Subject: Morning Brief: Italy swears in unity government, 2 police shot outside PM's office
From: "Foreign Policy Magazine" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2013 09:09:35 -0400 (EDT)

FP Passport Morning Brief
Monday, April 29, 2013
Italy swears in unity government, 2 police shot outside PM's office
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*Top news: *Two months of political gridlock in Italy came to an end [1]  
Sunday with the swearing in of a grand coalition government headed by Prime  
Minister Enrico Letta, a member of the center-left Democratic Party. Letta's  
coalition brings together his Democratic Party with Silvio Berlusconi's  
People of Liberty party, forming a unity government with backing from both  
sides of the aisles and a mandate to implement reforms to Italy's sclerotic  
economy.

But Monday's ceremony was marred [2] by the shooting of two police officers  
standing guard outside the prime ministers office. The man responsible for  
the shooting, which also injured a pregnant passerby, was an unemployed  
bricklayer from Calabria driven to desperation who said that he had intended  
to target politicians, but when he was unable to reach them decided to shoot  
the police instead. The shooting, which took place as the government was  
being sworn in, served as a poignant reminder of the ills this new government  
faces: rampant unemployment that threatens to turn into a social crisis.

"He is a man full of problems, who lost his job, who lost everything," Rome  
Prosecutor Pierfilippo Laviani told reporters. "He was desperate."

Italian markets responded [3] positively to the swearing in of the new  
government. The Italian stockmarket inched up 1.4 percent while Italian bonds  
traded under 4 percent for the first time since 2010.

*Bangladesh: *A fire broke out Sunday at a collapsed garment factory in  
Bangladesh where rescue workers are conducting a frantic search for  
survivors. The fire broke out as people at the site sought to extract a woman  
pinned in the rubble, but the fire apparently killed her. So far, the death  
toll has reached 377 [4], but that number may increase as workers continue to  
pull bodies from the rubble. The owner of the building, Sohel Rana, was  
arrested near the Indian border.

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Middle East

 * The Syrian prime minister narrowly escaped [5] an assassination attempt
   when a bomb went off near his convoy.
 * Five car bombs across various Shiite areas of Iraq killed [6] 26 and
   wounded dozens.
 * The Iraqi government revoked [7] the liscence of Al Jazeera and nine other
   television stations, alleging they are inciting sectarian conflict.

Asia

 * According to the New York Times [8], the CIA has attempted to buy
   influence with Afghan President Hamid Karzai by dropping off bags filled
   with cash totalling tens of millions of dollars.
 * The last 50 South Koreans still remaining at the jointly operated
   industrial park at Kaesong are expected to leave [9] today.
 * A suicide bombing in Pakistan killed [10] the son and nephew of an Afghan
   official involved in peace negotiations with the Taliban, in addition to
   killing four others and wounding 30.

Europe

 * The Greek parliament approved [11] a plan to lay off 15,000 civil servants
   by the end of next year as part of reforms required by its creditors.
 * Voters in Iceland ousted [12] a center-left coalition and restored to
   power the center-right grouping that held power in the run-up to the
   country's financial crisis.
 * A large explosion, believed by police to have been caused by a natural gas
   leak, injured [13] up to 40 people in downtown Prague.

Africa

 * During a visit to Mali, the French defense minister said [14] his country
   will keep up to 1,000 troops there after the arrival of U.N. peacekeepers.
 * A report by a U.S.-based NGO alleges that Joseph Kony received [15]
   support and protection from the Sudanese government.
 * According to a Nigerian government report, Boko Haram was paid [16] a
   ransom of $3 million to release from captivity a French family of seven.

Americas

 * The Venezuelan government arrested [17] an American documentary filmmaker
   and accused him of fomenting unrest in the aftermath of the country's
   contested presidential election.
 * Venezuela's election commission said [18] that an audit of the country's
   recent presidential election will begin May 6 but denied opposition
   demands for a full recount.
 * Some 400 people in Mexico's Veracruz state protested [19] against attacks
   on the press and demanded justice in the case of the killing of Regina
   Martinez, an investigative journalist.

/-By Elias Groll
/

FILIPPO MONTEFORTE/AFP/Getty Images

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[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/28/world/europe/italy-forms-new-coalition-government-to-end-months-of-political-stalemate.html
[2] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/29/world/europe/2-officers-shot-as-italys-government-sworn-in.html?ref=europe
[3] http://news.yahoo.com/italian-markets-rise-prospects-govt-094538661.html
[4] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/29/world/asia/after-building-collapse-tears-and-rage-as-hope-fades-in-bangladesh.html?ref=asia
[5] http://news.yahoo.com/syrian-premier-escapes-bomb-attack-damascus-103022986.html
[6] http://news.yahoo.com/5-car-bombs-kill-26-shiite-areas-across-091440443.html
[7] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/29/world/middleeast/iraq-suspends-al-jazeera-and-other-tv-channels.html?ref=middleeast
[8] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/29/world/asia/cia-delivers-cash-to-afghan-leaders-office.html?ref=asia
[9] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22334251
[10] http://news.yahoo.com/pakistan-suicide-bomber-targeting-police-kills-6-111054623.html
[11] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/29/world/europe/parliament-passes-plan-for-layoffs-in-greece.html?ref=europe
[12] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/29/world/europe/iceland-voters-oust-government.html?ref=europe
[13] http://news.yahoo.com/powerful-blast-injures-40-prague-093110174.html
[14] http://news.yahoo.com/french-defense-minister-visits-northern-mali-141953514.html
[15] http://news.yahoo.com/group-sudan-army-supporting-fugitive-warlord-kony-110043174.html
[16] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-22320077
[17] http://news.yahoo.com/american-charged-ex-general-held-venezuela-030249423.html
[18] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-22333705
[19] http://news.yahoo.com/mexican-journalists-march-against-attacks-press-182058190.html
[20] http://www.foreignpolicy.com/the_power_issue
[21] http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/29/minister_no
[22] http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/29/what_china_and_russia_don_t_get_about_soft_power
[23] http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/29/the_law_of_politics_according_to_sergei_lavrov_russia
[24] http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/29/engineering_terror_hezbollah_attacks_imad_mughniyeh
[25] http://www.foreignpolicy.com
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[27] http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/contact_us
[28] http://www.foreignpolicy.com/about_us
[29] http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/29/in_defense_of_leading_from_behind
[30] http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/29/into_africa
[31] http://ideas.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/04/29/gun_runner_no_1
[32] http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/29/you_cant_go_home_again
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