Monitor Daily News Briefing - September 9, 2013

September 09, 2013 - Daily News Briefing

Before cellphone videos and social media, it was easier to look the other way. The pressure to do something in Syria is being driven in large part by disturbing images that pour out of the conflict.

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Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari stepped down Sunday at the end of his five-year term, becoming the first democratically elected president in the country’s history to complete his full term in office. His successor, Mamnoon Hussain, is scheduled to be sworn in today. Zardari rose to power after the assassination of his wife, two-time Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, in a gun and bomb attack in December 2007.

The US National Security Agency is able to crack protective measures on iPhones, as well as BlackBerry and Android devices, giving it access to users’ data on all major smart phones, according to a report Sunday in German news weekly Der Spiegel. The magazine cited internal documents from the NSA and its British counterpart GCHQ in which the agencies describe setting up dedicated teams for each type of phone as part of their effort to gather intelligence on potential threats such as from terrorists.

An Israeli government official says Israel has issued a complaint to the US about Palestinian officials leaking classified details about ongoing peace negotiations. Israeli and Palestinian negotiators had pledged to US Secretary of State John Kerry they would not speak publicly about the content of their talks.

The daughter of Libya’s ex-spy chief under dictator Muammar Qaddafi was released by her abductors after her tribe cut off Tripoli’s water supply, officials said Sunday. The commander of the militia that kidnapped Anoud el-Senoussi said that she was handed over to her tribe in southern Libya late Saturday after the country’s prime minister negotiated her release.

Taliban militants detonated a car bomb outside an Afghan intelligence office near Kabul Sunday and then tried to attack it on foot with guns, officials and the insurgent group said. At least four soldiers guarding the compound were killed and six insurgents died in the assault, officials said. Separately Sunday, Afghan officials said that an apparent NATO airstrike had killed 15 people – nine of them civilians – in a remote eastern province where the Taliban are strong. NATO said 10 militants died in the strike, but that it had no reports of any civilian deaths.

At a meeting in Buenos Aires Sunday, the International Olympic Committee fixed what it admits was a mistake by returning wrestling to the Olympic fold after seven months in limbo. Presenting new leadership and a revamped sport, wrestling defeated bids from baseball-softball and squash to secure a spot in the program for the 2020 and 2024 Games.

Syrian rebels led by Al Qaeda-linked fighters seized control of a predominantly Christian village northeast of Damascus, sweeping into the mountainside sanctuary in heavy fighting and forcing hundreds of residents to flee, activists and locals said Sunday. The battle over Maaloula, an ancient village, has thrown a spotlight on the deep-seated fears that many of Syria’s religious minorities harbor about the growing role of Islamic extremists on the rebel side in the civil war.

Compiled from wire service reports

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