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BBC World


  • Obama defends 'just' drones war President Obama defends the use of drones as a "just war" of self-defence against deadly militants, and a campaign that has made America safer.
    23 May 2013 at 10:53pm

  • India soldiers die in Kashmir ambush Three soldiers are killed in an ambush by suspected militants in the Pulwama district of Indian-administered Kashmir, officials say.
    23 May 2013 at 11:56pm

  • WHO urges sharing over coronavirus The WHO urges countries with possible cases of novel coronavirus to share information amid concern over patent rights held by commercial labs.
    23 May 2013 at 4:11pm

  • US road bridge falls into river Three people have been rescued after part of a road bridge collapsed into the Skagit River in the US state of Washington, officials say.
    23 May 2013 at 9:55pm

  • US Boy Scouts to allow gay members The Boy Scouts of America organisation votes to accept openly gay scouts, after a divisive campaign pitting liberals against some religious groups.
    23 May 2013 at 6:01pm

  • Powerful quake off Russia east coast A strong earthquake strikes off the Kamchatka peninsula in Russia's far east, but an initial tsunami warning issued by the authorities is lifted.
    24 May 2013 at 12:05am

  • Bombers hit Niger barracks and mine Suicide bombers target a military camp and a French-run uranium mine in north-western Niger leaving at least 20 people dead, officials say.
    23 May 2013 at 6:12pm

  • Nasa to lease shuttle launch pad Nasa is looking for commercial operators to lease a historic launch pad in Florida used for the first Moon missions and by the Atlantis shuttle.
    23 May 2013 at 4:26pm

  • Foul weather hits US tornado cleanup Recovery efforts in an Oklahoma city hit by a huge tornado are hampered by thunderstorms, as the first victim's funeral is held.
    23 May 2013 at 6:10pm

  • Transition plan floated for Syria As Syria's main opposition coalition begins three days of key talks, its leader puts forward a transition plan for the country.
    23 May 2013 at 9:55am

  • US sanctions 'hit NK aid agencies' European aid agencies in North Korea say US financial sanctions are severely restricting their attempts to improve agriculture and nutrition there.
    23 May 2013 at 11:15am

  • New jewel theft hits Cannes festival A necklace reportedly worth 1.9m euros (£1.6m) is stolen during the Cannes film festival, the second such theft to hit this year's event.
    23 May 2013 at 12:41pm

  • EU axes plans to ban olive oil jugs The EU drops plans to ban restaurants from using refillable olive oil jugs, after the idea drew criticism from consumers and European leaders.
    23 May 2013 at 7:58am

  • French ex-leader reveals panda story Former French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing reveals he was once jumped on by a panda when he dared himself to enter its cage.
    23 May 2013 at 9:49am

  • 'Active' US hurricane season seen US forecasters predict an "active or extremely active" Atlantic hurricane season of seven to 11 hurricanes, up from the average of six.
    23 May 2013 at 6:57pm


The Guardian World News


  • Obama details new drone policy

    Increased oversight designed to bring killing programme out of legal shadows as president defends use of strikes in the past

    Special courts would be asked to decide on targeted assassinations of terrorism suspects under a clutch of new legal checks proposed by Barack Obama to bring an end to the notion of an "boundless war on terror".

    The president, who currently has to personally sign off on targeted drone strikes outside the US, hopes the increased oversight will help bring his controver...


    by Dan Roberts
    23 May 2013 at 12:44pm

  • Father rebukes Israeli report on son's death

    Report re-ignites war of words over death of 12-year-old al-Dura in Gaza in 2000 by claiming the incident was staged

    In a scrubby cemetery in central Gaza, where crumbling tombstones nestle in the sand amid wind-blown rubbish, Jamal al-Dura crouched at the grave of his son Muhammad to recite the Muslim prayer for the dead. With the youngest of his 11 children at his side, he took his hands from his face, laid them on the marble slab and looked up, a bitter as well as a bereaved man.

    "Israel say...


    by Harriet Sherwood
    23 May 2013 at 9:03am

  • Tibetan activists boycott Holiday Inn firm

    Free Tibet-led campaign calls on Holiday Inn owner to withdraw from vast Lhasa project criticised as 'PR coup' for Beijing

    Tibetan campaign groups are launching a boycott of the InterContinental Hotels Group ? the owner of Holiday Inn, Crowne Plaza and others ? because of plans to open a vast 2000-room resort in Lhasa.

    The campaign, led by Free Tibet and backed by Students for a Free Tibet, wants IHG to withdraw from the project in the Tibetan capital, arguing the hotel is a "PR coup for the Ch...


    by Tania Branigan
    23 May 2013 at 9:03am

  • Eurozone crisis live: Japan closes higher after wild day of trading

    The Japanese market suffered another turbulent session after Thursday's dive ? dropping as much as 3.5% in the afternoon ? but stabilised to close 0.9% higher

    Josephine Moulds


    by Josephine Moulds
    24 May 2013 at 12:16am

  • Guardian to launch new platform to streamline access to web content

    Theguardian.com will provide one destination for UK, mobile, US and Australian sites as monthly digital browsers hits 80m

    The Guardian is to launch a new global web presence, theguardian.com, in recognition of the newspaper's increasingly international digital appeal.

    The move will streamline access to Guardian content ? amalgamating the main entry point Guardian.co.uk, mobile site m.guardian.co.uk, US homepage guardiannews.com and the soon-to-launch Australian digital edition ? into one core w...


    by Mark Sweney
    24 May 2013 at 12:08am

  • Syria needs Britain's help, but it does not need our weapons

    Government outrage does not provide a sound basis for such a material policy change as vetoing the EU arms embargo

    The most seductive fallacy in foreign affairs is "something must be done". It now appears that the UK government is ready to veto any extension of the EU arms embargo on Syria when it comes up for review in Brussels next Monday. That would be "something". As set out by William Hague this week in the House of Commons, this policy is as follows. The government has not decided to sen...


    by Menzies Campbell
    23 May 2013 at 11:30pm

  • North Korea agrees to return to nuclear talks under pressure from China

    Pyongyang's special envoy makes concession on nuclear disarmament to ease tensions between communist allies

    North Korea has offered to renew nuclear disarmament talks, Chinese state media have reported.

    At a meeting on Thursday between vice-marshal Choe Ryong Hae and Liu Yunshan, a senior figure in the Chinese Communist party, North Korea heeded China's wishes after months of rising friction between the allies, according to reports

    Pynongyang's special envoy praised China's work on behalf of p...


    23 May 2013 at 11:07pm

  • Muhammad Yunus: 'Business is a beautiful mechanism to solve problems' | Liz Ford

    Grameen Bank founder is a microfinance pioneer, but are his plans for alleviating poverty a little too good to be true?

    At first, it is difficult to know what to make of Muhammad Yunus. In London this week to promote his work building social businesses, the Nobel prizewinner and founder of Grameen bank is compelling when he talks about his ideas to address poverty. But, after the recent microfinance fallout, there's a nagging feeling that what he's saying is a little too good to be true.

    Yunus'...


    by Liz Ford
    23 May 2013 at 11:00pm

  • Martin Luther King unmoved by death threats - from the archive, 24 May 1961

    White supremacists target Baptist minister for demanding end to racial segregation

    It seems a stroke of luck for the United States that the Negroes' leader in Montgomery, Alabama, during the present crisis is a scholarly Baptist minister whose hero is Mahatma Gandhi. He might well have been a black Huey Long or some such political boss of the kind who tries to hold hate-the-white demonstrations in Harlem (and - luckily again - finds little support there). That he is the Rev. Martin Luther King...


    23 May 2013 at 11:00pm

  • Bridge collapse in Washington state sends cars and people into water

    Part of bridge over the Skagit river gives way, with rescuers using boats to search for people in the water

    The major highway bridge linking the Washington state city of Seattle with Canada and the rest of the Pacific north-west region collapsed late on Thursday, dumping several vehicles and the people inside into a river.

    The four-lane Interstate 5 bridge collapsed about halfway between Seattle and Vancouver, British Columbia, Trooper Mark Francis of the Washington state patrol said.

    Francis sa...


    23 May 2013 at 10:50pm

  • Manila less than thrilled at Dan Brown's Inferno

    City chairman lodges protest with author over his description of Philippines capital as 'the gates of hell' in latest novel

    Kate Hodal


    by Kate Hodal
    23 May 2013 at 10:30pm

  • Cabinet office to fly rainbow flag during Pride week

    Francis Maude to show commitment to equality agenda by allowing flag to be flown from cabinet office next month

    Francis Maude is to show the government's commitment to the equality agenda by allowing the rainbow flag to be flown from the cabinet office in Whitehall during Pride week next month.

    David Cameron has faced criticism for attempting to distance the Tory leadership from gay rights after declining to speak in detail about the equal marriage bill in the run up to its bumpy ride through t...


    by Nicholas Watt
    23 May 2013 at 6:16pm

  • IRS replaces Lois Lerner amid controversy over Tea Party targeting

    Ken Corbin to take over as acting commissioner of division that oversees tax agency's exemptions division

    A day after she refused to answer questions at a congressional hearing, Lois Lerner has been replaced as director the Internal Revenue Service division that oversaw agents who targeted Tea Party groups.

    Danny Werfel, the agency's new acting commissioner, told IRS employees in an email Thursday that he had selected a new acting head of the division.

    Ken Corbin will be the acting director of t...


    23 May 2013 at 3:34pm
  • British fraud suspect found hanged in French jail

    John Steele, 38, was found by prison guards hanging in his cell on Tuesday, four days after being remanded in custody

    A Briton arrested on suspicion of organised fraud has been found hanged in a French jail. John Steele, 38, was found by prison guards hanging in his cell on Tuesday, four days after he was remanded in custody.

    Steele, who had lived near Paris for some years, was believed to be behind a scheme which took more than £1 million in loans from French banks.

    A Foreign Office spokesman s...


    23 May 2013 at 3:31pm

  • Boy Scouts of America vote to end ban on gay youth members

    Vote at annual meeting in Texas may relieve political pressure but openly gay leaders are still banned

    The Boy Scouts of America on Thursday voted to allow gay youths in the organization, partially ending a long-standing ban on accepting homosexual members.

    Of the 1,400 scout leaders voting at the annual meeting in Texas, more than 60% supported the proposal. The members voted in favor of adjusting the BSA membership rules to read: "No youth may be denied membership in the Boy Scouts of Americ...


    by Amanda Holpuch
    23 May 2013 at 3:22pm

NBC World News



AP World News

  • Clashes in Lebanon feed fear of Syria spillover BEIRUT (AP) -- Lebanese supporters and opponents of Syrian President Bashar Assad fired heavy machine guns and lobbed mortar shells at each other Thursday in some of the worst fighting in the port city of Tripoli in years....
  • WHO: Scientific red tape mars efforts vs. virus GENEVA (AP) -- International efforts to combat a new pneumonia-like virus that has now killed 22 people are being slowed by unclear rules and competition for the potentially profitable rights to disease samples, the head of the World Health Organization warned Thursday....
  • Sweden's riots raise questions about inequality HUSBY, Sweden (AP) -- Sweden has long been a bastion of generous social welfare and an egalitarian political culture. So many people were shocked when scores of youths hurled rocks at police and set cars ablaze during rioting in several largely immigrant areas near Stockholm this week....
  • Police: Suicidal jumper's fall kills SKorean girl SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- South Korean police say a suicidal man jumping to his death killed a 5-year-old girl by falling on her as she walked with her parents outside the apartment building....
  • Chinese media: North Korea envoy offers talks BEIJING (AP) -- A North Korean envoy, on the second day of his fence-mending visit to ally China, heeded Beijing's wishes by offering to renew nuclear disarmament talks, Chinese state media said....
  • Muslim hard-liners ID suspect in London attack LONDON (AP) -- A man seen with bloody hands wielding a butcher knife after the killing of a British soldier on the streets of London was described as a convert to Islam who took part in demonstrations with a banned radical group, two Muslim hard-liners said Thursday....
  • Earthquake hits Russia's Far East MOSCOW (AP) -- A powerful earthquake on Friday hit Russia's Far East with tremors felt as far away as Moscow, about 7,000 kilometers (4,400 miles) west of the epicenter....
  • Stricken Japan nuke plant struggles to keep staff TOKYO (AP) -- Keeping the meltdown-stricken Fukushima nuclear plant in northeastern Japan in stable condition requires a cast of thousands. Increasingly the plant's operator is struggling to find enough workers, a trend that many expect to worsen and hamper progress in the decades-long effort to safely decommission it....
  • Extremists claim responsibility for Niger attacks NIAMEY, Niger (AP) -- Suicide bombers in Niger detonated two car bombs simultaneously, one inside a military camp in the city of Agadez and another in the remote town of Arlit at a French-operated uranium mine, killing 26 people and injuring 30, according to officials in Niger and France. A surviving attacker took a group of soldiers hostage, and authorities were attempting to negotiate their release....
  • Writer Chinua Achebe honored in Nigeria funeral OGIDI, Nigeria (AP) -- Writer Chinua Achebe shunned Nigeria's corrupt politicians and twice turned down national honors, never fearing to criticize those he felt ruined his country. On Thursday, however, the lawmakers and the country's elite came to praise him....