In the World
Pakistan to avoid ground battles
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Pakistan's forthcoming military operation in South Waziristan - a border region that harbors Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders - will rely on air power, not ground offensives, to minimize casualties among soldiers in a mountainous landscape that favors guerrillas, Pakistani officials and analysts said.The approach likely will disappoint the United States, because the operation may leave in place warlords whom the NATO allies in Afghanistan regard as a significant cross-border threat.
A security expert familiar with Pakistan's plans said the aim was to "disrupt" and "punish" Taliban ledaer Baitullah Mehsud's network, not to engage in a ground battle that could lead to significant casualties among soldiers.
The Pakistani army is wrapping up its operation against militants in the Swat Valley, 100 miles northwest of Islamabad, the capital, and is expected to move shortly against the fountainhead of the Pakistani Taliban movement in South Waziristan, 240 miles to the southwest, on the Afghan border.
- McClatchy Newspapers
Israel rejects key Syrian demand
JERUSALEM - Israel will not withdraw from the entire Golan Heights in return for a peace deal with Syria, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's top policy adviser said in an interview published yesterday, rejecting Syria's key demand for an agreement.The two countries could split the territory, suggested Uzi Arad, who is Netanyahu's national security adviser and the aide widely seen as closest to the prime minister. But in his comments in the daily Haaretz newspaper, Arad said Israel must remain on the Golan Heights to a depth of several miles and cannot withdraw in full even in return for a peace agreement.
Israel captured the Golan Heights in the 1967 Mideast war and annexed it in 1981, a move that was never internationally recognized.
Syrian forces used the strategic plateau to shell Israeli communities before 1967, and Israel fears that those communities would become vulnerable again should the Heights be ceded. The area is also home to crucial water sources. - AP
Cyber attackers remain elusive
SEOUL, South Korea - South Korea is learning more about the mysterious cyber attacks that targeted the country and its ally the United States, but while suspicions quickly settled on North Korea, the ultimate question of who the attackers are remained elusive yesterday.The state-run Korea Communications Commission said it had identified and blocked five Internet Protocol, or IP, addresses in five countries used to distribute computer viruses that caused the wave of Web-site outages in the two countries that began in the United States on July 4.
The addresses were in Austria, Georgia, Germany, South Korea, and the United States, a commission official said on condition of anonymity.
- AP
Elsewhere:
Two ships using U.S. listening devices to search for the black boxes of Air France Flight 447, which crashed off Brazil, were ending their hunt yesterday as the search has been fruitless, an American commander said. A French nuclear submarine will continue to look.
Somalian Islamists yesterday beheaded seven prisoners accused of abandoning the Muslim faith and spying for the government. It was the largest mass execution since the Islamists were pushed from power 21/2 years ago.
