Our Great City

Washington Post staff writer David Nakamura discusses the controversy over the threat to burn copies of the Koran by a Florida pastor on the anniversary of 9/11, with first-hand reaction from the Muslim world.


Islam - Religion and Spirituality - Social Aspects - People - Angelina Jolie

KABUL - Demonstrations erupted here Thursday as hundreds of enraged youths burned effigies, threw rocks and chanted, "Death to America," to protest plans by a Florida church to burn copies of the Koran this weekend.



United States - Christianity - Religion and Spirituality - Islam - Afghanistan

The driver attacked a market in North Ossetia. No one immediately claimed responsibility.

A suicide car bomber hit the central market of a major city in Russia's North Caucasus on Thursday, killing at least 15 and wounding more than 130 people in one of the worst terror attacks in the volatile region in years, officials said.

Her comments reflect a striking shift in public comment by the Obama administration about the violence and come as U.S. officials weigh a large increase in aid to Mexico to help fight the cartels.

Mexico's violent drug cartels increasingly resemble an insurgency with the power to challenge the government's control of wide swaths of its own soil, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Wednesday.

A crackdown on vulgarity drives fans away from Guo Degang, once a hero to ordinary Chinese for mixing puns and poetry and making fun of authority figures.

He's foulmouthed. He's subversive. He has no respect for authority. In a country where an insurgent spirit can land you behind bars, it made Guo Degang rich instead.

Advocates say the women, who insist they suffered miscarriages, got caught up in Mexico's cultural wars over abortion.

The nation desperately needs road improvements, but farmers in Dhanaula say the project would benefit only rich people driving through. A new land acquisition bill could help the farmers' cause.

Three hundred farmers and shopkeepers blocked national highway 64 in Dhanaula for several hours on a recent weekday, protesting a planned upgrade they say threatens their farmland and economic livelihood.

Rwanda has threatened to pull troops from U.N. operations in the Darfur region of Sudan, due to outraged by a U.N. draft report accusing Rwandan troops of atrocities and possible genocide in Congo.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday pressed Rwanda to keep its forces serving on peacekeeping missions despite its anger over a draft report accusing the African nation's troops of atrocities and possible genocide in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

In Mexico, 600,000 have been displaced by flooding in five southeastern states. The search for 15 still missing in a Guatemala mudslide is called off because of the risk.

Heavy rainfall has set off deadly mudslides and widespread flooding across Central America and Mexico's southeast, killing more than 50 people and displacing more than half a million.

The three are accused of helping Faisal Shahzad get Taliban training and giving him money as he prepared for a car-bomb attack.

Pakistani authorities have charged three men with terrorism-related offenses for allegedly helping failed Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad prepare for the attempted May 1 attack by arranging meetings with top Pakistani Taliban leaders and sending him money, a senior police official in Islamabad said Wednesday.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai plans to impose rules restricting international involvement in anti-corruption investigations, a move that U.S. officials fear will hobble efforts to address the endemic graft that threatens support for his administration in Afghanistan and the United States.


Afghanistan - Hamid Karzai - United States - Asia - Politics

SEOUL, South Korea -- South Korea said it will ban many financial dealings with Iran and impose other penalties as part of a U.S.-led campaign to enforce sanctions against the country over its disputed nuclear enrichment program.


South Korea - Iran - Asia - Government - Embassies and Consulates

KABUL - Kabul Bank became the pride of Afghanistan's financial system by offering the conveniences and thrills of 21st-century capitalism: branches in far-flung provinces, plentiful ATMs, and lottery prizes of cash and houses.


Demography of Afghanistan - Kabul Bank - Asia - Afghanistan - Kabul

SEOUL - Almost every night, seeking to gather opinion from a country where opinion is often punishable, Kim Eun Ho calls North Korea. He talks mostly to people in Hoeryong city in Hamgyong-bukto province, and the conversations never last long. Hoeryong city employs 14 men who monitor the region's...


Kim Jong-un - North Korea - Asia - History - Government

A closely divided federal appeals court has dismissed a lawsuit seeking damages from a company that worked with the CIA as part of its "extraordinary rendition" program.



United States - United States Court of Appeals - Government - Central Intelligence Agency - Lawsuit

Than Shwe seeks Beijing's support for Myanmar's coming elections and its fight against border-area insurgents. Critics accuse China of propping up repressive regimes.

Once again, the head of a nation viewed as a pariah in the West had come to China to court favor, legitimacy and money, eliciting criticism that Beijing is coddling repressive regimes.

Baghdad is buying American military gear and weapons, which have yet to arrive. U.S. forces must stay to train Iraqis on how to use them, Defense Minister Abdul Qader Obeidi says.

Some form of U.S. military presence will be needed in Iraq at least until 2016 to provide training, support and maintenance for the vast quantity of military equipment and weaponry that Iraq is buying from America, Iraqi Defense Minister Abdul Qader Obeidi said.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton declared Wednesday that "a new American moment" has arrived in international relations, "a moment when our global leadership is essential, even if we must often lead in new ways."


United States - Foreign policy - President - History - Council on Foreign Relations

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Wednesday that the surging drug violence in Mexico now resembles war-torn Colombia a generation ago, with criminal cartels looking like "insurgencies" battling for control of territory.


Colombia - United States - United States Secretary of State - Mexico - Hillary Rodham Clinton

A Senate resolution condemning Egypt's record on human rights and free elections has sparked an aggressive Washington lobbying campaign by the longtime U.S. ally, which argues that the measure could harm the Middle East peace process and its relationship with the United States.


Human rights - Egypt - Human Rights and Liberties - Africa - Advocacy Organizations