Tuesday, June 02, 2009 SAN SALVADOR: Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Monday she's impressed by the Pakistani army's assault on Taliban militants who had captured much of Pakistan's Swat Valley."I am incredibly heartened by the resolve shown the Pakistani people, government and military," Clinton said in an interview with USA TODAY. She was in El Salvador for the inauguration of President Mauricio Funes.Pakistan's army has attacked Taliban strongholds throughout the Swat Valley, which is on the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.Members of the Taliban, the fundamentalist Muslim movement that ruled Afghanistan until its ouster in 2001, had moved into the Swat Valley and gradually taken control. In April, Clinton told a congressional committee that the Pakistani government of President Asif Ali Zardari "is basically abdicating to the Taliban and to the extremists."
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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