Politics

Australia's Deputy Prime Minster John Anderson resigned today citing health concerns. Anderson suffers from a benign tumor in his prostate and said he feels that only by cutting back his official and policial commitments would his condition improve. Anderson also said in a speech to parliament he will be stepping down as leader of the National Party of Australia -- the junior partner in the current Liberal Party of Australia coalition government. Deputy Leader of the Nationals Mark Vaile will replace Anderson.

North and South Korea today agreed to continue the quest for a peaceful resolution to the ongoing nuclear crisis in North Korea but did not agree on a date for continued talks, delegates from North and South Korea announced. Issuing a joint statement, South Korean Unification Minister Chung Dong-young said in part, "The South and the North have agreed to take real measures for peaceful resolution of the nuclear issue through dialogue as the atmosphere is created with the ultimate goal of denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula." North Korea

Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin's Liberal government is planning on passing the same-sex marriage bill, Bill C-38, before the spring session winds up. The gay-marriage bill is being linked with the passage of a $4.6 million budget bill that provides more money directed at social services and foreign aid. The two bills will be the final confidence vote until the fall. The opposition, the Conservative party, has vowed to do everything it can to defeat the Liberal government unless they pull the vote and wait until fall. Liberal House leader

Commemoration of the Srebrenica massacre will be held on July 11, when newly identified bodies will be buried. In 1995, Serbian forces, according to International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), massacred around 7500 Bosnian Muslims. A controversy arose after mothers of murdered Muslims in Srebrenica made a statement saying that the Serbian President, Boris Tadić, is not welcome in Srebrenica: "Tadić coming to Srebrenica is a planned provocation of the ones who will bury their families on July 11." The Serbian President wil

In an exclusive interview with the Associated Press, Abdel Hussein Shandal, Iraq's Justice Minister, said, "it seems there are lots of secrets they [U.S. government] want to hide." Shandal accused the U.S. of concealing information about Saddam Hussein and of trying to delay Iraqi interrogations of Hussein. The Iraqi government had said that Saddam's trial would be held within two months, but they are now saying it will be before the end of 2005. American officials have urged Iraq to be cautious about expediting a trial and have said Iraq nee

A veteran Lebanese politician, George Hawi, was assassinated today in Beirut. Hawi's death came as a grim punctuation mark to the final round of parliamentary elections in Lebanon, the first since Syrian occupation ended earlier this year. Hawi was formerly the secretary of the Lebanese Communist Party. He had long been a Syrian ally, but recently became a critic of Syrian influence in the country. George Hawi's assassination came on the heels of the conclusion of the last round of parliamentary elections in Lebanon, which saw a coalition of

Friday's elections whittled Iran's field of presidential candidates from eight to two, but the incredibly close vote has led to the scheduling of an unprecedented runoff to be held next Friday. Candidates Mahmoud Ahmadizezhad and Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani will square off next week --- unless candidate Mehdi Karroubi has his way. Karroubi has alleged voting irregularities and has called on Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to investigate. Karroubi alleges that members of the unelected Guardian Council and the Islamic Revolutionary Guar

The "Downing Street memo" is the subject of a forum at the Washington Capitol complex today headed by Congressman John Conyers of the House Judiciary Committee and televised on C-SPAN 3. Conyers said that "there was a secret decision well ahead of the authority Congress had given" and that as the Bush administration "was assuring Congress, they were secretly planning war." The Downing Street Memo is the leaked minutes of a July, 2002 meeting in British prime minister Tony Blair's office which occurred eight months before the war in Iraq. The m

The Brazilian Minister of Civil Affairs José Dirceu announced this evening his resignation from the government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. During his discourse José Dirceu said that he will return to his earlier position as a representative in the national congress allied with the Workers Party. He said that he will defend the government against those "who want to interrupt the democratic process and want to destabilize the government of president Lula". He said that he is leaving with "clean hands", "a heart without bitterness" a

Anonymous White House sources say that U.S. President George W. Bush will likely give a special news briefing on the subject of Iran. Sources say that the press conference is scheduled to be held within a week and it will be officially announced in short notice. Other details about the rumored conference, such as what exactly will be discussed, are unknown. One possibility is that Bush will deviate yet again from the expected theme at an already-scheduled function; on June 14, Bush addressed a Future Farmers of America (FFA) group at Penn

On Friday, June 10, 2005, U.S. President George W. Bush said that the United States will defend the Republic of China (Taiwan) if it is ever attacked by the People's Republic of China (mainland China). The President expressed this position in an interview with Neil Cavuto in Fox News Channel's Your World with Neil Cavuto. CAVUTO: Do we still stand by an agreement, Mr. President, that if Taiwan is ever invaded, we will defense Taiwan? BUSH: Yes, we do. It's called the Taiwan Relations Act. The policy of the U.S. government is this: We're for

The UK has suspended £30m ($54m) of aid payments to Ethiopia following the deaths of 36 people in protests over disputed elections. The UK Development Minister, Hillary Benn, announced the move after talks with Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi in Addis Ababa. Benn said that Ethiopia should allow the Red Cross access to detainees, and that they either be charged or released. Ethiopia has said it has started releasing people, but has not provided figures on the number imprisoned. Opposition groups estimate the number to be 3,600. UK Prim