Government Buildings

A suicide bomber plowed an explosives-laden vehicle into an Interior Ministry building in central Baghdad on Tuesday, killing 21 people and wounding more than 80 in an attack that raised fear that extremists are escalating a campaign of bombings aimed at destabilizing the government. The attack came a day after bombings at three major Baghdad hotels in which 37 people died. Though the capital has seen coordinated multiple bombings several times, it has become rare for suicide attackers to strike two days in a row. The latest attack targeted a building housing a forensic laboratory and fit a pattern of recent bombings at government institutions and high-profile landmarks as tension rises before pivotal national elections scheduled for March.

Over the last century, American public education was built on an assumption that it would be apolitical. School districts would not be dragged into the mire of city elections. School board members would remain above the partisan fight. Candidates would be drawn from respected local elites, sufficiently known so that large, expensive elections would hardly be necessary. Once elected, they would hand over operating responsibility to an appointed superintendent and forswear the sin of micromanagement.

Nearly 1,000 people looted government warehouses in East Timor's capital, Dili, loading trucks with computers, office chairs, car parts and even musical instruments. Many of the looters had been waiting for rice handouts and became angry after realizing a warehouse containing the food relief had been emptied. At least 28 people have died and more than 100 have been wounded in violence sparked by the dismissal of 600 soldiers.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - The firebrand cleric who led a massive street rally aimed at bringing down the Pakistani government called off the protests Thursday after negotiating a settlement with ruling coalition leaders. The agreement between religious scholar Tahirul Qadri and government officials ended a four-day standoff that threatened to upend the country's political landscape. It calls for the antigovernment movement to have a say in appointing a caretaker prime minister to run the country leading up to elections this year.

Opponents of the controversial sale of two dozen state government buildings won a significant victory Tuesday, when the state Supreme Court declined to hear a last-minute plea by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to approve the deal. The decision does not officially kill the sale; a state appeals court has scheduled a hearing on the case next month. But the Supreme Court's decision ensures that final approval must be made by Gov.-elect Jerry Brown, not Schwarzenegger, who has been the transaction's biggest booster.

A fire in an electrical closet near Vice President Dick Cheney's ceremonial office forced the evacuation Wednesday of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next door to the White House -- and sparked Internet chatter speculating on nefarious activities in the vice presidential suite. The vice president was in the White House West Wing when the fire broke out about 9:15 a.m., White House officials said.

A San Francisco judge refused Friday to halt the controversial sale of two dozen government buildings, clearing the way for what the Schwarzenegger administration describes as a much-needed infusion of revenue to shore up the ailing state budget. Superior Court Judge Charlotte Woolard ruled that the two men who opposed the sell-off ? which they described as a waste of taxpayer money ? have no standing to sue the state to stop the transaction. Outside Woolard's courtroom, a spokesman for the Department of General Services, which is conducting the $2.3-billion sale, said the state is "very satisfied with the judge's ruling" and would work to close escrow as planned on Wednesday.

Guards surrounded government buildings in the secessionist republic of Estonia today after Soviet loyalists converged on Parliament in what the prime minister called a failed "coup attempt." Lawmakers in neighboring Lithuania began a closed-door debate on new proposals designed to end an impasse with Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev. Calm was reported in all three Baltic republics.

Orange County officials have come up with an unusual plan to get cheap electricity for the offices at the Santa Ana Civic Center -- make it themselves and save the county government $4 million to $5 million a year. The project would serve the county Hall of Administration, the Superior Court, the federal office building and other government buildings. County supervisors are scheduled to vote on a financing plan for the project today.

Reinforced concrete barriers will be placed around Ventura County Jail, shatterproof office windows will be installed at the Government Center and the Sheriff's Department will double its intelligence-gathering staff to help guard against terrorist attacks. Ventura County Sheriff Bob Brooks outlined these added security measures in a presentation Tuesday to the Board of Supervisors.

Nearly everyone in Newport Beach thinks they need a new City Hall. Getting them to agree on where to put it is another story. On Tuesday, voters will decide whether to locate a new civic center on a 12-acre site in Newport Center that was slated to become a park. The fiercely contested ballot initiative has led to more than $800,000 in campaign spending, an amount almost unheard of for a local issue in a city of its size, including donations of more than $600,000 alone from one restaurateur.

As they celebrated the opening of downtown Los Angeles' new Grand Park on Thursday, local officials and civic leaders were already talking about the possibility of expanding the space and connecting it to other projects along Grand Avenue. The rectangular, 12-acre park, which stretches from the top of Bunker Hill to the base of City Hall, provides downtown with its first major green space, and officials hope it can become a new cultural hub for the region. For all the excitement about the park, officials said that they are aware of its limitations and that the current footprint should be only a first step.

In the days follwing the violence and destruction of April 1992, federal officials including Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan walked the newly burned-out Vermont Avenue corridor and promised to treat the area as an emerging market. In a way, they were true to their word: 20 years later, parts of South Los Angeles still have not emerged. Members of the Community Coalition led supporters through South Los Angeles neighborhoods on Satuday, in advance of the 20th anniversary of the violence, to remind them of what has been accomplished and what remains to be done.

Security forces opened fire Sunday on tens of thousands of demonstrators in Yemen's capital, Sana, killing at least 26 protesters in one of the bloodiest days of the 9-month-old rebellion against President Ali Abdullah Saleh. Violence broke out when protesters marched from Sana University toward heavily guarded government buildings. Most demonstrators were peaceful, although some hurled stones and Molotov cocktails after snipers shot from rooftops and troops loyal to Saleh opened fire with high-caliber weapons.

The gunman who went on a shooting rampage at a youth camp on an island near Olso on Friday fired shots from two weapons for an hour and a half before surrendering to authorities, Norwegian police officials said Saturday. It took police 40 minutes to get on the island after Anders Behring Breivik began shooting, Police Chief Sveinung Sponheim said at a news conference. He told reporters that police officials had responded as "quickly as possible" but there were problems getting boats to transport officials to Utoya Island, where the Worker's Youth League, the youth wing of Norway's Labor Party, was attending an annual gathering.

A horrific shooting rampage at a youth summer camp left at least 80 people dead as Norway reeled from apparently related terrorist attacks in a nation long known as the home of the Nobel Peace Prize. In addition to the shooting at a youth camp attended by hundreds on the island of Utoya, a massive bomb exploded in downtown Oslo, killing seven and injuring dozens. Police director Oystein Maeland told reporters early Saturday they had discovered many more victims after initially reporting the death toll at 10, the Associated Press reported.

VISITORS to the Tanggu district administrative offices are greeted by common watchwords plastered inside some public buildings: honesty, transparency, efficiency. Once they pass through security, though, they're often surprised to find government officials working out in the gym, splashing in the Olympic-size swimming pool, playing cards in the game parlor, shooting pool or getting facials at the salon. "When I first went into the government building, I thought I entered the wrong gate.

Opposition leaders in the small, mountainous Central Asian nation of Kyrgyzstan seized power in the capital early Thursday after thousands of protesters ransacked government buildings and riot police fired on crowds, killing dozens of people. The unrest appeared to have unseated the government of President Kurmanbek Bakiyev, who reportedly fled to the southern city of Osh. Bakiyev has led the country since 2005, when he headed the so-called Tulip Revolution that deposed autocratic leader Askar A. Akayev.

Gunmen stormed the local council offices in Diyala province Tuesday, killing at least eight people in the latest assault on government buildings in Sunni Muslim parts of Iraq. The morning attack in the eastern city of Baqubah lasted nearly two hours before army and police personnel took back control of the council building, according to local politicians and security officials. The gun battle, coupled with a U.S. military announcement that two American soldiers were killed Monday in the south, stoked a perception that the country was slipping back into violence.

The Taliban on Saturday declared the start of a spring offensive in Afghanistan, warning that insurgents plan to attack foreign troops, Afghan security forces and government officials in coming days. In a statement, the Taliban warned civilians to avoid public gatherings, military bases and convoys, as well as government buildings. "All Afghan people should bear in mind to keep away from gatherings, convoys and centers of the enemy so that they will not become harmed during attacks of mujahedin against the enemy," the statement said.