Parliament

RAMALLAH, West Bank -- In the latest spasm of chaos, angry Palestinian government employees who haven't been paid in months stormed the parliament building here yesterday, and skirmishes between rival factions in the Gaza Strip left at least one person dead. Nearly daily violence comes as part of a volatile power struggle percolating in the West Bank and Gaza Strip since late January, when the militant Hamas movement unseated the Fatah party in legislative elections. It has plunged Palestinian society into financial and political disaster and raised the specter of all-out civil conflict.

BRAMPTON, Ontario -- Prosecutors said yesterday that some of the men charged in a terrorist plot last week planned on storming the nation's Parliament, taking politicians hostage and beheading Prime Minister Stephen Harper if Canadian troops were not withdrawn from Afghanistan. The accusations delivered in a one-page investigation summary included no evidence to substantiate the charges, said defense attorney Gary Batasar. "There's an allegation, apparently, that my client personally indicated that he wanted to behead the prime minister of Canada," Batasar said of the synopsis of the case against his client, Steven Vikash Chand, 25, which he said he received minutes before the proceedings.

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip -- A fierce gunbattle erupted yesterday outside the Palestinian parliament building between rival Palestinian security forces, killing one man, wounding about a dozen people and deepening the sense of anarchy gripping the Gaza Strip. Passers-by scattered in panic as gunmen - some of them belonging to a new Hamas-led police force and others to a unit loyal to the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas - crouched against graffiti-covered walls and behind parked cars, squeezing off rounds from their automatic rifles and firing rocket-propelled grenades in one another's direction.

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- One lawmaker found the syntax of the new bylaws wanting. Another insisted yesterday that the ground rules being written for Iraq's elected officials must dub them "representatives," not merely "members" of parliament. Why, asked a third new legislator, didn't their proposed bylaws make it clear that they held supreme authority over government spending as well? A half-hour debate sputtered along without a vote or clear direction. One article nearly completed, 151 to go. At this pace, a lawmaker said, it would take two months for the fledgling Iraqi parliament just to write the rules for its internal operations.

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Baghdad's morgue received 1,091 homicide victims in April, most from sectarian killings that have become "no less dangerous than terrorism," Iraq's president said yesterday. "These daily crimes will create an environment of mutual suspicion between the nation's sons and destabilize our national unity," President Jalal Talabani warned in a statement issued by his office. Each victim leaves behind "an orphan, weeping mother, a suffering father or a suffering wife," he said.

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- A spurt in violence left dozens of Iraqis dead yesterday as the first working session of the nation's new parliament, which is aimed at stemming bloodshed by drawing Iraq's disparate ethnic and religious groups into the political arena, was convened. In restive Fallujah, dominated by Sunni Arabs, a suicide bomber wearing an explosives-laden belt set off a blast amid a crowd of aspiring police recruits, killing 18 Iraqis and injuring 20, police and hospital officials said.

KATMANDU, Nepal -- The Nepalese parliament voted yesterday to call elections for an assembly to redraw the country's constitution, an action that could signal the beginning of the end for the monarchy that has ruled this Himalayan kingdom for more than 200 years. During the same session, the newly sworn-in prime minister, Girija Prasad Koirala, asked Nepal's Maoist rebels, who have waged a bloody decadelong insurgency in the countryside, to come to the bargaining table. "I urge the Maoists to renounce violence and to come for dialogue," Koirala said to widespread approval from members of the house.

Haitian voters went to the polls in droves last February determined to elect a new president and end the political stagnation and violence that have paralyzed their country. Last week, they continued that process and selected legislative representatives from a slate of 127 candidates and laid the groundwork to seat the first functioning parliament in nine years. Although serious challenges lie ahead, the elections are a hopeful turn of events after two bloody and politically fractious years.

KATMANDU, Nepal -- Threatened with a popular revolt, King Gyanendra announced yesterday the reinstatement of parliament and offered condolences to the families of more than a dozen people killed by police during pro-democracy protests that have paralyzed this country for nearly three weeks. The embattled monarch said he was acceding to a key demand by the political coalition opposed to his absolute rule. He summoned parliament to convene Friday, which would be its first meeting in nearly four years.

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Rival Shiite leaders agreed yesterday to allow Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari's party to nominate the next prime minister on the condition that al-Jaafari step down, Iraqi politicians said. The move could bring the Shiite bloc closer to resolving a nearly two-month impasse over the candidate for prime minister and speed the formation of a new government. As of yesterday evening, al-Jaafari remained unwilling to resign, but officials in his party were discussing options, Shiite leaders said.