SANA’A: Gunmen abducted three Westerners in the centre of the Yemeni capital Sana’a yesterday, a security official said. “People saw a car stop in Tahrir Square, militants snatching three Westerners and speeding away,” the official said, adding that police were searching for the kidnappers.
No further details were immediately available about the nationality of the kidnapped or the affiliation of the abductors, but al Qaeda militants and tribesmen have been involved in kidnapping foreigners in the past. The incident came just two days after President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi overhauled the armed forces in a drive to bring stability and weaken political rivals in the impoverished country.
BEIT JALA: Arab League chief Nabil Al Arabi and a group of Arab foreign ministers will visit the West Bank on December 29, Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat has said. “Nabil Al Arabi and between eight and 10 foreign ministers will be our guests on the 29th,” he said during a late Thursday meeting with reporters in the West Bank town of Beit Jala, west of Bethlehem. Erakat also said he expected the first payment of the fiscal “safety net” of $100m, promised by the League in the event of Israeli financial sanctions following the November 29 Palestinian UN upgrade to observer-state status, by “December 24.”
ALGIERS: An Algerian army colonel has been killed in a gun battle between troops and Islamists in the Bouira region, 125km southeast of Algiers, local media reported yesterday. The clash broke out on Wednesday evening during a search operation for a “terrorist group” in the mountainous region, El Watan said, citing security sources, and employing the term officials use for Islamist insurgents.
WASHINGTON: Bahrain appears to have violated commitments it made to the United States to protect workers rights in its response to a March 2011 general strike at the time of the Arab Spring, the US Labour Department said in a report yesterday. “It is our duty to ensure that trading partners meet their commitments to labour standards in free trade agreements,” US Labour Secretary Hilda Solis said in a statement. Bahrain, a small island country in the Gulf off the coast of Saudi Arabia, is home to the US Fifth Fleet.Agencies
