Zimbabwe leaders 'to sign deal'

The agreement was due to be signed last week but Mr Tsvangirai pulled out.

The two sides are locked in a dispute over presidential elections – which they both claim to have won.

Mr Tsvangirai garnered more votes in the initial presidential poll – but election officials said there was no outright winner and called for a run-off.

Mr Mugabe won the run-off – but he was the only candidate after Mr Tsvangirai pulled out, accusing the government of mounting a campaign of violence against his supporters.

Opposition demands

Mr Menkerios said he believed the two men had agreed a draft memorandum of understanding setting out the terms under which they could enter direct negotiations.
But he said both men would have to sign the document to “clear the way” for talks.

Mr Tsvangirai’s party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), still has several conditions to be met before it will agree to talks with Mr Mugabe.

Party spokesman George Sibotshiwe told the BBC that future talks would remain conditional on a complete cessation of violence and the release of all political prisoners.

“We want a government that creates a platform for us to democratise our society, in order for us to have a genuinely free and fair election,” he said.

But he added that he expected the memorandum to be signed this week.

Mbeki ‘problem’

The MDC’s demands led Mr Tsvangirai to feel the need to pull out of signing the deal last week.

Among the problems identified by the MDC was South Africa’s Thabo Mbeki – the lead negotiator in international talks on Zimbabwe.

They accused him of being biased in favour of Mr Mugabe, and Mr Tsvangirai had asked for another envoy to join the talks.

It was later announced that a group of senior diplomats, drawn from the UN, African Union (AU) and the Southern African Development Community (Sadc), would help Mr Mbeki – a move welcomed by Mr Tsvangirai.

Since then, several senior diplomats and national leaders have expressed confidence that the agreement would eventually be signed.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7516019.stm

Barack Obama arrives in Iraq

Obama has said that if elected, he would order the military to end the war in Iraq and commit more troops to Afghanistan.

Accompanying Obama is Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, a leading Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, a Republican member of the Foreign Relations Committee and an outspoken critic of the Iraq war.

“The senators have a busy day ahead of them, as they meet with senior Iraqi officials, coalition leadership and officials from the U.S. Embassy,” Embassy spokesman Armand Cucciniello said.

They also plan to meet with troops from their home states and U.S. civilians working in Iraq, Cucciniello said.

Obama’s trip comes on the heels of an article quoting Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al Maliki as saying he backs Obama’s proposal to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq within 16 months.
A spokesman for al-Maliki has since called the remarks appearing in Der Spiegel on Saturday”misunderstood, mistranslated and not conveyed accurately.”

Obama has made Afghanistan a key focus of his foreign policy, saying he would make it the central front in the “war on terror” if elected.

“The Afghan government needs to do more. But we have to understand that the situation is precarious and urgent here in Afghanistan. And I believe this has to be our central focus, the central front, on our battle against terrorism,” Obama said Sunday on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

“I think one of the biggest mistakes we’ve made strategically after 9/11 was to fail to finish the job here, focus our attention here. We got distracted by Iraq,” he said.

Obama said troop levels must increase in Afghanistan.

“For at least a year now, I have called for two additional brigades, perhaps three,” he told CBS. “I think it’s very important that we unify command more effectively to coordinate our military activities. But military alone is not going to be enough.”
Obama met Sunday with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, a leader the Democratic senator has criticized for not doing enough to rebuild the war-torn nation.

The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee met with Karzai in Kabul, the capital city, during Obama’s first visit to the Asian nation.

Karzai’s spokesman characterized the senator’s message as pleasant.

“They’re happy to be in Afghanistan. They reassured the support of U.S. people to Afghanistan,” Humayoon Hamidzada said.

Karzai met with the congressional delegation that includes Obama, and they discussed the achievements of the Afghan government as well as challenges such as terrorism, corruption and illegal drugs.
McCain’s senior foreign policy adviser criticized Obama on Sunday for “stubbornly adhering to an unconditional withdrawal that places politics above the advice of our military commanders, the success of our troops and the security of the American people.”

“Barack Obama is wrong to advocate withdrawal at any cost just as he was wrong to oppose the surge that has put victory within reach. It is a strategy for defeat, and it is the only strategy Barack Obama has ever supported,” Randy Scheunemann said in a statement.

Democrat-turned-independent Sen. Joseph Lieberman, another McCain ally, echoed Scheunemann’s comments.

“John McCain had the guts to argue against public opinion, to put his whole campaign on the line, because, as he says, he’d rather lose an election than lose in a war that he thinks is this important to the United States,” Lieberman said on “Fox News Sunday.”
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The fight in Afghanistan has become a more pressing issue on the political radar. Three times as many coalition soldiers and other military personnel have died in July in Afghanistan, compared with Iraq. July’s death toll for coalition troops reached 22 after the Friday death of a Canadian soldier was announced.

Nine U.S. soldiers were killed July 13 in a fight with about 200 Taliban militants in eastern Afghanistan. It was the deadliest attack on U.S. troops in Afghanistan in three years.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/07/21/obama.mideast/index.html

Africa's women last and least in food crisis

First she set out a bowl of corn mush, seasoned with tree leaves, dried fish and wood ashes, for the 11 smallest children, who tore into it with bare hands.

Then she set out a bowl for her husband. Then two bowls for a dozen older children. Then finally, after everyone else had finished, a bowl for herself. She always eats last.
A year ago, before food prices nearly doubled, Lingani would have had three meals a day of meat, rice and vegetables. Now two mouthfuls of bland mush would have to do her until tomorrow.

Rubbing her red-rimmed eyes, chewing lightly on a twig she picked off the ground, Lingani gave the last of her food to the children.

“I’m not hungry,” she said.

Mealtime conspires against women
In poor West African nations such as Burkina Faso, mealtime conspires against women. They grow the food, fetch the water, shop at the market and cook the meals. But when it comes time to eat, men and children eat first, and women eat last and least.

Soaring prices for food and fuel have pushed more than 130 million poor people across vast swaths of Africa, Asia and Latin America deeper into poverty in the past year, according to the U.N. World Food Program. But while millions of men and children are also hungrier, women are the hungriest and skinniest. Aid workers call malnutrition among women one of the most notable hidden consequences of the food crisis.

“It’s a cultural thing,” said Hervé Kone, director of a group that promotes development, social justice and human rights in Burkina Faso. “When the kids are hungry, they go to their mother, not their father. And when there is less food, women are the first to eat less.”

A recent study by the aid group Catholic Relief Services found that many people in Burkina Faso are now spending 75 percent or more of their income on food, leaving little for other basic needs.

Pregnant women and young mothers are forgoing medical care. More women are turning to prostitution to pay for food. And more families are pulling children — especially girls — out of school, unable to afford fees and clothes.

But perhaps the most pervasive effect of the growing global crisis is the ache in the stomachs of millions of poor women such as Fanta Lingani.

Sweeping for pennies
Lingani, who sleeps on a concrete floor, began one recent day at 4 a.m. and dressed quietly in the dark. All around her, children slept on the cracked floor under a tin roof, common conditions in a country that ranks 176th out of 177 on the U.N. Human Development Index.

A year ago, Lingani might have started a small fire to boil herself a cup of weak coffee. But even that is now too expensive.

Such sacrifices led to food riots in February in Ouagadougou, the capital, and towns across the country. Hundreds of people were arrested after they set fires and smashed government buildings to protest rising prices. But for Lingani, the struggle is quieter, and harder by the day, and it starts before the sun comes up.

Lingani, who said she is about 50, walked across the dirt courtyard past the two-room hut where her husband was sleeping in his own double bed, with a thick mattress. The dirt street outside was muddy and steamy from an overnight rain shower.

After a half-hour walk on the black-dark streets, she reported for work and pulled on the long green smock of the Green Brigade, a city program that pays poor women the equivalent of about $1.20 a day to sweep streets two mornings a week.

Lingani picked up a pair of small straw brooms and pushed a wheelbarrow onto a wide, deserted avenue. In the orange haze of streetlights, she bent over at the waist, so far that her bottom was higher than her head, and started pushing red dust into little piles.

The “shssssh shssssh” of her sweeping was the only sound, except for the crowing of a few roosters and occasional laughter from men at an all-night bar down the road.

She worked a section of road about 150 yards long, while a dozen others in the all-female brigade swept along. A tanker truck sped down the street, kicking up a cloud of dust into her face and blowing away her little piles. She coughed, pulled her pink head scarf across her face and swept the same dust all over again.

Lingani swept until the sun came up, pushing her piles onto a small metal dish, then dumping them into a wheelbarrow and finally into a pothole on an unpaved side street.

By 7 a.m., she’d finished her section. But she had to wait an hour for a male supervisor to show up and check her work. In two weeks, she would get her monthly pay of less than $10.
‘The job of women’
Lingani walked a half hour back to her house, where her huge family was starting to stir. She took off her smock and picked up a green plastic basket about the size of a shoebox.

Market time. She and one of her two “co-wives,” Asseta Zagre, do the shopping on alternate days. Their husband’s other wife, the senior of the three, is nearly blind and can’t do chores anymore.

Polygamy is common in much of Africa. In this household, the patriarch is Hamado Zorome, 68, a retired police officer whose pension is the family’s main income — but he doesn’t tell his wives how much he gets.
The pension of a mid-level civil servant is probably modest in Burkina Faso, where the United Nations says nearly 72 percent of the country’s 15 million people live on less than $2 a day.

Zorome also collects a “tip” of 60 cents from each of his two working wives when they get their monthly pay, which he uses to buy the kola nuts he likes to chew.

Lingani and Zagre, who also sweeps streets, said Zorome doles out small amounts of money for them to buy staples such as cornmeal. But the bulk of the family’s meals are paid for out of the wives’ sweeping wages.

As she prepared to leave for the market, Lingani kept bending over and rubbing her ankles and feet. She said they hurt from sweeping for so long. She has never weighed herself, but she said she can feel a significant loss in her weight and strength in the past year.

Last month’s sweeping money was already gone. So she went to her husband, who handed her about $2.50 for groceries. He told her to spend no more than about 75 cents and save the rest for another day.

“Women are born with this job” of feeding the family, Lingani said, as she walked around puddles and past goats tied to trees. “The man has to have his share. And we have to make sure the kids have their share. So we eat less.”

Lingani said none of the older boys in the family has a steady job, since work is hard to come by in this poor city. So, she said, the boys mostly spend their days doing odd jobs or playing soccer. What little money they earn they tend to spend on food and beer for themselves.

“A man can never sit at home. They are always out somewhere,” Lingani said. “They don’t do anything. They don’t help.”

Lingani walked past small stands where women were selling fruit or water, assisted by small girls. A few men sold bags or charcoal, but most were sitting in the shade and talking.

“Men and women should fight together for the children,” Lingani said. “But if the men won’t do that, the women have to fight alone.”

Zorome, Lingani’s husband, said that men don’t help with shopping and cooking because “that is the job of women.” Like many men interviewed here, he said African culture clearly defines roles for men, who work outside the house, and women, who manage children and meals.

He said that men are willing to work but that jobs are scarce. He would prefer it if his wives didn’t have to sweep streets, but “life is much more expensive now.”

“Last year, we could eat well, but now, forget it,” he said. “My sons don’t work, so it’s up to me to feed 25 people. That’s why the women sweep. We don’t have anything, so they have to work. That’s life.”

Ugly math
On her way to the market, Lingani explained the ugly math: A year ago, she could feed her entire family a nutritious meal of meat and vegetables and peanut sauce for about 75 cents. But now the family gets much lower-quality food for twice the price.

She said the cost of six pounds of cornmeal has risen from 75 cents to $1.50. A kilogram — 2.2 pounds — of rice cost 60 cents last year and costs a little more than $1 now. Other basics such as salt and cooking oil have also doubled in price.

Fuel costs have more than doubled for trucks that haul food to landlocked Burkina Faso, helping keep food prices high.

Beef or goat meat is now so expensive — about $1.20 for a tiny portion — that the family has given up meat completely, eating cheap dried fish instead. Rather than seasoning their sauces with vegetables and peanuts, they now use the tough leaves of baobab trees, the gnarly giants that flourish here in the dry lands south of the Sahara.

To soften the sour taste of the leaves, Lingani mixes in potash, a paste made by boiling down water strained through ashes from wood fires.

“In the past, our money would last the whole month. We might even have some left over,” Lingani said. “But now as soon as it arrives, we spend it.”

Dinner happens only if there is a bit of food left over from lunch. Even then, she said, there is rarely enough left for women.

“When the children ask for food, we have to give it to them,” she
Never enough
“Are you sure you don’t want more?” the vegetable vendor asked Lingani. “Is that enough for your family?”

Lingani, standing in a crowded neighborhood market, had just asked the woman for 30 cents worth of baobab leaves.

“No, it’s fine,” Lingani said, handing over a few coins.
The vendor shrugged and stashed the coins under a burlap sack of tomatoes covered with a beard of small flies. She handed Lingani back some change, which she counted carefully.

At the next stall, Lingani bought four small onions. As she turned to leave, the seller tossed in a fifth with an understanding smile. Lingani caught her eye and thanked her.

Moving through the churning mass of people, Lingani bought a bag of dried fish, a small plastic bag of salt, two small cubes of beef bouillon and a bag of potash, the paste made from ashes.

In 10 minutes, her shopping was done. She had spent double her budget of 75 cents.

After the half-hour walk home, with the temperature already above 90, Lingani and Zagre started plucking the baobab she bought at the market, saving the leaves and throwing away the thick stems.

For an hour, the two women methodically pounded the rough leaves in a wooden bowl, then dumped them into a pot boiling over a wood fire. Then Lingani added the dried fish and some of the ash flavoring.

“Of course we would prefer something else,” she said. “But it’s the cheapest thing we can buy, and we can afford enough to feed everybody.”

Two hours after she started cooking, Lingani scooped out six bowls of flavorless food. The first was for Zorome, delivered to his hut. He ate it alone, then said he felt as though he needed a nap.

Others were set aside to be shared by the children.

The last bowl, slightly larger than Zorome’s, was to be shared by 10 people: Lingani, Zagre and eight small grandchildren. Lingani took two bites before letting five hungry toddlers finish her food.

Near the front gate, half a dozen of the children sat in a circle, playing a game. They had built a play fire out of pieces of bark. On top of it they had placed a little plastic cup, overflowing with street garbage: onion skins and bits of rotting leaves.

They were pretending to cook.

“We’re cooking rice with meat!” said a beaming Ousmane, 6, the head chef.

His father, Zorome, watched the game and laughed. He was asked if he would eat again today. Yes, he said, Lingani would make him a little rice or porridge for dinner that night.

Nearby, his daughters and granddaughters heard him and exploded. “What are you talking about?” they said. “Why are you saying that? We have no food.”

Zorome smiled sadly and admitted his lie.

“When we have food one day, we have to tighten our belt the next,” he said. “But it is very hard for a man to admit when things are not good.”

Lingani was still sitting next to her empty food bowl. She had stopped the children from finishing one last lump of corn mush, about the size of her fist.

“The small children will be crying in a couple of hours, so we have to save it,” she said. Her voice was small and soft, and she didn’t look up from the red dirt. She said she felt “very sad.”

“I’m thinking too much,” she said.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25757291/page/3/

Microsoft says demand for Vista is strong: 180 million licenses sold

Microsoft’s thriving business and balance sheet is the envy of every business man. Over the past 12 months, the company had sales of $60.42 billion and a profit of $17.68 billion. You just know that the company is ready to expand further: Microsoft’s war chest currently holds more than $23 billion.

Looking a bit closer at the most recent quarter, the company said that “revenue growth was primarily driven by increased Windows Server and SQL Server revenue, increased licensing of the 2007 Microsoft Office system and Windows Vista, and increased Xbox 360 platform sales.” The terrible dollar exchange rate also helped to drive up foreign sales: Foreign currency exchange rates accounted for a $542 million or four percentage point increase in revenue during the quarter.

Windows Vista sales were said to have been particularly strong. Vista OEM revenue increased $420 million or 13%, driven by 22% growth in OEM license units. Revenue from commercial and retail licensing of Windows operating systems increased $138 million or 22%, primarily from Enterprise Agreements and anti-piracy efforts in emerging markets. OEM premium mix was 72% for the three months ended June 30, 2008. According to Microsoft, total worldwide PC shipments from all sources grew approximately 12% to 14%, driven by demand in both emerging and mature markets.

For the full year, Microsoft said that Vista OEM revenue increased $1.7 billion or 13%, driven by 16% growth in OEM license units. Revenue from commercial and retail licensing of Windows operating systems increased $209 million. Client software revenue (which also includes Microsoft Office) was only 28% ($16.86 billion) of Microsoft’s total revenue, but it delivered the lion’s share of profits – $13.05 billion.

Microsoft said that 180 million Vista licenses have been sold since the operating system’s launch in late January 2007, which is a huge number by any measure. But given the criticism the software lately has received we were wondering whether demand for Vista in fact is increasing or whether it is stable or perhaps even decreasing.

Microsoft said that it sold 20 million copies of Vista in its first month, 40 million copies in its first 100 days and 60 million in six months. We have to be a bit careful with these numbers as they actually include Express Upgrade sales – a program that was available since October 26, 2006 and allowed Microsoft to take advantage of the Christmas season and sell Vista while it actually had no product available.

This current number of 180 million units is not directly comparable as it includes all Vista sales, including licenses via various volume-licensing deals. There was only one number we could find that more directly compares to this new information: In late October of 2007, or just after the 1-year sales anniversary of Vista, Microsoft said that it had sold 88 million copies plus an additional 40+ million licenses, which adds up to about 128 million units total. Divided by 12, this gave Vista a sales pace of about 10.6 million units per month. Nine months later, Microsoft apparently has sold an additional 52 million units total, indicating a pace of just 5.8 million copies and licenses per month since October 2007.

This number, which includes retail copies and volume licensing is actually below the performance of sold retail copies in the first few months after Vista launch: By July 31, or slightly more than nine months after sales begin, Microsoft had sold 60 million retail copies – about 6.7 million units per months.

Clearly, only Microsoft knows the details about its real performance, some numbers reported are more than wishy-washy and let’s not forget that Microsoft deferred Express Upgrade revenue, which blurs sales and unit shipments estimates even further. But if the reported Vista sales numbers are close, we are actually a bit surprised that the figures are not higher, especially since Microsoft said that PC sales in fact are increasing, which should show unit growth on a per-month basis.

So, we are taking these numbers with a grain of salt, but we still can’t help but feel that the Vista picture isn’t quite as rosy as Microsoft is painting it. However, it still brings in the cash, no doubt about it.
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/38485/118/

The Dark Knight shatters box office record

On its first day, The Dark Knight earnings added up to $66.4 million, sailing past the $59.8 million record set by Spider-Man 3 last year.

It is widely expected that The Dark Knight will also break Spider-Man 3’s opening-weekend record of $151.1 million. Spider-Man 3 grossed $373 million at the worldwide box office in its first six days of release.

“We have been thrilled by the response to The Dark Knight, first from the critics and now from audiences. From our earliest screenings, the buzz on the film has been white hot and it hasn’t let up,” Fellman said.
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/38488/98/

Iran describes nuke talks as 'constructive'

“We still didn’t get the answer we are looking for,” Solana said, adding that Iranians are being given an opportunity “to interact with the international community.”

As a way of addressing concerns that Iran is intent on developing nuclear weapons, EU officials and the United States, Russia and China have proposed that Iran take a six-week break from manufacturing centrifuges that enrich uranium.

Under the proposal, Iran would be allowed to continue to use the more than 3,000 centrifuges it already has but could not make more. In exchange, the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany would not impose further sanctions against Iran during that period.

Iran says it is pursuing nuclear power only for energy purposes.

Jalili indicated that Iran wants to continue talks but gave no indication that the nuclear issue would be resolved soon.
“The experiences we have had in the past years tell us that, alone, different parties cannot resolve this,” he said.

Without elaborating, Jalili said Iran has offered a package of proposals, “which is designed to address our common concerns, common worries. In return, we aren’t asking for anything.”

He said he spoke Saturday morning with representatives from the five Security Council members and Germany.

“I told them that there is a choice which you need to make: ‘You are free to work as seven minus one or six plus one,’ ” Jalili said.

The State Department warned that Iran will face further “disincentives” if it chooses not to cooperate on the nuclear issue.

“We hope the Iranian people understand that their leaders need to make a choice between cooperation, which would bring benefits to all, and confrontation, which can only led to further isolation,” department spokesman Sean McCormack said in a written statement.

“The P5+1 made clear to the Iranians that our proposal was serious, and an opportunity for them to engage with the international community on our concerns.”

According to McCormack, U.S. Undersecretary of State William Burns delivered the following message during the talks: “The United States is serious in its support for the package Mr. Solana conveyed in Tehran last month, the United States is serious in its support of P5+1 unity, and the United States with its P5+1 partners are serious that Iran must suspend uranium enrichment to have negotiations involving the United States.”

The decision to send Burns is meant to send a strong signal but does not indicate a change of the U.S. position on Iran, McCormack said.

Until now, President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice insisted that the United States would talk to Iran only after Tehran halted its nuclear program.

There has been somewhat of a thaw in U.S.-Iranian relations in recent weeks. Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said this month his country was interested in academic and scientific exchanges with the United States.
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Mottaki said Iran has proposed resuming flights between Tehran and the United States, and there has been a suggestion that U.S. diplomats be posted in Tehran.

The United States broke off diplomatic ties with Iran in April 1980, after Americans were taken hostage the year before at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran following the U.S.-backed shah.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/07/19/iran.nuclear/index.html

Corpse in Pennsylvania baby mystery tentatively identified

The partially eviscerated body of the woman was found at the apartment of a Pennsylvania woman who arrived at a hospital with a newborn infant earlier in the week.

A placenta was found at the scene, the Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, medical examiner said.

The body “was in a state of moderate decomposition” and the woman had been dead for about two days, Medical Examiner Karl Williams said in a written statement.

The woman’s hands and feet were bound by duct tape. The cause of death remains undetermined, Williams said.

Drugs were found at the scene, and authorities are awaiting toxicology results to determine whether the woman was sedated, he said. It’s unclear whether the woman was alive when the infant was taken, he added.

“The most important thing right now is to identify this individual,” said James Morton, assistant superintendent of Allegheny County Police.

He said investigators are seeking dental records to help with the identification process.

The body was found Friday at an apartment in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania, belonging to a woman with a history of attempting to steal newborns, according to court records obtained by Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.

Andrea Curry-Demus, 38, is charged with endangering the welfare of a child, a felony, and dealing in infant children, a misdemeanor. Court records show that she was arraigned on the felony charge Friday and is next set to appear in court on Thursday. She is being held at the Allegheny County Jail, WTAE reported.

According to a criminal complaint, Curry-Demus was taken by ambulance to a local hospital Wednesday with the baby, claiming it was hers. Tests at the hospital proved that she was not the mother, and police were notified.

Curry-Demus told Grande she had suffered a miscarriage in June and “did not want her mother to get upset.”

In the complaint, Detective Rich Grande said Curry-Demus told him she purchased the baby from a woman named Tina for $1,000. Morton said fingerprint testing had ruled out a woman named Tina Carter, one of two other pregnant black women who have been reported missing in the area.
On Wednesday, Curry-Demus said, Tina showed up with her newborn wrapped in a towel and left. Curry-Demus said she called medics because the baby was still “dirty from birth,” the complaint said.

The baby is in good condition, a hospital spokeswoman said, and will be released to child welfare workers when he is ready.

Reporters visiting Curry-Demus’ apartment earlier Friday had noticed flies and smelled an odor from the sidewalk below, WTAE said. Police Chief Ophelia Coleman said the body was not found earlier because Curry-Demus’ sister led them to another apartment.

Friends and relatives said Curry-Demus had told them she was pregnant for months, even having a baby shower.

“I went to the baby shower and her wedding,” Ivee Blunt said. “I had no idea something like this could happen. I’m totally shocked. And she was so nice and kind. It’s just unbelievable.”

But Stephanie Epps, Curry-Demus’ sister-in-law, said Curry-Demus would never allow her to touch her stomach.

“Pregnant women do things like that,” she said. “They’re happy because they’re pregnant. But she would never do none of that.”

As she was led out of the Wilkinsburg Police Department, Curry-Demus told reporters, “I didn’t do nothing,” according to WTAE.

According to court records obtained by the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Curry-Demus became pregnant at 12 and miscarried four months later. She had a second miscarriage in 1990, when she was 21, the paper said.

Only a few months after the second miscarriage, Curry-Demus befriended a woman who had just given birth but later attacked her with a knife and tried to steal the baby, the paper said, citing the court records.

The woman’s husband intervened, and she fled, the newspaper reported.

The next day, she went to a hospital and befriended a woman who had brought her 3-week-old daughter to the hospital to be treated for meningitis, the Tribune-Review said.

When the woman went home for the night, Curry-Demus left the hospital with the baby. It was found at her home, unharmed, the following day.

In 1991, according to the records, she pleaded guilty to various charges stemming from both incidents and was sentenced to three to 10 years in prison, the newspaper reported.

She was paroled in August 1998 and ordered to serve 10 years of probation, the paper said.

Curry-Demus was examined by psychiatrists at the Allegheny County Jail before her sentencing and was diagnosed with severe depression, personality disorders and auditory hallucinations, the newspaper reported, citing court records.

She told doctors she spent a lot of time thinking about her miscarriages and “kept hearing babies cry,” the Tribune-Review said.

Wilkinsburg is just east of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Earlier this year, a Kansas woman was sentenced to death in the 2004 killing of a Missouri woman whose baby was cut from her womb.

Lisa Montgomery was convicted in October in the death of Bobbie Jo Stinnett, 23, who was found strangled in her Skidmore, Missouri, home. Stinnett’s womb was cut open, and her unborn child was missing. Montgomery was found days later at home in Kansas, where she was attempting to pass the baby off as her own
http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/07/19/baby.mystery/index.html

Iraqi PM disputes report on withdrawal plan

“That, we think, would be the right time frame for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes,” he said.

But a spokesman for al-Maliki said his remarks “were misunderstood, mistranslated and not conveyed accurately.”

Government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said the possibility of troop withdrawal was based on the continuance of security improvements, echoing statements that the White House made Friday after a meeting between al-Maliki and U.S. President Bush.

In the magazine interview, Al-Maliki said his remarks did not indicate that he was endorsing Obama over presumptive Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain.

“Who they choose as their president is the Americans’ business. But it’s the business of Iraqis to say what they want. And that’s where the people and the government are in general agreement: The tenure of the coalition troops in Iraq should be limited,” he said.

“Those who operate on the premise of short time periods in Iraq today are being more realistic,” al-Maliki said.

The interview’s publication came one day after the White House said President Bush and al-Maliki had agreed to include a “general time horizon” in talks about reducing American combat forces and transferring Iraqi security control across the country.

The Bush administration has steadfastly refused to consider a “timetable” for withdrawing troops from Iraq.

In a statement issued Friday after a conversation between Bush and al-Maliki by closed-circuit television, the White House said that conditions in Iraq would dictate the pace of the negotiations and not “an arbitrary date for withdrawal.”
The two men “agreed that the goals would be based on continued improving conditions on the ground and not an arbitrary date for withdrawal,” the White House said.

In an interview to air Sunday on “Late Edition,” Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer that “those goals are being achieved now, as we speak. And so, it’s not at all unusual to start to think that there is a horizon out there, in the not too distant future, in which the roles and responsibilities of the U.S. forces are going to change dramatically and those of the Iraqi forces are going to become dominant.”

White House spokesman Scott Stanzel said al-Maliki had made it clear that such decisions will be based on continuing positive developments.

“It is our shared view that should the recent security gains continue, we will be able to meet our joint aspirational time horizons,” he said.

The prime minister’s remarks emerged as Obama visited Kuwait and Afghanistan before embarking on a tour of the Middle East and Europe to boost his foreign policy credentials. He also plans to visit Iraq.

The Democratic candidate says he supports a phased withdrawal of troops, promising to remove all combat brigades from Iraq within 16 months of taking office if he becomes president.

McCain does not think American troops should return to the United States until Iraqi forces are capable of maintaining a safe, democratic state.

He has been a strong advocate of the 2007 “surge” to escalate U.S. troop levels and says troops should stay in Iraq as long as needed.

McCain says Obama is wrong for opposing the increased troop presence, and Obama says McCain’s
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/07/19/almaliki.obama/index.html

Report: Kidnappers say British hostage commits suicide

The video was received in Baghdad last week, the newspaper said.

The British government said it could not independently verify the claims in the video, including the hostage’s “purported death,” a Foreign Office spokeswoman said.

“As in the case of previous messages from the hostage takers, the Government emphasizes the humanitarian appeal of the families for the men’s release,” a statement from the Foreign Office said.

The video is titled “Intihar” — or “suicide” — and opens with a photograph of the hostage wearing a football shirt, the newspaper reported.

He is identified as Jason in a statement signed “The Shiite Islamic Resistance in Iraq” that appears on screen.

The statement, according to the newspaper, blames the British government for the status of the hostages.

“This procrastination and foot-dragging and lack of seriousness on the part of the British government has prolonged their psychological deterioration, pushing one of them, Jason, to commit suicide on 25/5/2008,” the statement said, according to the newspaper. “He surprised our brethren, who were taking care of him, with his suicide.”

The newspaper reported that the captors said say they regret the hostage’s death “but hold the British government responsible for the hostages’ fate.”

The footage shows another hostage appealing for the British government to hasten the men’s release.

“Physically, I’m not doing well,” the newspaper quoted the unidentified hostage as saying. “Psychologically, I’m doing a lot worse. I want to see my family again.”

Five Britons and two Iraqis were kidnapped in May 2007 from an Iraqi Finance Ministry building in Baghdad. Only one hostage, Peter Moore, has identified himself by name in a video released in February in which he pleaded with the British government to negotiate for the hostages’ release.

On May 29, the anniversary of the kidnappings, Britain’s ambassador to Iraq, Christopher Prentice, appealed to the kidnappers to let the captives go.

The Sunday Times story said that an intermediary who handed the video to a newspaper representative said the hostage who died had made two previous attempts at suicide.

“He said proof of death would be provided only if the British government agreed to negotiate,” the newspaper said.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who is visiting Iraq, said in a statement, “we are taking this very seriously.”

“There are many people working behind the scenes trying to find a solution,” the statement said.

Brow said he has discussed the hostage situation with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

“We both share a desire to see them returned safely to their families. I call on those holding the hostages to release them immediately and unconditionally.”

The Foreign Office said the families of the hostages have been notified of the video.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/07/19/british.hostage/index.html

Obama meets U.S. troops, Afghanistan officials

Along the way, he got heavy criticism from his Republican rival, Sen. John McCain, and indirect support from an unlikely quarter, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Obama’s first overseas tour since securing the Democratic nomination last month could be key to honing his foreign policy strategy with less than four months before the election. McCain, has criticized Obama for not spending more time in the region and for developing a policy without more firsthand knowledge.
Obama met for breakfast with U.S. troops on Sunday and was to meet with Afghan President Hamid Karzai as part of a congressional delegation.

At breakfast, Obama and the other senators traveling with him met with soldiers and sailors from their respective constituencies, said Lt. Col. Dave Johnson, a U.S. military spokesman.

“The food was great, but the company was better,” Johnson said.

While officially part of a fact-finding tour expected to take him to Iraq, Obama arrived Saturday amid the publicity and scrutiny accorded a likely Democratic nominee for president rather than a senator from Illinois. Security was tight and media access to Obama was limited by his campaign; his itinerary in the war zones was a closely guarded secret.

Obama and others in the delegation received a briefing inside the U.S. base in Jalalabad from the Afghan provincial governor of Nangarhar, Gul Agha Sherzai, a former warlord.

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“Obama promised us that if he becomes a president in the future, he will support and help Afghanistan not only in its security sector but also in reconstruction, development and economic sector,” Sherzai told The Associated Press.

The area where the meeting took place is not far from where Osama bin Laden escaped U.S. troops in 2001 after his al-Qaida terrorist group led the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the U.S.

With the ousted Taliban regime resurgent and given the al-Qaida goal of terrorizing the U.S., Obama has argued that the war in Afghanistan deserves more attention as well as more troops.
He has proposed sending two more combat brigades — about 7,000 troops — to Afghanistan. McCain is also advocating sending more forces to the war-battered country.

In his weekly radio address Saturday, McCain, a former Navy pilot and Vietnam prisoner of war, insisted his “many years of military and political experience” made him better suited to lead the U.S. to victory in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“In a time of war, the commander-in-chief’s job doesn’t get a learning curve,” the veteran Arizona senator said.

McCain also chided Obama for giving a speech announcing “his strategy for Afghanistan and Iraq before departing on a fact-finding mission” to both countries.

“Apparently, he’s confident enough that he won’t find any facts that might change his opinion or alter his strategy. Remarkable,” McCain said.

Traveling with Obama were Sens. Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican, and Jack Reed, a Democrat from Rhode Island. Both military veterans, the senators have been mentioned as potential Obama vice presidential running mates, although Reed has said he is not interested in the job and Hagel would be an unlikely cross-party choice.

At the start of their Afghan trip, the delegation met with top military leaders and troops at Bagram Air Field, the main U.S. military base north of the capital, before going to Jalalabad.

Obama advocates ending the U.S. combat role in Iraq by withdrawing troops at the rate of one to two combat brigades a month. He supports increasing the military commitment to Afghanistan, where the Taliban-led insurgency is at its strongest in seven years.
In an interview with German magazine Der Spiegel released Saturday, al-Maliki called Obama’s suggestion of 16 months “the right timeframe for a withdrawal” and said U.S. troops should leave Iraq “as soon as possible.”

Al-Maliki said he was not seeking to endorse Obama. But his statement was a sharp contrast to the Bush administration policy, supported by McCain, opposing a set timetable for withdrawal.

A top McCain adviser, Randy Scheunemann, responded by accusing Obama of advocating “an unconditional withdrawal that ignores the facts on the ground and the advice of our top military commanders.”
The top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, said Saturday that after intense U.S. assaults there, al-Qaida may be considering shifting focus to its original home base in Afghanistan, where American casualties are recently running higher than in Iraq.

Obama has expressed frustration with the efforts by Afghanistan’s neighbor Pakistan to go after militants in its territory. That stance may strike a chord with Karzai, who has directly accused Pakistan’s intelligence service of supporting the Taliban insurgency by plotting bombings and other attacks in Afghanistan — claims that Pakistan, a key U.S. ally in its war on terror, flatly denies.

But Obama has also chided Karzai and his government, saying it had “not gotten out of the bunker” and helped to organize the country or its political and security institutions.
The Democrat, who is seeking to become the first black U.S. president, spent much of last week outlining his foreign policy views, even as the faltering U.S. economy eclipsed Iraq as the top campaign issue in the November election.

Obama’s trip affords the first-term senator a chance to promote his plans to mend rifts with allies weary of the Bush administration and end the Iraq war.

Campaign officials have announced stops in Jordan, Israel, Germany, France and Britain.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25745500/page/1/