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VOA NEWS IN SPECIAL ENGLISH
January 25, 2013
Burkina Faso has deployed troops to central Mali to help French and African troops fight Islamist militants. Malian officials reported Thursday that about 150 soldiers from Burkina Faso had arrived in the town of Markala about 250 kilometers from the capital. VOA reporter Idrissa Fall is in Bamako. He says the soldiers from Burkina Faso are gathering near the base that French forces used to help re-take the town of Diabaly. He also said French forces carried out airstrikes late Wednesday against militants in east central Mali.


Yemen says a citizen of Saudi Arabia who was held and then freed from detention at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has died. A government statement Thursday said Said al-Shihri died of wounds he received in an anti-terrorism operation in late November. The Yemeni state news agency said he had been unconscious since then. Neither of two government statements Thursday gave the date of his death. The Saudi newspaper Ukaz says he died in late December. After American officials freed him from Guantanamo, he became a leader of the group called al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. A secret American military report published by WikiLeaks in 2011 identified al-Shihri as a former officer in Saudi Arabia's internal security force who later joined al-Qaeda.


Officials from Britain, Germany and the Netherlands have urged their citizens to immediately leave the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi. The warnings come after what has been described as a specific and urgent threat against Westerners. The foreign ministries of the three countries released statements Thursday about the security situation in Benghazi. Britain said there was a high threat of terrorism in the city. The British warning said that attacks could be aimed at places where foreigners gather. On Wednesday, American Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was questioned by a Senate committee about the September attack on United States diplomatic offices in Benghazi. The American diplomat Christopher Stevens and three other Americans died in the attack.


Japanese forces used water guns to stop a ship carrying Taiwanese activists traveling to a disputed island in the East China Sea on Thursday. The Japanese Coast Guard says the boat was turned away about 30 kilometers from the islands. The islands are controlled by Japan but also are claimed by China and Taiwan. Four Taiwanese government ships were traveling with the boat. Taiwan's official Central News Agency says the activists had wanted to reach the islands to install an image of Matsu, the "goddess of the sea." They believe that will help protect Taiwanese fishermen. The islands have seen several such small conflicts in recent months, mostly between Japanese and Chinese boats.