Morning Brief, Wednesday, October 17

Middle East

STR/AFP/Gety Images

Turkish PM Tayyip Erdogan tried to tamp down fears that Turkey would invade northern Iraq, but news that the Turkish parliament is expected to pass the “Iraq incursion bill” Wednesday is hardly reassuring. In the U.S. House, meanwhile, enthusiasm is waning for a resolution recognizing the Armenian Genocide.

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates is pushing to bring all military contractors in Iraq under one authority. The State Department, which theoretically supervises contractors like Blackwater, is fighting back.

Asia

Burma’s military regime detained nearly 3,000 protesters during the recent crackdown, a government newspaper acknowledged.

Japan will allow its navy to continuing helping NATO forces in Afghanistan.

Safety and quality concerns seem to have had no impact on orders for Christmas toys from China.

Europe 

The pope named 23 new cardinals.

The British Foreign Office is preparing to claim an area off the coast of Antarctica.

The European Union’s trade with China is “deeply unequal,” the EU trade commissioner complained.

Elsewhere

The Bush Justice Department has focused on immigration and terrorism at the expense of “mobsters, white-collar criminals, environmental crimes and traditional civil rights infractions,” according to the department’s own data.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson labeled the decline in U.S housing prices “the most significant current risk” to the U.S. economy.

The U.N. and the African Union are investigating a possible new massacre in southern Darfur. 

Please welcome the newest members of the U.N. Security Council: Libya and Vietnam. 

Today’s Agenda

• U.S. President George W. Bush is to present the Dalai Lama with the Congressional Gold Medal of Honor (over China’s strenuous objections).
• Confirmation hearings begin for Michael B. Mukasey, President Bush’s nominee to replace Alberto Gonzales as attorney general.
• Former U.N. chief Kofi Annan is due to launch the Global Humanitarian Forum, billed as Davos for the humanitarian set.
• U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney hosts Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who has voiced skepticism about the upcoming Israeli-Palestinian peace conference.
• Today is International Day for the Eradication of Poverty.

Yesterday on Passport

• Tuesday Map: Don’t cry for me, Transnistria
• Hello, my name is Hu and I’m the president
• Israelis rush to get U.S. citizenship