Other world news in brief
Bomb attack on police station kills seven
KOHAT – A suicide bomber killed seven people and wounded 26 in an attack on a police station in Pakistans northwest yesterday, police said, the second attack in the volatile region in as many days.
On Saturday, two suicide bombers in the Kohat region attacked people displaced by fighting between the army and militants, killing 41 and wounding 65.
Security forces have made significant gains against militants in offensives over the past year, clearing the Islamist fighters from strongholds in the Swat valley and in the regions of South Waziristan and Bajaur on the Afghan border.
Militants have continued to demonstrate they have the capacity to strike back with gun and bomb attacks in towns and cities. The bomber drove a van into a roadblock outside a police station in Kohat yesterday, killing seven and wounding 26. Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility. – (Reuters)
Hassan murder trial postponed
The retrial of Ali Lutfi Jassar al-Rawi, convicted last year in the 2004 kidnapping and murder of Irish aid worker Margaret Hassan, was yesterday postponed a second time until May 16th, writes Michael Jansen.
The Iraqi interior ministry called for more time to investigate Rawi’s claim that he was not in Iraq when Ms Hassan was seized and executed by a violent Sunni group calling itself the Twentieth Revolution Brigade.
The recent submission of his passport as evidence that he was abroad prompted the court of appeal to grant him a retrial, originally set to take place on April 5th. Dublin-born Ms Hassan’s sister, Geraldine Fitsimons Riney, said: “We must keep going, we still hope for justice.”