May 7, 2004

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[edit] May 7, 2004

• Japan's longest-serving chief cabinet secretary, Yasuo Fukuda, resigns to take responsibility for not making pension payments. (VOA)
• A report from the UN's High Commissioner for Human Rights describes a "reign of terror" imposed by government-backed militias in Sudan's western province of Darfur. (UN)
• A bomb blast during Friday prayers at a Shia mosque in Karachi, Pakistan kills 10 people and injures 100. A suicide bombing is suspected. The head cleric of the mosque is among the dead. (NYT) (National Post)
• Vladimir Putin is sworn in for his second (and final) four-year term as Russian president. (BBC)
• Iraq Occupation and resistance:
  • Shieik Abdul-Satar al-Bahadli, a senior aide to Muqtada al-Sadr, is offering a reward of 250,000 dinars (~ USD 170) to any Iraqi who captures a British woman soldier; he says the captive will be kept as a concubine. (Reuters)
  • United States Armed Forces encounter heavy fighting in Karbala, Iraq where at least 24 gunmen of Moqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army are killed and in Najaf where another 12 gunmen are killed. (NYT)
  • Three Polish journalists are killed and a third wounded by Iraqi gunmen on the road between Baghdad and Karbala. (BBC)
  • U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld testifies before the U.S. Congress, taking "full responsibility" and apologizing for the abuse of Iraqi detainees at the Abu Ghraib Prison. The hearing highlights a split between how the abuses are perceived either as "isolated incidents" or as part of the "chain of command". (BBC)
  • The International Committee of the Red Cross states that on some of its inspection visits to Coalition detention centres in Iraq, it observed "incidents tantamount to torture". (Reuters)
• Chilean President Ricardo Lagos signs legislation legalizing divorce. (BBC)
• U.S. attorney Brandon Mayfield is detained in the investigation of the 11 March Madrid attacks. (CNN) (BBC)
• The Prime Minister of Nepal Surya Bahadur Thapa resigns amid protests by opposition parties. Prime Minister Thapa was appointed by King Gyanendra eleven months ago. The opposing parties are demanding formation of an all party government with a Prime Minister of their choice. (BBC)
• The FDA blocks the Over-the-counter sale of a morning-after pill despite the (23-4) recommendation of a federal advisory panel. (NYT)