Former vice president Al Gore accused President George W. Bush on Sunday of failing to make America safer after the September 11 attacks and using the war against terrorism as a pretext to consolidate power. "They have taken us much farther down the road toward an intrusive, `big brother'-style government -- toward the dangers prophesied by George Orwell in his book 1984 -- than anyone ever thought would be possible in the United States of America," Gore charged in a speech. Gore said terrorism-fighting tools granted after the attacks amounted to a partisan power grab that have led to the erosion of the civil liberties of all Americans.
■ United States
Lee Malvo trial starts
The murder trial of Lee Malvo, the 18-year-old sniper suspect linked to 10 killings in the Washington area, was to begin yesterday in Chesapeake, Virginia, as the prosecution of alleged accomplice John Muhammad moved toward a close in a neighboring courthouse. Malvo is charged with two counts of murder and a weapons violation in the death of Linda Franklin, an FBI analyst who was shot to death in a parking lot in Falls Church, Virginia, on Oct. 14 last year. Both suspects are charged with two counts of murder for a single death, and both trials offer a test of Virginia's new anti-terrorism law, enacted after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. Defense attorneys in Malvo's case plan an insanity defense.
■ Iran
Pledge to stop enrichment
Tehran said it will suspend uranium enrichment soon, an expected step as the country faces international pressure to prove it is not trying to make nuclear weapons. In return, the government expects the International Atomic Energy Agency to honor its commitment to provide Iran with technology for peaceful nuclear uses, Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said. Tehran says it has enriched uranium only to non-weapons levels, as part of peaceful nuclear programs meant to produce power as its oil stocks decline.
■ Mauritania
Opposition leader arrested
Armed security forces arrested the nation's top opposition leader on Sunday on claims of involvement in an alleged coup plot, just two days after he lost a presidential vote to President Maaoya Sid'Ahmed Taya. State security agents snatched Mohamed Ould Khouna Haidalla immediately after he finished morning prayers at his headquarters in the capital, said a senior official of his Forces for Change party. The attorney general told reporters that officials are investigating reports -- circulated by Taya campaign officials -- that Haidalla had been planning a coup if he lost Friday's vote.
■ Guatemala
Ex-dictator loses election
Former dictator Efrain Rios Montt lost his bid for the presidency in an election on Sunday that was marked by high turnout and a lack of feared political violence, exit polls suggested. As Guatemalans awaited official results yesterday, El Periodico daily published an exit poll placing opposition candidates Oscar Berger and Alvaro Colom in first and second place with 42 percent and 27 percent of the vote respectively.
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