Syria rebels capture key Idlib airbase

Syrian opposition fighters have overrun Taftanaz airbase, the largest in northern Syria, after several days of fierce combat, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights has said.

Anti-government activists said fighters from Jabhat al-Nusra and other groups opposed to President Bashar al-Assad seized control of buildings, ammunition and military equipment in the sprawling Taftanaz airbase in northern Idlib province on Friday.

"The fighting at Taftanaz military airport ended at 11:00 am (09:00 GMT) and the base is entirely in rebel hands," said Rami Abdel Rahman, the director of the UK-based rights group, on Friday.

"Many regime forces have been killed and most of the soldiers and officers fled at dawn," he told the AFP news agency by phone.

Egypt govt agrees to allocate 5000 acres to displaced Nubians

The Egyptian government has agreed to allocate 5,320 acres, including agricultural land, to Nubians in areas adjacent to Lake Nasser, the Aswan High Dam's main reservoir, Al-Ahram Arabic news website reported.

The decision comes after the previous governmental plan, tailored by Mubarak-era Minister of Planning and International Cooperation Faiza Abu El-Naga, to assign Nubians land-ownership in the residential area of Karkar has been met with wide discontent by the Nubian community, as the area did not include agricultural land.
The governmental initiative comes as part of a compensation program to Egyptian Nubians for 20th Century evictions and the inundation of their main homeland of Lower Nubia as a result of the construction of the Aswan High Dam during the Nasser-era. The compensation initiative also includes granting Nubians ownership of homes inhabited for more than a 100 years.
It has also been agreed, as part of the compensation program, to improve the performance and capacity of three wells to encourage agricultural activity and stimulate crop production in the Nubian areas of Al Qastal and Adandan. The Egyptian government and the United Nations World Food Programme will jointly undertake the project.
In 1902, residents of Nubian villages in today's known area of Lake Nasser were forced to evacuate in order to escape increased flooding.
The building of the Aswan High Dam Reservoir had a disastrous impact on Egypt’s Nubian community, as it led to the forced resettlement of 44 Nubian villages and displacement of hundreds of families.

IRAN PARLIAMENT SEEKS FULL PROBE IN BLOGGER DEATH

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Iran's parliament is urging the judiciary to thoroughly investigate the death of a blogger in custody and monitor police stations to prevent further abuses.

A parliamentary committee statement read during a Sunday session of the legislature called for a "special" investigation into the November death of Sattar Beheshti.

It is not clear what that means legally, as prosecutors are already investigating the case. But the statement reflects widespread outrage. Arrests of activists and claims of abuse in detention are commonplace in Iran, but deaths behind bars are much rarer.

Parliament also urged police to monitor all detention centers through closed circuit cameras, and suggested prosecutors visit regularly.

In December, Iran fired its head of cyber-security over the case. It also detained seven police officers, three of whom remain in detention.

SUICIDE BOMBERS KILL 5 AT AFGHAN DISTRICT COMPOUND

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) -- Two suicide bombers penetrated a government compound in the country's south Sunday, killing five people, Afghan officials said. There were no reports of foreign troops or civilians at the site.

The attack was in the district of Spin Boldak in Kandahar province. The district is a major infiltration corridor for Taliban fighters from Pakistan as well as a smuggling route for weapons and narcotics and Kandahar is one of Afghanistan's most violent provinces.

District chief of Spin Boldak said the two militants were targeting a meeting of local officials at a compound in a district of Kandahar province near the Pakistani border. Mohammad Hashim said the two attackers arrived in a car, killed a guard and entered the facility firing weapons before blowing themselves up along with their vehicle. The compound houses offices of the district chief and district council as well as other government buildings.

The head of the provincial council, Hafiz Abdul Haleem, said five people died including one policeman and four civilians. Fifteen were wounded.

IMF OFFICIALS RETURN TO EGYPT FOR LOAN TALKS

CAIRO (AP) -- The International Monetary Fund says talks will resume in Egypt this week on a $4.8 billion loan request that the government says is needed to rescue the country's ailing economy.

A statement by the IMF says that Director of the Middle East and Central Asia Department Masood Ahmed will meet with officials in Cairo on Monday.

The statement says the purpose of the visit is "to discuss with the authorities the most recent economic developments, their policy plans for addressing Egypt's economic and financial challenges, and possible IMF support for Egypt in facing these challenges."

An upswing of political turmoil in the past two months led to a rush on dollars and spurned a devaluation of the Egyptian pound. The upheaval also delayed IMF loan talks and painful economic restructuring.

PAKISTAN SAYS 1 DEAD IN BORDER CLASH WITH INDIA

ISLAMABAD (AP) -- Pakistan and India traded accusations Sunday of violating the cease-fire in the disputed northern region of Kashmir, with Islamabad saying that India staged a rare raid across the line dividing the two sides' forces and killed one of its soldiers. India said its troops had fired into Pakistan to retaliate for shelling that destroyed a home.

The accusation of a border crossing resulting in military deaths is unusual in Kashmir, where a ceasefire has held between these two wary rivals for a decade. Tensions over the disputed region are never far from the surface, however, as the nuclear-armed nations have fought two full-scale wars over it.

The Pakistani military's public relations office said in a statement that another Pakistani soldier was critically wounded in the incident. They said troops were still exchanging gunfire after a raid crossed the "line of control" dividing the Indian and Pakistani sides of Kashmir in Haji Pir sector and raided a post called Sawan Patra, the military said.

The remote area where the incident occurred is up in Himalayan mountain peaks. The closest town of Bagh, about 50 kilometers (30 miles) away, is itself about 260 kilometers (160 miles) from the Pakistani capital of Islamabad.

Col. Brijesh Pandey, a spokesman for the Indian army in Kashmir, said that Pakistani troops "initiated unprovoked firing" and fired mortars and automatic weapons at Indian posts early Sunday morning. He said Pakistani shelling had destroyed a civilian home on the Indian side.

"We retaliated only using small arms. We believe it was clearly an attempt on their part to facilitate infiltration of militants," Pandey said

India often accuses Pakistan of sending militants into the Indian-controlled part of Kashmir, often under cover of these types of skirmishes.

Mountainous Kashmir has been a flashpoint of violence between these two neighbors for decades. Both claim the entire region as their own, and the countries fought two full-scale wars over control of Kashmir and some minor skirmishes.

On Saturday, leaders of a Pakistan-based militant coalition held a rally in the city of Muzaffarabad near Kashmir, in which they pledged to continue the fight to gain control of the entire region.

The United Jihad Council is a coalition of 12 anti-India militant groups. Many of the groups were started with the support of the Pakistani government in the 1980s and 1990s to fight India for control of Kashmir. The rally was held to mark the Jan. 5, 1949 call by the United Nations for a referendum on Kashmir's fate.

A 2003 cease-fire ended the most recent round of fighting. Each side occasionally accuses the other of violating it by lobbing mortars or shooting across the LOC.

A number of Pakistani civilians were wounded in November due to Indian shelling, and in October the Indian army said Pakistani troops fired across the disputed frontier, killing three civilians.

But accusations that one side's ground forces actually crossed the LOC are rarer.

PAKISTANI OFFICIALS SAY US DRONES KILL 9 MILITANTS

DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan (AP) -- Suspected American drones fired several missiles into three militant hideouts near Afghan border on Sunday, killing nine Pakistani Taliban fighters, intelligence officials said.

The strikes targeted the group's hideouts in the South Waziristan tribal region, the three officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media. The identity of the killed militants was not immediately known yet, but two important commanders of the Pakistani Taliban may be among them, they said.

It was the third suspected U.S. drone strike in five days. A strike late Wednesday night killed a top Pakistani militant commander, Maulvi Nazir, whose fighters focus on attacks against U.S. and allied NATO troops in Afghanistan. It was followed close on by another attack on Thursday.

Islamabad opposes the use of U.S. drones on its territory, but is believed to have tacitly approval some strikes in past. Washington wants Pakistan to launch a military operation in North Waziristan, but Islamabad had been refusing to do so, saying it does not have enough troops and resources to do that.

In absence of such an operation, the U.S. relies more on drone strikes to take out militants. The program has killed a number of top militant commanders including Abu Yahya al-Libi, who was al-Qaida's No. 2 when he was killed in a June strike.

The dead of Nazir was likely to be seen in Washington as affirmation of the necessity of its controversial drone program. But it could also cause more friction in already tense relations with Pakistan because Nazir did not focus on Pakistani targets. Nazir was believed to have a nonaggression pact with the Pakistani army.