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GENEVA - A “toxic combination” of poverty and social injustice is killing people on a grand scale, a World Health Organization report said Thursday, urging states to fund healthcare to cut inequalities.

The Commission on the Social Determinants of Health, a report commissioned by the WHO and chaired by Sir Michael Marmot of University College London, said these health inequalities were avoidable but only if concerted efforts were made by governments and civil society.

“Reducing health inequities is an ethical imperative. Social injustice is killing people on a grand scale,” the report said.
Marmot told journalists that a girl born in Zambia can expect to live 43 years, Read more »

HARARE - Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe was jeered on Tuesday as he opened parliament in defiance of opposition objections, but voiced optimism for a power-sharing deal to end political turmoil.

Heckling by parliamentarians from the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) drowned out Mugabe’s speech, underscoring the bitterness of the divide. It said reconvening parliament could undermine deadlocked talks.

“Landmark agreements have been concluded, with every expectation that everyone will sign up,” said Mugabe, 84, whose ZANU-PF party goes into the new parliament without a majority for the first time since independence from Britain in 1980.
“The elections are now behind us, what is upon us is a challenge of vision and common Read more »

Avril Lavigne wants to begin her Asia tour in Kuala Lumpur Pop singer Avril Lavigne will be allowed to perform in Malaysia despite concerns her show is “too sexy”. Fundamentalist opposition group the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party had said Lavigne’s shows were unsuitable for a Muslim-majority country. The government then cancelled her concert on 29 August fearing disruption to independence day celebrations. A government minister would not explain the turnaround but said there had been talks with the concert organisers. Muzahet Masruri, secretary-general of the Arts, Culture and Heritage Ministry, told the AP news agency the gig organisers had told the government they had already sold thousands of tickets and that the cancellation could hurt tourism. When cancelling the show earlier this week, the government denied the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party had influenced their decision to stop Lavigne performing. Lavigne, 23, whose hits include Complicated and Girlfriend, is planning to launch her month-long Asia tour in Kuala Lumpur. Lavigne is not the only singer to have encountered problems

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BEIJING–Kenenisa Bekele added to his long list of laurels with another dominant victory.

Bekele became the first man to complete the Olympic distance double since 1980 when the Ethiopian ran away with the 5,000-meter title Saturday night at the Beijing Games.

Bekele won by nearly five seconds in 12 minutes 57.82 seconds, eclipsing the Olympic record of 13:05.59 set by Morocco’s Said Aouita in 1984.

“This is very special for myself and my country,” Bekele said. “It was a fantastic day for me. I’m happy to achieve this performance.”

Kenyans took the next two places, with Eliud Kipchoge finishing second in 13:02.80 Read more »

(CAIRO, Egypt) —The North African branch of al Qaeda claimed responsibility Friday for a devastating pair of attacks in Algeria that killed at least 55 people, in a statement carried by an Arab news station.

In an audio statement, a spokesman for the group, Salah Abu Mohammed, described the attacks on a police academy and a Canadian engineering firm as retaliation against security forces for their crackdown on militants. The statement was aired on Al-Jazeera television.

On Tuesday, a suicide bomber rammed a car full of explosives into a line of applicants waiting to register at a police academy, killing 43 in the town of Les Issers.

Twin attacks at dawn Wednesday killed another 12 in the neighboring town of Bouira. The 12 were Algerian employees of a Canadian engineering and construction firm, SNC-Lavalin.

Abu Mohammed insisted in his audio statement that his group does not target civilians.

There was no way to authenticate Friday’s message but in the past militant groups have delivered responsibility claims via Al-Jazeera. Subscribe=>

Source: Time More Top News

An image of the Burum Ocean — a suspected pirate mother ship in the Gulf of Aden.

Pirates hijacked three ships off the coast of Somalia Thursday in the “worst number of attacks” in one day in many years, an international maritime watchdog has told CNN.
“Four attacks in two days, ships being hijacked and crews being taken, and large ransoms being demanded is completely unacceptable,” said Capt. Pottengal Mukudan of the International Maritime Bureau (IMB), which monitors shipping crime.

Pirates fired at a ship sailing under an Iranian flag and boarded it around 2:20 a.m. local time Thursday (10:20 p.m. ET Wednesday), said Noel Chong, head of the International Chamber of Commerce’s Piracy Reporting Centre, a multinational coalition naval task force that monitors Read more »

A bomb at a police college east of the Algerian capital, Algiers, has killed 43 people and injured a further 38, the interior ministry says. The bombing targeted a paramilitary police training school at Issers, near Boumerdes, about 60km (40 miles) east of Algiers. An attacker drove a car full of explosives into the school’s entrance, witnesses told the AFP news agency. Algeria has suffered regular attacks blamed on militants linked to al-Qaeda. Tuesday’s attack targeted exam candidates who were waiting outside the police school, witnesses said. Civilians as well as security officials were among the victims,

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