In Brief

German issues CIA arrest warrants BERLIN – Arrest warrants have been issued for 13 suspected CIA agents in connection with the alleged kidnapping of a German citizen, a Munich prosecutor said yesterday.

Prosecutor Christian Schmidt-Sommerfeld told The Associated Press that the warrants were issued in the last few days against the 13 on suspicion of false imprisonment and causing seriously bodily harm. Khaled al-Masri, a German citizen of Lebanese descent, maintains he was abducted in December 2003 at the Serbian-Macedonian border and flown by the CIA to a detention centre in Kabul, Afghanistan, where he was abused.Al-Masri says he was released in Albania in May 2004 after the CIA discovered they had the wrong person.None of the suspects were identified.* Abu Hamza to face US extradition hearing LONDON – A British judge yesterday ordered jailed Muslim cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri to face a US extradition hearing in May.Al-Masri, serving a seven-year British sentence for fomenting racial hatred and urging his followers to kill non-Muslims, is charged in the United States on an 11-count indictment with trying to establish a terrorist training camp in Oregon, conspiring to take hostages in Yemen and facilitating terrorist training in Afghanistan.District Judge Timothy Workman set May 16 for the start of the extradition hearing after the House of Lords, Britain’s highest appeals court, denied al-Masri permission to appeal against his conviction.* Berlusconi’s wife demands public apology ROME – In a rare breach of her famously private nature, Silvio Berlusconi’s wife has demanded that her husband apologise publicly to her, following reported comments that the former Italian premier made to other women.Veronica Lario wrote an open letter published yesterday in La Repubblica – a left-leaning daily and a fierce opponent of Berlusconi – to voice her complaints over what she said was behaviour that damaged her dignity as a woman.Lario was reacting to comments that Berlusconi reportedly made last week after a TV awards show broadcast by one of the media baron’s Mediaset channels.”If I weren’t married I would marry you immediately,” Berlusconi told one woman, according to reports widely carried in the Italian press.Nampa-AFP-AP-ReutersKhaled al-Masri, a German citizen of Lebanese descent, maintains he was abducted in December 2003 at the Serbian-Macedonian border and flown by the CIA to a detention centre in Kabul, Afghanistan, where he was abused.Al-Masri says he was released in Albania in May 2004 after the CIA discovered they had the wrong person.None of the suspects were identified. * Abu Hamza to face US extradition hearing LONDON – A British judge yesterday ordered jailed Muslim cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri to face a US extradition hearing in May.Al-Masri, serving a seven-year British sentence for fomenting racial hatred and urging his followers to kill non-Muslims, is charged in the United States on an 11-count indictment with trying to establish a terrorist training camp in Oregon, conspiring to take hostages in Yemen and facilitating terrorist training in Afghanistan.District Judge Timothy Workman set May 16 for the start of the extradition hearing after the House of Lords, Britain’s highest appeals court, denied al-Masri permission to appeal against his conviction.* Berlusconi’s wife demands public apology ROME – In a rare breach of her famously private nature, Silvio Berlusconi’s wife has demanded that her husband apologise publicly to her, following reported comments that the former Italian premier made to other women.Veronica Lario wrote an open letter published yesterday in La Repubblica – a left-leaning daily and a fierce opponent of Berlusconi – to voice her complaints over what she said was behaviour that damaged her dignity as a woman.Lario was reacting to comments that Berlusconi reportedly made last week after a TV awards show broadcast by one of the media baron’s Mediaset channels.”If I weren’t married I would marry you immediately,” Berlusconi told one woman, according to reports widely carried in the Italian press.Nampa-AFP-AP-Reuters