A Syrian bomb plot suspect found hanged with a T-shirt in his cell had not been deemed an "acute" suicide risk, a German jail official said today.
	Jaber al-Bakr, 22, had been "quiet and calm, there was no indication of emotional issues," said Rolf Jacob, who heads the prison in the eastern city of Leipzig.
	Although the detainee had begun a hunger strike following his imprisonment on Monday, a "very experienced psychologist" who interviewed him had assessed that "there was no acute suicide risk", Jacob said.
	The psychologist therefore suggested that the regular checks, which were initially set at 15 minute intervals, be reduced to half hourly from Tuesday, said Jacob.
	He said the suspect was nevertheless held in isolation as he was deemed to pose a potential threat to other inmates.
	Bakr's death in custody marks a second official fiasco after police commandos earlier botched his arrest, sparking a nationwide weekend-long manhunt.
	The suspect was eventually captured by three ...

Syrian bomb plot suspect not deemed 'acute' suicide risk

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Almost 15 years after legalising euthanasia, the Dutch government may broaden the law to give elderly people who are not sick the legal right to assisted suicide if they feel their lives are "complete".
	The project, which is unlikely to be put forward as a draft law before elections due in March, was already triggering strong debate today across The Netherlands.
	"People who believe after deep reflection that they have completed their lives, should be able under strict conditions to end their lives in the dignified manner they choose," the Dutch health and justice ministers said in a letter sent to parliament late yesterday.
	The Netherlands and neighbouring Belgium became the first countries in the world to legalise euthanasia in 2002.
	But it is carried out under strict conditions, and only after a minimum of two doctors have certified that there is no other reasonable solution for the patient and that their suffering is "unbearable and without any hope of improvement".
	Last year .

Dutch mull assisted suicide for those whose 'life is complete'

Dutch tourists to Thailand were warned today to avoid any "declarations or discussions critical of the royal family" in updated travel advice sent by the foreign ministry after the death of the Thai king.
	The Netherlands also recommended that its citizens "follow the instructions of local authorities, and respect local customs and restrictions imposed on social life".
	Thailand has said it will hold a one-year period of mourning following the death today of King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the world's longest reigning monarch.
	The Dutch foreign ministry also advised tourists to follow events on local media and to always carry their identity papers with them.
	Bhumibol's death at the age of 88 ends a remarkable seven-decade reign and plunges Thailand into a deeply uncertain future.
	Minutes after the ailing monarch's passing was announced, Thailand's junta chief Prayut Chan-O-Cha said there was to be an official one-year mourning period.
	He also ordered that "all entertainment functions ...

Dutch tourists warned after Thai king's death

Thirty people were killed and 57 hurt in clashes between mainly-Muslim militia and UN peacekeepers in Central African Republic, the UN mission said today.
	The fighting today in the central market town of Kaga Bandoro began when a member of the mainly Muslim ex-Seleka militia was killed during an attempted robbery by the group.

30 dead, dozens injured in C Africa fighting: UN

The Algerian army killed two armed and "dangerous" Islamists today in the Skikda region east of the capital, the defence ministry said.
	Kalashnikov assault rifles and ammunition were seized during the operation in the Oued Zhour area of Skikda, the ministry said.
	It identified the men only as Habbach, also known as Abou Doujana, and Benaldjia who went by the name of Abderrahman.
	Algerian media named the first man as Saddek Habbach, the "emir" or leader in eastern Algeria of Jund al-Khilafa extremist movement which is linked to the jihadist Islamic State group.
	Jund al-Khilafa, or Soldiers of the Caliphate, has claimed responsibility for the abduction and murder two years ago in the Kabylie region east of Algiers of French mountain guide Herve Gourdel.
	More than 100 suspected Islamists have been killed in army operations in Algeria since the beginning of the year, according to an AFP count compiled from official statements.
	Algeria uses the term of "terrorists" for armed ...

Algeria says two Islamists killed in army operation

Iran has sent two warships to the Gulf of Aden off Yemen's coast to protect commercial vessels, Iranian media said today, at a time of heightened tension for the United States in the region.
	The announcement came as Washington said it had destroyed radar sites controlled by the Iran-backed Huthi rebels in Yemen, in response to failed missile attacks on its warships in the Red Sea.
	However, the two Iranian destroyers were dispatched on October 5, before the incidents involving the US, the conservative-linked Tasnim news agency reported.
	Their mission takes them to the Gulf of Aden and the Bab al-Mandeb Strait between Yemen and the Horn of Africa "to protect merchant vessels against pirates", before heading on to Tanzania and possibly South Africa, Tasnim said.
	It was not clear if the destroyers had already arrived in the Gulf of Aden.
	The US cruise missile strikes today were Washington's first direct action against the Huthi rebels, although it has provided logistical support to ..

Iran warships sent to waters off conflict-hit Yemen

South African President Jacob Zuma moved today to block a watchdog's potentially explosive report into graft allegations against him, in his latest legal bid to protect his battered reputation.
	Zuma, 74, has survived a series of damaging scandals while in office, but has faced increasing criticism as the economy stalls and after the ruling ANC party suffered unprecedented losses in local polls.
	Public Protector Thuli Madonsela had been expected to release tomorrow her report into allegations that Zuma let a wealthy business family have undue influence over government and were even able to choose ministers.
	"There is an application for an urgent interdict," Zuma's spokesman Bongani Ngqulunga told AFP, giving no further details.
	Madonsela's spokesman said the court application was due to be heard Tuesday.
	Madonsela, who is celebrated in South Africa for her diligent work unearthing official misconduct, stands down on Saturday after completing her seven-year term in office.
	In ...

S Africa's Zuma moves to block graft report

World stocks mostly fell today as weak Chinese data reinforced fears over the world's number two economy, while a spat between Britain's Tesco and Dutch giant Unilever hit sentiment in Europe.
	In afternoon deals, Europe's main stock indices were down over one per cent, while Wall Street also opened on the down side.
	Asian bourses also buckled on news that China's exports plummeted last month, as anaemic global demand hit the world's second-largest economy, while weak imports fuelled worries about crucial domestic appetite.
	However, troubled Samsung Electronics staged a slight recovery on bargain-buying after losing about 10 per cent of its value this week on the Galaxy Note 7 crisis.
	China said exports plunged more than predicted last month, disappointing markets after a recent upbeat reading on factory activity. In yuan terms it snapped six straight months of increases. Imports also fell, confounding predictions for a rise.
	"The drop in China's trade surplus, which included a ...

Markets swing lower on China trade data, retail row

An expanded US recall was ordered today for Samsung Galaxy Note 7 smartphones, including replacements for the devices plagued by exploding batteries.
	The Consumer Product Safety Commission announcement, formalising the action announced by the South Korean giant, said the recall affects 1.9 million handsets, including the one million announced in a September 15 recall.
	"Consumers should immediately stop using and power down all Galaxy Note 7 devices, including Note 7 devices received as replacements in the previous recall," the agency said in a statement.
	Samsung announced earlier this week it would recall all the Note 7 handsets worldwide, including replacements, and halt production of the flagship device in a massive blow to the world's biggest smartphone maker.
	The company recalled some 2.5 million Note 7s in 10 markets following complaints that its lithium-ion battery exploded while charging, and then had to expand that as reports emerged of replacement phones also catching ...

Expanded Samsung Note 7 recall ordered in US

The tuberculosis epidemic is larger than previously thought, infecting 10.4 million people last year, while research into vaccines and cures is "severely underfunded," the World Health Organisation (WHO) warned today.
	Across the planet, 1.8 million people died of TB last year, 300,000 more than a year earlier, according to the WHO's Global TB Report 2016.
	Two out of five people who fell sick with the disease -- caused by a bacteria that infects the lungs and makes people cough up blood -- went undiagnosed and untreated.
	Nearly half a million people were diagnosed with multi-drug resistant TB (MDR-TB).
	"WHO's annual look at the global state of tuberculosis this year makes for a shockingly bad report card," said a statement from Doctors Without Borders.
	"The WHO Global TB Report is a wake-up call to break the status quo in how TB, and its drug-resistant forms, are being diagnosed and treated."
	According to the report, the size of the epidemic rose largely because researchers ...

Tuberculosis epidemic larger than previously thought

A Palestinian security official sentenced to jail for criticising president Mahmud Abbas on Facebook for attending Shimon Peres's funeral has been pardoned, a rights group said today.
	Abbas has granted the pardon to Lieutenant Colonel Osama Mansour, 49, following his online post criticising the Palestinian president, according to the Independent Commission for Human Rights.
	Abbas's office had not commented.
	Mansour was public relations director at the Palestinian military liaison unit, which coordinates security with Israel.
	He was arrested 10 days ago and sentenced by a military court to a year in prison for disobeying orders against publicly expressing political opinions.
	But Amar Dweik, head of Palestinian group Independent Commission for Human Rights, said that Mansour was released on Wednesday and sent into retirement after Abbas issued a decree pardoning him.
	Abbas signed the Oslo accords along with late Israeli statesman Peres, who died on September 28, and has called him 

Abbas pardons Palestinian official jailed for criticising him

Turkey's foreign minister and his Arab counterparts in the Gulf today condemned "indiscriminate" air strikes on Syria's Aleppo and expressed "deep regret" at the UN's inability to stop the raids.
	The call came in a statement at the close of a meeting in the Saudi capital between Ankara's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu and his counterparts from the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council.
	Russian and Syrian warplanes have been backing a large-scale offensive by Syrian government forces against rebel-controlled east Aleppo.
	More than 70 civilians died on Tuesday and Wednesday alone in air strikes and regime artillery fire on eastern Aleppo districts, a monitoring group said.
	"Ministers condemned the escalation of military operations in Aleppo by the regime and its supporters through indiscriminate air raids against the civilian population and infrastructure," in a statement issued at the end of the GCC-Turkey talks.
	New Zealand, one of the 10 non-permanent UN Security Council ...

Gulf, Turkey bemoan UN inaction on Aleppo

German police said today they were investigating a refugee couple after their one-month-old baby was put up for sale on the online auction platform eBay for USD 5,500.
	Police launched a probe into possible human trafficking after they were tipped off about the advertisement which appeared online on Tuesday.
	The 40-day-old girl has been handed to child protection officers, police from the western city of Duisburg said in a statement.
	Preliminary investigations show that the advertisement was put up using the internet connection of the couple, identified by police only as "refugees".
	However, police said the internet connection was also in use by other members of the family, adding that the probe was ongoing.

Baby offered for sale on eBay prompts German probe

Bob Dylan, the surprise winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature today, became an icon of 1960s counterculture but his voice has reached widely and evocatively into the American past.
	The author of some of rock's early anthems such as 'The Times They Are A-Changin', Dylan tapped classic folk and gospel songs to rejuvenate defining US forms of story-telling.
	Since early in his career the 75-year-old singer has experimented with the intersection of the literary and the musical.
	In one of his most celebrated songs, "Mr Tambourine Man," Dylan created a literary character after a drummer he knew from the clubs of New York's Greenwich Village.
	"Like a Rolling Stone" tore apart pop convention by going on for more than six minutes, with Dylan's steady narration and a touch of R&B interrupted by the refrain, "How does it feel?"
	"After writing that, I wasn't interested in writing a novel or a play or anything, like I knew like I had too much. I wanted to write songs," Dylan said later ...

Bob Dylan, enigmatic voice of American life

World number one Novak Djokovic called for tennis to "improve and evolve" today after the women's tour signalled a move towards new scoring formats.
     Djokovic said different scoring methods were worth considering to make tennis, whose matches vary wildly in duration, easier to follow on TV.
     "All sports are doing everything they can in order to get their sport to the highest possible level and fulfil their potential," Djokovic said at the Shanghai Masters.
     "I think tennis has yet to fulfil its full potential. I think we are at a good state at the moment, for sure... But we still have a lot of room to get better."
     Women's Tennis Association chief executive Steve Simon has said he's considering using super tie-breaks and no-ad scoring, already used in doubles, in singles matches.
     Djokovic's cautious welcome contrasts with the reaction from Rafael Nadal, who said tennis thrived on long and "dramatic matches that become emotional".
     "Tennis has values that we ...

Djokovic says format must 'improve and evolve'

Openers Azhar Ali and Sami Aslam gave Pakistan a solid start against West Indies on the opening day of the day-night Test in Dubai on Thursday.
     Pakistan were 81-0 at tea without losing a wicket after Misbah-ul-Haq won the toss and opted to bat in the second ever day-night Test, played with a pink ball instead of the traditional red, at Dubai stadium.
     Ali, playing his 50th Test, was unbeaten on 38 and Aslam was 37 not out as West Indies' pace-cum-spin attack failed to strike on a flat grass-less pitch which is expected to take spin after three days.
     Australia and New Zealand featured in a day-night Test at Adelaide in November last year, the first-ever in Test cricket's 140-year-old history.
     It couldn't have been a better start for Pakistan in a match marking their 400th Test, as they won a crucial toss and were given a rock solid start against the West Indies who enterted the Test with three seamers and two spinners.
     Pakistan gave Test caps to middle-order ...

Pakistan 81-0 in a solid start to day-night Test

Tea scores in the first day-night
Test between Pakistan and West Indies played at Dubai stadium on Thursday:
     Pakistan
     Sami Aslam not out                37
     Azhar Ali not out                 38
     Extras: (lb2, nb4)                 6
     Total: (for no loss; 27 overs)    81
     Bowling: Gabriel 6-1-23-0 (4nb), Cummins 6-2-21-0, Holder 5-2-6-0, Brathwaite 3-1-10-0, Bishoo 4-1-10-0, Chase 3-0-9-0

Dubai, Oct 13 (AFP) Tea scores in the first day-night

World number one Novak Djokovic said he hadn't made any plans to keep Boris Becker as a coach next year as they appeared headed for a split on Thursday.
     Djokovic, speaking after cruising into the Shanghai Masters quarter-finals, said he had only made arrangements with the German great for the rest of the season.
     "We are still working (together), yeah... For now the plan is the rest of the season, what's left, indoor tournaments," he said.
     Asked what would happen next year, Djokovic said: "We still haven't talked about it."
     Becker joined Djokovic's coaching team at the start of 2014, helping him win six Grand Slam titles and put together one of the all-time great seasons last year.
     But speculation about their partnership has grown since the Serb suffered a crisis of motivation and a series of injuries since completing a career Grand Slam at the French Open.
     Djokovic says he has now taken a fresh mental approach since he lost in Wimbledon's third round and .

Djokovic says no talks on retaining Becker

The Washington Post today became the latest US newspaper to emphatically endorse Hillary Clinton for the White House, saying it was swayed as much by her competence as by the alarming specter of a Donald Trump presidency.
	"Hillary Clinton has the potential to be an excellent president of the United States, and we endorse her without hesitation," the influential US daily wrote, adding, "no, we are not making this endorsement simply because Ms Clinton's chief opponent is dreadful."
	Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee "is dogged, resilient, purposeful and smart," the newspaper wrote while acknowledging her many political and personal missteps of the past -- failings it said are outweighed by her strengths.
	"She has executive experience. She does not let her feelings get in the way of the job at hand. She is well positioned to get something done," the daily wrote.
	The newspaper took note of the former first lady's litany of shortcomings, writing: "We recognize that many ...

Washington Post backs Clinton for president

British athletics great Jessica Ennis-Hill, who won heptathlon gold at the 2012 Olympics, announced her retirement from athletics today.
     In a post on social media the 30-year-old reigning world champion described it as "one of the toughest decisions I've had to make".
     "I've always said I wanted to leave on a high and have no regrets. I know that retiring now is right," she wrote on Instagram.
     Her retirement means she will not return to the stadium where she experienced her greatest achievement -- as London hosts next year's World Athletics Championships.
     British Athletics described her record as an athlete as "phenomenal", adding: "And that's without considering the challenges of returning from pregnancy to win world gold and Olympic silver."
     Ennis-Hill, a two-time world champion in 2009 and 2015, had hinted at retirement after claiming silver at the Rio Olympics.
     Ennis-Hill's greatest moment came on a golden night for British athletics in front of a ...

Golden girl Ennis-Hill hangs up her spikes

Australia's Nick Kyrgios was hit with a $16,500 fine today after his extraordinary performance at the Shanghai Masters where he tanked points and argued with fans.
     The combustible world number 14 received the maximum $10,000 fine for "lack of best efforts", plus $5,000 for abusing a spectator and another $1,500 for unsportsmanlike conduct.
     Trouble-prone Kyrgios, 21, patted a slow serve into his opponent's court and failed to properly contest several points in his 6-3, 6-1 defeat to 110th-ranked Mischa Zverev.
     Kyrgios also clashed with the chair umpire and fans, received a code violation for swearing and had a heated argument with one spectator when he was facing match points.
     Afterwards, he lashed out at the crowd who booed him on several occasions during the second-round match and as he left the court.
     "I'm good at hitting a tennis ball at the net. Like, big deal. I don't owe them anything. It's like, it's my choice," he said.
     "If you don't like it, I ...

AFP

AFP

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