World News Thread & Breaking News!!

[AssassinsMace]

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Obama has made me appreciate politicians regarding foreign policy that say one thing to voters and do another many times the complete opposite when it comes to action. These people are more realistic where voters see negotiation and compromise as weakness and unconditional surrender is the only policy towards other countries. Obama is not one of them. He's a romantic idealist like most voters which usually means unrealistic. Why did Obama stir up that business with the Indian diplomat? It's as strange as managing to get Russia and China, the US's main geopolitical opponents in the world, both focused on the US instead on one another. This article above is really in the same vein of arrogance where if India doesn't get over the US recent slights, everyone should just give India the finger. And to put it into perspective, Obama's campaign against China all started, according to the media, because the Chinese "disrespected" him at the UN Copenhagen environmental summit.

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Obama's running out of continents he hasn't offended to salvage his legacy. China may have more money to invest in Africa but the US has something better to offer? Is this spinning the same old conditions and policies that turned Africa to China in the first place made out as something new? What has changed? Maybe some propaganda about how China is colonizing Africa? Again no negotiation and compromise. Just make the alternative look worse. Obama would've never invited African leaders to a summit in the US if China didn't do all that first. Just like Abe is following everywhere China goes in the world now to suggest Japan is a better alternative. Abe is just a different face from Western colonial ones but it's still the same policies that make countries turn to China. Yeah like Japan is going to be less protectionist as usual. That's not going to happen. So what's Abe's pitch to the world to turn to Japan instead of China? Buy more expensive Japanese bullet trains instead of bad quality Chinese ones? They're not going to change. Just scare everyone into their arms.

 

[Jeff Head]

Not good.

Passenger exiting aircraft at Gatwick Airport, outside London, collapses and then dies at hospital from Ebola after getting off airplane from Sierra Leone.

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[PanAsian]

Not good.

Passenger exiting aircraft at Gatwick Airport, outside London, collapses and then dies at hospital from Ebola after getting off airplane from Sierra Leone.

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One more reason to put up a travel ban on people from the infected countries and recent visitors!

 

[SamuraiBlue]

One more reason to put up a travel ban on people from the infected countries and recent visitors!

Unfortunately if you really want to stop any possibilities then you'll have to quarantine the entire African continent to ensure containment. Without it people will travel by land and then hop on a plane or worse an infected person could just spread the virus during transit at a large airport. It's a nightmare scenario many immunologist dread.

 

[TerraN_EmpirE]

I bet right now There are More spacesuits walking around that airport then at a Nasa convention

 

[solarz]

thank you t2, I wish you were right, Christians around the world face persecution as do many other faith groups, I have a very good friend in Kenya, a native who was a street kid, and she has done amazing things, and started an orphanage, she has about 60 children an is very faithful to send them to school and university, she just has such a burden for them. Another friend from here in the states was going to visit and help her with some upgrades, but because of the high level of violence is simply unable to travel to Kenya. I don't want you to think I'm whining, I'm not, I have been very blessed, but many Christians are facing persecution, as well as others, I am just so disappointed, I have such respect and hope for China on so many levels, but thank you so much for examining the article more closely. Actually the world just seems to be a more angry and unforgiving place, I am particularly sad for children, and women.

Here's some context regarding the claim of persecution based on 100 demolition notices to churches:

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Particularly salient statistics:

GKDragonomics estimates that between 2005 and 2010 alone China demolished 1.85 billion square meters of housing, more than 16% of its total stock. According to the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, nearly all buildings constructed before 1999 — more than half of those currently standing in the country today — are slated to be demolished in the next 20 years.

 

[Equation]

Here's some context regarding the claim of persecution based on 100 demolition notices to churches:

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Particularly salient statistics:

The author Wade Shepherd apparently doesn't know about the common practice in developers all over the world that build shoddy buildings just for a quick buck, he makes it seem that only China has that problem. Well he should come visit the US and look at all those tornado torn houses and suburban shopping malls and buildings that are built today. The bottom line is not so much about the construction materials, design, or building techniques it's rather developers wants to build them in the cheap and China has no shortage of that just like the US. Does he even know a lot of those foreign companies were also responsible for many of those shoddy construction as well?

 

[bd popeye]

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BEIJING (Reuters) - A city in China's restive western region of Xinjiang has banned people with head scarves, veils and long beards from boarding buses, as the government battles unrest with a policy that critics said discriminates against Muslims.

Authorities will prohibit five types of passengers - those who wear veils, head scarves, a loose-fitting garment called a jilbab, clothing with the crescent moon and star, and those with long beards - from boarding buses in the northwestern city of Karamay, state media said.

The crescent moon and star symbol of Islam features on many national flags, besides being used by groups China says want to set up an independent state called East Turkestan.

The rules were intended to help strengthen security through August 20 during an athletics event and would be enforced by security teams, the ruling Communist Party-run Karamay Daily said on Monday.

"Those who do not comply, especially those five types of passengers, will be reported to the police," the paper said.

In July, authorities in Xinjiang's capital Urumqi banned bus passengers from carrying items ranging from cigarette lighters to yogurt and water, in a bid to prevent violent attacks.

Exiled Uighur groups and human rights activists say the government's repressive policies in Xinjiang, including controls on Islam, have provoked unrest, a claim Beijing denies.

"Officials in Karamay city are endorsing an openly racist and discriminatory policy aimed at ordinary Uighur people," Alim Seytoff, the president of the Washington-based Uyghur American Association, said in an emailed statement.

While many Uighur women dress in much the same casual style as those elsewhere in China, some have begun to wear the full veil, a garment more common in Pakistan or Afghanistan than in Xinjiang.

Police have offered money for tips on everything from "violent terrorism training" to individuals who grow long beards. [ID:nL4N0PO0BC]

Hundreds have died in unrest in Xinjiang in the past 18 months, but tight security makes it almost impossible for journalists to make independent assessments of the violence.

About 100 people were killed when knife-wielding attackers staged assaults in two towns in the region's south in late July, state media said, including 59 "terrorists" shot dead by police. A suicide bombing killed 39 people at a market in Urumqi in May.

(Reporting by Michael Martina; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

 

[bd popeye]

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By Hamid Shalizi and Jessica Donati

KABUL (Reuters) - A U.S. general was killed and more than a dozen people were wounded on Tuesday, including a German general, in the latest insider attack by a man believed to be an Afghan soldier, U.S., German and Afghan officials said.

The U.S. Army said late on Tuesday the slain general was Major General Harold Greene, a senior officer with the international military command ISAF. He was the most senior U.S. military official killed in action overseas since the war in Vietnam, military officials said.

"These soldiers were professionals, committed to the mission," U.S. Army Chief of Staff Ray Odierno said in a statement, referring to the soldiers killed and wounded in the attack.

Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby told reporters that "many were seriously wounded," and the gunman was killed in the attack, which took place on Tuesday at the Marshal Fahim National Defense University, a training center in Kabul.

The attack raised fresh questions about the ability of NATO soldiers to train and advise Afghan security forces as western nations gradually withdraw. The U.S. and German generals were on a routine visit, the Pentagon said.

A U.S. official said the gunman fired on the foreign soldiers using a light machine gun. Afghanistan's Defense Ministry described him as a "terrorist in army uniform."

The German military said its general was one of 14 coalition troops wounded in Tuesday's attack, adding that his life was not in danger. Seven Americans and five British troops were among the wounded, an Afghan official said.

Past insider attacks have eroded trust while straining foreign efforts to train Afghanistan's 350,000-strong security force and prepare them to fight the Taliban once most U.S. and NATO forces depart.

U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel spoke by phone with General Joe Dunford, who commands U.S. and international troops in Afghanistan, about the incident, Kirby said. He said the shooting was being investigated jointly by Afghan authorities and the international military coalition that is winding down its long mission in Afghanistan.

The Afghan president was quick to condemn the attack, saying the delegation had been visiting the facility to help build the country's security forces.

The Taliban says insider attacks reflect their ability to infiltrate the enemy. International military coalition officials say the incidents often arise over misunderstandings or altercations between troops.

U.S. military officials said it was too soon to say whether the high-ranking officers had been specifically targeted by the shooter.

"We remain committed to our mission in Afghanistan and will continue to work with our Afghan partners to ensure the safety and security of all coalition soldiers and civilians," Odierno said.

 

[Miragedriver]

Have scientists solved the giant hole mystery in Siberia?

Scientists have been investigating the appearance of three mysterious holes in Siberia

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I will now get back to bottling my Malbec