Afghans gauging Taliban peace talks
KABUL, Afghanistan — Afghan political and tribal leaders will hold a large gathering known as a loya jirga next month to discuss negotiations with the Taliban, the president’s peace envoy said Wednesday.
Mohammad Omar Daudzai said in a televised speech that the gathering will aim to come up with a framework for the Kabul government to engage in peace talks with the insurgents, who effectively control nearly half the country. The Taliban have so far refused direct talks with Kabul but have been negotiating with the U.S. to end the war in Afghanistan, which is now in its 18th year. Daudzai said the loya jirga would discuss the government’s “values and red lines.”
He said most Afghan politicians want the ongoing U.S.-Taliban talks to lay the groundwork for direct negotiations between the Taliban and the government of President Ashraf Ghani. He said the Americans and the Taliban had agreed in principle on the withdrawal of U.S. troops, but only after a peace deal is reached with popular support.
Daudzai, who spoke at an event held by the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, said both military pressure and regional diplomacy were still on the table to coax the Taliban into engaging in direct negotiations with the Afghan government.
Egypt executes 9 assassination suspects
CAIRO — Egypt on Wednesday executed nine suspected Muslim Brotherhood members convicted of involvement in the 2015 assassination of the country’s top prosecutor, security officials said.
The nine were found guilty of taking part in the bombing that killed Hisham Barakat, the first assassination of a senior official in Egypt in a quarter-century. Barakat was also the most senior official killed since the military overthrew an elected but divisive Islamist president in 2013.
The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief media, said the families of the men were told to pick up their bodies from a Cairo morgue.
A total of 15 people have been executed in Egypt since the start of the year. Three were hanged earlier this month for their involvement in the 2014 killing of a judge’s son in the Nile Delta town of Mansoura. Authorities executed another three for killing a police officer in Cairo in September 2013. Rights groups decried the executions, saying the men were sentenced to death after torture and beatings to extract confessions.
According to rights groups, authorities have executed at least 165 people since July 2013.
70 deaths reported in Bangladesh fire
DHAKA, Bangladesh — A fire raced through at least five buildings in an old part of Bangladesh’s capital and killed at least 70 people, an official and witnesses said today.
About 50 people were injured. The fire in Dhaka was mostly under control after more than nine hours of efforts by firefighters.
The Chawkbazar area where the fire was burning is crammed with buildings separated by narrow alleys. The neighborhood is a mix of residential and commercial, with buildings that commonly have shops, restaurants or warehouses on the ground floors.
The blaze started late Wednesday in one building but quickly spread to others, said Brig. Gen. Ali Ahmed, the fire agency’s director general.
The death toll rose to 70, with many of the victims trapped inside the buildings, said Mahfuz Riben, a control room official of the Fire Service and Civil Defense in Dhaka.
Most buildings are used both for residential and commercial purposes despite warnings of the potential for high fatalities from fires.
The death toll could still rise, said Samanta Lal Sen, head of a burn unit of the Dhaka Medical College and Hospital.
Moroccans beaten at teachers protest
RABAT, Morocco — Moroccan police fired water cannons at protesting teachers who were marching toward a royal palace and beat people with truncheons amid demonstrations around the capital Wednesday.
Several demonstrations were held Wednesday, marking exactly eight years after the birth of a Moroccan Arab Spring protest movement that awakened a spirit of activism in this North African kingdom.
Teachers unions held a protest outside the Education Ministry in Rabat, the capital, and then tried to walk up an alley toward the nearby royal palace, prompting a crackdown.
Police officers beat several protesters to the ground.
The thousands of protesters, many wearing teachers’ robes, came from across Morocco to Rabat to seek salary raises and promotions and protest the limited opportunities for low-ranking teachers, who earn an average of $454 a month. They are also angry over temporary government contracts that do not cover health care or pensions.
“We are doing a peaceful march, but unfortunately the police are cracking down on us. Teachers are falling to the ground. Teachers are being insulted. Our message is education. Stop the injustice,” said demonstrator Naima Kalaii, who arrived from eastern Morocco to join the protest.
