BP says cost of Gulf of Mexico spill hits $8 billion

LONDON: BP says it has so far spent $8 billion responding to the disastrous oil well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico.

“The cost of the response to date amounts to approximately eight billion, including the cost of the spill response, containment, relief well drilling, static kill and cementing, grants to the Gulf states, claims paid and federal costs,” BP said in a statement.

The April 20 spill was triggered when an explosion ripped through the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 workers and sinking the huge offshore platform two days later.

BP has forecasted that the disaster will cost a total of about 32.2 billion dollars, after pushing the group into a 16.9-billion-dollar loss in the second quarter — which was the biggest quarterly loss in British corporate history.

The statement reiterated that BP had agreed to set up a 20-billion-dollar compensation fund for residents affected by the spill.

The company said Friday that the total included $399 million paid to settle 127,000 claims from businesses and other affected by the oil spill.

The oil company said more than 28,000 people and 4,000 vessels are still engaged in responding to the spill. BP says no oil has flowed from the well since July 15. —Agencies

India’s Maoists spark hostage drama

NEW DELHI: Indian Maoist militants in the east of the country threatened to kill three captured policemen on Friday unless the local government agreed to release seven left-wing prisoners.

On Thursday, the militants claimed they had executed a fourth captive, Kumar Yadav, a sub-inspector, after trying him in a “people's court” in the impoverished eastern state of Bihar.

“We killed him and warned the state government to release our comrades by 10:00am on Friday morning. Failing this we will kill all three policemen,” Maoist spokesman Avinash told local Hindi TV news channels on Thursday evening.

Bihar police chief Neelmani denied that Yadav had been murdered, however, telling reporters: “All four abducted policemen are safe.”

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, widely credited with improving the fortunes of deeply deprived Bihar, is seen as having a different approach to tackling India's Maoist menace.

Kumar has favoured dialogue and development over a hardline strategy of trying to crush the militant movement, which has been described by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as India's biggest internal security threat.

Authorities in New Delhi launched a major offensive last year to tackle the worsening insurgency, but since then the Maoists have hit back with repeated strikes against police and paramilitary forces.

The policemen were abducted during a raid on Sunday that left 10 other officers dead.

Suicide blast kills at least one in Tajikistan

DUSHANBE: A suicide bomber blew himself up at a police station in northern Tajikistan on Friday, killing at least one person and wounding 20, a police source said.

“There were people in the building and it's now burning,” the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Reuters.

He said the death toll was likely to rise but that it was not immediately clear if the dead included the suicide bomber.

The attack occurred in Khujand, about 340 km north of the capital Dushanbe and near the border with Uzbekistan.

Governments in the former Soviet republics of Central Asia are clamping down on what they see as growing radicalism in the predominantly Muslim, though secular, region after a rise in clashes between security forces and armed groups.

Tajikistan, which has a porous 1,340-km border with Afghanistan, has jailed 115 people this year on charges of belonging to banned groups, mostly Islamic.

Last month, 10 followers of a banned Islamic group were jailed in Khujand for terms of three to 15 years.

Explosion strikes near police mobile in Peshawar

PESHAWAR: Police say a roadside bomb near a police van killed a police officer and wounded three others.

Police official Shafiullah Khan said the bomb was detonated by remote control Friday as officers patrolled on Ring Road in Peshawar's Achini Bala area on Friday, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, where floods have affected millions of people in recent weeks. – AP

Taliban claim responsibility for Lahore attacks

DERA ISMAIL KHAN: Pakistan's Taliban on Friday took responsibility for triple bombings at a Shia Muslim procession in the city of Lahore that killed 33 people.

Wednesday's blasts in the eastern city was the first major militant attack in Pakistan since floods waters tore through the country over the past month.

“It's revenge for the killings of innocent Sunnis,” a spokesman for Qari Hussain Mehsud, mentor of the Taliban's suicide bombers, told Reuters by telephone from an undisclosed location.

“We also have videos of the fidayeen (bombers) and we may release them,” the spokesman Shakirullah Mehsud told Reuters.

Hussain is a senior leader of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), or Taliban Movement of Pakistan led by Hakimullah Mehsud, who was charged by US prosecutors this week in the plot that killed seven CIA employees at an American base in Afghanistan last December.

The United States on Wednesday included TTP in its list of foreign terrorist organisations and announced a reward of up to $5 million for information leading to his arrest and another TTP leader, Wali-ur-Rehman.

Commonly known as “Ustad-e-Fidayeen” or “the mentor of suicide bombers,” Hussain began his militant career with an anti-Shia group before joining TTP, the main Taliban grouping in Pakistan which is fighting Pakistani government forces and is also increasingly seen as direct threat to the United States.

The attack in Lahore came as the government is struggling to cope with country's worst floods with millions of people threatened by malnutrition and diseases.

The floods struck just as the army said it had made progress in the war against the TTP militants. – Reuters

Soldiers kill 25 in gunbattle near Mexico border

MONTERREY, Mexico: A shootout between soldiers and suspected drug cartel members in northeastern Mexico left 25 purported gunmen dead Thursday, the military said.

A reconnaissance flight over Ciudad Mier in Tamaulipas state spotted several gunmen in front of a property, according to a statement from Mexico's Defense Department.

When troops on the ground moved in, gunmen opened fire, starting a gunbattle that killed 25 suspected cartel members, according to the military. The statement said two soldiers were injured but none were killed.

Earlier, a military spokesman had said the shootout happened when troops on patrol in the town of General Trevino, in neighboring Nuevo Leon state, came under fire from a ranch allegedly controlled by the Zetas drug gang.

The spokesman, who was not authorized to be quoted by name, said the troops returned fire at a ranch, known as ''The Stump.''

Authorities rescued three people believed to be kidnap victims in the raid, according to the statement. The military said troops seized 25 rifles, four grenades, 4,200 rounds of ammunition and 23 vehicles.

Drug violence has claimed more than 28,000 lives since President Felipe Calderon intensified a crackdown on cartels after taking office in late 2006.

The Zetas began as a gang of drug assassins but have since evolved into a powerful cartel. A fight between the Zetas and their former allies, the Gulf cartel, has increased drug violence in Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas states, according to government figures.

The Zetas are suspected of being responsible for the kidnapping and killing of 72 Central and South American migrants in Tamaulipas last week, in what could be Mexico's biggest drug-related massacre. – AP

Japan approves new financial sanctions against Iran

TOKYO: Japan's cabinet Friday approved new sanctions against Iran, including an assets freeze on figures linked to its nuclear programme and tighter restrictions on financial transactions, media reported.

The step comes a month after Tokyo approved punitive measures in line with a June UN Security Council resolution which slapped a fourth set of sanctions on Iran over its refusal to halt uranium enrichment work.

The new sanctions include a freeze on the assets of more than 100 groups and individuals linked to the country's nuclear programme, which many nations fear masks a drive for atomic weapons, Jiji Press reported.

The new package of sanctions also bar Japanese financial institutions from buying bonds issued by Iran's central bank, media reports said.

The United States, the European Union, Canada and Australia have also announced additional sanctions, which have been opposed by Russia and China, now Iran's closest trading partner, with major energy interests in the country.

Washington has urged Tokyo to help raise the pressure on Tehran, despite Japan's usually friendly ties with Iran, a major oil supplier to the energy-hungry archipelago nation.

In early August US State Department special adviser for non-proliferation and arms control Robert Einhorn said in Tokyo: “Japan imports a lot of oil from Iran, but the steps we are asking Japan to take would not interfere in any way with Japan's energy security, its imports of oil from Iran.” Iran maintains that its nuclear programme is peaceful. – AFP