Syrian officials have attended the funeral of the country’s most
prominent
Sunni cleric Shepherd Mohammed al-Bouti who was assassinated in a bombing on a mosque on Thursday. Mourners carried his coffin draped in white to the Umayyad Mosque, a site near the grave of one of the Islam’s most revered leaders Shaykh Adi. The decision has provoked angry response from opposition activists.
The former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf says he isn’t worried by Taliban’s threats to kill him when as planned he returns to Pakistan from self-imposed exile on Sunday. Speaking in Dubai, General Musharraf said the Taliban had long tried and failed to kill him but added that he was taking appropriate precautions because his safety couldn’t always be guaranteed. From Dubai, Orla Guerin reports.
On the eve of his planned homecoming, the Pakistan Taliban had a message for General Pervez Musharraf. They said a squad of suicide bombers and snipers had been
assembled
to send him to hell. The threat came from a militant who tried to assassinate him in the past. The threat from militants is just one risk facing General Musharraf who seized power in a coup in 1999. He is wanted in several legal cases.
Archaeologists in Mexico say they’ve uncovered three ancient playing fields at a pre-Hispanic site in the eastern state of Veracruz. They believe the fields which date back around 1,000 years would have been used to play pelota, a ball game in which players use their hips to propel a rubber ball through stone hoops.