Bush stresses right to change religion at interfaith dialogue

US President George W. Bush Thursday insisted the ability to change one's religion is a fundamental human right at a UN interfaith conference sponsored by Saudi Arabia that has served to highlight the differences between the Muslim and Western worlds.

Bush praised his close ally, Saudi King Abdullah, but effectively challenged the strict Islamic kingdom's ban on apostasy, or change of religion.

Addressing the UN General Assembly, Bush noted that the UN Declaration of Human Rights, adopted 60 years ago, enshrines"the right to choose or change religions and the right to worship in private or public." "Freedom includes the right of all people to worship as they see fit," he told an audience made up of representatives from 80 countries.

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Cabbies held for NRI’s kidnap, murder

Nine days after Gurgaon police found an unidentified body on National Highway-8 and later learnt it was that of an NRI businessman, Delhi Police today arrested two persons for the kidnap, robbery and murder of K T Shameer.

The 39-year-old cloth merchant from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, was abducted from outside IGI Airport by private cabbies late October 10 evening. He was robbed and the body thrown in the bushes on Delhi-Jaipur highway, near Manesar. Shameer, whose business trip to India began on October 7, had arrived that evening (October 10) from Ahmedabad on a Spice Jet flight (SG-218).

Palam police today arrested Manish, 24, and Monu, 25, from Sanjay Gandhi T-point when the duo was returning from Haridwar. A third accused, one Anil, is still absconding, Joint Commissioner of Police (Operations) Amulya Patnaik said. “They were interrogated and were found involved,” Patnaik said.

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Saudi varsity, IBM to build fastest computer

Saudi Arabia’s upcoming King Abdullah University for Science and Technology (KAUST) has announced it will build one of the world’s fastest and most powerful supercomputers in collaboration with IBM.

The joint project will build and conduct research on the most complex, high-performance computing (HPC) system in the region and among academic institutions in the world, according to a KAUST statement.

To be named Shaheen, the new system will serve the university’s scientific researchers across dozens of disciplines, advance new innovations in computational sciences, and contribute to the further development of a knowledge-based society in Saudi Arabia.

Shaheen is the Arabic name for the Peregrine falcon which can fly at speeds of up to 342 km per hour.

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New bin Laden message to focus on Israel: monitors

Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden will address the 60th anniversary of Israel's founding in a Web message expected to underscore a growing focus on the Jewish state, U.S.-based Internet monitors said on Thursday.

Militant Islamist message boards on the Internet carried a banner announcing the statement with Israel's anniversary as the topic, said the monitoring service of the U.S. author and analyst who goes by the name Laura Mansfield.

The speech is addressed to "Western peoples" and entitled "The Causes of Conflict on the 60th Anniversary of the State of Israeli Occupation," the SITE Institute monitoring group said. The monitor IntelCenter said an audio-video statement was expected to be released within 72 hours.

"Bin Laden seems to be shifting gears," over the last decade, Mansfield said. "In his initial messages, bin Laden's focus was on the removal of U.S. forces from (Saudi Arabia) but in recent years he has more closely wedded himself to the Palestinian issue."

In a message on March 20, his second in 2008, bin Laden urged Muslims to maintain the struggle against U.S. forces in Iraq as a path toward "liberating Palestine."

Al Qaeda has vowed attacks on Jews both within and outside Israel, and regularly expressed support for the Palestinians. Al Qaeda was blamed for a suicide attack on an Israeli-owned hotel in Kenya and a simultaneous failed attempt to shoot down an Israeli charter jet near the Mombasa, Kenya, airport in 2002.

But despite calls by al Qaeda supporters for the militant network to establish a presence in Palestinian areas, U.S. intelligence officials see no evidence it has done so. Analysts say al Qaeda faces competition for turf from the well established Hamas.

Al Qaeda's second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahri, criticized Hamas in March 2007 as a servant of U.S. interests by agreeing to respect past Palestinian accords with Israel.

He denounced Saudi Arabia and Egypt in December for serving U.S. interests, as he accused Arab leaders of betraying Palestinians by attending a Middle East peace conference in the United States.

A new message from Zawahri was likely in the coming week and was expected to pertain to Egypt, Mansfield said.