The world in brief

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“God will not forgive the criminal perpetrators.”

Ismail Zlaiaa,

a 54-year-old resident of Jaramana,

Syria, where suicide bombers killed at least 34 people Wednesday Article, 1A

Iran to quicken uranium enrichment

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran will step up its uranium-enrichment program by sharply increasing the number of centrifuges used to make nuclear fuel, Iran’s nuclear chief, Fereidoun Abbasi, said Wednesday.

Abbasi said Iran is making nuclear advances in the face of the severe economic measures imposed by the U.N.

and the West.

The West suspects Iran’s nuclear program could be headed toward weapons production and has imposed punishing sanctions to try to persuade Tehran to stop enrichment. Iran has denied the charges, saying its program is peaceful and geared toward generating electricity and producing radioisotopes to treat cancer patients.

Abbasi’s remarks came days after the U.N. agency said Iran is about to double its output of higher-enriched uranium at its Fordo underground facility. That could move Iran closer to weapons capability.

Clashes leave 177 injured in Tunisia

TUNIS, Tunisia - A strike in a low-income region of Tunisia degenerated into a second day of clashes between police and protesters, leaving 177 people injured, including some seriously, a hospital official said Wednesday.

A local labor union organized a general strike in Siliana, a poor town in Tunisia’s interior, on Tuesday to protest a lack of jobs and government investment. Witnesses said police violently dispersed a peaceful march to the city hall for the second day in a row.

The Interior Ministry, however, maintained that police only moved against the demonstrators when they attacked city hall and threw stones at security forces.

Since the overthrow of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in January 2011, the Tunisian economy has suffered and the country has been wracked by demonstrations and strikes as people protest the lack of jobs.

On Tuesday, the World Bank approved a $500 million loan to help support changes in Tunisia’s financial sector to encourage investment and growth.

Moscow bomb plotter gets 15 years

MOSCOW - A man whose plot to cause carnage on Moscow’s Red Square was thwarted by a spam phone message that prematurely detonated a bomb was sentenced Wednesday to 15 years in jail.

Ilyas Saidov, a member of an underground Islamist group, took explosives-laden belts for two female suicide bombers on a bus from his native Dagestan, a southern province in the Caucasus region plagued by almost daily clashes between Islamists and federal forces.

But just hours before they were to detonate the bombs on New Year’s Eve, 2010, a belt attached to a cell phone exploded after the detonator was activated by a spam message, killing one of the women and prompting the arrest of the other. She was sentenced to 10 years in jail in May.

The Moscow City Court also found Saidov guilty of gunning down two police officers and three civilians in Dagestan.

Saidov pleaded guilty and cooperated with investigators, giving up the leader and several members of an underground Islamist group he was part of. His testimony led to the killing of several Islamists.

Colombia: Won’t follow border orders

BOGOTA, Colombia - Smarting from a World Court decision that cost Colombia some territorial waters, President Juan Manuel Santos said Wednesday that his government would no longer recognize the court’s jurisdiction in territorial disputes.

Legal experts, however, said Santos’ announcement was unlikely, in practice, to diminish the court’s authority in any international disputes involving the South American nation.

He was reacting to a Nov. 19 decision by the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, that affirmed Colombian sovereignty over a Caribbean archipelago off Nicaragua but said some waters around the islands belong to the Central American nation.

Those waters are valued for potential oil and gas deposits beneath them, and Santos, under pressure from environmentalists, had announced a moratorium on exploratory drilling in them. After the court’s ruling, Nicaraguan officials said they would study exploration.

Front Section, Pages 6 on 11/29/2012

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