Morning Brief, Thursday, October 12

Posted By Christine Y. Chen Thursday, October 12, 2006 - 12:50 PM Share

Terror fears

A small plane crashed into a skyscraper in Manhattan's Upper East Side yesterday, setting off jitters on the streets below. The only ones killed are the pilot, New York Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle, and his flight instructor. A north London man has admitted to plans to carry out terrorist attacks, including a dirty bomb, in Britain and the U.S. Pakistan arrested a group of suspects who are thought to be behind a series of security alerts last week. Rockets and rocket launchers were discovered near the parliament building in Islamabad. A native Californian and self-proclaimed al Qaeda memberbelieved to be living in Pakistan was indicted for treason by the U.S. Justice Department. If found guilty, he would be the 30th person in U.S. history convicted of the charge.

Middle East

Gunmen storm the offices of a new satellite TV channel in Baghdad and kill 11 people. The senior U.S. military officer in Iraq says that even though the U.S. sent thousands of new troops in August, Baghdad is reaching its highest levels of violence ever.

An Israeli raid in the Gaza Strip killed 5 Palestinians. Lebanese prime minister Fouad Siniora warns that Israel's continued military flights his country's territory is violating the 2-month old truce.

Elsewhere

North Korea continues to threaten more nuclear tests. A new draft on sanctions is making the rounds at the U.N. The year is only three-quarters of the way through, but China has already announced that its trade surplus currently stands at $110 billion, beating last year's record. 129 Sri Lankan soldiers were killed in clashes with the rebel Tamil tigers.

Turkey's Orhan Pamuk won the Nobel Prize for Literature. French parliament has passed a bill making it illegal to deny that Turks perpetrated genocide against the Armenians under the Ottoman Empire. A plague of locusts is on its way to north and west Africa, creating fears that crops will be destroyed. Violence in Darfur spills over to Chad again.

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