The Bush administration has described him as “Europe’s last dictator”, and Belarus features in the US list of “outposts of tyranny”, along with the likes of Zimbabwe, Burma and Cuba.The measure was foreshadowed by the White House after the March vote, when it linked the Lukashenko government with the murders of a pro-democracy businessman and an independent journalist.Even before yesterday’s move, Washington and the European Union had imposed some travel restrictions on Mr Lukashenko and his colleagues.”What are the grounds for these restrictions?” he asked angrily last month. “Is there some international court ruling that we are criminal?”. The prime suspect in the disappearance of two Belgian schoolgirls was ordered to stay behind bars yesterday as the search continued for the step-sisters who have been missing for more than a week. Lawyers for Abdallah Aid Oud told a court in Li? that police had insufficient evidence to hold their client, who was charged last week with kidnapping the two children. Mr Aid Oud’s lawyers said they would appeal against the decision.
The plight of Nathalie Mahy, aged 10, and Stacy Lemmens, seven, has rekindled memories of the abduction, rape and murder of Julie Lejeune and Melissa Russo, both aged eight, who were snatched by Marc Dutroux from their homes at Gr?-Hollogne, near Li?, in June 1995.Mr Aid Oud was in the pub in Li? visited by the parents of the missing girls on 10 June, the night they disappeared.On Sunday investigators questioned Catherine Dizier, Nathalie’s mother, for nine hours, who said she had received a suspicious text message.

Investigators have also interviewed her boyfriend, Thierry Lemmens, Stacy’s father. Police have been searching the river Meuse and an abandoned mine building in Li?.Didier Mahy, Nathalie’s father, said he believed the girls were alive and appealed to their captor to release them “Just drop them off somewhere,” he said in a TV message “Do it anonymously, but give them back.”. A private art museum in New York founded by Ronald Lauder, the cosmetics heir and billionaire tycoon, has reportedly paid a record $135m (£73m) for a Gustav Klimt portrait, until recently the subject of a notorious Nazi restitution battle. Considered one of Klimt’s most important works, the 1907 portrait is an exuberant homage in oil and gold to Adele Bloch-Bauer, a Viennese socialite and – according to some historians – a mistress of the artist.

Its visual accessibility has made it one of the most widely recognised works of any 20th-century artist.. The future of law enforcement was launched into the smoggy Los Angeles skies at the weekend in the form of a drone aircraft intended to bring spy-in-the-sky technology to urban policing. The unmanned aerial vehicle, called the SkySeer, looks like a remote-controlled toy and fits into a shoulder bag. In the air, the craft is guided by global positioning system coordinates, and a camera fixed to the underside sends video to a laptop command station.
A prototype is being tested by the LA county sheriff’s department, which says the SkySeer will accomplish tasks too dangerous for officers, and free helicopters for other missions. “This technology could be used to find missing children, search for lost hikers or survey a fire zone,” said Commander Sid Heal, head of the sheriff’s department technology exploration project. “The plane is virtually silent and invisible.”The SkySeer, which has low-light and infrared capabilities and can fly at speeds of up to 30mph, would also be able to spot burglary suspects.Commander Heal believes it will be the first of many unmanned surveillance crafts which will be used in police work. “Who knew five years ago we would be shooting photos and videos with our phones?” he said.

“I can see this drone technology replacing some conventional aircraft in 10 years.”The LA sheriff’s department operates 18 helicopters costing £2m to £3m each. The SkySeer costs £15,000 to £23,000.Although the SkySeer is not yet capable of spying into windows, some critics are uneasy about eyes in the sky monitoring daily life.”A helicopter can be seen and heard and one can make behaviour choices based on that,” said Beth Givens of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. “Do we really want to live in a society where our backyard barbecues will be open to police scrutiny?”Police say the concerns are unwarranted because everybody is already under surveillance.”You shouldn’t be worried about being spied on by your government,” said Commander Heal. “These days you can’t go anywhere without a camera watching you, whether you’re in a grocery store or walking down the street.”. The US Army has charged three soldiers with murder following the death of three Iraqi men who were being held in military custody. The deaths were in early May following an operation near the Thar Thar canal in Salahuddin province, north of Baghdad. Details of what happened have not been released but the soldiers charged apparently claimed that the men were trying to escape.
The US military in Iraq issued a statement last night that said the three soldiers, of the 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division, had been charged with murder, attempted murder, conspiracy, communicating a threat and obstructing justice.