Please login to continue
Around the World
Tracy Wilkinson
Los Angeles Times
Sat, 07 Nov 2009 01:52 EST
© Esteban Felix / Associated Press
The political crisis in Honduras deepened Friday after ousted President Manuel Zelaya declared "totally dead" a U.S.-brokered agreement that he had believed would restore him to power.
Zelaya, deposed in a military-backed coup four months ago after ignoring a court order to stop efforts to hold a referendum on revising the nation's constitution, said the accord collapsed after the de facto rulers formed a new "reconciliation government" without him.
The week-old deal had sought to bring representatives of Zelaya and his enemies into a transitional government as a way to ease the crisis and legitimize elections scheduled for Nov. 29.
Thomas Harding & Andy Bloxham
Telegraph.co.uk
Sat, 07 Nov 2009 01:37 EST
Three Grenadier Guards and two Royal Military Police were attacked as they rested inside a compound.
The soldiers, who had removed their body armour and helmets, were shot by an Afghan national policeman who then fled. It is not known whether he was a member of the Taliban or being coerced by the insurgents.
The gunman is thought to go by the name Gulbuddin and is believed to have had an accomplice.
There are also suggestions that he had animosity towards his superiors after being repeatedly moved around the country as part of his duties.
He is now being hunted by British soldiers on the ground, thought to include special forces.
The Daily Telegraph
Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:19 EST
Secret police agents have abducted and beaten award-winning blogger Yoani Sanchez, whose online reports chronicle the dark side of everyday life in communist Cuba.
Three agents in street clothes snatched Ms Sanchez and her friend Orlando Luis Pardo off the street in the Havana district of Vedado as they headed out to an anti-violence march.
"They beat me and then they shoved me into a car head-first. They did not give me any explanation at any time, but it is clear their goal was to stop us from taking part in the march," Ms Sanchez, who writes the blog
Generation Y, said.
Two other friends of hers were ordered into police cars and released later, she said.
In an item on her blog, which is often critical of the Americas' only one-party communist system in which only state media are legal, Ms Sanchez wrote an expose under the headline "A Gangland-style Kidnapping".
FTP/HGL
Tue, 03 Nov 2009 17:09 EST
The Daallo Airlines plane
Two Somali gunmen attempted to hijack a plane flying to Djibouti from Bossaso airport, but the effort was foiled by the passengers, local aviation officials announced.
The two Somali gunmen ordered the pilot to divert the plane, owned by Daallo Airlines, to land in the northern coastal town of Las Qorey, prompting the 30 passengers to desperately fight back and overpower the gunmen, according to Garowe online, a Press TV correspondent reported from Kenya.
The passengers were unhurt, but one of the hijackers was injured.
Sydney Morning Herald
Sat, 07 Nov 2009 15:24 EST
Mexico City: Three doctors and a nurse have been arrested for allegedly selling newborns after telling their mothers they had died.
Police uncovered the scheme after one of the women learnt her baby was alive and had been sold to a woman for 15,000 pesos ($1240), said Mexico City's deputy attorney general, Luis Genaro.
The woman gave birth to a girl through caesarean section at the private Central West Hospital in a working-class district in October 2008, Mr Genaro said.
She had told authorities she heard her baby cry but when she asked to see the child, doctors told her she had to wait until the effects of the anaesthetic wore off. Later they told her the baby had been taken to another hospital.
A day later, the woman was told her baby died and had been cremated, Mr Genaro said. The woman learnt the truth in an email from a man believed to be the son of the hospital director.
Comment: Difficult to believe that a group of 'caregivers' could be so uncaring!
John Ibbitson
The Globe and Mail
Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:33 EST
© The Canadian Press
Preparations have begun for the withdrawal of Canadian troops from Afghanistan, as the 2011 deadline for that withdrawal draws closer.
A government official confirmed media reports that General Walter Natynczyk, the Chief of the Defence Staff, has ordered preparations to get under way that would involve the return of the thousands of troops and their equipment from the troubled country.
"A Chief of Defence Staff directive has been issued to begin planning preparations for the 2011 end of combat mission," the official told
The Globe and Mail Friday.
Faith Karimi
CNN
Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:39 EST
© Unknown
There are some 200,000 albinos in Tanzania - this photo shows an albino child in neighboring Burundi.
A court sentenced four people to death in northern Tanzania for the killing of an albino man who was targeted for body parts believed to have special powers, authorities said Friday.
The four were found guilty of killing the 50-year-old albino in the Shinyanga region and sentenced to die by hanging for removing his body parts, said Lucca Haule, assistant commissioner of police.
So far, seven people have been sentenced to death for the killing of more than 50 Tanzanian albinos, including children, in the past two years, Haule said. Dozens more are awaiting trial.
Albinism is a genetic condition that leads to little or no pigment in the eyes, skin and hair.
Body parts of albinos are sought in some regions of Tanzania and other African countries, where some believe they bring wealth and good luck. Attackers chop off limbs and pluck out organs, selling them to witch doctors.
PressTV
Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:22 EST
In a rare fatal incident, two American troops have drowned in Afghanistan, while trying to recover equipment from a northwestern river, security officials say.
The soldiers died on Wednesday, while trawling in the Badghis province's Bala-Murghab River for lost supply packages, the area's Deputy Police Chief Mohammed Jabbar told a Press TV correspondent.
The supplies were lost as a US aircraft was dropping caissons and food parcels on the troops' base.
The present US contingent in cooperation with local military and police force have set out on a rescue operation.
Meanwhile, a spokesman for the Taliban, Ghari Yousuf Ahmadi, said that the militants had attacked the soldiers as the aircraft was on the supply mission, killing one of the soldiers while four others drowned themselves in the river.
The Daily Telegraph/Agence France-Presse
Fri, 06 Nov 2009 07:40 EST
A Japanese man collecting mushrooms in a mountain area today found the severed head of a young woman, believed to be a college student missing since last month, news reports said.
The man made the grisly find near the 1223-metre peak of Mount Garyu in the north of Hiroshima prefecture, where he was gathering wild mushrooms, Jiji Press reported, quoting police sources.
Police suspect the head may be that of a local 19-year-old college student who has been missing since October 26, Jiji said.
RIA Novosti
Fri, 06 Nov 2009 01:00 EST
© RIA Novosti
A gunman in the Japanese city of Yokohama committed suicide after having shot and seriously injured three men in a money dispute on Friday, Japanese media said.
Kenji Hayashi opened fire at around 2:30 p.m. local time (5:30 a.m. GMT) in a street in Yokohama's residential area and then took refuge in a nearby building, media reports said.
The man was found dead inside the building at around 4:00 p.m. local time after police failed to convince him to surrender. A revolver was found at the site.
Media reports said one of the injured men was in a critical condition.
257,461 people have viewed this page since Tue, 19 Dec 2006
Emails sent to Signs of the Times, Ark, Laura, or Cassiopaea become the property of Quantum Future Group, Inc and may be republished without notice.
Some icons appearing on this site were taken from KDE-look.org, Afterglow, Mayosoft, Everaldo, IconDrawer, VisualPharm, IconFactory, Klukeart, Icons-land, TpdkDesign.net, and IconShock.com.
Remember, we need your help to collect information on what is going on in your part of the world!
Send your article suggestions to: 
Original content © 2009 by SOTT.net/Signs of the Times. See: Fair Use Policy
![[Valid Atom 1.0]](/images/valid-atom.png?1222505720 "Validate my Atom 1.0 feed")
![[Valid RSS 2.0]](/images/valid-rss.png?1222505756 "Validate my RSS 2.0 feed")
