The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Kabul - U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld spent Wednesday in Afghanistan, using an unannounced visit to discuss elections and drugs. Afghanistan is set to hold its first presidential election in October, but the government's plans are beset with security problems. Taliban fighters are blamed for deadly attacks on election workers across the country. Despite the violence, Rumsfeld noted the government claims to have registered more than nine million Afghans to vote, including 3.5 million women, which he called "a very vivid demonstration of the Aghan people's determination to make democracy work." The United States has thousands of troops in Afghanistan hunting down the remnants of the Taliban regime and al-Qaeda fighters. Rumsfeld said on Wednesday the United States and its coalition partners are getting ready to go after Afghanistan's resurgent opium trade Washington - Illegal immigrants who cross the Canadian or Mexican borders into the United States will be deported more quickly and without the chance to appeal to an immigration judge under a new American policy announced this week. Santo Domingo Dominican Republic - Forty-five migrants of the 78 migrants who set out in a 12-metre wooden boat from the Dominican Republic two weeks ago are presumed dead after a fisherman found 33 people who accompanied them drifting at sea.
