Daily Newspaper

The Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki’s State of Law Coalition is widely expected to win the most seats according to preliminary results from the election. The Iraqi National Alliance opponents have also admitted Mr Maliki’s State of Law Coalition had done well, especially in Baghdad and in the Shia south of Iraq. But it is unlikely one party will form a government alone and there may be months of negotiations on a coalition

American Defense Secretary Robert Gates was keeping up the pressure on Iran, in the latest move Gates went to Saudi Arabia for consulting about how to respond to Tehran’s disputed nuclear program.

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband urged Afghans on Wednesday to push energetically for a peace settlement with Taliban insurgents and said Afghanistan’s neighbours must support such an agreement. Miliband’s conciliatory comments, in a speech to be given in the United States later on Wednesday, reflect growing acceptance in the West that Taliban fighters who break ties to al Qaeda have a role to play in the country’s future.

KABUL: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrived in Kabul on Wednesday to hold talks with his Afghan counterpart, a spokesman in Hamid Karzai’s office said.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates told troops in southern Afghanistan on Tuesday they would soon be part of a “decisive phase” in the war — an operation to impose control over the Taliban heartland of Kandahar province. NATO is sending thousands of extra troops to Kandahar over the next few months as part of plans to restore control over Kandahar, a central part of President Barack Obama’s strategy to reverse momentum in the 8-year-old war. The operation to restore government control in Kandahar is the main military objective remaining in Obama’s strategy, which aims to turn the tide this year with 30,000 extra troops so that US forces can begin withdrawing from Afghanistan in mid-2011.

Turkey said on Tuesday it will not send its ambassador back to Washington until it gets a “clear sign” on the fate of a US resolution branding the 1915-era killings of Armenians by Turkish forces as “genocide”. NATO member Turkey, a pivotal US ally, was infuriated and recalled its envoy after a US House panel last week approved the non-binding measure condemning the killings.

A traditional Islamic concept about protecting the faith and its followers has become a judicial weapon for Iran’s rulers: charging opponents as so-called enemies of God with the threat of possible death sentences. Iran’s accusations of “moharebeh”, literally “waging war” in Arabic, have opened deep rifts between ruling clerics and Islamic scholars questioning how an idea about safeguarding Muslims can be transformed into a tool to punish political protesters. The outcry increased last week after an appeals court reportedly upheld the death sentence for Mohammad Amin Valian, a 20-year-old student convicted of moharebeh crimes, which Iran’s legal code defines as “defiance of God”, or the state and punishable by hanging

Afghan President Hamid Karzai is arriving in Pakistan today on a two-day visit. During his stay, Karzai would meet with President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani

Iran’s Foreign Ministry on Tuesday criticized Germany for releasing the leader of the terrorist group Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan (PJAK).