CAIRO (Reuters) - After eight days of protests that killed nearly 60 people, a video of one demonstrator stripped naked, dragged across the ground and beaten with truncheons by helmeted riot police has fired Egyptians to a new level of outrage. Hamada Saber, a middle-aged man, lay in a police hospital on Saturday, the morning after he was shown on television naked, covered in soot and thrashed by half a dozen policemen who had pulled him to an armored vehicle near the presidential palace. ...
BELGRADE (Reuters) - A close aide to Serbian Prime Minister Ivica Dacic accused Dacic's SNS coalition partners on Saturday of staging a smear campaign after media reports linked Dacic to an alleged drug trafficker. The row rocked the coalition just as speculation grows that SNS, the biggest party in parliament and riding high in the polls, will quit the government and try to force an early election. ...
BERLIN (Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel urged her EU partners on Saturday to work together to get a deal on the 27-member bloc's budget at a summit this week, warning that agreement was far from certain. EU leaders meet in Brussels on Thursday and Friday to try to clinch a deal on its 1 trillion euro budget for 2014-2020 after they failed to do so in November. In her weekly podcast, Merkel said she expected very difficult negotiations. "Germany will try to contribute to a result. We will only be able to see at the end of next week whether it succeeds," she said. ...
ADEN (Reuters) - Yemen's military killed 10 suspected militants in air and artillery strikes on Saturday, a pro-government militia source said, as authorities battle insurgents linked to al Qaeda who seized several southern towns last year. The assault took place near the town of Shuqra in Abyan province, an impoverished, mountainous region of southern Yemen where tribal law holds sway and Islamist militants have a strong presence. Tackling lawlessness in Yemen, which lies near important oil shipment routes and flanks the world's biggest oil exporter Saudi Arabia, is an international priority. ...
VIENNA (Reuters) - Nine protesters have been arrested for civil disorder in demonstrations against a right-wing ball in Vienna's imperial Hofburg Palace, Austrian police said on Saturday. More than 2,500 joined protests against the Academics' Ball on Friday night which was hosted by Austria's far-right Freedom Party and has in the past attracted right-wing icons such as France's Marine le Pen. ...
MUNICH (Reuters) - The leader of the Syrian opposition was expected to meet U.S., Russian and U.N. officials on Saturday at a Munich conference which may provide a rare chance to overcome differences on how to end Syria's civil war. U.S. Vice-President Joe Biden, head of the Syrian National Coalition Moaz Alkhatib, U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov were all expected to meet - but not necessarily all at the same table, as the opposition hoped. ...
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Five men pleaded not guilty on Saturday to charges they gang raped and murdered an Indian trainee physiotherapist, in a case that led to a shake-up of laws against sexual crimes after protests about a rising number of attacks on women. A Reuters witness saw the men file into the court room with their faces covered, where lawyers in the case said they were read thirteen charges including murder, which carries a maximum penalty of death. They left after 15 minutes. "After the judge read out the charges, the five pleaded not guilty and walked out" said A.P. ...
TIMBUKTU, Mali (Reuters) - French President Francois Hollande arrived in Mali on Saturday on a one-day visit to support French troops fighting a campaign against Islamist rebels in the Sahel nation. Hollande, accompanied by his ministers for defense, foreign affairs and development, flew into Sevare in central Mali, French TV channels said. He was due to go on to Timbuktu, the famed Saharan trading town which was recaptured from the rebels on Sunday. ...
DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran unveiled what it said was a new, domestically built fighter jet on Saturday, local media reported. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said at a ceremony in Tehran that the Qaher 313 demonstrated Iran's growing self-reliance in the field of military technology. Iran's functional air force has been limited to perhaps as few as a few dozen strike aircraft, either Russian or ageing U.S. models acquired before the 1979 Iranian revolution. ...
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is facing protests from Sunni Muslims, an oil dispute with the Kurdistan region and turmoil in his own government. Now hackers have attacked his website to brand him a tyrant. A group called "TeaM KuWaiT HaCkErS" posted on Maliki's website a picture of two women in black weeping and expressing support for Iraqis who it said were fighting oppression. ...
PITTSBURGH—Gerardo Sciulli was a welder from a small town in the Abruzzi region of Italy. So when he emigrated to America in 1970, he chose this place; its vibrant steel mills assured him plenty of work. He settled with his family in Oakland, a half-square-mile neighborhood east of downtown.
SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Japan's coast guard detained a Chinese fishing boat near the southern Japanese island of Okinawa on Saturday and arrested the captain for collecting coral illegally, a coast guard official said. The vessel was detained off Miyako Island, some 150 km (95 miles) from islands in the East China Sea at the centre of a territorial dispute between the two countries, and about 400 km (250 miles) east of Taipei. ...
NEW YORK (AP) — In 1977, New York City was deep into its worst fiscal crisis ever. Riots erupted that summer during a blackout. And a fire in one of the most blighted, bombed-out parts of town that fall led Howard Cosell to announce during a World Series game at Yankee Stadium: "Ladies and gentlemen, the Bronx is burning."
DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan (Reuters) - Militants attacked an isolated army checkpoint in Pakistan's restive northwest on Saturday, with at least 31 people killed in the initial assault, subsequent crossfire and a rocket attack on a house, officials said. The Pakistan Taliban claimed responsibility, saying the attack was in response to a U.S. drone strike in neighboring North Waziristan last month in which two commanders were killed. ...
WASHINGTON (AP) — Port operators along the East Coast have reached a tentative deal on a new contract with the union for longshoremen, averting a possible strike that would have crippled operations at 15 ports, according to a federal mediator.
PERTH, Australia (Reuters) - Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard's government was rocked by the surprise resignation of two of her most senior cabinet ministers on Saturday, just four days after she stunned voters by calling a national election in eight months' time. Close ally Nicola Roxon quit as Attorney-General along with Chris Evans, who as Senate leader is the third in line to the prime ministership, citing demands of the job and family reasons for their decisions. ...
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Actress Kerry Washington was the big winner at the NAACP Image Awards on Friday, picking up awards for her roles in the slavery-era Western film "Django Unchained" and television drama "Scandal," as well as a special honor for professional achievement and public service. But on a night that celebrated the successes of artists of color, actor and activist Harry Belafonte struck a somber note when he admonished the black community for failing to speak out in favor of gun control, saying "the group most devastated by America's obsession with the gun is African-Americans. ...
