From Reuters, Jan. 10:

U.S. soldiers fed up with almost daily bomb attacks on their patrols near Iraq's main oil refinery are taking drastic measures to fight their shadowy enemy -- they're walling in an entire town.

Army bulldozers have begun building giant sand embankments around Siniya, a town of 50,000 close to the northern oil refining city of Baiji. When finished it will be 10 km (6 miles) long and more than 2 meters (nearly 8 feet) high.

From Newsday, Jan. 10:

The New York Civil Liberties Union sued the city on Tuesday, challenging restrictions on people's right to photograph public places after an award-winning filmmaker from India was blocked from videotaping near the MetLife building.

From Newsday, Jan. 11:

A criminal court judge in Manhattan has held that the city's main weapon in its campaign against the Critical Mass bicycle ride is unconstitutional.

From The Scotsman, Jan. 12:

A man armed with a knife wounded several people, including a rabbi, at a synagogue in Moscow yesterday. One Jewish official said the man called out as he burst into the building: "I will kill people, I will kill Jews."

Naga separatist guerillas in India's remote northeast are once again being hunted down by the authorities in neighboring Burma (Myanmar), where they had previously been granted refuge. This appears to be leading to a two-front insurgency in which the Naga separatists are seeking an independent state straddling the current Burma-India border. On Jan. 10, Naga guerilla leaders claimed to have killed seven Burmese soldiers while losing three rebel fighters in a heavy gun battle in Burmese territory.

From AP, via the New York Times, Jan. 10:

President-elect Evo Morales of Bolivia met with President Hu Jintao of China in Beijing and called China an "ideological ally," a day after he invited it to develop Bolivia's vast gas reserves. China has been developing links with Latin American nations as sources of fuel and raw materials and as markets for its exports. Mr. Hu promised to encourage "strong and prestigious" Chinese companies to invest in Bolivia, the official New China News Agency reported. On Sunday, Mr. Morales met with Tang Jiaxuan, the Chinese state councilor, and invited China to help with his country's gas industry after he carries out plans to nationalize its reserves.

From DPA, Jan. 9, via United Arab Emirates' Khaleej Times:

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan on Monday said it has launched a strong protest with the Afghan-based Coalition Forces over weekend firing from across the border that killed eight people in the country's North Waziristan tribal region.

"We have protested with the Coalition Forces as they are responsible for security on the other side of the (Pakistan-Afghan) border," Foreign Office spokesperson Tasneem Aslam told reporters in Islamabad.

From Newsday, Jan. 9:

[A] French engineer abducted Dec. 5 apparently was dumped on a Baghdad street by his fleeing captors and recovered by U.S. troops, who turned him turned over to the French Embassy on Sunday, according to Iraqi police and the French Foreign Ministry in Paris. Bernard Planche, 52, was kidnapped on his way to work at a water plant. Planche worked for a non-governmental organization called AACCESS and was found Saturday night near a checkpoint in the Abu Ghraib neighborhood. His captors had demanded the withdrawal from Iraq of French troops—even though the country has none in Iraq.