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Charges leveled against ex-guard
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MUNICH -- Rudolf Salomon Cortissos sobbed as he told a Munich court about the letter his mother had written on May 17, 1943 -- four days before she was gassed in the Nazis' Sobibor death camp with some 2,300 other Dutch Jews.
Mr. Cortissos testified yesterday, the second day in a German court for John Demjanjuk, the retired Ohio autoworker being tried on charges of being an accessory to the murder of 27,900 Jews in the Sobibor camp, including Mr. Cortissos' mother Emmy.
The 89-year-old Demjanjuk was deported from the United States in May to stand trial in Germany. He rejects the charges, saying he has been mistaken for someone else.
Prior Mr. Cortissos' testimony,, prosecutors accused Mr. Demjanjuk of playing an active role in the Nazis' machinery of destruction and of being a willing follower of Hitler's racist ideology as they read their indictment aloud.
TEHRAN, Iran -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said yesterday that Tehran is reviewing the option of decreasing cooperation with the U.N. nuclear watchdog after it issued a resolution critical of Iran last week.
Speaking in a live television interview late yesterday, Mr. Ahmadinejad also criticized Russia's support for International Atomic Energy Agency's resolution, calling it a mistake.
The sharply worded IAEA resolution on Friday demanded Iran halt all uranium enrichment and stop construction of a newly discovered nuclear facility near the Iranian city of Qom. Iran responded by saying it would build even more such facilities.
Iran says its nuclear program is peaceful, insisting it has a right to enrich uranium to produce fuel for nuclear reactors to generate electricity. The U.S. and its allies accuse Iran of secretly planning to build a weapon.
ISLAMABAD -- Pakistan's Supreme Court said yesterday it will soon begin examining an expired amnesty covering the president and key allies. The decision launches a process that could unseat the U.S.-allied leader just as the Obama administration needs stability in Islamabad to help crack down on the Taliban.
Highlighting the dangers, a suicide bomber killed an anti-Taliban lawmaker in the Swat Valley -- the latest in a series of bombings as the army presses offensives in militant strongholds close to the Afghan border.
President Asif Ali Zardari has been under mounting pressure to resign or relinquish key powers to the prime minister and assume a ceremonial role.
Those calls came to the fore with Saturday's expiration of an amnesty that had been granted to him and more than 8,000 other politicians and bureaucrats under his predecessor.
PARIS -- The Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at President George W. Bush in Baghdad last year had a taste of his own medicine yesterday when he nearly got beaned by a shoe thrower at a news conference in Paris.
Muntadhar al-Zeidi ducked and the shoe hit the wall behind him.
"He stole my technique," Mr.Zeidi later quipped.
The identity of the new shoe-thrower -- and his motivation -- weren't immediately clear, but he appeared to be an Iraqi.
Mr. Zeidi, a TV reporter, became a hero to many opponents of the Iraq war when he hurled his shoes at Mr. Bush during a news conference in Baghdad in December 2008. Mr. Zeidi was arrested, then imprisoned for nine months.
-- Compiled from news services
First Published December 2, 2009 1:38 am
