South Korea

Rice praises energy aid proposal to North Korea

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice today praised a South Korean proposal for massive energy aid to North Korea that enticed it to end a 13-month boycott of nuclear disarmament talks.

South Korea’s energy proposal “gives an opportunity for the North Koreans to address questions of their energy needs,” Rice said at a news conference with South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon during a visit to Seoul.

Rice noted today that the North’s energy needs also were addressed in a U.S. proposal made at the last nuclear talks in June 2004 that she said “is still on the table.” Washington has promised diplomatic recognition and economic aid to the North only after it verifiably dismantles its nuclear weapons program.

Rice also repeated calls for North Korea to return to the revived nuclear talks later this month prepared for substantive discussions on giving up its atomic arms.

“The agreement of the North Koreans to come back to the talks is a very good step but only a first step,” she said. “We look forward to a strategic decision by the North Koreans to abandon their nuclear weapons.”

Northern Ireland

Catholics attack police after Protestant marches

Militant Catholics attacked riot police with homemade grenades and gasoline bombs Tuesday in an explosion of fury over the Orange Order, a Protestant brotherhood that staged mass parades across Northern Ireland.

About 60 officers and at least a dozen civilians, including several rioters, were wounded when Catholics from Ardoyne, an Irish Republican Army power base in north Belfast, hurled at least two of the grenades into columns of riot police.

Officers responded with water cannons, clubs and volleys of British-style plastic bullets that hadn’t been used in Northern Ireland since 2002. The hourlong riot was the worst violence on a day of dangerous street confrontations across this British territory.

The officers had forced Catholic protesters off a main Belfast thoroughfare to clear the way for a few hundred Orangemen, an anti-Catholic organization whose members parade each July 12 in commemoration of a 315-year-old victory by Protestant King William of Orange over the Catholic he ejected from the British throne, James II.

Israel

Palestinian bomber kills three women

A teenage Palestinian suicide bomber killed three Israelis and wounded at least 30 others in front of a crowded shopping mall in Netanya, the first such attack in nearly five months and a blow to a truce that has revived peace hopes.

The mangled body of the young bomber lay in the street two hours after the blast, covered with a white plastic sheet. Bloodied clothes were strewn on the asphalt, and the body of a woman was sprawled nearby.

Among the wounded was a 6-year-old girl who was badly burned, Israel TV reported. Two women were killed instantly, and a third died later of her wounds, according to Israel Radio.

Israel blamed Islamic Jihad, which has continued its attacks against Israelis despite a truce declared in February.

The Israeli military early this morning closed off the West Bank and Gaza Strip, banning Palestinians from entering the country in response to the suicide bombing.

The military said the ban, a routine security measure after such an attack, would be in effect “until further notice.”

Israeli police and Palestinian security identified the bomber as Ahmed Abu Khalil, an 18-year-old member of Islamic Jihad from the West Bank village of Atil, about eight miles east of Netanya.

Monaco

Prince Albert takes throne

Monaco’s bachelor prince – long considered shy, secretive and a reluctant heir – took the throne as an assured leader Tuesday in ceremonies mixing tradition with a rock ‘n’ roll nod to a younger generation.

After a lifetime in the shadow of his father, Prince Albert II has shown a more forthright side. Last week, he unblushingly acknowledged fathering a child out of wedlock.

During festivities to mark Albert’s ascension to the throne of Monaco’s 700-year-old dynasty, a classical orchestra performed Mozart’s Coronation Mass. Then, with fireworks bursting over the Mediterranean enclave’s port, the music switched to recordings from artists including Pink Floyd and U2.

In his first speech to his subjects, the 47-year-old prince outlined plans to promote the banking industry in the principality and stressed that money laundering would not be tolerated.

Albert was proclaimed ruler of Monaco at a Mass in the cliff-top cathedral where his father, Rainier III, and mother, Hollywood beauty Grace Kelly, are buried.

The Netherlands

Murderer confesses, says he would kill again

The Muslim extremist on trial in the slaying of filmmaker Theo van Gogh confessed Tuesday, saying he was driven by religious conviction. “I don’t feel your pain,” he told the victim’s mother.

Mohammed Bouyeri stunned the courtroom when, in the final minutes of his two-day trial he declared: “If I were released and would have the chance to do it again … I would do exactly the same thing.”

Bouyeri, 27, faces life imprisonment in the Nov. 2 killing of Van Gogh, who was shot, stabbed and nearly beheaded on an Amsterdam street. A verdict is to be handed down this month.

Bouyeri glanced at notes, paused between sentences and chose his words carefully. Some spectators rose to their feet as he spoke, visibly stunned by his comments.

At one point, he addressed the victim’s mother, Anneke, who was sitting in the public gallery. “I have to admit I don’t have any sympathy for you,” he said. “I can’t feel for you because I think you’re a nonbeliever.”

The killing is believed to have been an act of retribution for Van Gogh’s film “Submission,” which criticized the treatment of women under Islam.

Aruba

Prosecutors seek to send two brothers back to jail

A judge heard competing appeals Tuesday in the disappearance of Natalee Holloway, with a defense lawyer seeking the release of a Dutch teen in the case and prosecutors asking for the rearrest of two brothers from Suriname.

Brothers Satish and Deepak Kalpoe and 17-year-old Joran van der Sloot were among the last people to see Holloway, 18, of Mountain Brook, Ala., before she vanished on the final night of a high school graduation trip to the Dutch Caribbean island.

The hearings were closed and the judge was expected to confer with two colleagues before issuing a ruling Thursday.

The first hearing Tuesday was an appeal of a judge’s ruling earlier this month that there was insufficient evidence to hold the brothers in Holloway’s disappearance. Satish Kalpoe, 18, and Deepak Kalpoe, 21, had been in custody since June 9, when they were arrested along with van der Sloot. They were released on July 4.

The judge also was hearing a fourth appeal from prosecutors seeking to overturn an order allowing van der Sloot’s father, Paul, to visit his son while he’s in custody.

United Nations

Kofi Annan to have surgery on shoulder

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan will have surgery to repair a shoulder he injured while cross-country skiing last winter, a spokesman said Tuesday.

Annan, 67, had initially been told he wouldn’t need surgery for the torn rotator cuff in his right shoulder, but doctors determined it wasn’t healing properly, spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.

Officials wouldn’t say when the injury occurred, although Annan took a skiing holiday in Jackson Hole, Wyo., in December. He returned to New York early because of the Dec. 26 tsunami in Southeast Asia.

Annan’s wife, Nane, an avid cross-country skier, has been spotted on the trails of New York City’s Central Park. Annan himself prefers hiking.

Annan will have the surgery Friday and plans to work from home as soon as he’s out of the hospital, Dujarric said.