Labor leader Kevin Rudd appeared set for a sweeping victory in elections in Australia on Saturday, a win that would end a conservative era and usher in major changes to policies on global warming and the Iraq war. A Labor win would also hand outgoing Prime Minister John Howard a humiliating end to a career in which he became Australia’s second-longest serving leader, and who appeared almost unassailable as little as one year ago. Potentially adding insult to injury, Howard was among government lawmakers in danger of losing his seat in Parliament – a result that would make him only the second sitting prime minister in 106 years of federal government to be dumped from the legislature.\nOfficial figures from the Australian Electoral Commission showed Labor in front with more than 60 percent of the ballots counted.
Pakistan’s government denounced an international organization’s suspension of its membership Friday, while an opposition party said its exiled leader was taking key steps to return to the emergency-ruled country. The government condemned the banishment from the Commonwealth as “unreasonable and unjustified” and said the 53-nation body, composed mainly of Britain and its former colonies, had failed to appreciate Pakistan’s “serious internal crisis” in demanding that it immediately restore democracy. Meanwhile, the return of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif from Saudi Arabia could bolster opponents of President Gen. Pervez Musharraf ahead of Jan. 8 parliamentary elections. Sharif’s plan was announced Thursday hours after the Supreme Court swept away the last legal obstacles to Musharraf’s new five-year term as president.
The U.S. Navy was prepared Friday to deliver much-needed food and medical supplies to hundreds of thousands of Bangladeshis stricken by Cyclone Sidr, a top U.S. military commander said. The arrival of the USS Kearsage off the Bangladesh coast came as authorities and aid workers warned that the South Asian country faces acute food shortages after the devastating storm ravaged crops and destroyed infrastructure across a large swath of the country. The ships are each carrying about 20 helicopters, which will help in delivering water, food and medical supplies to survivors in remote areas, U.S. officials said.
Workers clearing rocks from a landslide in central China discovered a bus underneath the rubble Friday, three days after the accident, and authorities said the 27 people believed to be on board and two others missing were unlikely to be found alive. The landslide tore a 50-yard gash on a mountainside Tuesday and raised concern that the massive reservoir of the Three Gorges Dam, 120 miles away, was wreaking ecological havoc in the region. Work crews clearing the rubble found the wreckage of the long-distance bus Friday morning, a local official and the government’s Xinhua News Agency reported. The bus was traveling from Shanghai to Lichuan City when the accident occurred.\nThe landslide had already resulted in one confirmed death, that of a worker building a tunnel on the slope above the highway. Two of his colleagues were missing.
Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama intensified the bickering Sunday over their competing health plans, reflecting the crucial stakes as Iowa’s leadoff caucuses in early January approach. Clinton said Obama’s proposal was “crafted for politics” and the latest example of his shifting policy positions. Obama said much the same of her approach. Obama focused on Clinton’s proposal to require that people buy coverage. His approach carries no such mandate, which he says is potentially costly for consumers. Clinton said Obama tried to convince voters at first that his plan would offer universal coverage, then acknowledged it would not cover everyone and now is trying to justify an approach that falls short of universal coverage. The Obama campaign circulated a memo to reporters Sunday demanding to know how Clinton would enforce the mandate, noting that one state – Massachusetts – has taken that route and consumers that do not get coverage lose their personal tax exemption, a $219 cost.
