Islamabad, Pakistan - NATO forces said on Saturday that they had killed a senior Pakistani Taliban commander in an airstrike in Afghanistan, highlighting the increasingly complicated nature of the fight against Islamist militants along the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Mullah Dadullah, who led the Pakistani Taliban in the Bajaur tribal agency, was killed late Friday in a strike on a compound across the border in the Afghan province of Kunar, NATO and Pakistani intelligence officials said.

The Kunar police chief, Gen. Elwaz Mohammad Naziri, said 12 other militants, including Mullah Dadullah's deputy, were also killed.

The death of Mullah Dadullah, a former prayer leader who rose through the Taliban ranks to become a commander, will have an impact on the fighting in Bajaur, where the Pakistani Army has been battling the Pakistani Taliban since 2008.

But it may also offer an opportunity for a fresh turn in the relations among NATO, Pakistani and Afghan forces along the porous border, which have been marred by acrid recriminations in recent months.

Pakistani officials have publicly accused NATO of failing to stop Taliban fighters sheltering in the Afghan provinces of Kunar and Nuristan, from which American forces have largely withdrawn, from carrying out attacks inside Pakistan.

The protests reached a crescendo in June after a Taliban ambush killed 13 Pakistani soldiers, 7 of whom were beheaded. Some Pakistani officials have gone as far as to accuse NATO and Afghan forces of secretly supporting the insurgents.

Nearly 12 years after it began, America's war in Afghanistan has all but approached a stalemate. Now the cost for such an outcome is once again being brought up after the number of US casualties hits another milestone: 2,000.

There are more than 80,000 US troops still fighting a war overseas that has been on the verge of ending since President Barack Obama took the oath of office over three years ago. But with America's exit from the Afghan War almost as drawn out as the operation itself, the country's collective attention span is spent as not only support for the mission wanes, but even public acknowledgment of the endeavor and its atrocities seem to be slipping away.

At the same time, though, US troops are being killed at a rate that exceeds what soldiers experience during the height of the war. As of August 22, the US Defense Department reports that 1,972 Americans have been killed in Afghanistan since the post-9/11 war began, with an additional 116 troops losing their lives in other locales, like Pakistan and Yemen, as part of the greater War in Afghanistan. Even still, exactly why the US is still in Afghanistan is being brought up less and less as young servicemen see a surge in battlefield fatalities.

A gas explosion at a Venezuelan oil refinery -- one of the world's largest -- killed at least 24 people, many of them soldiers stationed there, and injured dozens more, Vice President Elias Jaua said Saturday.

The local governor said the victims included a 10-year-old boy.

"There's no risk of another explosion," said Falcon state Gov. Stella Lugo, who added that at least 53 people were hurt.

The Amuay refinery, in western city of Paraguana, is Venezuela's largest, producing some 645,000-barrels a day.

"There was a gas leak," Energy Minister Rafael Ramirez told state TV. "A cloud of gas exploded ... it was a significant explosion, there are appreciable damages to infrastructure and houses opposite the refinery."

Emergency workers were at the scene, where smoke and flames could be seen over the facility. Inhabitants of the immediate area were evacuated, authorities said.

Norwegian mass murderer Anders Brevik - who admitted killing 77 people, and taunted the court with Nazi salutes - has been declared sane by judges. He's been jailed for the maximum 21 years, for committing the country's worst atrocity since World War 2, with his bombing and gun rampage in Oslo and Utoya island. But, broken down, his sentence equates to just over three months for each of his victims.

Breivik smirked when he heard the verdict. At the end of his sentencing, he apologised to 'militant nationalists' for not killing more people. He's always insisted on his sanity, and that the killings were part of his fight against the 'Islamification of Norway.' EU countries were suffering a rise in far-right activities before the tragedy but, as Tesa Arcilla reports, Breivik's ideas are fuelling even more hatred towards immigrants and Islam.

Ecuador is standing by its decision to grant asylum to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, who's resisting Britain's efforts to extradite him to Sweden to face sex crime claims. In an exclusive interview with RT's Spanish channel, Ecuador's president explains the choice he made, and says what he thinks Britain's motives really are.

Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi has ordered a newspaper editor accused of insulting him freed from jail.

Mr. Morsi Thursday decreed that no journalist shall be jailed for such alleged publishing-related crimes as libel and slander. It was his first presidential decree since taking law-making powers away from the military earlier this month.

The president's decision came almost immediately after a Cairo court ordered newspaper editor Islam Afifi to remain in jail until his next court appearance in September. Prosecutors say Afifi's Al-Dustour newspaper insulted the president and incited disorder by criticizing Mr. Morsi's former party, the Muslim Brotherhood.

The U.S. State Department and human rights groups urged Egypt to uphold press freedom, saying demands for free speech were one reason Egyptians overthrew former president Hosni Mubarak.

U.S. missiles slammed into three compounds close to the Afghan border Friday, killing 18 people, Pakistani officials said, just a day after the government summoned an U.S. diplomat to protest drone strikes in the country's northwest tribal region.

The drones struck the North Waziristan tribal area, Pakistani media reported.

Friday's strikes were the fourth attack in the span of a week, as well as the most deadly. The drone campaign has been a source of friction between the U.S. and Pakistan, which sees the strikes as an infringement on its sovereignty.

On Thursday, Pakistan's Foreign Ministry summoned a U.S. diplomat to protest the recent drone strikes.

"A senior U.S. diplomat was called to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and informed that the drone strikes were unlawful, against international law and a violation of Pakistan's sovereignty. It was emphatically stated that such attacks were unacceptable," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. The diplomat was not identified.

One day later, Pakistani intelligence officials said American drone-fired missiles hit three militant hideouts in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal areas.

Our writer hears the Syrian forces' justification for a battle that is tearing apart one of the world's oldest cities.


A victorious army? There were cartridge cases all over the ancient stone laneways, pocked windows, and bullet holes up the side of the Sharaf mosque, where a gunman had been firing from the minaret. A sniper still fired just 150 yards away - all that was left of more than a hundred rebels who had almost, but not quite, encircled the 4,000-year-old citadel of Aleppo.

"You won't believe this," Major Somar cried in excitement. "One of our prisoners told me: 'I didn't realise Palestine was as beautiful as this.' He thought he was in Palestine to fight the Israelis!"

Do I believe this? Certainly, the fighters who bashed their way into the lovely old streets west of the great citadel were, from all accounts, a ragtag bunch. Their graffiti - "We are the Brigades of 1980", the year when the first Muslim Brotherhood rising threatened the empire of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's father, Hafez - was still on the walls of the Syrian-Armenian hotels and silver shops. A 51-year-old general handed me one of the home-made grenades that littered the floor of the Sharaf mosque; a fluffy fuse poking from the top of a lump of shrapnel, coated in white plastic and covered in black adhesive tape.

Inside the mosque were bullets, empty tins of cheese, cigarette butts and piles of mosque carpets, which the rebels had used as bedding. The battle had so far lasted 24 hours. A live round had cut into the Bosnian-style tombstone of a Muslim imam's grave, with a delicate stone turban carved on its top. The mosque's records - lists of worshippers' complaints, Korans and financial documents - were lying across one room in what had evidently marked the last stand of several men. There was little blood. Between 10 and 15 of the defenders - all Syrians - surrendered after being offered mercy if they laid down their arms. The quality of this mercy was not, of course, disclosed to us.

Tehran's Friday Prayers Leader Hojjatoleslam Kazzem Sediqi said massive participation of the world leaders in the next week summit meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) in Tehran means another defeat and failure for the US and Israel in their confrontation against Iran.

Addressing a large congregation of worshipers on Tehran University Campus on Friday, Sediqi referred to the 16th heads-of-state summit of the NAM in Tehran next week, and said Iran's enemies, specially the US, have spared no efforts to discourage the officials, especially the leaders, of the NAM member states from participating in the Tehran summit in a bid to portray Iran as an isolated country, but to no avail.

"The summit is a milestone and a clear and practical response (to enemies) and shows that the global arrogance is holding just a rusty gun in its hand and its motto's are empty and its claims are baseless," he added.

And the vast participation of the world leaders in the Tehran summit means another defeat and failure for the enemies, he added.

Greece is considering selling off some of its islands to avoid national bankruptcy.

Greek prime minister Antonis Samaras said yesterday that leasing islands might ease its woes.

Greece has around 6,000 islands in total, many of which are uninhabited.

He told French newspaper Le Monde: 'On condition that no national security problem is posed, some of the islands could be used commercially.

'It would not be a case of getting rid of the islands, but of transforming unused terrain into capital that can generate revenue, for a fair price.'

Mr Samaras argued that attracting foreign investment was crucial to reviving the Greek economy, adding that sections of Greece's Attica coast to the east of Athens may also be attractive to private buyers.

Under the plans it is likely that developers would lease the land for a period of decades and build houses and hotels.