YANGON: Democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi faced a second day of a closed-door trial Tuesday as international criticism mounted of a military regime that repeatedly has found pretexts for keeping her in detention over most of the past two decades. Suu Kyi, her two companions under house arrest, and an American,John W. Yettaw, are being tried together for violating the conditions of her restriction order, which bans visitors without official permission. The offense is punishable by up to five years' imprisonment. The ambassadors of Britain, France, Germany and Italy as well as an Australian diplomat were barred from entering the prison compound for the trial, but U.S. consular chief Colin Furst was allowed in.
BAGHDAD: Nearly 500 U.S. Army combat engineers who specialize in clearing roads of explosives started shifting to southern Afghanistan."We are probably going to be the beginning of the influx you are going to see to Afghanistan," Lt. Col. Kevin Landers, commander of the Fort Carson, Colo.-based 4th Engineer Battalion, said as crews packed crates and cleaned vehicles for the flight to Kandahar.Obama has ordered 17,000 more U.S. soldiers and Marines to Afghanistan to bolster the 38,000 American troops already battling the resurgent Taliban."We are going to take this footprint out of Iraq," said Landers, whose battalion received word of its reassignment last month just after taking command of clearing roads in Baghdad of bombs and debris.
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