September 3, 2003

Saudi Women Make Up 20% of AIDS Cases

RIYADH, 3 September 2003 —Saudi women make up some 20 percent of the 800 AIDS cases reported in Saudi Arabia this year, a senior official at the Ministry of Health here has announced. Quoting Saudi Health Ministry consultant Dr. Tarek Al-Madani, Arab News reported that most of the cases were the result of infected blood transfusions or transmitted to the women by their husbands. According to Dr. Al-Madani the Ministry of Health has set up a technical committee to follow up on the disease and its treatment worldwide. The committee also monitors lab tests carried out on expatriate workers to make sure they are free from HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. The HIV virus has so far claimed around 450 lives in the Kingdom, Dr. Al-Madani said. The incidence of AIDS has gone up from 350 cases in 2001 to 800 this year. A majority of the patients were Saudis in the 20-45 age group. More Related News

Kerala CM  to inaugurate Varkala Railway Passage 

Thiruvananthapuram: The Varkala Railway Under Passage which has been constructed on the Varkala-Kallambalam road at a cost of 251 lakh will be inaugurated by the Chief Minister of Kerala Shri.A.K.Anthony at 4.00.p.m on September 4. The Varkkala-Kallambalam road which comes under the World Bank project will be standardized to the National Highway level and ts inauguration will be carried out by P.W.D Minister Dr.M.K.Muneer. Varkkala Kahar MLA will preside over the function. The keynote speech will be delivered by MP Shri.Varkkala Radhakrishnan.The function will be attended by  Former MLA Ali Hassan , Municipal Chairman N.Ashokan, Additional Chief Secretary Babu George and Chief Engineer. K.Joseph  Mathew

British Embassy in Tehran Attacked

The British embassy in the Iranian capital, Tehran, closed temporarily today after shots were fired at the building, theForeign Office said. No one was injured in the incident. The foreign office said five shots were fired from the street shortly before midday local time,hitting offices on the first and second floors of the embassy. Accordin to the Guardian, leading British Daily, Britain's ambassador to Iran, Richard Dalton, was in contact with the Iranian foreign minister, Kamal Kharrazi, but the Foreign Office said that it was "much too early" to say who was responsible for the shooting. Tension has been running high between the two countries since an Iranian diplomat was arrested in Britain in connection with the 1994 bombing of a Jewish centre in Buenos Aires, Argentina, that killed 85 people. The Iranian government has also been angered by British pressure over Iran's nuclear programme, full report from the Guardian

Iran demands US extradite suspect in 1994 shrine bombing

TEHRAN, MAY 22 Iran's intelligence minister Thursday demanded the United States extradite a suspect in a 1994 bombing of a Shiite Muslim shrine in the northeastern city of Mashad. "We have demanded the US hand over the terrorist responsible for the bomb attack on the holy shrine of Imam Reza," Ali Younesi told state television. "We are well informed the US has the bomb attacker, but they are not willing to hand him over," he added in the surprise outburst, but did not elaborate or name the
suspect. Nearly a dozen people were killed when a bomb exploded at the Shiite Muslim shrine of the eighth Imam Reza in Mashad on June 20, 1994. Iran blamed the blast on the People's Mujahedeen, also known as the Mujahedeen Khalq (MEK), which earlier this month concluded a disarmament treaty with the US military in Iraq. Full Report from the Middle East Times

Special Report on the Terrorist Attacks haunting American British soldiers in Iraq

The plot to assassinate Ayatollah Mohammed Baqr al-Hakim... was undoubtedly planned by the US and implemented by local mercenaries under US control.As far as local US mercenaries are concerned, one should not forget the role of the Monafeqin [hypocrites, pejorative reference to the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organisation]... As they are Shia Iranians, theMonafeqin can easily infiltrate Iraqi Shia circles." Ideologically, the MEK – Marxist, militantly feminist,and linked by an umbilical cord of financial and political support to the old Ba'athist regime – is theantipode of SCIRI, which is Islamist, militantly
anti-modernist, and for all intents and purposes an agent of the Iranian regime. If the Ayatollah al-Hakimhad lived to establish an Islamic Republic of Iraq,there would have been no place in it for the MEK. .Iran is next in the neocons’ crosshairs: make no mistake about that. And they are moving quickly. It’s the perfect diversion from the disaster unfolding in Iraq. The weapons of mass destruction Saddam never had have migrated eastward, or so we’re told, and the logic of intervention is carrying along the Bush administration – and us -- like a leaf in a torrent.Weather fore cast for the rest of the year: stormy, with darkening war clouds punctuated by thunderbolts of warmongering rhetoric. If Israel doesn’t bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities – and they’re putting out broad hintsthat they just might -- then don’t expect George W. Bush to be deterred by an election year. Full Report Special Report