Word: tuesday
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Kenya's political opposition has suspended talks with President Mwai Kibaki on forming a coalition government, claiming that the Kenyan leader and his allies had no intention of honoring a power-sharing agreement that ended more than a month of bloodshed after disputed December elections. As news of Tuesday's decision spread, protests broke out in the Nairobi slum of Kibera and the western city of Kisumu, both strongholds of opposition leader Raila Odinga. Demonstrators who had chanted "No Raila, no peace" last December this time shouted "No cabinet, no peace...
Even as General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker made their case on Capitol Hill for maintaining U.S. troop levels in Iraq, a key Iraqi advocate of sending them home was making a power play. Tensions had been high in Baghdad Tuesday morning, in anticipation of a million-strong march against the U.S. occupation called by Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. His Mahdi Army had been engaged in weeks of violent clashes with U.S. and Iraqi government forces in the capital and in the southern city of Basra, and many in the capital feared the worst. But on Tuesday...
...cautiously optimistic assessments offered by Petraeus and Crocker, many Iraqis remain pessimistic about the weeks and months ahead. The country is still reeling from the fresh wave of violence brought on by Maliki's disastrous military offensive against Sadr's militia that began in Basra two weeks ago. On Tuesday, Sadr City - the sprawling Baghdad Shi'ite slum that is the capital's largest neighborhood and a stronghold of the Mahdi Army - remained locked down as fighting continued between militia fighters and Iraqi and American forces. Politicians from a number of parties warned of an impending humanitarian crisis...
...Sadr himself, who maintains that the United States is the chief enemy, warned in his Tuesday statement, "If the national benefit requires us to unfreeze our army to achieve our goals, we will do so." And with the increasing incursions of Iraqi and American forces into Sadr City and other Mahdi Army strongholds, the cleric will be under growing pressure to act on that warning...
Things in Iraq today are worse than they were a month ago, but they're far better than they were last September, when Ambassador Ryan Crocker and General David Petraeus last testified before Congress. This Tuesday and Wednesday, Crocker and Petraeus will remind lawmakers how far Iraq has come since the "surge" of 30,000 additional U.S. troops arrived in Iraq last year. Expect at least two of their interlocutors, Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, to focus on recent setbacks - increased violence, a continuing political stalemate, and mounting strains on the U.S. military - as both seek to demonstrate...