International Affairs

STORY HIGHLIGHTS Outgoing head of internal oversight office says there is an "absence of strategic guidance" Ahlenius says "there is no transparency (or) accountability" Ban's spokesman calls his efforts "visionary" on a number of fronts United Nations (CNN) — A departing senior U.N. official has released a rare rebuke of her boss's performance — saying the United Nations is "drifting …

The war in Iraq led to a huge increase in the terrorist threat to the UK, the former head of MI5 has told the Iraq Inquiry. Baroness Manningham-Buller added that the decision to remove Saddam Hussein had caused a "long-term major and strategic problem" for Britain by allowing al-Qaeda time to build a stronghold in Afghanistan unnopposed. She told the …

Voters in Teaneck have chosen the first Muslim mayor in the thickly Jewish populated Bergen County in New Jersey. According to reports, Mohammed Hameeduddin, who won a council seat two years ago, earned five out of seven votes at the annual reorganization of township government. Teaneck has 14 synagogues and lots of stores catering to the town's large Jewish population. And …

  The Methodist Church today voted to boycott all products from Israeli settlements in Palestinian territories becoming the first major Christian denomination in Britain to officially adopt such a policy. The decision was made at the church’s Conference in Portsmouth, an annual gathering which decides Methodist policy. The official stance of the church, the fourth largest Christian denomination in Britain, …

  The Muslim Council of Britain deplores Home Secretary Theresa May’s uncharacteristicall y intemperate move to ban the renowned Indian mainstream Islamic scholar Dr. Zakir Abdul-Karim Naik, from a speakers’ tour in the UK, reported in the media (Daily Telegraph, 18th June 2010), apparently because of his “unacceptable behaviour” and that his visit “would not be conducive to the public good”. …