ISTANBUL (Reuters) – A Turkish court jailed seven Islamist militants for being part of an armed gang that plotted to kill US President George W. Bush during a 2004 NATO summit, a news agency said yesterday. The seven men were sentenced for being members of Ansar al-Islam, a radical group believed to have links to al Qaida, not specifically for conspiring to assassinate Bush, the private Dogan News reported. The gang was captured after police in the Turkish city of Bursa launched an operation against them in April 2004 ahead of the NATO summit held in Istanbul in June of that year. In searches of the defendants’ homes and offices, police found explosives and other bomb-making materials in addition to pistols and rifles. During questioning, the men admitted to planning to carry out a suicide bombing against Bush. Alpaslan Toprak was jailed for 12 years for being gang leader, while six other defendants were sentenced to six years, three months in prison for membership in the group.

BUCHAREST (AP) – An international journalists’ organization yesterday called on Romania not to reintroduce insult and libel into the country’s criminal code, a measure that could lead to journalists being imprisoned. The International Federation of Journalists, which represents journalists’ unions in 100 countries, urged Prime Minister Calin Popescu Tariceanu to “take action to reassure journalists they will not be treated as criminals just for doing their normal work.” “Journalists must be free to criticize and to express themselves in a frank and robust manner,” Aidan White, general secretary of IFJ, said in a statement. “If they face jail for doing what comes naturally in a democracy, it will be damaging for Romania’s ambitions to be accepted as a defender of human rights in Europe,” White added. In 2006, following years of debate on freedom of expression and fragile press freedom in the Balkan country, Parliament decriminalized insult and libel. Last week, the country’s Constitutional Court ruled the move was unconstitutional and demanded the offenses be reintroduced into the criminal code.

Serbia’s president yesterday scheduled meetings with key political parties for the next week to try to form a new government following recent parliamentary elections, while a UN envoy presents his plan for the future of the breakaway province of Kosovo. Starting Monday, President Boris Tadic will hold separate meetings with a dozen parties and coalitions that won assembly seats in the January 21 vote, his office said in a statement without specifying when a new cabinet will be in place. (Reuters)