LIBYA: 600 migrants feared dead after ship sinks.
Almost everyone on an overcrowded ship carrying some 600 African migrants to Europe is believed to have died when the vessel broke apart within sight of the Libyan capital, the United Nations said. The U.N. accused the Libyan government of complicity in a rising number of deadly smuggling incidents, many involving workers from sub-Saharan Africa who had moved to Libya to find work before war broke out there in March.
International agencies said some recent migrants report being forced onto dangerously packed ships at gunpoint by Libyan soldiers. A spokesman for Moammar Gadhafi suggested that increased illegal immigration was the price European nations would pay for their military and political support of the rebels trying to topple Libya’s strongman.
SYRIA: Crackdown has claimed 750 lives, group says.
A human-rights group reports that more than 750 people have been killed in a military crackdown after seven weeks of unrest. Tanks and troops rolled into southern villages near the heart of Syria’s anti-government uprising, with activists saying the regime has isolated parts of the country. The military has been sealing off various areas of Syria and conducting house-to-house raids in search of people whose names are on wanted lists, with many fleeing cities and towns for fear of detention by the regime of President Bashar Assad.
UNITED STATES: White House may push for change at top in Syria.
The U.S. is edging closer to calling for an end to the long rule of the Assad family in Syria. Obama administration officials said the first step would be to declare for the first time that President Bashar Assad has forfeited his legitimacy to rule. Assad retains considerable international support, and it is not clear how much backing the U.S. would have in suggesting regime change.
EGYPT: Mubarak official convicted of corruption.
An Egyptian court has convicted the country’s former tourism minister of corruption and sentenced him to five years in prison. He’s the second former high-ranking official of ex-President Hosni Mubarak’s regime to be convicted of corruption since Mubarak’s Feb. 11 ouster. Also, recent figures show inflation running above 12 percent annually and food prices jumping 20 percent. Both are issues that helped ignite the popular revolution.
YEMEN: Oil production shut down amid unrest.
Yemen stopped producing oil Tuesday because of internal strife, plunging a nation that is already the Arab world’s poorest into further economic decline as pressure builds on longtime President Ali Abdullah Saleh to step down. Income from the oil sales has provided funds for about three quarters of the government’s budget.
BAHRAIN: Iran putting together humanitarian aid.
Iran will send a convoy of humanitarian aid ships to Bah rain in solidarity with anti- government demonstrators, the Iranian state-run Fars news agency reported, citing Mehdi Eghrarian, head of the Islamic Revolution Supporters Society. The flotilla will depart from the southern port city of Bushehr on Monday, he said in Tehran. The effort is part of Iran’s condemnation of “crimes” against the Bahraini people by their government and that of neighboring Saudi Arabia, Fars said.
Denver Post wire services
