Riots to Protest Death Sentence Enter 3rd Day in Bangladesh

Associated PressA car burned in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on Saturday. Unrest continued after the leader of an Islamic party was sentenced to death. DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Demonstrators protesting the death penalty given to an Islamic political party leader clashed with Bangladeshi security forces for a third straight day on Saturday, killing two people and injuring about a dozen, the police said. ...

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IHT Rendezvous: Muslims Seek Dialogue With Next Pope

LONDON — As the Catholic Church’s cardinal electors gather at the Vatican to choose a new pope, Muslim leaders are urging a revival of the often troubled dialogue between the two faiths.During the papacy of Benedict XVI, relations between the world’s two largest religions were overshadowed by remarks he made in 2006 that were widely condemned as an attack on Islam.In a speech at Regensburg University...

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The Lede: Video of Turkish Premier Comparing Zionism to Anti-Semitism and Fascism

One day after Turkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, told a United Nations forum the world should consider Islamophobia a crime against humanity, “just like Zionism or anti-Semitism or fascism,” his Israeli counterpart lashed back. “I strongly condemn the remarks made by Prime Minister Erdogan of Turkey, comparing Zionism to fascism,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu replied on Twitter.I...

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German Sees 'Clowns,' and Italian Sends Cancellation

BERLIN — The president of Italy canceled a dinner meeting Wednesday with Peer Steinbrück, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s challenger in the coming September elections, after Mr. Steinbrück referred to two prominent Italian political figures as “clowns.” Mr. Steinbrück, the candidate for the Social Democratic Party, made the comments at an event in Potsdam on Tuesday that was part of a nationwide...

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Immigrants Released Ahead of Automatic Budget Cuts

Federal immigration officials have released hundreds of detainees from immigration detention centers around the country in a highly unusual effort that is intended to save money as automatic budget cuts loom in Washington, officials said Tuesday. The government has not dropped the deportation cases against the immigrants, however. The detainees have been freed on supervised release while...

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Lens Blog: The Largely Unknown Photography of Lola Álvarez Bravo

The year 2007 was a pretty good one for rediscovering long-forgotten images in Mexico. Most people already know about Robert Capa’s Mexican suitcase, a trove of his work from the Spanish Civil War. But that same year an unknown archive of vintage prints by Mexico’s greatest photographers was also discovered, left behind in the longtime home of Lola Álvarez Bravo.The find, known as the Gonzalez-Rendon...

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IHT Rendezvous: Opera for an Era When Money Is Tight

VIENNA—Not long ago it looked as if cuts in arts funding would sound the death knell of the Vienna Chamber Opera, known in German as the Kammeroper, an ensemble esteemed for its chamber-scale productions in an intimate, inviting setting. The Austrian federal government’s decision to eliminate entirely its support, which constituted half of the company’s governmental subsidies (the other half coming...

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The Lede: Reeva Steenkamp, Steve Biko and the Quest for Justice in South Africa

LONDON – The title of the presiding judge 35 years ago was the same, chief magistrate of Pretoria, and the venue for the hearing, a converted synagogue, was not far from the modern courthouse seen on television screens around the world in recent days as Oscar Pistorius, the gold medal-winning Paralympic athlete, fought for bail in the killing of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp.The case that unfolded...

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Chinese Passports Seen as Political Statement

Todd Heisler/The New York TimesHu Ping, the editor of a pro-democracy journal in New York, has not seen his aging parents in decades because of passport restrictions. BEIJING — Flush with cash and eager to see the world, millions of middle-class Chinese spent the 10-day Lunar New Year holiday that ended on Monday in places like Paris, Bangkok and New York. Last year, Chinese made a record 83 million...

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3 Convicted in Britain Over Terrorist Plot

LONDON — Three men accused of plotting what prosecutors said would have been the most devastating terrorist attacks in Britain since the London transit system bombings of July 2005 were convicted Thursday after a 12-week trial. The judge hearing the case told the men to expect sentences of life imprisonment. Prosecutors said the three men — Irfan Naseer, 31, Irfan Khalid, 27, and Ashik Ali,...

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IHT Special: Lebanon Voting Plan Stirs Sectarian Fervor

BEIRUT — A controversial draft law to overhaul Lebanon’s electoral system gained traction Tuesday when a parliamentary joint committee supported it, raising the possibility that voters will in future be able to cast ballots only for candidates from their own sect. Proponents say the law would protect their communities and ensure fairer elections. Opponents say it would further entrench sectarianism...

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At War Blog: General Allen's Tenure in Afghanistan

Most Americans probably know of him only as a secondary character in the sweeping drama of David H. Petraeus’s affair with his biographer, Paula Broadwell. But Gen. John R. Allen, who announced Tuesday that he would retire from the Marine Corps rather than become the top commander of NATO, was for more than a year and a half the commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan. And when he said farewell to...

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Mikhail Pakhomov’s Body Is Found Near Moscow in Cement-Filled Barrel

MOSCOW — The body of a missing city legislator and construction tycoon has been found in a private basement garage on the city’s outskirts, inside a rusted metal barrel filled with cement, the police said Monday. Russian television showed investigators removing the body of the man, Mikhail Pakhomov, 36, on Sunday evening from the garage, 20 miles east of Moscow, where the police said he had...

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IHT Rendezvous: Taming the Runaway U.S. Budget

WASHINGTON — If Democrats and Republicans can’t agree on a deficit reduction plan, in two weeks automatic budget cuts will kick in that could severely weaken the U.S. economy and the American military.As I write in my latest Letter From Washington, there are sensible ways to avoid this, though it is far from certain dysfunctional Washington can achieve them.One reason is that so much of spending is...

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IHT Rendezvous: Should Common Plastics Be Labeled Toxic?

THE HAGUE — Hoping to reduce one of the most ubiquitous forms of waste, a global group of scientists is proposing that certain types of plastic be labeled hazardous.The group, lead by two California scientists, wrote in this week’s issue of the scientific journal Nature:We believe that if countries classified the most harmful plastics as hazardous, their environmental agencies would have the power...

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The Lede: Teenager Killed as Bahrain Marks Protest Anniversary

Video posted on YouTube by activists in Bahrain showed a man confronting riot police officers after a young protester was shot and killed in the village of Al Daih on Thursday.A Bahraini teenager was shot and killed during clashes with the kingdom’s security forces on Thursday, as protesters marked the second anniversary of the start of their movement calling for reforms on the Arab island.Both rights...

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Kerry Says He Is Preparing Proposals on Syria Crisis

WASHINGTON — Secretary of State John Kerry said on Wednesday that he had ideas about how to persuade President Bashar al-Assad to agree to a political transition in Syria and planned to raise them on his first foreign trip this month. “We need to address the question of President Assad’s calculation currently,” Mr. Kerry said after a meeting with Jordan’s foreign minister, Nasser Judeh. “I...

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Putin Aims to Limit Officials’ Investments Abroad

MOSCOW — President Vladimir V. Putin introduced a draft law on Tuesday that would ban senior Russian officials from holding bank accounts or stocks outside Russia, the latest in a series of recent measures intended to insulate the country’s governance from foreign influences. The draft law, which requires legislative approval, applies to a wide range of top officials, including lawmakers,...

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The Lede: Latest Updates on the Pope’s Resignation

The Lede is providing updates on Pope Benedict XVI’s announcement on Monday that he intends to resign on Feb. 28, less than eight years after he took office, the first pope to do so in six centuries. (Turn off auto-refresh to watch video...

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IHT Rendezvous: Sharper Tongues in China's Year of the Snake?

BEIJING — The Snake is determined and smart, according to traditional Chinese beliefs. Today is New Year’s Day in China, the first day in the Year of the Snake, and a good day to ask: Will Xi Jinping, a “snake” set to become president in March (Mr. Xi was born in a Year of the Snake, in 1953) bring change to China?Whether or not one believes in feng shui — the thought system based on geomancy, astronomy...

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