Iraq holds 73 as two million throng shrine city
KARBALA: Iraq has arrested 73 Al-Qaeda-linked suspects officials said were implicated in plotting "chaos" during Ashura in Karbala, as two million pilgrims thronged the Shia shrine city on Thursday. The…
US to send dancers as diplomats on world tours
By AFP The US government said Wednesday it will send US dance companies in 2012 to east and south central Asia as well as to the Middle East and Africa…
Fiennes directorial debut, Wenders 3D pic at Berlin fest
A British drama directed by Ralph Fiennes and a 3D documentary by Wim Wenders on the late German choreographer Pina Bausch will premiere at the Berlin film festival in February,…
Is open diplomacy possible?
By Peter Singer PRINCETON: At Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson, who was president of the university before he became president of the United States, is never far away. His larger-than-life image looks…
Time for politics in Kabul
By Fatima Ayub LONDON: As US and NATO soldiers prepare for their tenth Christmas in Afghanistan, a new buzzword is making the rounds: “transition,” the process of transferring responsibility for security…
Voodoo economics revisited
By Simon Johnson WASHINGTON, DC: Democratic and Republican leaders in Washington are suddenly falling over themselves to agree on the need for major tax cuts — affecting not just middle-class Americans,…
‘Microphone’ hits the right note in unconventional ode to Alexandria music
By Sarah El Sirgany Three men spell out a curse word in Arabic. The three letters rhyme with the rest of their sharp and furious rap. But these seem to be…
British Muslims look to public relations to engage
LONDON: The last decade has been nothing less than challenging for Muslims in Britain. In the aftermath of the horrific attacks of 9/11 in New York and 7/7 in London,…
Alexandria factory collapse death toll reaches 26
CAIRO: Egyptian rescue workers have pulled 26 corpses from the rubble of a six-storey textile factory that collapsed during a storm in the Mediterranean port city of Alexandria, a police…
Swedish tolerance threatened by first suicide bombing
By Rita Devlin Marier/ AFP STOCKHOLM: Even as Sweden's Muslim community denounces the country's first suicide bombing, experts have cautioned the attack could be exploited by the rising far-right to polarize…
