Paraguay Senate starts presidential impeachment trial
The Senate of Paraguay has started the impeachment trial of the country's president, Fernando Lugo. He is to be tried on five charges of malfeasance in office, most notably for his role in an altercation between landless farmers and police that left 17 dead last week. Thousands of Lugo's supporters gathered outside the Congress building to protest the trial. To impeach the president, the Senate would require 30 of its 45 legislators to vote in favor. On Thursday, the country’s lower chamber of Parliament, the Chamber of Deputies, voted in favor of impeachment. The Senate rejected a request from Lugo’s lawyers to postpone the trial to allow the defense to prepare their arguments. In 2008 Lugo, a leftist, became the country’s first president not to be a member of the conservative Colorado Party in over 50 years.
Nigeria fires defense minister, national security adviser amid religious violence
Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan has fired his minister of defense and national security adviser amid escalating violence in the country's north. President Jonathan did not announce who will become the next defense minister, but the new security adviser will be Sambo Dasuki, a cousin of Nigeria's highest Muslim spiritual figure. Nigeria is divided between a mainly Muslim north and a predominately Christian south. This week, three suicide bombings at Christian churches sparked reprisal attacks on mosques, which killed dozens of Muslims.
Saudi Arabia plans to pay salaries to Syrian rebels – report
Saudi official are planning to pay salaries to the Free Syrian Army, an opposition group fighting Syrian government forces, reports The Guardian. The move is meant to encourage military defectors, who are considered to make up the FSA core, and thus increase pressure on President Bashar Al-Assad. The preparations, coordinated with the US and several other Arab countries, come as Saudi Arabia and Qatar increase arms supplies to the Syrian rebels. The Syrian military has been encouraged by the French Foreign Legion to desert en masse. Paris also expressed approval of a Syrian military pilot who made an emergency landing in Jordan on Thursday and appealed for political asylum there.
Pakistani MPs elect former Power Minister Ashraf new PM
Pakistan’s parliament on Friday elected former Water and Power Minister and a ruling party member Raja Pervez Ashraf as the new Prime Minister. He will replace Yusuf Raza Gilani, who was disqualified by the Supreme Court this week for refusing to reopen corruption cases against the President. Ashraf received 211 votes from members of the National Assembly. He needed 172 to win.
Greek finance minister taken to hospital
Greece’s incoming Finance Minister Vassilis Rapanos was reportedly rushed to hospital on Friday after a fainting spell. “He felt dizzy and fainted and was taken to hospital where he was given fluids intravenously,” a source at the bank where Rapanos is chairman told Reuters. The minister was in the process of undergoing checks in hospital, a government official said. Rapanos, who heads the National Bank of Greece, the country’s biggest commercial bank, was due to be sworn in later on Friday.
Fire sweeps through New Delhi shantytown
Fire swept through a shantytown in the Indian capital on Friday. Hundreds of shanties where residents had collected scrap plastic and rubber for resale were destroyed, AP said. No one was reported injured or killed. It took 25 fire trucks and some 70 fire fighters about two hours to put out the flames. Three hospitals in the historical part of Delhi near the makeshift slum were protected from the blaze by a brick wall.
Greek PM Samaras to undergo eye surgery
Greece’s new Prime Minister Antonis Samaras will undergo eye surgery this weekend for a detached retina discovered during a routine examination, authorities said on Friday. Samaras will be operated on Saturday morning in Athens’ Attiko Hospital, AP reports. He was sworn in as Greece’s fourth Prime Minister in eight months on Wednesday. Samaras heads a three-party coalition government formed after the June 17 elections.
Norwegian trial of Breivik ends, sentence due on August 24
The 10-week trial of confessed mass killer Anders Behring Breivik ended in Norway on Friday. As he started his closing statement, about 30 survivors and relatives of some of the 77 people he killed left court. The sentencing by the Oslo district court is set for August 24, AP said. Norwegian prosecutors on Thursday asked judges to give Breivik psychiatric care, not prison. Breivik and his defense told the court he should be considered sane.
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