World news briefs — Feb. 25 - World on Astini News
YEMEN
Bomb follows swearing-in
A car bomb outside the gate of a presidential compound in southern Yemen killed at least 25 people hours after the country's new president was inaugurated. A security official said the attack in the city of Mukalla in Hadramout province was carried out by a suicide bomber, and that it bore the hallmarks of an al-Qaida operation. The blast came hours after Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi was sworn in as president to replace longtime leader Ali Abdullah Saleh, following an election aimed at ending more than a year of political turmoil in Yemen. Hadi was the only candidate in the election. In his televised speech before parliament, Hadi vowed to keep up Yemen's fight against al-Qaida-linked militants, who have taken advantage of the country's political turmoil to seize control of towns and swaths of territory in the restive south.
PAKISTAN
Bin Laden hideout razed
Pakistani authorities moved on Saturday to demolish the house where Osama bin Laden died at the hands of a Navy SEAL unit last May, erasing a three-story building that had acquired a painful symbolism for Pakistan's powerful military, which was badly embarrassed by the raid. Working by floodlight, operators of heavy machinery broke through the tall perimeter wall of the 3,000-square-meter compound in Abbottabad, 35 miles north of Islamabad, after dark on Saturday. Hours later, they started to knock down the main house, where bin Laden lived with his family, and three smaller buildings.
ANTARCTICA
Research station burns
A fire at Brazil's research station in Antarctica on Saturday killed two navy personnel and forced the evacuation by helicopter of 44 people, the Brazilian navy said. The fire broke out in the morning in the machine room that houses the energy generators of the Comandante Ferraz station, the navy said in an emailed statement. Two navy officials at the base died and a third was injured in the fire, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff's office said. The office said the base will be reconstructed.
Compiled from wire reports.
