Tuesday, August 04, 2009 MELBOURNE: Australian police launched a major anti-terrorism operation on Monday, detaining several people they said were suspected of plotting an attack in the country.About 400 officers from state and national security services took part in at least 19 pre-dawn raids on properties in the southern city of Melbourne, Victoria state police said in a statement. Police said members of a Melbourne-based group had “been undertaking planning to carry out a terrorist attack in Australia.'' The group was allegedly linked to hostilities in Somalia, the police statement said without giving further details. The Australian newspaper reported the detainees were Islamist extremists who had planned to launch a suicide attack on an Australian Army base. The men were allegedly planning to use automatic weapons to kill as many soldiers as possible before killing themselves, the newspaper reported. Police refused to confirm the report or release any further details, but said they would hold a press conference later Monday.
BEIRUT: Thousands of people converged Saturday on central Beirut to mark the fourth anniversary of the assassination of Lebanese former premier Rafiq Hariri.Waving Lebanese flags and carrying pictures of the slain leader, men, women and children gathered under sunny skies in Martyr's Square where members of the parliamentary majority were to address the crowd. The rally comes as final preparations are underway in The Hague for the launch of the international tribunal set up to bring Hariri's killers to justice. It also comes as the country prepares for legislative elections in June that will pit Western-backed political parties against a Hezbollah-led alliance backed by Syria and Iran.Hariri died in a massive car bombing on February 14, 2005 that also killed 22 others. The assassination was widely blamed on then Lebanese power-broker Syria, which has denied any involvement. The attack on the Beirut seafront was one of the worst acts of political violence to rock Lebanon since t...
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