World Briefs

Delay in Iraqi vote count sparks fears of election fraud

IRAQI voters braved the threat of insurgent attack to turn out in their millions for this month’s general election but eight days on not one of the country’s 18 provinces has released full results. Electoral officials say that software problems have delayed the count but some politicians are now alleging fraud. Faraj al-Haidari, head of the Independent High Electoral Commission (IHEC), told reporters on Sunday that early in the process, its data entry system had been unable to cope with the volume of information being inputted.

“The server was not able to cope with it and crashed several times,” he said. — Sapa-AFP

Paedophile party disbands

A DUTCH political party formed by self-described paedophiles has voted to disband itself after failing for the second time to participate in national elections in June. The group, which sought to lower the age of sexual consent to 12, says it could not get the 600 signatures necessary to win a place on the ballot in a country of 16.5 million. It would need 60 000 votes to win a seat in the 150-member Dutch parliament. The party also failed to meet the threshold in 2006, when its creation caused an international sensation. — Sapa-AP

Facebook operations in India

SOCIAL networking site Facebook is opening an operations office in India, its first in Asia, to help manage rapid growth in the number of users. The office, in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad, will have advertising and developer support teams, the company said yesterday. It will supplement Facebook’s other centres in Palo Alto, California; Dublin, Ireland; and Austin, Texas. The number of Facebook users has rocketed to over 400 million since it was founded in 2004. Seventy percent of users are now outside the US and use the site in over 70 languages. — Sapa-AP

Would-be suicide bombers shot

AFGHAN security forces shot dead five men wearing suicide vests and armed with guns as they tried to storm government buildings and a bazaar in eastern Afghanistan yesterday. “The suicide bombers, who were also armed with different types of guns ... were killed before reaching their targets,” the interior ministry said in a statement. The Taliban have been waging an insurgency against Afghanistan’s government since their own regime was overthrown in a 2001 US-led invasion. There are about 120 000 foreign NATO and US troops stationed in Afghanistan to help Kabul defeat the Taliban. — Sapa-AFP

Officials arrested over floods

THE mayor of a Kazakhstan village devastated by flooding and the local emergency services chief have been arrested as part of a criminal investigation into the disaster, the interior ministry said yesterday. At least 35 people are confirmed dead and thousands were left homeless after a dam overspilled in southern Kazakhstan, unleashing torrential flooding in the energy-rich country. Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev called for the prosecutions, saying that while recent earthquakes in Chile and Turkey could not have been prevented, the failure to check the safety of the dam and give sufficient warning for full evacuation “needs to be seen as a crime”. — Sapa- AFP

Powerful cyclone tears into Fiji

A POWERFUL cyclone packing sustained winds of 175 kilometres an hour smashed into Fiji yesterday, damaging homes and crops and forcing thousands of people to flee to evacuation centres. Cyclone Tomas was classified as a category-four cyclone – the second-most destructive on a five-point scale – the Fiji Meteorological Service said, with gusts that wreaked havoc across the north of the country. There were no early reports of casualties, although officials confirmed a woman drowned over the weekend in heavy seas as the storm approached. The cyclone was reported to be generating waves up to 7.2m high and shipping was warned to stay away from the area. It was expected to intensify yesterday evening and into early today, with average wind speeds rising to 200km/h, with gusts up to 270km/h. The head of Fiji’s Disaster Management Office, Pajiliai Dobui, said about 5 000 people had moved into evacuation centres in the north of the country, especially on the second-largest island, Vanua Levu. — Sapa-AFP

Obama seeks healthcare votes

STILL seeking votes for his proposed national healthcare overhaul, President Barack Obama appears ready to reverse his position and allow unpopular deal-sweetening measures in the hopes of finding Democratic support for the Bill whose future will be decided in coming days. Increasingly eager to finish work on his top domestic priority, Obama was set to head to northeast Ohio yesterday with a final sales pitch for healthcare legislation that the top Democratic vote-counter in the House said lacked support to pass.Obama’s top political adviser, David Axelrod, said he was “absolutely confident” the measure would pass during a make-or-break week that already saw the President delay his trip to Indonesia, Australia and Guam. “This is the week where we will have this important vote,” White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said. “I do think this is the climactic week for healthcare reform.” — Sapa-AP

Eight killed in Iraq

A DOUBLE-BLAST suicide bomber targeting a military checkpoint and labourers killed eight people yesterday in the former Sunni rebel bastion of Fallujah, Iraqi police and medics said. Twenty-eight other civilians were wounded in the blasts, which occurred within minutes of each other early yesterday in the centre of Fallujah, 50km west of Baghdad. — Sapa-AFP

Car bombs explode in Nigeria

TWIN car bombs exploded outside a government building where amnesty talks were under way yesterday in Nigeria’s restive and oil-rich region, wounding two people and causing panic, a government spokesman said. Yesterday’s bombing is the most daring attack claimed by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, the most prominent militant group in the Niger Delta, and they have promised more attacks.