Israeli air-strike on Islamic Jihad unit
An Israeli military aircraft targeted a Islamic Jihad unit on Monday, as their car drove in the Gaza Strip, wounding one of the fighters. The group have been responsible for launching rocket attacks against targets in Israel.
Two Palestinians have been killed in the Ein el-Helweh refugee camp in Lebanon, amid clashes between rival factions. Three Palestinian women were also wounded in one of the incidents.
A local Fatah leader's bodyguard was killed and seven people injured on Sunday, when an armed group threw grenades and opened fire near a children's festival at a UN-operated elementary school in the southern Gaza Strip.
Olmert survives no-confidence vote Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has retained the confidence of the Knesset, after three motions of no-confidence were heard in parliament over the PM's handling of the 2006 Lebanon war.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has backed a United States proposed Palestinian-Israeli security plan, which would include "important steps" toward peace. Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniya is critical of the proposal, however, which he says will legitimise the Israeli occupation. Israel favours several of the proposals, yet feels some of the tenets are unacceptable.
Meanwhile, Abbas and Olmert have engaged in secret security talks, the Haaretz newspaper reported on Tuesday. Members from both camps have refuted the claims.
Double suicide attack in Ramadi
A double suicide bomb attack has targeted the Iraqi city of Ramadi, killing 13 people and wounding 25 others. The first explosion hit a busy market in Albu-Thiyab, east of Ramadi, the second a police checkpoint.
A local restaurant has been hit by a suicide car bomb in the Iraqi Shia city of Kufa, south of Baghdad, killing at least 16.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is to increase its budget for Iraq by more than 60 percent in the face of "an ever-deepening humanitarian crisis" in the country, it was announced on Monday.
Taliban allow Sarkozy bargaining time
France's new president, Nicolas Sarkozy, has been given space to breathe by Taliban forces holding the French aid worker Eric Damfreville and three Afghans from Terre d'Enfance, having extended the deadline to deal on their release.
UN Security Council members accused of breaching embargo
Amnesty International have accused Russia and China of supplying weapons to Sudan which have been used by the Janjaweed militia in Darfur, in breach of a United Nations (UN) arms embargo. The Sudanese ambassador to the UN has rejected the claims as "baseless and unfounded".
Rwanda-DRC joint conflict resolution effort proposed
Kigali is to to offer support to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in a bid to contain the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda. The group, operating mostly in the North Kivu region of the DRC, comprises of former Rwandan army personnel and ethnic Hutu militias accused of involvement in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
US to call for Sri Lanka resolution Richard Boucher, US Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs, began a visit to Sri Lanka on Tuesday. He is expected to call upon the government to address human rights abuses by security forces, and to rein in paramilitary activity.
Sri Lankan government forces have conducted air strikes against a Tamil Tiger training camp near the group's de facto capital, Kilinochchi. No casualties are thought to have been sustained.
North-South Korea dialogue Military officials from North and South Korea have brokered discourse over a border rail crossing. Northern officials have also called for redress of the UN-drawn border lines in the western sea, long a cause of naval clashes.
US-Indian nuclear fuel discussions US President George W. Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh have discussed ratification of a bilateral civil nuclear fuel co-operation treaty drawn up in July 2005, the specifics of which were not ironed out at the time.
Former prime minister and President of the Awami League, Sheikh Hasina, has returned to Bangladesh after her 51-day exile in the US and United Kingdom. A military-backed interim government had hoped to prevent her from returning.
