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oppostion leader tortured by police

By TIMES WIRES
Published March 13, 2007

HARARE, ZIMBABWE

This nation's most prominent opposition leader suffered deep gashes on his head and shoulders from beatings and torture by police who broke up an illegal public meeting, colleagues said Monday. Morgan Tsvangirai, head of the Movement for Democratic Change, was detained at Sunday's meeting of the Save Zimbabwe Campaign. Lawyers said at least five other opposition leaders were among scores arrested in the crackdown on dissent by President Robert Mugabe's forces and supporters.

BRUSSELS

Diamond thief gets $28M in stones

A man stole $28-million worth of diamonds from an Antwerp bank where he had been a customer for a year using a stolen Argentine passport, officials said Monday. Prosecutors say the suspect - he speaks English with an American accent and often wears a baseball cap - broke into safety deposit boxes in an ABM Amro bank in the city's diamond quarter last week.

DAMASCUS, SYRIA

Syria opens door to talks with U.S.

Syria told a visiting U.S. State Department official Monday that it is willing to engage in "serious" dialogue with Washington on all Middle East issues, just days after both countries attended a conference in Baghdad on restoring security to Iraq. Ellen Sauerbrey, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for population, refugees and migration, is the most senior American official to visit Syria since the United States withdrew its ambassador in 2005.

JERUSALEM

Drunken Israeli diplomat recalled

Israel has recalled its ambassador to El Salvador after he was found naked, bound and drunk, according to Israeli media reports confirmed Monday by a government spokeswoman. Two weeks ago, El Salvador police found longtime diplomat Tsuriel Raphael in the yard of his residence, tied up, gagged with a ball and drunk. He did not file a police report.

[Last modified March 13, 2007, 00:49:29]