WASHINGTON: US envoys last week raised concerns with Damascus about Islamic fighters transiting Syria to enter Iraq, the State Department said Monday, following a report that increasing numbers of foreign combatants are making the crossing. Assistant Secretary of State Jeffrey Feltman and National Security Council official Daniel Shapiro raised the concerns Thursday during their second visit to Damascus since President Barack Obama's inauguration, the State Department said. "We continue to have very deep concern about this issue of the flow of foreign fighters going into Iraq via Syria," said State Department spokesman Ian Kelly.He urged Syria "to take immediate and decisive action, including better screening of individuals entering Damascus airport, increased security on the Iraq-Syria border, better cooperation with the government of Iraq and denying foreign fighter facilitators safe haven within Syria." The administration last week renewed sanctions against Syria, accusing Damascus of supporting Mideast terrorism and undermining Iraqi stability.
Friday, August 14, 2009 MUMBAI: A 26-year-old woman died Thursday of H1N1 swine flu in the southern city of Bangalore, raising India's death toll from the virus to 20, authorities said.The death was the first reported in India's information technology capital, the Press Trust of India reported.Meanwhile in Pune, the worst-affected in India, two more victims of the virus died Thursday, raising the death toll in that western city near Mumbai to 12, the report said. The victims were an 11-month-old boy and a 75-year-old old woman.US media reported movie halls, schools and colleges were ordered closed Thursday for three days to a week in Mumbai, the commercial and financial capital of the country, as fear of the pandemic spread.Prajakata Lavangare, a spokeswoman for the government of Maharashtra state of which Mumbai is the capital, said similar orders were issued in Pune, which is also located in the state.The woman who died in Bangalore was identified only as Roopa, a teacher in...
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