At least 75 killed, hundreds injured in Egyptian soccer match riot

At least 75 people have been killed after a riot erupted during an Egyptian League football match in Cairo, the Ministry of Health said on Wednesday.

The ministry also said that at least 200 people were injured after fans chased Al Ahly soccer players after they lost a match to the home team.

The fans cornered supporters on the field in the port city of Port Said and around the stadium, throwing stones and bottles at them.

The game was between Al Ahly, one of Egypt’s most successful clubs, and al-Masry, a team based in Port Said. Live television footage showed fans running onto the field and chasing Ahly soccer players.

Hesham Sheiha, deputy health minister, told state television most of the injuries were caused by concussions and deep cuts, calling the incident “unfortunate.”

“The players’ room has turned into a morgue,” Ahmed Nagy, the team’s goalkeeper coach said on the scene.

Violence at football matches across north Africa has increased significantly since political unrest sweeping across the region began more than a year ago.

Egyptian Islamists, meanwhile, blame supporters of ousted Predisent Hosni Mubarak for the deadly football violence, AFP news agency reports.

Another match in Cairo was halted by the referee after receiving news of the violence in Port Said, prompting fans to set parts of the stadium on fire, television footage showed.

Part of the stadium is currently engulfed in flames, according to live television footage on the Egyptian state channel.

Ahly player Mohamed Abo Treika described the violence as war as Masry fans invaded the pitch after the referee blew the whistle, even though the team had beaten Ahly 3-1.

“This is not football. This is a war and people are dying in front of us. There is no movement and no security and no ambulances,” Abo Treika told the Ahly television channel. “I call for the premier league to be cancelled. This is horrible situation and today can never be forgotten.”

State television quoted Sheiha as saying that most of the injuries were caused by concussion and deep cuts.

The Egyptian parliament is to hold emergency session on Thursday over the Port Said soccer violence.

47 people have been arrested over the deadly incident, Al Arabiya television reported.

Meanwhile, Egypt’s football federation indefinitely delayed premier league matches after the violence, state television reported. Egypt’s parliament would hold an emergency session on Thursday, according to state media reports.

Egypt’s state prosecutors have ordered an investigation into the pitch invasion and the violence that ensued, judicial sources told Reuters news agency.

Taliban deny reports of talk with Afghan officials

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- The Taliban have denied reports that they are planning to send representatives to meet with Afghan government officials in Saudi Arabia. Rumors have swirled for days that President Hamid Karzai's government was seeking direct talks to be held in the kingdom. A statement Wednesday from Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid says those reports are "baseless." Mujahid says negotiations to end the 10-year-old war cannot begin until trust is established between the Islamist militants and the U.S. and its international coalition. He says that process has not started. The Taliban have so far expressed willingness only to talk with the U.S., calling the Afghan government a puppet. Washington insists eventual talks must be Afghan-led and involve Karzai's government. THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - An Afghan soldier shot and killed a NATO service member in southern Afghanistan, officials said Wednesday, in what the international coalition described as an attack and an Afghan commander called an accident. It was the sixth report since Dec. 26 of an Afghan soldier - or an insurgent posing as one - turning his weapon on the international troops working to train the Afghan security forces. The string of attacks has raised concerns about relations between Afghan troops and their foreign allies. International forces and the Afghan army disagreed on exactly what happened in the latest killing. Lt. Col. Jimmie Cummings, a spokesman for the international military force, said Afghan soldiers detained the gunman after he turned his weapon on a NATO service member and killed him Tuesday night. The coalition gave no other details. Afghan National Army commander Sayed Malluk confirmed the killing, which he said happened during a night watch on a base in Helmand province's Marjah district. But he said the Afghan soldier, who has been in the army for more than two years, told investigators the shooting was an accident. "It wasn't intentional. It was a mistake," Malluk said. He said an investigation has been opened. After an Afghan soldier killed four French soldiers on Jan. 20, French President Nicolas Sarkozy announced that France would speed up the exit of its troops from Afghanistan and that it would ask NATO to hand over all combat operations to Afghan forces in 2013 instead of by the end of 2014. Sarkozy at the time said the attacker was a Taliban infiltrator, but Afghan and NATO investigators have said it was too early in the investigation to know his motivation. The rising number of attacks by supposed friendly Afghan forces has prompted speculation that Taliban insurgents or sympathizers may be infiltrating national army and police as they rapidly expand to meet a 2014 target for Afghan forces to take over security and most international troops to leave. There have been at least 35 attacks on international troops since 2007 by Afghan soldiers, police or insurgents wearing their uniforms, according to a tally by The Associated Press. The number rose sharply last year to 17, up from six in 2010. In Kabul, NATO spokesman Cummings said Wednesday that the rising number of attacks doesn't point to any pattern. "We feel they're isolated cases," he said. "There's no indication these incidents are linked or part of any coordinated effort." Cummings said that the 130,000-strong international force works daily with more than 300,000 Afghan security personnel, mostly without problems. He said that NATO is satisfied with Afghanistan's vetting process for army recruits. Tuesday's attack brought to 34 the number of international troops killed in Afghanistan this year. The U.S. House of Representatives is set to hear testimony on Wednesday on insider attacks by Afghans. In testimony prepared for delivery Wednesday to the House Armed Services Committee, U.S. defense officials said attacks by Afghan security forces have killed 70 coalition personnel and wounded 110 since 2007. They said that in most cases the Afghans acted out of personal motivation and were not controlled or directed by insurgent groups. The second most common circumstances involved insurgents impersonating or infiltrating Afghan security forces. The U.S. defense officials' testimony, obtained by The Associated Press in advance of Wednesday's hearing, includes improvements in the program made after an attack at Forward Operating Base Frontenac in March 2011 that killed two U.S. soldiers and wounded four others. The base is in Kandahar Province in southern Afghanistan, and lawmakers have been demanding details about the incident. "The insider threat is an issue of increasing significance to coalition forces and Afghan National Security Forces operating in Afghanistan," the defense officials said. "It creates distrust between our forces and their Afghan counterparts during a critical juncture in Afghanistan."

Clashes in Kuwait before parliamentary vote

More than 20 people were wounded when Kuwaiti riot police clashed with tribesmen who stormed a local television station in a second day of violence before parliamentary elections, witnesses said.

The incident took place late on Tuesday at the offices of the privately-owned Al-Watan satellite channel which was hosting Nabeel al-Fadl, a pro-government candidate in Thursday's vote to determine Kuwait's 50-seat parliament.

Police used tear gas to disperse the crowd that started throwing stones, wounding around 20 security men and four reporters, a witness told AFP.

Some of the angry crowd managed to enter the offices and damaged some furniture and equipment, but all staff members escaped unhurt. They later attacked a nearby fire station, the witness added.

Around 15 tribesmen were arrested during the clashes.

The incident came a day after angry tribesmen burned down the election tent of Mohammed al-Juwaihel, a controversial pro-government candidate and ally of Fadl, over remarks deemed offensive to the Mutairi tribe, the second largest Bedouin clan in Kuwait.

Al-Juwaihel has alleged that many tribes are not "true Kuwaitis" because of ancestral roots in Saudi Arabia that allow them to obtain dual citizenship and gain access to generous welfare systems in both countries.

Opposition tribal candidates held a massive rally to condemn Juwaihel's remarks and to ask the government to take legal action against him.

"We tell the (ruling) family that we are partners in governance and public funds and we are free people," Mussallam al-Barrak, a leading opposition candidate, told a crowd of over 20,000 who listened to him under heavy rain.

Kuwait's royal court, many election candidates and a large number of political groups on Tuesday strongly criticised the Juwaihel incident as well as the tribesmen's response.

The royal court warned in a statement that the incident risked "fuelling divisions in society," and called on Kuwaitis to steer clear of anything that could negatively affect the elections.

Veteran opposition figure Ahmad al-Saadun charged that anti-democracy elements were trying to discredit elections in which the opposition is tipped to win.

"This time we are before an abnormal struggle ... Parties that will not come back (to parliament) will not remain silent ... They want to sabotage the election," Saadun told an election rally on Tuesday night.

The liberal National Democratic Alliance described Juwaihel and his associates as "puppets and destructive tools being moved by certain quarters in the regime."

Oil-rich Kuwait has been hit by a series of political crises over the past six years leading to the resignation of seven governments and the dissolving of parliament on four occasions.

UN nuke official: New trip to Iran planned

VIENNA (AP) -- A U.N. nuclear team on Wednesday announced plans to revisit Tehran "in the very near future," indicating some progress on its quest to wrest information from Iran about allegations that it secretly worked on an atomic arms program.

The announcement from mission leader Herman Nackaerts came shortly after his team landed at Vienna airport and on the heels of three days of discussions with Iranian officials.

While Nackaerts gave no details on what the International Atomic Energy Agency experts had achieved, diplomats had said before their departure that their main focus was to break Iranian resistance to talking about the weapons program allegations.

"We had three days of intensive discussions about all our priorities, and we are committed to resolve all the outstanding issues," Nackaerts told reporters. "And the Iranians said the are committed, too.

"But of course there's still a lot of work to be done," he said. "So we have planned another trip in the very near future."

Any progress on the issue would be significant. Iran has refused to discuss the alleged weapons experiments for more than three years, saying they are based on "fabricated documents" provided by a "few arrogant countries" - a phrase authorities in Iran often use to refer to the United States and its allies.

The IAEA team was seeking progress on its efforts to talk to key Iranian scientists suspected of working on a weapons program. They also hoped to break down opposition to their plans to inspect documents related to nuclear work and secure commitments from Iranian authorities to allow future visits.

Beyond concerns about the purported weapons work, The United States and its allies want Iran to halt uranium enrichment, which they worry could eventually lead to weapons-grade material and the production of nuclear weapons. Iran says its program is for peaceful purposes - generating electricity and producing medical radioisotopes to treat cancer patients.

Tehran is under four sets of U.N. Security Council sanctions because of its refusal to heed international concerns about its nuclear programs, as well as penalties imposed by the United States and Western nations meant to force it into dialogue.a

Arab League urges U.N. Security Council to take ‘decisive’ action on Syria

Arab League Nabil Elaraby and the prime minister of Qatar urged the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday to take decisive action to end the deadly crackdown in Syria and to support an Arab initiative for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to relinquish power.

Elaraby urged the council to take “rapid and decisive action” while Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani warned the 15-nation body that Syria’s “killing machine is still at work.”

Elaraby added that Arab nations are attempting to avoid foreign military intervention in the 10-month old Syrian crisis.

Opening a top-level Security Council meeting on the Syrian crisis, Hamad bin Jassim said that the Arab League had tried to seek a solution with Assad in face of the 10-month uprising.

“Our efforts and initiatives, however, have been all useless because the Syrian government failed to make any sincere effort to cooperate with us and the only solution available to it was to kill its own people,” he said.

“Bloodshed continued and the killing machine is still at work,” he said.

He called for support of a U.N. draft resolution, sponsored by Arab League member Morocco, under which Assad would step down from power and agree to an end to violence ahead of negotiations on a settlement.

Defiant Syria

Syria’s U.N. representative, meanwhile, rejected the proposed Arab resolution, saying Damascus will confront its “enemies.”

“It will stand firm in confronting its enemies,” Bashar Jaafari, the Syrian ambassador to the world body, told the council.

In a defiant speech, Jaafari accused the alliance of Western powers and Arab League states of “double standards” and of “fomenting the crisis.”

“One can't be an arsonist and a firefighter at the same time,” he said.

“Scandalous silence”

French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe urged the Council to end its “scandalous silence” over bloodshed in Syria by supporting a resolution calling on President Assad to quit.

“We are gathered here today to end the scandalous silence of this Council,” Juppe said. “We are gathered today in order for the Security Council to assume its responsibilities toward a suffering people.”

Juppe said that the Arab League would take the lead in the proposed peace plan under which Assad would step down ahead of talks on the country’s political future.

“It’s for the Arab League to implement it,” Juppe said. “Our responsibility is to help them by sending the Syrian regime a clear message that the international community is united behind Arab efforts.”

No Libyan Scenario

U.S. Secretary Clinton says it’s ‘false analogy’ to compare U.N. action on Syria to Libya, adding that Assad’s “reign of terror” will end and that the main question was how many people would die first.

Appearing before the U.N. Security Council to press Russia to support a U.N. resolution calling for Assad to go, Clinton said that Syria will become a more intractable problem the longer that Assad stays in power.

“We all know that change is coming to Syria. Despite its ruthless tactics, the Assad regime’s reign of terror will end and the people of Syria will have the chance to chart their own destiny,” Clinton said.

“The question for us is how many more innocent civilians will die before this country is able to move forward towards the kind of future it deserves,” she said.

Egypt PM calls for retribution against old regime

Prime Minister Kamal El-Ganzouri addressed the People’s Assembly for the first time on Tuesday after being summoned by MPs to speak about the revolution's slain and injured.

He began by expressing relief that the old vanguard of corrupt MPs had been replaced by new faces, before going on to defend his record as a Mubarak-era prime minister by claiming Mubarak had sacked him for refusing to accompany a visiting Israeli prime minister to Ras Al Tin international airport.

“I am the only ex-prime minister who was not honoured or given a job after leaving the cabinet,” he added.

In comments that raised the speech's only round of applause, Ganzouri said money alone would not adequately compensate the revolutionaries killed and injured during the uprising that brought down Hosni Mubarak – retribution against those who stole the wealth of the country for thirty years was also necessary.

A cabinet report on the status of the revolution's killed and injured would be distributed to MPs, added Ganzouri, and he announced that the official number of dead and injured during the 18-day uprising was 775 and 4325 respectively.

Compensation had been paid to 3883 of the 4325 injured so far, while delays paying compensation to slain protesters' families had occurred due to bureaucratic problems with inheritance documents.

Ganzouri blamed ten years of failed and corrupt government policies for the parlous state of Egypt's economy, and said social justice could be achieved by increased efficiency and production.

Furthermore, he claimed that Western and Gulf countries had failed to fulfil any of the financial promises they had made over the past year.

Chinese workers kidnapped in Egypt freed

"I can confirm that all 25 people have been released. Right now they are being taken care of by the Egyptian government and are staying in army accommodation," the assistant to the Chinese ambassador to Egypt told AFP.

The Chinese nationals -- technicians and engineers who work for a military-owned cement factory in central Sinai -- were abducted on Tuesday on their way to work, an Egyptian security official said.

The protesters were demanding the release of five Bedouins held in connection with an attack on the tourist resort of Taba in 2004, part of a series of bombings claimed by an Islamist group.

"They are all well, with no injuries. There was no need to send them to hospital," the Cairo-based assistant, who would not give his name, said over the phone. He refused to give details of how the workers were released.

They said the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, which took power last year when a popular uprising ousted Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, had repeatedly promised to release the Bedouins.

The official Xinhua news agency said the workers had been freed by their abductors, but gave no further details of any negotiations.

China's foreign ministry was not immediately available for comment, but in an earlier statement on Wednesday, it warned Chinese companies and personnel working abroad to be on their guard after a similar incident in Sudan.

We "remind Chinese personnel and firms abroad to improve their risk awareness and strengthen security," the ministry said.

The 29 workers in Sudan were captured on Saturday. They have been described as hostages by the Sudanese military but rebels say they were only collateral victims of fighting with government troops.

China dispatched a team to the African nation earlier this week to help secure their release, and the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) holding the workers said they were ready to talk with the delegation.

Beijing has already lodged a formal protest with Sudan over the situation, and has called for the release of the workers.

The SPLM-N was once allied to the former rebels who now rule South Sudan, which gained independence from Khartoum in July last year after decades of civil war.

The oil-rich South Kordofan state remains under Khartoum's administration, but the SPLM-N insurgents have been fighting against the Sudanese army since June, sparking growing international concern over refugees.