QUOTE OF THE DAY
“The Syrians helped Lebanon a lot. We should help them and rid them of the conflict in their country.”
Tamam Alameh, a Shiite in Lebanon who agrees with Hezbollah’s decision to fight alongside Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces Article, 1A
16 killed in Mexico tourist-bus rollover
MEXICO CITY - Mexican authorities say a bus apparently went out of control after a blowout and turned over, killing 16 people in central Hidalgo state.
State attorney general’s spokesman Fernando Hidalgo said the accident happened Sunday afternoon as a group of tourists was returning to Mexico City from a weekend trip to the thermal baths in the town of Santa Maria Amajac.
Hidalgo said witnesses reported that the bus driver lost control when the vehicle blew a tire. The bus hit a guardrail and flipped.
The official said the bus was an old model from the 1970s and in poor condition.
The attorney general’s Twitter account says seven men, seven women and two children died. Nineteen people were injured.
Separate militant attacks kill 14 in Iraq
BAGHDAD - A string of attacks killed at least 14 people in Iraq on Sunday, officials said, in the latest violence of what has been a particularly bloody month in the country.
Iraq has been hit by a wave of bloodshed that has killed some 300 people in the past two weeks, raising tensions between the country’s Sunnis and the Shiite-led government.
Sunday’s deadliest attack took place in the northern city of Mosul, where a car bomb went off at a house early in the morning while a joint army-police unit was conducting door to-door searches, killing three policeman and one soldier, police said.
Also in Mosul, police said militants gunned down a policeman and authorities found a body in the Tigris River.
In northern Baghdad’s Kazimiyah district, militants in a speeding car went on a shooting rampage that killed three civilians and wounded another, two police officers said. A policeman was killed in another attack in the northern Waziriya neighborhood when gunmen fired on his vehicle.
Also in Baghdad, militants armed with silenced pistols killed a secondary-school teacher, police officers said.
In Iraq’s western province of Anbar, three soldiers were killed and five wounded in two attacks by roadside bombs.
Colombia, rebels reach land agreement
Colombia, rebels reach land deal
HAVANA - The Colombian government and the country’s biggest rebel group announced an agreement Sunday on one of their main bones of contention - land policy overhaul - after more than a half-year of slow-moving peace talks in Cuba’s capital.
Both said the agreement constituted a major breakthrough, although several key details still needed to be worked out. They did not release the text of the accord, but said it dealt with issues such as property rights, access to land and rural infrastructure development.
The parties must now reach understandings in five other areas, starting with the political reintegration of fighters for the rebel movement, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, another highly sensitive issue.
The two sides have stressed that no agreement on a particular issue will be final until a complete peace accord is reached. But for one day, at least, the long-time enemies seemed optimistic an important step had been taken toward ending the half-century long conflict.
“Today we have a real opportunity to attain peace through dialogue,” said the government’s chief negotiator, Humberto de la Calle. “To support this process is to believe in Colombia.”
India condemns attack by Maoist rebels
NEW DELHI - Indian officials reacted with anger Sunday to an audacious attack by about 200 suspected Maoist rebels who killed 24 people by setting off a bomb and firing on a convoy carrying ruling party leaders and members.
Saturday’s ambush, which targeted Congress party politicians returning from a campaign event with the area’s indigenous tribal community, appeared to be a warning to officials to stay away from the rebels’ main base of support.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and party President Sonia Gandhi visited some of the 37 people who were injured in the attack in a hospital Sunday in the Chhattisgarh state capital and said the government would take firm action against the perpetrators.
The convoy was attacked in a densely forested area about 215 miles south of Raipur, Chhattisgarh’s capital.
Four state party leaders and eight police officers were among the 24 people who were killed.
Front Section, Pages 7 on 05/27/2013