Tunisian leader to form new government after activist shot

TUNIS (Reuters) - The killing of an outspoken critic of Tunisia's Islamist-led government on Wednesday sparked street protests by thousands who fear religious radicals are stifling freedoms won two years ago in the first of the Arab Spring uprisings. Chokri Belaid was shot at close range as he left for work by a gunmen who fled on the back of a motorcycle; crowds poured on to the streets...

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Syria opposition talks offer suffers setbacks

DAMASCUS: An offer of talks by Syria's main opposition leader to President Bashar al-Assad suffered setbacks on Tuesday as state media said it was two years too late, and a principal opposing faction flatly rejected the idea.Assad himself has yet to comment on the offer from Ahmed Moaz al-Khatib of the opposition National Coalition who says "the ball is now in the regime's court".Khatib...

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FCC holds first hearing on Sandy communications failures

A hardware store in the West Village offered power strips so that the thousands of people in the neighborhood who were without power after Hurricane Sandy could charge their cell phones and other gadgets. (Credit:Marguerite Reardon/CNET)The Federal Communications Commission held the first of several planned field hearings on Tuesday in Hoboken, NJ to review what went wrong with the nation's communications...

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Gay marriage gets OK from British lawmakers

LONDON British lawmakers on Tuesday voted overwhelmingly in favor of a bill to legalize same-sex marriage championed by Prime Minister David Cameron, despite strong opposition from within his Conservative Party. In a first House of Commons vote, lawmakers voted 400 to 175 in support of the legislation. There was majority support from the left-leaning Labour Party and Liberal Democrats party, but...

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Jodi Arias Tried Wicca, Buddhism With Boyfriends

Accused murderer Jodi Arias testified over the last two days about a flurry of boyfriends and how she followed them into exploring a string of religions including witchcraft, Buddhism, Hinduism and eventually Mormonism.Arias, 32, has yet to tell the jury about meeting Travis Alexander, the ex-boyfriend who baptized her into the Mormon religion and who she is charged with killling...

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Iran's Ahmadinejad kissed and scolded in Egypt

CAIRO (Reuters) - Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was both kissed and scolded on Tuesday when he began the first visit to Egypt by an Iranian president since Tehran's 1979 Islamic revolution. The trip was meant to underline a thaw in relations since Egyptians elected an Islamist head of state, President Mohamed Mursi, last June. But it also highlighted deep theological and geopolitical differences....

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Israeli, Palestinian textbooks give kids slanted view: study

JERUSALEM: Israelis and Palestinians rarely demonise each other in their schoolbooks but each side's texts offer children a one-sided view of their conflict, says a joint study released on Monday."Dehumanising and demonising characterisations of the other are rare in both Israeli and Palestinian books," according to the study funded by the US State Department and carried out by Palestinian,...

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Double asteroid trouble may have wiped out dinosaurs

This artist's image of the Chicxulub impact might have to be revised.(Credit:Donald E. Davis)When asteroids attack, dinosaurs lose. Though there are still competing theories as to why we lost awesome animals like Tyrannosaurus rex and Velociraptors, many scientists look to a long-ago asteroid impact to explain the wipeout.A study published in Earth and Planetary Science Letters adds a new wrinkle...

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Crashed bus owner failed one-third of safety inspections

YUCAIPA, Calif. The company linked to a tour bus involved in a deadly crash in Southern California failed more than a third of federal vehicle safety inspections in the last two years.Play VideoCalif. tour bus crash kills at least 8 17 PhotosTour bus crashes in Calif.U.S. government records show that buses operated by the firm Scapadas Magicas of National City, Calif., flunked 36 percent of random...

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Arias' Underwear, T-Shirt Shown at Murder Trial

A woman's T-shirt emblazoned with the possessive "Travis Alexander's" and a pair of pink panties with the word "Travis'" on the front hint at the controlling nature and abusive attitude that existed between Alexander and Jodi Arias in the months before she killed him, defense attorneys said today.Defense attorneys also questioned porn on Travis Alexander's computer during today's...

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