CAIRO (AP) — Rebels in Sudan’s war-torn region of Darfur said Sunday that government forces backed by bomber aircraft are pursuing a week-old offensive.

“A considerable part of the report covered Iran’s extensive cooperation with the Agency and its inspectors,” Asefi said according to a statement released by the Foreign Ministry’s Information and Press Bureau.

Addressing a fervent congregation of the people in the northwestern city of khoy on the second day of his three-day tour of the northwestern West Azarbaijan province on Friday

Relief and rescue teams said that only 18 of the 147 passengers on board the crashed plane survived the incident.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stressed that the west’s opposition to the peaceful nuclear activities of the Islamic Republic on the pretext of diversion to military purposes is a big lie.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- Iranian Parliament Speaker Gholam Ali Haddad Adel stressed that the United States’ pressures on Iran which are exerted on the pretext of the nuclear issue are in fact in revenge for the vigilance of the world of Islam.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad described his US counterpart George W. Bush as an illogical person for having shrunk from his proposal for a televised debate on global acceptability of the two countries’ rationales, measures and view points.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Wednesday that he hoped the ceasefire with Lebanon could lead to a permanent peace deal, but Lebanon’s premier rebuffed the idea, saying his country would be the last Arab nation to make peace with the Jewish state.

GENEVA (AFP) — The number of people killed by cluster bombs in southern Lebanon since a ceasefire  two weeks ago has climbed to 13, and clearance teams face a tough task as they try to lower the risk, experts said on Wednesday.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) — Bombers killed nearly 50 Iraqis on Wednesday, mostly in Baghdad, but the top US commander said a security drive in the capital was making progress and local forces could largely be running Iraq within 12 to 18 months.