Washington announced on Saturday that it was removing Pyongyang from its list of terrorism-sponsoring countries. The other countries included in the list are Cuba, Sudan, Syria and Iran. The North Korean foreign ministry subsequently committed themselves to nuclear disablement at its Yongbyon nuclear complex as a result of the US declaration. It will also allow US and International Atomic Energy Agency inspections to oversee the process. This revival of the 2007 inspections agreement, which North Korea suspended in August after Washington postponed a decision on delisting, will entitle the North to oil aid and see the lifting of several trade and financial sanctions.Keep up to date with the latest developments and sharpest perspectives in a world of strife and struggle.
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The toD verdict: The North Korean regime stunned the world two years ago when it claimed to have conducted its first nuclear test using a plutonium device. The US decision has been received badly by Japan, who denounced the concession as "extremely regrettable". Japan considers itself to be a prime target for North Korean conventional and nuclear missiles, and additionally does not want international acceptance of North Korea until the government accounts for 13 Japanese citizens abducted during the cold war. Yet South Korea is said to have welcomed the breakthrough, despite Wednesday's announcement from South Korea's top military official, Gen. Kim Tae-young, that he believed the North to be trying to develop a nuclear warhead to fit on a missile.
However, a South Korean government official said on Monday that they had not seen signs of North Korea restarting work to take apart its nuclear plant as the government had guaranteed. The US removal of North Korea from its terror blacklist is provisional; if they do not comply with the inspections they will be put back on the list.
Violence increasing in Iraq
Suicide car bombers struck twice on Sunday in the northern city of Mosul in an attack which killed at least six people and wounded dozens more. Nine other people were killed on the same day in a bomb attack in Baghdad. Attacks have continued in Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, despite months of US and Iraqi security operations against al-Qaida and other Sunni extremist groups. It has also been centre stage in the persecution of Christians; Sunni militants have been blamed for the murders of 12 Christians over the past fortnight, and over the weekend a 1,000-strong police contingent was sent in to quell the violence which has led, in the last 24 hours, to thousands of Christians taking refuge in churches and to thousands more fleeing the area during the past week.
In an unrelated attack, an Iraqi member of parliament was killed on Friday in a roadside bomb attack in eastern Baghdad.
A return to cold war politics?
Russia successfully test-fired four long-range nuclear-capable missiles over the weekend in an unprecedented show of force the like of which has not been seen since the Cold War era. On Sunday, two nuclear submarines were simultaneously deployed in the Sea of Okhotsk, north of Japan, and the Barents Sea, northeast of Norway, to test the Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM), which hit targets at the opposite extreme of the country. Another missile, Topol, was fired from a mobile land-launcher at the Plisetsk space centre in northwest Russia. A day earlier, a nuclear submarine test-fired the new ICBM Sineva in the Barents Sea. Dmitry Medvedev, the Russian president, has said that his country's nuclear capabilities are "in good shape", hinting to the introduction of new weapon systems in the future. The missile launches were part of the "Stability 2008" war games, the biggest strategic manoeuvres by Russia since the break-up of the Soviet Union. The exercise involved nearly 50,000 troops and over 7,000 pieces of heavy-war gear, including aircraft, ships and nuclear missiles.
Pakistani airstrike kills 27
A Pakistani air strike on Saturday killed at least 27 Taliban militants, with some reports putting the death toll at as much as 40, near the Afghan border. It was reported that two commanders were amongst the dead and that 12 of those killed were "would-be suicide bombers". The reported attack came after a suicide car bomb blamed on the Taliban killed at least 55 people and wounded up to 200 others at an anti-militant tribal meeting on Friday. The soaring militant violence in Pakistan comes amidst a stepped-up campaign by the United States against militant targets inside Pakistan, including a missile attack on Saturday night which killed at least five militants and residents.
House of Lords likely to reject 42 day pre-charge detention
Monday is likely to see a majority decision in the House of Lords to reject plans drawn up to detain terror suspects without charge for up to 42 days. Such influential figures such as Lord Goldsmith, Tony Blair's long-serving attorney general, have described the proposal as "not only unnecessary but also counterproductive... we should fight to protect the liberties the terrorists would take from us, not destroy them ourselves. This proposal is wrong in principle and dangerous in practice." Rejection of this measure by the Lords would mean that Brown would have to gain a majority in the Commons for a series of new votes if he wants to see it passed into law, though it is debatable whether he would do this as another Commons majority cannot be guaranteed. The measure was passed in the Commons in June by only nine votes; since, then the number of opposition MPs has increased by two.
War declared against drug barons
On Friday, it was decided during a meeting of the defence ministers of NATO in Budapest that troops could be authorised by their own countries to attack drug barons blamed for pumping up to US$100 million (€74 million) a year into the coffers of resurgent Taliban fighters. This move, praised by US Defence Secretary Robert Gates, is one that the United States had been pushing because up until now the problem has lain with the Afghan police. NATO has pledged that only drug producers deemed to be supporting the insurgency will be targeted, so that farmers who depend on growing opium poppies for a living will not be affected. NATO defence ministers will review the success of the mission when they next meet in February in Poland.
This announcement came just days before an attack on Sunday during which more than 60 Taliban fighters were killed when they had tried to launch a surprise attack on Afghan forces in Lashkar Gah, capital of Helmand province. Afghanistan supplies 90 percent of the world's heroin, a trade worth billions of dollars, and Helmand is the largest drug-producing area in the world, accounting for more than half of Afghanistan's production of opium poppies.
