December 30, 2004

• Israeli-Palestinian Conflict:
  • Nine Palestinians, including civilians, are killed in an Israeli army incursion into the Khan Younis refugee camp in the Gaza Strip. During the raid the local Hamas commander is killed and two Israeli soldiers are slightly wounded. (BBC) (Haaretz)
  • Israel declares that a deal has been struck between Ariel Sharon and Shimon Peres to form a coalition government. (BBC)
• In Sudan, the government and the rebel group SPLA have agreed to sign a ceasefire in Naiwasha on the road to a peace deal. The treaty would end the civil war that began in 1983. (IAfrica) (News24) (BBC)
• The Ukrainian Central Election Commission rejects complaints of prime minister Viktor Yanukovych, who lost the presidential election. (Reuters) (BBC)
• In Spain, parliament of the Basque regions favors increasing autonomy and eventual negotiated independence (Independent Online) (BBC)
• A Dutch court hands down the country's first fines to spammers. (PCWorld) (DV Hardware)
• In Senegal, President Abdoulaye Wade signs a peace deal with separatist rebels in the Casamance region. The war has lasted 22 years. (BBC) (News24)
• In Zimbabwe, four people are charged for selling secrets to unspecified foreign agents. They include former political allies to President Robert Mugabe. (Iafrica) (Reuters)
• The death toll from the Indian Ocean Earthquake and subsequent tsunamis on December 26 reaches more than 120,000 in 12 countries from Malaysia to Somalia; the Norwegian newspaper Verdens Gang reports a current total of 115,982 deaths. The Malaysian News Agency reports the death toll in Sumatra may exceed 400,000. According to the WHO, as many as five million people are at risk, with little water, food or shelter.
• The Canadian Food Inspection Agency reported what may be a second case of mad cow disease in a ten-year old dairy cow at the same time as the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced an end to their ban on imports of live Canadian cattle. (International Herald Tribune) (Bloomberg)
• A fire in República Cromagnon, a nightclub in Buenos Aires, Argentina, kills 194 and injures 714. (Reuters) (CNN) (BBC)