AKUEM — Eight months pregnant, Achan Lual headed off into the grassy bush, crisscrossing southern Sudan’s former battlefields, in search of a doctor. Swollen with twins, the 34-year-old arrived four days later at the only operational health centre for hundreds of miles — a collection of mud huts with thatch …

Israel ended its military presence in the Gaza Strip on Monday, having removed 8,500 Jewish settlers from 21 enclaves and demolished their homes after 38 years of occupation. Following is an outline of Israel’s first handover of an entire territory that it captured in the 1967 Middle East war and …

ISRAEL’S PULLOUT FROM the Gaza Strip on Monday stirred memories on both sides of the day Israel pushed into the Egyptian-administered territory 38 years ago. Mohammad Ahmad Ashour was a 23-year-old Palestinian soldier serving in the Egyptian army in Gaza City when war broke out on June 5, 1967. “A …

CAIRO (AFP) — Egypt’s first multi-candidate presidential election which propelled veteran leader Hosni Mubarak to another six years in office was marred by widespread violations and irregularities that caused confusion and chaos at polling stations, rights group charged Monday. “Indelible” ink that rubbed off, outdated voting lists, monitors being denied …

DAMASCUS (Reuters) — Syria agreed on Monday with chief UN investigator Detlev Mehlis on the procedures for questioning Syrian witnesses in the probe into the killing of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri. “An agreement has been reached on the procedures and arrangements for hearing Syrian witnesses,” a Syrian official …

BAGHDAD (AP) — The US military, acting on a tip, raided a farmhouse Wednesday and rescued an American held hostage for 10 months. In southern Iraq, a roadside bomb killed four American security guards, fuelling fears the bloody insurgency was taking deeper root outside Sunni-dominated territory. Roy Hallums, 57, was …

GAZA CITY (AFP) — The security chaos blighting the Gaza Strip Wednesday claimed its highest-profile victim when local strongman Moussa Arafat, an adviser to Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, was assassinated by gunmen. Abbas led condemnation of the popular resistance committees’ killing of Arafat, a cousin of the late Yasser Arafat, …

NAIROBI — Hollywood wasn’t exaggerating when it portrayed Osman Ali Atto as the master survivor of Mogadishu’s ganglands. But the warlord with a wrestler’s build and hawk-like face immortalised in the film “Black Hawk Down” says his wheeling and dealing is aimed as much at strengthening Somalia as at making …

CAIRO (AFP) — Confused Egyptian voters and officials tried Wednesday to adjust to indelible ink, independent monitors, party delegates and multi-choice ballots, in the country’s first contested presidential poll. In the Khaled Ben Walid School in the Cairo suburb of Shubra Al Khima, two judges debated which ink they were …

JEDDAH (AFP) — Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) foreign ministers called Wednesday for Israel to withdraw completely from the occupied West Bank and for the establishment of a Palestinian state. A statement issued after a meeting Tuesday of the GCC’s top diplomats also called for better relations with Iran and for …