Political News from Yahoo

Israel to give Palestinians $100 million in withheld funds

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel will give Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's administration around $100 million in tax revenues that had been withheld in retaliation for his statehood bid in the United Nations, Israeli officials said on Wednesday. They described the handover as a one-time deal, signaling rightist Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had not formally scrapped sanctions that have hurt the Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank and worried world powers. ...

U.N.'s Ban says aid response for Syria "very limited"

KUWAIT (Reuters) - The United Nations is receiving only limited support for its aid to millions of Syrians, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said in published remarks, adding its humanitarian work needed "generous" help from a donor pledging conference on Wednesday. The gathering in the Gulf Arab state of Kuwait will seek $1 billion of aid for Syria's neighbors sheltering 700,000 registered refugees, and another $500 million to bankroll humanitarian work for 4 million Syrians inside their country. ...

Sixty-five people executed in Syria's Aleppo: activists

BEIRUT (Reuters) - At least 65 people were found shot dead with their hands bound in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on Tuesday in a "new massacre" in the near two-year revolt against President Bashar al-Assad, activists said. Opposition campaigners blamed the government but it was impossible to confirm who was responsible. Assad's forces and rebels have been battling in Syria's commercial hub since July and both have been accused of carrying out summary executions. U.N.-Arab League mediator Lakhdar Brahimi told the U.N. ...


Pakistan says militant bases broken up near Afghan border

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pakistani security officials broke up more than a dozen militant sanctuaries in the Khyber tribal region this week and killed 23 fighters, they said, while tribal sources said pro-Taliban groups killed 20 pro-government militants. The Lashkar-e-Islam and Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) militant groups attacked villages in the Tirah region and killed residents when they tried to stop them entering the area, the security officials said, requesting anonymity. Tirah is a maze of valleys on a route from Afghanistan to the Pakistani city of Peshawar. ...

Exclusive: CIA nominee had detailed knowledge of "enhanced interrogation techniques"

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - John Brennan, President Barack Obama's nominee to head the CIA, had detailed, contemporaneous knowledge of the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques" on captured terrorism suspects during an earlier stint as a top spy agency official, according to multiple sources familiar with official records. Those records, the sources said, show that Brennan was a regular recipient of CIA message traffic about controversial aspects of the agency's counter-terrorism program after September 2001, including the use of "waterboarding. ...


In big push for Hagel, no leading from behind from White House

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - As Chuck Hagel, President Barack Obama's nominee to lead the Pentagon, prepared to meet with senior New York Senator Chuck Schumer in mid-January, the White House stepped in and ensured that the get-together would take place quickly - and in the West Wing. Some of the loudest objections to Obama's choice of Hagel for secretary of defense stemmed from lawmakers' concerns about his past comments on Israel and Iran. ...


Fed seen maintaining bond-buying, but divisions remain

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Federal Reserve is expected to keep monetary policy on a steady path when it concludes a two-day meeting on Wednesday, though behind the scenes intensive debate continues over when the controversial bond-buying program should be curtailed. The policy statement issued by the U.S. ...


U.S. growth seen braking as inventories, government weigh

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. economy likely grew at its slowest pace in nearly two years in the fourth quarter as businesses added less stock to their warehouses and government spending fizzled, setting it up for a difficult start in 2013. Gross domestic product probably expanded at a 1.1 percent annual rate, braking sharply from a 3.1 percent clip in the third quarter, according to a Reuters poll of economists. That would mark the weakest growth pace since the first quarter of 2011 and it would show the economy entering the new year with little momentum. ...

AP Interview: Top Justice prosecutor Breuer quits

WASHINGTON (AP) — In a final response to his critics, the head of the Justice Department's criminal division defended his record on a pair of the defining issues of his four-year tenure — the absence of prosecutions against Wall Street executives and his conduct in the controversy over a botched arms-trafficking investigation in Arizona.


Treasury needs exit plan for Ally Financial: watchdog

(Reuters) - The U.S. Treasury needs to develop a concrete plan for exiting its 74 percent stake in auto lender Ally Financial Inc, the second-largest remaining recipient of federal bailout dollars, an internal watchdog said in a report released Wednesday. The agency, however, must exercise "great care and coordination" with the U.S. Federal Reserve in planning its exit to make sure Ally maintains a viable presence as a lender to the U.S. auto industry, said the watchdog, the special inspector general for the U.S. government's bailout program. Starting in 2008, the government pumped $17. ...

Japan PM: BOJ steps aimed at beating deflation, boosting economy

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's monetary and fiscal stimulus measures are aimed at beating deflation and boosting economic growth, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Wednesday, shrugging off criticism from some overseas policymakers that Tokyo was trying to intentionally weaken the yen. "I strongly hope that the Bank of Japan pursues bold monetary easing to achieve (2 percent inflation) as soon as possible," Abe said in parliament, keeping up pressure on the bank to expand monetary stimulus to beat deflation. (Reporting by Leika Kihara; Editing by Shinichi Saoshiro)


China parliament: no flowers, gifts and keep speeches short

BEIJING (Reuters) - No flowers, no banquets, no gifts, no welcoming ceremonies and more importantly no useless long-winded speeches -- Chinese state media on Wednesday laid out strict instructions for this year's annual meeting of parliament. Normally a bastion of sycophancy, as the hand-picked delegates seek to out-compete each other in lauding the Communist Party, the official Xinhua news agency said that would change when the largely rubber stamp parliament meets in March. ...

Nudists lose bid to block San Francisco ban on baring all

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Nudists in famously tolerant San Francisco lost a bid on Tuesday to block a city ban on nakedness in public places, when a federal judge threw out a legal challenge that argued public nudity was akin to political expression. San Francisco city leaders last month approved the ban on baring it all in streets, public plazas and the transit system to curtail public nudity, which some residents and business owners complained had gotten out of control. ...

Pages