A round-up of today's other stories in brief
Farc offers conditional peace talks
BOGOTA - Colombia's biggest rebel group will talk peace with President Alvaro Uribe if he halts US-backed anti-guerrilla operations, a Farc leader said yesterday, reversing the organisation's earlier refusal to negotiate.
Raul Reyes, spokesman for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, said it would meet the government if Mr Uribe withdraws security forces from the provinces of Putumayo and Caqueta and suspends his popular anti-rebel campaign.
Having reduced urban crime and sparked economic growth with his tough security policies, Mr Uribe won re-election last month in a 62 per cent landslide. - (Reuters)
US-led forces kill 30 Taliban
KABUL - US-led forces have killed more than 30 Taliban fighters in clashes during a major operation against rebels in volatile southern Afghanistan.
Eight insurgents were killed in a raid on Thursday on a cave complex used as a "meeting place and sanctuary" for Taliban bomb-makers. - (Reuters)
Mladic reported to be near death
BELGRADE - A Belgrade newspaper yesterday quoted an unnamed source as saying top war crimes fugitive Gen Ratko Mladic had suffered "his third stroke" and was in grave condition, near death.
The story said loyalists protecting the 64-year-old former Bosnian Serb army commander were discussing where to bury him. But a government source said: "This is just more sensationalist nonsense." - (Reuters)
Slovenia offers to help Montenegro
MONTENEGRO - Slovenia opened the first embassy in newly independent Montenegro yesterday, offering to help its former sister republic in the Yugoslav federation realise its EU aspirations.
Montenegro voted in a May 21st referendum to end a union with Serbia and form a separate state, completing the dissolution of the former Yugoslavia. - (Reuters)
Rock producer to stand trial
LOS ANGELES - Rock producer Phil Spector will go on trial in January for killing a B-movie actress, nearly four years after the fatal shooting took place.
Spector, who has pleaded not guilty and is free on $1 million bail, was not present at the hearing before Superior Court Judge Larry Paul Fidler.
Best known for his work with the Beatles and his signature Wall of Sound recording technique, the 66-year-old music impresario is accused of shooting to death Lana Clarkson (40) in the foyer of his Los Angeles-area mock castle. - (Reuters)
Cameraman shot in Mogadishu
MOGADISHU - A gunman shot dead a Swedish cameraman covering a pro-Islamist rally yesterday in Mogadishu, Somalia, just weeks after its new rulers said they had pacified one of the world's most lawless cities after 15 years of anarchy. - (Reuters)
Refugees want to go to West
CONAKRY - About 1,000 refugees who fled a civil war in Sierra Leone to camps in neighbouring Guinea are refusing to return home and want to be moved to Western countries, a humanitarian source said yesterday. - (Reuters)
Harriet packs it in aged 175
QUEENSLAND - Harriet the tortoise has died at an estimated age of 175. As the oldest-known living creature in the world, the giant Galapagos tortoise was thought to have been born in 1830.
She finally passed away in an Australia zoo on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland. - (Reuters)