Tuesday, August 18, 2009 KABUL: A Taliban rocket struck the grounds of Afghanistan's presidential palace on Tuesday, just two days before incumbent Hamid Karzai seeks re-election in tense polls that could go to a second round.Polls show Karzai likely to win Thursday's vote, but not with the outright majority required to avoid a second round. He is relying on the last-minute support of former guerrilla chieftains in a bid to tip the balance.His main rival Abdullah, an urbane eye doctor, has run an energetic campaign, seeking to garner support from beyond his base in the mainly ethnic-Tajik north.Several small rockets were fired overnight and a police source said one caused some damage inside the sprawling, fortified presidential palace compound in central Kabul, while a second hit the capital's police headquarters. Neither caused any casualties.Militants who have vowed to disrupt Thursday's election have fired rockets at the capital twice this month as well as detonated a massive suicide bomb outside the NATO-led International Security Force Headquarters (ISAF) in central Kabul that killed seven people and wounded dozens more.Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid, in a message sent to foreign news agency, claimed the fighters had fired four rockets, but gave no further details.
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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