Daily News Channel
Even as Pentagon lawyers begin trying to ease the “don’t ask, don’t tell” prohibition on gays serving openly in the U.S. military, the murder last week of an apparently gay sailor at California’s Camp Pendleton has raised new questions over the readiness of the armed forces to accept openly homosexual personnel. Seaman August Provost of Houston was shot and killed while standing nighttime guard at his base on June 30.
The circumstances surrounding the 2005 collapse of carmaker MG Rover are to be investigated, the British government confirmed Monday. The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) said in a statement it had been asked to consider whether there should be a criminal investigation following completion of an inquiry into the failure of the MG Rover Group (MGRG) on April 8, 2005, which owed nearly £1.3 billion ($2.09 billion) to creditors.
Iranian opposition leader Mir Hossein Moussavi plans to form a new political party aimed at reining in the power of the Islamic Republic’s leadership, a leading reformist newspaper reported Sunday. Moussavi told supporters the party will be focused on upholding “the remaining principles of the constitution,” according to Etemad-e Melli, a newspaper aligned with fellow opposition candidate Mehdi Karrubi. He is expected to file papers with Iran’s Interior Ministry to establish the party before hard-line incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is sworn in for a new term, the newspaper reported
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he wants to engage President Obama in "negotiations" before international media, a semi-official Iranian news outlet reported on Saturday.
Lance Armstrong returned to the Tour de France for first time in four years by finishing 10th in the opening time trial in Monaco which was won by Fabian Cancellara of Switzerland. Cancellara, renowned for his awesome performances against the clock, clocked 19 minutes 32.14 seconds for the 15.5 kilometer course in the Mediterranean principality
The number of Internet scammers offering fake anti-swine flu drug Tamiflu has surpassed those selling counterfeit Viagra, a UK body said Friday. Since the H1N1 virus, also known as swine flu, was declared a global pandemic last month, there has been an increase in the number of Web sites and junk emails offering Tamiflu for sale. More than 70,000 people have now been infected with the virus, according to the World Health Organization
Profits at celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay’s British restaurants plunged by nearly 90 percent in the last 12 months.
A top Iranian cleric said Friday some of the arrested employees from the British Embassy in Tehran would be put on trial, Iranian Students News Agency reported. The employees have been accused of helping to incite some of the post-election protests that sweep through Iran. The British Foreign Office in London reacted strongly to the statement Friday.
A month ago, Britain’s Health Secretary Andy Burnham issued a statement urging British citizens not to panic despite a surge in cases of H1N1 influenza virus in the country. Now it seems health officials have the opposite problem, and are urging parents not to hold “swine flu parties” which some people believe will build up children’s immunity by infecting them with the virus. Parents in Britain have long held “chicken pox parties” at the beginning of summer so that children can catch the disease at a convenient time
The Islamic Republic has been busy in three main ways since the presidential elections of June 12. Rejecting charges that the result — a 63% vote for incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad — was the result of fraud, the regime organized a partial recount, which on June 29 reconfirmed Ahmadinejad’s victory, a finding the opposition continues to reject. Simultaneously, the regime worked to put down the widespread street demonstrations that followed the disputed poll, sending in police and pro-government militiamen to beat up and disperse demonstrators