In the World
Egypt tank moves raise Israeli worry
JERUSALEM - Israel is "troubled" by the entry of Egyptian tanks into the northern Sinai Peninsula without coordination with Israel, a violation of the terms of the 33-year-old treaty between the countries, and has asked Egypt to withdraw them, an Israeli government official said Tuesday.
The Israeli request was conveyed within the last few days, the official said, adding that it was likely that the Obama administration had made a similar request. The Israeli official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the fragility of Israel's relations with Egypt, already strained by the recent upheavals there.
The dispute over the tanks appeared to be part of a delicate balancing act as Egypt's new leadership tests Israel's limits. For its part, Jerusalem seeks to encourage Egypt's efforts to restore order in the increasingly chaotic Sinai Peninsula but without posing a threat to Israel's security.
- N.Y. Times News Service
Wildfires set off Balkan mines
BANJA LUKA, Bosnia-Herzegovina - Authorities Tuesday declared a state of emergency around a town in Bosnia's northeast and a tourist area was evacuated in the country's south as a triple-digit heat wave fueled wildfires across the Balkans.
Bratunac Mayor Nedeljko Mladjenovic declared the emergency as wildfires from several directions threatened his town. In the country's south, firefighters were battling four blazes around the town of Konjic.
Fires were sweeping through fields still dotted with mines from the 1992-95 Bosnian war. Tourists said they could hear loud explosions from a forest as the mines were set off by blazes. Such fires have been burning in several areas of Bosnia for weeks.
Croatia has suffered a number of wildfires throughout the summer, and the coastal municipality of Split has urged the government to postpone the start of the school year because of heat. - AP
Tainted water angers Egyptians
CAIRO - Villagers briefly locked the Egyptian health minister and a provincial governor inside a hospital room Tuesday after allegedly contaminated water caused hundreds of residents to fall ill, officials said.
A hospital in the Nile Delta province of Menoufia, 40 miles north of Cairo, admitted dozens of people with severe cases of diarrhea, vomiting, and high fevers, Health Ministry official Amr Kandil said. Egypt's state-run news agency MENA said the number of sick people reached more than 400.
During a visit by Health Minister Mohammed Mustafa and Gov. Ashraf Helal to the hospital Tuesday, angry family members held up bottles of brackish-looking water and chanted, "Drink it." Then they locked the two officials in a room.
After an hour, the two were released with police intervention. Mustafa ordered closure of illegal and unlicensed sources of water. Helal suspended government employees responsible for the village's main source of tap water. - AP
Elsewhere:
Japanese journalist Mika Yamamoto died Monday in Syria, a Japanese Foreign Ministry official said. Yamamoto, who was in her 40s, died amid a firefight in Aleppo. She reportedly is the fourth foreign reporter killed in Syria since March 2011.