Owner sentenced in fatal club fire; band absolved

Argentina’s Court of Justice on Wednesday convicted and sentenced a club owner to 20 years in prison for a deadly club fire that killed 194 people but absolved the band that had played that night of responsibility for the tragedy. The incident happened in December 2004, when a fire broke out in the overcrowded Republica Cromanon venue in Buenos Aires.

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Controversy as Semenya wins women’s 800m

South African teenager Caster Semenya won the women’s 800 meters gold medal at the World Athletics Championships in Berlin, just hours after the sport’s governing body asked for the 18-year-old’s gender to be verified. Semenya crushed her rivals by streaking away to secure victory in a time of one minute 55.45 seconds — the best time in the world this year. Defending champion Janeth Jepkosgei of Kenya took the silver with Briton Jennifer Meadows claiming bronze.

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Lockerbie: the aftermath remembered

Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi’s fate hangs in the balance. The Libyan man convicted for the 1988 Lockerbie bombings has terminal prostate cancer and, according to his lawyers, just weeks to live. Scotland’s Justice Minister Frank MacAskill is weighing up whether to release him on compassionate grounds so he can die at home; to transfer him to a Libyan jail under a prisoner transfer agreement drawn up between Libya and the UK; or whether to keep him in a Scottish jail for the rest of his days.

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Dolly Parton: ‘I know I’m a bit over-exaggerated’

"Never wear your make up to bed," implore the beauty editors. But Dolly Parton was never one for following conventional advice on looking good. She sets her own standards, from her striking sculptured hair to the bright lashings of eyeshadow caked on a face that she has admitted in the past owes a lot to modern surgery

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Three Americans reportedly arrested in Iran

Iranian security forces arrested three Americans, accusing them of illegally entering the country from Iraq’s Kurdish region, Iran’s official Press TV said on Saturday. The network’s Web site quoted a wire story saying the three Americans were backpackers and that a Kurdish official had warned them not to hike in the mountains because of the proximity of the Iranian border. Officials say the case is under investigation, Press TV said

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