India recalls ambassador

India recalls ambassador
NEW DELHI, India -- India said today it is recalling its ambassador from Pakistan and terminating rail and bus services between the nations, as relations worsened following a suicide attack on Parliament that India blames on Pakistan-based militants. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Nirupama Rao said the actions would take effect Jan. 1. There was no immediate indication whether India's action was intended as a definitive break in diplomatic ties, and Rao did not say for how long the ambassador would be recalled.
"Since the Dec. 13 attack on Parliament, we have seen no attempt on the part of Pakistan to take action against the organizations involved," Rao told a press conference. She reiterated that India has asked Pakistan's government to shut down two Islamic militant organizations India has accused of carrying out the attack that killed eight people, as well as the five assailants.
India has demanded that Pakistan arrest the leaders of the two groups -- Lafhkar-e-Tayyaba and Jaish-e-Mohammed -- and freeze their assets. Both groups have denied involvement in the attack. Pakistan has rejected India's accusations that its intelligence service supported the attack and said it would take no action until India supplies proof.
Identification of missingscientist found on body
MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- A body found snagged on a tree in the Mississippi River carried the identification of a missing Harvard University scientist who was last seen in Memphis over a month ago. Memphis police Lt. Joe Scott said the body and the wallet with Don C. Wiley's identification were found Thursday by workers at a hydroelectric plant in Vidalia, La., about 300 miles south of Memphis.
An autopsy was scheduled for today in Memphis. Wiley, 57, has been missing since Nov. 16, when his rental car was discovered on a Mississippi River bridge. The keys were in the ignition and the gas tank was full.
The molecular biologist had been in Memphis for a two-day annual meeting of the Scientific Advisory Board of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. His disappearance, following the terrorist attacks by about a month, had raised larger concerns because Wiley had done research into a number of potentially deadly viruses, including Ebola, a fever that is highly contagious and lethal.
Protestant hard-linerslose bid to eject leaders
BELFAST, Northern Ireland -- Protestant hard-liners lost a legal effort today to topple the leaders of Northern Ireland's unity government. In Belfast High Court, Justice Brian Kerr ruled that the Nov. 6 election of First Minister David Trimble and Deputy First Minister Mark Durkan was valid, even though it happened after a six-week deadline for the posts to be filled.
The Democratic Unionist Party, which takes part in the power-sharing government but wants it dismantled, had argued that the law governing how the coalition works required the posts to be filled by Nov. 4. Because that didn't happen, the Protestant party argued, Britain was obliged to call a new general election in Northern Ireland.
But in his ruling, Kerr said it would best serve community interests to enforce this deadline "with latitude." He said the 1998 pact sought to promote the widest possible agreement among political parties, and it would be "inimical to that concept to impose an inflexible time limit."
Kerr said Britain's secretary of state for Northern Ireland, John Reid, enjoyed "wide discretion" in deciding whether to bend the rules or call a new election.
Associated Press