Morning Brief, Wednesday, May 16

Europe

JACQUES DEMARTHON/AFP/Getty

Nicolas Sarkozy officially took over from Jacques Chirac as France’s president. 

Russia and the United States each promised to dial down the harsh rhetoric, but otherwise agreed to differ. 

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is working on an “opt-out” arrangement for Britain on some elements of the stalled European Constitution.

Middle East

Three-star Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute, now chief operations officer on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will become the White House’s “war czar,” overseeing Iraq and Afghanistan. Lute is known to be a skeptic of the troop surge in Iraq.

This just in: “The Palestinian unity government … is something of a fiction,” the New York Times reports. Last year, aid to the Palestinian Authority tripled despite (or perhaps because of) an international boycott of Hamas.

A chlorine bomb attack rocked a village in Iraq’s turbulent Diyala province. 

Is Iraq’s government building a Shiite intelligence agency? 

Asia

A top representative of Tibet’s exiled Dalai Lama plans to hold discussions with the Chinese government in Beijing.

Taiwanese military forces simulated an attack from mainland China as part of the island’s annual war games. 

The war on drugs heats up in Afghanistan, producer of 92 percent of the world’s opium.

Elsewhere

The Bush administration indicated its willingness to let Paul Wolfowitz resign, but European governments see the move as a feint aimed at keeping the World Bank president in office.

In riveting testimony to the U.S. Congress, former Deputy Attorney General James Comey described a dramatic fight within the Bush administration over the legality of a controversial NSA eavesdropping program. 

A former death squad commander testified that the Colombian defense minister had plotted with “paramilitary leaders” in the mid-1990s to unseat then-president Ernesto Samper.

Today’s Agenda

• The 60th annual Cannes Film Festival kicks off with Blueberry Nights, Hong Kong director Wong Kar Wai’s first English-language film.
• 
  The African Development Bank Group is holding its annual meeting … in Shanghai. Special guest: Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, who is keen to overcome China’s “credibility gap” in Africa.
  
  
• 
  British Prime Minister Tony Blair arrives in Washington for a final White House visit.
  
• 
  Libya’s Muammar el-Qaddafi answers questions submitted by BBC News readers.
  
• 
  The first synagogue in 60 years opens in Estonia.
  
  

Yesterday on Passport

• Tuesday Map: It’s going to be a scorcher in Berlin in 2071
• Australia blames globalization for biker gangs
• No more MySpace for the military