World briefs

CHINA Chinese rights lawyers say their meeting in a Beijing suburb to discuss wrongful cases has been broken up by police who stormed into their conference room. It’s the latest effort by authorities to obstruct the work of rights lawyers, who have grown into a force demanding rule of law. Rights lawyer Sui Muqing said about 40 attorneys, relatives of victims of wrongful cases and other citizens were gathering in a hotel yesterday to discuss the cases when police from suburban Huairou district stormed into the conference room.

CHINA Chinese authorities are urging officials who have fled abroad to avoid corruption charges to turn themselves in before Dec. 1 in exchange for leniency or face stiffer punishment. The Friday notice was jointly issued by the ministries of public security and foreign affairs, the supreme court and the supreme prosecuting office. It says those who should return willingly could get leniency and even get exonerated if they can help recover the financial losses.

GAZA The United States promised USD212 million in immediate assistance to the devastated Gaza Strip yesterday yet urged Palestinians and Israelis to return to peace negotiations to break a cycle of violence that has yielded three wars in six years.

IRAQ On the western edge of Iraq’s capital, Islamic State group militants battle government forces and exchange mortar fire, only adding to the sense of siege in Baghdad despite airstrikes by a U.S.-led coalition. Yet military experts say the Sunni militants of the Islamic State group, who now control a large territory along the border that Iraq and Syria share, won’t be able to fight through both government forces and Shiite militias now massed around the capital. It does, however, put them in a position to wreak havoc in Iraq’s biggest city, with its suicide attacks and other assaults further eroding confidence in Iraq’s nascent federal government and its troops.

SYRIA  U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel says the U.S. is making “considerable progress” in its negotiations with Turkey over the plan to train and equip moderate Syrian rebels in their fight against Islamic State militants.

USA With an uncommon view of history in action, a new documentary captures Edward Snowden’s leak of National Security Agency documents as it unfolded in a Hong Kong hotel room. Laura Poitras’ highly anticipated documentary “Citizenfour” premiered Friday night at the New York Film Festival. The film presents a remarkably intimate portrait of Snowden, including his first meetings with the journalists with whom he shared thousands of documents revealing the collection of Americans’ phone and email records.

BOSNIANS were voting yesterday in general elections that will show whether people are more concerned about the 44 percent unemployment rate or still mired in wartime nationalist divisions. The incumbent leader of the Serb half of the country based his campaign on promises of Serb secession and Russian support for it, while his opponents focused on fighting poverty and corruption.

HAITI Hundreds of people attend the funeral of former dictator Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier, displaying lingering respect for a man who was widely reviled for repression and corruption during his 15 years in power.