Wednesday, September 02, 2009 TRIPOLI: Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi marked the 40th anniversary of the bloodless coup that brought him to power, with celebrations attended by African, Arab and Latin American leaders. Kadhafi's party kicked off around midnight on Monday at the former US military base of Matega near Tripoli with a two-hour spectacle that paid homage to the leader himself and featured music, illuminations and dance. Guests included Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, African leaders who had earlier attended an African Union summit in Libya, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, his Dominican counterpart Leonel Fernandez, Serbian leader Boris Tadic and Philippine President Gloria Arroyo. Later on Tuesday, there was a military parade of detachments from African, Arab and eastern European armed forces, while dozens of aircraft, including French and Italian jets, flew overhead.
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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