Republic of Kiribati recognizes the Republic of Kosovo as an independent and sovereign state, informs the Foreign Ministry of the Republic of Kosovo.

“Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kiribati has notified the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Kosovo through a verbal note that this country has decided to recognize the independence of the Republic of Kosovo on October 21, 2010.”

At the same time, the Republic of Kiribati has expressed readiness to enter the Republic of Kosovo diplomatic bilateral relations to develop friendly relations and cooperation between the two countries in political, trade and economic.

Kiribati, is an island nation located in the central tropical Pacific Ocean. Kiribati became independent from the United Kingdom in 1979.

The News:
http://www.newkosova … dence-of-Kosovo.html

Some of the Somali regions that share a border with Ethiopia have been in a state of turmoil over the past few days. In the shifting patterns of this prolonged war in Somalia, the escalation of violence in the regions of Galguduud, Hiiran, Gedo and Bakool has illuminated some of the underlying geo-political dynamics that are at play in the volatile region of the Horn of Africa.

More than 400 Transitional Federal Government (TFG) soldiers, accompanied by up to 300 Ethiopian forces, raided the town of Baladweyn, Hiiran, in order to bring an end to the Islamists’ rule in the region; in Galguduud, hundreds of Ahlu Sunna Wal Jama (ASWJ) rebels attacked Cadaado, the region’s business hub which is governed by a tribal administration, with military equipment and reinforcements readily supplied by the Ethiopian government; in the border towns of Yeed and Ceel Berde, Bakool region, the Islamists are fending off the Ethiopian troops’ aggressive incursions; in the South-Western region of Gedo, TFG troops buttressed by the Ethiopian might and men wrestled the region’s capital, Beledxaawo, from the iron grip of the Islamists.

But while the Transitional Federal Government has its own reasons for driving out the Islamists from the region, what are the motives that underpin the Ethiopian involvement?

The News:
http://somalilandpre … stop-islamists-18783

Russian troops pulled back from a small village of Perevi at the western part of administrative border of breakaway South Ossetian on Monday evening.

Georgia said the withdrawal was “a step made in the right direction.”

“The de-occupation of each village is of outmost importance for Georgia and especially for the population residing in those villages,” the Georgian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on October 18.

“However, it should be emphasized that the withdrawal of Russian occupational forces from Perevi is just a miniscule step in comparison with commitments envisaged by the ceasefire agreement of August 12 2008 which Russia still has to comply with,” it said.

The News:
http://www.geotimes. … ?m=home&newsid=22940

A group of gunmen has attacked the parliament of Russia’s republic of Chechnya leaving at least three people killed in the assault.

According to Russia’s Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliev, who is in the Chechen capital at the moment, the victims are two militiamen and one civilian. The latest reports say that at least 17 people have been wounded. The injured include seven police officers and 11 civilians.

According to investigative committee on Tuesday morning cars with deputies entering the territory of the parliament were followed by a car carrying terrorists. At least one suicide blast followed and up to three gunmen managed to break into the building and open fire. According to the country’s law enforcement agency all of them have been neutralised.

The News:
http://rt.com/Top_Ne … upts-parliament.html

Central African countries plagued by the brutal rebellion of the Lord’s Resistance Army are working to reclassify the group as terrorists, the African Union said on Saturday.

At a meeting this week in the Central African Republic aimed at promoting a joint approach to the LRA, participants agreed to take steps to have the LRA classified as terrorists, rather than rebels, by the AU.

This would give affected countries greater access to international funds and require increased levels of judicial cooperation.

The group has killed about 2,000 people in the last two years, and displaced more than 400,000, according to the UN.

Representatives from Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan met in Bangui on Wednesday and Thursday, along with Kenya, where they also agreed to step up joint military action.

The News:
http://www.reliefweb … Document&rc=1&cc=uga

Somali government troops and allied forces retook the southeastern town of Bulo Hawo near the Kenyan border Sunday after defeating al-Qaeda-inspired al-Shabaab Islamists, officials and witnesses said.

“We took control of the city after defeating the enemy,” Mohamed Abdi Kalil, the government’s governor for the province, said by telephone.

“Residents were applauding with happiness after they saw the national army back in town after living under the tough regime of the al-Shabaab,” he added.

Kalil said many al-Shabaab fighters had been killed in the fighting, while one government soldier was killed and two injured.

The News:
http://somalilandpre … lamist-militia-18742

The Sudanese army reacted angrily to the announcement by the United Nations peacekeeping chief Alain Le Roy yesterday in which he said that the world body intends to redeploy peacekeepers in the south to Abyei and other hotspots along the north-south border ahead of the referendum to create limited buffer zones.

On Friday an unnamed UN official told Reuters that as of yesterday, the United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) “significantly increased its troop presence in the Abyei area”.

The South Sudan referendum is required by a 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that ended the 21-year civil war between Sudan’s predominantly Arab and Muslim north and rebels in the largely Christian-animist south.

Preparations for the January 9 vote have proceeded haltingly amid political and logistical obstacles, and the southerners have accused the northerners of stalling, warning of violence if the referendum is delayed.

La Notizia:
http://www.sudantrib … pip.php?article36614