Today's Reuters World News Headlines - Yahoo! News:
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Mexico police arrested over torture video
Mon,26 Dec 2011 10:57 PM PST
Reuters - MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican authorities arrested five policemen on Monday on suspicion of torture after a video was made public showing police officers submerging a detainee's head in a bucket of water. An official at the attorney general's office said five Mexico City police officers were taken into custody over the alleged torture, which took place in the capital's tough inner city neighborhood of Tepito last month. ... Full Story | Top |
Insight: FDA warned PIP on implant safety in 2000
Mon,26 Dec 2011 09:32 PM PST
Reuters -  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - As early as 2000, U.S. health authorities raised concerns about the French breast implant maker at the heart of a scandal affecting hundreds of thousands of women worldwide. That was almost ten years before the company came under scrutiny from European regulators. The Food and Drug Administration sent an investigator to inspect a plant run by the manufacturer, Poly Implant Prothese (PIP), at La Seyne Sur Mer in southeastern France in May 2000. ...
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China official says Wukan protest shows rights demands on rise
Mon,26 Dec 2011 05:59 PM PST
Reuters -  BEIJING (Reuters) - The senior Chinese official who helped defuse a standoff with protesting villagers has told officials to get used to citizens who are increasingly assertive about their rights and likened erring local governments to red apples with rotten cores. Zhu Mingguo, a deputy Communist Party secretary of southern Guangdong province, last week helped broker a compromise between the government and residents of Wukan village. Ten days of protests over confiscated farmland and the death of a protest organizer drew widespread attention as a rebuff to the stability-before-all government. ...
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Pakistan urged to share border-post map
Mon,26 Dec 2011 03:47 PM PST
Reuters - WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The head of the U.S. Central Command is urging Pakistan to share a map of its facilities and installations near the Afghan border to help avert episodes like the one that killed 24 Pakistani forces last month. U.S. Marine Corps General James Mattis, the commander, said in a statement on Monday that the strike's chief lesson was that "we must improve border coordination and this requires a foundational level of trust on both sides of the border." Separately, the U.S. ... Full Story | Top |
Arab observers aim to see Syria's deadliest city
Mon,26 Dec 2011 04:59 PM PST
Reuters -  BEIRUT (Reuters) - Newly-arrived Arab League peace monitors will try Tuesday to see for themselves the situation in the Syrians city of Homs, which opponents of President Bashar al-Assad say has been pulverized by government troops and tanks in recent days. At least 31 people were killed in the city Monday as tanks fired into districts where opposition has been strongest to Assad's rule, activists said. ...
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Sadr bloc calls for early elections in Iraq
Mon,26 Dec 2011 02:44 PM PST
Reuters -  BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The head of the political bloc of anti-American Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr called on Monday for new elections in Iraq after the biggest crisis in a year saw Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki move against two senior Sunni rivals. Tensions are rising after Maliki, a Shi'ite, sought the arrest of Sunni Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi - accused of running death squads. Maliki also asked parliament to fire Sunni Deputy Prime Minister Saleh al-Mutlaq. ...
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Aide to top Mexican drug boss Guzman captured
Mon,26 Dec 2011 02:17 PM PST
Reuters -  (Adds details of seizure) MEXICO CITY, Dec 26 (Reuters) - Mexico landed its third blow against the country's most wanted drug trafficker in as many months after capturing a suspected lieutenant of Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman, boss of the powerful Sinaloa cartel. On Monday, masked Mexican soldiers presented Felipe Cabrera, known as "el Inge," to the media following his capture in Culiacan, capital of Sinaloa, the northwestern Pacific state after which the drug cartel is named. ...
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Carnage in Homs district as tanks open fire: video
Mon,26 Dec 2011 10:25 AM PST
Reuters - BEIRUT (Reuters) - Terrified residents cowered in their homes on Monday in Syria's Homs, as army tanks fired shells, machineguns and mortars into their neighborhoods, and amateur video filmed by anti-government activists showed carnage in a city street. Four bodies of what appeared to be male civilians lay bloodied under fallen power lines in a narrow alleyway of the Baba Amr district, their limbs twisted, heads gashed and brains spilling out. "What is happening is a slaughter," said Fadi, a resident near Baba Amr who spoke to Reuters on Skype. "They hit people with mortar fire. ... Full Story | Top |
Egypt's PM urges G8 to help unlock promised aid
Mon,26 Dec 2011 09:49 AM PST
Reuters -  CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's prime minister appealed to Group of Eight countries on Monday to help unlock billions of dollars in aid promised in September but not yet delivered under an initiative to support countries of the Arab spring. Army-backed Prime Minister Kamal al-Ganzouri, who was appointed in November, met ambassadors of G8 countries to tell them Egypt needed financial support immediately, Foreign Minister Mohammed Kamel Amr said. ...
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Cuba makes more reforms to retail sector
Mon,26 Dec 2011 09:44 AM PST
Reuters -  HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba will open up more of the country's retail services to the private sector next year, allowing Cubans to operate various services such as appliance and watch repair, and locksmith and carpentry shops, official media reported on Monday. The measures are the latest by President Raul Castro in his attempt to reinvigorate Cuba's struggling Soviet-style economy by reducing the role of the state and encouraging more private initiative. A resolution published in the official gazette on Monday said the new reforms would take effect on January 1. ...
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Pakistan PM denies reports govt wants to sack army, intel chiefs
Mon,26 Dec 2011 08:34 AM PST
Reuters -  ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistan's prime minister Yusuf Raza Gilani on Monday denied domestic media reports he was planning to sack the powerful army and intelligence chiefs, saying the military supported democracy. The reports about army chief General Ashfaq Kayani and the Director-General of Inter-Services Intelligence (DG-ISI), Lieutenant-General Ahmad Shuja Pasha, were the latest in what has been feverish press speculation about a rift between civilian politicians and the military. ...
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Former South Korean first lady heads North for condolences
Mon,26 Dec 2011 08:26 AM PST
Reuters -  PAJU, South Korea (Reuters) - The widow of former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, the author of a now-jettisoned engagement policy with North Korea, crossed the fortified land border between the two sides on Monday to pay her respects to deceased dictator Kim Jong-il. Ties between the North and South have been frozen since the election of conservative South Korean President Lee Myung-bak in 2008, who cut aid in a bid to force the North to abandon a nuclear programme and bring it to the negotiating table. ...
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Analysis: Russia's Putin risks losing touch amid protests
Mon,26 Dec 2011 07:50 AM PST
Reuters -  MOSCOW (Reuters) - Vladimir Putin is looking increasingly out of touch in Russia after the opposition brought tens of thousands of people out onto the streets of Moscow for the second time in two weeks to demand a parliamentary election be re-run. But the looming New Year holiday in Russia means there is likely to be a pause in the biggest opposition protests since he rose to power 12 years ago and he will hope they will now at least temporarily lose momentum. ...
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Israeli lawmakers weigh recognizing Armenian genocide
Mon,26 Dec 2011 07:02 AM PST
Reuters - JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli lawmakers debated on Monday recognizing the 1915 mass killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks as genocide but were warned by the Foreign Ministry about further damage to frayed relations with Turkey. The issue has stirred deep emotions in Israel, where some legislators have said the Jewish people, who suffered six million dead in the Nazi Holocaust, have a moral obligation to identify with the Armenian tragedy, even at the risk of a Turkish backlash. ... Full Story | Top |
Toll in Syria's Homs rises to 20 before monitor visit
Mon,26 Dec 2011 04:32 AM PST
Reuters - BEIRUT (Reuters) - A third day of heavy gunfire in Syria's flashpoint city of Homs has killed at least twenty people, a day before an Arab League monitoring mission is expected there, activists said on Monday. "The toll has risen to 20 martyrs documented by name and the circumstances of their deaths," the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. "Fourteen died in the continuous shelling on the Baba Amr neighborhood and six were killed in random gunfire in nearby neighborhoods." (Reporting by Erika Solomon; Editing by Louise Ireland) Full Story | Top |
Opposition leader calls upcoming Iran election bogus: report
Mon,26 Dec 2011 04:29 AM PST
Reuters - TEHRAN (Reuters) - An Iranian opposition leader who has been under house arrest since February has accused the Islamic establishment of intending to hold a "rubber-stamp" parliamentary election in March, his website Sahamnews reported on Monday. Candidates began registering on Saturday for the March 2 vote, which will be the first litmus test of the clerical leadership's public standing since a disputed 2009 presidential vote that precipitated months of unrest. ... Full Story | Top |
Gandhi clan blamed for keeping India in poverty
Mon,26 Dec 2011 04:28 AM PST
Reuters -  NEW DELHI (Reuters) - The Gandhi dynasty that has ruled India for most of the 64 years since independence has kept the world's largest democracy in poverty, leaders of a protest movement said on Monday as they prepared renewed rallies to target the government on corruption. A three-day fast led by 74-year-old activist Anna Hazare and a plan for thousands of people to picket the home of Congress party leader Sonia Gandhi on New Years Eve will be a test of strength for the anti-corruption movement that forced a government U-turn in the summer. ...
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Pope condemns Nigeria attacks, prays for them to stop
Mon,26 Dec 2011 04:02 AM PST
Reuters - VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict on Monday condemned the Christmas Day bomb attacks by Islamist militants in Nigeria as an "absurd gesture" and prayed that "the hands of the violent be stopped." The pope, speaking from his window overlooking St Peter's Square in Rome, said such violence brought only pain, destruction and death. Militants of the Boko Haram sect said they had set off the bombs, raising fears that they are trying to ignite sectarian civil war. Three of the five bombs hit churches and one killed at least 27 people at a Catholic church. ... Full Story | Top |
Japan nuclear disaster panel faults preparation, communication
Mon,26 Dec 2011 03:25 AM PST
Reuters - TOKYO (Reuters) - A lack of preparation and poor communication at top levels after disaster struck were among the failures that turned a nuclear accident at Japan's Fukushima plant into the worst atomic crisis in 25 years, a panel probing the disaster said on Monday. The panel -- headed by an expert in why big mistakes are made -- said Tokyo Electric Power, the utility operating Fukushima's tsunami-wrecked Daiichi nuclear power plant, as well as regulators failed to sufficiently anticipate a massive tsunami and the devastating impact likely to result. ... Full Story | Top |
Ex-speaker Shevchuk wins vote in rebel Transdniestria
Mon,26 Dec 2011 02:47 AM PST
Reuters -  TIRASPOL, Moldova (Reuters) - Former parliament speaker Yevgeny Shevchuk won the presidential election in Moldova's breakaway Transdniestria region, the territory's election authority said on Monday, the second setback for regional power Russia within two months. "According to preliminary results, he (Shevchuk) received 73.88 percent of votes while his opponent Anatoly Kaminsky received 19.67 percent," Central Election Commission chairman Pyotr Denisenko told reporters. Shevchuk competed against current speaker Anatoly Kaminsky, who was backed by Russia, in a run-off on Sunday. ...
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Suicide bomber kills 7 outside Iraq ministry
Mon,26 Dec 2011 02:20 AM PST
Reuters - BAGHDAD (Reuters) - At least seven people were killed when a suicide car bomber hit Iraq's interior ministry on Monday in the latest attack since a crisis erupted between the Shi'ite-led government and Sunni leaders a week ago. Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki sought the arrest of the Sunni vice president last Monday and asked parliament to fire his own Sunni deputy, triggering turmoil that threatens new sectarian strife just after the last U.S. troops withdrew. ... Full Story | Top |
Thirteen dead in third day of heavy shelling in Homs
Mon,26 Dec 2011 01:38 AM PST
Reuters - BEIRUT (Reuters) - A third day of heavy shelling in Syria's flashpoint city of Homs has killed at least thirteen people, a day before an Arab League monitoring mission is expected there, activists said on Monday. "The death toll has risen to thirteen martyrs so far, they were killed in heavy shelling that started this morning in the neighborhood of Baba Amr," said British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. (Reporting by Erika Solomon; Editing by Louise Ireland) Full Story | Top |
China jails dissident 10 years for "subversive" essays
Mon,26 Dec 2011 01:10 AM PST
Reuters -  BEIJING (Reuters) - A court in China sentenced on Monday a veteran dissident, Chen Xi, to 10 years in jail for subversion, his wife said, one of the heaviest sentences given for political charges since Nobel Prize winner Liu Xiaobo was jailed two years ago. The court in Guiyang, southwest China, tried Chen, swiftly declared him guilty of "inciting subversion of state power," and said he deserved a tough sentence of a decade in prison, his wife, Zhang Qunxuan, told Reuters by telephone. ...
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Arab mission to Syria to visit Homs Tuesday: source
Mon,26 Dec 2011 12:37 AM PST
Reuters - CAIRO (Reuters) - The Arab League's monitoring team will start its mission in Syria by visiting the turbulent city of Homs on Tuesday, a source at the mission told Reuters. The first group of about 50 monitors, led by Sudanese General Mustafa Dabi, is expected to travel to Syria on Monday. It also will visit the capital Damascus, Hama and Edleb on Tuesday, the source said. (Reporting By Ayman Samir; Wirting by Tamim Elyan) Full Story | Top |
13 found dead in truck in eastern Mexico: local media
Sun,25 Dec 2011 06:26 PM PST
Reuters - MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Thirteen bodies were found in an abandoned truck in eastern Mexico on Sunday, local media reported, as a turf war between drug cartels spreads far from the border with the United States. The truck was found during a routine security patrol near the border between the eastern states of Veracruz, a major oil-producing region, and Tamaulipas, local media said, citing state officials. Messages left at the site suggested the dead were killed in a rivalry between criminal gangs, local media said. ... Full Story | Top |
Over half Japanese against sales tax hike; PM support falls
Sun,25 Dec 2011 05:44 PM PST
Reuters - TOKYO (Reuters) - More than half the Japanese public oppose a proposed doubling of the country's 5 percent sales tax by mid-decade, a newspaper poll showed on Monday, boding ill for the government's aim of fleshing out its plan on overhauling taxes by a self-imposed year-end deadline. The government is in the final stage of debate on sales tax hikes to pay for rising welfare costs, a step towards fiscal consolidation in a nation whose public debt is already twice the size of its $5 trillion economy. ... Full Story | Top |
Mortars hit Iranian dissident camp in Iraq: Iraqi army
Sun,25 Dec 2011 05:12 PM PST
Reuters - BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Two mortars hit an Iranian dissident camp in Iraq just days after Baghdad extended a year-end deadline for the camp to be closed as the U.N. negotiated resettlement of 3,000 residents there, the Iraqi military said Sunday. The mortars landed on Camp Ashraf, home to the People's Mujahideen Organization of Iran, or PMOI, an Iranian opposition group the United States and Iran officially consider a terrorist group. The camp is 65 km (40 miles) from Baghdad. ... Full Story | Top |
Head of Arab mission reaches Syria amid more unrest
Sun,25 Dec 2011 03:25 PM PST
Reuters -  BEIRUT (Reuters) - A Sudanese general flew to Damascus on Sunday to head an Arab League mission that will check Syria's compliance with an Arab peace plan to halt a nine-month crackdown on unrest in which more than 5,000 people have been killed. General Mohammed al-Dabi's arrival coincided with fresh violence in the restive central city of Homs and followed twin suicide bombings that killed 44 people in Damascus on Friday. ...
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Islamists kill dozens in Nigeria Christmas bombs
Sun,25 Dec 2011 02:44 PM PST
Reuters -  ABUJA (Reuters) - Islamist militants set off bombs across Nigeria on Christmas Day - three targeting churches including one that killed at least 27 people - raising fears that they are trying to ignite sectarian civil war. The Boko Haram Islamist sect, which aims to impose sharia law across the country, claimed responsibility for the three church bombs, the second Christmas in a row the group has caused mass carnage with deadly bombings of churches. Security forces also blamed the sect for two other blasts in the north. ...
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Mortars hit Iranian dissident camp in Iraq: Iraqi army
Sun,25 Dec 2011 02:03 PM PST
Reuters - BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Two mortars hit an Iranian dissident camp in Iraq just days after Baghdad extended a year-end deadline for the camp to be closed as the U.N. negotiated resettlement of 3,000 residents there, the Iraqi military said Sunday. The mortars landed on Camp Ashraf, home to the People's Mujahideen Organization of Iran, or PMOI, an Iranian opposition group the United States and Iran officially consider a terrorist group. The camp is 65 km (40 miles) from Baghdad. ... Full Story | Top |
Egypt's military rulers study plan to speed up vote
Sun,25 Dec 2011 01:45 PM PST
Reuters -  CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's military rulers are studying a proposal from their own advisers to bring forward parliamentary elections by two weeks after demands from protesters and politicians to speed up transition to civilian rule, an advisory council member said Sunday. Many Egyptians believe the army is no longer fit to manage security on the ground and carry out difficult reforms at a time of political and economic crisis. ...
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Iran says woman's stoning case might change to hanging
Sun,25 Dec 2011 12:12 PM PST
Reuters - TEHRAN (Reuters) - An Iranian woman sentenced to be stoned to death for adultery could be hanged instead, the students news agency ISNA reported. A court sentenced Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani to be stoned in 2006 but the sentence was suspended last year after an international outcry. However, under a judicial review being carried out she still could be hanged. "There is no rush ... ... Full Story | Top |
Yemen leader urges truce after troops kill protesters
Sun,25 Dec 2011 10:45 AM PST
Reuters -  SANAA (Reuters) - Yemen's acting leader on Sunday urged foes and loyalists of President Ali Abdullah to call a truce, after Saleh's forces killed nine people demanding he be tried for the deaths of demonstrators over nearly a year of protests against him. Troops from what witnesses identified as loyalist units opened fire on tens of thousands of protesters approaching Saleh's compound in the capital on Saturday after a days-long march from the city of Taiz by protesters chanting "No to immunity!. ...
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Iraqi political parties seek to resolve crisis
Sun,25 Dec 2011 09:11 AM PST
Reuters - BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi lawmakers tried on Sunday to negotiate an end to the country's worst political crisis in a year after Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki sought his Sunni vice president's arrest on charges he ran an assassination squad. U.S. officials, diplomats and politicians have been in a flurry of talks to calm a crisis that threat the ns to push Iraq back in the kind of sectarian strife that took the OPEC oil producer to the edge of civil war only a few years ago. Just a week after the last U.S. ... Full Story | Top |
22 feared dead in India Christmas boat capsize
Sun,25 Dec 2011 09:02 AM PST
Reuters - CHENNAI, India (Reuters) - Up to 22 Christmas vacationers in India were feared dead after a boat capsized on a lake near the southern city of Chennai Sunday afternoon, government officials said. The accident happened in Pulicat, a tourist spot about 70 kilometers (43 miles) north of Chennai, when a family of 25 went on a boat ride, Ashish Chatterjee, the top government official in Tiruvallur district of the southern Tamil Nadu state, told Reuters. "Three survived and eight bodies have been recovered so far," Chatterjee said, adding search was on to find more bodies. (Reporting by S. Murari) Full Story | Top |
Massive Khan rally defies Pakistan ruling party
Sun,25 Dec 2011 08:46 AM PST
Reuters - KARACHI (Reuters) - Pakistan's former cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan brought at least 100,000 people into the streets of Karachi Sunday in a massive rally that increases pressure on the civilian government and cements his standing as a political force. Khan, 59, is riding a wave of dissatisfaction with the government of President Asif Ali Zardari, who co-chairs the ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP), and is facing challenges from the military, the supreme court and political opponents after a year of cascading crises. ... Full Story | Top |
Powerful Darfur rebel chief dead, Sudan says
Sun,25 Dec 2011 07:37 AM PST
Reuters - KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Sudan's armed forces have killed the leader of Darfur's most powerful rebel group, state media said on Sunday, dealing a severe blow to insurgents in the remote western region in their nearly decade-long war with Khartoum. The Darfur conflict has rumbled on since mainly non-Arab insurgents took up arms in 2003, saying the central government had left them out of the political and economic power structure and was favoring local Arab tribes. Khalil Ibrahim, head of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), emerged as one of the most powerful rebel commanders. ... Full Story | Top |
Egypt's military rulers study plan to speed up vote
Sun,25 Dec 2011 07:36 AM PST
Reuters - CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's military rulers are studying a proposal from their own advisers to bring forward parliamentary elections by two weeks after demands from protesters and politicians to speed up transition to civilian rule, an advisory council member said on Sunday. Many Egyptians believe the army is no longer fit to manage security on the ground and carry out difficult reforms at a time of political and economic crisis. ... Full Story | Top |
Timeline: Ethnic and religious unrest in Nigeria
Sun,25 Dec 2011 06:50 AM PST
Reuters - (Reuters) - Following is a timeline of religious and ethnic violence in Nigeria over the last 10 years: 2000 - Thousands killed in northern Nigeria as non-Muslims opposed to the introduction of sharia (Islamic law) fight Muslims who demand its implementation in state of Kaduna. September 2001 - Christian-Muslim violence flares after Muslim prayers in Jos, with churches and mosques set on fire. At least 1,000 people are killed, according to September 2002 report by a panel set up by Plateau state government. November 2002 - Nigeria abandons Miss World contest in Abuja. ... Full Story | Top |
Egypt releases prominent blogger pending investigation
Sun,25 Dec 2011 06:48 AM PST
Reuters - CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian authorities released a prominent blogger detained on charges of inciting violence against the armed forces, a court source said on Sunday, adding that prosecutors were still investigating his case. Military prosecutors detained Alaa Abd El Fattah in October after deadly clashes broke out between the army and demonstrators in central Cairo. The detention has outraged activists who saw it as part of a broader crackdown. ... Full Story | Top |
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