Algeria hostage crisis ends in bloodshed

IN AMENAS, Algeria: Algerian troops stormed a remote gas plant on Saturday to end a hostage crisis that killed 23 foreigners and Algerians, seven of them executed by their Islamist captors in a final military assault.Twenty-one hostages died during the siege that began when the Al-Qaeda-linked gunmen attacked the In Amenas facility deep in the Sahara desert at dawn on Wednesday, the interior...

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JBT scam: Convicted retired staff & kin in a shock

NEW DELHI: Four days after the CBI court gave its verdict in the junior basic trained (JBT) teachers' recruitment scam, 50 retired Haryana primary education department employees, who were convicted by the court, and their families are in a state of shock.Having lost the legal battle following the CBI court's conviction, the former government employees of the education department on Saturday pleaded...

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Lilly drug chosen for Alzheimer's prevention study

Researchers have chosen an experimental drug by Eli Lilly & Co. for a large federally funded study testing whether it's possible to prevent Alzheimer's disease in older people at high risk of developing it.The drug, called solanezumab (sol-ah-NAYZ-uh-mab), is designed to bind to and help clear the sticky deposits that clog patients' brains.Earlier studies found it did not help people with moderate...

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Ex-Teammate: Armstrong Showed 'Genuine Emotion'

While critics railed against Lance Armstrong for coming off as detached in the two-part interview with Oprah Winfrey that aired Thursday and Friday nights, former teammate and friend, Tyler Hamilton, told "Good Morning America" today that he felt Armstrong was displaying "genuine emotion.""I've never seen Lance shed a tear until last night. Before I even heard one word from...

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Algerian army stages "final assault" on gas plant

ALGIERS/IN AMENAS, Algeria (Reuters) - The Algerian army carried out a dramatic final assault to end a siege by Islamist militants at a desert gas plant on Saturday in which 23 hostages were killed, many of them believed to be foreigners, the interior ministry said. Thirty-two al Qaeda-linked militants were killed in the army operation to recapture the complex, according to a provisional...

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US stocks mostly higher; Intel pulls Nasdaq down

NEW YORK: US stocks ended mostly higher on Friday helped by news that Republicans might give way to a short-term rise of the debt ceiling to avoid a new crisis, but poor earnings from Intel pulled the Nasdaq lower.The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 53.68 points (0.39 percent) to 13,649.70.The broad-based S&P 500 added 5.04 points (0.34 percent) at 1,485.98.But the tech-heavy Nasdaq...

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Nirbhay to be test-fired in February

HYDERABAD: Nirbhay, India's first subsonic cruise missile, will be test-fired by the end of February, said V K Saraswat, director general of Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and scientific advisor to defence minister A K Antony. Saraswat was speaking to the media during a seminar on 'Nurturing, Managing and Institutionalising Innovation' organised by the Defence Research and...

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Manti Te'o Hoax Incredibly Detailed and Complex

Fresh details have emerged about how complex and layered was the hoax involving Notre Dame star linebacker Manti Te'o and his fake girlfriend, "Lennay Kekua."According to ABC News interviews and published reports, Te'o received phone calls, text messages and letters before every football game from his "girlfriend." He was in contact with her family, including a twin brother,...

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Foreigners still caught in Sahara hostage crisis

ALGIERS/IN AMENAS, Algeria (Reuters) - More than 20 foreigners were still either being held hostage or missing inside a gas plant on Friday after Algerian forces stormed the desert complex to free hundreds of captives taken by Islamist militants. More than a day after the Algerian army launched an assault to seize the remote desert compound, much was still unclear about the number and...

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Amazon says music catalogue open to Apple users

SAN FRANCISCO: Amazon said Thursday its 22-million song music catalogue was now "optimised" for users of Apple devices, making it easier for iPhone owners to circumvent the iTunes store.The move is part of a new initiative by the Internet retail giant challenging Apple's dominance of the digital music market."For the first time ever, iPhone and iPod touch users can discover and buy digital...

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Murder accused MLA makes Cong insecure in HP

SHIMLA: The disqualification of murder accused Congress MLA Ram Kumar Chaudhary has jeopardized the party's position in 68-member House of Himachal Pradesh. The Doon MLA's ouster has left the party with 34 MLAs only. For clear majority, the government should have the support of 35 members. If Chaudhary is disqualified, the party will be left with no option but to seek the outside support.The MLA's...

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Will Obama's order lead to surge in gun research?

MILWAUKEE (AP) — Nearly as many Americans die from guns as from car crashes each year. We know plenty about the second problem and far less about the first. A scarcity of research on how to prevent gun violence has left policymakers shooting in the dark as they craft gun control measures without much evidence of what works.That could change with President Barack Obama's order Wednesday to ease research...

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'Catfish' Star Reaches Out to Manti Te'o

Nev Schulman, the star and creator of the MTV show "Catfish" that follows Internet dating hoaxes, has reached out to Notre Dame football star Manti Te'o and offered to help solve his girlfriend hoax.Te'o and Notre Dame claim he was a "catfish" victim when it was revealed that the woman he said was his girlfriend and died of leukemia never existed.The "Catfish" television show...

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Some foreign hostages said killed in Algeria assault

ALGIERS (Reuters) - Algeria said several hostages were killed on Thursday when its forces stormed a remote desert gas plant occupied by Islamist militants in retaliation for French intervention in Mali, and local sources said six foreigners were among the dead. Amid reports of many more casualties in one of the biggest international hostage crises in decades, Western leaders expressed anger they...

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Chavez to troops: thanks for the 'loyalty and love'

CARACAS: Lying in a Havana hospital bed as he recovers from cancer surgery, President Hugo Chavez thanked Venezuela's military for their loyalty and love, the vice president said Wednesday.Nicolas Maduro told a military audience the president expressed this message to Science Minister Jorge Arreaza, who is also Chavez's son-in-law and with him in Cuba."He told us to pass on to the armed...

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Ludhiana-Delhi expressway to cut distance by 50km

NEW DELHI: Punjab, Haryana and Delhi governments and the Centre on Wednesday decided to build an expressway on new alignment linking the national Capital with Ludhiana, which would also have a separate node to connect Chandigarh. The expressway is likely to cost Rs 20,000 crore, and would reduce distance between Delhi and Ludhiana by 50 km. The decision was taken at a meeting chaired by highways...

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ER visits tied to energy drinks double since 2007

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The young man stumbled into the emergency room late one night after a house party, saying his heart wouldn't stop pounding and he could barely breathe after downing liquor mixed with energy drinks.Emergency physician Steve Sun soon found the patient was so dehydrated he was going into kidney failure — one of many troubling cases Sun says he has treated in recent years tied to...

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Obama Unveils Sweeping Plan to Curb Gun Violence

Flanked by four children from across the country, President Obama today unveiled a sweeping plan to curb gun violence in America through an extensive package of legislation and executive actions not seen since the 1960s.Obama is asking Congress to implement mandatory background checks for all gun purchases, including private sales; reinstate a ban on some assault-style weapons;...

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Dozens held after Islamists attack Algerian gas field

ALGIERS (Reuters) - Islamist militants attacked a gas field in Algeria on Wednesday, claiming to have kidnapped up to 41 foreigners including seven Americans in a dawn raid in retaliation for France's intervention in Mali, according to regional media reports. The raiders were also reported to have killed three people, including a Briton and a French national. An al Qaeda...

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Oil prices fall on weak German, US data

NEW YORK: Oil prices retreated Tuesday after unimpressive economic data out of Germany and the US raised questions about the strength of petroleum demand.Prices of US benchmark West Texas Intermediate futures settled at US$93.28 a barrel, down 86 cents. European benchmark Brent crude futures settled at US$110.30 a barrel, down US$1.58.German gross domestic product shrank by about 0.5 pe...

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