Kathmandu, Apr 23 : Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal has started talks with the diplomatic mission chiefs here over the Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Rookmangad Katawal row.

Envoys from eight countries including the United States, United Kingdom, India, China and Japan are attending the meeting at the PM''s residence in Baluwatar today.

Finance Minister Dr. Baburam Bhattarai is also present.

Dahal has deferred action against General Katawal due to increasing international pressure.

New Delhi, Apr 23 : Communist Party of India (Marxist) General Secretary Prakash Karat has ruled out the possibility of forming a post-poll alliance with the with the Congress party.

In an exclusive interview with TIMESNOW, Karat clarified that his party''s aim is to see that there is a "non-Congress secular government."

He revealed that in the event of the CPI (M) failing to do so, it "would prefer to sit in the opposition."

Washington  - US President Barack Obama and key administration officials launched a full media blitz Wednesday to push for limits to climate-damaging pollution in the United States, coinciding with Earth Day.

Obama touted the importance of wind power during a trip to the US state of Iowa and called for a "new era of energy exploration," sounding a theme repeated by a series of cabinet members who testified before Congress on the same day.

Harare  - Zimbabwe's Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai said Wednesday he had given President Robert Mugabe a deadline on the resolution of issues threatening to derail the country's unity government.

Tsvangirai was speaking ahead of a third meeting between the two leaders on Thursday over the unilateral claw-back by Mugabe of the telecommunications dossier from Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

Pratapgarh, Apr. 22: Saying that the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati was just like a sister to him, Samajwadi Party General Secretary Sanjay Dutt has apologized Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister for his "Jadu ki Jhappi" remarks.

In his reply to the district magistrate and district election officer on Tuesday, Dutt apologized for the remarks and said it was a mere dialogue from his Bollywood blockbuster Munnabhai series which were used in the rally to spread a message of love in society.

Wellington - Fiji military strongman Voreqe Bainimarama's declaration that his country does not need free and open discussion about current issues placed his government "outside the community of civilized peoples," New Zealand's Society of Authors said on Wednesday.

The society, which includes the writers' organization PEN New Zealand, issued a statement saying its members joined a wide range of other freedom of speech advocates throughout the world in deploring the "vicious repression of media" by Fiji's military government.