An Italian religious studies teacher has been suspended for depicting the Apocalypse so vividly that it shocked an elementary school girl to tears. The teacher wrote to the Pope, who has sent her an encouraging response.
Month: December 2011
The fight against addiction may have a powerful new weapon. Rehab will rid your body of addictive substances and teach you how to live without drugs, but temptation remains. What if you could forget ever having taken cocaine?
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‘Al-Qaeda jail break’ in Yemeni city of Aden
Fifteen al-Qaeda militants have broken out of a prison in the southern Yemeni city of Aden, officials have said. The militants escaped through a six metre tunnel dug from the yard at the city’s central prison.
Panama’s ex-leader Manuel Noriega has been extradited back to his home country from France and taken straight to prison.
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World Stocks Mixed after Europe Sets Pact
A shaky Monday opening in Asia and Europe as skeptical investors assessed a new European fiscal pact aimed at fixing the continent’s debt crisis and preventing a breakup of the euro currency bloc.
Indian real estate mogul D.S. Kulkarni has built a state-of-the-art digital graphics campus from scratch in Pune, India. The educational impetus is provided by a French computer graphics university – a relationship light years indeed from old English colo
Essay: He Jianchao, director of the Daming Palace Bureau, is leading efforts to restore the remains of the imperial city of the Tang Dynasty. His response to criticism about the quality of the restoration might be funny — if it weren’t for the h
Op-Ed: To save the euro, the struggling southern countries must tighten their belts and modernize their economies. But the northern euro zone must change too. If Germany jacked up salaries rather than sitting on its export success, it might just set off a
Analysis: Long shut out from ruling, Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood achieved success in parliamentary elections that exceeded even their own expectations. But they must now navigate between potential extremism of Salafists and liberal forces’
Police in France are tracking a rash of rhinoceros horn robberies. The latest Hollywood-like heist took place earlier this week in Paris. Why rhino horns? Among other values, they are prized in Asia for their supposed medicinal properties.
Elio Di Rupo’s arrival as Prime Minister ends more than 500 days of political gridlock in Belgium, which saw threats of the country splitting in two. But Di Rupo, the last of seven children of poor Italian immigrants, has his own dramatic story to tell.
Italy is in hot water with EU authorities over its insistence that chocolate be classified as “pure” or “less pure” depending on its vegetable fat content. According to the European Commission, chocolate is chocolate – and should be labeled as such.
SchülerVZ, a youth portal, has introduced a new app for young school children to rate their peers. While the company says it’s safe and fun, some experts and parents say it encourages the worst kind of child social pressures that can have lasting conseque
Filmmaker Stanislav Govorukhin, who has also served for six years in Parliament, has been plucked to lead Putin’s campaign to return to the Russian presidency. It may be an attempt by Putin to shine a tarnished image. But who will really be pulli
We already knew that stress, alcohol, coffee and mental disorders could affect the quality and duration of our sleep. Research now suggests that genes play a role as well. European scientists recently isolated a gene that may affect a person’s ni
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Congress rebuffs easing of Iran sanctions
Republicans and Democrats determined to look tough on Iran and avoid any election-year challenges to their pro-Israel bona fides are rebuffing Obama administration pleas to ease proposed penalties on Iran’s central bank.
Most EU members have agreed to a tax and budget pact to tackle the eurozone debt crisis, but a German and French attempt to get all 27 EU states to back changes to the union’s treaties was dropped after objections from the UK.
The death toll at the Amri Hospital has risen to 73. 70 patients and three hospital staffers were among those killed at the multistoreyed private hospital which turned into a towering inferno in the early hours of the morning.
A Spanish university and Catholic clergy in Cuba have joined forces to help train Cuba’s business leaders of the future — even if ‘What Future?’ remains a looming question as regulations still restrict free enterprise from bloo
For years, Tzaphira Stern Assala kept the curtains of her Jerusalem dance studio closed to avoid offending the neighborhood’s Ultra-Orthodox Jews. Not anymore. Fed up with Ultra-Orthodox efforts to keep women out of public life, the studio is suddenly giv
Analysis: A very public U.S. air pollution monitor has become central in the debate over Beijing’s air quality. But China is so far from facing its environmental crisis that it doesn’t even use the latest standard means for measuring smo
Banana Republic is sparing no expense for Thursday’s grand opening along the Champs-Élysées, where big-name apparel companies now occupy close to 50% of the highly coveted real estate. That’s in part because few others can afford the chic avenue’s sky hig
Chinese police have busted two child-trafficking rings after a six-month nationwide investigation, rescuing 178 children and arresting 608 suspects, the country’s Ministry of Public Security announced.
The Somali capital, Mogadishu, has been hit by some of the fiercest fighting in the city in months, in what is seen as a major setback for the government.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin accuses the United States of stirring up protests against his 12-year rule and says foreign countries are spending hundreds of millions of dollars to influence Russian elections.
Op-ed: America’s two major political parties have become monolithic combat units with no sense of measure and little interest in compromise. One foreign observer says the only way to grease the frozen gears of the U.S. political machine is with a clear th
Tibetan refugees continue to brave harrowing journeys across the Himalayas to Nepal and beyond. Back home Chinese repression has triggered a new wave of self-immolations. But in Nepal too, “pressure from China is visible,” says one Tibetan refugee.
More so than elsewhere in Indonesia, the world’s largest Islamic nation, the province of Aceh adheres to the strict precepts of Sharia law. If caught by the religious police, residents face public flogging and prison. Still, the rich have ways ar
Colombia, already the fourth-largest oil producer in Latin America, is hoping to reach the million-barrel-a-day mark by Christmas. The holiday wish may come true, but there are still major obstacles in Colombia’s path to oil riches.
The first ever Sino-German car is being launched in China by Daimler, but won’t be a Mercedes brand. As a foreign business, Daimler had to pick a Chinese partner to launch the all-electric auto, opting for BYD (Build Your Dreams), the world’s lar
Following his United Russia’s narrow parliamentary victory, Putin responds to allegations of voter fraud, which have led to demonstrations and hundreds of arrests. Amongst party loyalists, the Russian leader stands his ground with a mix of imperi
A R A B I C A ارابيكا By Kristen Gillespie SYRIA: DEFINE DISOBEDIENCEThe Syrian New Media group has posted a primer to explain to Syrians the meaning of the term “civil disobedience.” The first of multiple installments, the two-and-a-half minute clip explains that any country is comprised of a regime, the people and the […]
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Muslim Brotherhood Claims Win in Egypt
The Muslim Brotherhood says it has won 34 seats in Egypt’s most recent elections, out of 56 seats that were up for grabs.
The Australian was convicted of blasphemy while doing the hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia, and is facing 500 lashes and one year in prison.
President Asif Ali Zardari is undergoing treatment for a minor heart attack in a Dubai hospital, according to a hospital source.
One middle manager takes us inside an all-too-common practice: public offices that must spend their annual funding increasingly turn to travel agencies to set up all-expense-paid vacations for the whole staff. And of course, the big bosses get extra speci
From China’s Weiwei to the Egyptian blogger Aliaa Magda al-Mahdi, people are again busy using their naked bodies as a way to challenge authority and demand rights. Even in today’s much more sexualized world, public nudity continues to be a powerful form o
Op-Ed: The military’s recent decision to appoint Kamal al-Ganzouri as prime minister is the latest bad sign from Egypt’s ruling class. Ganzouri, who already served under Mubarak, is the wrong choice at a time when citizens are clamoring
Going vegan may be a healthy choice, but it’s not an easy one, particularly when it comes to squinting at labels to ferret out the animal byproducts hidden within. But in Berlin, at least, vegan shopping just got a lot easier thanks to Veganz, a pioneer s
Essay: The West traces its origins to Greece and its Mediterranean neighbors. The region’s history and traditions continue to inspire, even as developments there warn us against taking capitalism and its social benefits too far.