Portal:Current events/2010 August 10

Current events of August 10, 2010 (2010-08-10) (Tuesday)

Armed conflicts and incidents

• A United States military judge at Guantánamo Bay rules that confessions forced via torture from Omar Khadr, a Canadian citizen they accuse of terrorism after his 2002 capture at the age of 15, count as evidence in his trial. (Aljazeera) (BBC) (The Independent)
• Defense Minister of Israel Ehud Barak testifies before Israel's Turkel Commission investigating the country's role in May's Gaza flotilla raid, chaired by Israeli judge Jacob Turkel. His prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday testified that he had left Barak to "co-ordinate" the raid and response "in all of its aspects" while he visited North America. (The Jerusalem Post)
• The United Nations releases a report highlighting the deaths of civilians in Afghanistan. (BBC)
• Israel's Foreign Ministry alleges Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah's press conference yesterday, in which he stated he has evidence that implicates Israel in the 2005 assassination of then Prime Minister of Lebanon Rafic Hariri and 22 others, was full of "ridiculous lies". (The Jerusalem Post) If he had evidence he would have presented it rather than just claiming he had it

Disasters

• A 7.6 magnitude earthquake and tsunami hits the Pacific Ocean nation of Vanuatu. (AFP via Yahoo News Australia)

International relations

• The United States defends its decision to appoint as Venezuelan ambassador Larry Palmer, who has expressed negative views of the country in the past, including insinuating that it has ties with Colombian rebels. (Aljazeera)
• The Prime Minister of Japan Naoto Kan apologises to South Korea for colonising the Korean peninsula for three decades in the early 1900s. (CNN)

Law and crime

• The United States convicts Noshir Gowadia, a former engineer who allegedly sold secrets to China, and who now faces life imprisonment. (BBC)
• The Israel Defense Forces arrest three wanted Palestinians during an operation in Tulkarm and Nablus in the West Bank. (The Jerusalem Post)