|
SYDNEY: The official program for the Catholic Church's World Youth Day began Friday but was partly overshadowed by the launch of an investigation into sexual abuse allegations against a disgraced priest. The leader of the Catholic Church in Australia, Sydney Archbishop Cardinal George Pell, ordered an independent, church-appointed panel to investigate the claims after he was accused earlier this week of trying to cover them up.
-- AFP
JAKARTA: An earthquake with magnitude of 5.9 rocked Tasikmalaya town of West Java province on Friday with no damage or casualties reported, meteorology agency said.
-- Xinhua
SHANGHAI: China's third scientific expedition to the North Pole started Friday, with hundreds waving goodbye on the dock. A group of 110 Chinese scientists and logistics staff were participating in the 75-day research expedition in the icebreaker "Snow Dragon." Another 12 scientists from the US, Finland, Japan, the Republic of Korea and France were also invited on the journey.
-- Xinhua
SEOUL: A North Korean soldier on Friday shot dead a female South Korean tourist who was taking a morning stroll at a resort in the communist state, officials said. Seoul called for a full investigation to the incident, which it called "deeply regrettable." Seoul also suspended tours to the Mount Kumgang resort, one of only two sites in North Korea open to South Korean visitors. The shooting was the first incident of its kind since tours to the resort began in 1998.
-- Xinhua
NEW YORK CITY: With their champion Hillary Clinton by his side, Democratic White House hopeful Barack Obama on Thursday launched an overt appeal to working women, a key voting bloc in November's general election. Many of Clinton's fervent supporters, especially white working class women who powered her through the prolonged primary struggle against Obama, have yet to come to terms with her defeat.
-- AFP
WASHINGTON: The US Senate on Thursday confirmed the nomination of Gen. David Petraeus as the chief of the US military's Central Command that takes charge of Middle East and Central Asia areas. Petraeus would succeed Admiral William Fallon, who stepped down last month after a dispute with the Bush administration over perceived policy differences on Iran and reports that he had clashed with Petraeus over how deeply to draw down troop levels in Iraq.
-- Xinhua
JALALABAD, Afghanistan: An official investigation has found that US-led air strikes a week ago struck a wedding and killed 47 Afghan civilians, most of them women and children, an official said Friday. The US-led coalition has steadfastly denied that it killed civilians in the July 6 strikes in the mountains of eastern Nangarhar province, saying only extremist militants had died.
-- AFP
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: The United Nations would form a commission to probe into the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said Friday. Bhutto, also former leader of Pakistan People's Party, was killed at the gate of Liaquat Bagh park in the city of Rawalpindi on December 27, 2007, after addressing an election protest.
-- Xinhua
PRETORIA, South Africa: Zimbabwe's ruling party and opposition held a second day of talks in South Africa on Friday as the UN delayed a vote on fresh sanctions against Robert Mugabe's regime after his one-man election. The talks, aimed at laying the groundwork for fully-fledged negotiations to resolve Zimbabwe's political crisis, are the first since Mugabe won a new term as president in a June 27 poll widely denounced as a sham.
-- AFP
|
