Greek police arrest fugitive terrorist
ATHENS, Greece — Greek police arrested one of the country’s most wanted men — a fugitive convicted of terrorism — during a shootout Wednesday in Athens’ central tourist district that left four people wounded, authorities said.
Police said the wounded were two tourists from Australia and Germany, a police officer and the fugitive, Nikos Maziotis. The 43-year-old has been on the run along with his wife, Panagiota Roupa, since June 2012. Roupa is still at large.
Maziotis and Roupa were convicted in absentia last year and sentenced to 25 years for participation in the Revolutionary Struggle, a group active between 2003 and 2009 and best known for firing a rocket-propelled grenade into the U.S. Embassy and bombing the Athens Stock Exchange. Neither of those attacks caused injuries.
Police Chief Dimitris Tsaknakis said Maziotis shot eight times from a handgun Wednesday while being pursued and was fired upon and hit once in the left shoulder by police. Maziotis received surgery for his gunshot wound at a state hospital in central Athens hospital under heavy police guard.
Tsaknakis said Maziotis was using a false identity and had been implicated in two bank robberies since his disappearance.
Gunmen attack Kabul airport with rockets
KABUL, Afghanistan — Gunmen used rockets to attack the Kabul International Airport in the Afghan capital today, a senior military official said.
The gunmen occupied two buildings, which were under construction, 700 yards north of the airport and were using them as a base to fire rockets and gunfire toward the airport and jet fighters flying over Kabul, said Afzal Aman, a general in the Afghan army.
In a call to The Associated Press, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for the attack.
Aman said several rockets hit the airport, but no planes had been damaged. He said two attackers had been killed by Afghan forces.
Besides civilian traffic, the airport is used as a base for NATO-led forces that have been fighting for more than a decade against the Taliban and others. Rocket attacks near the airport are not rare but are not usually this close.
Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said the gunmen who captured the buildings had been surrounded by the police. He did not have any other immediate details.
The attack came after a suicide bomber blew up a car packed with explosives near a busy market and a mosque in eastern Afghanistan on Tuesday, killing at least 89 people in the deadliest insurgent attack on civilians since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.
China pulls oil rig from disputed waters
HANOI, Vietnam — China on Wednesday moved an oil rig out of waters claimed by Hanoi after two months of drilling that triggered a near-breakdown in ties between the neighbors and led to deadly protests in Vietnam.
China’s Foreign Ministry said the rig was withdrawn from near the Paracel Islands in the South China Sea because the typhoon season was beginning and the work had been completed.
Vietnam demanded that China never deploy a rig again in waters it claims in the region.
China deployed the rig in early May, then Hanoi demanded that Beijing withdraw it and sent patrol ships to try and disrupt the operations. China insisted that it had done nothing wrong and accused Vietnam of illegally disrupting its activities.
The deployment of the rig was widely seen as part of a strategy by China of gradually staking out its claims in the South China Sea, all or part of which is also claimed by Vietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei.
7 in Egypt get life in prison for rapes
CAIRO — An Egyptian court sentenced seven men to life in prison Wednesday for sexual assaults on women during public rallies in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, in the first such heavy sentences since the government vowed to crack down on rampant sexual violence.
The charges stemmed from four attacks this year and last year, including during celebrations of the inauguration of President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi in June.
Judge Mohammed el-Fiqqi sentenced the seven men to life in prison, with four of them receiving multiple life sentences. An eighth defendant received two 20-year jail sentences, and a ninth received a single 20-year sentence.
The five were given multiple sentences after being found guilty of taking part in more than one attack.
Sexual harassment has long been a problem in Egypt, but assaults have become more frequent and brutal since the 2011 overthrow of longtime ruler Hosni Mubarak.