Middle Orient

Sectarian strife remains a great threat despite improving security, Iraqi leaders said at a conference on Wednesday, hours after a powerful roadside bomb exploded not far from where they met in central Baghdad.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Wednesday talks on Palestinian statehood must be predicated on the recognition of Israel as “the state of the Jewish people”, a new Israeli condition.

The European Union called on Pakistan’s military ruler again on Wednesday to end the state of emergency and set a firm date for elections, but said now was not the time to cut aid to the country.

Iraq’s cabinet has submitted to parliament a draft bill that would ease curbs on former members of Saddam Hussein’s Baath party joining the civil service and military, the government said on Wednesday.

Wearing blue camouflage fatigues and crooning about Islamic holy war, the five members of Hamas’s Protectors of the Homeland police band are trying to boost morale in Gaza with an arsenal of anti-Israel numbers.

Turkey’s prime minister denied on Wednesday carrying out aerial strikes this week against Kurdish rebel targets in northern Iraq, but the government reaffirmed its readiness for a cross-border operation if deemed necessary.

Iran’s intelligence minister accused a former nuclear negotiator on Wednesday of supplying information to Britain in violation of the Islamic Republic’s security interests, an Iranian news agency reported.

NATO said on Wednesday it had no evidence of systematic torture of detainees it had handed to Afghan authorities after a rights group accused the force of breaking its own rules by not ensuring prisoners’ safety.

Prosecutors said on Wednesday they had charged seven Polish soldiers over the shooting to death of six Afghan civilians.

Following are security developments in Iraq at 9:30 a.m. EST on Wednesday.* denotes new or updated item. * ISKANDARIYA – At least two people were killed and six wounded when a suicide bomber wearing a vest packed with explosives infiltrated a meeting of Sunni Arab tribal sheikhs in Iskandariya, a …