Portal:Current events/October 2010

Armed conflicts and incidents

In Abuja, two car bombs explode during Nigeria's 50th anniversary celebrations of its Independence from the British Empire, killing 12 and injuring 17. Militant rebel group MEND claims responsibility. (BBC)
Prominent video journalist Merajuddin is hospitalised in Srinagar after being severely beaten with a baton in his neck by Kashmir police. They also beat up his son and colleague in the latest police attack on the media there. (BBC)
Following the killing of 3 Pakistani soldiers by NATO, tankers carrying supplies for NATO troops based in Afghanistan are set alight in Shikarpur, Sindh, injuring no one. (Al Jazeera)
6 sailors taken hostage off the coast of Cameroon on September 12 by the Africa Marine Commando are released. (BBC)
An airstrike launched by the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) kills 15 insurgents in the Tsowkey district of Afghanistan's eastern Kunar province. (Xinhua)

Arts and culture

American author Jonathan Franzen advises British fans to cease reading his latest novel Freedom as a printing error has led to the publication of an old draft of his text, with thousands of copies set to be pulped. (The Guardian)
Sky 3D, the first dedicated 3D TV channel in Europe, launches in the UK. (BBC) (The Guardian) (The Daily Telegraph) (The Independent)

Business and economics

BMW announces the international recall of hundreds of thousands of luxury cars. (BBC)
American Bob Dudley succeeds Tony Hayward as the new CEO of BP after the recent controversies over the Oil Spill crisis in the Deepwater Horizon. (AP via Google News)

Disasters

A massive rainstorm, formed from the combination of the remnants of Tropical Storm Nicole and a second extratropical low, drenches the East Coast of the United States from North Carolina to Maine. (AOL) (AP via WMBF)^{[permanent dead link]}

International relations

The United Nations publishes a toned down version of its report into war crimes said to have occurred in the Democratic Republic of the Congo during the 1990s after Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi rejected the report's findings. (Al Jazeera) (BBC) (The Guardian) (AFP via The Straits Times)
North Korea and South Korea agree to restart a family reunion program for families separated in the Korean War. (AFP via Google News)

Law and crime

Nobel peace laureate Mairead Maguire is to be deported from Israel within 48 hours after her appeal to overturn her entry refusal was rejected. (BBC)
Nigerian police free 15 schoolchildren kidnapped by an armed gang. (NEXT) (BBC) (Al Jazeera)

Politics

Politicians in Iceland flee from their own people as they protest on the streets of Reykjavík. (The Guardian)
David Lloyd Johnston is sworn in as new Governor General of Canada, succeeding Michaëlle Jean. (The Globe and Mail)
Former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf launches a new political party - the All Pakistan Muslim League - in London. (Dawn) (Al Jazeera) (BBC)
Thailand lifts a state of emergency in Nakhon Ratchasima, Khon Kaen and Udon Thani but it remains in place in Bangkok and the nearby provinces of Nonthaburi, Pathum Thani and Samut Prakan. (AFP via Google News) (Thai News Agency)
President of the United States Barack Obama calls a press conference in the White House to make a "personnel announcement" reported to be related to the departure of his aide Rahm Emanuel. (BBC)

Science and technology

Sky has launched its 3D Channel, Virgin Media has announced the launch of 3D Movies On Demand – the first digital TV service. (Sky) (Virgin Media)
The 2010 Ig Nobel Prizes are announced. (The Guardian) (BBC) (AP via The New Zealand Herald)^{[permanent dead link]}
The discovery of Inkayacu, an extinct genus of prehistoric penguin that lived in the Late Eocene period, is announced. (The New York Times)
More than 1,200 NASA employees are laid off despite a $19 billion funding budget passed by the United States Congress earlier in the week. (CNN)
China launches the Chang'e 2 lunar probe from Sichuan. (Xinhua) (BBC)

Sport

The 2010 Ryder Cup between golfers representing the PGA of America and the PGA European Tour begins at the Celtic Manor Resort in Newport, Wales. (BBC)

Television

Fox Sports en Español is Changing to Fox Deportes

October 2, 2010 (Saturday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

A British soldier has been killed in an explosion while on patrol in Nahr-e Saraj District of Helmand Province in Afghanistan. (York Press via AP) (Google via AP)
3 drone strikes kill 18 people in the Data Khel area of North Waziristan in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Area as the government continues to block a NATO supply route into Afghanistan, bringing the numbers of militant and civilian deaths to at least 150. (CNN) (BBC)
Iran arrests several people suspected of spying for foreign intelligence services on its nuclear facilities. (Al Jazeera) (The Observer)

Business and economy

2010 strikes in France: Millions of people demonstrate on the streets of France for a third day in more than 200 protests against President Nicolas Sarkozy's plans to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62. (Xinhua) (BBC) (Reuters)

Disasters

A four-story residential building under construction collapsed Saturday morning in Chang'an District of Xi'an City, northwest China's Shaanxi Province, killing eight workers and injuring three. (China Daily)
In Indonesia, two trains are involved in a rear-end collision at Petarukan, killing 43 and injuring 50. Another train crash at Solo kills one person. (BBC) (Jakarta Post)

Arts, culture and entertainment

Rick Sanchez, a Cuban-born news anchorman with the American channel CNN, is fired by the network after calling comedian Jon Stewart a "bigot", saying Jews are not an oppressed minority in the United States, and implying the people who run CNN and other news media are Jewish. (BBC) (The Times of India) (AP via The New Zealand Herald)^{[permanent dead link]}
The MAXXI – National Museum of the 21st Century Arts in Rome wins the Stirling Prize, a British architectural award given by the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA). (BBC) (The Observer) (The Daily Telegraph)
The 60th Miss World 2010 pageant begins as the last delegates from 120 nations worldwide arrive in China. (Globalbeauties)
A film produced for the 10:10 campaign in which a teacher explodes two of her students is withdrawn due to complaints and an apology is issued. (BBC) (The Guardian)
American female television station Oxygen gives the go-ahead to a new reality show set to star American celebrity and heiress Paris Hilton; the show is to follow Hilton in the course of her daily life. (Reuters)

International relations

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas tells that peace negotiations will not continue until Israel makes a new settlement freeze on the West Bank, ending the current Israel-Palestine peace negotiations after just one month, though maintaining contacts with the United States. (Xinhua) (Aljazeera)
Sweden raises its threat level in response to reports that the country could be targeted by terrorists. (Stockholm News) (CNN)

Law and crime

Spanish police arrest 41 people suspected of financing FARC rebels in Colombia. (Al Jazeera) (euronews)
Druidry is recognised as religion for first time in the United Kingdom. (AP via Google News)
Phillip and Nancy Garrido, the kidnappers of 11-year-old American child Jaycee Lee Dugard, are each indicted on 18 counts, ranging from rape to false imprisonment. (Fox News)

Politics and elections

President of Ecuador Rafael Correa declares "a great victory for the government" after defeating the 2010 Ecuador crisis in a nationally broadcast address from the presidential palace. (Al Jazeera)
Voters in Latvia go to the polls in a parliamentary election. (Latvians Online) (Reuters)
A report into the second Irish referendum on the Treaty of Lisbon is published, indicating reasons why people voted for and against the European Union treaty, which the Government eventually ratified successfully after much effort. (RTÉ) (The Irish Times) (Socialist Worker)
Death of Kwa Geok Choo:
- Kwa Geok Choo, wife of first Prime Minister of Singapore Lee Kuan Yew and mother of current prime minister Lee Hsien Loong, dies at home. (Channel News Asia) (TODAY) (The Straits Times)
- Lee Hsien Loong interrupts his visit to the Asia–Europe Meeting (ASEM) in Brussels to fly home. (Channel News Asia)
- The nation mourns and tributes are given by netizens. (The Straits Times)
- There are international tributes, including official condolences sent from Belgium, Malaysia and Taiwan. (Channel News Asia) (The Straits Times) (Focus Taiwan)
Thousands of people rally in Washington, D.C., calling for improved civil rights in the country. (CNN) (Al Jazeera)
Around 1,500 people demonstrate peacefully in Bremen city centre against a weekend of celebrations as the 20th anniversary of German reunification approaches, discrediting police fears of large-scale riots. (Deutsche Welle) (BBC)

October 3, 2010 (Sunday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Security forces eliminated 25 Taliban militants in their former stronghold Nad Ali district of southern Helmand Province of Afghanistan. (Xinhua) (People)
A roadside bomb strikes a civilian car in Paktika Province, in eastern Afghanistan, leaving seven civilians dead. (Xinhua)
Twelve people were killed and seven injured after individuals opened fire at NATO oil tankers near the Defence Housing Authority, in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. (Xinhua)
In a second audio recording in 24 hours, Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden says Muslim nations haven't done enough to support relief efforts in flood-hit Pakistan. (timesnow.tv)
An Israeli military tribunal convicts two Israeli soldiers for using a Palestinian child as a human shield during an offensive in Gaza in 2009, said to be the first conviction of its kind in Israel's history. (BBC) (Haaretz) (AFP via Google News)
Two Thai soldiers are killed and four others are wounded during a gun fight with suspected Islamist rebels in the south of the country. (Channel NewsAsia) (Thai News Agency)
Police in Indonesia kill six suspected Islamist militants and arrest four others in a raid in North Sumatra. (AFP) (Jakarta Post) (Xinhua)

Arts and culture

Archaeologists digging at a site on the Egypt-Gaza border unearth parts of a possible hidden city which they believe is more than 2,000 years old. They encounter difficulties while excavating due to the blockade of Gaza. (Al Jazeera)
International cultural experts attack the Italian government's policy of tolerating oversized advertisements on historic Venetian sights as being "probably illegal". They say it violates the city's UNESCO ranking as a World Heritage Site. (The Observer)
An art exhibition indicates Adolf Hitler's foreign minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop, planned to retire in Cornwall after the planned German invasion of Britain during World War II. (The Observer)

Disasters

Six people were killed and five injured Sunday after a wall of a factory building under construction collapsed in east China's Shandong Province. (Sina)
Five people were killed and four others were injured in a colliery explosion in southwest China's Guizhou Province. The accident was reported at Huanghegou pit in Xixiu District of Anshun City. (China Daily)
Rain-triggered floods killed four people and left two others missing Sunday in Atush city in northwest China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. (Global Times)
Nine die in floods in central Vietnam. Four people have been killed in Hà Tĩnh Province, one in Quảng Bình Province and one in Quảng Trị Province, while two individuals were injured in [à Tĩnh and Quảng Bình Provinces. (Vietnam News) (Vietnamnet)
An explosion rips through a leather workshop in the town of Güzelburç in Hatay Province, Turkey, killing 3 people and injuring 5 others. (Hürriyet)^{[permanent dead link]}
74-year-old Prime Minister of Italy Silvio Berlusconi tells a blasphemous joke about Jews to emergency workers dealing with the 2009 L'Aquila earthquake, causing upset to the Vatican. Berlusconi describes it as "just a laugh" he "made in private, not offensive and not a sin." (The Daily Telegraph)

International relations

Germany marks 20 years as a reunified nation with events in Bremen and pays its last World War I reparations. (BBC) (Al Jazeera) (AFP via The Sydney Morning Herald)
Egypt and Iran agree to resume direct flights after three decades. (Al Jazeera)
The United States issues a travel alert to its citizens across Europe, warning that it suspects they may become the target of a commando-style attack. (Al Jazeera) (BBC) (Channel 4 News)
The United Kingdom's Foreign and Commonwealth Office updates its travel advice for Europe. (The Guardian) (BBC) (Sky News)
American and British government officials make contact to collaborate on the issue of a broad travel alert. (PA via The Independent)

Law and crime

Ecuadorean Policy Minister Doris Soliz announces that parts of an austerity law which provoked the 2010 Ecuador crisis are to be rewritten. (BBC)
22 Mexican tourists are kidnapped in Acapulco. (CNN) (RFI)

Politics and elections

Fiji's former prime minister, Mahendra Chaudhry, is arrested for allegedly breaching the military government's emergency regulations. (Al Jazeera) (BBC) (Fiji Times) (Sify India)
Voters in Brazil go to the polls in a presidential election with a runoff election likely between Dilma Rousseff of the Workers' Party and José Serra of the Brazilian Social Democratic Party. (Al Jazeera), (The Guardian)
Voters in Bosnia and Herzegovina go to the polls in a general election. (Al Jazeera)
Healthcare Professionals for Change, the first professional body established with the aim of improving the United Kingdom's Suicide Act 1961, is to launch its campaign to change death laws, described as "unprecedented". (The Observer)

Sport

The 2010 Commonwealth Games officially start at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in Delhi, India. (Al Jazeera) (BBC News)
Rugby league:
- The St. George Illawarra Dragons defeat the Sydney Roosters 32–8 to win the 2010 NRL Grand Final in Sydney. (The Australian)
- Wigan Warriors defeat St Helens 22–10 to win the 2010 Super League Grand Final in Manchester. (BBC Sport)

October 4, 2010 (Monday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

3 people killed in Pibor county of Jonglei state of Sudan. (Sudan Tribune)
Afghanistan and Pakistan
- Three soldiers with the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) were killed in separate attacks in Afghanistan's restive southern and eastern regions. (Xinhua)
- 12 people die and 7 others receive wounds during a torch attack in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, on a convoy of more than a dozen oil tankers intended for NATO forces in Afghanistan. This follows a dispute over a NATO helicopter strike that killed 3 soldiers in Pakistan territory. (AFP via The Age) (The New York Times), (BBC)
- At least 8 people are killed by a CIA drone strike in Pakistan, with three to five of those killed being citizens of Germany. (BBC)
Jewish settlers in the West Bank set fire to the Muslim Al-Anbiaa mosque in Beit Fajjar area near the Palestinian city of Bethlehem. Its rug ground and some parts of the Qur'an are burnt and anti-Islamic and anti-Palestinian slogans are written. (Xinhua) (Al Jazeera) (BBC)
War in Iraq
- 89 people are killed in violence in Baghdad and northern Iraq, including a journalist for a US-funded Al Hurra satellite television station. (Khaleej Times via AFP) (Africasia) (IFEX)
- At least 1 person is killed in a roadside bombing in Baghdad targeting a deputy minister of the country's government. (Al Jazeera)
5 Tajik policemen are killed in a clash in East Tajikistan. (Xinhua)
4 people, including two Central Reserve Police Force men, are killed and 2 others are injured in an evening landmine blast in the remote parts of South Gadchiroli. The attack is carried out by Maoists. (DNA) (ZEE)

Arts and culture

TVNZ Breakfast race row: Video
- TVNZ Breakfast broadcaster Paul Henry questions Prime Minister John Key about whether New Zealand's ethnic minority Governor-General Anand Satyanand, representative of Queen Elizabeth II, is a proper New Zealander. Henry has previously described singer Susan Boyle as "retarded" and homosexuality as "unnatural", though the state-owned broadcaster defends him, furthering the controversy. (AFP via The Age)
- Breakfast tech commentator Ben Gracewood quits after describing Henry's comments as "the final straw" and saying "I can't work with him". (The New Zealand Herald)
The world's oldest known high altitude human settlement, estimated to be 49,000 years old, is uncovered near Kokoda, Papua New Guinea. (Radio Australia)
Jonathan Evans, head of Britain's MI5, gives a rare interview, disclosing details of his love for classics and calling for wider availability of Latin and Greek in schools as, he claims, they are useful for spies. (The Daily Telegraph)
British comic actor and songwriter Sir Norman Wisdom dies in an Isle of Man nursing home. (BBC)(The Guardian)
The industrial dispute surrounding The Hobbit film project is mediated by New Zealand's Economic Development Minister Gerry Brownlee and Arts and Culture Minister Chris Finlayson. (The New Zealand Herald) (BBC)
Hundreds of people attend the public funeral of actor Tony Curtis who died last week. (BBC)

Business and economy

2001 Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz warns of a "wave of austerity" set to sweep across Europe, triggering a new recession and the demise of the euro, and predicts Spain will enter a "death spiral" - similar to that of Argentina a decade ago - when it is attacked by speculators. (AFP via The Age)
The Greek government announces additional harsher austerity measures in its 2011 draft budget. (BBC)
Visa and MasterCard agreed to settle an antitrust lawsuit brought by the U.S. Department of Justice and the attorneys-general of seven states. They agreed to allow their participating merchants to steer customers toward lower-cost options. American Express will fight rather than agree to the terms, it said. (NPR)

Disasters and accidents

Indonesian Coordinating Minister for Public Welfare Affairs Agung Laksono said here on Tuesday that the massive flood in Wasior, West Papua that continuously occurred from Sunday to Monday has claimed 56 lives. (Xinhua)
3 people were killed and 5 were injured after a boiler exploded in a tannery in Hatay in the Dericiler area of Güzelburç town. The injured were taken to Mustafa Kemal University’s faculty of medicine hospital. (Today's Zaman)
Two persons were killed when a mini-lorry was hit by the Netravati Express, they were travelling at an unmanned level crossing at Panachuvadu near Punnapra, India. (The Hindu)
At least 26 are killed and many more left missing after flash floods in eastern Indonesia's Papua province. (Deccan Chronicle via AP) (Jakarta News)

International relations

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan met in Brussels, on the sidelines of the Asia–Europe Meeting. (CNN)
The 2010 Asia–Europe Meeting commences in Brussels, Belgium with Russia, Australia and New Zealand joining the discussions. (Xinhua)
China's State Councilor Dai Bingguo delivers a speech at the opening session of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change meeting in Tianjin before the U.N. climate summit in Mexico at year's end. (China Daily via Xinhua) (Al Jazeera)
An angry stand-off results from a row over the ongoing presence of dozens of United States military bases on the Japanese island of Okinawa, all of which remain through intense U.S. pressure despite protests from tens of thousands of residents. (BBC)
Federal Minister of the Interior Thomas de Maizière tells a news conference in Berlin that there is no concrete evidence of an imminent attack and "no reason to be alarmist at this time"; the Japanese government alerts its citizens to watch out for any attacks in Europe. The United States and UK have both done so in recent times. (BBC)
Israel decides to deport 1976 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mairead Maguire, whom it has kept locked up in a detention facility since last Tuesday when she arrived to attend a conference with 5 other Nobel peace laureates. An Israeli court orders her to keep "her propaganda to herself". Israel claims it has banned her from entering its land but she says she is unaware of such a ban. (The Irish Times) (BBC) (Haaretz)

Law and crime

Dutch MP Geert Wilders is put on trial in Amsterdam on charges of inciting hatred against Muslims in his 17-minute film Fitna. Anti-Wilders protests occur outside court. (BBC) (Al Jazeera) (AFP via iAfrica)
Syria issues arrest warrants for more than 30 people accused of misleading an investigation into the 2005 assassination of Lebanon's former prime minister Rafic Hariri. (Al Jazeera)
Former Prime Minister of Fiji Mahendra Chaudhry is released on bail. (Indian Express) (BBC)
A court in Thailand rejects a request to drop charges against Viktor Bout, whom the United States suspects of attempting to sell weapons to its opponents. He was arrested by undercover United States agents in 2008 at a Bangkok hotel. (BBC) (Xinhua)
A vigil is held by Rutgers University in the United States for Tyler Clementi, who committed suicide after a roommate and another student secretly streamed online a private sexual encounter he had with a man. (AP via The Age)
A gunman in Gainesville, Florida shoots six people, killing his father before committing suicide. (Gainesville Sun)
Tens of thousands of people protest about tree-felling in Stuttgart and are confronted by police wielding water cannon and pepper spray. (BBC)

Politics

Brazilian elections:
- The Brazilian presidential election heads for a second round, with Dilma Rousseff polling most votes. (BBC)
- Brazilian clown Tiririca wins a seat in Congress with more votes than any other candidate in yesterday's elections. (BBC)
- Former FIFA World Player of the Year Romário is elected as a deputy by Rio de Janeiro. (The Daily Telegraph)
A Japanese judicial panel calls for charges against top Democratic Party (DPJ) figure Ichirō Ozawa. (BBC) (Bangkok Post)^{[permanent dead link]}
Lima receives its first female mayor in Susana Villarán. (BBC)
The Cuban government considers another large-scale round of political prisoner releases after the release of 52 in July. (BBC)

Science

Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine:
- Robert Geoffrey Edwards of the United Kingdom wins the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his role in developing in vitro fertilisation. (Nobel Prize) (Al Jazeera) (AFP via The Age) (BBC)
- A Vatican official condemns the move as "completely out of order". (BBC) (AFP via The Sydney Morning Herald)
The first Census of Marine Life (CoML), a 10-year major international project described as the most comprehensive study of its kind, is completed, sparking celebration among scientists. (BBC), (AFP via Google News)

Sport

2010 U.S. Open champion Graeme McDowell of Northern Ireland defeats Hunter Mahan of the United States in the final match to win the 2010 Ryder Cup for Europe by 14½-13½. (BBC Sport) (RTÉ Sport) (The Irish Times) (Sky News)
Football:
- FIFA suspends the Nigeria Football Federation due to government interference, thereby barring the country's men's, women's, and age-grade national teams from all competitions. (BBC Sport)
- Al Jazeera calls on Jordan for a full investigation into why its signal was jammed during live coverage of the 2010 FIFA World Cup. (Al Jazeera)
- The corpse of David Le Cluse, the chairman of Croydon Athletic football club, is located with a bullet wound to the head. The team's owner was recently arrested in connection with the recent Pakistan cricket spot-fixing scandal. (BBC News) (Sky News)

October 5, 2010 (Tuesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Afghan militant attacks kill 4 civilians, wound 6 in southwestern Farah province's Rusht Rod district. (Poten via Associated Press)^{[permanent dead link]}
At least 3 people are killed and 9 others receive wounds during a bomb explosion at an apartment complex in the suburbs of Bangkok. (BBC), (ABC Online)
A linkmen working for the banned ULFA is killed, while 2 other cadres reportedly escape with their lives in an encounter in Meghalaya's West Garo Hills district. (PTI)
A car bomb explodes beside a shopping centre in Derry, Northern Ireland. (BBC)
A state of emergency in place in Ecuador after the 2010 Ecuador crisis is extended to Friday. (CNN)

Arts and culture

TVNZ Breakfast race row:
- Breakfast broadcaster Paul Henry is suspended effective immediately by TVNZ after yesterday's controversial interview with John Key. The network had previously issued a statement in support of Henry. (The New Zealand Herald)
- Protesters rally outside TVNZ's central Auckland office to call for the broadcaster's scalp. (The New Zealand Herald)
Google lines up Internet TV programming partners like TBS, TNT, CNN, HBO, NBA, CNBC. (Shanghai Daily)
Researchers identify a new, though threatened, language known as Koro. (BBC)

Business and economy

The Bank of Japan lowers interest rates in Japan to a range of between 0 and 0.1%. (The New York Times)
Mexico issues its first ever 100-year bond, raising US$1 billion in a day. (Reuters)

Disasters

A state of emergency is declared after three people are killed and 120 injured by chemical sludge from an alumina plant flooded out of a burst dam in western Hungary. (Al Jazeera) (BBC) (Reuters) (AFP via Sydney Morning Herald)
The United Nations states that at least 400 children have already died in the Zamfara State lead poisoning epidemic, double the amount that had been previously reported; the incident is described as "far from over". (BBC) (AFP via The Sydney Morning Herald) (Reuters via News24)
At least seven people die after a Cessna 402 crashes in the Bahamas. (Reuters via Yahoo)

International relations

President of Indonesia Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono cancels a state visit to the Netherlands in protest of a possible court arrest. (Al Jazeera) (BBC)
Former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf tells Der Spiegel that a blind eye was turned to militant groups fighting in Kashmir. (BBC) (Der Spiegel) (The Asian Age)
President of the United States Barack Obama announces plans via Secretary of Energy Steven Chu that additional solar panels will be installed at the White House, while the founder of Sungevity plans to install solar panels at the private official residence of President of the Maldives Mohamed Nasheed for the "Global Work Party" event planned by 350. (The Associated Press) (The Washington Post) (Asian Tribune)
1976 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mairead Maguire is deported by Israel ending her joint effort with other Nobel laureates to meet Israeli and Palestinian peace activists. (The Hindu) (Hindustan Times)

Law and crime

Israel's army says it is investigating a video which appears to show a soldier dancing around a bound and blindfolded Palestinian woman. (Al Jazeera) (BBC)
A London court is told that a Saudi prince sexually murdered his servant. (BBC)
Faisal Shahzad, the failed Times Square bomber, is sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole by a court in New York. (Al Jazeera) (Sky News)
Former Société Générale trader Jérôme Kerviel is sentenced to three years in jail in France for his role in the 2008 Société Générale trading loss. (Al Jazeera) (BBC)
The extradiction of alleged arms dealer Viktor Bout from Thailand to the United States moves a step closer after a Thai court dismisses money laundering charges against him. (The Guardian)
French police arrest twelve alleged al-Qaeda terrorists in Marseilles and Bordeaux including three suspects allegedly found with bomb making kits. (Al Jazeera) (Jerusalem Post)
Steven Hayes is found guilty of murdering three women of the same family in Connecticut during a home invasion in 2007, now he is facing the death sentence or life imprisonment.(Fox News)
Ahmed Ghailani will have the first civilian trial for a Guantanamo inmate which will begin tomorrow in New York. (BBC)

Politics

Serbia mark the tenth anniversary of the overthrow of Slobodan Milošević. EU and U.S. politicians send their congratulations. (BBC)
UK Prime Minister David Cameron is forced to issue an apology to his own voters after breaking an election promise by withdrawing child benefit from 1.2 million of them. (The Guardian)
President of Bolivia Evo Morales knees a political opponent in the "testicular zone" during a friendly football match. (The Guardian)
Kim Jong-un joins his father Kim Jong-il in observing Korean People's Army, confirming his status as heir-apparent as Supreme Leader of North Korea. (AP via Google News)
President of Senegal Abdoulaye Wade dismisses his energy minister Samuel Sarr, following a week of protests over frequent power cuts, and replaces him with Wade's own son. (BBC)
Sudan announces its timetable for January's referendum on independence for the south, with 14 November named as the first date for voter registration. (BBC) (AFP via The Sydney Morning Herald)
Guinea announces that the second round of voting for the Guinea presidential election will be on October 24 after months of delay. (CNN)

Science

Physicists Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov at the University of Manchester win the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics "for groundbreaking experiments regarding the two-dimensional material graphene". (Nobel Prize) (Al Jazeera) (The New York Times)

October 6, 2010 (Wednesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Eleven suspected militants are killed in a US drone attack near Miramshah in North Waziristan, Pakistan. (Dawn)^{[permanent dead link]}
One person is killed and two others were injured when an explosion took place in the Azmat Khel Area of Bannu, Pakistan. (Dawn)
Thai authorities accuse the anti-government red shirts of being behind a bomb blast in the capital Bangkok that killed at least three people. (AFP) (Straits Times) (Thai News Agency)
Gunmen torch up to 40 oil tanker trucks carrying fuel for NATO forces in Afghanistan in Quetta and Nowshera, Pakistan and kill a truck driver. The Tehreek-e-Taliban claimed responsibility for that and other attacks. This was the sixth attack on convoys taking supplies to Afghanistan since Pakistan closed a key border crossing almost a week ago. (AP via MSNBC) (Reuters), (AFP via Google News) (Sky News) (Reuters)
Yemen attacks
- A British embassy car is attacked in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen with three people injured . (Channel News Asia) (Yemen Observer), (AFP via Google News)
- A Frenchman is shot dead outside the Austrian oil company OMV compound outside Sanaa. (Reuters via the New York Times)
- Suspected al-Qaeda militants are believed to be responsible for both attacks. (Reuters)
President of the United States Barack Obama awards a Medal of Honor posthumously to Robert James Miller of the US Army Green Berets for "conspicuous gallantry ... at risk of life above and beyond the call of duty" while fighting in the War in Afghanistan on January 25, 2008. (CNN)

Arts and culture

The 15th Pusan International Film Festival started in Pusan, South Korea. (People via Xinhua)
Irish poet Seamus Heaney wins the Forward Poetry Prize. (BBC)
An autopsy finds that the death of United States actor Gary Coleman in Salt Lake City, Utah was an accident. (BBC)

Disasters

Four people were killed and three others were injured when two containers of fireworks exploded near the My Dinh National Stadium, Hanoi. (Vietnamnet)
At least 25 soldiers are killed in a helicopter crash in Tajikistan, east of the capital Dushanbe. (BBC) (Xinhua)
Floods leave 1 dead, 3 missing, 33,000 evacuated in the Chinese province of Hainan. (Global Times) (China Dialy)
At least 75 people are killed in flash floods in eastern Indonesia. (Straits Times) (Al Jazeera)
Ajka alumina plant accident:
- Hungary expects to take at least a year and tens of millions of dollars to clean up what the country's environment minister describes as its worst chemical accident. (BBC)
- Hungary opens a criminal investigation into the incident. (The Telegraph)
The death toll from floods in central Vietnam rises to at least forty-nine. (AFP via Sydney Morning Herald) (VOV News) (Vietnamnet) (TRT)
A firefighter is killed and 17 others injured in a major fire in Vishwas Nagar, India. (PTI)
Tornadoes hit Bellemont, Arizona in the southwest of the United States resulting in at least seven people being injured. (CNN)

International relations

South Korea and the European Union sign a free trade agreement. (Xinhua)

Law and crime

46 police officers in Ecuador are arrested on suspicion of involvement in last week's uprising. (AFP)
The first civilian trial of a person formerly imprisoned by the United States in Guantánamo Bay begins in New York. According to his lawyers Ahmed Ghailani of Tanzania was tortured. (BBC)
A Federal Court of Canada judge rejects a request by francophone groups outside Quebec to overturn the Conservative government's decision to scrap the longform census. (Toronto Sun)
United States Federal Bureau of Investigation agents arrest dozens of Puerto Rico police officers accused of aiding drug traffickers. (AP via Google News)
Law enforcement agencies in Victoria, Australia, the United Kingdom and Spain conduct raids in relation to allegedly corrupt behaviour by the currency subsidiary of the Reserve Bank of Australia. (Radio New Zealand)
Two Turkish soldiers are shot dead by a third soldier in the southwestern province of Muğla. (Hurriyet Daily)^{[permanent dead link]}

Politics and elections

Ethiopian opposition leader Birtukan Mideksa of the Unity for Democracy and Justice is released from prison after two years of incarceration. (Bloomberg)
China's climate negotiator Xie Zhenhua states that the country's voluntary efforts supported by its own resources and technologies only accept "non-invasive" international consultation and analysis at the UNFCCC meeting in Tianjin, China. (China Daily)

Science

China's gross domestic product (GDP) will grow by 10.5 percent in 2010 and 9.6 percent in 2011, ahead of other major economies, according to a report released by the International Monetary Fund. (Global Times)
Richard F. Heck, Ei-ichi Negishi and Akira Suzuki win the 2010 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for developing new ways of linking carbon atoms together. (Nobel Prize), (BBC)

Sports

The appeals of Pakistan cricket players Salman Butt, Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif regarding spot-fixing during the tour of England are set for October 30 and 31. (BBC)
Boston Red Sox owner John W. Henry agrees to purchase Liverpool F.C. for an undisclosed sum, the deal still needs final approval. (Boston.com),(Sky News)
Roy Halladay of the Philadelphia Phillies throws a no-hitter against the Cincinnati Reds making him the first Major League Baseball pitcher to throw a no-hitter in postseason play since Don Larsen's perfect game in the 1956 World Series. (New York Times)

October 7, 2010 (Thursday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Six gangsters died and one soldier was injured when an army patrol clashed with suspected gang members in northeastern Mexico state Tamaulipas. (People Daily)
At least 7 people are injured in separate attacks by the Israeli Air Force on the Gaza Strip after rockets were fired at Israel from Gaza on Wednesday. (Ynetnews) (Daily Times)
The African Union says its forces have captured 40% of the Somali capital Mogadishu from Islamist militants in a recent offensive. (BBC) (News24)
The leader of a Congolese rebel group suspected of being involved in the mass rape of more than 300 civilians is arrested by the Congolese army and United Nations peacekeeping troops. (The Irish Times)
14 people are killed and 70 others are injured in 2 suicide blasts at a shrine in Pakistan's southern port city of Karachi. (Xinhua) (IRNA)^{[permanent dead link]}
At least 5 people are killed due to back-to-back afternoon bombings at a vegetable market south of Baghdad. In Iskandariyah, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) south of Baghdad, also wounded at least 20 people. (AP)
A land mine blast kills 6 soldiers in Tajikistan. (Dawn)
Gunmen kill 4 police officers in Iranian Kurdish area. (Santa Cruz Sentinel) (Chron)
20 Taliban militants, including two rebel commanders, are killed in fighting with security forces in northeastern Takhar province, Afghanistan. (Deccan Chronicle)
An airstrike and a raid by ground troops kills 8 insurgents, including a senior Taliban leader who spearheaded attacks against Afghan security forces. (Boston Herald)

Arts and culture

Peruvian-Spanish writer Mario Vargas Llosa is announced as the winner of the 2010 Nobel Prize in Literature. (The Guardian) (Al Jazeera) (The Irish Times) (BBC) (Huffington Post)
TVNZ Breakfast race row:
- Suspended TVNZ broadcaster Paul Henry is embroiled in further controversy as his mockery of Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit is declared "racist" and "unacceptable" and New Zealand's ambassador to India is summoned for a dressing down. (AFP via NDTV) (Indian Weekender) (Xinhua) (Radio New Zealand) (TVNZ)
- A senior TVNZ manager resigns over her defence of Henry. (The New Zealand Herald)
- There are calls for advertising to be withdrawn from TVNZ's Breakfast show after Henry's slur. (The New Zealand Herald)
A lost Antonio Vivaldi concerto is found in the National Archives of Scotland in Edinburgh. (BBC)
A Roman parade helmet discovered by a metal detectorist in May 2010 is auctioned for £2.3 million ($3.6 million). (The Independent)
The FBI seizes a set of John Lennon's fingerprints. (BBC)
United States film studio Metro Goldwyn Mayer begins plans to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in a bid to rid itself of $4 billion in debts. (BBC)

Business and economy

Austerity measures of pay cuts and pension freeze supported by the European Union and International Monetary Fund (IMF) cause civil servants to stage a 24-hour strike in Greece. (Al Jazeera)
The United States dollar reaches a 15-year low against the Japanese yen and depreciates against a range of other currencies due to concerns about further quantitative easing by the United States Federal Reserve. (FT via CNN)

Disasters

Nine, mostly children, die, after an overloaded river ferry capsizes in the Irrawaddy River delta, in Myanmar. (AP)
A woman was killed and 25 others were injured when the tractor-trolley they were travelling in overturned in Kashipur town of Udhamsingh Nagar district. (DNA)
Six workers die when scaffolding collapsed near the Beishan Interchange in Nantou County, Taiwan. (Taipei Times)
The death toll from flash floods in Indonesia's West Papua province rises to 97 with dozens of people missing. (ABC News Australia)
Red mud from the Ajka alumina plant accident in Hungary reaches the Danube River with alkalinity rising in the Rába River which flows into the Danube. (Al Jazeera) (BBC) (AFP via Google) (Reuters)

International relations

United Nations Security Council visit to Sudan:
- Members of the U.N. Security Council arrive in the Darfur region of Sudan prior to the referendum on independence from Sudan and receive a hostile welcome from pro-government forces. (VOA) (AFP)
- A United Nations worker is kidnapped in Darfur hours after the Security Council delegation visited the area. (BBC)
Russia will refund Iran for the canceled the sale of an air defense missile system following United Nations sanctions against Iran’s nuclear program (VOA) (AP)
United States helicopter strike on Pakistan:
- The United States apologizes to Pakistan for a helicopter strike on a Pakistan Army border post that killed 3 soldiers. (The New York Times)
- Pakistan opts to maintain a shut border in the face of NATO troops. (Al Jazeera)
- Pakistan says no decision to reopen the border will take place until the security situation is improved. (Xinhua)
Israel buys 20 F-35I variant radar-evading fighter jets from the United States, Israel's first batch of advanced fighter jets which arm the country with the most sophisticated combat aircraft in the Middle East. Officials at The Pentagon acknowledge the sale. (AFP via Google News) (Haaretz) (Ynetnews)

Law and crime

Kenyan authorities announce that more than 1,000 teachers have been fired for sexually abusing girls over a 2-year period. (BBC)
Right-wing Israeli politicians push for a controversial change to the wording of the oath required to become an Israeli citizen, amending the wording so that potential citizens must promise to respect Israel as a "Jewish and democratic state". (BBC)
China issues new regulations requiring the managers of mines to accompany workers down the shafts. (BBC) (RTHK)

Politics and elections

New Zealand MP and senior Cabinet Minister Chris Carter quits politics, stating that his travel expenses received unfair attention due to his sexuality. (The New Zealand Herald)
Zimbabwean Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai charges his President Robert Mugabe with violating the constitution and unilateral decision-making. Mugabe and his party fail to respond in public. (BBC)
The United Kingdom Labour Party announces its Shadow Cabinet to be led by Ed Miliband. (Sky News) (Press Association via Google News) (Xinhua)
Mark Rutte of the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy is asked by Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands to become Prime Minister of the Netherlands leading a coalition government. (Reuters)

Religion

South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu retires from public life after reaching his 79th birthday. (Al Jazeera) (BBC)

Sport

English team officials at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India seek reassurance about water safety at the Dr SPM Aquatics Centre after up to fifteen members of the English and Australian swim teams come down with a stomach virus. (The Guardian) (Al Jazeera) ( Sky News)
Danish tennis player Caroline Wozniacki becomes the new world number one during the 2010 China Open. (BBC) (Reuters)

October 8, 2010 (Friday)

Armed conflicts and incidents

Four miners were killed and another was seriously injured after a colliery collapsed in Xinjiang. A pit owned by Xinjiang Shenhua Tiandian Mining in Hutubi County in Changji Hui Autonomous Prefecture caved in. (Global Times)
Several militants are killed in Khyber Agency when security forces targeted militant hideouts with gunship helicopters. (Tafreehmela) (Dawn)
At least 16 people, including the governor of Kunduz Province, Mohammad Omar, are killed in a bombing. (Al Jazeera) (Voice of America)
German officials say that Islamic militants whose disclosures have triggered a Europe-wide terror alert, have links to the perpetrators of the September 11 attacks on the United States in 2001. (AP via Google News)
A Taiwanese ship initially believed to have been hijacked off the coast of Madagascar is later found safe. (BBC) (Focus Taiwan News Channel) (Xinhua)
Israeli–Palestinian conflict:
- Two Hamas militants are killed, several others are injured and more are detained in an overnight Israeli military raid on Hebron in the Palestinian territories. A Hamas-affiliated group, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, threatens revenge attacks. (Al Jazeera) (Haaretz) (The Jerusalem Post)
- Two Palestinian boys stoning an Israeli car in Shiloach are hurt when the driver of the car, the director of the Ir David Foundation, crashes into them while trying to escape the crowd of youths stoning his car. One of them is hospitalized. (The Jerusalem Post) (Al Jazeera)

Arts and culture

Google celebrates the 70th birthday of John Lennon with an animated Google Doodle. (The Daily Telegraph)
German film The White Ribbon wins the BBC Four World Cinema Award. (BBC)
United States gospel music singer Albertina Walker, known as the "Queen of Gospel" dies in Chicago. (Chicago Tribune via HeraldNet)

Business and economy

The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) concluded its 37th session of its assembly on Friday at its headquarters in Montreal, making progresses on aviation emissions. (Xinhua) (China Daily)^{[permanent dead link]}
The United States economy shed 95,000 more jobs than expected in September. (Al Jazeera)
The Government of Japan approves a $60 billion economic stimulus package. (BBC)
The United Arab Emirates announces that it will not implement a proposed ban on all BlackBerry services due to go into effect from next year. (CNN)
Premier Wen Jiabao of the People's Republic of China denies reports that China is using its control over minerals crucial to high technology (called "rare-earth") as a bargaining chip, especially in a dispute with Japan over Japan's arrest of a Chinese fishing-boat captain (AP)

Disasters

Ajka alumina plant accident in Hungary:
- 2 more corpses are discovered, bringing the death toll to 7, as Prime Minister of Hungary Viktor Orbán plays down the disaster on the Danube. (BBC)
- Greenpeace say samples taken in Kolontár indicate "surprisingly high" levels of toxic substances, including arsenic, chrome and mercury. (Al Jazeera)
- MAL Hungarian Aluminium Production and Trade Company, the company responsible for the Ajka alumina plant accident in Hungary, offers $150,000 for local authorities to help deal with the disaster while not admitting fault. (Al Jazeera) (Sky News)
Maltese chemical tanker YM Uranus is reported to be sinking following a collision with the Panamanian cargo ship Hanjin Rizhao off the coast of Brittany, France. (Sky News) (Vesseltracker)
One person died and 42 others remain hospitalized in the Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Garze. Over 100 people, mostly tourists and hotel staff, were affected. (Global Times)

International relations

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao holds talks with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Ankara. (China Daily)
2010 Nobel Peace Prize:
- Imprisoned Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo is announced as the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. China blocks internet coverage of the award. (Al Jazeera) (The New York Times) (CNN) (The Hindu) (RIA Novosti)
- Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu remarks in a press release that the Nobel Peace Prize has been "desecrated" and this event could damage ties between the countries. (Xinhua)
TVNZ Breakfast race row: New Zealand issues an apology to India's External Affairs ministry over the "gratuitous and insulting" behaviour of its now suspended broadcaster Paul Henry, who works for the government-owned corporation television network TVNZ. (Bloomberg)
Arab League leaders meeting in Libya announce their support for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas's decision to stop peace talks with Israel over Israe]'s recently expired moratorium on construction in the West Bank. (The Jerusalem Post)

Law and crime

The International Criminal Court orders the resumption of the war crimes trial of Congolese militia leader Thomas Lubanga, who is on trial for using children under the age of 15 to fight for his militia during the civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo. (Al Jazeera) (AFP via Google News) (CNN)
Pakistani army Chief of Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani orders an investigation into a video showing the firing squad execution of 6 blindfolded Pakistanis by men dressed in what appear to be Pakistani army uniforms. (Los Angeles Times)
The Supreme Court in Burma agrees to hear an appeal by Aung San Suu Kyi against her house arrest. (AP via Google News)
France's highest legal authority rules in favour of a ban on facial veils. (Al Jazeera)

Politics and elections

United States National Security Advisor General James L. Jones announces his resignation effective in two weeks; his deputy Thomas E. Donilon is expected to replace him. (MSNBC) (Al Jazeera)
A senior North Korean official, Yang Hyong Sop, confirms that Kim Jong-un will succeed his father Kim Jong-il in an interview with the Associated Press. (AP via Google News)
The Australian Murray-Darling Basin Authority issues a report calling for water consumption in the 19 catchments of the Murray–Darling basin to be cut by up to half. (ABC News Online)

Science

China's second lunar probe, Chang'e-2 completes final braking, enters working. (Xinhua)
Two Russian cosmonauts, Aleksandr Kaleri and Oleg Skripochka, and American astronaut Scott Kelly leave on mission Soyuz TMA-01M for the International Space Station from Kazakhstan's Baikonur Cosmodrome. (AP via Yahoo! News)
Anthropologists claim to have proven that Yersinia pestis was responsible for the Black Death in Medieval Europe. (AFP via ABC News Australia)

October 9, 2010 (Saturday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

A senior Taliban commander and two other insurgents were killed in a fire fight with Nato and Afghan forces in western Badghis province's Murghab district. (Dawn)
7 naxals are gunned down by the police in an encounter in Mahasamund district of Chhattisgarh. (Deccan Chronicle)
Four Italian soldiers die following an attack in the Farah area, Afghanistan. (CNN)
Violence in England:
- Riot police and dogs clash with protesters as demonstrations lead to violence in England. There are injuries and 5 men are arrested in the country's largest police operation for a quarter of a century (25 years). (BBC) (The Daily Telegraph)
- A Sky News satellite truck is attacked by elements of the far-right English Defence League as 4 frightened members of its news team lock themselves inside. (Sky News)
Death of Linda Norgrove:
- The death of Linda Norgrove occurs during a botched rescue attempt by the United States in Afghanistan. (Sky News)
- David Cameron defends the failed American rescue attempt. (BBC)
Gunmen in southwestern Pakistan near the town of Sibi set fire to more than 20 oil tanker trucks carrying fuel for NATO forces in Afghanistan. (Al Jazeera) (Reuters via Yahoo! News)
The Government of Ecuador extends a state of emergency initially imposed on September 30 in the 2010 Ecuador crisis. (CNN)

Arts and culture

Minister of Māori Affairs Pita Sharples adds his name to calls for suspended TVNZ broadcaster Paul Henry to be sacked after he manages to upset most of India. (stuff.co.nz)
Warner Bros. axes the 3D version of the next Harry Potter film. (BBC) (Daily Mail)

Business and economy

Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) has signed a series of cooperative framework agreements with the Shanghai Financial Office. (21cbh)

Disasters

Ajka alumina plant accident:
- The Hungarian town of Kolontár is evacuated as the emergency worsens. (BBC) (Sky News)
2010 Copiapó mining accident:
- A drill reaches the underground chamber where the 33 trapped miners reside. Wild celebrations occur. Rescue efforts are scheduled to begin within days. (BBC) (Reuters)
More than 200 passengers are rescued, 20 of whom sustain injuries, from Baltic Sea ferry Lisco Gloria, en route from Kiel to Klaipėda, after it ignites near Fehmarn off the eastern coast of Schleswig-Holstein. There are reports of an explosion on board. (BBC) (Deutsche Welle)

International relations

The United States leads a group of non-EU developed countries in attempts to thoroughly revamp the Kyoto Protocol, blocking any possible progress in the climate negotiations currently under way in Tianjin, according to negotiator Sui Wei. (China Daily)

Law and crime

An Ecuadorean court orders the imprisonment of 12 police after last week's 2010 Ecuador crisis, with a lawyer saying they are being swept up in a "witch hunt". (Al Jazeera)
Former Oceanic Bank chief Cecilia Ibru is sentenced to six months in prison after being found guilty of committing 3 of 25 charges of fraud and mismanagement. (BBC)
Erwin Arnada, the former editor of Playboy Indonesia, is arrested on Bali. He had been on the run since being sentenced to two years in prison in August after an earlier trial in 2007. (BBC) (AFP via Philippine Daily Inquirer)

Politics

Kim Jong-un attends the Arirang Festival performance in Pyongyang with his father Kim Jong-il. It is Kim Jong-un's first appearance before the world's media. (BBC) Senior Chinese leader Zhou Yongkang is also in attendance. (Xinhua)

Sport

The New York Yankees sweep the Minnesota Twins to progress to the 2010 American League Championship Series in Major League Baseball. (New York Times)

October 10, 2010 (Sunday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Four people are killed and over 36 injured as violence mars the first phase of 3-tier Panchayat elections across Uttar Pradesh which registered an 80 per cent turnout in India. (Chennai)
A clash in the north of Honduras kills two policemen and four criminals. (Xinhua via People Dialy)
110 people are injured and 200 people are arrested as anti-gay protesters and police clash in Belgrade at Serbia's first gay pride parade event since 2001. (BBC) (Al Jazeera) (B92) (CNN) (Deutsche Welle)
The United States fires four missiles in Shewa district about 40 kilometres northeast of the region's main town of Miramshah, North Waziristan, Pakistan, killing seven and destroying two cars, as the country increases its attacks on the tribal area. (BBC) (Dawn)
2 Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) workers are shot dead by suspected Maoists at Balarampur in Maoist-hit Purulia district. (India Today)
Riots in Lawdar, Yemen, reinforcements sent in to maintain order. Dozens killed in Lawdar District during the protests.

Arts and culture

Works of art created by 30 celebrated Iranian artists go on sale at Bonhams auction house in Dubai. (Tehran Times)
Nelson Mandela's letters, written during his 27-year spell in jail, reveal new details of the agony he suffered in South Africa under apartheid. (BBC)
TVNZ race row:
- John Key pledges to continue fronting TVNZ's Breakfast amid calls by MPs for disgraced and suspended broadcaster Paul Henry to be sacked. (The New Zealand Herald)
- Paul Henry resigns from TVNZ, effective immediately. (Media Spy) (TVNZ) (Resignation Statement) (BBC)
Hanoi, Vietnam, celebrates its 1,000 birthday. (AP via Yahoo! News)
10-10-10
- A celebration occurs as a male British child turns 10 at 10:10 on the 10th day of the 10th month of 2010. (BBC) (Leicester Mercury)
- Couples around the world rush to get married as 10 October 2010 is seen as auspicious especially in Chinese culture. (BBC), (AP via Yahoo! News), (New York Times)
U.S. soul singer Solomon Burke dies at Amsterdam's Airport Schiphol. (AP via Yahoo News) (BBC)

Disasters and accidents

12 people die and 73 are injured when two express buses, a van and three cars collide at Km 223, Plus Highway near the Simpang Ampat toll in Negri Sembilan, Malaysia. (Brisbane Times) (NST) (Xinhua)
Nearly half a million people are made homeless by flooding caused by three days of heavy rain in Bangladesh. (ABC News Australia)
17 people are killed and 6 are seriously injured after a passenger coach collides with a cement tanker truck between Hefei, capital of the eastern Anhui province, and Nanjing, capital of neighboring Jiangsu province. (SINA)
Hungary races against time in its efforts to construct an emergency dam to defeat the Ajka alumina plant accident. (BBC)
At least 36 people die after an overloaded boat capsizes on the Ganges River in the Buxar district of India's Bihar state. (BBC)

Law and crime

2010 Nobel Peace Prize:
- 20 people are reported arrested in China over imprisoned human rights activist Liu Xiaobo's 2010 Nobel Peace Prize award. Liu's wife's whereabouts remain unknown after she was taken away by police with human rights group Freedom Now claiming she is in de facto house arrest. (Los Angeles Times) (AFP via Yahoo News)
- Liu's wife is reportedly allowed to meet her husband, who is said to have wept and dedicated his Nobel Peace Prize to the "martyrs" of the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. (BBC)
The Israeli cabinet approves a bill requiring all non-Jews taking Israeli citizenship to swear loyalty to Israel as a "Jewish and democratic state". (Al Jazeera) (Ynet News)
The Equality and Human Rights Commission releases a 700-page report condemning Britain as a land where discrimination and disadvantage are rife. (The Observer)
Two people face court in the Republic of Ireland following a crackdown on suspected dissident republicans. (BBC) (RTÉ) (The Irish Times)
The men found guilty of the Västberga helicopter robbery in Sweden are sentenced to lengthy prison terms. (The Local)

Politics and elections

Dissolution of the Netherlands Antilles:
- Bonaire, Saba and Sint Eustatius become special municipalities of the Netherlands. (Radio Netherlands Worldwide)
- Curaçao and Sint Maarten become constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
  - Gerrit Schotte becomes the first Prime Minister of Curaçao. (Radio Netherlands Worldwide)
  - Sarah Wescot-Williams becomes the first Prime Minister of Sint Maarten. (Caribbean 360)
Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir accuses authorities in Southern Sudan of breaching a peace deal and warns of a possible new conflict if issues are not resolved before the independence referendum. (Al Jazeera) (Angola Press)
Havana's Roman Catholic Church says Cuba is to release 3 more political prisoners who will be allowed leave for Spain. (BBC)
Details emerge of contacts between the far-right English Defence League and extremist U.S. groups such as the American Tea Party in a "war on Islamification". (The Observer)
North Korean television broadcasts live a military parade for Supreme Leader Kim Jong-il and his heir apparent Kim Jong-un. (AP via Google News) (BBC) (Arirang)
Prominent North Korean defector Hwang Jang-yop is found dead in Seoul, South Korea. (Yonhap News Agency) (AP)
Voters in Kyrgyzstan go to the polls for a parliamentary election amid concerns about a possible renewal of tensions between ethnic groups. With 50 percent of the vote counted, the Ata-Zhurt party has received the most votes so far but no party is close to achieving a majority. (The Guardian) (BBC), (BBC)
10:10 and 350.org's "Global Work Party: a day of positive action on climate change" attracts a wide range of events in over 180 countries. (Huffington Post), (LoHud.com) (WLBT), (San Jose Mercury News)

Sport

Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull Racing wins the 2010 Japanese Grand Prix with teammate Mark Webber finishing second. (Fox Sports),(Sky Sports)
Australian V8 Supercar drivers Craig Lowndes and Mark Skaife win the 2010 Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000 ahead of Triple Eight teammates . (Autosport)
Sachin Tendulkar of India becomes the first cricketer to pass 14,000 runs in Test cricket. (Cricinfo)
Brazil beats Cuba 3-0 to win the 2010 FIVB Men's World Championship held in Italy. (AP via USA Today) (Reuters)
In the United States, the Philadelphia Phillies sweep the Cincinnati Reds in the 2010 National League Division Series to make the 2010 National League Championship Series. (New York Times)

Television

Discovery Kids is Changing to Discovery_Family#As_The_Hub/Hub_Network_(2010–2014).
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic premieres.

October 11, 2010 (Monday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

A Telugu Desam leader is murdered in broad daylight in a restaurant near Srikantam circle in Anantapur, India. (Deccan Chronicle)
Afghanistan:
- Afghan President Hamid Karzai confirms holding unofficial talks with Taliban "for quite some time" in order to end the nine-year war. (AFP via Google News) (Xinhua)
- Six Taliban fighters including shadowy district governor are killed in separate operations in western Herat province. (PLA)
- Two Indians are killed in a missile attack launched by the Taliban on an Indian NGO's office in Afghanistan's Kunar province. (Deccan Chronicle)
The Indian Army says that nearly 40 militants have been killed by security forces during 25 infiltration attempts in Indian-controlled Kashmir from across the border in the last two months. (China Daily)

Arts and culture

The Hobbit is set to be most expensive movie ever. The New Zealand company, Wingnut Films, is waiting for the green light for its planned adaptation. (NZ Herald)
British pop singer George Michael is released from a Suffolk prison after serving 4 weeks for driving while under the influence of cannabis. (BBC), (Sky News)
Australian opera singer Dame Joan Sutherland dies in Switzerland after a lengthy illness. (Sydney Morning Herald) (Swissinfo.ch)

Business and economy

Economists Peter A. Diamond, Dale T. Mortensen and Christopher A. Pissarides win the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for their work in labor market analysis. (Nobel Prize), (AP via Fox News)
Microsoft launches Windows Phone devices. (C-Net)

Disasters

18 people are killed when a bus falls into a river in Bulandshahr district, Uttar Pradesh, India. (Deccan Chronicle) (Zeenews)
The death toll from flooding in Indonesia reaches 145 with West Papua most heavily affected. (CNN) (Straits Times) (Jakarta Post)
2010 Atlantic hurricane season: Tropical Storm Paula forms near Honduras and is expected to become a hurricane by Tuesday. (AP)

International relations

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says that he will extend the settlement freeze if the Palestinian leadership recognizes Israel as a Jewish state. The Palestinians quickly reject the offer. (Haaretz), (AFP via Google News)
Liu Xiaobo:
- China cancels a meeting with Norwegian Minister of Fisheries and Coastal Affairs Lisbeth Berg-Hansen after the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to him. (Reuters)
- Xiaobo's lawyer confirms that his wife Liu Xia is under house arrest in Beijing. (CNN)
The United Arab Emirates closes its airspace to Canada's Defence Minister Peter MacKay over a growing dispute over aviation rights.(CBC)

Law and crime

Greek Police officer Epaminondas Korkoneas is convicted of the culpable homicide of teenager Alexandros Grigoropoulos which sparked the 2008 Greek riots. (Greek reporter) (BBC)
British judge Heather Hallett opens the inquests into the 7 July 2005 London bombings. (Reuters UK)
Benigno Aquino III, the President of the Philippines, elects only for administrative, and no criminal charges to be laid in relation to the botched Manila hostage crisis in August. (Philippines Star)^{[permanent dead link]} (Philippines Daily Enquirer)
A woman accused of sexually abusing girls at the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls in Meyerton, South Africa, is acquitted. (AP via USA Today)
The son of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, the woman sentenced to death by stoning, and two German journalists posing as tourists seeking to interview him, may have been arrested in Iran. (AFP via Herald Sun)

Politics

Kyrgyzstani parliamentary election:
- Five Kyrgyz political parties, including Ata-Zhurt, Social Democratic Party of Krygyzstan, Ar-Namys, Respublika, and Ata Meken, have passed all thresholds at the election thus can obtain parliamentary seats. (24.kg) (Xinhua)
The Bharatiya Janata Party government of India's Karnataka state wins a vote of no confidence after 16 members of the Karnataka Legislative Assembly are disqualified from voting. (OneIndia) (Hindustani Times)
The government of Bolivia annuls a new coca production law which cut the number of leaves growers could sell following widespread protests. (BBC)

Science

Surgeons at the Shepherd Center in Atlanta, Georgia inject a spinal cord injury patient with embryonic stem cells in an experiment approved by United States Food and Drug Administration. (USA Today)

Sport

Nigerian athlete Oludamola Osayomi, the winner of the 100 metres sprint at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India, tests positive for the banned stimulant Methylhexanamine. (AFP via Yahoo! News Australia), (ABC News Australia), ( Sky Sports)

October 12, 2010 (Tuesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Two explosions occur in the southern Yemeni city of Aden, killing one person and injuring several others. The Al-Qaeda offshoot in the country also states its intention to establish a "new army" to overthrow the President. (BBC) (Al Jazeera) (Voice of Russia)
Two people are killed and ten injured after a NATO helicopter explodes just after landing in eastern Afghanistan. (AP via San Jose Mercury News)^{[permanent dead link]}
A Nigeria Police Force station in the northern city of Maiduguri is destroyed in an attack blamed on the Boko Haram Islamist group. (BBC)

Arts and culture

British author Howard Jacobson wins the Man Booker Prize for Fiction for his book The Finkler Question. (Sydney Morning Herald)

Business

Greenpeace sends Facebook a letter containing half a million signatures asking the company to cut its ties to coal based electricity.(Reuters)
2010 strikes in France: French workers initiate a 24-hour strike against pension reform with transport services badly affected. (Euronews)

Disasters

2010 Copiapó mining accident rescue:
- Chile begins attempts to rescue 33 miners trapped underground as a result of the 2010 Copiapó mining accident. (BBC) (Reuters)
- The first of the miners, Florencio Ávalos, is pulled from the mine after two months underground. (Fox News), (BBC)
41 people die following a collision between a bus and a train in the Dnipropetrovsk region in the eastern Ukraine. (BBC) (Kyiv Post) (China Daily)
18 people die in a bus accident near Nowe Miasto nad Pilicą, Poland. (BBC) (AP via Fox News)
2010 Atlantic hurricane season: Tropical Storm Paula (2010) reaches hurricane strength as it moves towards Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula. (Reuters)
Tanker Mindolo and cargo ship Jork Ranger collide off Scheveningen, Netherlands. (Yahoo)
Nearly 700 people from a small town within Lagos, Nigeria, are relocated following heavy flooding. (CNN)
Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono tours the disaster area resulting from the 2010 floods in West Papua Province. (RNZI)

Law and crime

Iran says two foreigners arrested for interviewing the son of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani had connections to "anti-revolutionary" groups abroad. (Reuters) (AFP) (Press TV)
Judge Virginia A. Phillips of the United States District Court for the Central District of California orders an injunction against the United States military continuing its don't ask don't tell policy against lesbian and gay members. (USA Today), (AP via New York Times)
The trial of Ahmed Ghailani, the first Guantanamo Bay prisoner to face a criminal trial in the United States, begins in New York City. (Reuters)

Politics and elections

Kim Jong-il's eldest son, Kim Jong-nam, announces his opposition to the hereditary succession plan in North Korea which would see power transferred to his younger brother Kim Jong-un. (AP) (RTHK) (Korea Herald)
The winners' list of the Kyrgyzstani parliamentary election is topped by the Ata-Zhurt party, led by former Emergency Situations Minister Kamchybek Tashiyev and is particularly popular in the south, gaining 8.88 percent of the vote. (Xinhua)
The Obama administration in the United States lifts a six month moratorium on deep water oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico imposed following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. (BBC)
Green Party Candidate, Laura Wells, is arrested upon trying to enter the 2010 Gubernatorial debate in California. All parties other than the Republicans and Democrats were barred from the debate. (Democracy Now!) (Mercury News)

Sports

The Commonwealth Games Federation advises that a second Nigerian athlete, hurdler Samuel Okon, has tested positive for a banned substance Methylhexaneamine at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India. (ABC News Australia)
A Euro 2012 qualifier between Italy and Serbia in Genoa, Italy, is abandoned after seven minutes of play after violent behaviour from Serbian fans. (BBC)
Major League Baseball: The Texas Rangers beat the Tampa Bay Rays in the fifth game of their American League Division Series to make the 2010 American League Championship Series, the first time they have played in an American League Championship Series. (AP via NBC Sports)

October 13, 2010 (Wednesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Two soldiers died and another one was injured in clash with PKK militants in Ovacik township of southeastern province of Tunceli, Turkey. (World Bulletin)^{[permanent dead link]}
The death toll has risen to 11 following a U.S. drone strike launched late Wednesday night in the Datta Khell area of Pakistan. (Xinhua) (AP)
Somali pirates release Puntland's Ports Minister Said Mohamed Rageh who was kidnapped last Friday. (BBC)
Iran's Fars News Agency (FNA) announces that 18 people were killed in a blast at one of the Revolutionary Guards' bases in Luristan Province. (Xinhua)
War in Afghanistan
- 8 people are feared dead after a cargo plane crash near Kabul. (Hindustan Times) (AP via anhourago)
- NATO claims to have killed two Taliban leaders in fighting in the Afghanistan War while a soldier was lost in fighting during an insurgent attack in eastern Afghanistan. (AP via Washington Examiner)^{[permanent dead link]}
10 people, including three women, are injured in a clash between two groups at Kaserwa in Uttar Pradesh, India. (DNA)

Business and economy

India will spend $2.3 trillion by 2030 to attempt to improve energy efficiency and use of clean technology.(DNA) (Reuters)
French unions continue mass strikes for a second day with over one million people protesting on Tuesday against pension reform. (CNN)
The Australian dollar reaches its highest level against the United States dollar in 27 years. (The Australian)
The US government rules out a moratorium on foreclosures. The moratorium would help millions expected to lose their homes, but may also hurt the housing market. (Reuters)(MSNBC)
An unknown pornographic actor has tested positive for HIV, with Wicked Pictures and Vivid Entertainment halting production. ABC News

Disasters

Rescue efforts conclude for the Chilean miners trapped in the 2010 Copiapó mining accident, with the last miner being rescued at 9:56PM local time. (Bloomberg), (Reuters), (AFP, AP via Sydney Morning Herald), (BBC)
The New Zealand city of Christchurch is hit by a magnitude 5.0 earthquake, an aftershock to the 2010 Canterbury earthquake. (ABC News Australia)

International relations

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visits Lebanon amidst concern from Israel and United States. (BBC)

Politics and elections

A group of 23 elder Communist Party of China members call for an end to restrictions on freedom of speech in the country. (BBC) (Al Jazeera)
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao calls for reform of China's political system in the lead-up to a four-day annual policy meeting of Communist Party leaders. (AP via Yahoo!)

October 14, 2010 (Thursday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Eight ISAF NATO soldiers are killed in multiple attacks in Afghanistan, including four in roadside bombings. (AP)
Six people, including an Iraqi Interior Ministry official and four members of a leading political bloc, die in multiple explosions throughout Baghdad apparently targeting members of former prime Minister Ayad Allawi's al-Iraqiya political coalition; four were killed in a roadside bomb and three others were wounded. (CNN)

Art and culture

The shortlist for the United States National Book Award is announced. (AAP and ABC Australia Online)

Business and economy

The number of mortgage foreclosures in the United States in September 2010 exceeds 100,000 for the first time. (Reuters)

Disasters

Floods kill an elderly man in Turkey's Bursa. (Hurriyet)

International relations

American actor and UN peace messenger, George Clooney, calls for the freezing of assets held by Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes in Darfur, as a good way of putting pressure on the Sudanese government (BBC) (The Washington Post)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says that Lebanon is becoming a "satellite" of Iran after it hosts a controversial visit by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who again "predicts" Israel's destruction at a Hezbollah rally in southern Lebanon. (AFP)(Arutz Sheva)
A new border gate opens on the divided island of Cyprus, providing a seventh crossing point between the Turkish-controlled TRNC and the southern part of the country. (TRT)
Turkish lawyers file a complaint against Israel over the Gaza flotilla raid in the International Criminal Court. (Ynetnews)
At least seven Afghan border guards are detained by Iran after crossing their mutual border. (Xinhua) (Fars News Agency)
The Prime Minister of Japan Naoto Kan calls on China to release Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo. (BBC) (Yemen News Agency) (Japan Today)
Canada's PM Stephen Harper and Lan Lijun, China's Ambassador to Canada, take part in a ceremony to mark the 40th anniversary of Sino-Canadian relations. (SINA)

Law and crime

President of the Islamic Sharia Council in the United Kingdom, Sheikh Maulana Abu Sayeed, stirs controversy in Britain by claiming that it is impossible for men to rape their wives and that husbands who commit such acts should not be prosecuted.(MSNBC) (The Independent)
Rights groups in Indonesia welcome the striking down of a Suharto-era law banning books that were deemed to be "offensive" or a "threat to public order". (AP) (Jakarta Post) (BBC)
Greek riot police clash with protesting workers outside the Acropolis in Athens using tear gas to clear the demonstrators from the entrance. (AP via Atlanta Journal-Constitution)^{[permanent dead link]} (BBC)

Politics and elections

Rwandan opposition leader Victoire Ingabire is arrested on charges of forming a terrorist organisation. (AFP) (BBC)
Colonel Abdoulaye Badie, the second in command in Niger's military government, the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy, is arrested. (AFP) (Bloomberg)
Somali President Sharif Ahmed appoints Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed as Prime Minister of the Transitional Federal Government. (Al Jazeera)
18-year-old Anton Abele becomes Sweden's youngest ever MP; he is a member of the ruling Moderate Party. (The Local)
Burmese pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi announces that she will boycott next month's general election. (BBC via ABC News Australia)
Don't ask, don't tell
- The Obama administration asks United States District Court for the Central District of California judge Virginia A. Phillips to stay her ruling in Log Cabin Republicans v. United States of America that the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy is unconstitutional while it appeals the decision. (Reuters)
- President Barack Obama promises that "don't ask, don't tell" will "end on his watch". (KTLA)
The President of Peru Alan Garcia denies claims that he slapped a man who called him corrupt when he visited a Lima hospital last weekend. (BBC)
First liberal cabinet in the Netherlands since 1918, led by Mark Rutte, is sworn in in The Hague.

Science

The World Health Organisation warns about an outbreak of Cutaneous leishmaniasis in Afghanistan. (BBC)
United Nations scientists claim to have eliminated rinderpest virus making it the second virus to have been wiped out by humans if confirmed. (BBC)
French-American mathematician Benoît Mandelbrot dies of cancer in Cambridge, Massachusetts. (AFP via ABC News Australia)

Sport

2010 Commonwealth Games
- Australia tops the medal tally followed by India and England. (CNN)

October 15, 2010 (Friday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

United Nations envoy Margot Wallström says Congolese government troops may have committed rape and murder in the Democratic Republic of the Congo weeks after similar attacks by rebels. (BBC)
Gunmen abduct British and local Save the Children aid workers from a compound in western Somalia. (AP via Wall Street Journal)
A United States Army soldier from 5th Stryker Brigade Combat Team is to face a court martial on murder and other charges related to the deaths of civilians in Afghanistan. (CNN)
MPs called for a "wide-ranging and independent inquiry" after G4S agents restrain and suffocate Jimmy Mubenga during his deportation from England. (The Guardian)

Arts and culture

A museum in Berlin opens an exhibition on Adolf Hitler and his relationship with the German people, the first museum in Germany to do so. (BBC)
US rapper T.I. is sentenced to eleven months in prison for violating the terms of his parole. (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)^{[permanent dead link]}

Business and economy

Canton Fair opens, China's largest trade fair and a key barometer of its trade and economic development. (China Daily)
The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China opens its fifth plenary session in Beijing to discuss the country's next five-year economic and social development plan. (Al Jazeera) (China Daily)
United Kingdom consumer goods company Reckitt Benckiser agrees to pay a fine of £10.2 million for abusing its market position for Gaviscon in the United Kingdom. (BBC)
The Gotthard Base Tunnel in the Swiss Alps becomes the world's longest railway tunnel, as final breakthrough occurs on the east bore. (Washington Post)

Disasters

The Nicaraguan Health Ministry reported nine new deaths of leptospirosis in Leon department, to make a total of 17 deaths due to this disease. (People Daily)
Miners in Chile rescued from the 2010 Copiapó mining accident return home after receiving hospital treatment. (Reuters)
The Ajkai Timföldgyár alumina plant in Ajka, Veszprém County, in western Hungary is set to reopen following the accident earlier this month as the death toll reaches nine. (Deutsche Welle)
Four miners are trapped underground in southern Ecuador. (CNN)

International relations

United Nations Security Council:
- The Council votes to extend the mandate for the mission to Darfur as South Sudan prepares for a referendum on self-determination; China abstains. (UPI) (Winnipeg Free Press)
- Anti-UN protesters in Haiti blockade the United Nations military headquarters in Port-au-Prince a day after the Council extended the mandate of the Stabilisation Mission in Haiti. (Al Jazeera)
- An arms embargo, and financial and travel sanctions, are extended on Côte d'Ivoire for a further six months. (Afrol) (Reuters)
Israel unveils preliminary plans for 238 new homes for Jewish settlers in East Jerusalem with Palestinians protesting in response. (BBC), (Reuters)
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad wraps up a controversial visit to Lebanon (BBC) (The Australian)

Law and crime

18-year-old Andrew Conley is sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole in Ohio, United States.^[1]
A London court is told that Saud bin Abdulaziz bin Nasir al Saud, a Saudi prince accused of murdering his servant after sexually assaulting him at a London hotel, could face the death penalty in Saudi Arabia, where homosexuality is illegal, over his alleged gay sex life. (AFP) (BBC)
Iran says two Germans arrested for interviewing the son of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, who has been sentenced to be stoned to death for adultery, have "admitted to breaking the law". (BBC) (Reuters)
Former Countrywide Financial Chief Executive Officer Angelo Mozilo and two other senior executives agree to settle United States Securities and Exchange Commission claims that they misled investors and of insider trading. (Bloomberg via Business Week), (AP via New York Times)

Politics and elections

More than 100 Chinese scholars, journalists and lawyers publish an open letter demanding the release of Liu Xiaobo. (IOL) (The Daily Telegraph) (RTHK)
A senior official from the Sudanese National Congress Party says it is "not possible" to hold a referendum on whether the disputed region of Abyei remains a part of northern or Southern Sudan. (Al Jazeera)

Sport

2010 Commonwealth Games: Nigerian athlete Folashade Abugan tests positive for testosterone prohormone and is stripped of two silver medals in the 400 metres and 4×400 metres. (Rediff)
New England Sports Ventures, the owner of the Boston Red Sox, takes over as owners of English Premier League team Liverpool Football Club. (BBC)

October 16, 2010 (Saturday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Three blasts rocked southern Afghanistan's restive city of Kandahar, killing at least four people and injuring two others. (Xinhua)
Senior United Nations envoy Roger Meece calls the scale of sexual attacks in the Democratic Republic of the Congo "enormous". More than 15,000 rapes occurred in the east of the country last year. (Al Jazeera)

Arts and culture

Oscar Wilde receives a Google doodle on the 156th anniversary of his birthday, a portrait from his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray. (The Guardian)
The number of visitors to Expo 2010 Shanghai exceeds 64 million, breaking the record the history of the World's Fairs. (Global Times)

Business and economy

Dubai World Trade Centre opens GITEX technology week 30th Anniversary. (Khaleej Times)
2010 strikes in France: Thousands of students join millions more people on the streets of France for a fifth day of protests against government pension reform plans; Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport is running out of fuel amid calls by the government for people "not to panic". (BBC) (Al Jazeera)
Two of four trapped Ecuadorean gold miners are found dead near the town of Portovelo. (Reuters) (BBC)

Disasters

A gas explosion in a Chinese coal mine in Henan province kills at least 20 workers. Another 17 are declared missing. (BBC) (Al Jazeera) (CNN) (AFP via Yahoo! News)
28 of 33 miners rescued in the 2010 Copiapó mining accident are secretly discharged from hospital in Chile, with 2 remaining inside. (BBC)

International relations

China mounts a diplomatic campaign to block the publication of a U.N. report that claims that Chinese ammunition has been shipped into Darfur in the past year in violation of U.N. sanctions. (The Washington Post) (Bor Globe)
On World Food Day, United Nations calls for united front against food shortages, because one billion people are still hungry. (UN) (Sina)
The Israeli Air Force and the Hellenic Air Force combine for manoeuvres involving helicopters and jets as Israel seeks new air links following its disagreement with Turkey. (BBC)
Zambia investigates an incident in which managers at a Chinese-run mine allegedly shot and wounded at least 11 miners who had objected to their working conditions. (Zambia Post) (BBC)

Politics and elections

44 people are arrested regarding poll-related violence in the second phase of the panchayat elections in Uttar Pradesh, India. (DNA)
Environment and Water Minister of Dubai, Dr Rashid Ahmed bin Fahd greets Sheikha Fatima on her appointment as FAO Goodwill Ambassador. (WAM)
The Georgian parliament votes 112 to 4 to introduce 44 changes to its constitution. (Xinhua)
The Government of India sets up an inquiry into allegations of corruption and mismanagement at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi. (NDTV)
Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe states that a power sharing deal with Morgan Tsvangirai should not be extended past its expiration in four months time. (BBC)
A delegation of The Elders visits the Gaza Strip to survey conditions, expressing disagreement with the Israeli restrictions in evidence there. Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter is to join them tomorrow. (AFP via Google News) (Bangkok Post)^{[permanent dead link]} (Xinhua)

Science

Scientists discover a new type of snailfish, in the Peru-Chile trench in the south-east Pacific Ocean. (CNN) (Science Daily) (BBC)

Sports

The #18-ranked Wisconsin Badgers defeated the previously unbeaten #1-ranked Ohio State Buckeyes by a score of 31-18 in Madison, Wisconsin. The victory provided a spark for the Badgers' season, which culminated in a 2010 Big Ten Conference championship, ending a decade-long championship drought, and a Rose Bowl appearance on January 1, 2011 in Pasadena, California. The victory would go on to become a defining transition moment for Wisconsin football, as the program again established itself as a perennial Big Ten powerhouse. The Badgers would go on to win three consecutive Big Ten Championships, extend its postseason bowl streak, and produce many nationally-recognized players (including multiple Heisman Trophy finalists) in the coming years. The 2010 team featured many future NFL players, including future NFL MVP runner-up and Defensive Player of the Year J. J. Watt, 2010 Outland Trophy winner Gabe Carimi, Lance Kendricks, Kevin Zeitler, Rick Wagner, and Brad "B52" Nortman, among others. [1]

October 17, 2010 (Sunday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

At least 33 people are killed and 50 others are injured during violence in Karachi as a by-election approaches. (India Times), (Reuters via ABC News Online) (UPI)
15 people are killed in target killing in Quetta, Pakistan. (Xinhua)
Yemen begins a ground and air campaign against al-Qaeda forces, killing at least 6; Western embassies in Yemen go on high security alert. (CNN)

Arts and culture

70 films from 23 countries and territories will be shown during the first Vietnam International Film Festival opening in Hanoi. (Vietnamnet)
Rare German stamps featuring film star Audrey Hepburn smoking fetch €430,000 at a charity auction in Berlin. (BBC)
Canonization:
- Pope Benedict XVI canonises Mary MacKillop, the first Australian saint, in front of 50,000 people in Saint Peter's Square in the Vatican City. (Herald Sun) (BBC) (The Times of India)
- Five other saints from other countries are also canonised: André Bessette of Canada, Stanisław Sołtys of Poland, Giulia Salzano and Camilla Battista da Varano of Italy, and Cándida María de Jesús of Spain. (Ynet), (AP)

Business and economy

GM workers protest a drop in wages, from $58,000/year to $30,000/year, at a new car plant in Michigan that was funded by a $50 billion government bailout and is receiving $770 million in tax incentives. (Reuters)
Workers in Hilton Hotels in the US cities of Chicago, San Francisco, and Honolulu continue a strike over what they claim are efforts to "lock workers into cheap recession contracts." (AP via Yahoo! News) (LA Times)

Disasters

The Philippines prepares for Typhoon Megi, potentially the strongest typhoon to hit the country this year. (ABC News Australia) (BBC) (Philippine Inquirer)
Five more bodies are found after a gas leak in a coal mine in China's Henan province, bringing the death toll to 26. (CNN)

International relations

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says that Israel had recently renewed contacts with a German mediator to negotiate the release of a captured Israeli soldier, Staff Sgt. Gilad Shalit, who is being held incommunicado by Hamas. (The New York Times) (The Jerusalem Post) (AFP)
French Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux states that Saudi Arabia has warned that Al-Qaeda is targeting Europe particularly France. (Reuters via Yahoo!) (CNN) (BBC)
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says Iran is ready for talks with the six majors powers of the G5|5+1 group in November, but the Islamic Republic's previous conditions for holding talks should be met. (Iran Daily) (Mehr) (Tehran Times) (IRNA)^{[permanent dead link]}
A planned summit between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak scheduled for October 21 in Paris is postponed amidst Palestinian ojections to a decision by Israel to construct 240 housing units in east Jerusalem (AFP via Google News)
An international report finds its most noticeable example of racial profiling is that black people are 26 times more likely than white people to be searched by police in England and Wales; U.S. civil rights activist Jesse Jackson describes it as "astonishing". (The Observer)
Angela Merkel claims that multicultural society has "failed" in a Potsdam speech before younger activist members of the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party. (BBC)

Law and crime

It was reported that Ingmar Guandique, an illegal immigrant from El Salvador, was to go on trial Monday for Chandra Levy's 2001 killing. (Fox News)
Somali pirates hijack a South Korean owned Kenyan registered fishing boat with 43 crew aboard. (Yonhap) (BBC)
At least twelve people die when gunmen try to rob jewellery shops in Baghdad, Iraq and get into a gunfight with security, police and military. (Reuters via ABC News Australia)

Politics

A Rwandan opposition party, the United Democratic Forces, says that their, leader Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, arrested last week, is being held in "intolerable and immoral" conditions without food or water. (AFP)
Former Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi accuses Iran of working to destabilize the Middle East, claiming that the region is falling victim to terrorist groups backed financially by Iran. (CNN) (AFP)
Iranian police have arrested seven Afghan border guards who had illegally crossed the border, border police chief Hossein Zolfaqari announced. (Tehran Times) (Mehr News)
Tens of thousands of people rally in Rome against a weakening of labour rights being carried out by the country's government; rumours spread by politicians of clashes caused by "anarchist infiltration" prove unfounded. (Bangkok Post)^{[permanent dead link]} (SwissInfo)
The U.K. government urges councils to stop giving charity tax breaks to Scientology, an organization described as a cult by a high court judge. (Guardian)
Olive Lembe di Sita, the First Lady of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, leads a march of thousands of women against sexual violence in the town of Bukavu in the east of the country where hundreds of women have been raped. (BBC)

Science and environment

A prolonged drought in the Amazon region forces Brazil to declare a state of emergency in 25 towns. (Al Jazeera)
Canada declares BPA toxic, prompting curbs or bans on the widely used chemical. (Reuters)
The first babies to have been created through in-vitro fertilization utilizing a full gene screen are born this year. This gene screen looks for chromosomal defects which often lead to unsuccessful IVF treatments. (Reuters)

Sport

FIFA, the world's football governing body, is hit by an undercover sting operation by the Sunday Times; it investigates claims that two of its officials offered to sell their votes in return for hosting the 2018 FIFA World Cup. (BBC) (The Observer) (Sky News)
Andy Murray of the United Kingdom beats Roger Federer of Switzerland 6-3 6-2 to win the 2010 Shanghai Rolex Masters 1000 in Shanghai, China. (BBC)

October 18, 2010 (Monday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Iraq War: Amid increasing uncertainty about the timing of the release of the next batch of classified documents by WikiLeaks, the U.S. military assembles a 120-member team to search its database for clues in preparation for the publication event. (The New Zealand Herald) (BBC)
Indonesia investigates following the release of a video purportedly showing Indonesian soldiers torturing indigenous Papuans, in a region where a small group of rebels has waged a war for independence from Indonesia for the last few decades. (BBC) (AFP) (AP)
The death toll from a robbery on jewelry stores in western Baghdad rises to nine, while 12 others are wounded. (People's Daily)
Thousands protest the murder of three civilians after soldiers loot homes in the Congo's South Kivu province. (AP)
The Latvian Defense Ministry said four NATO fighter jets from the Lithuanian Air Force Base near Šiauliai were deployed when two Russian bombers flying in the neutral airspace almost entered Latvian air space. (15 min).

Arts and culture

Miss Vietnam World 2010 nominated for Miss Earth. It will be held from November 4 to December 4 in HCM City, Phan Thiet, Hoi An and Nha Trang. (vietnamnet)

Business and economy

Bank of America resumes foreclosures in 23 states following a temporary halt in foreclosures due to the 2010 Foreclosure crisis
BP is to sell assets worth an estimated $1.8 billion as part of series of sales to help pay for damages caused by the explosion on its Deepwater Horizon rig in April, which killed 11 workers and spilled more than 200 million gallons of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. (AOL News) (BBC) (Bloomberg)
Rio Tinto Group and BHP Billiton announce that they have scrapped a proposed $120 billion joint venture in the Pilbara region of Western Australia due to regulatory problems. (ABC Australia)
French strikes intensify ahead of Wednesday's Senate vote on pension reform, with a thousand petrol stations running out of fuel, rail strikes intensifying and truck drivers performing go-slows on highways. (Reuters), (CNN)

Disasters

Typhoon Megi:
- One person is missing and thousands of people have fled as Typhoon Megi, the first supertyphoon of the 2010 Pacific typhoon season, makes landfall in the Philippines. (Bloomberg via Business Week), (BBC)
- The Peoples' Republic of China evacuates 140,000 people from Hainan province ahead of an expected arrival on Tuesday. (AP)
Flood waters in Vietnam's Hà Tĩnh Province sweep away a bus with 20 people missing, presumed dead. (Canadian Press via Google News) (Vietnam News)
At least nineteen people die near Santiago de Querétaro, Mexico, after a bus collides with a truck. (Reuters via Yahoo!)

International relations

The U.S. government has concluded that Chinese companies are bypassing UN sanctions on Iran and helping Iran to improve its missile technology and develop nuclear weapons, and has asked China to stop such activity. (The Washington Post)
Rwandan opposition parties appeal to the United States and the UN Security Council to intervene on behalf of the opposition FDU party leader, Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, arrested last week, and other political prisoners. (AFP) (VOA)
Fears mount that the Ugandan rebel group, the Lord's Resistance Army, which has ties to the Sudanese government, is poised to destabilize South Sudan as it prepares for a referendum on independence. (VOA)
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki visits Iran, where he is told to "get rid of America". (Telegraph) (CNN)
The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), a major United Nations gathering, meets in Japan to work out why governments have failed to stop the rapid rate of extinction and loss of habitats by 2010, as they vowed 8 years ago. (BBC) (The Guardian)
The Prime Minister of Japan Naoto Kan voices concerns about rowdy anti-Japanese protests in China, sparked by a recent territorial dispute. (AFP via Yahoo! News) (Japan Today)

Law and crime

The United Arab Emirates' highest court rules in a domestic violence case that a man can beat his wife and children as long as he leaves no physical marks. (MSNBC) (The National)
Five migrant Filipino workers are arrested in Saudi Arabia for filing a labor complaint against their employer according to a Philippine migrant workers' rights group. (The Philippine Star)^{[permanent dead link]}
More than 150 people, including 12 mayors and some politicians, go on trial for alleged links to the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in Turkey. (Al Jazeera) (Today's Zaman)
Islamist Al-Shabaab rebels in Somalia ban mobile phone money transfers, saying they are "unIslamic". (BBC) (AFP)
Three inmates are killed in a prison riot in the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince. (Al Jazeera) (IBN Live)
The appeal of Ajmal Kasab against the death sentence imposed by an Indian court for his role in the 2008 Mumbai attacks begins in Mumbai. (BBC News)
China releases the Tibetan writer, Kalsang Tsultrim, who was arrested in China earlier this year for what China termed a "political error". (MSN)^{[permanent dead link]}

Politics

Burma bans all foreign media and international observers from the upcoming general election in November. (BBC) (CNN) (Sify)
China's Vice President Xi Jinping is named vice-chair of the Central Military Commission. (BBC) (Xinhua) (CBC)
The Sudanese government fires the special prosecutor for Darfur war crimes, in what the Sudan Tribune calls "an apparent bid to deflect the case of the International Criminal Court against President Omar al-Bashir". (Sudan Tribune)
The Australian Government announces that it will establish two new Immigration detention centres in Northam, Western Australia and Inverbrackie, South Australia and end detention of children and family groups. (BBC), (Sydney Morning Herald)

Science and environment

Marine researchers discover a large reef of deep-sea coral in the Mediterranean stretching for several kilometers, 30 to 40 kilometers off the coast of Tel Aviv, in an area once thought to be relatively barren of sea life. (INN)

Sports

American olympic gold medalist LaShawn Merritt is suspended 21 months for doping. (BBC)

October 19, 2010 (Tuesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Russian troops withdraw from the Georgian border town of Perevi and are replaced by a Georgian Army unit. Perevi is located just outside South Ossetia, and had been occupied since the 2008 war. (BBC) (Zee News)
The Kachin Independence Army, a Burmese ethnic militia, is in a tense stand-off with the Burmese military following the arrest of three of its members. (BBC)
Six people are killed and seventeen wounded following an attack on the Parliament of the Russian republic of Chechnya. (CNN) (RIA Novosti), (BBC)
CIA director Leon Panetta reveals Jordanian double agent Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi was not properly vetted before his suicide attack on the CIA's Forward Operating Base Chapman in Afghanistan. (BBC)

Arts and culture

Simon Cowell signs a deal with ITV which will see The X Factor and Britain's Got Talent return for the next three years. (Peace FM)^{[permanent dead link]}
Google and the Israel Antiquities Authority announce plans to publish the Dead Sea Scrolls online. (AP via NPR)

Business and economy

China reveals plans to develop a "super-speed" train with a speed of up to 500 km per hour from the 431 km per hour speed. (China Daily)
Jia Qinglin, chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, announces the opening of the 7th China-ASEAN Expo (CAEXPO) in Nanning, capital of southwest China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. (Xinhua)
China raises deposit rate for 1st time since 2007, the People's Bank of China said in a statement. (China Daily)
French unrest
- French strikes against pension reform as the Government of France taps emergency reserves to meet a fuel shortage with more than four thousand petrol stations running out of fuel. (Reuters via France 24), (BBC)
- French police fire tear gas on rioting high school students in Paris with cars set on fire while there are reports of looting in Lyons. (AP), (BBC)
- Half the flights at Paris-Orly Airport and thirty per cent of flights at Charles de Gaulle airport are expected to be cancelled. (CNN)
The Crystal Cathedral Ministries, the California megachurch founded by televangelist Robert Schuller and best known for its weekly The Hour of Power television program, files for bankruptcy court protection. (Reuters)(AP)

Disasters

The death toll from Typhoon Megi in the Philippines rises to three as heavy rain falls on the island of Luzon for a second consecutive day. (AFP via Yahoo)

Law and crime

A British court finds Saudi Prince Abdulaziz bin Nasser al Saud guilty of murdering his servant in a hotel. (Al Jazeera) (BBC)
The International Criminal Court (ICC) agrees to pursue the criminal trial of former Vice-President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo Jean-Pierre Bemba. (BBC)
The United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says that she understands the trial of two hikers will start on November 6. (CNN)

Politics

The Kenyan Higher Education Minister William Ruto is suspended by President Mwai Kibaki after a court ruled he must stand trial for corruption allegations. (Daily Nation) (Reuters)
Human Rights Watch accuses the Ethiopian government of withholding foreign aid from opposition supporters. (BBC) (Reuters)
Salou Djibo, the de facto leader of Niger sacks his intelligence chief Seyni Chekaraou following the arrest of several members of the ruling Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy junta on suspicion of planning a coup d'etat. (BBC)
The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom David Cameron announces a cut to British Armed Forces of 17,000 or ten per cent over five years. (CNN)
Naheed Nenshi is voted mayor of Calgary, Alberta, the first Muslim person to be elected mayor of a major city in Canada. (The Globe and Mail)

Sports

The National Football League announces that it will suspend players for dangerous hits, especially those involving helmets. (AP via Yahoo! News)

October 20, 2010 (Wednesday)

Armed conflicts and incidents

Somali gunmen release a British security consultant for Save the Children after six days in captivity. (BBC)

Arts and culture

United Kingdom boyband JLS and hip hop MC Tinie Tempah dominate the Music of Black Origin Awards in Liverpool. (BBC)

Business and economy

French strikes
- France braces itself for another day of strikes against proposed cuts to pensions that the Senate will consider later this week. (Reuters via Yahoo! News)
- The Government of France sends in security forces to lift blockades in three oil depots at Donges, La Rochelle and Le Mans. (BBC)
China denies reports that it has banned export of rare earth mineral to the United States and Europe following similar measures against Japan. (CNN)
The Sino-Singapore Tianjin Eco-city holds a groundbreaking ceremony for its Eco-technology Park in Binhai New Area a key national strategic area in Tianjin. (enorth) (China Daily)
Apple announces iLife 11, Mac OSX Lion, a refreshed Macbook Air and the mac app store.

Disasters

All four Ecuadorean miners trapped underground since a mine collapse have been found dead. (CNN)

International relations

South Korea arrests an alleged North Korean agent on suspicion of plotting to kill high-profile defector Hwang Jang-yop who died of a heart attack earlier this month. (Al Jazeera)
Danish and Swedish royals celebrate 200 years since establishment of Swedish royal family. (CPHPOST)

Politics and elections

Leader of the Batkivschyna party Yulia Tymoshenko says that an additional monetary emission by the Ukrainian government of Hr 83.6 billion has already translated into growth in consumer prices. (Kyiv Post)
At least 1,000 Tibetan students protest in China against a new language policy which they say erodes their culture. (BBC) (RTHK) (Turkish Weekly)
Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero reshuffles his cabinet in a move to strengthen his government. (Reuters)
The two rival presidential candidates in Guinea agree to go ahead with a presidential run-off on Sunday amid the replacement of the head of the election commission. (BBC)
In the United Kingdom, Chancellor George Osborne outlines a Comprehensive Spending Review which will see the biggest spending cuts in decades, totalling £81bn, with welfare, local government and police particularly affected. (BBC)
The Obama administration notifies the United States Congress of plans for a $60billion-dollar weapons deal with Saudi Arabia in a move to threaten Iran. (CNN) (Reuters)

Science

Astronomers announce the discovery of the galaxy UDFy-38135539, the most distant object observed from earth. (Daily Mail)

October 21, 2010 (Thursday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

A bomb attack on a bus on the southern Philippine island of Mindanao kills at least seven people. (BBC)
Suspected Taliban militants kill an International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) soldier and five Afghan policeman in attacks in Afghanistan. (RTT News) (AFP)

Arts and culture

Biochemist Nick Lane wins the Royal Society Science Book Prize for Life Ascending: The Ten Great Inventions of Evolution. (BBC)

Business and economy

French protests
- France faces another day of strikes with a quarter of petrol stations not having any fuel. (Reuters)
- Activists block access to the Marseille Provence Airport, the fifth biggest airport in France. (BBC)
Toyota orders a recall of 1.5 million vehicles, including various Lexus models and Toyota Avalon models, due to brake fluid and fuel pump problems. (AP via MSNBC)

Disasters

A powerful 6.9 magnitude occurs off the coast of Baja California Sur in Mexico. (Economic Times)
At least 50 people die as an outbreak of an as-of-yet unidentified disease occurs in Haiti. (BBC)

International relations

The African Union calls on the United Nations Security Council to impose an air and naval blockade of Somalia to counter an Islamist Al-Shabaab militant insurgency and piracy. (BBC) (AFP)
Cuban dissident Guillermo Fariñas, who has staged more than 20 hunger strikes, is awarded the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought by the European Parliament. (BBC) (Reuters Canada) (The Telegraph)
China condemns a United Nations report that says Chinese bullets were used in attacks on international peacekeeping forces in the Darfur region of Sudan. (Reuters Africa) (BBC)
President of Venezuela Hugo Chávez finishes a two-day visit to Iran, signing agreements on oil, energy and commerce. (CNN)
Jewish settlers have started building more than 600 homes in the West Bank since a building freeze expired last month. (BBC) (The Jerusalem Post)

Law and crime

Belgian woman Els Clottemans is sentenced to 30 years imprisonment for murdering her love rival Els Van Doren by sabotaging her parachute so neither it nor a safety chute would open during a November 18, 2006 parachute jump. (Fox News)
Russell Williams escalated to sexual assaults and culminated in the brutal sex killings of Cpl. Marie-France Comeau, 37, and Jessica Lloyd, 27. Canadian Air Force Colonel Russell Williams is sentenced to two consecutive life sentences for two murders, several sexual assaults and dozens of fetish burglaries. (CNN) (Chronicle Herald)

Politics

Tibetan students protest Chinese government education policies that limit the teaching of Tibetan language. (CNN)
Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir retracts an earlier remark and says there will be no return to civil war with the south if the referendum on South Sudanese self-determination results in a vote for independence.(AFP) (Africa News)
Myanmar changes its name from Union of Myanmar to Republic of the Union of Myanmar, and also changes the design of the national flag. (Reuters)
Thousands of people protest in Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina, after a left-wing activist is killed in a dispute between two labor unions. (BBC)

Science

The Brazil hydroelectric plant in Foz do Iguacu is second largest hydroelectric plant in world after the Three Gorges in China. (Xinhua)
Microsoft Research and Wikipedia have joined forces to launch a beta version of a new multilingual content creation tool for Wikipedia named WikiBhasha. (The Independent) (Softpedia)
Shanghai-Hangzhou High-Speed Railway makes trial operation. (China)
An analysis of data detected by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter of the LCROSS impact last October finds the presence of carbon monoxide in Cabeus Crater in higher concentrations than the approximately 155 kg of water ice and water vapour, more than initially estimated, in addition to two hydroxyl flavours and smaller quantities of hydrogen sulfide, carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, methane, formaldehyde, mercury, magnesium, calcium, sodium, hydrogen gas, and possibly ammonia, ethylene and silver. (Universe Today) (New York Times) (The Register)

October 22, 2010 (Friday)

Armed conflicts and incidents

Wikileaks releases Iraq War Logs, secret American military records which reveal new information, including that U.S. commanders allowed torture and execution to occur without investigation and that hundreds of civilians have been killed at U.S. military checkpoints during the War on Iraq. Hillary Clinton and other U.S. officials condemn the disclosures. (BBC), (New York Times)
Three bombs explode in front of government offices in Kirovohrad, Ukraine, ahead of a visit by President Viktor Yanukovych. (Kyiv Post) (People's Daily)
Journey to Fearless is on The Hub
Indonesia admits that the men seen torturing Papuan villagers in a video were soldiers of the Indonesian National Armed Forces. (BBC) (Al Jazeera)
A bomb attack killed six Pakistani soldiers in the Orakzai tribal region. (dawn)
At least two people are killed following a blast near a mosque in Peshawar, Pakistan. (AAJ)
Fighting between pro-government forces and Islamist insurgents in Beled-Hawa district of Somalia near the Kenyan border has killed 12 people. (Associated Press)

Art and culture

2 Iranian films, ‘Michael’ and ‘When the Light Shines’, win top prizes at Italy's “13th International Religions Today Film Festival” at its closing ceremony. (IRNA)^{[permanent dead link]}
Fifty-seventh National Film Awards given away by President Pratibha Patel in New Delhi. (Hindu)
Chilean writer and social critic Pablo Huneeus registers the copyright in "Estamos bien en el refugio los 33" on behalf of the man who wrote it. (BBC)

Business and economy

2010 strikes in France:
- French riot police take over the Grandpuits Total S.A. oil refinery which had been blockaded by strikers for more than ten days. (BBC)
- The Senate of France passes the contentious pension reform bills. (BBC)
- French trade unions plan two further days of protest on October 28 and November 6. (Reuters)
The Premier of Saskatchewan Brad Wall calls on the Government of Canada to reject a $28.6 billion takeover bid by BHP Billiton for the Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan. (The Star)
China’s urban unemployment rate fell to 4.1% at September. (Business China)
Unemployment fell in 23 states and Washington, D.C., rose in 11 states.(Washington Times)

Disasters and accidents

The Haitian Health Ministry informs the World Health Organisation of a cholera outbreak north of Port-au-Prince; at least 150 people have been killed. (CNN) (BBC)
An outbreak of jiggers, a rotting disease, kills 20 people in Uganda and sickens a further 20,000. (CBC) (Straits Times)
Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon warns that North Korea is headed for a "chronic" food crisis with droughts and floods in various parts of the country. (AFP via Yahoo! News)
Typhoon Megi kills 7 people and leaves 23 missing after triggering landslides in Taiwan. (Focus Taiwan) (AFP via Google News)
Cyclone Giri, which rapidly intensified with winds of 144mph, makes landfall in western Burma. (CNN) (The Irrawaddy)
Forest fires in Sumatra, Indonesia, cause a thick haze to drift over Singapore. (BBC) (Straits Times)
A cargo ship collides with a small ferryboat at Nieuwer ter Aa, Utrecht, capsizing the ferryboat. (BBC)
HMS Astute runs aground off the Isle of Skye. (BBC)
A car crash in Austria leads to the death of Christian Kandlbauer, thought to be the first man to drive using a mind-controlled robotic arm. (BBC) (Ap via The Guardian) (USA Today)

International relations

3 South Koreans are investigated for allegedly attempting to defect to North Korea. (The Telegraph) (Press TV)

Law and crime

Several people are attacked in Uganda after a newspaper publishes the names and addresses of homosexuals. (BBC)
Files on the death of British biological weapons inspector David Kelly, which had previously been kept secret by the British government for 7 years, are released, stating that his wounds were typical of "self-inflicted injury". (The Telegraph) (RTÉ)
Judges in the trial of Dutch MP Geert Wilders are ordered to step down by an independent appeals panel, with the legal process now having to begin again. (BBC) (The Guardian) (AFP via The Sydney Morning Herald)
An ex-convict kills 3 people and injures 6 others at a school near the city of Zamboanga in the Philippines. (AFP via Google News) (ABS-CBN News)

Politics

Protests by Tibetan students against a new language policy making Chinese the official teaching language spread in China, with a demonstration taking place at the Minzu University of China in Beijing. (Los Angeles Times) (BBC) (Global Times)

Science

Google says that its Street View cars collected more information than it previously admitted including e-mails, passwords and URLs and that it would change its privacy practices. (Reuters)

October 23, 2010 (Saturday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

50 people are injured in Bangladesh protests attacked army camps, set a jeep on fire and damaged two other vehicles during the clashes in Roopganj, a sub-district of Narayanganj near Dhaka. (Tha Indian)
Iraq War Logs: Julian Assange of Wikileaks tells a London news conference that the 400,000 classified U.S. military documents released to the general public yesterday reveal that the Iraq War is "a bloodbath on every corner". (AFP via Tehran Times)
There are clashes on the streets of Conakry after the second round of voting in the Guinean presidential election, due on 24 October, is deferred for the third time. (BBC)
Suspected Maoist rebels kill six policemen in eastern India. (Al Jazeera) (AP via Google News) (Times of India)
A suicide bomber attacks the United Nations compound in western Afghanistan based in Herat. (Voice of America)
Nine Taliban fighters, including two commanders, are killed as security forces storm their hideout in Kandahar province, south of Afghanistan. (Xinhua via PLA)

Business and economy

2010 strikes in France: French unions challenge a back-to-work order in court, one day after the senate voted in favour of increasing their retirement age. (Al Jazeera)
Group of Twenty finance leaders agree to give 6% more International Monetary Fund votes to developing countries, though the U.S. retains its veto power, in a meeting in Gyeongju, South Korea. (BBC) (Reuters via Yahoo! News)
Residents of Naples are repelled by the police force while expressing their ire over a government plan to open a huge garbage dump on the edge of town. (Al Jazeera)

Disasters and accidents

At least one person is killed and thousands more are affected after Cyclone Giri makes landfall in western Burma. (Al Jazeera)
The death toll from Typhoon Megi in Taiwan has reached as least eleven with at least 23 people from two Chinese tour groups missing. It has now made landfall in China's Fujian province. (CNN) (Reuters)
Seven people are killed at Nyayo National Stadium in the Kenyan capital Nairobi as fans try to enter a Kenyan Premier League football match between Gor Mahia and AFC Leopards. (Al Jazeera) (BBC)
Several people are killed in a helicopter crash in the Mourne Mountains, County Down. (BBC) (RTÉ) (Xinhua)
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention project that as many as 1 in 3 adult Americans will have diabetes by 2050 if current trends in diet and exercise continue.(Reuters)

International relations

Israeli–Palestinian conflict:
- Richard Falk, a UN human rights rapporteur, issues a report to the United Nations General Assembly saying continued settlement construction would probably make Israel's occupation of Palestinian land irreversible and that said the UN, the US and Israel had failed to uphold the rights of Palestinians. (BBC)
- Bishops from across the Middle East urge Israel to end its occupation of Palestinian territories at the end of a two-week-long meeting at the Vatican. (The New York Times)
- The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) reports that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are preventing it from building schools in Gaza; the Israeli Defense Ministry says it is doing so to thwart Hamas from building the schools next to Hamas military installations.(The Jerusalem Post) (Ynetnews) (RIA Novosti)
Rival demonstrations take place in China and Japan over the disputed Senkaku Islands. (CP) (Straits Times)
German economy minister Rainer Bruederle criticizes the United States' monetary easing as indirectly manipulation of the USD exchange rates. (Reuters)

Law and crime

The high court in Egypt orders the government to ban police officers from university campuses. (Al Jazeera) (BBC)
306 former Tamil Tiger combatants are to be released from rehabilitation in Sri Lanka. (Xinhua)
Gunmen kill thirteen people and wound fifteen at a birthday party in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juárez. (Al Jazeera) (Reuters)

Politics and elections

David Thompson, the Prime Minister of Barbados, dies of pancreatic cancer with Freundel Stuart being sworn in as the new Prime Minister. (Reuters via ABC News Online)
Voters in Bahrain go to the polls for the Bahraini parliamentary election. (Al Jazeera) (BBC)
The opposition Social Democrats are awarded control of the Czech senate by the people in mid-term elections, giving them the chance to oppose right-wing government attempts to cut the wages of workers, stop them sending more troops to Afghanistan and make government reforms "socially more tolerable". (BBC) (AFP via France24)^{[permanent dead link]}
The Chinese government announces it will review a new language policy promoting mandarin as the sole language of instruction in universities following protests by Tibetan students across the country. (The Hindu)

Sports

The Texas Rangers advance to their first World Series after defeating the New York Yankees in the 2010 American League Championship Series. (Sports Illustrated) (New York Post)
The Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority states that nine Australian athletes have tested positive for the banned stimulant methylhexanamine. (ABC News Australia)
In a fight promoted as "Aztec warrior vs. Viking", Cain Velasquez defeats Brock Lesnar at UFC 121 to become the new UFC Heavyweight Champion. (Sherdog)

October 24, 2010 (Sunday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Six killed in shooting rampage inside militia outpost in Palid, Ipil town, in the Zamboanga Sibugay province of the South Philippines. (Xinhua via PLA)
South Korea and the United States cancel a joint naval drill against North Korea in the Yellow Sea, citing its previous anti-submarine training -- held from Sept. 27 to Oct. 1 -- and a desire "not to irritate neighboring countries" ahead of the upcoming 2010 G-20 Seoul summit. (Xinhua)
Despite the law enforcement agencies being on alert in Karachi city of Pakistan, four more people are killed in the Agra Taj Colony, Kausar Niazi Colony. (dawn)^{[permanent dead link]}
Somali pirates attack and seize two ships in the Indian Ocean. (AFP via Google News)
Bang-Bang Club photographer Joao Silva is injured when treading on a mine while working near Arghandab, Afghanistan. (The Observer)
The dismembered corpse of an abducted 9-year-old albino boy is found in a river on the Burundi-Tanzania border and buried. (BBC)
Fifteen Latin American parliaments pass simultaneous resolutions demanding that the captive Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, held incommunicado for over four years by Hamas, be released. (Ynet) (The Jerusalem Post)
"Israeli commandos fired 308 live bullets at the MV Mavi Marmara to repel passengers who attacked them with lethal weapons",says Israel's top general as he testifies before a state-appointed inquest into May's Gaza flotilla raid. (The Irish Times)

Business and economics

The number of visitors to the Shanghai World Expo 2010 topped 70 million. (Xinhua)
Nobel-winning economist Christopher Pissarides states that Britain's Finance Minister George Osborne is exaggerating the possibility of a crisis and unnecessarily risking the country's economic recovery with his deep spending cuts. (Reuters via Arab News)
Britain's privacy watchdog is to investigate Google once again, charging it with gathering personal information from private wi-fi networks. Google admits collecting details such as passwords and e-mails. (BBC)
Chinese Vice Premier Wang Qishan welcomes U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner to the port of Qingdao as the United States objects to what it labels the "artificial" value of China's own currency, the yuan. (BBC)
2010 strikes in France: Further, larger strikes are planned against government attempts to increase the age of retirement for the country's workers. (The Observer)
Mayors from near Naples reject a government proposal to indefinitely freeze the opening of a new regional waste dump, requesting that the plan be permanently abandoned. People peacefully demonstrate against the plan in Terzigno. (BBC) (The Guardian) (Reuters via Arab News)
President of Ecuador Rafael Correa rejects leniency towards police officers who protested against being stripped of their bonuses, stating on radio that "this will tear us apart as a society". (Al Jazeera)
China and Bangladesh want green technology free of cost. Hasan Mahmud held a meeting with global warming negotiators in the UNFCCC climate talks and chairman of National Development and Reform Commission of China Xie Zhenhua. (bss)

Disasters and accidents

At least 21 people died and a dozen more seriously injured in a bus accident in Nwoya district, northwestern Uganda. (People)
2010 Haitian cholera outbreak:
- Cholera is detected in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, for the first time since the post-earthquake outbreak began. (BBC) (Al Jazeera)
- The death toll passes 250. (The Wall Street Journal)
Leading Nepalese Sherpa Chhewang Nima, known for climbing Mount Everest 19 times, disappears during an avalanche. (BBC) (The Guardian)
Tropical Storm Richard lashes Honduras's Caribbean Coast with heavy rain before becoming a hurricane and making landfall in Belize. (AP) (CNN), (Reuters), (AP via Yahoo)
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees starts an emergency airlift to Benin which is suffering its worst flooding in decade. (BBC)
Scientists studying the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster's impact find substantial amounts of oil on the seafloor, contradicting statements by US government officials that the oil has largely disappeared (USA Today)
Charles, Prince of Wales's friend was among those killed in yesterday's helicopter crash. The family express their shock. (BBC)

International relations

Chinese Vice Premier Wang Qi-shan has held talks with US Treasury, Secretary Timothy Geithner at Qingdao Airport, east China's Shandong province. They exchanged views on Sino-US economic relations, and preparations for the upcoming G20 Summit. (cntv)
Darfur's rebel Justice and Equality Movement says it is ready to start discussions with international mediators in Qatar, but was not yet prepared to re-join full peace negotiations, saying Sudan's government had broken a ceasefire (Reuters Africa)
The Pope calls for an end to conflict in the Middle East, and for Islamic countries in the Middle East to guarantee freedom of worship to non-Muslims. (Reuters) (Sify) (BBC)
Angola begins deporting Congolese citizens from the north of the country. (Reuters)

Law and crime

Four people are arrested over a bus bombing in Matalam, the Philippines, that killed 10 people on Saturday. (Philippine Inquirer) (Al Jazeera)
A campaign led by Peter Tatchell is to legally challenge Britain's ban on same-sex marriage and heterosexual civil partnerships; eight couples are to file applications for the illegal ceremonies. (The Observer)
Three U.S. citizens are to stand trial on charges of spying in Iran after illegally entering the country. (Tehran Times)
Swedish police say they do not have a suspect for the serial shooting of 15 immigrants in Malmö. (CNN)
Four employees of Chinese dairy giant Mengniu are arrested in Hohhot, Inner Mongolia for allegedly hiring a public relations firm to spread false rumours online about products of industry rival Yili Group. (Global Times)
Israel's military police investigates an air raid that killed at least 21 members of a single family and injured 19 others during the 2008-2009 Gaza War. (Haaretz) (AFP via Google)
Actor Randy Quaid and his wife seek asylum in Canada to avoid prosecution in the United States, claiming they are being "persecuted". (BBC)
Mexican gunmen burst into a drug rehabilitation centre in eastern Tijuana, killing thirteen people. (Sign On San Diego)

Politics and elections

David Cameron bans Sayeeda Warsi, Baroness Warsi, Britain's first female Muslim cabinet minister, from attending Global Peace and Unity, Europe's largest multicultural gathering. Nick Clegg takes the side of Baroness Warsi. (The Observer)
Ghana-born doctor Peter Bossman becomes Mayor of Piran (Slovenia), the first black mayor of a town in the so-called former Eastern Bloc of Europe. (BBC) (The Guardian)
The Supreme Court of Iraq orders the country's parliament back to work, ruling that the self-declared absence of politicians is unconstitutional. (BBC) (Xinhua)
Bahrain's elections officials say voter turnout was 67 per cent in the parliamentary election. The main Shia opposition group, Al Wefaq, kept its 18 seats in the 40-member legislature. (AP) (Tehran Times)
Former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is reported to be a "lot brighter" following her hospitalisation with the influenza that disrupted her 85th birthday reception. (Press Association)
Cellou Dalein Diallo and Alpha Condé, the two candidates in the second round of the Guinean presidential election, call for calm after the election is delayed. (BBC)

Sports

The San Francisco Giants beat the Philadelphia Phillies in the 2010 National League Championship Series, advancing to the 2010 World Series. (Reuters)
The National Olympic Committee of Sri Lanka announces that Commonwealth gold medal winning boxer Manju Wanniarachchi has failed a drugs test taken during the 2010 Commonwealth Games. (BBC)

October 25, 2010 (Monday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

A bomb at the Fariduddin Ganjshakar Sufi shrine in Pakpattan, a city in Pakistan's Punjab province, kills at least eight people and injures twenty. (NDTV), (CNN) (Xinhua) (irna)^{[permanent dead link]}
A roadside bomb struck a passenger van in the Orakzai tribal region killing three people and wounding two others near Tanda. (dawn)
An Afghan official claims that a NATO air strike killed about 25 people in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. (AP via Salon) (Xinhua)
A Sahrawi boy was killed and five other injured by the Moroccan Army near a protest camp in Western Sahara. (Sahara Press Service)^{[permanent dead link]}

Business and economy

China and Africa celebrated the tenth anniversary of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in Beijing. Jia Qinglin, chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, addressed the reception commemorating. (gov.cn) (China Gate)
Lhasa invests 90 million yuan in 23 tourist facilities. The tourist facilities include Lhasa Tourist Service Center, Namtso Scenic Spot, Potala Palace- Jokhang Temple- Norbu Linka Cultural Heritage tourist attractions, etc. (China Tibet Online)^{[permanent dead link]}
United Arab Emirates pavilion in Shanghai wins National Council of Structural Engineers Associations (NCSEA) Excellence Award in Structural Engineering at Shanghai Expo 2010. (UAE)
Singapore Exchange proposes a $A8.4 billion takeover of the Australian Securities Exchange. (Dow Jones via The Australian), (BBC)
Sony stops selling the original cassette Walkman. (Newcore via Herald Sun)
US financial regulators launch an investigation into the foreclosure practices of various US financial institutions. (BBC News)
BP
- CEO Bob Dudley outlines a strategy to rebuild public trust, after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. (BBC News)
- The British oil firm sells its interests in four Gulf of Mexico oil wells to Japanese firm Marubeni, in a wider cash-raising effort that aims to raise 30 billion dollars for compensations related to the oil spill. (BBC News)
American International Group CEO Robert Benmosche has cancer, the company said, and he is receiving "aggressive chemotherapy," but his prognosis is not clear. (CNBC)^{[permanent dead link]}

Disasters and accidents

One person is killed and nine others injured after a plane carrying employees of BP Canada crashes in northeastern Alberta. The twin-engine King Air 100 was on its way from Edmonton City Centre Airport to Kirby Lake, southeast of Conklin. (Edmonton Journal) (Globe and mail) (Calgary Herald) (Canada)
Leading Nepalese Sherpa Chhewang Nima, known for climbing Mount Everest 19 times, is now feared dead. (The Independent)
Indonesia
- Authorities evacuate 40,000 people in Java due to fears of an explosion by Mount Merapi. (CNN)
- A magnitude 7.5 earthquake strikes near the Mentawai Islands, but tsunami warnings for western Sumatra proved unwarranted. (BBC News), (News Limited) (Sina)
At least 27 people are killed and eighty injured after oil leaks from a pipeline near the town of Pakokku in Burma. (BBC)

International relations

Israeli officials criticize the concluding document of the Vatican’s synod on the Middle East, with Israeli deputy foreign minister Danny Ayalon accusing the synod of being "a forum for Arab propaganda". (The Irish Times) (The Jerusalem Post) (AP)
Japan lodges a formal protest with China after two Chinese fishing boats were seen near the Senkaku Islands. (BBC)
Afghanistan
- President Hamid Karzai acknowledges that his office has regularly received cash from Iran and the United States but claims that the process was transparent. (BBC), (AP via Yahoo! News)
- A Dutch aid worker, along with an Afghan driver, are kidnapped on a highway while traveling to Kunduz Province, Afghanistan. (BBC News)
U.S. Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts claims the government of Sudan – which has been subject to U.S. sanctions since 1997 – has assured him it will hold a referendum on independence for the south. (BBC) (Xinhua)
Iran and Kenya signed an agreement in the field of tourism. (irna)^{[permanent dead link]}

Law and crime

Abdul Nacer Benbrika, serving a 15-year jail term in Australia after being found guilty on a number of terrorism-related charged, loses an appeal in the Court of Appeal against conviction of leading a terrorist group. (ABC Melbourne) (Herald Sun)
The EU activates its Rapid Border Intervention Teams for the first time since its creation in 2007 to stem illegal immigration at the Greek border. (BBC News)
The trial of the alleged killer of Chandra Levy, Ingmar Guandique of El Salvador, begins in Washington D.C. (AP via USA Today)

Politics and elections

Liberal Democrat Deputy Leader Simon Hughes is threatening a backbench rebellion over proposed housing benefits cut, which might threaten the stability of the United Kingdom coalition government, of which the Liberal Democrats are a part of. (BBC News)
Voters in Piran, Slovenia elect Ghanaian-born Peter Bossman as its mayor, the first time a person of African descent has been elected mayor in any Slovenian cities and towns. (BBC News)
Voters in Philippines go to the polls for the Philippine barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections. (PhilStar)
Voters across all municipalities in Ontario go to the polls for the Ontario municipal elections, 2010. (CTV)
An audience member throws shoes at former Prime Minister of Australia John Howard during an appearance on Q&A on ABC1. (Canberra Times)

Science

More than 700 species of ancient insects are discovered preserved in amber in an ancient rainforest in India. (BBC)

Sports

UEFA:
- UEFA President Michel Platini proposes a goal-line referee's assistant rather than goal-line technology which he says would lead to "Playstation Football", despite controversial decisions in 2010 World Cup matches. (BBC Sports)
- The European football rulemaking body has called for proof to substantiate corruption allegations leveled against the Euro 2012 bidding process. (BBC Sports)

October 26, 2010 (Tuesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

A curfew is imposed on two villages in southeastern Nigeria's Cross River State following communal violence which killed 30 people. (BBC) (Vanguard Nigeria)
10 killed, 13 wounded in Iraq gold market robbery in a market in Kirkuk, 250 km north of Baghdad. (Xinhua) (CRI)
Nigeria's State Security Service intercepts an arms shipment in Lagos amid high security following bomb attacks in Abuja earlier this month. (Reuters) (Nigerian Tribune) (IOL)

Arts, culture

The Emperor of Exmoor, a red deer believed to be Britain's largest wild animal, is shot and killed. (The Guardian)
Crisis talks between the New Zealand Government and Warner Bros. to prevent The Hobbit film project from moving its production to another country have ended inconclusively. (BBC)

Business and economy

The Shanghai–Hangzhou High-Speed Railway, with a top speed of 355 km/h begins operation. (Xinhua) (Jakarta Post) (CNR) (Global Times)
The water level of the Three Gorges Dam, the world's largest water control and utilization project, reaches its designed full capacity mark. (Xinhua) (People's Daily) (China Daily) (CNN)
The Japanese Cabinet approves an extra budget containing an emergency economic stimulus package to help shore up the economy. (AAP via NineMSN)
Independent Print Limited launches i, the UK's first national daily newspaper in a quarter of a century. (BBC) (The Guardian)
BMW is recalling 150,000 vehicles in the U.S. due to potential fuel pump failure.(Reuters)
Economy of the United Kingdom
- The UK economy grew by 0.8% in the third quarter, higher than expectations, but lower than second quarter's growth rate of 1.2%. (BBC)
- Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne hails the results as proof that the economy is going through a steady recovery, but opposition Labour Party leader Ed Miliband asserts that the recent spending review and budget cuts will harm economic performance. (BBC)

Disasters and accidents

All 3 dead in US small plane crash in southwest Washington state, about 10 miles (16 km) northeast of Morton. (Shanghai Daily)
Sumatra earthquake, tsunami and Merapi volcanic eruption:
- After receiving orders from President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who is now on his visit program to China and Vietnam, Indonesian Public Welfare Minister Agung Laksono declares an emergency response. (Xinhua)
- The death toll from the tsunami rises to 23. (AP) (Xinhua)
- 160 people are missing from a village on the Indonesian village of Betu Monga on Sumatra hit by a local tsunami after a 7.5 magnitude earthquake struck south of the Mentawai Islands. The earthquake leaves at least one person dead and damages 150 houses. (Reuters) (Today's Zaman)
- At least nine Australian surfers go missing after the tsunami struck including Alex McTaggart, a former member of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly but are later found. (Herald Sun)(News Limited) (News Limited)
- At least 12 people are dead following the eruption of Mount Merapi in Central Java. Thousands of people are evacuating the area. (BBC) (Al Jazeera)
A cholera outbreak kills 559 in Cameroon. (Xinhua) (India Vision)
18 people die in Brazil after contracting hospital "superbug" bacteria Klebsiella pneumoniae; which produces the enzyme carbapenemase (KPC), which renders most modern antibiotics ineffective. (BBC)
The death toll from Cyclone Giri making landfall in Burma rises to 27 with 15 people missing; aid agencies dispute the military government's figures. (Al Jazeera)
The World Health Organization announces a mass polio vaccination campaign across Africa, the same day an outbreak of the disease in Uganda is declared. (CP) (VOA) (WHO)
Approximately 1 in 5 vertebrate species are threatened with extinction according to scientist taking part in the Nagoya talks.(Reuters)

International relations

The Emir of Qatar begins a state visit to the United Kingdom by meeting Queen Elizabeth II at Windsor Palace. (BBC)
Ecuador throws its support behind Peru in their demands for the return of over 40,000 Machu Picchu artifacts taken by US explorer Hiram Bingham III, and now in Yale's possession. (Reuters)
The United States has fallen to a new low of 22nd place in Transparency International's rating of the least corrupt nations, noting various financial scandals and a lack of regulation leading to power being bought. (Reuters)
Hungarian-born multibillionaire George Soros donates $1 million to the Drug Policy Alliance to fund California's Proposition 19 in the upcoming November 2, 2010 elections that would legalize marijuana in the state if passed. (Sfgate.com)

Law and crime

Former Foreign Minister of Iraq Tariq Aziz is sentenced to death for persecuting members of the Islamic Dawa Party during Saddam Hussein's regime. (AP)
GlaxoSmithKline pleads guilty to intentionally manufacturing and distributing adulterated drugs, including Paxil, and will pay $750 million for committing the felony. (Reuters)(Boston Globe)
A U.S. court disables Limewire's file-sharing service due to copyright infringement.(Reuters)

Politics and elections

Egypt arrests up to 70 members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood opposition group as it begins campaigning for the parliamentary election in November. (Reuters) (Al Jazeera)
The Tibet Military Command of the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) holds the first air-ground live ammunition drill in Tibet. (People's Daily)

Science

Iran starts loading fuel into the Bushehr Nuclear Plant, its first nuclear power plant. (BBC) (CNN)

October 27, 2010 (Wednesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Several people are injured in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir during protests marking the anniversary of the arrival of Indian forces in the region in 1947. (AFP) (Hindustan Times)
Clashes between pro-government forces and al-Shabaab militants in southern Somalia kill 17 people. (Press TV)
A United States drone attack kills three in Pakistan. (AFP)
At least three people are killed in an explosion in Baghdad, Iraq. (CNN)
Security forces raid Taliban hideouts in northern Baghlan Province of Afghanistan eliminating five insurgents. (China Daily)^{[permanent dead link]}
A NATO soldier is killed in a roadside bomb attack in Afghanistan, taking the 2010 death toll for allied troops in Afghanistan to 603. (AFP)
Israel:
- An Islamic Jihad terrorist is killed when three men who approached an Israeli security fence from the Gaza Strip are fired upon by Israel Defense Forces tanks. (Arutz Sheva)
- Israeli Police send seven hundred officers to the Arab town of Umm al-Fahm ahead of a march by right wing activists on the twentieth anniversary of the murder of Rabbi Meir Kahane and use tear gas to stop violent clashes between the activists and Arabs. (CNN)

Arts and culture

Warner Bros. and New Line confirm that the The Hobbit films will be shot in New Zealand. (BBC)

Business and economy

American bank Wells Fargo admits it made mistakes in 55,000 real estate foreclosure cases. (AP via Today Online)

Disasters and accidents

One sailor drowns and 12 are missing after a freighter carrying Chinese crew capsized off Taiwan. (Focus Taiwan News Channel) (Straits Times)
Floods in 18 Thai provinces kill 59 people. (Bangkok Post) (UPI)
Fatalities caused by the eruption of Mount Merapi in Indonesia's Yogyakarta province rises, with 28 people known to have been killed by hot ash. (Xinhua)
Indonesian tsunami
- The death toll from the tsunami following the October 2010 Sumatra earthquake reaches at least 282 with hundreds of people still missing. (AFP via Yahoo! News), (Fox News) (BBC)
- Concerns are raised about the effectiveness of the Indian Ocean Tsunami Warning System. (BBC)
Factory fishing ship Athena catches fire off the Isles of Scilly, with 111 crew onboard. (BBC), (CNN)

International relations

A surprise trip by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to China has been confirmed. (People Daily)
North Korea demands 500,000 tonnes of rice and 300,000 of fertilizer from South Korea in return for family reunions. (Times of India) (CNN)
India and Malaysia announce that a free trade accord between them would come into effect in July 2011. (Straits Times) (AFP)
Transparency International releases its Corruption Perceptions Index showing Denmark, New Zealand and Singapore as the least corrupt nations and Somalia as the most corrupt. (CNN)

Law and crime

Judge Kimba Wood of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York shuts down filesharing service LimeWire. (AFP via Melbourne Age)
Farooque Ahmed of Ashburn, Virginia, is arrested for allegedly plotting an attack on the Washington Metrorail system. (Reuters)
15 people are killed in a Mexican Drug War-related shootout at a car wash in Tepic, Nayarit, the country's third such mass shooting in under a week. (New York Times) (CNN)

Politics

Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev says it was “impossible” for coalition forces to secure victory in Afghanistan in a BBC interview. (Tehran Times)
Three labour activists are sentenced to up to nine years in prison in Vietnam for distributing anti-government leaflets and going on strike. (Straits Times)
Kenyan foreign minister Moses Wetangula steps aside following a corruption scandal. (BBC) (AllAfrica.com) (Daily Nation)
Néstor Kirchner, Secretary General of UNASUR, former President of Argentina and husband of President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner dies at his home in El Calafate, Santa Cruz Province, with three days of mourning declared. (ABC News Australia)
The National Assembly of France takes a final vote on pension reform, with President Nicolas Sarkozy hoping that it will end the recent strikes and demonstrations. (BBC)

Science

Scientists announce the discovery of the Myanmar snub-nosed monkey. (National Geographic)
Astronomers discover the most massive neutron star yet known. (Nature)

October 28, 2010 (Thursday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

France announces it is likely to withdraw some of its troops from Afghanistan in 2011. (CNN)
Somali group Al-Shabaab publicly executes two teenage girls, claiming they were spies. (AFP)

Business and economy

Chinese industrial profits rose 53.5 percent year on year in the first nine months of 2010, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said. (People Daily)
Nissan recalls 2.1 million vehicles worldwide due to an ignition problem. (BBC)
American International Group says that if chief executive Robert Benmosche needs to step aside for treatment of his cancer, the chairman of the board, Steve Miller, will serve as interim CEO "for as long as it takes to identify" a permanent replacement. (AIG Release)

Disasters

Indonesia
- The death toll from the recent eruption of Mount Merapi in Indonesia rises to 32 as it erupts again. (CNN), (BBC)
- The death toll from the tsunami rises to at least 343. (CBC) (Jakarta Globe)
Two volcanoes erupt on Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula, Klyuchevskaya Sopka and Shiveluch, forcing flights to divert and spewing volcanic ash over the nearby town of Ust-Kamchatsk. (AP)

International relations

The 17^th ASEAN Summit opens in Hanoi, Vietnam. (Bangkok Post)^{[permanent dead link]} (Xinhua)
China cancels a meeting with Japan and South Korea amid a dispute over the use of rare earth metals. (Mainichi Daily News) (Straits Times)

Law and Crime

Verizon will pay a $25 million settlement to the U.S. Treasury for overcharging 15 million cellphone customers. (Reuters)

Politics and elections

China's top legislature adopts a decision to appoint Vice President Xi Jinping as vice chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC) of the People's Republic of China. (Xinhua)
Kenya's internal security minister George Saitoti is named as acting foreign minister following the resignation of Moses Wetangula amid an embassy property scandal. (Kenya Broadcasting Corporation) (Reuters)
The Croatian government survives a motion of no confidence over economic problems and corruption. (Reuters) (Bloomberg)
Burma
- Burmese authorities announce that its leader General Than Shwe will not be standing in the upcoming general election. (Al Jazeera)
- Foreign Minister Nyan Win indicates at an ASEAN summit that Aung San Suu Kyi may be freed following the elections on November 7. (AFP) (Taiwan News)
Guinea sets November 7 as the new date for the presidential run-off. (Reuters) (Al Jazeera)
Tens of thousands of Argentinians pay tribute to the former President of Argentina Néstor Kirchner at a wake at the Presidential Palace. (Reuters)

Science

China's Tianhe-1 overtakes Nebule to regain top spot as the world's fastest supercomputer. (China Daily) (BBC)

Sport

Sandy Alderson is chosen as the new general manager of the New York Mets. (AP)

October 29, 2010 (Friday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

The memoir of George W. Bush reveals his initial belief that he had United Airlines Flight 93 shot down during the September 11 attacks in 2001. (The Guardian)
Israeli soldiers fire tear gas and sound grenades to shut down rallies across the West Bank held to protest an annexation of land by Israel. The events are attended by Norwegian politicians Torunn Kanutte Husvik and Stine Renate Håheim. (Ma'an News Agency)
Israeli crossings authorities shut Gaza for the weekend. (Ma'an News Agency)
A suicide bomber wearing an explosives belt kills at least 21 people, mostly Shiites, in Balad Ruz, the town north of Baghdad. (AP) (Xinhua)
At least one Islamist militant from the banned Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan is killed in an operation in Tajikistan. (Interfax)
20 militants are killed and six others wounded as helicopter gunships pound militant hideouts in Khadizai, Shahu Wam, Kasha and Saifal Dara areas of Orakzai tribal region of Pakistan. (Dawn)
At least nine Mexican police officers in the state of Jalisco are shot dead during an ambush with drug cartels, continuing a recent wave of violence connected to the Mexican Drug War. (BBC News)
Saboteurs attack an oil pipeline in Nigeria's Niger Delta, shutting in 4,000 barrels a day of crude oil production. (Reuters) (AFP)
Al-Shabaab militants take control of a town on the border between Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya from pro-government forces, following fighting that displaced 60,000 people. (AHN)
Russian and American forces conduct their first joint anti-narcotics operation in Afghanistan. (RIA Novosti) (Reuters) (The Hindu)
North Korea fires two shots at South Korean military units across the border at Kwacheon, South Korea. (BBC) (MSNBC) (Xinhua) (Yonhap)
NATO is expected to reduce its peacekeeping force in Kosovo by half, citing improved security situation. (BBC News)
The death toll from the suicide bombing of a cafe in the Diyala Governorate near Baghdad, Iraq reaches 22. (Reuters)
Security alert in the United Kingdom and United States:
- Law enforcement authorities in the UK and the US are on high alert after suspicious packages are found on flights arriving from Yemen. A similar package is discovered in Dubai. (BBC News) (CNN)
- United States investigators sweep cargo planes at Newark Liberty Airport and Philadelphia International Airport. (New York Times)

Arts and culture

The Parliament of New Zealand successfully amends New Zealand labour laws, as a part of a deal with Warner Bros. to keep the production of The Hobbit film project in the country. (BBC News)
Kings of Leon are announced as headliner of the 30th anniversary of Ireland's Slane Concert, to be held at Slane Castle in May 2011. (The Irish Times) (Irish Independent) (Hot Press) (The Belfast Telegraph)

Business and economy

Wikimedia, the owner of online encyclopedia Wikipedia, plans to open its first non-US office in India as it seeks to take advantage of the country's open Internet culture, the group tells AFP. (Deccan Chronicle)
Japan's Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission and the Tokyo Stock Exchange investigate recent trading activity due to allegations of insider trading ahead of new share issues by Japanese companies. (CNN)
TeliaSonera, through its Nepal subsidiary Ncell, announces that a series of eight 3G wireless transmitters have been installed along the trail to base camps on Mount Everest, with coverage reaching the summit. (BBC News)
British Airways reports a half-year profit of £158m, the first in two years. (BBC News)
German rail operator DB Fernverkehr conducts a test run of their high-speed Intercity-Express train inside the Channel Tunnel, with passengers on board. (BBC News)
A U.S. Court of Appeals upholds the conviction of Conrad Black for one fraud count and one obstruction-of-justice charge, while reversing two other fraud counts on the basis of a Supreme Court decision last year. (The Globe and Mail)

Disasters and accidents

Indonesian tsunami
- The death toll from the Indonesian tsunami climbs to 394 with 312 still missing. (BBC), (CNN)
- Only nine of the 23 sensor buoys off the coast of Indonesia of the Indian Ocean Tsunami Warning System are working due to technical problems or vandalism. (ABC News Australia)
The death toll from the 2010 Haitian cholera outbreak reaches 300 as new cases are reported nearer the capital Port-au-Prince. (BBC)
Three bodies are found by rescuers at a crash site in Antarctica involving a French helicopter. A fourth person is still missing. (BBC News)
Seven people are killed and one missing after a blast at a coal mine in Sichuan, China. (Trend News Agency) (CRI)
2010 Atlantic hurricane season: Tropical Storm Shary strengthens and nears Bermuda, while Tropical Storm Tomas forms and approaches the Caribbean Sea. (ABC News)

International relations

Iran says it is ready to resume international talks over its nuclear program "in a place and on a date convenient to both sides", says a letter to the European Union. (The Guardian)
European Union leaders agree to reform of the Treaty of Lisbon to keep member states budget deficits in line at a two-day summit in Brussels, Belgium. (Deutsche Welle)
Foreign Ministers from Japan and China meet to try to resolve soured relations over a maritime territorial dispute. (AP via Sign On San Diego) (BBC News)
The UN Convention on Biological Diversity places a ban on geoengineering projects and experiments. (Washington Post)

Law and crime

A British man is sentenced to 18 weeks in prison for posting malicious and abusive messages on Facebook memorial sites, including the page for deceased reality TV star Jade Goody. (BBC News)
An American judge has ruled that a six-year-old may be sued for negligence after crashing into an elderly woman while riding a bicycle at age four.(BBC)

Politics and elections

Néstor Kirchner is buried amid a mass outpouring of grief in Argentina. (AFP via France24)^{[permanent dead link]} (The Independent) (BBC) (Sky News)
The Supreme Court in Burma hears an appeal from lawyers of Aung San Suu Kyi against her house arrest. (Bangkok Post)^{[permanent dead link]} (BBC)

October 30, 2010 (Saturday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

One person was killed and eight others were wounded when unknown assailants opened fire in Rawalpindi’s Civil Lines area of Pakistan. (dawn)^{[permanent dead link]}
Gunman opened fire on a group of people on a neighborhood sports field in northern Honduras and killed at least 14. (Shanghai Daily)
NATO forces repel a Taliban attack on an outpost in Afghanistan's Paktika Province, killing at least 80 insurgents. (BBC) (Reuters Africa) (The Australian)
2010 cargo plane bomb plot
- The United States searches on Saturday for the people behind the attempts to send mail bombs to Chicago synagogues. (BBC) (The Jerusalem Post)
- Yemeni authorities arrest two women in relation to the attack and search for other people of interest. (Al Jazeera) (AP)
President of Afghanistan Hamid Karzai reprimands Russia after its forces enter the country without permission and "violate Afghan sovereignty" in a joint mission with United States agents. Karzai orders an investigation. (Al Jazeera) (BBC)
Thousands of people flee their homes in Guinea amid ethnic clashes ahead of a presidential run-off. (IOL)
Community leaders in Plateau State, Nigeria, appeal for calm following attacks by Muslim Hausa-Fulani against a Christian village near the city of Jos. (BBC)
Somali pirates attack and seize a Liberian tanker with 24 crew on board in the Indian Ocean. (AFP)
A roadside bomb targeting the African Union Mission to Somalia kills seven people in the capital Mogadishu. (AHN)
Arts, culture and entertainment
English pop group Take That sell 1 million 2011 reunion tour tickets within 24 hours amid crashing websites and jammed phone lines. (The Times of Malta) (The Irish Times) (Reuters) (BBC)
18-year old Alexandria Mills from the United States wins the 60th edition of the Miss World pageant in China. (ABC News)

Business and economy

A large oil field is discovered off the coast of Brazil that could contain between 8 and 15 billion barrels. (BBC)

Disasters and accidents

At least 16 people drown and 70 are missing after an overcrowded ferry sinks in a river in West Bengal, eastern India. (AFP)
Aftermath of October 2010 Sumatra earthquake:
- The death toll from the tsunami climbs to 413 and 218 people missing with the Government of Indonesia considering evacuations. (CNN)
- Rescue workers find 135 people on a remote island and revise downwards by half the missing toll. (Al Jazeera)
Typhoon Chaba heads towards eastern Japan. (AFP via Google News)
French and Australian rescue crews find four French nationals who died in a helicopter crash in Antarctica. (CNN)
Hurricane Tomas lashes the islands of Saint Lucia and Saint Vincent in the Lesser Antilles. (BBC)

International relations

Family reunions take place in North Korea between North and South Korean families separated during the Korean War sixty years ago. (Al Jazeera) (Yonhap)
Turkey's national security council adds Israeli activity in the Middle East, "online terror" and global warming to a document listing potential threats, while removing Armenia, Bulgaria, Georgia, Iran and Syria from the same list. The document also calls for a Middle East without nuclear weapons. (Ynetnews)
The prime ministers of China and Japan meet in Vietnam amid a diplomatic disagreement, with Hillary Clinton of the United States wading into the dispute during a speech. (Al Jazeera)
Abdullah of Saudi Arabia invites Iraqi political leaders for a meeting in Riyadh as part of an attempt to sort out the deadlock over the formation of a new government. (Al Jazeera)

Law and crime

Two men are sentenced to life imprisonment for the killing of a Rwandan journalist who had allegedly uncovered evidence that the Rwandan government was behind the attempted murder of an ex-army general. (IOL)
Turkey lifts a two-year ban on YouTube, which was blocked due to videos insulting the country's founder Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. (BBC) (Today's Zaman)
Sweden detains two people for allegedly plotting to attack Gothenburg in an alleged "terrorist crime". (Al Jazeera)
Fourteen people are killed by gunmen at a soccer field in San Pedro Sula, Honduras. (CNN)

Politics

An estimated 200,000 people attend the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear by political satirists Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. (Al Jazeera) (Toronto Sun) (Reuters)
Harriet Harman, the deputy leader of the British Labour Party, issues an apology for branding Danny Alexander, a member of the British Government, a "ginger rodent". Mr Alexander tweets in response: "I am proud to be ginger and rodents do valuable work cleaning up mess others leave behind". (Sky News) (Press Association via The Guardian)
In an interview with Al-Hayat later quoted by Israeli television, senior Hamas official Mahmoud al-Zahar calls a "rebel" against Hamas policy anyone who fires rockets from Gaza into Israel. (Haaretz)

Sport

Australia defeat Ireland by a score of 102-92 to win the 2010 International Rules Series at Croke Park. (RTÉ Sport) (The Irish Times) (ABC News) (The Sydney Morning Herald) (BBC Sport) (Sky Sports)

October 31, 2010 (Sunday)