ISRAEL: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave in to international pressure yesterday and agreed to release £64 million a month in tax revenues owed to the Palestine Authority (PA).
The Israeli government released the tax money “following the cessation of unilateral steps by the PA” — a reference to its bid for UN membership.
Under the 1993 Oslo accords Palestinian import duties are collected by Israel, which controls almost all access to the occupied West Bank and blockaded Gaza Strip.
Transsexual police get recognition
ARGENTINA: MPs approved a Bill yesterday allowing transsexual members of federal police and security forces to be recognised by the gender of their choice.
Members of the federal, naval and airport police and the gendarmerie will now be allowed to wear the uniforms and use the facilities matching their adopted gender.
In 2010 Argentina became the first Latin American country to legalise same-sex marriage.
Vice-PM announces new stimulus plan
TAIWAN: The government unveiled the first part of a stimulus plan today aimed at growing the export-led economy by 4 per cent in 2012.
Vice-Premier Sean Chen said the government will invest more in public projects and help private firms create new jobs.
He also said the government would rescue the LED light industry by installing 320,000 energy-saving street lights across the island.
Minister resigns in £255m scandal
JAMAICA: The chairman of the ruling right-wing Labour Party has resigned from the Cabinet over allegations that his ministry has botched a £255 million Chinese-funded road project.
Mike Henry announced his resignation on Tuesday night citing “ongoing attacks” on his handling of the five-year plan to improve the island’s roads that began in 2010.
Prime Minister Andrew Holness has taken over the project and started an independent review. Mr Henry says he has nothing to hide.
Activists lament Gadaffi killing
GHANA: Pan-Africanist activists told parliament today that the murder of former Libyan leader Muammar Gadaffi was “part of a grand neocolonial strategy of global domination.”
Granfadaa Ayitomeka told Ghana’s foreign affairs select committee that “the building blocks” of African unification developed by the Libyan government — an African investment bank, monetary fund and central bank — had been “laid to waste” by the new regime.
He called on the African Union to “live up to the realities of the present and put on the armoured gown to resist oppressors.”
Cigarette giants sue government
AUSTRALIA: British American Tobacco sued the Labour government today over a new law that bans logos from cigarette packs.
The legislation came into effect on December 1 and sparked outrage from tobacco firms. Hong Kong-based Philip Morris Asia has also filed legal action against the government and other cigarette makers have threatened to do the same.
British American Tobacco, the Australian market leader, claims that the law is unconstitutional and violates intellectual property rights.
British embassy protesters let out
IRAN: Authorities have released 11 hard-line protesters detained for storming the British embassy and diplomatic compounds in Tehran this week, the Fars news agency reported today.
It said that they were freed on Wednesday, a day after they were arrested for ransacking the embassy.
There was no immediate explanation for their release. Damaging property carries a prison term of up to three years under Iranian law.
Subway bombers to be executed
BELARUS: The supreme court sentenced two men to execution by firing squad yesterday after convicting them of carrying out a deadly bombing on April 11 in Minsk’s subway system that killed 15 people and wounded hundreds.
Investigators said the men, Dmitry Konovalov and Vladislav Kovalyov, were driven by “hatred for humankind,” not political motives.
Amnesty International condemned the sentence, saying the trial had failed to meet international standards.
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