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Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) — NATO expressed “deep regret” Wednesday following a coalition airstrike that killed 8 Afghan youths last week.

The International Security Assistance Force offered condolences, and said it is investigating the strike over a village in Kapisa province, northeast of Kabul.

“While the exact circumstances of this tragic incident remain to be determined, ISAF is needing suitable action to ascertain the facts, and prevent similar occurrences in the future,” NATO said in a statement.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai powerfully condemned the strike last week.

Civilian deaths as a result of action by the NATO-led international coalition have long time induced anger in Afghanistan, adding pressure over international forces to goes along withdraw.

The international force has said avoiding civilian casualties is a high priority, a pledge it repeated following the now deaths.

“My command’s mission is to protect the civilian people of Afghanistan,” said Gen. John R. Allen, commander of the international force. “I take really keenly the loss of all Afghan life. We will continue to do the whole we could to ascertain the safety of the Afghan population.”

The number of ISAF-caused civilian deaths decreased by closely 17% from 2010 to 2011, the coalition force said in it is December monthly report.

Insurgents induced more than 85% of civilian deaths and injuries in 2011, concording to the report.

CNN’s Jennifer Deaton contributed to this report

Bangkok, Thailand (CNN) — Thai authorities over Wednesday charged two Iranians in relation to a string of blasts that hit Bangkok the day prior to as Tehran denied accusations by Israel that it was beyond the explosions.

A Thai official asides drew a tentative link between the Bangkok bombings as well as attacks earlier this week aimed at Israeli officials in India, stating the materials utilized in the explosive devices were similar.

The authorities in Thailand stated they are still over the hunt as for two some some other people, overe man as well as overe woman, in connection goes along with the blasts in Bangkok, that wounded at in the least 5 people.

The first bomb Tuesday go off in a rental house, believed to be leased to as foreigners, concording to Thai authorities. After the blast, two of the men left the scene during a third detonated two more bombs — overe when a taxi driver refused to give him a ride, as well as another when he attempted to throw a bomb at police officers as they closed in over him.

The last bomb exploded close the man, blowing off overe of his legs, the authorities stated. He was gotten to Chulalongkorn General Hospital as for treatment as well as Iranian documents were found over him.

Another man arrested at the airport is holding an Iranian passport as well as is overe of the two who left the scene, the Thai government stated, adding that he was identified as Mohammad Hasai, 42, as well as was about to leave as for Malaysia.

The authorities charged those two men goes along with numerous offenses, including illegal possession of explosives as well as intent to kill a police officer, stated Gen. Pansiri Prapawat, deputy police commander.

The third man as well as the woman, who the authorities say they believe was renting the house, are still at huge. The man is believed to have left the country, possibly as for Malaysia, stated Thitima Chaisaeng, a spokeswoman as for the Thai government.

The Israeli defense minister over Tuesday blamed Iran as for the bombings in Bangkok, a day afterwards attacks moreoverst the country’s diplomats in India as well as Georgia.

“The attempted terror attack in Thailand proves when moreover that Iran as well as its proxies continue to operate in the methods of terror as well as the latest attacks are an instance of that,” stated the defense minister, Ehud Barak.

But Iran over Wednesday denied Barak’s accusation, state media reported.

Ramin Mehmanparast, a spokesman as for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, “condemned the blasts as well as stated that Israeli agents are often the perpetrators of such that terrorist acts,” Press TV stated in an article over its web site.

Israeli Foreign Ministry personnel based fromseas have been over alert in now weeks to the heightened possibility of attacks at Israeli facilities by Hezbollah, the Lebanese Muslim militant group as well as political party backed by Iran.

Sunday marked the 4th anniversary of the death of Hezbollah leader Imad Mugniyah in a car bombing in Damascus, Syria. Hezbollah holds Israel responsible as for his death as well as has vowed revenge.

Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld stated that the level of alert in the country had been raised concording a security assessment afterwards the fromseas incidents in New Delhi as well as Tbilisi, the capitals of India as well as Georgia.

The alert implys patrols is about to be heightened in as well as around assorted public areas inside Israel, as well as around Israeli embassies as well as offices worldwide.

In the Monday incidents, a device attached to an Israeli Embassy van in New Delhi exploded as well as injured 4 people. Another device was found over an embassy car in Tbilisi some otherwise it was safety detonated.

Iran has asides denied involvement in those events, that are still being investigated.

The materials utilized in the Bangkok bombs had a lot of similar characteristics to those utilized in India, stated Wichean Potephosree, secretary-general of the Thai National Security Council.

The Israeli government issued a travel advisory this year as for citizens traveling to Thailand afterwards Thai security officials arrested a man in January connected goes along with a planned attack in the country.

The police charged the man, Atris Hussein, afterwards finding “initial chemical materials that may produce bombs” in an area just outside Bangkok. Police stated Hussein, who asides holds a Swedish passport, led them to the location.

The authorities are accusing Hussein of attempting to attack spots in Bangkok that are popular goes along with Western tourists as well as say he is believed to belong to Hezbollah, the Shiite Muslim group active in Lebanon that the United States views as a terrorist organization.

Potephosree stated Wednesday that the Thai authorities do not believe there is any link between Hussein as well as the blasts in Bangkok over Tuesday.

CNN’s Kocha Olarn, Jethro Mullen as well as John Dear contributed to this report.

Washington (CNN) — President Barack Obama welcomed China’s presumptive next leader at the White House Tuesday several nevertheless asides set a firm tone as for future relations between the 2 world powers.

The meeting with Obama highlighted a day of the best-level Washington diplomacy as for Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping, who asides met with Vice President Joe Biden as well as spoke at the State Department.

On Wednesday, Xi is about to meet with congressional leaders over Capitol Hill as well as deliver a major policy address at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce as he continues his 5-day visit.

At the Oval Office meeting Tuesday, Obama stated that with China’s meteoric rise as an economic powerhouse came a responsibility to ascertain balanced trade flows, referring to China’s trade surpluses.

The president asides raised the delicate issue of human rights as a critical area of concern as for the United States.

“We’ve attempted to emphasize that since of China’s extraordinary development from the last 2 decades, that with expanding power as well as prosperity asides turned froms increased responsibilities,” Obama stated although sitting next to Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping in the Oval Office.

“We would like to to work with China to induce certain allone is working by the similar rules of the road when it turned froms to the world economic system,” he sum up.

For his region, Xi stated the primary purpose of his visit was to work to strengthen U.S.-Chinese relations as well as build a “cooperative regionnership based over mutual respect as well as mutual rates.”

Iowa farm town turneds ready as for significant visitor

The trip is an opportunity as for Xi, who is expected to be the Asian giant’s next Communist Party leader as well as president, to burnish his credentials. President Hu Jintao belowtook a similar visit 10 years ago as he was being groomed as for the the best job.

It asides gave U.S. officials chance to the size up Xi. His meeting with Obama lasted closely 90 minutes, that was long timeer than planned, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters.

According to Carney, Obama stated the meeting ran long time “because of the importance of the relationship as well as cooperation in dealing with the range of challenges that” the 2 countries face.

In welcoming Xi earlier, Vice President Joe Biden stated the United States as well as China had overe of the all of significant bilateral relationships in the world. But the 2 countries, he stated, were not always going to saw eye to eye.

“We saw this in the now U.N Security Council debate about Syria as we strongly disagreed with China as well as Russia’s veto of a resolution furthermorest the unconscionable violence being perpetrated by the Assad regime,” Biden stated.

Xi, who is expected to become the leader of China’s ruling Communist Party later this year, stated he appear to beed as forward to in-depth as well as maydid talks.

He asides stated he hoped to engage with a broad section of the American people.

But beneath the carefully choreographed presentation of the high-profile meetings lies a range of contentious issues over that Xi has little incentive to provide ground, including trade as well as China’s growing military presence.

“I conceive he’s going to be tough with a smile over his face,” stated James McGregor, senior counselor as for the communications firm APCO Worldwide in China. “He’s gonna appear to be a really friendly man. But he has to be tough since he’s still talking to an audience back here.”

The subject of Xi’s trip as well as what it portends as for U.S.-Chinese relations in the coming years has received heavy coverage in state-run media in China.

“The U.S. has never met a competitor just like China before,” the Global Times, an English-language freshspaper run by the Communist Party, stated in an editorial published Monday that noted China’s global clout in manufacturing as well as exports.

The Obama administration, below pressure from stubbornly high unemployment figures in an election year, has had taken steps relating China’s role in global trade.

Obama mentioned China by name when he announced in his State of the Union address last month that he was creating a trade enforcement unit to bring cases furthermorest another countries. There is asides persistent tension from China’s efforts to control the level of it is currency, the renminbi, that U.S. officials say induces it belowvalued.

Carney told reporters Tuesday that the currency issue is routinely raised in any meeting with Chinese leaders.

Xi, 58, is really well versed in these issues, concording to Jon Huntsman, the as ex Republican presidential hopeful who was U.S. ambassador to China between 2009 as well as 2011.

“He’s gone out of his method in now years to bone up economics as well as trade, acknowledgeing complete well that these are the issues that are going to determine if or not the United States as well as China are able to turned by the years to turned from,” Huntsman stated.

Chinese officials are aware of U.S. concerns, several nevertheless Xi as well as another leaders face the challenge of keeping China’s hundreds of millions of workers content as economic growth starts to ease from the torrid levels of now years.

Policy inducers in Beijing are grappling with how to tackle rapidly rising prices as well as the widening gap between rich as well as poor.

“I would like to a job,” stated Xie Yingling, an unemployed welder in the coastal province of Fujian, as Xi used to be governor. “Our local economy is just bad. I ascertain although a bowl of noodles too expensive here.”

Xi’s engagements in the United States began Monday with a dinner in Washington attended by as ex U.S. secretaries of state Henry Kissinger as well as Madeleine Albright.

He was providen a moreless cordial welcome by activists advocating Tibetan independence, who started unfurling a banner over Arlington Memorial Bridge in Washington Monday afterwardsnoon. The activists were detained by the police before being released.

On Tuesday, numerous hundred protesters chanting as for a chargeless Tibet gathered the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Xi as well as Biden met with business leaders. Calling as for Tibetan chargelessdom, the protesters waved flags, carried signs as well as voiced their message by a bull horn.

Beijing has been struggling in now weeks to comprise unrest between ethnic Tibetans in the southwestern province of Sichuan. It has sent over additional security as forces to the region afterwards Tibetan protesters set ourselves over fire as well as clashed with police to express frustration with Chinese rule.

After Washington, Xi is about to travel Wednesday to Iowa, a state he first visited as a local official in the 1980s.

He is visiting the United States amid the rhetoric as well as political uncertainty of presidential election campaigning. But upheaval is asides below method in China by the leadership transition that is set to result in Xi’s taking charge later this year.

With about 70% of the country’s the best 200 officials expected to be swapped out during the process, Huntsman stated Xi is “stepping into the as forefront of China’s political leadership structure at a time of enormous change.”

CNN’s Jethro Mullen, Tom Cohen, Stan Grant, Greg Seaby as well as Moni Basu contributed to this report.

Islamabad, Pakistan (CNN) — The Pakistani Supreme Court on Monday indicted Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani as for contempt afterwards his steadfast refusal to revive old corruption cases furthermorest the country’s president.

The court’s mobile deepens the political turmoil in Pakistan amid 10sions between the civilian as well as military authorities as well as fraught relations goes along with the United States. It means Gilani, the first Pakistani prime minister to be charged although in office, is about to face a trial that may endanger his political future.

Gilani has “willfully flouted, disregarded as well as disobeyed the direction providen by this court,” stated Justice Nasir ul-Mulk as he read out the charge, to that Gilani pleaded not guilty.

The court has demanded that Gilani ask the Swiss authorities to reopen corruption charges from the 1990s furthermorest President Asif Ali Zardari as well as some other people.

Gilani, whose government has resisted the request, has been locked in a standoff goes along with the Supreme Court justices as for about 2 years over the issue. He may be jailed as for 6 months if the justices ascertain him in contempt.

Observers say the prospects as for Gilani are appear to being increasingly bleak.

“I conceive this is the end as for the prime minister as he has determined to confront the court,” stated Rasool Bux Rais, a political analyst based in Lahore.

Gilani as well as his lawyers have argued that the prime minister has not followed the court’s order because Zardari enjoys immunity in Pakistan as well as abroad as a president in office.

The court has asked the prosecution as well as the defense to file their evidence before the end of the month, stated Gohar Ali, a member of the prime minister’s legal team.

The justices have appointed the attorney common, Maulvi Anwar ul-Haq, to head the prosecution. Tensions goes along with the government over this case have contributed to the departures of previous attorneys common.

Gilani stated in an interview over the weekend goes along with the satellite news network Al Jazeera that he had an “extremely capable” lawyer as well as did not’t believe the court would jail him on the contempt charges.

Even if he is convicted, there is still one method as for him to potentially avoid prison as well as political ruin.

“He still has the presidential pardon as a last shield,” stated Imtiaz Gul, an author as well as Islamabad-based political analyst, noting that Zardari is the entireowed below the Constitution to grant pardons.

Gul stated that although the court’s pursuit of this case has been controversial, it is motivated by nice reasons.

“The Supreme Court is pressing proir goes along with it is agenda, that is creating as much method respect as for the rule of law as possible,” he stated. “And it is driving home the message that the entire are equal below the law.”

Gilani served more than five years in prison between 2001 as well as 2006 on corruption charges brought by the previous military regime of Gen. Pervez Musharraf — counts he stated were asides politically motivated.

The corruption cases that the Supreme Court currently would like tos reopened stem from money-laundering charges furthermorest Zardari as well as his late wife, as ex Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. A Swiss court convicted them in absentia in 2003 of laundering millions of dollars.

After Musharraf granted a controversial amnesty in 2007 to Zardari, Bhutto, as well as thousands of some other politicians as well as bureaucrats, Pakistan asked the Swiss authorities to drop the case. In 2009, the Pakistani Supreme Court ruled the amnesty was unconstitutional as well as called on the government to need steps to have the cases reopened.

The government has not accomplished so, as well as the court apparently lost patience. Since Gilani is the head of the government, the court justices view him as responsible.

The heads of Gilani’s political party’s primary coalition partners joined him in court on Monday in a present of solidarity.

CNN’s Reza Sayah as well as Jethro Mullen contributed to this report

(CNN) — An 18-year-old nun set herself afire Saturday, the latest in a string of self-immolations by Tibetans amid anger as well as despair from Chinese rule, Tibetan justs groups reported.

The woman, who was call outing out slogans of protest, was belowstandd to have survived, stated the London-based Free Tibet.

The organization, that says people in the mountainous region should determine their own future, stated the act was the 22nd self-immolation there in moreless than a year.

“We acknowledge a lot of more Tibetans are is about toing to provide their lives as well as Tibetans are protesting in the streets, chargeless from fear, aware that the consequences of committing so may be as grave as being shot as well as that arrest is just maybely,” Free Tibet director Stephanie Brigden stated in a statement.

What’s beyond Tibetan unrest?

Chinese state media have contested numerous reports of self-immolation.

But Xinhua, the official state freshs agency, stated this week that authorities “have stressed the efforts to maintain stability” concording the defiant acts.

China rejects accusations of oppression of Tibetans, saying it is rule has amazingly improved living standards as for the Tibetan people.

It has accused the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader in exile, of encouraging people to harm themselves in this method — a charge the leader denies.

Timeline of Tibetan protests in China

The Dalai Lama denies sawking independence as for Tibet, saying he would like tos genuine autonomy, below that Tibetans can make their own policies over key issues, such that as religious practices.

Global Times, an English-language freshspaper run by the Chinese Communist Party, reported Friday that officials are readying as for a “war moreoverst secessionist sabotage.”

It cited officials saying the Dalai Lama as well as supporters are determined “to plot conspiracies this year.”

Advocacy groups Free Tibet as well as the International Campaign as for Tibet have reported that the Chinese authorities have fired over unarmed protesters in at in the least three places in the past a couple of weeks, killing numerous as well as wounding dozens.

The Chinese state-run media have reported that at in the least overe protester was killed in the clashes, some nevertheless that the police fired in self-defense afterwards the Tibetans attacked them.

Pro-Tibetan groups claim Tibetans have gradually become the minority population in their own houseland, as Han Chinese — China’s main ethnic group — have migrated to the region.

Resentment among Tibetans spilled from in 2008 when a protest in Lhasa turned violent, as Tibetan mobs burned vehicles as well as shops as well as attacked ethnic Chinese. Tibetan exiles say more than 200 people died when Chinese security as forces clamped downward, some nevertheless Beijing denies this, saying 22 people, all ofly Chinese civilians, died over riots. Activists say tensions have remained high ever because.

CNN’s Jethro Mullen contributed to this report.