| | |
| Tropical Storm Sonia weakens near Mexico's Pacific coast Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 07:32 PM PST Tropical Storm Sonia weakened as it approached the Pacific coast of Mexico on Sunday, but threatened heavy rains over swaths of western Mexico that have experienced major flooding over the past couple of months. Sonia was churning 115 miles east of the southern tip of the Baja California peninsula and the center of the storm was expected to reach the mainland coast early on Monday, the Miami-based U.S. National Hurricane Center said in its latest advisory. The storm was expected to weaken rapidly after making landfall and dissipate over Mexico on Monday afternoon, it added. Sonia was expected to produce rainfall of 3 to 10 inches in both Sinaloa and Durango states, the NHC said. Full Story | Top |
| China sends graft busters to more provinces, government departments Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 07:07 PM PST China has sent anti-corruption investigators to six more provinces and four government departments, the Chinese Communist Party's corruption watchdog said on Monday, in the government's latest move to tackle graft. The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection has dispatched inspectors to government departments that include official news agency Xinhua and the Commerce Ministry, the watchdog said in a statement on its website. Since taking office in March, Chinese President Xi Jinping has called corruption a threat to the ruling Communist Party's survival and vowed to go after powerful "tigers" as well as lowly "flies". These investigations are unrelated to this new round of probes, or the previous one, which began in May. The May probes, which lasted through the summer and reported back in September, targeted five regions and five departments, including the poor southern province of Guizhou, the southeastern province of Jiangxi and coal-rich Inner Mongolia, as well as the state-owned China Grain Reserves Corporation and the China Publishing Group Corp. The party has so far given few details of the outcome of the first round of investigations, in line with its secretive nature, though the anti-corruption watchdog publishes website reports of a steady stream of minor officials being probed. Full Story | Top |
| Eight dead after plane crashes in northern Bolivia: hospital Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 05:01 PM PST  A Bolivian plane carrying 18 people crashed on Sunday while trying to land during bad weather in the north of the Andean country, killing eight passengers and injuring the others on board, the director of a local hospital told Reuters. Heavy rain was falling as the small turboprop plane operated by local airline Aerocon tried to land in Riberalta, in Beni department near the Brazilian border, according to witnesses. President Evo Morales said he had ordered "a deep investigation" into the accident and "drastic sanctions on the company." (Reporting by Daniel Ramos; Full Story | Top |
| Toronto mayor urges police to release video, apologizes for 'mistakes' Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 03:18 PM PST  By Jeffrey Hodgson TORONTO (Reuters) - Toronto Mayor Rob Ford on Sunday urged his police chief to release a video that media reports say show him smoking what appears to be crack cocaine and issued a broad apology for mistakes in his past, including public drunkenness. But Ford, who previously said he does not use crack, said he could not discuss the content of the video until he had seen it. "Whatever this video shows ... Toronto residents deserve to see it, and people need to judge for themselves what they see on this video," Ford said on his weekly radio show. Full Story | Top |
| China reform checklist: How to tell that this time it's for real? Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 03:08 PM PST  By Tomasz Janowski TOKYO (Reuters) - The message from Beijing could not be clearer: China needs to shift to a more balanced economy that is socially and environmentally sustainable. That was the conclusion of a key Communist Party meeting a decade ago, yet what followed was more of the same: rapid investment-led expansion, which turned China into the world's no.2 economy, but left it laden with debt, environmental damage and excess capacity. Fast forward to 2013 and China's new leadership is again promising more harmonious development and the question is how to tell whether, this time, it is for real. One encouraging sign suggesting that President Xi Jinping, Premier Li Keqiang and their team mean business is their greater tolerance for slower economic growth while they carry out reforms. Full Story | Top |
| World Bank urges better cookstoves in developing states to curb deaths Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 03:04 PM PST  By Environment Correspondent Alister Doyle OSLO (Reuters) - (Release at 2301 GMT, Sunday Nov 3) Simple measures to reduce pollution from cooking stoves in developing nations could save a million lives a year and help slow global warming, a World Bank study showed on Monday. The study called for tough limits on pollution from methane and soot, which can settle on snow and ice and hasten a thaw by darkening the surface, in everything from cooking and heating to mining and flaring by the oil and gas industry. "The damage from indoor cooking smoke alone is horrendous - every year, four million people die from exposure to the smoke," World Bank President Jim Yong Kim said in a statement of the study "on Thin Ice: How Cutting Pollution can Slow Warming and Save Lives." Many people in developing nations cook on open fires with wood or coal, exposing people - mainly women and children - to fumes that cause everything from respiratory problems to heart disease. "If more clean cook-stoves - stoves that use less or cleaner fuel - would be used it could save one million lives," the report said of the annual benefits. Full Story | Top |
| Kerry sees signs Egypt moving back towards democracy Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 02:14 PM PST  By Lesley Wroughton and Shaimaa Fayed CAIRO (Reuters) - A day before Egypt's deposed Islamist president goes on trial, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Sunday expressed guarded optimism about a return to democracy in the country during a tour partly aimed at easing tensions with major Arab powers. On his first visit to Egypt since the army removed president Mohamed Mursi in July, Kerry called for fair, transparent trials for all citizens. However, he described Cairo as a vital partner to the United States and the region, as he tried to repair relations hurt by a partial freeze in U.S. aid. Kerry said the relationship between the United States and Egypt should not be defined by aid but by a partnership, and promised to launch talks on a U.S.-Egypt strategic dialogue. Full Story | Top |
| Newsmaker: Egypt's Mursi faces trial after short taste of power Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 02:14 PM PST By Michael Georgy CAIRO (Reuters) - When Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohamed Mursi broke out of an Egyptian jail during Hosni Mubarak's final days in office in 2011, he little thought he would end up behind bars again. After decades of repression under Egyptian autocrats, the Muslim Brotherhood won every election since a popular uprising toppled Mubarak in 2011, eventually propelling Mursi to power. Mursi promised a moderate Islamist agenda to steer Egypt into a new democratic era where autocracy would be replaced by transparent government that respected human rights and revived the fortunes of a powerful Arab state long in decline. The stocky, bespectacled Mursi told Egyptians he would deliver an "Egyptian renaissance with an Islamic foundation". Full Story | Top |
| East Libya movement launches government, challenges Tripoli Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 01:59 PM PST By Ayman Warfalli and Ghaith Shennib BENGHAZI/TRIPOLI, Libya (Reuters) - Leaders of an autonomy movement in Libya's oil-rich east unilaterally declared a regional government on Sunday, in a challenge to the weak central government as new violence erupted in the restive region. The announcement is a symbolic blow to efforts by the Tripoli government to reopen eastern oil ports and fields blocked since summer by militias and tribes demanding a greater share of power and oil wealth. Lawlessness has blighted large areas of the OPEC producer since the 2011 war that toppled Muammar Gaddafi. The government has been unable to rein in militia groups, armed tribes and radical Islamists. Full Story | Top |
| In China's Xinjiang, poverty, exclusion are greater threat than Islam Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 01:16 PM PST  By Michael Martina URUMQI, China (Reuters) - In the dirty backstreets of the Uighur old quarter of Xinjiang's capital Urumqi in China's far west, Abuduwahapu frowns when asked what he thinks is the root cause of the region's festering problem with violence and unrest. So they don't really understand each other," he said, referring to the Muslim religion the Turkic-speaking Uighur people follow, in contrast to the official atheism of the ruling Communist Party. But for the teenage bread delivery boy, it's not Islam that's driving people to commit acts of violence, such as last week's deadly car crash in Beijing's Tiananmen Square - blamed by the government on Uighur Islamist extremists who want independence. Mostly, those who support it are unsatisfied because they are poor," said Abuduwahapu, who came to Urumqi two years ago from the heavily Uighur old Silk Road city of Kashgar in Xinjiang's southwest, near the Pakistani and Afghan border. Full Story | Top |
| Another Canadian freight train derails in Alberta, no injuries Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 01:14 PM PST By Jeffrey Hodgson TORONTO (Reuters) - A Canadian National Railway Co train carrying lumber and sulfur dioxide derailed in the Western Canadian province of Alberta on Sunday, but there were no injuries or spills of dangerous goods, a spokesman for the railway said. And Sunday's derailment comes just two weeks after another Canadian National Railway train carrying crude oil and liquefied petroleum gas derailed and caught fire in Alberta. The train that derailed on Sunday was traveling eastbound near the hamlet of Peers, Alberta, which is about 110 miles from the provincial capital of Edmonton, when 13 freight cars went off the tracks at about 1 a.m. local time. Twelve of the cars were carrying lumber, the railway said, while one was a dangerous-goods tanker car carry sulfur dioxide, a toxic gas. Full Story | Top |
| India throws rings of protection around divisive candidate Modi Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 01:10 PM PST  By Sanjeev Miglani NEW DELHI (Reuters) - - Indian security forces are preparing for one of their most challenging assignments in decades, protecting prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi in a country with a grim history of political assassinations. A series of small bombs killed six people at a rally the Hindu nationalist leader held in the city of Patna on October 20. Authorities said the home-grown Indian Mujahideen (IM) group was responsible. While Modi was not in the immediate vicinity of the explosions, the message was clear. Full Story | Top |
| Less sin, more Shrek in Macau as China takes aim in corruption fight Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 01:05 PM PST  Xie Xiaoqing, chairman of Rongzhong Group, was sued in January for failing to repay the money to Sands China Ltd, U.S. billionaire Sheldon Adelson's Macau gambling unit. For many years, politically linked tycoons and government officials were frequently spotted betting millions in the southern Chinese city's lavish VIP rooms. But their numbers have dwindled because of an anti-corruption campaign led by China's new leader Xi Jinping. Just a few years ago, that might have devastated Macau, which typically generated 70 percent of its revenues from high rollers including wealthy government officials. Full Story | Top |
| Insight: Won for the money: North Korea experiments with exchange rates Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 01:02 PM PST  By James Pearson SEOUL (Reuters) - In a dimly-lit Pyongyang toyshop packed with Mickey Mouse picture frames and plastic handguns, a basketball sells for 46,000 Korean People's Won - close to $500 at North Korea's centrally planned exchange rate. Luckily, for young North Koreans looking to shoot hoops with Dennis Rodman, the new friend of leader Kim Jong Un, the Chinese-made ball actually costs a little less than $6 based on black market rates. Once reserved for official exchange only in zones aimed at attracting foreign investment, and in illegal underground market deals elsewhere, black market rates are being used more frequently and openly in North Korean cities. Publicly advertised prices at rates close to the market rate - around 8,000 won to the dollar versus the official rate of 96 - could signal Pyongyang is trying to marketise its centrally planned economy and allow a burgeoning "grey market" to thrive. Full Story | Top |
| Tropical Storm Sonia draws closer to Mexico's Pacific coast Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 12:59 PM PST Tropical Storm Sonia picked up speed as it took aim at the Pacific coast of Mexico on Sunday, threatening intense rains over a large portion of western Mexico that experienced major flooding over the past couple of months. Sonia was churning 115 miles south of the resort city of Los Cabos at the southern tip of the Baja California peninsula and was expected to approach the mainland coast Sunday night or early Monday, the Miami-based U.S. National Hurricane Center said in its latest advisory. Sonia is expected to produce rainfall of 3 to 10 inches in both Sinaloa and Durango states, the NHC said. Mexico's national water commission said heavy rains could extend to seven other western and northern states. Full Story | Top |
| Suspected L.A. airport gunman planned 'suicide' mission: congressman Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 12:41 PM PST  The suspected gunman in last week's deadly attack at Los Angeles International Airport wrote a note saying he intended to die after killing at least one security officer, the chairman of a key U.S. security committee said on Sunday. Twenty-three-year-old Paul Anthony Ciancia also discussed weaknesses in airport security in the "suicide" note before Friday's attack, Michael McCaul, the Republican chair of the House Committee on Homeland Security told CNN. Ciancia is accused of shooting dead a Transportation Security Administration officer, the first employee from the agency to die in the line of duty since it was created after the September 11 attacks in 2001. Airport police shot and wounded the gunman, ending the rampage. Full Story | Top |
| Swiss Finance Minister wants banks to boost leverage ratios: paper Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 12:16 PM PST  Swiss banks should be subject to higher leverage ratio requirements, Swiss Finance Minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf was quoted as saying on Sunday. Under Basel III, banks will be subject to a leverage ratio requiring them to hold capital equivalent to at least 3 percent of their total non risk-weighted assets. Authorities have been grappling since the collapse of U.S. investment bank Lehman Brothers five years ago with the question of how banks regarded as systemically important, or too-big-to-fail, can be recapitalized without causing panic or needing taxpayer cash. But they must be organized so that the state does not end up being liable." After Switzerland's biggest bank UBS had to be bailed out by the government in 2008, Swiss regulators have implemented tough new capital requirements for banks that go beyond the Basel III rules, which were laid out by a committee of banking supervisors from nearly 30 countries. Full Story | Top |
| UK response to Snowden data 'imperils press freedom': rights groups Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 11:49 AM PST  The British government's response to leaks of intelligence information by former U.S. spy agency contractor Edward Snowden has eroded human rights and press freedoms, rights groups said on Sunday. In an open letter to Prime Minister David Cameron published in Britain's Guardian newspaper, 70 different press advocacy and rights groups from 40 countries said they were alarmed at the way his government had reacted, saying it had invoked national security legislation to try to suppress information of public interest. "We believe that the United Kingdom government's response ... is eroding fundamental human rights in the country. Full Story | Top |
| South African mob burns, stones five to death in vigilante riot Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 11:26 AM PST Five alleged criminals including a witch doctor were killed by an enraged South African mob in a township on Sunday, police said, the latest act of vigilantism in a country plagued with high rates of violent crime. Another township in the area, Bekkersdal, has been the scene of periodic riots the past few weeks by residents angry at the failure of the local government to provide services such as garbage collection, an ominous sign for the ruling African National Congress ahead of general elections next year. They first attacked a 61-year-old traditional healer or witch doctor, setting his house alight and burning him to death. Two young men who the police said belonged to a criminal grouping known as the "Casanova Gang" were then set upon and also burnt to death. Full Story | Top |
| France says its journalists "coldly assassinated" in Mali Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 10:21 AM PST  By John Irish and Adama Diarra PARIS/BAMAKO (Reuters) - France said on Sunday two French journalists found dead in the northern Mali region of Kidal had been "coldly assassinated" by militants and vowed to step up security measures in the area. Radio journalists Claude Verlon and Ghislaine Dupont were abducted after interviewing a member of the MNLA Tuareg separatist group in northern Mali. Their bodies were found on Saturday by a French patrol 12 km (8 miles) outside Kidal, the birthplace of a Tuareg uprising last year that plunged Mali into chaos, leading to a coup in the capital Bamako and the occupation of the northern half of the country by militants linked to al Qaeda. Adama Kamissoko, the governor of Kidal region, said French and Malian security officials were jointly investigating the attack, but French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius put the blame firmly on militants operating in the region. Full Story | Top |
| Syria opposition says no to peace talks without clear timeframe for Assad exit Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 10:08 AM PST Syrian National Coalition President Ahmad Jarba said on Sunday the opposition would not attend proposed peace talks in Geneva unless there was a clear timeframe for President Bashar al-Assad to leave power. "We have decided not to enter Geneva talks unless it is with dignity, and unless there is a successful transfer of power with a specific timeframe, and without the occupier Iran at the negotiating table," Jarba told an Arab League emergency meeting in Cairo. Jarba's latest comments throw the proposed talks into further confusion. The United Nations envoy to Syria has said there would be no pre-conditions for the long-delayed peace talks. Full Story | Top |
| Berlin prosecutors investigate ex-Merkel ally who joined Daimler Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 09:58 AM PST Berlin prosecutors are investigating ex-German state minister Eckart von Klaeden over a potential conflict of interest after Chancellor Angela Merkel's former ally joined carmaker Daimler as a lobbyist, a spokeswoman for the prosecutors confirmed on Sunday after a media report. Daimler said it had no doubts about Klaeden's integrity. Klaeden, a former treasurer of Merkel's Christian Democrats who spent the last four years in a senior chancellery role, said in May that he would quit the government after Germany's September 22 national elections to take up the position of chief political lobbyist at Daimler. Germany last month blocked an agreement among EU member states to cap car emissions, arguing the plan would cost jobs and hurt its premium carmakers Mercedes of parent Daimler, BMW and Audi. Full Story | Top |
| Kosovo vote, key to Serb integration, marred by violence, boycott Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 09:55 AM PST  By Aleksandar Vasovic MITROVICA, Kosovo (Reuters) - An election in Kosovo designed to help end years of de facto ethnic partition was marred by violence and intimidation by Serb hardliners on Sunday, undermining a fragile EU-brokered pact between the Balkan country and former master Serbia. Two hours before polls closed in the ethnically-divided town of Mitrovica, a volatile Serb pocket of northern Kosovo, masked men burst into three schools housing polling stations on the Serb side, lobbing tear gas and smashing ballot boxes. Participation of the north Kosovo Serbs in the Kosovo-wide council and mayoral elections is central to an agreement reached in April to integrate the 40,000-50,000 Serbs living there with the rest of Kosovo, which is majority Albanian and declared independence from Serbia in 2008. Serbia had called on Serbs in northern Kosovo to take part for the first time, with the EU holding out the prospect of membership talks - slated to begin in January - as a reward for Belgrade's support for the process. Full Story | Top |
| Syrian army and allies push into southern Damascus: activists Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 09:08 AM PST  By Khaled Yacoub Oweis AMMAN (Reuters) - Syrian army and Shi'ite Muslim fighters attacked Sunni rebel areas in southern Damascus on Sunday in an offensive aimed at breaking resistance to President Bashar al-Assad around the capital, activists said. Militia from Iran and Iraq and the Lebanese Shi'ite group Hezbollah, who overran two southern suburbs last month, are looking to build up their advances by capturing opposition districts closer to the center of Damascus, the sources said. Fighters from the al-Qaeda linked al-Nusra Front and the Islamic State for Iraq and the Levant, which is heavily comprised of foreign jihadists, have joined Islamist rebel brigades and Free Syrian Army units in close quarters fighting around the district of Hajar al-Aswad. It is one of a series of Sunni districts on the edge of Damascus at the forefront of the uprising against Assad, who belongs to the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam that has dominated Syria since the 1960s. Full Story | Top |
| Bahrain charges top opposition leader Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 09:05 AM PST  Bahrain's public prosecutor has charged the head of the main Shi'ite opposition group with insulting the interior ministry, state news agency BNA said on Sunday, in a move that could further unsettle the Gulf island state. Sheikh Ali Salman, secretary-general of the al-Wefaq Islamic Association, was the most senior opposition figure charged since majority Shi'ites began protests in 2011 to demand political reform and a greater role in running the country. The U.S. Fifth Fleet is based in Bahrain, a key regional ally of the West, which is ruled by the Sunni Muslim Al-Khalifa dynasty. Minister of State for Information Affairs Samira Rajab said the Wefaq leader was suspected of "denigrating and disparaging the interior ministry" by alleging human rights violations by the police against protesters. Full Story | Top |
| Masked men attack Kosovo polling station, throw tear gas Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 08:51 AM PST MITROVICA, Kosovo (Reuters) - Masked men burst into the main polling center in the Kosovo town of Mitrovica on Sunday, throwing tear gas and smashing ballot boxes during an election that the West hopes will help integrate Serbs and Albanians, witnesses said. The Sveti Sava school where the attack took place houses around half the polling stations on the Serb side of the ethnically-divided town. ... Full Story | Top |
| Britain scraps immigration bond plan after outcry, coalition split Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 08:50 AM PST  By Andrew Osborn LONDON (Reuters) - Britain has scrapped a plan to force people from certain African and Asian countries to pay a cash bond in return for a visitor's visa after it caused an outcry at home and abroad and exposed a rift in the governing coalition. In a move that political rivals said showed Prime Minister David Cameron's flagship immigration policy was in disarray, a government spokesman said a pilot scheme which had been due to start this month had been canceled. Under the plan, visitors from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nigeria and Ghana seeking a six-month British visa would have been obliged to pay a refundable 3,000-pound ($4,800) cash bond to deter them from overstaying. The government chose those countries because they were "high risk" sources of illegal immigration, it said. Full Story | Top |
| Mursi to go on trial as Egypt struggles for democracy Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 08:41 AM PST  By Michael Georgy CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's first freely elected president, Mohamed Mursi, goes on trial on Monday under a security crackdown that has devastated his Muslim Brotherhood movement and raised concerns that the army-backed government is reimposing a police state. Mursi, who was ousted by the army on July 3 after mass protests against his rule, is due to appear in court at the same Cairo police academy where autocrat Hosni Mubarak also faces trial following his own overthrow in 2011. However, the generals are back in charge, to the dismay of Western allies who hoped Egypt's experiment with democracy would be smooth. Mursi, who has been held in secret location since his removal after only a year in office, is due to appear along with 14 other senior Muslim Brotherhood figures on charges of inciting violence. Full Story | Top |
| Hungarian far-right sparks protests as it commemorates wartime leader Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 08:38 AM PST  By Marton Dunai BUDAPEST (Reuters) - Hungary's far-right Jobbik party unveiled a statue of wartime leader Miklos Horthy, who presided over the country's alliance with Nazi Germany, in Budapest on Sunday, sparking protests and highlighting concerns about anti-Semitism in the country. About a thousand Hungarians took to the streets of the capital to denounce the statue while the mayor of central Budapest and parliamentary leader of the ruling Fidesz party, Antal Rogan, warned the bust would provide an excuse to paint an unfair picture of extremism in Hungary. Jobbik has stoked anti-semitism in the country, vilifying Jews and Israel in speeches in parliament, where it is the third-biggest party. One of the organizers of Sunday's ceremony was Jobbik's deputy parliament group leader Marton Gyongyosi, who sparked outrage last year when he called for lists of people in Hungary with Jewish ancestry to be drawn up. Full Story | Top |
| Congo's M23 rebels declare ceasefire but shelling continues Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 08:31 AM PST  By Kenny Katombe RUNYONI, Democratic Republic of Congo (Reuters) - Congo's M23 rebels declared a ceasefire on Sunday after a string of defeats by government forces, but clashes with the Congolese army continued in the steep, forested hills to where the rebels have withdrawn. The army has in recent weeks driven rebels from towns they had occupied across eastern Congo, making mediators optimistic for a deal to end the conflict, the most serious since a major Congolese war ended a decade ago. Uganda, which has led attempts to end the rebellion, has called for both sides to stop fighting. A spokesman for Congo's government called the rebel statement "a step in the right direction" but said it was waiting to see if the ceasefire was implemented on the ground. Full Story | Top |
| Israel issues tenders for more settler homes ahead of Kerry visit Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 08:30 AM PST  Israel issued tenders for construction of more than 1,700 new homes for Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank on Sunday, moving ahead with projects opposed by the United States and others ahead of a visit by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry. The plots being advertised are in nine settlements in areas Israel says it intends to keep in any peace deal with the Palestinians. They are part of the 3,500 settler homes whose planned construction Israel announced on Wednesday when it released 26 Palestinian prisoners, a government official said. "The tender bidding process should take between two to three months and contractors could begin to build after about a year," a Housing Ministry spokesman said about the tenders for 1,729 dwellings published on a government website. Full Story | Top |
| Scores missing after boat sinks off Myanmar coast Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 08:20 AM PST By Jared Ferrie YANGON (Reuters) - Around 50 members of a Muslim minority in Myanmar are feared drowned after trying to flee Rakhine state in a boat that sank in the early hours of Sunday, according to a community leader and a security official. Rohingya have been leaving Myanmar in droves since clashes with ethnic Rakhine Buddhists, who make up the majority of the state's population, erupted in June and October 2012. The government said at least 192 people died in the violence and the United Nations says about 140,000 people remain in camps. ... Full Story | Top |
| Parasite depletes wild shrimp haul off southeast Atlantic coast Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 07:37 AM PST  By Harriet McLeod CHARLESTON, South Carolina (Reuters) - Wild shrimp hauls off the southern Atlantic coast have plunged in recent months as a parasite has made it harder for the creatures to breathe, according to state wildlife officials in Georgia and South Carolina. Experts said they believe black gill disease, caused by a tiny parasite, contributed to a die-off of white shrimp between August and October, typically the prime catch season. "It's like the shrimp are smoking three packs of cigarettes a day, and now they're having to go run a marathon," said Mel Bell, director of South Carolina's Office of Fisheries Management. "Shrimpers are reporting to us that they dump the bag on the deck, and the shrimp are just dead." South Carolina shrimpers hauled in 44,000 pounds of shrimp in September, less than 6 percent of the September, 2012 catch of more than 750,000 pounds, Bell said. Full Story | Top |
| Russia's Putin approves tougher anti-terrorism laws as Sochi games loom Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 07:35 AM PST  President Vladimir Putin has signed off on tougher anti-terrorism laws ahead of the 2014 Winter Olympics that could oblige relatives to pay for any damage caused by militants fighting a separatist campaign in southern Russia. The February games will take place around the Black Sea resort of Sochi, a few hundred kilometers (miles) from the mountainous North Caucasus region where rebels are fighting to carve out an Islamic state. Moscow has cracked down on the Islamist insurgency in Dagestan, the epicenter of North Caucasus violence. "Compensation for damage...caused as a result of a terrorist act is covered... with the means of the person that committed a terrorist act, and also the means of close relatives, relatives and close acquaintances if... they obtained money, valuables and other property as a result of terrorist activity," the law also says. Full Story | Top |
| Greek retail workers protest Sunday shopping rules Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 06:44 AM PST  After opposition from small retailers and the Orthodox Church, the government has backed away from allowing retailers to trade on any Sunday. But the government says more Sunday shopping would boost retail sales in a country struggling to pull itself out of a six-year recession deepened by austerity measures and record unemployment. Full Story | Top |
| Hackers deface dozens of websites in Australia, Philippines Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 06:19 AM PST By Manuel Mogato and Randy Fabi MANILA/JAKARTA (Reuters) - Hackers claiming links to international activist group Anonymous defaced dozens of websites belonging to Australian businesses and Philippine government agencies on Sunday. A group calling itself Anonymous Indonesia posted on Twitter a list of more than 100 Australian sites it had hacked, saying the action was in response to reports of spying by Australia. The websites, defaced with a message reading "Stop Spying on Indonesia", are mainly owned by small Australian businesses and seemed to have been chosen at random. News of Australia's role in a U.S.-led surveillance network could damage relations with Indonesia, Australia's nearest Asian neighbor and an important strategic ally. Full Story | Top |
| Kuwaiti woman arrested for driving in Saudi Arabia: report Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 05:57 AM PST A Kuwaiti woman was arrested in Saudi Arabia for trying to drive her father to hospital, a Kuwaiti newspaper reported on Sunday, a week after Saudi women protested against a ban on female drivers. Kuwaiti women are free to drive in their country and enjoy far more rights than those in Saudi Arabia, who are not allowed to travel abroad, open a bank account or work without permission from a male relative. The English language Kuwait Times said the woman was driving in an area just over the border, with her father in the passenger seat, when she was stopped by police. The paper did not suggest that the woman was protesting Saudi Arabia's ban on female drivers. Full Story | Top |
| French public want Hollande to change policies: poll Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 05:22 AM PST  By John Irish PARIS (Reuters) - The vast majority of French people want President Francois Hollande to change his polices or reshuffle his government, an opinion poll suggested on Sunday, a day after thousands protested against tax hikes and rising unemployment. Hollande, the most unpopular French president on record according to a previous poll, has been hit by public anger over his economic methods, rows over immigration policy and repeated gaffes within the government. According to an IFOP poll for newspaper Journal du Dimanche, 91 percent of French people want Hollande to change his policies or his government before March's local elections. "There is a real doubt over the government's method and that is shared equally and in a way not seen before between supporters of the left, right and far-right," said IFOP's Frederic Dabo. Full Story | Top |
| Khamenei tells Iran's hardliners not to undermine nuclear talks Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 04:55 AM PST  By Yeganeh Torbati DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran's supreme leader gave strong backing on Sunday to his president's push for nuclear negotiations, warning hardliners not to accuse Hassan Rouhani of compromising with the old enemy America. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's comments will help shield Rouhani, who has sought to thaw relations with the West since his surprise election in June, from accusations of being soft on the United States, often characterized in the Islamic Republic as the "Great Satan". Iran will resume negotiations with six world powers, including the United States, in Geneva on Thursday, talks aimed at ending a standoff over its nuclear work that Tehran denies is weapons-related. Rouhani hopes a deal there will mean an end to sanctions that have cut the OPEC country's oil exports and hurt the wider economy, but any concession that looks like Iran is compromising on what it sees as its sovereign right to peaceful nuclear technology will be strongly resisted by conservatives. Full Story | Top |
| Nigeria church stampede kills 24 people: Red Cross Sunday, Nov 03, 2013 04:54 AM PST At least 24 people died during a stampede at an overcrowded church gathering in eastern Nigeria, the Red Cross said on Sunday. Nineteen women were amongst the dead at the stampede in the Holy Ghost Catholic Church in Uke, Anambra state on Saturday, where around 100,000 worshippers had gathered for All Souls Day, Red Cross spokesman Peter Kachi said by telephone. "There were too many people and the place was so overcrowded," Osmond Okoli, who narrowly survived being squashed in the crowd, told local station Channels TV. "We were too compacted so people fell and they were being pushed on us and then we all began to shout from the ground." Religious services gathering several hundred thousand people are common in Nigeria, a country of around 170 million split roughly evenly between Christians and Muslims. Full Story | Top |
|
No comments:
Post a Comment