World

MADRID (Reuters) – Coins worth nearly half a billion dollars finally arrived in Spain yesterday after lying in a sunken warship for more than 200 years and following a five-year legal battle between the Spanish government and a salvage company.

SANAA/ADEN (Reuters) – A suicide bombing claimed by al Qaeda killed at least 26 people outside a presidential palace in southern Yemen yesterday, hours after the newly-elected president was sworn in and said the battle against the Islamists was a “national duty”.

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea threatened today to wage a “sacred war” in response to joint military exercises planned by its arch-rival South Korea and the United States, saying it was determined to keep Washington from imposing its political will on it.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Syria holds a referendum yesterday on a new constitution, dismissed by the opposition as a charade amid an intensifying crackdown on the 11-month-old revolt against President Bashar al-Assad.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) – Pakistani forces began demolishing the house where al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was killed by US special forces last May, in an unexplained move carried out in the dark of night.

MILAN (Reuters) – Italian judges yesterday ended former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s trial on charges of bribing British lawyer David Mills, saying the statute of limitations had run out and a verdict could not be reached.

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – Former South African president Nelson Mandela was comfortable in hospital yesterday after undergoing a “diagnostic procedure” for abdominal pains, the government said, telling people not to panic about the health of the 93-year-old anti-apartheid leader.

(OneIndia) The rumours of Deepika Padukone and Siddharth Mallya’s split have been proved true, when the duo were seen avoiding each other at an award function.

(Trinidad Express) An unnecessary level of muscle was used in the two police raids on media houses, particularly the one on Newsday, given the nature of the complaint, chairman of the Police Service Commission (PSC) Dr Ramesh Deosaran said on Friday.

KABUL (Reuters) – Twelve people were killed yesterday in the bloodiest day yet in protests that have raged across Afghanistan over the desecration of copies of the Muslim holy book at a NATO military base with riot police and soldiers on high alert braced for more violence.

(Reuters) – The first wounded and sick women trapped in the most embattled district of the Syrian city of Homs have been evacuated, and talks were held to evacuate more on Saturday, while pressure mounted on President Bashar al-Assad’s government to call a ceasefire and let in humanitarian aid.

ZINTAN, Libya (Reuters) – In a secret location, somewhere among the sandstone and concrete buildings of the straggling mountain town of Zintan, Libya’s most prominent prisoner awaits his fate.

VIENNA (Reuters) – Iran has sharply stepped up its controversial uranium enrichment drive, the UN nuclear agency said yesterday in a report that will further inflame Israeli fears the Islamic Republic is pushing ahead with atomic bomb plans.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Vladimir Putin will reclaim the Kremlin’s top job by winning two thirds of the vote in a March presidential election, but Russia’s alpha-dog leader may face growing resentment against his rule, the last major poll before the vote showed yesterday.

KABUL (Reuters) – Afghanistan wants NATO to put on public trial those who burned copies of the Koran at a NATO base, President Hamid Karzai’s office said yesterday, after a third day of bloody protests over the incident.

AMMAN/BEIRUT (Reuters) – Western and Arab nations will demand that Syrian forces implement an immediate ceasefire to allow relief supplies to reach desperate civilians in bombarded cities such as Homs when they meet in Tunis today.

FORT MEADE (Reuters) – US Army intelligence analyst Bradley Manning, accused of the largest leak of classified documents in US history, deferred a plea in a military court arraignment yesterday, marking the first step in a court-martial that could land him in prison for life.

LONDON (Reuters) – The new Sunday edition of Rupert Murdoch’s British Sun tabloid, to be launched with a huge advertising campaign and a print run of around 3 million this week, is expected to be more family-friendly and less salacious than its predecessor, The News of the World.

LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s Valerie Amos, who is heading to Syria on a UN humanitarian mission, is an expert in the delicate art of international diplomacy.

(Reuters) – US and European officials are downplaying allegations that Iran and al Qaeda have recently stepped up cooperation in preparation for possible attacks on US and other Western targets.