June 15, 2005
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- Venezuela officially requests extradition of Luis Posada Carriles from USA (Reuters) (BBC)
- The Serbian special war crimes tribunal asks the government to ask Argentina for extradition of Nebojša Minić, suspected of crimes against humanity in Kosovo in 1999 (B92) (Reuters)
- Zambian government reopens a case against Kashiwa Bulaya, former health ministry official and ally of president Levy Mwanawasa. Bulaya is accused of diverting AIDS drugs funds (Times of Zambia) (AllAfrica) (Reuters)
- In Mexico, supreme court rules that former president Luis Echeverría can be charged with human rights violations connected to 1971 deaths of student activists (El Universal) (Bloomberg) (BBC)
- Microsoft is criticized for censoring Chinese blogs. They are accused of censoring words such as "freedom", "democracy", and "human rights". (RealOpinion.com), (BBC)
- World leaders of the Group of 77 and China today launched in Doha the two-day second South Summit amid calls to wealthy countries to honour pledges of additional aid to close the gap between the rich and poor. (Xinhua), (Reuters)
- Qatari Prime Minister Abdallah ibn Khalifah Al Thani and German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder agree to begin a study to look into the feasibility of building a maglev line approximately 160 km long linking Qatar and Bahrain, powered by Transrapid technology developed by Siemens AG and ThyssenKrupp. Also being considered is a possible extension to the United Arab Emirates that would make the combined length of the line roughly 800 km. (AME Info) (Expatica)
- Spanish police arrest 17 suspected Islamic extremists in a series of raids around the country. Eleven are alleged to be associated with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and 5 are alleged to be connected to the Madrid train bombings of 11 March 2004. (Times)
- The Israeli Shin Bet (SHABAK) states that one month ago it arrested an alleged eight-member Palestinian militant cell in Nablus that included four teenage would-be suicide bombers. It claimed that the cell was part of Fatah (the ruling party of the Palestinian Authority), and that the Lebanese group Hezbollah was behind it. (Haaretz)
- A memo from 1998 from an executive of Cotecna Inspection S.A. suggests that Kofi Annan was aware of their bid to participate in the Oil-for-Food Programme, reawakening suspicions of a conflict of interest. (Yahoo! News)
- In Russia, explosion and fire in an oil depot near Moscow kills two (RIA Novosti) (Russia Journal) (BBC)
- Catholic Archbishop Chaput warns Europe about growing anti-Semitism and intolerance. (BeyondtheNews)
- Douglas Wood, an Australian hostage residing in California is released in Iraq after 47 days in captivity, and is now being moved to a secret location. (ABC Online)
- In Guatemala, a mudslide kills 22 people and injures around 45 others. (Reuters AlertNet) (Reuters AlertNet)
