SUDAN’S PRESIDENT BASHIR BUYS MORE TIME

Judges at the International Criminal Court have asked for more evidence before deciding whether to issue an arrest warrant against Sudan’s leader.

Chief prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo wants the court to issue a warrant for President Omar al-Bashir over war crimes allegedly committed in Darfur.

Mr Ocampo has been given a month to provide the additional evidence. President Bashir has denied the charges and Sudan has been lobbying to get the investigation delayed.

The African Union and Arab League agree with Sudan that any arrest warrant could jeopardise the peace process in Darfur.

The UN estimates that up to 2.7 million people have been forced from their homes and some 300,000 have died during the five-year conflict in Sudan’s western Darfur region.

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MUGABE UPBEAT AS TALKS RESUME

A fourth day of power-sharing talks has begun in Zimbabwe, with President Robert Mugabe appearing optimistic and the opposition cautious.

“It’s a day for deals,” Mr Mugabe said as he arrived for the talks. But an opposition spokesman has reportedly called for the UN and African Union to help break an impasse.

The US has threatened to impose new sanctions on Mr Mugabe if he does not agree to share key posts with the opposition, AFP news agency reports.

Former South African President Thabo Mbeki is hosting the crisis talks in Harare. The BBC’s Jonah Fisher in Johannesburg says earlier rounds of talks were given impetus by Mr Mbeki’s need to return to his presidential duties in South Africa.

Now removed from office, Mr Mbeki’s diary is clear and his ability to seal a deal once again open to question, our correspondent says.

When Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, arrived for the talks on Friday he sounded cautious saying, “We all have to have hope don’t we?”

President Mugabe last week allocated the most important cabinet posts to his Zanu-PF party, prompting Mr Tsvangirai to threaten to pull out of a deal to share power.

The rivals signed the deal last month but did not thrash out which party would hold which posts

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47 JAILED FOR INTERNET CAFE BLAST IN MOROCCO

A court in Morocco has convicted and sentenced 47 people to up to 30 years in prison over a suicide bombing last year at an internet cafe in Casablanca.

The suicide bomber died in the attack, and three people were wounded. The state news agency MAP said that the accused had been planning a string of attacks in Casablanca using home-made explosives.

The bombing plot was uncovered by the police investigation that followed the internet cafe bombing.

The defendants all denied charges that included forming a criminal gang with the aim of committing terrorist acts, making explosives, theft, forgery and failure to denounce terrorism.

One man was given a 30-year sentence, and 45 others received jail terms of between two and 15 years.

One person received a suspended sentence. Four others were acquitted.

No details were given about their individual roles.

The alleged leader of the plot, Abdelfettah Raydi, detonated an explosive belt in a Casablanca internet cafe to avoid arrest in March 2007, killing only himself.

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HEAVY FIGHTING IN MOGADISHU

Heavy fighting has left at least 20 people dead and dozens more injured in clashes across the Somali capital, Mogadishu, officials and witnesses say. Islamist insurgents have been engaged in fierce battles with government troops and their Ethiopian allies, and both sides suffered casualties.

Five people were also reported killed when a mortar hit their house.

Correspondents say it is the fiercest fighting for several weeks and has engulfed three separate districts.

An official at the city’s biggest hospital said it was treating 35 civilians wounded in fighting late on Thursday, and six had died overnight.

Government forces said one of their soldiers had been killed in the clashes in central Mogadishu and a further two had been injured, the BBC’s Mohamed Ibrahim Moalimuu reports from the Somali capital.

They also said two Islamists had been killed, and that insurgents had been forced to abandon a vehicle mounted with anti-aircraft guns.

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