WORLD BRIEFS

PAKISTAN: Prime minister indicted

The Supreme Court charged Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani with contempt Monday for defying its order to reopen an old corruption case against the president, sharpening a political crisis that has shaken the volatile country. Gilani pleaded not guilty. If convicted, he could be imprisoned and is likely to lose his job. But analysts said the premier seems willing to sacrifice himself for the benefit of his party and his political ally, President Asif Ali Zardari. The political turmoil has been a problem for the United States because it wants Pakistan to focus on repairing troubled bilateral relations and help negotiate peace with the Taliban in Afghanistan.

IRAN: Ahmadinejad ex-aide jailed

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's former press adviser has been sentenced to six months in jail, the semiofficial Mehr news agency said Monday. Ali Akbar Javanfekr had been convicted previously of insulting Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The case appears part of a continuing power struggle between Ahmadinejad's backers and Khamenei loyalists. Last year, Javanfekr got a separate one-year sentence for writing that the practice of women wearing head-to-toe black coverings was not originally an Iranian practice, but was imported. This was considered offensive by hard-line Iranian clerics.

NORTH KOREA: Meeting for U.S. envoy

A U.S. envoy will hold talks with North Korea on its nuclear program in Beijing next week, the first such negotiations since the death of the nation's longtime leader, Kim Jong Il. Glyn Davies, the U.S. envoy on North Korea, will meet Feb. 23 with North Korean First Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye Gwan, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said Monday. It will be the third round of bilateral talks since last summer, aimed at restarting six-nation aid-for-disarmament negotiations on North Korea's nuclear program. It could signal a willingness of the new regime, under Kim Jong Un, to address international concerns over its missile programs.