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YANGON: UN envoy Ibrahim Gambari arrived Thursday in
Myanmar to try to press the ruling junta to include detained
opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in promised multi-party
elections. Gambari was set to meet foreign diplomats later Thursday,
and on previous missions has also been allowed to meet Aung San Suu
Kyi and senior government officials. The regime’s reclusive
leader, Senior General Than Shwe, however, shunned Gambari on his
last visit and it was unclear if he would see him this time.
--AFP
MANILA: The Asian Development
Bank (ADB) will provide Pakistan with $75 million in loans to help
the country develop farming across the Potohar Plateau near
Islamabad, the bank said on Thursday. The loans will be used to
build multipurpose dams, irrigation canals and drinking water
supplies, said the lender in a press release. The project is
expected to improve the livelihoods of about 22,000 farming
households by bringing irrigation to 11,500 hectares of agricultural
land as well as improving existing irrigation networks across
another 10,000 hectares.
--XINHUA
BERLIN: German Chancellor Angela
Merkel is due in Moscow Saturday to test the diplomatic waters with
president-elect Dmitry Medvedev, on whom Berlin has pinned hopes for
better ties with Russia. Merkel will be the first Western leader to
travel to Russia following last Sunday’s presidential election
which outgoing President Vladimir Putin’s protege won by a
landslide. The visit will see the German chancellor hold talks with
both Medvedev, who is due to take office on May 7, and Putin, who is
set to become Russia’s powerful
new prime minister.
--AFP
ISLAMABAD: The party of slain
opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was expected Thursday to nominate
Pakistan’s new prime minister to lead a parliament that could
decide the fate of President Pervez Musharraf. Pakistan People’s
Party vice-chief Makhdoom Amin Fahim is the frontrunner to be
nominated by the party’s MPs, who are meeting in Islamabad just
over two weeks after the PPP scooped the most seats in parliamentary
elections. Musharraf, a key ally in the US-led “war on terror”,
saw his backers trounced in the polls.
--AFP
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