World Scene

ISRAEL

Olmert probers raid City Hall

JERUSALEM — Israeli police raided Jerusalem’s City Hall yesterday, searching offices and confiscating documents as part of a widening corruption inquiry against Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

Mr. Olmert is suspected of illicitly accepting large sums of cash from a Jewish American donor. Some of the donations are thought to have occurred during Mr. Olmert’s 10-year tenure as mayor of Jerusalem.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said the police’s anti-fraud team conducted the raid. He said the seized documents were connected to Mr. Olmert’s time as mayor from 1993 to 2003, but had no further details on their contents.

Mr. Olmert denies any wrongdoing. President Bush told Israeli television in an interview that he found Mr. Olmert to be an “honest man.”

RUSSIA

Suspect named in reporter’s slaying

MOSCOW — Russian investigators yesterday named the man they suspect of killing journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who was fatally shot in Moscow in 2006.

The Investigative Committee said Rustam Makhmudov was “the immediate executor of the murder,” adding in a statement that he remained at large. Mr. Makhmudov, a 34-year-old resident of Chechnya, has been charged, and an international arrest warrant has been issued for him, it said.

Ms. Politkovskaya was shot in her central Moscow apartment building in October 2006. Many observers and colleagues suspect that her murder was linked to her work: She wrote dozens of articles detailing abuses by Russian troops during the Chechen conflicts.

NEPAL

Constitution assembly to open May 28

KATMANDU — Nepal’s prime minister has set May 28 as the first day for a special assembly that plans to abolish the centuries-old monarchy in this Himalayan country.

Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala said yesterday that the first meeting of the Constituent Assembly elected last month will be held May 28.

It was decided before the election by the major political parties that the first meeting of the assembly would remove the king and declare Nepal a republic.

The 601-member assembly will also rewrite the constitution and decide the future political system for Nepal.

SPAIN

Royal sister seeks privacy

MADRID — A sister of Spanish Crown Princess Letizia asked a court yesterday to all but bar media outlets from filming her, arguing that she is not a public figure and that news organizations have been harassing her.

Telma Ortiz, 35, is suing nearly 50 news outlets in a case being heard in the central city of Toledo. A decision on her request for a restraining order is expected in a few days. The media organizations include major TV channels and gossip magazines such as Hola!

Ms. Ortiz’s problems with the Spanish gossip media began early this year when she returned from the Philippines, where she had been employed as an aid worker, to have a baby in Spain.

IRAN

Government media rejects Iraq-U.S. pact

TEHRAN — Two hard-line newspapers seen as speaking for Iran’s clerical establishment called yesterday for Iraqis to oppose a strategic framework deal with the United States, Tehran’s first public condemnation of the arrangement.

The papers accused Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki of caving in to American demands over the pact.

Mr. al-Maliki’s government and the U.S. began negotiations in March on the deal meant to provide for long-term bilateral ties and a status of forces arrangement regulating U.S. military operations in Iraq.

GEORGIA

Separatist republic shoots down drones

SUKHUMI —The separatist Georgian republic of Abkhazia said yesterday that it had shot down two unmanned Georgian spy planes over its territory — the latest in a series of such claims denied by the Georgian government.

Georgia acknowledges that one pilotless reconnaissance plane was shot down over Abkhazia last month. But it contends that the drone was taken out by a Russian warplane, not Abkhazian forces.

Since then, Abkhazia has said it shot down at least five other such planes.

The claims come amid a sharp escalation of tension over the region, which has had de-facto independence from Georgia since the end of a mid-1990s separatist war.

HAITI

Ferry capsizes; at least 13 dead

PORT-AU-PRINCE — A U.N. official says the bodies of two teenagers have been found near a capsized Haitian sailboat, raising the death toll to 13.

U.N. mission spokesman David Wimhurst says many passengers apparently swam the 150 yards to shore after the boat began taking on water. It is not known how many people are still missing.

The boat is believed to have been carrying at least 100 people, plus cargo along Haiti’s southern peninsula to the capital when it tipped late Saturday night.

Bodies of 11 people were taken to a Port-au-Prince morgue on Sunday. Mr. Wimhurst said the bodies of a boy and girl were found early yesterday . From wire dispatches and staff reports