Our Great City

For most of his 26 years in the military, Maj. Jeff Hackett was a standout Marine. Two tours in Iraq destroyed him.

Home from combat, he drank too much, suffered public breakdowns and was hospitalized for panic attacks. In June 2010, he killed himself.

BEIRUT — The daylight assassination of a top general in a residential neighborhood of the Syrian capital, Damascus, on Saturday underscored the growing militarization of the uprising against the rule of President Bashar al-Assad, and also perhaps its increasing militancy.

BEIJING — As measured by China’s state-run media, the country’s leadership transition is already well underway.

Vice President Xi Jinping, who will move up to Communist Party general secretary later this year and president of China in 2013, has appeared prominently on the front page of China Daily in recent weeks, signing ping pong paddles with former president Jimmy Carter, toasting the 40th anniversary of President Nixon’s visit to China, and being welcomed with honors in Thailand and Vietnam.

CAIRO — A crackdown on U.S.-funded pro-democracy groups in Egypt and a bill before parliament that would further restrict nongovernmental organizations here are inhibiting development work and activism during a period many Egyptians hoped would be marked by greater freedoms.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — They now inhabit regal mansions in the nation’s capital, but the prime minister and the president of Pakistan have known their share of more lowbrow addresses — namely, jail cells.

BEIRUT — Fears of an as-yet-undefined Middle Eastern war are darkening the horizons of a region that only a year ago was celebrating the fall of dictators, the ascent of people power and the promise of a new era of democracy.

BEIJING — As China moves to invest billions in businesses around the world, one major industrial nation has so far soaked up very little of the cash: the United States.

The issue will be on the agenda next week during Vice President Xi Jinping’s official visit to the United States. The Obama administration has made seeking Chinese investment a priority, with an eye toward creating more American jobs. But the flow of funds dropped sharply last year, and experts say the task is complicated by a perception that the United States is an unfriendly place for Chinese investors.

BERLIN — Greeks clashed on the streets of Athens and in the halls of government Friday, as protesters grew violent and one after another cabinet minister resigned, a day after the nation’s leaders accepted foreign lenders’ demands for tough austerity cuts to try to stave off bankruptcy.

The Obama administration and its allies see few, if any, viable options to end the carnage in Syria as President Bashar al-Assad’s forces continue their offensive against the opposition to his rule in what has become the uprising’s most violent month.

Turkey’s top diplomat said Friday that Iran is ready to negotiate an end to the standoff with Western powers over its nuclear program, suggesting that the controversy could be resolved quickly if the deep distrust between the two sides could be overcome.

The radical Yemeni American cleric who was killed in a CIA drone strike in Yemen in September personally directed the plot to take down a plane over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009, according to a Justice Department memo.

There is no more potent symbol of Egypt’s economic fragility than the pocket bread that is a staple of life here.

Every day, the Egyptian government allocates 25-pound bags of subsidized flour to designated bakeries to produce the Frisbee-shaped loaves, which Egypt’s impoverished and working poor buy for about eight cents per 10 loaves. But sometimes, there is not enough to go around.

For the second day in a row, a protester in Saudi Arabia has been shot dead by security forces during demonstrations, the Lede blog reports, citing activists.

Protester Zohair al-Saad died of gunshot wounds after security forces opened fire in a tiny town north of Qatif, according to an activist Facebook page for videographers, Revolution East.

Gabrielle Giffords, the former Arizona congresswoman who survived an assassination attempt one year ago, is getting a Navy vessel named in her honor.

The Navy said Friday that its newest Littoral Combat Ship, a small, agile surface vessel, will be known as the USS Gabrielle Giffords. The ship’s “sponsor” will be Roxanna Green, the mother of Christina-Taylor Green, the 9-year-old girl who was killed in the Tucson shooting that wounded Giffords in January 2011.

NEW DELHI — Hundreds of people marched in New Delhi on Friday to protest an ambitious free-trade agreement being negotiated between India and the European Union that patient groups and health activists say could severely curtail India’s production and export of affordable drugs for millions living with HIV in developing countries.

Turkey called Friday for rapid international action to supply humanitarian assistance to besieged cities in Syria but said the time was not right to begin arming the Syrian opposition.

“We are talking about what should be done today,” said Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, in Washington for consultations with the Obama administration. His visit is part of an international effort to organize an effective response to the Syrian carnage after the veto of a United Nations resolution last week calling on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step aside.

In Greece, old stereotypes about Germany are coming back with a vengeance.

A Greek newspaper upset over Angela Merkel’s handling of Greece’s debt crisis Thursday ran a Photoshopped image on its front page showing the chancellor in Nazi attire standing before a swastika.

ISLAMABAD — It’s never been easy being a sexual minority in Pakistan, but transgender citizens, known here as eunuchs or “hijras,” are getting a surprising amount of judicial protection and newfound civil rights.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistan’s Supreme Court on Friday rejected a last-ditch appeal by Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani against an imminent contempt charge, prompting fears of further political instability in the strategically vital country.