Bangladesh has set up anthrax checkpoints at cattle markets as a major outbreak of the disease spreads through the country’s dairy belt, infecting more than 400 people, officials said Wednesday. Eight districts have confirmed human and cattle anthrax infections and meat consumption ahead of the Islamic festival of Eid, set to start Friday, has fallen [...]
The head of the Directorate for Combating Economic Crimes and three police officers in Russia’s east Siberian Zabaikalsky Territory are suspected of taking bribes worth 14 million rubles (more than $450,000), a spokesman for the local investigation committee said. The suspects are accused of helping local businessmen to acquire documents to export lumber products to [...]
The CEO and major shareholder of a Russian bank was shot dead on Wednesday evening in southwestern Moscow, a spokesman for Russia’s investigation committee said. Mikael Daudov, 66, was shot in the head with a small-caliber gun while leaving his office on Leninsky Prospekt. Daudov owned an 18.34 percent stake in the small Moscow-based bank, [...]
A Russian circus touring Australia has dropped an act in which a performer swallows a live fish then regurgitates it after complaints that it was in poor taste and inhumane. Great Moscow Circus general manager Greg Hall said Wednesday that the fish-gobbling part of the show was removed on Monday after the New South Wales [...]
Mullah Omar says NATO-led forces are losing the war in Afghanistan and his fighters are close to victory. The Afghan Taliban leader has said his fighters were close to victory in driving foreign forces out of the country. In a message on Wednesday marking the end of the Muslim fasting month Ramadan, Mullah Omar called on [...]
North Korea has marked its founding 62 years ago on Thursday with patriotic songs and commentaries, and national flags decorating street corners, as speculation mounted over political succession plans. In Pyonyang, thousands marked the anniversary by placing flowers at the foot of a giant statue of Kim Il-sung, North Korea’s founder, and father of current [...]
Prison break by armed rebel group Boko Haram raises new fears of violence as security is tightened in country’s north. A prison break by an armed group known as Boko Haram has raised fears of renewed violence in northern Nigeria just months before elections. The group staged a raid on the prison on Tuesday night [...]
Sitting in on the Rachel Corrie trial alarmingly reveals an open Israeli policy of indiscrimination towards civilians. “During war there are no civilians,” that’s what “Yossi,” an Israeli military (IDF) training unit leader simply stated during a round of questioning on day two of the Rachel Corrie trials, held in Haifa’s District Court earlier this [...]
Since the 1930s, leprosy patients in Egypt have been rounded up and placed in the town of Abu Zaabal. The Egyptian government has now offered the inhabitants the right to return to their villages and cities. But many have refused, preferring to live and work away from the social stigma that often comes with their [...]
At least two of the five US soldiers charged in the deaths of three Afghan civilians had kept body parts taken from Afghan corpses and threatened subordinates, according to new documents released by the US army. Five soldiers – Calvin Gibbs, Adam Winfield, Jeremy Morlock and Michael Wagon, Andrew Holmes – have been charged with [...]
A blind, self-taught activist lawyer who documented forced abortions and other abuses was released from a Chinese prison Thursday and promptly locked down in his rural village with no access to communication, a relative said. Chen Guangcheng, 39, is a charismatic, inspirational figure for civil liberties lawyers who have fought to enforce the rights enshrined [...]
Niko Mushi hated rats, as did most people in his village near Tanzania’s Mt. Kilimanjaro — until he learned the critters had a nose for land mines. Mushi, 32, has been working with giant African pouched rats for almost seven years. He now enjoys their company — “They’re just like my friend,” he says — [...]
A Russian Rokot carrier rocket blasted off from the Plesetsk space center in northern Russia early on Wednesday to put a Gonets-M and two Kosmos satellites into orbit, a Defense Ministry spokesman said. The launch took place on schedule at 07:30am Moscow time (03:30 GMT), Lt. Col. Alexei Zolotukhin said, adding that the satellites are [...]
Police in Russia’s Kamchatka have seized 29.5 tons of red caviar worth some 30 million rubles ($970,000) from a refrigerator found in the street in a local town, a Kamchatka police spokesman said on Wednesday. Some 1,340 plastic containers full of caviar were seized in the town of Sobolevo, the official said. A total of [...]
Afghanistan has frozen the assets of leading shareholders and borrowers at Kabul Bank, the country’s leading private bank, in the wake of the crisis sparked by the resignation of two high-level directors. Aimal Hashoor, the central bank’s spokesman, said on Tuesday the Central Bank had ordered the assets of Sher Khan Farnood, Kabul Bank’s former chairman, and [...]
It’s a huge risk meeting Taliban fighters. There’s not just the threat that they might turn on you after promising you an interview. Our producer, Qais Azimy, was returning from one of his previous visits when he was arrested by Afghan intelligence. They held him for questioning for three days. The phrase “don’t shoot the [...]
UN troops failed 242 women and children who suffered a mass rape attack in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), a top UN peacekeeping official has said. Congo hosts the largest and most costly UN peacekeeping mission in the world, but the mass rape attacks happened just 30km from a UN base some time [...]
Galina Litvyak had stopped by the kiosk down the road, wandered through nearby supermarkets and badgered friends for the latest rumors. Nobody knew where to find it. All over her middle-class neighborhood, the stores were filled with an ample selection of goods, reflecting just how much Moscow has changed over the last two decades. With [...]
Three icons, one of which contained relics of one of Russia’s most venerated saints, have been stolen from a church in a village north of Moscow, a police source said on Sunday. The theft was apparently committed on Saturday afternoon. Priests discovered that the icons of St. Sergiy of Radonezh, Elijah the Prophet, and St. [...]
The Congolese are particularly interested in pigeons, having exterminated nearly all the mammals, such as elephants and hippopotamuses, who used to come to the mudflats. The hunting of pigeons has not been controlled, and as a result the number of African Green Pigeons has fallen dramatically. Hunting these pigeons was legal up to two years [...]
Israel’s hard-line foreign minister said Monday that his party will try to block any extension of Israel’s settlement slowdown, a move that could derail the recently launched Mideast peace negotiations. Avigdor Lieberman said the Israeli government must keep its promise to voters that the 10-month slowdown, declared last November under U.S. pressure in order to [...]
Vladimir Putin hinted that he would run for a third and possibly even a fourth term as Russian president as he likened himself to former US President Franklin D Roosevelt. The 57-year-old Russian Prime Minister appeared to deliberately fan speculation on Monday when he met with foreign academics and journalists at the Black Sea resort [...]
Police in Mozambique have arrested nearly 150 people following violent protests which have resulted in 13 deaths over the government’s decision to increase bread prices by 30 per cent. There was little sign of a reoccurrence of the protests in the capital Maputo, mainly by young men who were assembled in part by anonymous text [...]
Lebanon’s prime minister has said he was wrong to accuse Syria of killing Rafik al-Hariri, his father, in 2005 and said the charge against Damascus had been politically motivated. Saad al-Hariri’s comments to Asharq al-Awsat, a London-based newspaper, published on Monday, repudiate his earlier accusation that Syria was behind the Beirut bombing which killed his [...]
North Korea has finished preparing for a key meeting of its ruling communist party, a South Korean official has said, but there it was still unclear when it would get under way. The Workers’ Party Convention, the first of its type since 1966, is widely expected to confirm the youngest son of leader Kim Jong-Il as [...]
The rearrest and trial of Iranian human rights activist and journalist Shiva Nazar-Ahari adds another name and face to a long list of those targeted by the government there, charged with a list of extraordinary offences and subjected to an opaque justice system. Hers is not an exceptional case, as the government continues to expand [...]
A security check on Chinese airlines has uncovered 200 pilots flying with falsified qualifications, it emerged on Monday. The Chinese Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) began the wide-ranging safety investigation in the wake of last month’s air crash in Yichun, in which 42 people died. Combing through the pilot records of China’s major airlines, officials discovered [...]
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has accused Chinese billionaires of refusing an invitation to a gala event because they are nervous about being buttonholed for donations to charity. The dinner on September 29 had planned to gather “dozens” of China’s richest people together in order to support the Gates Foundation, which funds Aids charities [...]
A court in northern Japan found two Greenpeace activists guilty Monday for stealing whale meat, but suspended their sentences, Greenpeace Japan said. The Aomori District Court ruled that the activists, Junichi Sato and Toru Suzuki, will only have to serve one-year terms if they commit a crime in the next three years, Greenpeace said. In [...]
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has called for the speedy creation of an independent Palestinian state with the capital in East Jerusalem and pledged to do his best to unite the Palestinians. “We cannot allow the peace process to make no headway, progress to give way to failures, and tensions to follow relaxation,” Mubarak said in [...]
The Russian and Israeli defense ministers, Anatoly Serdyukov and Ehud Barak, are planning to sign on Monday an agreement on military cooperation between the countries during talks in Moscow, the Russian defense minister’s spokeswoman has said. Barak will arrive in the Russian capital on a two-day visit later on Monday. “This agreement will regulate cooperation [...]
A Japanese freelance journalist released at the weekend after five months’ captivity in Afghanistan said in an online posting Monday that his kidnappers were not Taliban but corrupt Afghan soldiers. Kosuke Tsuneoka, 41, who had been missing in northern Afghanistan since April, has been under the protection of the Japanese embassy since Saturday, and was [...]
A suicide bomber rammed his car into a police station in northwest Pakistan on Monday killing at least 17 people, police said, in the third in a string of attacks by al Qaeda- and Taliban-linked militants over the last week. An official said the death toll could rise as the police station had collapsed after [...]
Mini-bus packed with explosives targets former defense ministry building in Baghdad, where security has been high. At least 12 people, including four soldiers, have been killed and 29 others wounded after five suicide bombers armed with rifles attempted to storm an army base in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad. Sunday’s attack came less than a week [...]
Iran is paying Taliban fighters a hefty sum for killing U.S. troops in Afghanistan — $1,000 per soldier, according to an investigation by The Sunday Times. The British newspaper interviewed a “Taliban treasurer” who said a Kabul-based Iranian company has paid him more than $77,000 in the last six months for attacks to sabotage U.S. [...]
A Japanese Moto2 rider has died after suffering a horrific crash during the San Marino Grand Prix. Shoya Tomizawa, 19, was travelling at full speed when he fell off on a corner and was hit violently by the bikes of Alex De Angelis and Scott Redding, who both also tumbled but looked relatively unhurt. Suter [...]
Iranian woman facing death for adultery to receive 99 lashes despite Times apologizing for using picture of another person in error. Iran has reportedly sentenced Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani – the 43-year-old Iranian woman who faces execution after being convicted of adultery – to 99 lashes in prison for “spreading corruption and indecency” after allowing an [...]
Congo survivor says overcrowded vessel reminded her of a ‘market in village full of people’. Two boats capsized over the weekend in separate incidents on Congo’s rivers, leaving at least 270 people feared dead, and both vessels were operating with few safety measures, officials said. Early on Saturday, a boat on a river in northwest [...]
A South Korean grandmother has become a national celebrity by passing her driving test at the 960th attempt. Cha Sa-soon, 69, whose surname coincidentally means “vehicle” in Korean, is now appearing in a prime-time advertisement for Hyundai, Korea’s largest carmaker. For three years beginning in April 2005, she took her driving test once a day, [...]
Discrimination against women and girls takes a staggering toll around the world, says author Sheryl WuDunn. It leads to as many as 100 million fewer females than males in the world. Ending the oppression of women is the great moral challenge of the 21st Century, a cause she compares to fighting slavery in the 19th [...]
No one seemed to notice the gunfire inside Pacific Rim Bank. Even when two dozen panicky people rushed out onto the plaza at Restaurant Row, heads barely turned. But when Alex O’Loughlin, Daniel Dae Kim and Grace Park stepped up to save the day in this scene from the new “Hawaii Five-0″ — each in [...]
Kyrgyz Interim President Roza Otunbayeva will sign a decree pardoning persons who had committed economic crimes over the last two years, a spokesman for the Kyrgyz government said. The document will relieve from criminal liability persons who had committed commercial or official crimes between March 24, 2005 and April 7, 2010, Kyrgyz Justice Minister Aida [...]
The Belarusian Prosecutor General’s Office will inquire into the death of opposition journalist and human rights activist Aleh Byabenin, whose hanged body was found on Friday. Byabenin, 36, was one of the leading figures of the human rights organization Charter97 and ran the Charter97 website. The journalist’s relatives found his corpse hanged in his summer [...]
Hundreds of Chinese residents, deported to Japan during the World War II, will sue Japan’s Mitsubishi motor corporation, the Xinhua news agency said on Sunday. Some 40,000 people were deported from China to Japan during the World War II, the majority of them worked at the Japanese heavy industries. At least 7,000 of those deported [...]
Mohamed ElBaradei, the former UN nuclear watchdog chief, has accused the Egyptian government of publishing pictures of his daughter in a swimsuit in response to his call for democratic reforms in the country, a newspaper has reported. ElBaradei returned to Egypt earlier this year to begin a campaign calling for electoral reform and constitutional amendments [...]
Bahrain has accused 23 Shia Muslim activists of forming a “terror network” aimed at toppling the Arabian Gulf state’s government, the official BNA news agency says. The agency, citing the charge sheet on Saturday, said the suspects allegedly held secret meetings in Bahrain and abroad in order “to change the political regime through illegal means”. [...]
The United Nations says that three million people affected by floods in Pakistan have yet to receive the food aid they desperately need. Martin Mogwanja, the UN humanitarian co-ordinator in Pakistan, said flooding was still reaching into new areas in the southern Sindh province. “Hundreds of thousands of people are moving out of the areas of [...]
Violent clashes in Sudan’s Darfur region have left more than 40 people dead this week, according to international peacekeepers. The joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force in Darfur (UNAMID) said clashes between different armed groups left six people dead and another 33 people injured on Saturday. Citing witnesses at refugee camps where the fighting took place, [...]
An outbreak of cholera in Chad has killed at least 41 people, according to medical sources. Mahamat Mamadou Adji, a health official, said on Friday that there had been nearly 600 confirmed cases in the Central African nation. Neighboring Cameroon and Nigeria are also battling outbreaks of the fast-moving infection that causes diarrhoea in victims, leading [...]
Two Palestinians have been killed in Israeli air raids in the Gaza Strip, medics and security sources say. Another person has been critically injured. The Israeli army launched three raids in the south of Gaza on Saturday after Palestinian fighters fired a rocket over the border. The flare-up of violence on the Israel-Gaza border came [...]
Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, is once again in the position of pledging a commitment to peace with Palestinians while resuming the construction of settlements in disputed territories. The talks, which are dismissed by many as posturing and lauded by few as a sustained challenge of Israel’s policies by the US, are the second round [...]
Lebanon submitted a protest to the United Nations over a list of 141 suspected Israel spies that have operated within its frontiers. Beirut wants the role of the suspected agents to be debated at the UN General Assembly meeting in New York later this month. “Lebanon has complained over Israel having set up an espionage [...]
Exquisite artworks hidden under 2,000 years of soot and grime in a Jordanian cave have been restored by experts from the Courtauld Institute in London. Spectacular 2,000-year-old Hellenistic-style wall paintings have been revealed at the world heritage site of Petra through the expertise of British conservation specialists. The paintings, in a cave complex, had been [...]
Some 600,000 Muslims crowded into the Grand Mosque in Islam’s holiest city of Mecca for prayers on the last Friday of Ramadan. In all more than a million worshippers were in the mosque and surrounding areas, Said al-Mansoori, a spokesman for the commission governing Mecca and Medina said. The two cities have swollen with worshippers [...]
Tokyo police responded to a record 2,444 Internet crime cases nationwide in the first half of this year, a National Police Agency survey showed today. The number, up 586 or 31.5 per cent from a year earlier, represented a new high since the NPA started gathering statistics for Internet crimes, defined as crimes which use [...]
Rather intriguing, the story of the arrest of Hindu India documentary filmmaker Vijay Kumar at a Houston airport on August 20th. According to a Houston Chronicle report, Kumar is behind bars until a September 8 hearing. Kumar, on his way to Canada, was arrested at a Houston airport after officials noticed Kumar “acting suspiciously” and [...]
A powerful predawn earthquake struck New Zealand on Saturday, causing water mains to break and some buildings to crumble, though there were no immediate reports of deaths or major damage, emergency officials said. Roughly 100 people were being treated for minor bumps and cuts, and two people suffered more serious injuries, hospital officials said, just [...]
A United Parcel Service cargo plane crashed in an unpopulated area near the Dubai airport, killing the two crew members on board, UPS officials said Friday. The 747-400, a UPS-operated cargo plane, crashed with two pilots about 8 p.m. as it took off for Cologne, Germany, UPS officials reported Friday. “Safety is a key priority [...]
A Malaysian man pleaded guilty to wildlife smuggling after his bag bursting with 95 live boa constrictors broke open on a luggage conveyer belt at Kuala Lumpur International Airport, an official said Friday. Keng Liang “Anson” Wong, 52, who was previously convicted of wildlife trafficking in the United States, was charged Wednesday in a district [...]
Sixty people were killed and more than 100 were injured in a bomb attack targeting a Shia Muslim rally in Quetta on Friday. The bomb appeared to target a rally being held for Al-Quds day, an international annual event held by the Shia community opposing Israel’s control of Jerusalem and showing solidarity with Palestinian Muslims. [...]
President Alexander Lukashenko’s remarks suggesting Russia could have been behind an attack on its own embassy in Minsk are “obscene”, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday. A day after Russia strongly condemned the attack, Lukashenko retaliated by saying that “thugs and scoundrels” from Moscow may be to blame. “I do not want to [...]
Confidence in China’s food safety standards has taken another battering after it emerged that authorities in central China covered up the discovery of cancer-causing chemicals in a batch of cooking oil for more than five months. Food safety monitors in Hunan province found high levels of the carcinogen ‘benzoapyrene’ in 42 tons of Camellia oil [...]
Toshiba has announced the voluntary recall of about 41,000 notebook computers worldwide at risk of overheating and burning users. The recalled models are the Satellite T135, Satellite T135D and Satellite ProT130 notebook computers, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. Consumers are asked to immediately download the latest version of a software program called [...]
Japan has imposed new sanctions on Iran over its nuclear programme. The measures – which go beyond than those imposed by the UN Security Council – ban transactions with some Iranian banks, and also target energy-related investments. Japan approved sanctions against Iran last month, but US officials have been urging Tokyo to adopt tougher measures. [...]
Six recruiters were accused of luring 400 laborers from Thailand to the United States and forcing them to work, according to a federal indictment Thursday that the FBI called the largest human trafficking case ever charged in U.S. history. The indictment alleges that the scheme was orchestrated by four employees of labor recruiting company Global [...]
A Russian Proton-M carrier rocket with three GLONASS satellites blasted off early on Thursday morning from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan. The rocket was launched at 4:53 Moscow time (0:53 GMT), Lt. Col. Alexei Zolotukhin, a spokesman for Russian Space Forces said. Glonass – the Global Navigation Satellite System – is the Russian equivalent [...]
Wealthy landowners in Pakistan have allegedly diverted waters from the country’s devastating floods away from their own properties and into villages, the country’s UN ambassador said Thursday. Abdullah Hussain Haroon called for an inquiry into claims that embankments had been allowed to burst to protect commercial crops. “Over the years, one has seen with the [...]
US prosecutors have charged the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Hakimullah Mehsud, for the plot that killed seven CIA employees at an American base in Afghanistan last December, the US Justice Department said on Wednesday. Mehsud was charged with conspiracy to kill Americans overseas and conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction. On Dec. [...]
Nacho-fueled Super Bowl bashes and multi-course wedding banquets may hark back to a time when preagricultural people devoured wild animal meat at their comrades’ gravesides. That’s what happened 12,000 years ago at Hilazon Tachtit cave in Israel, say zooarchaeologist Natalie Munro of the University of Connecticut in Storrs and archaeologist Leore Grosman of Hebrew University [...]
Prominent scientists dispute kinship’s role in self-sacrifice among highly social creatures. A furor has broken out among biologists over ant specialist E.O. Wilson’s latest attack on a concept used to explain the origins of self-sacrifice in the dog-eat-dog world of evolution. The debate centers around an idea called kin selection, which biologists use to understand [...]
The Big Bang was the result of the inevitable laws of physics and did not need God to spark the creation of the Universe, Stephen Hawking has concluded. The scientist has claimed that no divine force was needed to explain why the Universe was formed. In his latest book, The Grand Design, an extract of [...]
Ferrari has recalled all its 458 Italia models following reports of the car catching fire. Five of the cars have burst into flames since leaving the company’s factory at Maranello near Bologna, northern Italy. Incidents have been reported in California, Paris, China and Switzerland. None have taken place in Britain. The recall involves 1,248 cars [...]
The World Food Programme has warned that flood-ravaged Pakistan faces a “triple threat” after the worst disaster in the country’s history left eight million people dependent on aid to survive. Torrential rains triggered massive floods that have moved steadily from north to south over the past month, engulfing a fifth of the country and affecting [...]
Dozens of Afghan asylum seekers have broken out of a detention centre in northern Australia and held a sit-in near a major highway to protest against the long delays in processing their refugee applications, police say. More than 70 men were peacefully taken back into police custody after their protest, while five others were taken to a [...]
Four Greenpeace activists have scaled an oil rig off the coast of Greenland, forcing a British energy company to shut down its drilling operation in the Arctic. The environmental campaigners managed to breach a 500 metre security perimeter around the Stena Don rig, climb the structure and fasten themselves to it, police said on Tuesday. [...]
Afghanistan’s central bank has taken control over the country’s most powerful and politically connected private bank, Afghan bankers and officials say, as fears of insolvency and financial mayhem grow. Kabul Bank, which has taken $1 Billion in deposits from ordinary Afghans and handles salary payments for Afghan soldiers, police and teachers, has engaged in a [...]
A Japanese man has broken the world record for calculating the value of Pi, reaching 5 trillion digits on a computer that he built himself. Shigeru Kondo, a 55-year-old systems engineer for a food company based in northern Japan, easily surpassed the previous record of 2.7 trillion digits, set late last year by a French [...]
The body of one of Russia’s top spies has washed up on the Turkish coast after he disappeared close to a sensitive Russian naval facility in neighboring Syria. Major-General Yuri Ivanov, 52, was the deputy head of Russia’s foreign military intelligence arm known as GRU which is thought to operate the biggest network of foreign spies [...]
A senior Swedish prosecutor is reopening a rape investigation against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange – the latest twist to a case in which prosecutors of different ranks have overruled each other. The case was dropped by a Stockholm prosecutor last week who said there was nothing suggesting Assange had raped a Swedish woman who reported [...]
An American medical agency said gunmen fired on a private plane carrying international aid workers in eastern Congo who were forced to seek refuge in the jungle. The International Medical Corps said UN peacekeepers were en route to save the three Americans and one Georgian and two Congolese staff. The group was at the landing [...]
Two violent incidents in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, have led to the deaths of at least 14 people. Eight people were killed and 14 others wounded in a roadside bomb blast on Tuesday. Five men and three women were killed in the explosion, Ali Muse, the head of the city’s ambulance service, said. Ahmed Adma, the driver of the [...]
A Pakistani air strike targetting fighters believed to have been preparing for imminent suicide attacks has killed between 40 to 45 people in a northwestern the country. “Security forces today carried out a successful operation against militants in the Tirah valley of Khyber Agency,” a senior Pakistani security official told AFP news agency on Tuesday. “Militant hideouts, a training [...]
Russian police have arrested more than 100 people, including Boris Nemtsov, a former deputy prime minister, who were taking part in anti-Kremlin protests in Moscow and St Petersburg. Opposition leaders and rights activists have been converging at the capital’s Triumph Square on the 31st of each month, symbolising the right to free assembly guaranteed in Article 31 of Russia’s constitution. [...]
Palestinian gunmen opened fire Tuesday on an Israeli car in the West Bank and killed four passengers on the eve of a new round of Mideast peace talks in Washington. The Islamic militant group Hamas claimed responsibility. Assailants firing from a passing car riddled the vehicle with bullets as it traveled near Hebron – a [...]
Her son Sajad says she was told she would be hanged at dawn on Sunday and visits by her family and lawyer have been denied. Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, the Iranian woman sentenced to death by stoning, was told on Saturday that she was to be hanged at dawn on Sunday, but the sentence was not [...]
The Russian Embassy in Minsk was the target of a violent attack late on Monday night, when unknown assailants hurled fire bombs at the building. “At around 10:50 p.m. local time (19:50 GMT), two fire bombs were thrown onto the territory of the Russian Embassy,” a local emergencies spokesman told RIA Novosti. “One of them [...]
The Russian Mir-2 mini-sub has found several shiny metal objects on the bottom of Lake Baikal that could be the legendary Tsarist gold lost during the Russian civil war, the Fund for the Protection of Lake Baikal said. Explorers have long been searching for the Tsarist gold that was allegedly carried by Admiral Alexander Kolchak [...]
The Government Pension Investment Fund, which manages the reserves for the National Pension and Employees’ Pension Insurance, said Monday it incurred an investment loss of ¥3.59 trillion in the April-June quarter. The fourth-largest quarterly loss on record was largely due to stock price falls both at home and abroad resulting from the sovereign debt crisis [...]
The former editor in chief of “Playboy Indonesia” missed a deadline to begin serving a two-year jail term for indecency, vowing to fight his conviction, the Jakarta Globe reported. The boss of the now-defunct publication, Erwin Arnada, was acquitted of charges of indecency by the South Jakarta District Court in April 2007, but prosecutors said [...]
A Saudi employer and his wife, who are accused of torturing a Sri Lankan housemaid by hammering nails into her body, have been arrested in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, officials at the Sri Lankan External Affairs Ministry said Monday. Saudi Arabian authorities could not be reached immediately for verification. No further details were available. The two [...]
Four African Union (AU) peacekeepers have been killed in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, after al-Shabab fighters fired a mortar at the presidential palace. “A mortar was fired at one of our positions, and it killed four soldiers and injured eight,” said Ba-Hoku Barigye, a spokesman for the peacekeeping force. Barigye said the dead soldiers are all [...]
India’s government says it has withdrawn its threat to ban Blackberry services for at least two months after the smartphone’s maker agreed under pressure to give security officials “lawful access” to encrypted data. The country’s interior ministry, which wants real time access to corporate emails and instant messaging, said on Sunday it would review Research in Motion (Rim)’s, the [...]
Two men taken off a Chicago-to-Amsterdam United Airlines flight in the Netherlands have been charged by Dutch police with “preparation of a terrorist attack,” U.S. law enforcement officials tell ABC News. U.S. officials said the two appeared to be travelling with what were termed “mock bombs” in their luggage. “This was almost certainly a dry [...]
“We have not presented any proposal to the Americans on an extension of the freeze … the government has not taken any decision on the issue,” an official quoted Netanyahu as saying at a Likud party meeting. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has denied promising the Obama administration that a colony freeze would be renewed [...]
Graduating members of the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) celebrate during the passing out parade of some 413 Sub-Inspector trainees at the National Industrial Security Academy (NISA) in Hyderabad. The Home Ministry’s CISF is responsible for security services at ports and other tranportation facilities, as well as vital industrial units including atomic power plants, aerospace [...]
Dubai-based fashion designer Rabia Z. unveils this season’s top hijab looks. Follow the easy steps and before you know it, yours will be the most stylish shayla around. Eliminate the stress of a shayla/scarf that refuses to stay put by working on your base band first. Opt for a wide band or A’mta – a [...]
Muslim countries and organisations have pledged nearly $1 Billion in cash and supplies to relief efforts for flood victims in Pakistan, the head of a group of Islamic states has said. The announcement came as rising waters inundated the city of Thatta in the southern Sindh province and threatened the nearby town of Sujawal, home [...]
At least 15 people died and 25 were injured on Sunday when a bus plunged into a ditch in the Coochbehar district of West Bengal, India, Indo-Asian News Service (IANS) said. The injured were hospitalized; four remain in a critical condition. Local people later went on the rampage over claims that the injured received improper [...]
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has accused western countries of using unfair political methods including deceit and breaking promises to obstruct the process of “resetting” relations between Russia and the West. In an interview in Kommersant Daily, Putin said his speech at the 2007 Munich Security Conference, which several western politicians considered a declaration of [...]
Nine people suffocated to death during fire at a retirement home in Central Russia’s Tver Region on Monday, a spokeswoman for the regional emergencies service said. The fire brigade was called out at 5:05 Moscow time [1:05 GMT], the first firefighting unit arrived three minutes later. “At 5:30 [1:30 GMT] the fire was put out [...]
A pill costing little more than $1.50 a day could save the lives of thousands suffering from a common heart condition. British doctors are so impressed with the ‘breakthrough findings’ of a major study that they have pledged to start using the drug, ivabradine, to treat patients with heart failure straight away, even though it [...]
The spiritual leader of Shas, an ultra-Orthodox party in Israel’s governing coalition, has called on God to “strike down” Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas. Only days before Mr Abbas is due sit down in Washington in face-to-face talks with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef termed the Palestinian president an evil hater of Israel. [...]
A report finds poor conditions and mistreatment at major zoos and safari parks, including the declawing of tigers and bears. It’s probably much worse at other places, animal advocates say. In 10 years of visiting zoos and animal parks in China, David Neale has seen a bear punched in the head by a trainer, tigers [...]
The Little League team from Japan ended the United States’ five-year reign as World Series champions. The team from Tokyo limited Waipahu, Hawaii, to four singles, and got a homer and three RBIs from Konan Tomori to take the Little League World Series title with a 4-1 victory Sunday. For the first time since 2003, [...]
Five civilians were killed in an attack which occurred early on Sunday when militants tried to attack Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov’s home village of Tsentoroi, a source from the Chechen police force said. “According to the latest information, five civilians and two police officers were killed in a shootout with a group of up to [...]
The sun is setting over South Africa’s oldest vineyard and the last of the wine-tasting tourists are climbing onto their buses. But one large family group has no intention of leaving – and there is little the management can do about it. Groot Constantia, in the heart of Cape Town’s wine country, can deal with [...]
Indonesia has issued a red alert after the Sinabung volcano on the western island of Sumatra erupted for the first time in 400 years. The volcano spewed smoke and ash 1,500 metres into the air, forcing the evacuation of thousands of people from the Karo district in North Sumatra on Sunday. “Initially we thought the ash [...]
Grupo Mexicana suspended operations at its three airlines Saturday “until further notice,” citing the financial problems inherited when the group changed owners a week ago. The company’s three airlines — Mexicana Airlines, MexicanaClick and MexicanaLink — stopped all flights at midday Saturday, according to a statement from the group. “Today’s decision is a painful one [...]
The demonstrators appeared one day in December, just as children at an elementary school for ethnic Koreans were cleaning up for lunch. The group of about a dozen Japanese men gathered in front of the school gate, using bullhorns to call the students cockroaches and Korean spies. Inside, the panicked students and teachers huddled in [...]
One of the country’s most senior prosecutors said Saturday that President Hamid Karzai fired him last week after he repeatedly refused to block corruption investigations at the highest levels of Mr. Karzai’s government. Fazel Ahmed Faqiryar, the former deputy attorney general, said investigations of more than two dozen senior Afghan officials — including cabinet ministers, [...]
North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il reportedly met top Chinese leaders in an apparent bid for Beijing’s diplomatic and financial support for a succession plan involving his third and youngest son, who is said to be traveling with him. Many North Korea watchers predict the son — Kim Jong Un, believed to be in his [...]
Iranian woman sentenced to death by stoning was told by guards she had been abandoned by her children, says son. The Iranian woman sentenced to death by stoning has been denied visits by her lawyer and family, her son told the Guardian today, as it emerged that her lawyer has been subjected to fresh harassment. [...]
A young long tailed macaque monkey has been spotted in a forest protectively nuzzling and grooming a ginger kitten and making sure no harm came to it. The extraordinary sight was captured by amateur photographer Anne Young while on holiday at the Monkey Forest Park, in the Ubud region of Bali, Indonesia. During the remarkable [...]
Hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis were fleeing the Thatta district Friday after the bloated Indus River crushed a levee and flooded new areas, officials said. The UN said as many as one million people have been displaced in the south since midweek. More than eight million people are need in of emergency assistance across the [...]
African leaders joined tens of thousands of Kenyans to witness a once-in-a-generation event: the signing into law of Kenya’s new constitution. The East African nation replaced a colonial-era constitution with one that curtails the president’s powers with an American-style system of checks and balances. President Mwai Kibaki’s official signing into law of the new constitution [...]
A Norwegian journalist has been granted unprecedented access to the Taliban army for the first time. The journalist, Norwegian Paul Refsdal, says Taliban leader Commander Dawran granted him the access and allowed him to film the enemy soldiers while they attacked a US convoy. The Taliban leader also allowed Refsdal to film him with his [...]
Iranian authorities have banned all advertisements for pets, pet food and other pet products. The decision by Iran’s Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance comes after the fatwa was issued by powerful cleric Grand Ayatollah Nasser Makarem Shirazi. While keeping dogs as pets has become increasingly fashionable in Iran in recent years, the fatwa cited [...]
An Australian woman has told how she apparently brought her premature baby son back to life with two hours of cuddles after doctors had declared him dead. Jamie Ogg showed no signs of life when he was delivered along with a twin sister at just 27 weeks gestation and weighing 2lb at a hospital in [...]
Surgeons have removed a tumor the size of a four-year-old child from a woman’s womb after a four-hour operation. The growth, which weighed 51 pounds, was extracted from the 54-year-old patient by surgeons at a hospital in Buenos Aires. She had approached doctors after her abdomen became so swollen that she would no longer bend [...]
Discovery made after X-ray reveals animal’s beating heart and other organs inside woman’s luggage at Bangkok airport. Customs officers at Bangkok airport in Thailand have discovered a drugged tiger cub in a check-in bag filled with stuffed animal toys. An X-ray revealed the animal’s beating heart and other functioning organs inside the oversized luggage of [...]
The fight against superbugs has taken a leap forward thanks to the discovery that powerful new antibiotics could come from frogs. Scientists have long known that the skin of frogs contains plenty of powerful germ-fighting substances because of the hostile environments they exist in. But the substances are also often poisonous to humans. Now a [...]
Researchers in South Africa have revealed the earliest direct evidence of human-made arrows. The scientists unearthed 64,000 year-old “stone points”, which they say were probably arrow heads. Closer inspection of the ancient weapons revealed remnants of blood and bone that provided clues about how they were used. The team reports its findings in the journal [...]
The UN is reviewing security measures for its aid workers in Pakistan, after a warning of new threats from the Pakistani Taliban. A US official said militants planned to attack foreigners delivering aid to the millions of people affected by the devastating floods in the country. One Taliban spokesman told Associated Press that the presence [...]
A Sri Lankan maid returned from her job in Saudi Arabia with 24 nails inside her body — the result of torture by the family who employed her, according to a doctor and a government official. L.G. Ariyawathi’s body is riddled with needles and nails, which are scheduled to be removed Friday, a doctor confirmed. [...]
An Iranian journalist imprisoned since 2009 is suing telecommunications giant Nokia Siemens in the US. Isa Saharkhiz says the company sold surveillance equipment to the Iranian government , and that is what led to his capture. By Tom Ackerman in Washington, Al Jazeera, August 26, 2010.
Heavy fighting in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, has flared for the third consecutive day, with six people being killed. Another 25 people were injured in the latest attacks on Wednesday, in the Bakara market area. Battles between government forces, backed by African Union troops, and al-Shabab fighters continued on several fronts in the north and south of [...]
A series of deadly attacks have rocked Iraq, leaving more than 30 people dead and scores more wounded as US forces go ahead with plans to end formal combat operations in the country. Al Jazeera’s Mike Hanna, reporting from Baghdad, said: “It does appear the primary targets [of Wednesday's attacks] are police stations, check points [and other] symbols [...]
An Afghan trainee has shot and killed two Spanish police trainers and their interpreter before being killed by NATO forces. The incident in Afghanistan’s western Badghis province on Wednesday sparked a large protest, with hundreds of people chanting slogans, throwing stones and attempting to storm the site of the shooting – a Spanish-run base in [...]
An Australian high school teacher caused a stir this week after asking her class to plan a terror attack that would kill as many innocent people as possible. The teacher of society and an environment class told her pupils to plan a chemical or biological attack in Australia, the Australian Associated Press reported. The students [...]
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter arrived in North Korea Wednesday to negotiate the release of an American held there. Carter was greeted at the airport by the country’s vice minister for foreign affairs, the communist nation’s official news agency said. The trip is intended to secure the release of Aijalon Mahli Gomes, a 31-year-old Boston, [...]
It began with an Aug. 12 press release from the US-led military in Afghanistan. KABUL, Afghanistan (Aug. 12) – An Afghan and coalition security force killed several suspected insurgents and detained many more, including a Taliban commander, in Wardak province Wednesday. The commander conducted improvised explosive device, direct fire and indirect fire attacks against Afghan [...]
Over 2,000 law enforcers will be providing security on Wednesday at the long-awaited rock concert of legendary U2 in the Russian capital, a spokesman for Moscow police said. “Some 2,100 policemen and Interior Ministry’s troops will be providing security at the Luzhniki Stadium. Officers of the canine team and their dogs will inspect the stadium [...]
The first foreign tourist marriage ever in Papeete took place Monday morning at the Papeete City Hall. The newlyweds come from Australia. They have been living close to Sydney for fifteen years. But 37-year old Michelle Reid is Scottish and 47-year old Brian Parkinson is Irish. The newlyweds wanted a very exotic and romantic setting [...]
More than 40 people were feared dead after a Chinese passenger jet overshot a runway in the country’s northeast and burst into flames. The Henan Airlines plane crashed in Heilongjiang province’s Yichun City, according to state media, who said 49 of the 91 passengers had been rescued. State media last night confirmed 42 passengers had [...]
All 14 passengers and crew on board a Nepalese plane that crashed in bad weather near the capital Kathmandu on Tuesday were killed, the head of the rescue team said. A small plane heading for the Everest region with 14 people on board including four Americans, a Japanese and a British national when it crashed [...]
Almost 200 women have been raped by rebels in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), during a four-day seizure of a town, aid groups have said. A US aid worker and a Congolese doctor told the Associated Press on Monday that the attacks occurred within miles of a UN peacekeepers’ base Will Cragin of the International [...]
Police in the Philippines have defended their handling of a bus hostage crisis that ended in the deaths of eight tourists from Hong Kong, as anger mounts against Philippine authorities. The Chinese government demanded answers from the Philippines on Tuesday, a day after the botched rescue attempt on a bus in the Philippines capital, Manila. [...]
A 22-year-old Mexico woman has won the Miss Universe pageant after donning a flowing red gown and telling an audience it’s important to teach kids family values. Jimena Navarrete of Guadalajara was first to answer an interview question Monday night and the last of 83 contestants standing in the headline-grabbing pageant on the Las Vegas [...]
A nurse at a Romanian hospital has been charged with murder in the deaths of five newborns killed in a fire in an intensive care unit, prosecutors said Monday. Florentina Daniela Cirstea will remain in police custody for 24 hours and appear before a judge Tuesday, said Marius Iacob, chief prosecutor in charge of the [...]
Amiza Mai rushes through the hospital doors, tears streaming from her eyes and her two-month-old boy cradled in her arms. He is screaming. Her baby boy Kalsoon has severe diarrhea and has been vomiting. He is so dehydrated that he needs fluids pumped into him intravenously immediately. He and his entire family are living in [...]
A humpback whale has put on a spectacular show in waters off Australia’s north Queensland state coast on Monday. The whale repeatedly jumped out of the water, twisting and slapping its tail in what is believed to be a way of attracting female attention, according to Australia’s Channel 7 television. Humpback whales are in northern [...]
Twenty-five inmates escaped from a prison in Tajikistan’s capital overnight, killing six personnel in a dramatic jail break, a police source said on Monday. The incident occurred after 1 a.m. when one of the convicts attacked a duty officer, took his keys and opened the cells with other inmates. The prisoners later grabbed weapons from [...]
Traffic authorities were still struggling to cope with days-long congestion on a major national expressway, nine days after traffic slowed to a snail’s pace, and nearby residents are profiting on the latest traffic snarl by overcharging drivers for food. Since August 14, thousands of Beijing-bound trucks have jammed the expressway again, and traffic has stretched [...]
A riveting, televised hostage situation in the Philippines came to a dramatic end Monday night. There were reports that the armed hostage taker was dead, but CNN could not immediately confirm that. Several people were seen walking off the bus following the 10-hour standoff. Dozens of heavily-armed policemen had earlier converged on the parked tour [...]
A disgruntled ex-policeman armed with an automatic rifle was holding hostage 17 people, including tourists from Hong Kong, on a bus in downtown Manila Monday. The gunman, identified as Rolando Mendoza, had said, via a handwritten note, that a “big deal” would happen after 3 p.m. (8:00 a.m. British time), but the deadline passed without [...]
Flooding has forced the evacuation of more than a quarter-million people in northern China along its border with North Korea, state media said Monday. Heavy rains over the last several days caused the Yalu river, which marks the border, to breach its banks, although the water level had started to fall late Sunday, the official [...]
Somali pirates who have been holding an Egyptian merchant ship since early August have demanded a $4 million ransom for the ship’s release, the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram reported on Sunday. The MV Suez cargo ship transporting a large batch of cement was seized by pirates in the Red Sea on August 2. The pirates took [...]
An 11-year-old albino girl from Swaziland was shot dead in front of her friends and then beheaded in what police believe was a ritual murder. The child had been washing clothes and bathing at a river with friends and was returning home when she was grabbed by a man wearing a balaclava. As her friends [...]
The young lovers didn’t stand a chance. In a desolate field on the edge of their village in northern Afghanistan, hundreds of men, stones in hand, closed in to carry out the mullah’s death sentence, handed down after the pair eloped against the wishes of their families. “It was an act of great cruelty,” said [...]
None of the alarms and only seven out of 43 surveillance cameras were working at a Cairo museum where a Vincent van Gogh painting was stolen, Egypt’s top prosecutor said Sunday. Thieves made off with the canvas, known by the titles of “Poppy Flowers” and “Vase with Flowers,” on Saturday from the Mahmoud Khalil Museum [...]
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Sunday inaugurated the country’s first domestically built unmanned bomber aircraft, calling it an “ambassador of death” to Iran’s enemies. The 4-meter-long drone aircraft can carry up to four cruise missiles and will have a range of 620 miles (1,000 kilometers), according to a state TV report – not far enough [...]
Afghan President Hamid Karzai confirmed Sunday that he engineered the release of a security official arrested on suspicion of corruption, bolstering the perception by many that he is unwilling to confront a major problem in his country. His comments on the ABC program “This Week” followed a statement by Karzai last week that he would [...]
Posters have sprouted up around Egypt promoting the son of President Hosni Mubarak as the country’s next leader, in the most overt campaign yet for a controversial father-son succession in this key U.S. Arab ally. For the last decade, it has been believed that Gamal Mubarak is being groomed to succeed his 82-year-old father, who has ruled [...]
Flooding has forced the evacuation of 94,000 people in the north China port city of Dandong after heavy rains caused the Yalu river to breach its banks, state media said Sunday. More rain was expected to pound the region, which borders North Korea, and threatened to trigger more flooding Sunday, the official Xinhua News Agency reported. [...]
Staring menacingly at the camera these exotic looking creatures look like monsters straight out of a horror film. But, despite their appearance, these creatures are actually jumping spiders, which measure a tiny six millimetres. The harmless arachnids, which are capable of jumping up to six times their own height, can be found in grassy meadows [...]
A painting by Vincent van Gogh, ‘Vase with Flowers’ valued at $50 Million, was seized at Cairo airport hours after being stolen from a museum for the second time. The work, which also goes by the name “Poppy Flowers”, vanished from the Mahmoud Khalil Museum on the banks of the River Nile in central Cairo. [...]
Donors have come forward with nearly $500 Million dollars to meet an emergency appeal for flood-hit Pakistan, with the United States, Saudi Arabia and Britain leading the way, figures showed Friday. The Financial Tracking Service, a UN database that aims to track all donations, showed late Friday that $490.7 Million dollars in funding has come [...]
Air strikes by the NATO-led force in Afghanistan accidentally killed at least three Afghan police in the country’s north and a woman and two children in the west, officials said on Saturday. Sensitivities about civilian casualties and “friendly fire” incidents have been running high as violence spreads across Afghanistan, reaching its worst levels since the [...]
Swedish authorities on Saturday issued an arrest warrant for Julian Assange, the founder of whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks. Karin Rosander, the Director of Communication for the Swedish Prosecution Authority, told reporters that the arrest warrant was issued in relation with two separate events. According to the office, one woman alleges Assange raped her while another woman [...]
More than 50,000 people have been evacuated after a swollen river flooded a city in northeastern China on Saturday, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported. Earlier reports said 10,000 people had been evacuated. Torrential rains caused flooding along the Yalu River that marks the border between China and North Korea. Floodwaters cut off transport and [...]
Iran has started loading fuel into its first Russian-built nuclear power plant. After decades of delay, engineers finally began loading the Russia-supplied fuel into the Bushehr plant in southern Iran on Saturday. The development is a major milestone in Iran’s atomic programme despite UN sanctions. The transfer took place under the scrutiny of International Atomic [...]
Though some say talk is cheap, one man’s cell phone conversation cost him his life. Gopal Gujjar, 23, was killed Wednesday in India while talking on a mobile phone that exploded, the Times of India reports. There were no witnesses, but Gujjar was believed to be mid-conversation when the accident occurred. Police found pieces of [...]
New Zealand conservation officials are planning another attempt to refloat at least 15 pilot whales that were part of a larger group that beached themselves early Friday. The country’s Department of Conservation said it got a distress call Friday morning from a person who spotted 73 beached whales stranded on Karikari Beach, a remote area [...]
Japan’s search for its centenarians has led to the discovery of the remains of a Tokyo woman who was thought to be 104 stuffed into her son’s backpack for nearly a decade. The discovery comes weeks after the discovery of the more than 30-year-old mummified corpse of a man who had been thought to be [...]
Jobs in Russia’s law enforcement sector are being bought by the mafia for more than $45,000 a time, such is the level of corruption, according to a new report. It warned that Russian law enforcement structures were increasingly intertwined with the country’s organized crime scene and said the most popular job to be bought and [...]
Russian tennis star Maria Sharapova was named the world’s highest-paid female athlete by Forbes magazine. Sharapova pulled in $24.5 million over the past year, she earned $1 million in prize money and the rest was derived from endorsements and appearance fees, Forbes said. Sharapova, 23, became an overnight tennis sensation at the age of 17 [...]
The Thai appeals court ruled on Friday to extradite Russian businessman Viktor Bout to the United States. Bout said he is ready to prove his innocence in front of a U.S. court. “Well, now we’ll just go to a U.S. court and win there instead,” Bout told RIA Novosti after the court had given its [...]
Bangladesh’s Supreme Court on Thursday sentenced an opposition-affiliated newspaper’s editor to six months in jail for contempt, in a case that has been condemned by an international press freedom group. Mahmudur Rahman, editor of the daily Amar Desh, was detained in June when the Awami League government, which swept to power in December 2008 elections, [...]
Russia’s security services are planning to create an “automated atlas” of the country’s many national languages – and aim to use the database to establish a reliable means of identifying phonecalls in languages other than Russian. A tender published on the FSB website offers 24 million roubles ($787,000) to a company capable of creating a [...]
Researchers working at the forefront of stem cell technology may also unexpectedly have come up with a cure for baldness. They almost miraculously changed one cell type into a completely different one, but in the process ended up with skin cells complete with working hair follicles. A treatment for baldness was not the goal when [...]
Police in the Philippines have relieved 11 officers of duty after the release of video footage showing the apparent torture a naked detainee. The torturer, allegedly a police commander in Manila, shouts insults as his victim screams in pain as a rope tied around his genitals is pulled. The victim is believed to be a [...]
More than one million South African state workers have gone on strike to press for an increase in pay, a move that threatens to paralyse Africa’s biggest economy. Schools were closed early on Wednesday as teachers left for meetings to discuss the walkout, while workers dressed in red T-shirts gathered outside hospitals and government offices. “The [...]
Fossils from Australia show animal life on Earth began at least 650 million years ago, 70 million years earlier than previous estimates, Princeton University scientists report. Princeton geosciences professor Adam Maloof and graduate student Catherine Rose came upon the fossils while researching a massive ice age, known as the “snowball effect,” that left much of [...]
Suspected rebels hacked to death three Indian UN peacekeepers in their camp in Kirumba, in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, the army said Wednesday. “A group of FDLR (Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda) or Mai-Mai (Congolese militia) penetrated the camp at Kirumba,” General Vainqueur Mayala, commander of the 8th military region of [...]
A role reversal comedy shown on Saudi television in which a woman marries four husbands has hit the very nerve it satirised – male pride and double standards. The comedy was an episode in Saudi Arabia’s most celebrated satirical series, Tash Ma Tash or No Big Deal, a take-off of social prejudices shown annually during [...]
A North Korean aircraft, thought to be a fighter jet, has reportedly crashed in China, amid speculation its pilot may have been trying to defect to Russia. South Korea’s Yonhap news agency, citing intelligence sources, said the aircraft appeared to be a Soviet-era North Korean fighter jet and that the pilot had been killed following [...]
Russia’s military presence in Armenia will be extended by another 24 years, the Armenian foreign minister said on Wednesday. The term of a 1995 bilateral treaty on the Russian military base in Gyumri, northern Armenia, will be extended from 25 to 49 years, Eduard Nalbandyan said. Under the amendments to the treaty, to be signed [...]
Russia and Nicaragua signed on Tuesday an agreement on the supply of 250 Russian buses to the Latin American country as part of gratuitous aid program. Russia has already donated 130 buses to improve public transportation in Nicaragua under an agreement signed during a visit of Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega to Moscow in 2008. The [...]
Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency, Rosaviatsiya, may impose restrictions on flights or even cancel the air operator licenses of 42 percent of the country’s airlines, including over a third of the country’s leading operators, due to their weak financial situation, Kommersant business daily said on Wednesday. Kommersant quoted the transport agency statement saying that companies [...]
How can we process the idea of 20 million people left homeless and six million facing immanent starvation, with little or no locally produced food available for at least the next two years? How do you quantify feeding and housing 20,000,000 people – the seven zeros make the sheer scope of the disaster far more [...]
Turkish authorities have detained American activist and freelance journalist Jake Hess in the southeastern, predominantly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir. At a court appearance Sunday, a prosecutor charged Hess with “taking orders from a terrorist organization” and called for his immediate deportation from Turkey, witnesses said. Turkish officialdom regularly refers to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or [...]
We’ve all splashed water over our face in a bid to wake up in the morning. But one Australian man has taken it to the extreme. Standing perilously close to the edge of a rock face, the fearless individual stood head-on with Mother Nature as she threw giant whitewater waves over Ben Buckler headland North [...]
A surfer has died after being attacked by a shark on a west Australian beach close to the popular tourist region of Margaret River. The 31-year-old man was attacked while surfing alone at about 8.15am. Witnesses said that the shark “tore his leg to shreds”. “We have just had confirmation that a male has died. [...]
Three newborn babies have been killed in a Romanian maternity ward by an explosion caused by an electrical fault. Eight babies were also severely burned in the explosion following a glitch in the hospital’s air-conditioning system. “It’s very sad. Three babies in the intensive care department at the Giulesti maternity ward (in Bucharest) have died,” [...]
The World Bank has agreed to provide a $900 million loan to flood-hit Pakistan, saying the economic impact of the disaster on the country’s economy is expected to be “huge.” The funding will come from the International Development Association, the World Bank’s arm for low-income countries, a bank statement said on Monday. “The government of [...]
A homicide bomber blew himself up Tuesday among dozens of Iraqi army recruits who had gathered near a military headquarters in downtown Baghdad in a devastating strike that officials said killed 51 people and wounded 119. The massive morning blast took place just outside the former Iraqi Ministry of Defense building that now houses the [...]
A teenage American has been arrested on suspicion of killing his mother in a tourist resort in western India, police said Monday. The woman, identified as Cindy Iannarelli, of Cecil, Pennsylvania, was found with her throat slit at the resort in the historic town of Osian in Rajasthan state last Thursday. Police superintendent Girdhari Lal [...]
A former Israeli soldier posted photos on Facebook of herself in uniform smiling beside bound and blindfolded Palestinian prisoners, drawing sharp criticism from the Israeli military and Palestinian officials. In one photo, she is sitting with her legs crossed beside a blindfolded Palestinian man who is slumped against a concrete barrier. His face is turned [...]
Research In Motion (RIM) has assured Indian authorities of limited access to its Messenger services by September 1 and will hold talks this week on giving access to enterprise mail, a government source said on Monday. RIM faces an August 31 deadline to give Indian authorities the means to read e-mail and instant messages sent [...]
A Moscow court extended on Monday the custody of former Yukos head Mikhail Khodorkovsky and his business partner Platon Lebedev for another three months. Both businessmen are already serving eight-year sentences for fraud and tax evasion. They are now accused of stealing $9.6 billion from the $15.8 billion profit generated by Yukos between 1999 and [...]
A senior Romanian diplomat who was detained in Moscow while trying to obtain military secrets from a Russian national has been declared persona non grata and ordered to leave the country within 48 hours, the Federal Security Service (FSB) said on Monday. The FSB has identified the alleged spy as Gabriel Grecu, first secretary of [...]
A religion-obsessed Russian tycoon has ordered his employees to quickly embrace the Russian Orthodox Church or lose their jobs. Vasily Boiko-The Great, who controls a major agricultural holding, has written to his 6,500 employees, ordering those “living in sin” to get married in church within two months or be fired. The deadline, 14 October, is [...]
The wife of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pleaded that 400 children of migrant workers be allowed to stay in the country, wading into a debate which has sparked intense interest in the country. Sara Netanyahu’s appeal was snubbed by Israel’s interior minister, an ultra-Orthodox Jew who advocates whittling down the number of foreign [...]
A man and woman have been stoned to death in northern Afghanistan after being accused by the Taliban of having an affair, a witness and an official said Monday. The 23-year-old woman and 28-year-old man were killed because “they had an affair,” said Mohammad Ayob, the governor of Imam Sahib district in Kunduz province. “Two [...]
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Sunday he has never seen anything like the flood disaster in Pakistan after surveying the devastation and urged foreign donors to speed up assistance to the 20 million people affected. Ban’s comments reflect the concern of the international community about the unfolding disaster in Pakistan, which is battling al-Qaida and [...]
Just as it did in 2004, the 92nd PGA Championship came down to the treacherous 18th hole. This time it included a bizarre ruling that won’t soon be forgotten. In a three-hole playoff that went from three men to two before it began, Martin Kaymer beat Bubba Watson with a bogey on 18 in extended [...]
The Israeli military on Sunday began dismantling a concrete barrier that protected residents of a once-troubled district on the edge of Jerusalem from Palestinian sniper fire. At the height of the second intifada, the violent Palestinian uprising that broke out in 2000, the barrier’s tall concrete blocks had shielded the residents of Gilo, most of [...]
After three decades of spectacular growth, China passed Japan in the second quarter to become the world’s second-largest economy behind the United States, according to government figures released early Monday. The milestone, though anticipated for some time, is the most striking evidence yet that China’s ascendance is for real and that the rest of the [...]
Men were digging through an earthen embankment on Sunday on the outskirts of the Pakistani town of Jacobabad hoping to drain away steadily rising flood waters. Three quarters of Jacobabad’s 300,000 people have already fled for dry ground, fearing the town would soon be swamped. More than two weeks after devastating floods first hit the [...]
The humanitarian and economic disaster caused by the worst floods in Pakistan’s history could spark political unrest that could destabilize the government, dealing a major blow to the Obama administration’s efforts to fight violent Islamic extremism. The government’s shambling response to floods that have affected a third of the country has some analysts saying that [...]
Bangladesh Anthrax Spreads, Public PanicsTop Police Official In Siberia Accused Of Taking $450,000 In BribesRussian Banker Shot Dead In MoscowRussian Performers Drop Fish-Eating Circus ActTaliban Chief Says Victory ImminentNorth Korea Marks 62nd Founding DayFear Of Fresh Violence In NigeriaRachel Corrie Trial: During War There Are No Civilians
Egypt’s Leprosy Colony Lives On, VIDEOUS Soldiers ‘Kept Afghan Body Parts’China’s Blind Activist Lawyer Released From Prison
9th Circuit Throws Out CIA Torture Lawsuit For National Security Reasons
Mexican Mayor Gunned Down Inside Own OfficeGiant Rats Put Noses To Work On Africa’s Land Mine Epidemic
Fidel: ‘Cuban Model Doesn’t Even Work For Us Anymore’
Vitamin B Halts Memory Loss In Breakthrough British Trial
Bremner: ‘I Represent Seattle Police, You Can’t Arrest Me’Russian Rokot Carrier With Three Satellites Blasts Off From Plesetsk Space CenterPolice In Kamchatka Seize Poached Caviar Worth $1 Million
Europe Raids File-Sharing Groups Including SwedenKabul Bank Freezes Assets of Directors And Major BorrowersMeeting The Taliban In Baghlan, VIDEOUnited Nations ‘Failed’ Congo Rape Victims
California Regulators Seek Up To $9.9 Billion In Fines From PacifiCare
18 Murdered In Shoe Factory Shooting In Honduras
The Amazing World Of The Praying Mantis
9/11 Koran Burning Would Put US Troops’ In Danger, Petraeus Warns
Dozens Of Homes Burn Across Detroit, VIDEO
John Lennon’s Killer Denied Parole For The 6th Time
Belize Mob Torches Americans’ Animal Sanctuary
Pastor Wonders If It’s Wise To Burn Qurans Amid U.S. Warnings, VIDEO
Italian Crime Fighting Mayor Is Killed In Mafia-Style Execution
With A Little Help From My FriendsIn Russia, No Kasha Creates Political TensionThieves Steal 3 Ancient Icons From Moscow Region Church
George Soros Donates $100 Million To Human Rights WatchCongolese Poachers Destroy Protected Birds
French Unions Stage Nationwide Strike
Oracle Hires Former HP’s Mark Hurd
LAPD Kills Unarmed Migrant, Community Protests
El Salvador: 3rd Migrant Survived Mexico Massacre
Mexican Soldiers Open Fire On Family’s Car At Checkpoint, Killing 15-Year-Old And Father
U.S. Considers Boosting Funds For Mexico Drug War
California’s Union Jobs Take Hit From RecessionIsraeli Minister: Speed Up Building, A Promise Is A Promise
Miners Seeking Gold Destroy Suriname Ecosystem
Little Rock Nine Member, Jefferson ThomasPutin Compares Himself To Roosevelt As He Hints At Third Term
Condoleezza Rice ‘Ordered Bush To Stay Out Of Washington’ After 9/11
Stone Mason Sparks Cathedral Row With ‘Muslim’ Gargoyle
John Travolta Drops Charges In Extortion Case150 Arrested In Mozambique Following Deadly Protests
U.S. Investors Sue For Payback For Pre-World War II German BondsSaad al-Hariri Retracts Charge That Syria Killed His FatherNorth Korea Plans Succession MeetingThe Arrest And Trial Of Human Rights Activist Shiva Nazar-Ahari
Arsenic Scare Hits Argentina, VIDEO
President Obama Unveils $50 Billion Infrastructure Plan
Cockroach Immune To Deadly Super-Bacteria
Gulf Residents Test Positive For Oil In Blood
