U.S. keeping vote monitors away, Putin says
President Vladimir Putin accused the U.S. of pressuring international monitors to stay away from Sunday’s parliamentary elections, a decision that hurts the credibility of balloting expected to bolster his power.
The election-monitoring arm of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe had said that Russia has so severely restricted its ability to watch the elections that it could not monitor them.
But Putin blamed the State Department for persuading the OSCE not to send the monitors in order to delegitimize the vote.
A landslide being predicted for the Putin-backed United Russia party is expected to set the stage for the highly popular president to remain “national leader.” Putin is constitutionally barred from seeking a third consecutive term in presidential elections, which lawmakers have scheduled for March 2.
Anti-Putin demonstrations were violently broken up over the weekend by riot police who detained scores of protesters and opposition leaders, including former world chess champion Garry Kasparov.
A Moscow judge ruled Monday that Kasparov had to serve out the five-day jail sentence he received Saturday in a hastily organized trial.
Kabul, Afghanistan
Bombings kill 7; lawmakers protest
A roadside bomb struck an Afghan army vehicle in an eastern province Monday, killing four soldiers and wounding two, an official said. Several hours later a suicide bomber killed two civilians in Kabul.
The attacker blew himself up next to a convoy of armored vehicles used by foreigners in the central part of the capital, killing the civilians and himself, according to Gen. Ali Shah Paktiawal, director of criminal investigations for the Kabul police. The target of the attack wasn’t immediately known.
Meanwhile, the speaker of the lower house of parliament led a mass walkout of lawmakers, protesting government actions after the killing of six lawmakers and 61 schoolchildren earlier this month.
Also Monday, a blast ripped through a car south of the capital of Kabul, killing four civilians, police said.
More than 6,000 people - a record number - have died this year in insurgency-related violence, according to officials. Most were militants.
Quito, Ecuador
Explosion traps 60 gold miners
An explosion ripped through an underground gold mine in southern Ecuador on Monday, trapping about 60 miners and killing at least one, officials said.
Interior Minister Gustavo Larrea said an undetermined number of miners were injured in the blast at the mine in the village of Ponce Enriquez, 230 miles southwest of Quito.
He said the mine was run by a local cooperative with “limited safety.”
Also
Chad clashes: Chad’s army and a rebel group both claimed to have killed hundreds of fighters on the opposing side in a battle Monday in the country’s east, an area in turmoil from domestic unrest as well as spillover conflict from the neighboring Darfur region in Sudan.
Bin Laden: Al-Qaida’s media wing, as-Sahab, said Monday it will soon release a new message from Osama bin Laden to European countries. It did not say when it would be released and whether it would be a video or just audio. But the U.S.-based IntelCenter, which monitors terrorist Web sites, said the message would be a video and would be released within 72 hours.
Seattle Times news services