Taliban leader may be freed

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistan is ready to release Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, an imprisoned senior Taliban commander, in a bid to bolster the faltering peace process in Afghanistan, officials in Islamabad said Tuesday.

The release of Baradar, a former deputy leader of the Taliban who was captured with CIA help in 2010, would meet long-standing demands from American and Afghan officials, who hope he can help draw other Taliban commanders into peace talks.

Even as Pakistani officials released several waves of Taliban prisoners over the past year, including a new group of seven on Sunday, they resisted setting Baradar free.

Kenyan official stands trial

NAIROBI, Kenya — Kenya’s deputy president, William Ruto, rose before the International Criminal Court for the start of his trial Tuesday and three times — once for each charge of crimes against humanity facing him — repeated the words “Not guilty.”

Mr. Ruto went on trial before the court in The Hague, Netherlands, for his role in the violence that rocked the country after the disputed 2007 election.

The election in 2007 set off ethnic clashes across the nation that claimed the lives of more than 1,100 people and displaced some 600,000.

Iran to restart nuke talks

TEHRAN — Iranian president Hassan Rohani said his government plans to restart nuclear talks with world powers in New York, where he will attend the United Nations General Assembly this month.

Also on Tuesday, Mr. Rohani appointed Masouomeh Ebtekar as the country’s first female vice president and head of environmental affairs. She served as the spokeswoman for the Iranian Islamic revolutionaries who seized 52 Americans at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979.

Thief won’t reveal stash

BUCHAREST, Romania — The accused ringleader of Romanian thieves who stole seven works by artists including Picasso and Matisse won’t reveal where five are stashed after his request to be tried in a Dutch court was denied, his lawyer said.

A Bucharest court opened a trial Tuesday in the October 2012 theft of seven artworks, insured for a combined 18 million euros ($24 million), from the Kunsthal museum in Rotterdam. Defendant Radu Dogaru, who admitted stealing them with two accomplices, offered in August to return five of the paintings in exchange for being tried in the Netherlands.

Tensions rise over islands

TOKYO — Japan has not ruled out stationing government officials on islands at the center of a territorial dispute with China, the top Cabinet secretary said Tuesday, as a fleet of Chinese patrol ships entered disputed waters amid tensions in the year-old maritime standoff.

The fight over the uninhabited islands in the East China Sea, known as Senkaku in Japanese and Diaoyu in Chinese, has tainted relations between the two countries.

Web users face jail time

HONG KONG — China says authorities could jail Web users for as much as three years if they post comments deemed defamatory, in a legal interpretation that defines punishments for people who violate government Internet controls.

People face imprisonment if the defamatory rumors they post online are read by more than 5,000 people, reposted more than 500 times or cause the subjects to hurt themselves, commit suicide or “experience mental disorders,” Xinhua News Agency reported.