Middle Orient

WASHINGTON — Libya’s top diplomat in Washington on Friday expressed frustration at the pace of renewed relations with the United States following the restoration of diplomatic ties.

SANAA(AFP)  — Veteran Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, in power since 1978, announced Saturday that he would seek a new seven-year term after all, at a mass rally in the capital of the impoverished Arabian Peninsula republic.

Sunnis outraged by arrest of religious leader in TikritBAGHDAD (Reuters) — Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al Maliki was expected to present a national reconciliation plan to parliament on Sunday to defuse a Sunni insurgency and tackle sectarian violence, political sources said.

RIYADH (AFP) — Saudi security forces have detained 43 suspected militants, including two Somalis, an Ethiopian and an Iraqi, the interior ministry said Saturday after a deadly gunbattle in the capital.

SYDNEY (AP) — Australia will review its troop deployment to Iraq by the end of this year, Defence Minister Brendan Nelson said Wednesday — the first time the Australian government has signalled a possible timeline for withdrawing its troops.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) — One of Saddam Hussein’s main lawyers was shot dead on Wednesday after men in police uniform took him from his home, relatives said, the third defence attorney to be killed since the trial opened in October.

EL FASHER, Sudan — Myriam Ibrahim, a tall quiet 28-year-old clad in a bright blue robe, thought she had seen it all. Three years of violence since the Darfur conflict erupted during which her town was invaded twice.

CAIRO — The true identity of Abu Ayyub Masri, the man said to have succeeded the slain Abu Musab Zarqawi as leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq, remains an enigma in his reported homeland of Egypt.

EL FASHER (AP) — The only rebel leader to have endorsed the Darfur Peace Agreement threatened to pull out of the deal geared at ending three years of war if the international community does not move to support him fast.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The story of the Iraq war can be told in stark numbers and mournful milestones as the death toll for US troops reached 2,500 and the price tag rose to $320 billion.