Attackers kill 16, burn houses of the city of Northern Nigeria

BAUCHI, Nigeria - the attackers killed at least 16 people and set fire to more than a dozen houses in a town in Northern Nigeria has been beset by years of sectarian violence, police said late Friday.

Residents, said that the attack on the town of Tafawa articulated in Bauchi State appears to have been an act of retaliation for the earlier murders, in the region while the police said that the authors had not yet be identified.

"Sixteen people were confirmed killed by unknown assailants," Bauchi police Commissioner, said John Aba Kasanga.

Bauchi neighbors of Nigeria "Middle Belt," a region Plateau State where the predominantly Muslim North meeting the predominantly Christian South and where communities of different ethnic and religious backgrounds are seated side by side.

The tension is rooted in decades of resentment among Aboriginal groups, mainly Christian or animist, are vying for control of fertile agricultural land and to political and economic with migrants and settlers in the Muslim north.

There were frequent clashes between crowds of Christians and Muslims, in the villages around Jos the capital of the State of Plateau, and Bauchi. Hundreds of people were killed in violence around Jos in the first months of the year.

At least 500 people were killed last month in protests and the murders of reprisals after President Goodluck Jonathan, a Southern Christian, was declared winner of the presidential election, defeating the leader of the former North Muhammadu Buhari Muslim army.

There were demonstrations in cities across the North, but the worst violence was in the southern part of Kaduna State, Plateau of neighbours, sharing diverse ethnic and religious in the rest of the middle belt.

Jonathan, who had broad support in the South, but also earned millions of votes, in the North promised "all included" Government to try to heal the breaches.

Congress of the Buhari for change party progressive (CPC) said that there was evidence that electoral commission computers have been rigged and that the vote count was manipulated in Jonathan favor. He promised to challenge the outcome in court.

Friday, the Group has asked a court to compel the electoral commission to preserve all the data and the ballot box capture machines used in the polls for forensic examination and to enable access to the voter new biometric register so he could cross check thumb on the ballots.

Suicide bombing in the northern Iraqi city kills 7

 Iraqi officials say that a suicide bomber jump himself near a point of control of the Iraqi army, in the city of the North of Mosul killing seven people.

Police and medical officials say 16 people were injured. Four of the dead were Iraqi soldiers.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to speak to the media.

Iraqi security at points of control or on patrols are often targeted by Sunni insurgents who see their collaborators with the Shiite government.

Suicide bombing in a northern Iraqi city kills 7 (AP)

Baghdad - Iraqi lawmakers approved a $ 400 million settlement controversial Saturday for the Americans, who claim that they have been abused by the regime of Saddam Hussein during the invasion of Kuwait by 1990.

The regulation is part of an agreement concluded between Baghdad and Washington last year to end years of legal battles by the citizens of the United States who claim they were tortured or traumatised, including held hundreds as human shields.

Many Iraqis considered victims of the regime of Saddam Hussein and the invasion led by the United States in 2003 and ask why they should pay for the faults committed by the ousted dictator.

Legislators approved the regulations, by a majority, after listening to abroad and the Finance Ministers so that the head of the Central Bank describe why it is necessary, said Abbas al-Bayati of the block of the State of political right.

Another legislator, Mahmud Othman, said by approving the settlement, Iraq would be to protect themselves from prosecution more in the future which could be well over $ 400 million which was agreed to.

"They very well explained what was the colony and how it will be negative if we do not approve it," he said. "This is why people have been convinced."

Anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr affiliated legislators rejected the settlement, said one of the legislators of the block, Hakim al-Zamili. Al-Zamili, stated that he was surprised that so many legislators who had been arguing against the legislation before the session of reversed the course at the last minute Saturday.

"It is better compensate the Iraqi martyrs and prisoners as Americans," he said.

Saddam's regime has held hundreds of Americans during the period that preceded the war in the Gulf, their use as human shields in an attempt to stave off an attack by the United States and their allies hostage. Most of the Americans had been living and working in the Kuwait and after having been taken hostage are dispersed sites around Iraq.

Many Americans continued legal proceedings for years against the Government of Saddam Hussein and maintained their legal fight after Saddam was overthrown in 2003 and a new Government came to power.

Also, some former American soldiers who were captured by the army of Saddam Hussein during the Gulf war and repeatedly tortured and abused continued as relatives of the American oil workers who were working at the Kuwait when they were picked up by the Iraqi guards along the border.

We know exactly who will be entitled to the money under the regulations. When asked who would receive the money, a spokesman for the Embassy of the United States in Baghdad, David Ranz, said: "We are not able to confirm whether specific cases or claims by specific persons are covered by the agreement." He refused to comment further on.

The Iraq was under a tightening of the time to approve the regulation before 30 June, when Iraq will assume the responsibility of overseeing its oil revenue account. Since 2003, the country's oil revenues were held in an account based in New York, it houses claims of international creditors. United Nations-backed protection expires when oil revenues are transferred to Iraqi control and Iraq could face international creditors like any other country.

According to the site Web of Parliament, Minister for Foreign Affairs Hoshyar Zebari told legislators that the Iraqi Government still had the right to submit his own requests for compensation for the US Government.

Many Iraqis harbor deep resentment toward the United States for the bloodshed triggered after the overthrow of Saddam. Eight years later, violence is still rife the country.

In the northern city of Mosul a suicide bomber jump himself Saturday near a point of the Iraqi army, killing seven people. Police and medical officials said 20 people were injured in the explosion. Five of the dead were Iraqi soldiers.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to speak to the media.