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The Jakarta Post | Thu, 07/09/2009 2:58 PM | Headlines Burnt out: Fire fighters extinguish a burning public minivan on Jl. Wachid Hasyim, Malang, on Thursday. The fire spread to piles of mattresses stacked on the pavement nearby and caused heavy traffic jams along the busy road. JP/Wahyoe Boediwardhana

By VOA News 09 July 2009 US President Barack Obama speaks at at the Group of Eight (G8) summit in L'Aquila, 09 Jul 2009 U.S. President Barack Obama meets with representatives of African countries on Friday, the final day of an international summit in L'Aquila, Italy. The president is set to attend a breakfast and discussion with African countries and later a bilateral meeting with South African officials before departing L'Aquila. Later in the day, he will meet with Pope Benedict XVI in Vatican City. Thursday, Mr. Obama said the 17 industrialized and developing countries attending the summit made important strides in preparing for a December meeting in Copenhagen on climate change. While there was no consensus on targets for emissions of greenhouse gases, the nations did agree on a goal for limiting global warming to just two degrees centigrade above pre-industrial levels. Also Thursday in L'Aquila, Fren...

By Sonja Pace L'Aquila, Italy 09 July 2009 U.S. President Barack Obama said the G8 and its partners have reached a historic consensus on climate change and the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. Thursday's announcement came at the end of two days of discussions at the G8 summit in L'Aquila, Italy. President Obama said G8 members and their partners from the world's major emerging economies made important strides in combating climate change. "Developing nations committed to reducing their emissions in absolute terms and for the first time, developing nations also acknowledged the significance of the two degree Celsius metric and agreed to take action to meaningfully lower their emissions relative to business as usual in the next decade or so," he said. Group of Eight (G8) leaders pose for a family photo at the summit in L'Aquila, central Italy, 08 Jul 2009 Meeting here in L'Aquila, all ...

By Edward Yeranian Cairo 09 July 2009 Iraqi security forces secure the site of a bomb concealed in a bicycle parked at a market in Baghdad, 09 Jul 2009 A series of bombings in Iraq, Thursday, have left at least 50 people dead and over 100 wounded. Two suicide bombings in the town of Tal Afar, near the Syrian border, and a bombing in Baghdad's Sadr City, come just over a week after U.S. troops pulled out of Iraqi towns and cities. It was a bloody day in Iraq, Thursday, recalling some of the worst bombings of recent years, with dozens of casualties in in explosions in Baghdad and the northwestern border town of Tal Afar. Witnesses say two suicide bombers blew themselves up, minutes apart, in the northwestern town of Tal Afar, near the Syrian border. The second explosion appeared to target civilians who had gathered to help victims of the first bombing. Tal Afar is home to a large population of ethnic Turkme...

By VOA News 09 July 2009 Photo obtained by AP outside Iran shows an Iranian female protester in front of burning public trash bins during an opposition rally in Tehran, 09 Jul 2009 Witnesses in the Iranian capital say police clashed with demonstrators who defied a government warning against protests Thursday. The witnesses in Tehran say police fired shots into the air and also used tear gas and batons to hold back protesters who tried to rally at Tehran University. The school was the site of a student uprising 10 years ago Thursday. The witnesses say about 3,000 demonstrators gathered near the site, some chanting "Death to the dictator." Some protesters set trash cans on fire. Witnesses say police detained some of the demonstrators, and they also say members of the pro-government Basij militia have also been out in force. Supporters of opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi had called for demonstrations to ma...

By Ayaz Gul Islamabad 09 July 2009 P eople stand around the crater caused by a bomb blast in the Mohammad Agha district on the main road from Kabul to the Logar province, Afghanistan, 09 Jul 2009 Authorities in Afghanistan say that a powerful bomb explosion in a central province has killed 25 people, including at least 15 school children. President Hamid Karzai has condemned the blast as a "savage and anti-Islamic attack." The violence comes as thousands of U.S Marines are engaged in a major anti-insurgency offensive in the south of the country. The bomb explosion occurred in the central province of Logar and officials say that several policemen are also among those killed. Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Zamary Bashary tells VOA the explosive was hidden in a timber truck overturned on the side of the road the night before. The bomb was detonated, he says, when local p...

By VOA News 09 July 2009 Police and civilians stand at the scene of a car bombing near Mosul, northwest of Baghdad, Iraq, 09 Jul 2009 Iraqi officials say two suicide bombers have killed at least 34 people and wounded 62 others in the northern town of Tal Afar. Police said the first bomber detonated an explosives vest Thursday in the town, about 400 kilometers northwest of Baghdad. The second attacker blew himself up minutes later, as people gathered to help victims of the first blast. Meanwhile, police in Baghdad say a bombing in Sadr City killed at least six people and wounded 16 others early Thursday. Iraq has seen several deadly attacks since U.S. combat troops withdrew from Iraqi cities last week. Police said Wednesday a series of attacks in and around the northern city of Mosul killed at least 14 people. Authorities say car bombs exploded within minutes of each other near a Shi'ite mos...