Egypt (and Beyond) Live Coverage: Policemen on Strike

A woman runs for cover during clashes in Port Said in Egypt on Thursday (Photo: Khalil Hamra/AP)

See also US Audio Feature: Drones and Senator Paul's "False Drama" Filibuster --- Scott Lucas with Monocle 24
Syria Live Coverage: Opposition Leaders Cancel Trip to Washington --- Why?
Thursday's Egypt (and Beyond) Live Coverage: Court Suspends Parliamentary Elections

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2011 GMT:Iraq. Minister of Agriculture Ezz al-Din al-Dawla quit today over the killing of a protester in the northern city of Mosul.

Police said they fired shots into the air to disperse a crowd of stone-throwing demonstrators.

Ezz al-Din al-Dawla is the second Iraqi minister to announce his resignation over the handling of mainly-Sunni protests, staged daily against the al-Maliki Government since December.

"I announce my resignation before the Iraqi people and my people in Mosul because there is no way to continue any longer with a government that does not respond to my people's demands," said Dawla, a member of the Sunni-backed Iraqiyya Bloc, in a televised news conference.

Minister of Finance Rafa al-Issawi, whose home and offices were raided by security forces in December, quit earlier this month.

Thousands of protesters took to the streets again in the cities of Mosul, Samarra, and Kirkuk and in Anbar Province on Friday. They again demanded the release of detainees and the scrapping of anti-terrorism laws they say are unfairly used against them.

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Iran Live Coverage: Chest-Beating for the Next Nuclear Talks

See also Iran Analysis: Tehran's Signals on Nuclear Talks --- We Will Negotiate, But We Can Be Tough Just Like the US
Thursday's Iran Live Coverage: "Our Enemies Are Within Our Houses, Mosques, Seminaries, and Schools"

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1530 GMT: Your Tehran Friday Prayer Update. Scott Lucas returns from an academic break....

Ayatollah Movahedi Kermani takes the podium today to give the crowd an economic message from the Supreme Leader: "Temporary hardships can be overcome with faith in Islam....The enemy scorns us because of our progress."

The cleric said sanctions had aimed at "opposing the people to the rulers, but they had failed, as seen by the turnout of the Iranian people at rallies in February for the anniversary of the Islamic Revolution.

In other words, "unlike the West, we have solutions for economic problems".

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Iran Analysis: Tehran's Signals on Nuclear Talks --- We Will Negotiate, But We Can Be Tough Just Like the US

On Thursday, going beyond simple headlines in the Western press that the Supreme Leader had "condemned" or "slammed" the US over the nuclear issue --- we assessed the signals in Ayatollah Khamenei's statement.

We argued that the Supreme Leader was talking tough, calling on the West to prove its "honesty" in the next high-level talks in April. In particular, Ayatollah Khamenei was signalling that the US and European countries must acknowledge the Islamic Republic's sovereignty to enrich uranium --- before Iran made any commitment to suspend enrichment of 20% uranium and limit activities to 5% fuel.

We also noted,"Western media coverage...does not consider the possibility that Ayatollah Khamenei might be responding to American declarations in the last 72 hours condemning and 'slamming' Iran."

Ayatollah Khamenei's line --- we are taking a firm negotiating position, but we are pursuing technical talks next week and then the high-level discussions next month --- is reflected by Iranian officials and media this morning.

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Iran Live Coverage: "Our Enemies Are Within Our Houses, Mosques, Seminaries, and Schools"

See also Wednesday's Iran Live Coverage: "600 Journalists Work With the Enemy"

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General Hassan Firouzabadi1958 GMT:Political Prisoner Watch (Journalist Edition). The doors of Iran's prisons continue to revolve, with more journalists released and detained today.

Mohammad Mehdi Imami Naseri and Alireza Aghaeirad, the editor-in-chief and political editor of the reformist daily Maghreb, have been freed after 24 hours in detention.

Khosrow Kordpour, the head of the Kurdish Moukerian News Agency, and Ghasem Ahmadi, editor-in-chief of Roje monthly, have been arrested.

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Syria Live Coverage: Insurgent Brigade Kidnaps 21 UN Peacekeepers

2110 GMT: Idlib Town Bombed. Hish, a small town in southern Idlib province (map), is near where one of the aircraft below was reportedly shot down. Now, that town has been heavily bombed. According to this video, this shows the aftermath of a "barrel bomb," but whatever it is the devastation is readily apparent. As the video rolls, there is another large explosion off to the right:

2046 GMT: Assad Aircraft Shot Down. Many videos are floating around today that reportedly show two different jet fighters shot down over Idlib province. In one video, we see a large gun fire, though it is unclear if that is the road that supposedly hit the aircraft. What's interesting is that the black smoke trail is both blacker and wider than a typical contrail. There are other videos from other angles. We'd caution, however, that none of the videos shows the planes hit the ground, and none of them show any wreckage. Those videos may surface later:

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Iraq Feature: The US Pentagon is Linked to Torture Centres (The Guardian/BBC Arabic)

The 5-minute trailer for the full Guardian/BBC documentary

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The Pentagon sent a US veteran of the "dirty wars" in Central America to oversee sectarian police commando units in Iraq that set up secret detention and torture centres to get information from insurgents. These units conducted some of the worst acts of torture during the US occupation and accelerated the country's descent into full-scale civil war.

Watch the full Guardian/BBC Arabic documentary

Colonel James Steele was a 58-year-old retired special forces veteran when he was nominated by Donald Rumsfeld to help organise the paramilitaries in an attempt to quell a Sunni insurgency, an investigation by the Guardian and BBC Arabic shows.

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Syria Audio Feature: Britain Is "Economical with the Truth" About Aid to Insurgents --- Scott Lucas with the BBC

British Foreign Secretary William HagueI spoke with BBC WM last night about the statement by British Foreign William Hague, given in Parliament, about aid to the Syrian insurgency.

Listen to the interview from the 1:54.01 mark

The discussion noted Hague's declaration, following the US, of "non-lethal" assistance; however, it gets interesting when Paul Franks and I chatted about Hague's denial that Britain is providing any weapons.

I noted that Britain and the US have been co-operating and co-ordinating with those, like Saudi Arabia and Qatar, who have been provided advanced weapons in the last two months.

Pushed by Franks, I said, "Of course I am not saying that William Hague is lying."

I was just saying that, for political reasons, he is being "economical with the truth".

Egypt (and Beyond) Live Coverage: Court Suspends Parliamentary Elections

See also Iraq Feature: The US Pentagon is Linked to Torture Centres
Syria Live Coverage: Insurgent Brigade Kidnaps 21 UN Peacekeepers
Wednesday's Egypt (and Beyond) Live Coverage: Top Mubarak Ally Sentenced to 37 Years in Prison

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2025 GMT: Tunisia. Prime-Minister designate Ali Larayedh has presented a new coalition Government to President Moncef Marzouki after two weeks of difficult negotiations.

Earlier today, the hopes of Larayedh and his Ennadha Party, the leading faction in the Government, appeared to be dashed when three political parties that had been asked to join announced they were pulling out of the talks. That left only Ennahda and its secular allies in the previous Government --- Marzouki's Congress for the Republic and Ettakatol -- -- to discuss a new Cabinet and a proposed Government programme.

Tonight's announcement comes a day before a Constitutional deadline to announce the proposed Government.

The current political crisis was sparked by the 6 February protest of opposition politician Chokri Belaid and subsequent protests. Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali resigned when he was unable to form an apolitical Government of technocrats.

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Iran Live Coverage: "600 Journalists Work With the Enemy"

See also Iran Caption Competition: The Supreme Leader Plants A Tree

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1809 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. Gholam Hossein Elham, a former spokesman for the Government, has complained about the "unfair" interpretation that a State TV documentary about Abolhassan Bani Sadr --- the President who was impeached and fled Iran in 1980 --- was a coded jab at President Ahmadinejad.

Elham said there was no resemblance between the two men, including the implication that Bani Sadr's dispute with Ayatollah Khomeini was analogous to Ahmadinejad's relationship with the current Supreme Leader.

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Egypt (and Beyond) Live Coverage: Top Mubarak Ally Sentenced to 37 Years in Prison

1900 GMT: Bahrain. Claimed footage of police firing tear gas at three women:

1730 GMT: Libya. The car of Mohamed Magarief, the head of the General National Congress, came under fire in Tripoli as he left a chaotic session of the assembly disrupted by protesters.

There were no casualties.

The Minister of Interior, Ashur Shwayel said the gunmen were demanding that legislators pass a bill barring former associates of ousted leader Muammar Qaddafi.

Magarief survived a gun attack at his home in January.

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