World Highlights

¤ President George W. Bush yesterday issued an order blocking the assets of anyone connected with the February 14, 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri. Mr Bush in a statement said the new order blocks the property and interest of anyone determined to have been involved in Mr Hariri's assassination and that additional steps were being taken "concerning certain actions of the government of Syria".

¤ Sri Lanka's military launched air and artillery strikes on Tamil Tiger targets in the island's northeast yesterday, with thousands fleeing their homes a day after a suicide attack damaged an already fragile ceasefire. Military spokesman Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe said the latest strikes came after the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) fired at the military near the northeastern port of Trincomalee. By night, the army said the island was quiet.

¤ Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas yesterday used the backdrop of the Nobel Peace Institute in Oslo to call on Israel to resume stalled peace talks and beg for international aid for his impoverished state. Meanwhile, acting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's Kadima Party signed up its first partner for a coalition government yesterday, a party spokesman said. He said Gil, a pensioners' party with seven of Parliament's 120 seats, had agreed to join forces with centrist Kadima.

¤ The Hamas-led Palestinian Authority yesterday vowed not to give in to Western financial pressure and appealed to banks to take "some risks" and agree to handle the new government's funds. Palestinian officials and Western aid agencies say the economy could quickly collapse and violence could spread because Israel froze tax receipts and Western nations cut aid to the Palestinian Authority.

¤ More than 5,000 Romanians have fled low-lying areas of the Danube basin in the last 24 hours as the river overwhelmed flood defences to swamp towns, villages and farmland, officials said yesterday.