Feb. 19, 2011 (United Press International) -- Report: U.S. talking directly with Taliban
NEW YORK, Feb. 19 (UPI) -- A New Yorker magazine writer says the United States has entered into "direct, secret talks with senior Afghan Taliban leaders."
The Voice of America Saturday said Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Steve Coll, writing in The New Yorker, described the talks as being of "an exploratory nature."
Coll said government insiders familiar the talks told him about the negotiations.
"The Obama Administration has entered into direct, secret talks with senior Afghan Taliban leaders, several people briefed about the talks told me last week," Coll wrote. "The discussions are continuing; they are of an exploratory nature and do not yet amount to a peace negotiation."
Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the Taliban can't defeat or outlast the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan and that it must break with al-Qaida.
In a speech at the Asia Society in New York, Clinton said if the Taliban doesn't break with al-Qaida it would be labeled "an enemy of the international community."
The New Yorker article said the talks are the "final diplomatic achievement" of the late Richard Holbrooke, the United States' special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Clinton also said former diplomat Marc Grossman is coming out of retirement to become the new U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, replacing Holbrooke.
ROME, Feb. 19 (UPI) -- The woman known as "Ruby" says Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi intervened in her arrest because he was afraid she would tell about alleged sex parties.
Karima El Mahroug, the 18-year-old Moroccan dancer also known as "Ruby the Heartstealer," alleged that Berlusconi stepped in when she was arrested in an unrelated incident because he feared she would tell about his "bunga bunga" sex parties, The Daily Telegraph reported.
"Everyone was naked at the bunga bunga parties and when I was in the police station Silvio was scared," she allegedly told investigators.
Berlusconi allegedly paid El Mahroug for sex when she was 17. She said she met Berlusconi at a private party at his Villa San Marino mansion on Valentine's Day 2010.
She alleged that after dinner, Berlusconi, 74, invited her to join him and about 30 women in an underground "bunga bunga" room.
Berlusconi goes on trial on April 6 on charges he abused his office and for allegedly paying El Mahroug for sex.
Berlusconi has denied the allegations.
JALALABAD, Afghanistan, Feb.
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