Afghans order US forces out of two areas

AFGHAN President Hamid Karzai has demanded the withdrawal of US special forces from Wardak within two weeks, accusing them of fuelling "insecurity and instability" in the volatile province neighbouring the capital Kabul.

"In today's national security council meeting ... President Karzai ordered the ministry of defence to kick out the US special forces from Wardak province within two weeks," presidential spokesman Aimal Faizi said on Sunday.

"The US special forces and illegal armed groups created by them are causing insecurity, instability, and harass local people in this province," he told a media conference.

The announcement would be another blow to the prestige of US-led forces as they prepare to withdraw combat troops from the war against Taliban Islamist insurgents by the end of next year.

The bulk of NATO's 100,000 troops are due to leave Afghanistan by the end of 2014.

A US Forces Afghanistan (USFOR-A) spokesman said he was aware of the reported comments by Faizi.

"We take all allegations of misconduct seriously and go to great lengths to determine the facts surrounding them," he said.

"Until we have had a chance to speak with senior (Afghan) officials about this issue we are not in a position to comment further. This is an important issue that we intend to fully discuss with our Afghan counterparts."

More than 3200 NATO troops, mostly Americans, have died in support of Karzai's government in the war since the Taliban were ousted by a US invasion in 2001, but relations between the president and the US are often prickly.

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Newspoll shows NSW Labor down

THE latest Newspoll shows support for NSW Labor is at its lowest point for six months as a corruption scandal dims the party's prospects at a state level and federally.

The poll conducted for The Australian newspaper in January and February shows primary support for state Labor at 27 per cent, two points down on a poll conducted in November and December last year.

Labor was last at 27 per cent in a poll conducted in July-August last year after dipping to only 24 per cent in March-April.

Support for the O'Farrell coalition government is up one percentage point, at 46 per cent, indicating a 60-40 split in favour of the coalition in two-party preferred terms.

The poll, published on Monday, is bad news for federal Labor, with half of the party's 20 most marginal federal seats in NSW, and big swings against it widely tipped in western Sydney and on the NSW Central Coast.

Polls have shown support for Labor has been slipping since NSW's Independent Commission Against Corruption began hearing last year into allegedly corrupt conduct by three former state Labor ministers.

Monday's poll result is also bad news for state Opposition Leader John Robertson whose support as preferred premier has slipped back two points to 19 per cent.

Premier Barry O'Farrell's support has risen four points to 48 per cent.

He has 43 per cent of voters satisfied with his performance and 38 per cent dissatisfied compared with 28 per cent satisfied with Mr Robertson and 35 per cent not satisfied.

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Joan Child, first female Speaker, dies

JOAN Child, the first female Speaker of federal parliament, has died at the age of 91.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard has paid tribute to Ms Child, saying she is deeply saddened by her death on the weekend and she will remain a source of inspiration.

"With Joan Child's passing, Australia has lost one of its pioneering female political leaders, and I have lost a role model," Ms Gillard said.

Ms Child was elected to the Melbourne seat of Henty in 1974, when she became the first female Labor member of the House of Representatives and only the fourth woman ever elected to the House.

She was Speaker from 1986 to 1989 under the Hawke government, and retired from parliament the following year.

Until the election of Labor's Anna Burke last October, Ms Child had been the only female Speaker.

Ms Gillard said in a statement that Ms Child came to politics later in life, bringing "remarkable gifts of common sense, good humour and persistence against the odds".

Widowed at a young age, she had brought up five boys on her own and for a time worked as a cleaner to make ends meet.

"Though she attained high office, Joan always retained a sense of perspective. Her hobbies - gardening, reading detective fiction, listening to her idol Elvis - kept her firmly grounded," Ms Gillard said.

She said Ms Child was one of Labor's 'true believers' and was a powerful voice for the needs and rights of women, especially working women and women doing it tough.

Ms Child also set an example that led the way for women's participation in the Labor Party.

The prime minister said Ms Child's family had accepted the offer of a state funeral.

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Police praise heavy rock concert goers

POLICE have uncovered drugs and ejected more than 80 revellers from the Soundwave heavy rock concert in Sydney but say the majority of the crowd was well behaved.

More than 200 officers were on patrol at Sunday's concert at Olympic Park at Homebush that was attended by around 75,000 people.

Police said officers and drug detection dogs conducted 252 person searches and identified 54 people allegedly in possession of illicit drugs.

They were dealt with by way of Field Court Attendance Notices or cannabis cautions.

Illicit drugs seized include cannabis, ecstasy, ice and amphetamines.

Throughout the day, 82 revellers were ejected from the event by police and security staff - many of them for being intoxicated.

Acting Assistant Commissioner Peter Lennon said the majority of the crowd was well behaved with only a small number letting the rest down.

"While one person is too many, we were pleased to see far fewer people in possession of and affected by drugs at this festival."

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One killed in fierce Syria-Lebanon clash

FIERCE fighting erupted during the night on the Syria-Lebanon border between Syrian troops and unknown gunmen, leaving a Lebanese man dead and four wounded, a Lebanese security source says.

Lebanese President Michel Sleiman demanded on Sunday that Syria "refrain from firing towards Lebanese territory".

He also stressed, in a statement, the need to "respect the neutral position of (Lebanon) which means not interfering in the internal affairs of other countries, notably Syria".

The violence was triggered by the death hours earlier of another Lebanese man, who was killed on Saturday in gunfire coming from the Syria side of the border near a river separating the two countries, the security source said.

Members of his clan took part in the clashes against Syrian troops during the night in the Bukayaa region of northern Lebanon, a Lebanese official told AFP.

The Syrian army used artillery, mortars and automatic weapons fired from the Syrian village of Mcherfe as they clashed with the gunmen, according to the security source, who said a Lebanese man was killed and at least four others wounded in the fighting.

He was unable to say whether the gunmen were Lebanese or Syrians opposed to the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.

Beirut has officially adopted a neutral policy towards the Syria conflict, but it has deepened divisions in the country, with the Sunni-led March 14 movement supporting the revolt and the Shi'ite Hezbollah and its allies backing the Assad regime.

The violence has raised fears of the kind of sectarian strife that rocked Lebanon during its 1975-1990 civil war.

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Bond's Aston Martin up for sale

JAMES Bond's famous Aston Martin car, complete with hidden machine guns and a smoke screen, is up for grabs for a cool STG3 million ($A4.5 million).

Swiss millionaire Thomas Straumann put the vehicle up for sale in Britain with the price tag, the Swiss newspaper NZZ am Sonntag said.

Straumann, a shareholder in a dental implant firm, bought the Aston Martin DB5 in 2006 and spent three years restoring the car driven by Sean Connery as the fictional British spy in Goldfinger and Thunderball.

After buying the car for $US2.7 million ($A2.65 million) at a US auction, Straumann had 3000 hours of work put into its overhaul, according to NZZ am Sonntag.

Its famous JB007 licence plate aside, the Aston Martin boasts machine guns hidden behind retractable headlights, a smoke screen and a bullet-proof shield.

But one notable absence is a gadget Straumann chose to eliminate during the makeover: the ejector seat.

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French photographer dies after Syria blast

FRENCH freelance photographer Olivier Voisin, who was seriously wounded in Syria on Thursday, has died of his wounds after surgery in Turkey, the foreign ministry says.

Voisin, 38, had suffered head and arm injuries from shrapnel when a shell exploded near Idlib in northern Syria.

Turkish surgeons operated on Voisin on Friday in the border city of Antakya.

"We confirm his death," a ministry spokeswoman said on Sunday.

Voisin's pictures have been published in major French and British newspapers and he collaborated with AFP in January, providing about a dozen pictures from Aleppo.

Apart from Syria, he also covered news events in Libya, Somalia, Brazil, Haiti, Kenya and the United States.

Voisin was born in South Korea and adopted by a French family.

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Bangladesh moves to ban main Islamic party

BANGLADESH'S parliament has amended a law to allow the prosecution of the country's largest Islamic party Jamaat-e-Islami for war crimes in a move that could pave the way to it being banned.

News of the move was greeted by loud cheers from tens of thousands of protesters in central Dhaka who have been demanding a ban on Jamaat, whose leaders are on trial for war crimes allegedly committed in the 1971 war of independence from Pakistan.

Law minister Shafique Ahmed told AFP that under the new law, "any organisation including Jamaat can be prosecuted" by a special court for war crimes and if found guilty "it can be banned" from politics.

Previously only individuals could be prosecuted for war crimes.

"It's one step towards banning Jamaat," deputy law minister Qamrul Islam told AFP.

The move comes after Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Saturday indicated she would back a ban on Jamaat, whose members are suspected in the murder of an anti-Islamist blogger, as it had "no right to be in politics in Bangladesh".

Demonstrations championed by online activists have seen thousands take to the streets for the past two weeks demanding the execution of Jamaat leaders accused of genocide, murder and rape during the 1971 war.

Rival protests by Islamists demanding a halt to the trials of Jamaat leaders have turned violent, leaving 13 people dead.

Clashes between police and Islamists have intensified since last week after a senior Jamaat leader was sentenced to life imprisonment for mass murder.

Jamaat and the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party have said the trials are based on bogus charges and are part of a wider political vendetta.

The government rejects this and says the trials are needed to heal wounds from the nine-month war in which three million people were killed.

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Blasts kill 21 in Shi'ite areas of Baghdad

A SERIES of bombings mainly targeting Shi'ite areas of Baghdad has killed at least 21 people in the latest violence to hit Iraq as it struggles with protests and a political crisis.

Three car bombs struck the sprawling Sadr City slum in the north of the city, car bombs exploded in Ameen, Al-Husseiniyah and Kamaliyah in the east, and a roadside bomb blew up in Karrada in central Baghdad, security and medics said.

Another roadside device went off in Saidiyah in the capital's south.

At least 21 people were killed and more than 120 were wounded in Sunday's attacks, the officials said.

Residents of Sadr City were enraged by the bombings, and hospitals in the area were quickly crowded with people searching for relatives.

"What did we do? We're always the victims of conflicts between politicians," one woman shouted.

Ali Kadhim, who owns a shop near the site of one blast, agreed, saying: "They always threaten each other, and it's us who die. The people are always the victims."

And Hussein Mohammed, who was wounded and whose car was destroyed by one explosion, questioned how the bomb could have got past security forces into the area.

"I spent about two hours to enter Sadr City, so how could this car bomb enter?" he asked, his clothes smeared with blood and dirt. "Where is the security?"

Also on Sunday, gunmen killed a police captain in front of his home in Mosul in north Iraq, officials said.

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NATO to comply with Afghan air strike ban

THE commander of US-led forces in Afghanistan says he will comply with President Hamid Karzai's order banning Afghan security forces from seeking NATO air support.

Karzai said on Saturday he would issue a decree ordering an end to local security forces calling in NATO air strikes amid new tensions over civilian casualties caused by such attacks.

Air strikes have been an important weapon in the fight against Taliban insurgents, but they have also proved hugely controversial as they have led to numerous civilian deaths.

US General Joseph Dunford, who took charge of the US-led NATO force in the war-battered country last Sunday, said he was prepared to comply with Karzai's order, made after a NATO air raid killed 10 civilians including women and children in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday night.

"We are prepared to provide support in line with the president's intent," Dunford told reporters in Kabul on Sunday.

Karzai summoned Dunford over the air raid in Kunar province.

"I get the broad guidance from the president and we will work out the details in the coming days," Dunford said.

"We have restraints and constraints on each operation. I believe we will continue to support the ANSF (Afghan National Security Forces) and meet the president's intent," Dunford said in response to questions about Karzai's order.

"There are other ways to support the Afghans besides aviation," he said.

Afghanistan's own poorly equipped air force has no fixed-wing attack aircraft and is not capable of providing firepower to support ground troops.

A Western security source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the new ban would make the fight against the militants much harder.

"If air strikes are eventually banned, it's a good victory for the Taliban - without air power you have to chase after them," he told AFP.

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