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/ 12 October 2007
The award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Democrat Al Gore and the United Nations climate panel on Friday intensified pressure on the former United States vice-president to launch a late bid for the presidency, but advisers said he is showing no signs of interest in the 2008 race.
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/ 12 October 2007
A diplomatic rift between Turkey and the United States deepened on Friday after Ankara recalled its ambassador to Washington over a vote in the US Congress to label the massacre of Armenians by the Ottoman Turks an act of genocide. The envoy’s recall came as the White House sought to mollify its Nato partner.
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/ 12 October 2007
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Had things turned out differently, one of the seats in the press box in the Stade de France last Sunday night might have been occupied by a 79-year-old Argentinian newspaperman whose own rugby career was blighted by asthma. But life held different challenges for Che Guevara.
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/ 12 October 2007
It is an intriguing image. Shot among the birch trees and snow of a Siberian forest, two policemen kiss each other passionately on the lips. They hold and possibly caress each other’s buttocks. But the work by a Russian art collective has proved too much for Russia’s Culture Minister, Alexander Sokolov.
Two suicide car bombs killed at least 22 people in northern Iraq on Tuesday in attacks targeting a police chief and a Sunni Arab tribal leader working with United States forces to fight al-Qaeda, police said. ”Look at this. Is this acceptable? Does God accept this?” said a youth hold ing torn, blood-splattered pages of the Qu’ran.
President George Bush said on Friday that the United States does not use torture during interrogations, amid renewed debate about his administration’s methods in the war on terror. ”This government does not torture people. We stick to US law and our international obligations,” Bush said.
Israeli and Palestinian leaders held a new round of talks on Wednesday, meeting for the first time with their negotiating teams to try to bridge gaping differences ahead of a United States-sponsored peace summit. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas met one-on-one for the fourth time in less than two months.
North Korea has agreed to disable its Yongbyon reactor and other nuclear facilities by the end of the year, throwing the ball into the hermit country’s court to turn its promises into action. In an agreement which won praise from United States President George Bush, the isolated state will in return get aid equivalent to one million tonnes of heavy fuel oil
With a skullcap bearing the Star of David and a fervent belief that God gave the Holy Land to the Jews, Paul McCaleb could be mistaken for a Jewish settler. The 73-year-old from Tennessee is actually a born-again Christian, part of a growing group of devout Protestants, who are supporting Israel with their votes and their wallets.
The African Union on Monday began probing an unprecedented attack on one of its bases in Sudan’s war-ravaged Darfur that left 10 peacekeepers dead and 25 missing, vowing to punish those responsible. ”The inquiry is under way and we will make its conclusions public,” AU Mission in Sudan spokesperson Noureddine Mezni said.
South Korea’s president said on Monday he would use the second summit between the leaders of the divided Koreas to press for peace and an eventual arms cut. Roh Moo-hyun will lead a motorcade from Seoul on Tuesday, which includes business leaders, bureaucrats, poets and clerics.
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/ 30 September 2007
Talks aimed at reining in North Korea’s nuclear programmes ended on Sunday to allow delegates to return to their home countries to discuss a ”nuts and bolts” joint statement with their governments. Under an accord reached in February, North Korea must disable its atomic facilities and make a complete declaration of all its nuclear programmes.
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/ 29 September 2007
United Nations envoy Ibrahim Gambari flew to Burma on Saturday carrying worldwide hopes he can persuade its ruling generals to use negotiations instead of guns to end mass protests against 45 years of military rule. ”He’s the best hope we have. He is trusted on both sides,” Singapore Foreign Minister George Yeo said.
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/ 29 September 2007
Burma or Myanmar? As the military regime has cracked down on pro-democracy protests in the Asian country this week, a war of words has flared again over what to call the troubled nation. The United States and the BBC prefer the old name, Burma, while the United Nations, Japan and other nations have adopted Myanmar.
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/ 28 September 2007
United States President George Bush on Friday called for a ”strong and transparent” way for nations to measure progress on fighting climate change, but said each country should set its own approach. In a speech to a US-sponsored conference of major emitting countries, Bush also called for the creation of a global fund to promote clean technology.
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/ 28 September 2007
Meet Max, the Stud Butler. He’s an oversized, flesh-coloured ventriloquist’s dummy with a bow tie and hard-on — the world’s first hands-free sex toy, available at South Africa’s first sex expo, the Sexpo. However, he won’t fit discreetly into the underwear drawer, and will probably require a cupboard all to himself.
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/ 28 September 2007
Fuelled by ”revulsion” at Burma’s violent crackdown on popular protests against military rule, South-east Asia rounded on the generals on Friday and critics planned demonstrations at embassies across the region. Burma state media said nine people were killed when soldiers fired on crowds in Yangon on Thursday.
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/ 27 September 2007
Developing countries are willing to do more when it comes to tackling climate change, but the ”trigger” has to come from the North, Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism Marthinus van Schalkwyk said on Thursday. In a speech prepared for delivery in Washington, he said participants in such efforts had to include the United States.
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/ 27 September 2007
The United States-sponsored meeting of major emitting countries is aimed at supporting and accelerating the United Nations process on climate change, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice insisted on Thursday. Sceptics have expressed concern that the climate meeting might be an attempt to circumvent the UN process.
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/ 27 September 2007
Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe accused United States President George Bush of ”rank hypocrisy” on Wednesday for lecturing him on human rights, and likened the US Guantánamo Bay prison to a concentration camp. ”His hands drip with innocent blood of many nationalities,” Mugabe said in a typically fiery speech to the United Nations General Assembly.
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/ 26 September 2007
World governments vowed on Wednesday to hold Burma’s military rulers to account for a bloody crackdown on mass street protests, as the United Nations Security Council prepared to meet in emergency session and European Union officials began drawing up new sanctions.
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/ 26 September 2007
The leaders of Zimbabwe and Iran are looking to form a ”coalition for peace” after receiving a tongue-lashing from United States President George Bush. ”The United States and its allies are so bloodthirsty they don’t want to see peace anywhere in the world,” said Zimbabwe Deputy Information Minister Bright Matonga.
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/ 26 September 2007
Troops fired shots over the heads of a large crowd in central Yangon on Wednesday, sending people scurrying for cover as a crackdown intensified against the biggest anti-junta protests in 20 years. Security forces also fired tear gas at columns of monks trying to push their way past barricades sealing off the Shwedagon Pagoda, Burma’s holiest shrine.
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/ 26 September 2007
South African Nobel Peace Prize laureate Desmond Tutu said on Tuesday he was ”devastated” by the human rights abuses of President Robert Mugabe’s government in Zimbabwe. Tutu said he struggles to understand how Mugabe changed so drastically after steering the country to independence in 1980.
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/ 26 September 2007
Burma security forces sealed off Yangon’s Shwedagon Pagoda on Wednesday, fired tear gas and arrested up to 80 monks trying to get into the shrine, cracking down on the biggest anti-junta protests in nearly 20 years. Witnesses said some of the deeply revered Buddhist clergy were beaten by riot police taking them away from the shrine.
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/ 26 September 2007
Troops and riot police took up positions outside at least six big activist monasteries in Yangon on Wednesday as Burma’s junta tried to prevent monks leading new protest marches against military rule. There was no immediate word from the monks on whether they would risk their first major confrontation with the junta.
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/ 25 September 2007
President George Bush announced new United States sanctions against Burma on Tuesday as world leaders at the United Nations General Assembly focused on rising protests against military rule in the South-East Asian state. Bush urged all nations to ”help the Burmese people reclaim their freedom”.
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/ 25 September 2007
An Iraqi man stands with his hands up in surrender, surrounded by an American soldier, Iraqi security forces, a militiaman, an al-Qaeda fighter and a faceless thug. ”Hands up! Legs up! Head down!” they all bark at him as the cartoon takes a satirical swipe at how poorly ordinary Iraqis are treated.
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/ 25 September 2007
Hundreds of monks marched towards central Yangon on Tuesday in defiance of a threat by Burma’s ruling generals to send soldiers in to end the biggest anti-junta protests in 20 years. About 2Â 000 monks and ordinary people marched out of the Shwedagon Pagoda, the former Burma’s holiest shrine and the symbolic heart of a growing campaign against 45 years of unbroken military rule.
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/ 25 September 2007
President George Bush is set to announce new United States sanctions against Burma over human rights as the annual United Nations General Assembly gathering of world leaders gets under way on Tuesday. Bush will advocate supporting groups in Burma that are trying to advance freedom and announce new sanctions directed at key members of the military rulers.
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/ 24 September 2007
Saddam Hussein’s notorious hatchet man ”Chemical Ali” was accused on Monday of ordering villagers executed in batches of 25 at a time as he brutally crushed a Shi’ite rebellion in Iraq in 1991. Ali Hassan al-Majid and 14 others returned to the dock for their trial on charges of crimes against humanity after a month-long break.
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/ 24 September 2007
The jostling for dominance among the world’s leading stock market operators has seen many alliances and feuds, but it has rarely had a day as dramatic as last week, when some of the Middle East’s most powerful sovereign funds took the sector by storm.