A polling station in California has been placed on lockdown following a nearby shooting that left one person dead and three wounded, authorities and news reports said.
	The shooting took place in early afternoon yesterday in the city of Azusa, 25 miles (40 kilometers) east of Los Angeles, Vanessa Lozano, spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County Fire Department told AFP.
	She said three people were transported to a hospital with gunshot wounds and one was dead on arrival.
	Details about the incident, which happened in a residential neighborhood, were sketchy.
	A polling station in the area was placed on lockdown as was a school, according to local news reports.

California polling site on lockdown after shooting: reports

PTI Automatic

Gunmen believed to be cattle rustlers have killed 36 miners in northern Nigeria, the government and residents have said, the latest in a long-running series of such raids.
	Motorcycle-riding attackers struck late on Monday at a goldmine outside Bindin village in northern Zamfara state, shooting dead miners and gold merchants, they said.
	The state governor condemned the attack "in strongest terms" in a government statement, describing it as an "act of terrorism".
	The statement said an investigation had been launched, while local residents said it was just the latest deadly raid by cattle thieves on herding communities in the state.
	"We have no doubt that the cattle thieves that have been terrorising us were behind the attack," resident Lawwali Usmanu told AFP.
	"We buried 36 bodies of those killed in the attack today. For us it is a day of mourning," he said.
	Zamfara is known for its huge gold deposits and mines still using traditional methods. A local chief said the gunmen entered 

Suspected cattle rustlers kill 36 miners in Nigeria:government

Ukraine has launched a bid at the United Nations to condemn rights abuses in Crimea and press Russia to allow UN monitors to visit the territory.
	Backed by 38 countries including the United States, France and Britain, Ukraine yesterday presented a draft resolution that for the first time puts Crimea under scrutiny by the General Assembly's human rights committee.
	"Crimea is not just a Ukrainian territory occupied by Russia," said Ukrainian Ambassador Volodymyr Yelchenko.
	"Crimea is 2.5 million people suffering from the authoritarian regime, frightened and helpless without any chance to defend their rights."
	The measure condemns abuses and discrimination in Crimea, which was seized by Russia in February 2014 and later annexed in a move that was not recognized by the United Nations.
	It urges Russia to reverse its decision to shut down the Crimean Tatars' governing body, the Mejlis, and to allow cultural and religious institutions to reopen.
	Rights groups have raised alarm over the 

Ukraine pushes UN to step up scrutiny of Crimea

A lawyer for Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman filed an appeal to block his extradition to the United States, where he faces drug and murder charges.
	The lawyer, Andres Granados, dropped off the documents at a court in Mexico City yesterday, which he said will hand them over to a panel of appellate judges.
	Granados argued that the wrong US embassy official signed one of the extradition requests and that Guzman could face the death penalty if he is put on trial for murder in Texas.
	"We know it's a high-profile case, which is very complex because it has to do with Mr. Guzman," Granados told reporters after filing the appeal.
	"We hope that the federal government won't interfere like it did" when a lower court rejected a previous legal challenge on October 20, he said.
	A "college," or panel, of judges will review the appeal but Guzman's lawyers also plan to take the case up to the Supreme Court.
	Guzman is facing two extradition bids, one in California for drug ...

Mexico drug lord Chapo appeals extradition to US: lawyer

Iran blinded a man today after convicting him of throwing chemicals in face of a four-year-old girl and depriving her of sight, a judicial official was quoted as saying.
	It was the second time this year that Iran had carried out the strict eye-for-eye punishment that can be imposed for such crimes in the Islamic republic, the head of criminal affairs for the Tehran prosecutor's office, Mohammad Shahriari, said.
	"In 2009, this man threw lime into the face of a little girl of four years in the Sanandaj region, leaving her blind," the ISNA news agency quoted him as saying.
	"Today, the law of retribution was applied in my presence and that of experts," he said, without giving details.
	The law of retribution is a central part of Islam's sharia code but has been condemned by international human rights groups.
	Victims can choose to spare their attackers the punishment often in exchange for blood money.
	In 2011, young Iranian woman Ameneh Bahrami, one of a number who have been blinded ..

Eye for an eye for Iran man who blinded toddler

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange today defended the website's decision to publish emails from Hillary Clinton's election campaign team and denied a link with Russia, as Americans went to the polls.
	The anti-secrecy website was behind the damaging leak of tens of thousands of emails from the Democratic Party and Clinton's campaign last month, in the final weeks of the race for the White House.
	Assange said WikiLeaks had no desire to influence today's election, only to make public the material it had.
	After earlier publishing Clinton's diplomatic cables and indexing her emails, "we are seen as domain experts on Clinton archives. So it is natural that Clinton sources come to us," Assange said in a statement.
	"We cannot publish what we do not have. To date, we have not received information on Donald Trump's campaign," he said, referring to Clinton's Republican rival.
	"The Clinton campaign, when they were not spreading obvious untruths, pointed to unnamed sources or to speculative and 

Assange blasts Clinton on Russia email leak claims

At least seven children and two pregnant women were killed in an air strike on Syria's rebel stronghold province of Idlib today, a monitor said.
	The strike, which hit the town of Khan Sheikun, in the south of the province, appeared to have been carried out by Syrian government ally Russia, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said.
	The Britain-based group, which relies on a network of sources inside Syria for its information, says it determines what planes carried out raids according to their type, location, flight patterns and the munitions involved.
	In Moscow, the defence ministry denied that Russian aircraft had been in the area today, and accused the Observatory of "information provocations".
	Russia began its air campaign in support of the government in September 2015, saying it was targeting "terrorists."
	"The strike hit a street where children were playing. Three of the dead children were from one family and were visiting their grandfather," Observatory director .

Raid kills 7 children in Syria rebel bastion: monitor

When Saada al-Aboud saw Islamic State fighters bringing weaponry into her village near their Syrian bastion of Raqa, she feared she and her family would become human shields for the jihadists.
	"Daesh fighters brought heavy weapons to our village and stayed among us so that if there were strikes they would hit us," the 45-year-old told AFP as she fled her village of Al-Heisha, using an Arabic acronym for IS.
	"They wouldn't let us leave," she said, her lined face marked with a Bedouin chin tattoo.
	"We had to escape by running out into the fields, with our children and old people. What else could we do? We left everything behind."
	Al-Heisha, 40 kilometres north of Raqa, was already controlled by IS, but the jihadists began moving artillery there as they came under pressure from a new assault to seize their stronghold.
	The US-backed Kurdish-Arab alliance known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) began its operation to capture Raqa on Saturday night, in an attempt to pressure IS as .

Civilians flee in fear as forces advance on IS Syria bastion

US electric car maker Tesla today said it would buy German engineering firm Grohmann to help ramp up production at its heavily-automated factories.
	"Several critical elements of Tesla's automated manufacturing systems will be designed and produced" in Pruem in western Germany, the California-based firm said in a statement.
	Tesla, founded by tech billionaire Elon Musk, aims to produce 500,000 cars per year by 2018 after taking some 370,000 pre-orders for its mass-market Model 3, which will sell for around USD 35,000 (just under 32,000 euros).
	This year, the firm hopes to build between 80,000 and 90,000 units of its luxury Model S and Model X vehicles, 50,000 of them in the second half.
	"The key to making electric cars affordable are economies of scale and automation in order to have the costs be something that people can afford to buy," Musk told reporters in a conference call.
	Neither Tesla nor Grohmann offered details of how much money is to change hands in the ...

Tesla buys German automation firm to drive up production

Chancellor Angela Merkel today said Russia could try to influence Germany's general elections next year through cyber attacks or disinformation campaigns, after Washington accused the Kremlin of similar meddling in the US vote.
	"We are already, even now, having to deal with information out of Russia or with internet attacks that are of Russian origin or with news which sows false information," Merkel, said at a press conference alongside Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg.
	Dealing with that was already "a daily task", she told reporters in Berlin.
	"So it may be that this could also play a role during the election campaign."
	The comments came in response to a question about whether Germany could experience the type of cyber attacks that have plagued the White House race, notably targeting Hillary Clinton's Democratic party.
	Washington last month formally accused the Russian government of trying to "interfere" in the election by hacking US political institutions, charges the ...

Merkel warns of possible Russian interference in German vote

The World Trade Organisation said today it will set up a panel to resolve an escalating dispute between the United States and China over Beijing's export barriers for raw materials.
	Washington claims that China's export duties, export quotas and limitations placed on businesses that want to export raw materials have hurt US businesses.
	The raw materials concerned in the dispute range from cobalt to copper and tin and China is facing a similar spat with the European Union.
	The US first requested arbitration at the WTO last month, with the country's trade representative Michael Froman questioning China's commitment to the WTO's goal of establishing a level-playing field in global trade.
	China rejected the first US request for arbitration. WTO rules state that a second request for arbitration automatically triggers the creation of a panel by the organisation's Dispute Settlement Body.
	Froman's office has insisted that Chinese raw materials are crucial to sustaining key American ...

WTO panel to rule on US, China raw materials dispute

Scoreboard at stumps on the third day
of the second Test between Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka today:
     Sri Lanka first innings 504 all out (D. De Silva 127, A. Gunaratne 116, Tiripano 3-91, Cremer 3-136)
     Zimbabwe first innings
     T Mawoyo lbw b Herath              3
     B Chari b Herath                  80
     H Masakadza c de Silva b Herath    0
     C Ervine c Karunaratne b Lakmal   64
     S Williams lbw b D. Perera        58
     M Waller c Silva b Herath         18
     P Moor lbw b Perera               33
     G Cremer c Karunaratne b D. Perera 3
     D Tiripano c Herath b Lakmal       3
     C Mumba lbw b Herath               2
     C Mpofu not out                    0
     Extras (2b, 6lb)                   8
     Total (all out, 82.1 overs)       272
     Fall of wickets: 1-17, 2-17, 3-134, 4-173, 5-210, 6-253, 7-265, 8-268, 9-272, 10-272
     Bowling: Lakmal 21.1-5-55-2, Herath 26-4-89-5, Kumara 14-0-60-0, D Perera 18-2-51-3, Gunaratne 2-0-5-0, De Silva 1-0-4-0.
     ..

Harare, Nov 8 (AFP) Scoreboard at stumps on the third day

Rangana Herath became just the third bowler to pick up five-wicket hauls against all nine Test opponents to earn Sri Lanka a big first-innings lead before Zimbabwe bounced back on the third day of the third Test at Harare Sports Club today.
     Herath recorded figures of 5 for 89 -- his first five-wicket haul against Zimbabwe -- to bowl the home side out for 272 and give Sri Lanka a 232-run lead in the first innings.
     But after the tourists opted not to enforce the follow-on, fast bowler Carl Mumba picked up three wickets to reduce Sri Lanka to 84 for four.
     With opener Dimuth Karunaratne scoring an unbeaten 54 -- his third fifty-plus score in four innings -- Sri Lanka went to stumps on 102 for four, giving them an overall lead of 334 with two days to play.
     Although Herath had come into the series with 26 five-wicket hauls in Test cricket, he had never played against Zimbabwe in a 17-year career.
     On Tuesday he joined countryman Muttiah Muralitharan and South ...

Herath joins five-wicket Test elite

The Turkey representative for Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and two other campaigners went on trial today charged with making terror propaganda for Kurdish militants, as concerns mount over press freedom in the country.
	RSF representative Erol Onderoglu, rights activist Sebnem Korur Fincanci and journalist Ahmet Nesin were being tried at the main courthouse in Istanbul. They were initially arrested in June but then freed pending trial.
	All three have been charged with making "terror propaganda" on behalf of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) after guest-editing pro-Kurdish Turkish newspaper Ozgur Gundem.
	Ozgur Gundem had invited guest editors to take control of the paper in a campaign of solidarity as it faced pressure from authorities.
	The daily was then raided and permanently shut down in August on charges of links with the PKK, which has waged an insurgency against Ankara for more than three decades.
	One of the paper's columnists and board members, the ...

Top press rights defender goes on trial in Turkey

Britain's Supreme Court has set aside four days starting on December 5 for the government's appeal against a ruling that it cannot start the Brexit process without parliament's approval.
	All 11 Supreme Court judges will hear the landmark case, which could delay Britain's withdrawal from the European Union, and will deliver their judgement "probably in the New Year", a court statement today said.
	The High Court of England and Wales ruled last Thursday that the government could not use its executive power to trigger Article 50 of the EU's Lisbon Treaty, which starts a two-year countdown to Brexit.
	The judgement that parliament must give its approval first threatens to derail the timetable set by Prime Minister Theresa May, who has said she intends to trigger Article 50 by the end of March.
	There is also speculation that members of the House of Commons, the majority of whom opposed Brexit, may seek to soften Britain's break with the EU or even try to stop it.
	"The Supreme Court has .

UK Supreme Court to hear govt Brexit appeal Dec 5-8

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will visit Cuba and Argentina next week in a bid to strengthen ties and boost trade, the government announced today.
	Trudeau will meet with Cuban President Raul Castro and Argentine President Mauricio Macri in his travels from November 15 to 18.
	"Cuba and Argentina are two of our closest partners in the hemisphere," Trudeau said in the statement.
	Among the aims of the trip is encouraging "sustainable economic growth, inclusive governance, security, climate change, and gender equality," it said.
	Canada and Cuba have had 71 years of uninterrupted diplomatic engagement and constructive cooperation in areas including trade and investment, and tourism.
	Bilateral trade in goods is valued at more than USD 1 billion annually.
	The government did not provide precise details on Trudeau's schedule in Cuba and Argentina.
	He will travel to Peru from November 19 to 20 to participate in the 2016 Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.
	APEC's 21 members 

Canadian PM Trudeau to visit Cuba, Argentina

Islamic State fighters forced thousands of civilians to retreat with them from Hamam al-Alil as Iraqi police were recapturing the town, and moved them towards Mosul airport, the UN said today.
	Iraqi forces retook the key town from the jihadists yesterday, in a major win in its offensive to wrest back the nearby city of Mosul.
	But the IS fighters did not leave the town alone: UN rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani told reporters in Geneva the agency had received reports that the jihadists "forcibly moved about 1,500 families from Hamam al-Alil town to Mosul airport" on November 4.
	The UN has for weeks warned that IS was forcing civilians living in districts around Mosul into Iraq's second city, hoping to use them as human shields in an upcoming battle.
	Shamdasani also said the rights office had received information that the jihadists had "abducted at least 295 former Iraqi Security Forces personnel" from areas around Mosul.
	"Between November 1-4, 195 former ISF personnel ..

Thousands of civilians forced to join IS retreat in Iraq: UN

Scoreboard at tea on the third day of
the second Test between Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka today:
     Sri Lanka first innings 504 all out (D. De Silva 127, A. Gunaratne 116, Tiripano 3-91, Cremer 3-136)
     Zimbabwe first innings
     T Mawoyo lbw b Herath                3
     B Chari b Herath                    80
     H Masakadza c de Silva b Herath      0
     C Ervine c Karunaratne b Lakmal     64
     S Williams lbw b D. Perera          58
     M Waller c Silva b Herath           18
     P Moor lbw b Perera                 33
     G Cremer c Karunaratne b D. Perera   3
     D Tiripano c Herath b Lakmal         3
     C Mumba lbw b Herath                 2
     C Mpofu not out                      0
     Extras (2b, 6lb)                      8
     Total (all out, 82.1 overs)         272
     Fall of wickets: 1-17, 2-17, 3-134, 4-173, 5-210, 6-253, 7-265, 8-268, 9-272, 10-272
     Bowling: Lakmal 21.1-5-55-2, Herath 26-4-89-5, Kumara 14-0-60-0, D Perera 18-2-51-3, Gunaratne 2-0-5-0, .

Harare, Nov 8 (AFP) Scoreboard at tea on the third day of

Climate change has made deadly heatwaves and hurricanes, along with droughts and flooding, both more frequent and more intense in recent years, according to a UN report released today.
	More than 50 per cent of major extreme weather events from 2011 to 2015 showed the telltale fingerprint of human- induced global warming, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) reported on the sidelines of United Nations climate talks in Marrakesh.
	The last half-decade was the warmest five-year stretch on record, with 2014 and 2015 the hottest of all.
	These unprecedented temperatures were coupled with rising seas, adding to the destructive power of storms already amped up by warmer, moister air, the report said.
	Climate change "has increased the risks of extreme events such as heatwaves, drought, record rainfall and damaging floods," WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas said in a statement.
	Some 300,000 people perished in climate-boosted catastrophes during the 2011-2015 period, the WMO ...

Climate change making extreme weather events worse: UN

Sri Lanka's Rangana Herath became just the third bowler in history to pick up five-wicket hauls against all nine other Test countries as Zimbabwe were bowled out for 272 in Harare today.
     Herath recorded figures of 5 for 89 - his first five-wicket haul against Zimbabwe - to bowl Sri Lanka to a 232-run lead in the first innings on the third afternoon of the third Test.
     After the tourists opted not to enforce the follow-on, openers Dimuth Karunaratne and Kaushal Silva took them to tea on 13 without loss at Harare Sports Club.
     Although Zimbabwe made a promising start to their reply to Sri Lanka's first innings total of 504 all out, reaching 134 for two on the third morning, they ultimately succumbed to spin with offspinner Dilruwan Perera picking up 3 for 51 as the hosts lost their last five wickets for just 19 runs.
     However, it was fast bowler Suranga Lakmal who set Sri Lanka on their way in the morning session, which saw Zimbabwe resume on 126 for two, when he had ...

Herath enters select club with five-wicket haul

Ex-French economy minister Emmanuel Macron, a 38-year-old former banker who has vowed to transform the country's politics, has decided to stand in next year's presidential election, aides said today.
	   Macron "will declare his candidacy before December 10", a member of his team said, putting an end to months of speculation over his intentions since he quit the Socialist government in August.
	   "All the conditions are in place," the aide said, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity.
	   Macron, a business-friendly former protege of Socialist President Francois Hollande, will aim to exploit the deep divisions in the French left to make a run for the presidency.
	   Hollande, who has some of the lowest popularity ratings of any post-war president, is expected to decide by the end of the year if he will make a bid for re-election.
	   Macron founded his own political movement, En Marche ("On the Move"), in April saying he wanted to promote "new ideas... Neither of the right nor the 

AFP

AFP

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