Foreign Desk
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
NBC Will Refer to Conflict In Iraq as a ‘Civil War’
NBC News says its reporters and anchors will begin referring to the ongoing sectarian strife in Iraq as a “civil war,” a move that reflects the increasingly dismal public view of the violence gripping that country. The network’s announcement spotlights a shift in semantics that has quietly been taking place on the airwaves and in newsprint, despite White House opposition.
— Los Angeles Times
Huge Fire at Iraq Oil Plant; U.S. Jet Crashes
BAGHDAD, Iraq — Mortar rounds crashed into an oil processing facility near the northern city of Kirkuk yesterday, igniting a huge blaze, and a U.S. Air Force jet with one pilot crashed while supporting American soldiers fighting in Anbar province, a hotbed of Iraq’s Sunni Arab insurgency. The fire at the pipeline filtering facility shut down the flow of crude to the massive Beiji refinery, according to an official at the North Oil Co., and burned for several hours. Earlier yesterday, a bomb exploded beneath an oil pipeline south of Baghdad and set it on fire, and Iraqi and American forces were deployed to secure the area, police said.
— Associated Press
Britain May Start Pulling Its Troops Out of Iraq
LONDON — Britain said yesterday it expects to withdraw thousands of its 7,000 military personnel from Iraq by the end of next year, while Poland and Italy announced the impending withdrawal of their remaining troops. President Kaczynski of Poland said his country, an American ally in Iraq and Afghanistan, would pull its remaining 900 soldiers out of Iraq by the end of 2007. And Prime Minister Prodi of Italy said the last of his country’s soldiers in Iraq — some 60–70 troops — will return home this week, ending the Italian contingent’s presence in the south of the country after more than three years.
— Associated Press
Military Junta Closes Red Cross Offices in Burma
GENEVA — The military regime in Burma has ordered the International Red Cross to close five key field offices in the country, the humanitarian organization said yesterday. Closing the offices in Mandalay, Mawlamyine, Hpa-an, Taunggyi, and Kyaing Tong would make it “impossible for the organization to carry out most of its assistance and protection work,” in Burma, the International Committee of the Red Cross said. The five field offices provide humanitarian assistance to thousands of people in sensitive border areas of Burma.
— Associated Press