France has 3,600 soldiers in Afghanistan. A thousand will be withdrawn this year. Only a few hundred will remain after 2013 to oversee the transition. The decision has surely been taken with public opinion in mind. In a survey published on Thursday, 84% of French people said they supported the full withdrawal of troops by the end of this year. France spends around 500m a year on its Afghan operations, and the government's commitment in Afghanistan is getting harder to defend.
South Sudan says it'll completely shut down its oil production because of a dispute over transit fees with its northern neighbour, Sudan. Talks between the two countries in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa have failed to resolve the disagreement. South Sudan's chief negotiator Pagan Amum told the BBC that all output of oil will be halted within two days.
"What we have here is that the government of Sudan is stealing the oil resources of the people of South Sudan. The government of South Sudan decided to shut down the production of oil and to stop pumping oil into the pipeline in north Sudan. That is all what has happened and nothing more. There is no war, no aggression">aggression from our side. The
aggression
is on the side of the government of Sudan." Pagan Amum
World News from the BBC
An aide to Pervez Musharraf says the former Pakistani president has decided to postpone his return to the country. General Musharraf had previously announced he would end his self-imposed