Rebel News - Independent News and Analysis

Security forces, backed by helicopter gunships, have killed at least 15 Taliban-linked militants in Kurram tribal region in northwestern Pakistan.

Helicopter gunships pounded militant hideouts in the tribal area, killing 15 militants and injuring 10 others, a senior military official told Press TV on Wednesday.

Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski says his country's participation in the Afghan war is hampering a program to modernize the military.

"The problem is that the costs of Poland's engagement in foreign operations are so significant that they are having an impact ... on the technical modernization of the armed forces," he told a press conference in Brussels on Wednesday.

Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski has urged EU partners to secure grants for poorer regions, saying Warsaw is willing to help fund eurozone bailouts.

Komorowski, who is on a three-day visit to key European Union countries, said in Brussels on Wednesday that Poland was ready to be engaged in certain projects that were not necessarily an obligation for the country.

A senior Israeli official says Tel Aviv will not accept East al-Quds (Jerusalem) as the capital of a future Palestinian state.

An aide to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday described al-Quds as the "undivided capital of Israel," saying that Tel Aviv will not the city to be divided, AFP reported on Wednesday.

Germany's Cabinet has approved budget cuts valued at around EUR 80 billion which critics say can hit the poorest and endanger the country.

The measures in the plan include a new tax on passenger air travel but postpone a decision on a planned tax on nuclear-fuel rods until later this month.

Sweden upholds rape charges against the Wikileaks founder, with the director of public prosecutions saying, they have "a reason to believe that a crime has been committed."

"Considering information available at present, my judgment is that the classification of the crime is rape," the prosecutions official Marianne Ny said in a statement, according to AFP.

The Russian foreign minister dismisses sanctions against Iran as ineffective, saying Tehran's isolation would have regional consequences.

“It is obvious that sanctions against Iran won't be effective,” Sergei Lavrov said in the Moscow State University of Foreign Relations on Wednesday.

A man armed with a rifle has shot seven people dead and wounded at least 14 before killing himself in Bratislava, the Slovakian capital. His motive is still unclear, but six of the dead were members of the same Roma family, people who often face discrimination in Eastern Europe. Witnesses say he "shot at everything that moved," in the hour-long shooting spree. Erica Wood reports. [August 30, 2010]

An Iranian lawmaker has criticized acting Palestinian Authority Chief Mahmoud Abbas' decision to attend US-brokered peace talks with Israel in Washington.

"Abu Mazen's presence at the Americans' summit will only weaken the status of Palestinians. He should know that the US-Israeli plans will turn him into a puppet," Fars news agency quoted Head of the Palestinian Intifadha Faction of Majlis (Parliament) Mohammad Karami-Rad as saying on Tuesday.

The British families who lost loved ones in the Iraq war have been reacting angrily at Tony Blair's self-professed anguish over the carnage he created by joining the US-led war.

The former prime minister, in his memoirs A Journey, to be published Wednesday says he regrets “with every fiber of my being” the lives lost since the invasion.