World in brief: Portugal’s new president demands financial discipline

LISBON, Portugal – A center-right candidate scored a resounding victory in Portugal’s presidential election Sunday, warning he would use the largely ceremonial post to prevent the center-left anti-austerity government from worsening the debt-heavy country’s financial health.

Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, a veteran moderate politician and law professor, collected more than half the votes against nine rivals.

The president has no executive power, and is largely a figurehead, but can be an influential voice and in a crisis has the power to dissolve Parliament if he feels the country is going off track.

A Socialist minority government runs Portugal with the backing of the Communist Party and the radical Left Bloc. The government is trying to pull off a balancing act by ending austerity measures while pledging to continue the financial prudence adopted after Portugal’s $84 billion bailout in 2011 amid a eurozone financial crisis.

Rebelo de Sousa said in his victory speech he expected the government to generate more economic growth “without compromising financial stability.”

Peres sent to hospital

over ‘irregular heartbeat’

JERUSALEM – Israel’s former President Shimon Peres was rushed to a hospital after experiencing chest pains, just a week after suffering a mild heart attack, his spokeswoman said Sunday night.

The 92-year-old statesman had been discharged from a hospital Tuesday.

Medics treated Peres at his home and detected an “irregular heartbeat” after conducting an EKG test, spokeswoman Ayelet Frisch said.

Later Sunday, Peres’ personal physician, Rafi Walden, said that “to be on the safe side we took him to the hospital where we diagnosed a slight disturbance in the rhythm of the heart.”

Peres won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 following the signing of the Oslo peace accords with the Palestinians a year earlier, a prize he shared with Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was later assassinated, and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

He completed his seven-year term as president in 2014 and remains in the public eye. He is still active through his non-governmental Peres Center for Peace, which promotes coexistence between Arabs and Jews and peace and development in the Middle East.

Syrian troops capture

rebel redoubts prior to talks

BEIRUT – Syrian army troops have overrun rebel strongholds in the mountains of western Latakia province, according to government and opposition accounts on Sunday, marking the latest government gains before peace talks slated to begin this week in Geneva.

Forces loyal to President Bashar Assad swept through the town of Rabiaa and nearby villages close to the Turkish border, according to the official Syrian media and a pro-opposition monitoring group.

The army advanced “after violent clashes against Islamic battalions” including al-Qaida-affiliated Jabat al Nusrah, reported the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a pro-opposition monitor based in Britain. Syrian and Russian warplanes backed the thrust, the observatory said.

The Russian intervention has helped turn the tide of battle on several fronts, boosting the fortunes of Assad’s government as United Nations peace talks are set to convene in Geneva this week.

While the Geneva talks were scheduled to begin Monday, officials say a delay of at least a day is likely because of a dispute about who will represent the opposition delegation.

Still, officials from the United States and Russia – two principal backers of the Geneva talks – have said they are optimistic the negotiations will take place.