N. Korean leader in China for talks

Beijing North Korean leader Kim Jong Il reportedly arrived Tuesday in Beijing for talks with President Hu Jintao on resuming stalled negotiations aimed at ending the North’s nuclear development.

The top U.S. negotiator on North Korea’s nuclear programs, Christopher Hill, arrived in Beijing today, but the U.S. Embassy said that it had no information on whether he would meet with Kim.

Kim is believed to have spent nearly a week visiting China’s booming south on a study tour of economic reform before his reported arrival in Beijing, which a Foreign Ministry spokesman said he could not confirm.

Beijing is under U.S. pressure to use its status as the North’s main aid donor to press it to return to the six-nation talks, which began in 2003. The other participants are South Korea, Japan and Russia.

Accused Marines stay in U.S. custody

Carmen, Philippines The United States on Tuesday refused a Philippine request to hand over four Marines charged with rape, provoking anti-American protests in the capital and the Muslim south, where U.S. troops began annual counterterrorism training of Filipino soldiers.

In a letter to the Philippine government, the U.S. Embassy invoked the bilateral Visiting Forces Agreement, which allows large-scale U.S. training in the country, and vowed to keep the Marines in its custody during an upcoming trial.

Prosecutor Prudencio Jalandoni said he was disappointed but would ask the court handling the rape case to abide by the U.S. decision and set a trial date.

A Philippine judge last week issued arrest warrants for the Marines, who were charged with rape late last year while on liberty following counterterrorism maneuvers with Filipino troops.

Prosecutors allege that Lance Cpl. Daniel Smith raped a 22-year-old woman Nov. 1 inside a van at Subic Bay, a former U.S. Naval base northwest of Manila, as fellow Marines cheered him on. Smith claims he only had consensual sex.

Al-Jazeera pursuing Blair-Bush transcript

Cairo, Egypt Al-Jazeera has hired a British law firm to request a partial transcript of a conversation in which President Bush allegedly told British Prime Minister Tony Blair that the Arab broadcaster’s headquarters should be bombed.

Yosri Fouda, acting Al-Jazeera bureau chief in London, told the Associated Press the network had hired Finers Stephens Innocent LLP in an “attempt to put pressure on the British government” to hand over part of the record of the conversation between Bush and Blair.

“We would like to know the truth,” Fouda said in a telephone interview Tuesday.

Fouda said the Doha, Qatar-based Al-Jazeera was only asking Blair for a transcript of “the ten lines” of the conversation that purportedly involved the network, which is highly popular throughout the Middle East. He acknowledged that Britain’s desire to keep the rest of the conversation secret was understandable as a matter of state security.