A not-quite-vanquished foe

December 16, 2013 - Daily News Briefing

When an old-style communist purge unfolds, totalitarianism comes back into view.

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Iran’s foreign minister said Sunday his country will continue nuclear negotiations with world powers, even after pulling out of expert-level talks to protest the US targeting companies it says evaded current sanctions. Writing on Facebook, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif blamed “improper actions” by the US for Iran pulling out Friday. Technical experts from six world powers and Iran – which negotiated a deal in November to freeze Iran’s nuclear activity for six months in return for no new sanctions – had been meeting in Geneva to discuss implementing the arrangement.

The aunt of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has been named to an ad-hoc state committee, the country’s official media reported, an indication that the execution of her husband and the country’s No. 2 official has not immediately diminished her influence. What might happen to Kim Kyong-hui – a younger sister of late leader Kim Jong-il, Kim Jong-un’s father – was questioned after North Korea announced Friday that her husband, Jang Song-thaek, was executed for trying to overthrow the government.

Syrian activists say government air raids have killed at least 22 people, including 14 children, in the northern city of Aleppo. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says the aircraft dropped barrel bombs on the Haidariya and Ard al-Hamra neighborhoods on Sunday. The antigovernment group monitors the Syrian civil war through a network of activists on the ground.

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s new coalition partners are bringing back a former foreign minister and pledging to make Germany’s transition from nuclear to renewable energy a success as they enter government. The center-left Social Democrats also said Sunday that a deputy party leader with Turkish roots will become the government official responsible for immigrant issues. The Social Democrats will have six ministers in the conservative Merkel’s 16-member Cabinet. They include Frank-Walter Steinmeier, a well-respected foreign minister from 2005 to 2009 who returns as Germany’s top diplomat.

Iran has canceled a planned $500 million loan to Pakistan to build part of a pipeline to bring natural gas from the Islamic Republic. Deputy Oil Minister Ali Majedi said Iran has no obligation to finance the Pakistani side of the project and also doesn’t have the money. Iran has already invested more than $2 billion to construct the Iranian side of the pipeline.

Anti-apartheid champion Nelson Mandela was buried in his home village of Qunu on Sunday after a funeral that mixed ancient tribal rituals with a display of the might of the new, integrated South Africa.

The chairman of a 50-member panel that drafted a new constitution for Egypt called Sunday on supporters of the country’s ousted Islamist president to participate in next month’s referendum on the charter. “The constitution is for all Egyptians. There is no exclusion of any individual or group,” Amr Moussa told a news conference.

Compiled from wire service reports

“The object of the Monitor is to injure no man, but to bless all mankind.” – Mary Baker Eddy

The Daily News Briefing is published Monday through Friday by The Christian Science Publishing Society in Boston, Massachusetts.

Compiled from wire service reports

“The object of the Monitor is to injure no man, but to bless all mankind.” – Mary Baker Eddy

The Daily News Briefing is published Monday through Friday by The Christian Science Publishing Society in Boston, Massachusetts.

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