see evidence of the attacks on opposition
supporters with their own eyes, a group of Western
ambassadors visited a number of hospitals on Tuesday where
they chatted with victims.
"I think it is absolutely urgent that the entire world
knows what's happening in Zimbabwe," US Ambassador James
McGee told an AFP correspondent accompanying the
diplomats.
On a visit to one of the hospitals, McGee became embroiled
in a stand-off with four armed police who tried to prevent
him from leaving the grounds before relenting.
"If on two occasions, you are questioned for nearly two
hours by security officials, yes, it is harassment," State
Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters in
Washington, adding the incident was "indicative of the
kind of atmosphere in Zimbabwe right now."
The post-election tension has been mounting by the day,
with an opposition lawmaker and the country's two most
senior trade unionists among those who are currently in
custody.
Iran rules out talks on nuclear
‘rights’
AFP, Tehran
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Tuesday Iran is
ready to talk to world powers over global problems but
ruled out negotiations over Tehran's nuclear "rights".
"We are ready for talks to resolve world problems and
alleviate concerns," Ahmadinejad said in response to a
question about a new proposal that world powers are to put
forward to resolve the long-running nuclear standoff.
"We are ready to examine with a positive view others'
propositions, wherever they come from, and give our
opinion," he said.
But asked if Iran would suspend sensitive uranium
enrichment work during talks with the world powers,
Ahmadinejad said it would refuse to "discuss its rights"
in the nuclear programme.
"All we want is our rights and nothing more."
Iran insists it has the right to enrich uranium to make
nuclear fuel and has so far defied UN Security Council
resolutions which demand a halt to the work.
Highly enriched uranium can also make the fissile core of
an atom bomb but Iran insists its nuclear programme is
peaceful and has vehemently denied allegation of seeking
to make atomic weapons.
Permanent Security Council members Britain, China, France,
Russia and the United States plus Germany have agreed on a
"reviewed and updated" offer initially made to Iran in
2006, including economic, security and technological
rewards.
No details of the new offer have yet been made public,
although Russia has said it asks Iran to suspend uranium
enrichment during talks on the proposal.
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