Britain smashed their own world record to win Olympic gold in the women's team pursuit in Rio.
     It was the third time in the space of 48 hours that the quartet of Katie Archibald, Laura Trott, Elinor Barker and Joanna Rowsell-Shand had set a new world mark in the 4km race.
     They had already set world records in qualifying and their semi-final.
     "In the semi-final we rode more within ourselves, the girls came off the track saying that was about 80%," said Rowsell-Shand, who as part of the winning team four years ago alongside Trott and Danielle King, when the women rode 3km in a three-rider team.
     "All we had to do in that ride (the semi-final) was beat Canada, which we did, so we thought we might go a bit quicker in the final, but we also thought we might run a bit closer with America.
     "You always go quicker when you're chasing a team -- I think we knew we had more in the tank."
     The 2012 London Olympic champions beat world champions USA by more than two ...

Britain smash world record to win women's team pursuit

PTI Automatic

Brazil captain Neymar blasted his first goal of the Olympics to edge the hosts closer to a first football gold medal in a bruising 2-0 quarter-final win over Colombia.
     The Barcelona star curled home an exquisite free-kick after just 12 minutes, but was lucky to stay on the field when he chopped down Andres Roa, sparking a brawl between both sets of players and coaches.
     Brazil kept their cool, and a fourth clean sheet in four Games matches, as Luan's dipping effort eight minutes from time set up a semi-final meeting with Honduras in Rio on Wednesday.
     Germany remained on course for a mouthwatering rematch with Brazil in next Saturday's final, two years on from their 7-1 thrashing of the hosts at the 2014 World Cup, by disposing of Portugal 4-0 in Brasilia.
     Brazil edged the latest instalment of a bad-tempered trilogy with South American rivals Colombia in Sao Paulo with Neymar the focus of attention for good and bad reasons.
     Neymar missed the Germany semi-final ..

Neymar takes Brazil closer to Germany rematch

American veteran Venus Williams became only the second tennis player in history to win five Olympic medals after reaching the mixed doubles final.
     The 36-year-old teamed up with Rajeev Ram to beat India's Sania Mirza and Rohan Bopanna 2-6 6-2 10-3 in the semi-final.
     Britain's Kathleen McKane also won five medals between 1920-24.
     Later today, Venus also bids to become the first ever tennis player to win five Olympic gold medals. She currently shares the record of four golds with her sister Serena.
     "I'm used to doing this with Serena and it's such a crazy feeling to do it with someone else," said Venus who was beaten in the first round of the singles in Rio as well as the doubles with Serena.
     "To feel what I feel with Serena, (but) with someone else, is a wild emotion and I never thought it would happen."
     Williams and Ram will face fellow Americans Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Jack Sock who beat Lucie Hradecka and Radek Stepanek 6-4, 7-6 (7/3).
     Williams ..

Venus Williams wins historic fifth medal

Britain's Mo Farah overcame the shock of a mid-race fall to take a second straight Olympic 10,000m title and extend his remarkable record at global championships.
     The 33-year-old produced a trademark surge over the last 100 metres to time 27min 05.17sec in the 25-lap race.
     Kenyan Paul Tanui won silver in 27:05.64 with Ethiopian Tamirat Tola third in 27:06.26.
     Farah tumbled in the 10th lap after being clipped by American training partner Galen Rupp.
     But he brilliantly recovered to accumulate a second 10,000m title to add to the 5,000m gold he also won in London four years ago.
     "When I went down, I thought, 'Oh my God, that is it.' I just got up and wanted to stick with the guys and stay strong," Farah said.
     "It's never easy but everyone knows what I can do."
     Farah added: "I thought about all my hard work and that it could all be gone in a minute.
     "I wasn't going to let it go. I got up quickly. I thought about my family. It made me emotional."
    

Farah defies fall to retain 10,000m title

Jamaica's Elaine Thompson stormed to victory in the women's 100m here to end the Olympic reign of compatriot Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce.
     Thompson, 24, got off to a flying start and quickly surged to the front to cross in 10.71sec, punching the air and embracing training partner Fraser-Pryce at the finish.
     Tori Bowie of the United States took silver with 10.83sec while Fraser-Pryce claimed bronze in 10.86.
     "When I crossed the line and glanced across to see I was clear (I) didn't quite know how to celebrate," a jubilant Thompson said.
     "There is a big screen back home in my community in Jamaica. I can't imagine what is happening there right now."
     The win ended 29-year-old Fraser-Pryce's hopes of a hat-trick of 100m titles after her gold medals in the 2008 and 2012 Olympic Games.
     Instead it was Thompson who confirmed herself as the next star of Jamaican women's sprinting with an imperious display at the Olympic Stadium.
     "What I'm most happy about is that ...

Thompson storms to women's 100m gold

Monica Puig won Puerto Rico's first ever Olympic gold medal when she defeated Germany's Angelique Kerber 6-4, 4-6, 6-1 in the women's tennis singles final.
     The 22-year-old Florida-based Puig defied her ranking of 34 to get the better of the world number two and Australian Open champion on the back of a sizzling 54 winners yesterday.
     Puig, who also knocked out French Open champion Garbine Muguruza in the quarter-finals, is the first woman from the Caribbean island to win a medal of any sort.
     Before her golden breakthrough, Puerto Rico had won just eight Olympic medals, two silver and six bronze. Six of that total had come in boxing.
     Victory for Puig came in a dramatic seventh game of the final set when she saved six break points before taking gold on a fourth match point when a Kerber forehand sailed wide.
     "Oh my God," she screamed before breaking down in floods of tears and parading her national flag around centre court.
     "It's amazing. My country ...

Tearful Puig wins Puerto Rico's first ever gold

Cuba's Fidel Castro made a rare public appearance for his 90th birthday, alongside his brother and successor, Raul, and Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, a live broadcast on local television showed.
	The Cuban revolutionary leader, who had not been seen publicly since April, wore a white track jacket and sat next to the two presidents at a gala organised yesterday by a children's theatre company in Havana's Karl Marx Theater, the island nation's largest.
	In an article published by official media late Friday, Castro showed that he had lost little of his old fire when it comes to his longtime enemy the United States.
	He criticised US President Barack Obama for failing to explicitly apologise during his historic visit to Japan in May for Washington's decision to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945.
	He condemned as "equally criminal" the bombing of Nagasaki three days later.
	"That's why you have to stress the need to preserve peace and that no power has the right to kill ...

Cuba's Fidel Castro makes public appearance for 90th birthday

An imam and another unidentified male were both shot in the head and killed in New York, police said, in an attack with unclear motives.
	Gunshots rang out just before 2:00 pm (local time) yesterday near a mosque in the Ozone Park neighbourhood of Queens.
	Both men were taken to nearby Jamaica Hospital, where imam Maulama Akonjee, 55, was pronounced dead, a spokesman with New York's Office of the Deputy Commissioner, Public Information told AFP.
	The unidentified male, age 64, later succumbed to his injuries, the spokesman said.
	 Police said the motive is unknown.
	"There is nothing in the preliminary investigation to indicate that they were targeted because of their faith," police told journalists.
	The two men were approached from behind by an at-large suspect, who witnesses saw fleeing from the scene with a gun after the shooting, according to police.

Imam among two men killed in shooting near New York mosque

Younis Khan's superb double century and three wickets from Yasir Shah left Pakistan eyeing a series-levelling win after they dominated the third day of the fourth Test against England at The Oval today.
     Younis's 218 was the centrepiece of Pakistan's first-innings 542 all out.
    	His sixth innings of 200 or more in Test cricket was a dramatic way for the 38-year-old to end a run of low scores.
	Younis had managed just 122 runs in six previous innings this series, with a best of 33 in Pakistan's first Test win at Lord's.
	Leg-spinner Shah then took three wickets for four runs in 22 balls as England, in their second innings, slumped to 88 for four at the close -- still runs 126 behind.
	Gary Ballance was four not out and Jonny Bairstow 14 not out.
	England now needed something remarkable if they were to deny Pakistan victory with two days left in the game.
	If the four-match series ends 2-2, Pakistan could go top of the world Test rankings but England must avoid defeat at The Oval 

Younis and Shah take Pakistan to brink of victory

Scoreboard at stumps on the third
day of the fourth Test between England and Pakistan at The Oval today:
     England 1st Innings 328 (M Ali 108, J Bairstow 55; Sohail Khan 5-68)
     Pakistan 1st Innings (overnight: 340-6)
	Sami Aslam lbw b Broad                         3
	Azhar Ali c Bairstow b Ali                    49
	Yasir Shah c Root b Finn                      26
	Asad Shafiq c Broad b Finn                   109
	Younis Khan lbw b Anderson                   218
	Misbah-ul-Haq c Hales b Woakes                15
	Iftikhar Ahmed c Ali b Woakes                  4
	Sarfraz Ahmed c Bairstow b Woakes             44
	Wahab Riaz st Bairstow b Ali                   4
	Mohammad Amir not out                         39
	Sohail Khan c Broad b Finn                     2
	Extras: (B-18, LB-6, W-3, NB-2)                29
     Total: (all out in 146 overs)                  542
     Fall of wickets: 1-3, 2-52, 3-127, 4-277, 5-316, 6-320, 7-397, 8-434, 9-218
     Bowling: Anderson 29-10-78-1, ...

London, Aug 13 (AFP) Scoreboard at stumps on the third

Usain Bolt and Justin Gatlin warmed up for their 100m Olympic showdown today with easy victories as German discus thrower Christoph Harting claimed his brother's crown.
     Bolt and Gatlin are poised for the final chapter of their long rivalry here tomorrow when they are expected to duel once more for the title of fastest man on the planet.
	The two sprinters easily negotiated their opening heats on a raucous morning session at the Olympic Stadium, with Gatlin topping the qualifying times with a tidy 10.01sec.
     Jamaican superstar Bolt, bidding to win 100m, 200m and 4x100m titles for a third straight Games, was fourth quickest in 10.07sec.
	Afterwards Bolt said he was pleased to have got off the mark without any problems.
    	"I'm feeling good. I'm happy. As I said, I've got the first one out of the way so I'm happy about that," Bolt said, predicting a fast semi-final.
	"It's definitely going to be a good semifinal. There are a lot of guys running fast. It's good. It gets you ...

Bolt, Gatlin breeze as Harting wins discus

A man set a train carriage in Switzerland on fire using a flammable liquid and stabbed passengers today, injuring six people including a six-year-old child, police said.
	The attack was the latest in a string of violent, often deadly assaults in Europe in recent months, with many claimed by the jihadist Islamic State group.
	The motive for today's attack was not immediately clear, police told AFP.
	"According to the information we have for the time being, the 27-year-old Swiss man poured out a flammable liquid ... (which) caught fire," police said, adding that the man "was also armed with at least one knife".
	The man carried out the attack on a train travelling in Switzerland's far east, along its border with Liechtenstein, and was also injured, regional police in the city of Saint Gallen said in a statement.
	Police said the attack had taken place at around 2:20 pm (local time) near the Salez station on a train running between Buchs and Sennwald and that some of the injuries were ...

Knifeman attacks passengers, sets train alight, injuring 6

Torrential rains have caused record flooding in parts of the southern United States, officials said today, with US media reporting at least three deaths.
	Flooding in southeast Louisiana and southern Mississippi shut down roads, cutting off at least one town as an area of low pressure slowly moved west along the Gulf Coast.
	Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards declared a state of emergency, calling the flooding "unprecedented."
	"We have record levels of flooding along rivers and creeks," he told reporters during a news conference, urging residents who have been advised to evacuate to leave their homes.
	Emergency services were transporting residents by high-water vehicles, boats and aircraft, he said. More than 1,000 residents had been evacuated in Louisiana, the authorities said.
	The floods killed at least three people yesterday, media reported. Among them, a man in the Louisiana town of Zachary, near the capital Baton Rouge, drowned trying to escape flood waters, local television .

'Unprecedented' floods kill at least 3 in southern US

The French resort of Cannes won court backing for its "burkini ban" today as a judge refused to overturn its decision to forbid Muslim women from wearing the full-body swimsuit.
	Local authorities in the Riviera city, home to the famous Cannes film festival, moved to ban burkinis from beaches at the end of July. The nearby resort of Villeneuve-Loubet followed suit today.
	Three women backed by the Collective Against Islamophobia in France (CCIF) challenged the Cannes decision in court on yesterday, saying it was illegal and calling for it to be suspended.
	But a court in Nice rejected the request, saying the move was legal under French law forbidding people from "invoking their religious beliefs to skirt common rules regulating relations between public authorities and private individuals".
	The judge noted that the Cannes ban had been declared "in the context of the state of emergency and recent Islamist attacks, notably in Nice a month ago".
	"The wearing of distinctive clothing, ...

French court upholds Cannes burkini ban

US Vice President Joe Biden is expected to visit Turkey later this month, the Turkish prime minister said today, as relations between the two countries are strained over Ankara's demand to extradite an exiled cleric blamed for the July 15 coup attempt.
	"The American vice president is expected... To come to Turkey, on August 24 with the American delegation," Binali Yildirim told a group of journalists, according to the website of TV channel CNN Turk.
	If confirmed, the Biden visit would mark the first time a top Western leader has visited Turkey since the attempted putsch by a rogue faction within the military to oust President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
	Yildirim's comments came after Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Friday that Turkey had received "positive signals" from Washington regarding its extradition demand.
	Ankara wants the return of Pennsylvania-based preacher Fethullah Gulen, whom it accuses of being responsible for orchestrating the coup alongside his movement.
	Gulen ..

Turkey says Biden to visit on August 24

A man set a train carriage in Switzerland on fire using a flammable liquid and also stabbed passengers today, injuring six people, including a six-year-old child, police said.
	The man, a 27-year-old Swiss citizen, carried out the attack on a train travelling in Switzerland's far east, along its border with Liechtenstein, and was also injured, regional police in St Gallen said in a statement.

Man attacks Swiss train passengers with fire, knife, injures 6

Torrential rains causing flooding in parts of the southern United States have killed at least three people, US media reported today, as millions of Americans on the East Coast sweat through soaring temperatures and stifling humidity.
	Flooding in parts of southeast Louisiana and southern Mississippi shut down many roads yesterday, prompting numerous rescues and cutting off at least one town as an area of low pressure slowly moved west along the Gulf Coast.
	Rivers and streams were out of their banks on yesterday, the National Weather Service said.
	The floods killed at least three people yesterday, local media reported. Among them, a man in the Louisiana town of Zachary, near the capital Baton Rouge, drowned trying to escape flood waters, local television station WAFB reported.
	"We were walking out and he slipped and fell," his roommate Vernon Drummond told the station. "He went under the water. We tried to save him, but we couldn't."
	The area recorded 10 to 15 inches (25.4 to 38.1 .

Floods kill at least 3 in southern US as heat wave bakes East

Younis Khan's superb double century took Pakistan into a dominant position in the fourth Test against England at The Oval today.
     The veteran batsman's 218 was the centrepiece of Pakistan's 542 all out at tea on the third day in reply to England's 328.
     That left Pakistan with a first-innings lead of 214 runs as they looked to end the four-match series all square at 2-2.
     England won the third Test at Edgbaston by 141 runs after overturning a first-innings deficit of 103 runs.
     But only six times in properly completed matches in the 139-year history of Test cricket have a team come back from more than 200 runs behind on first innings to win.
     Younis received excellent support in a ninth-wicket stand of 97 from Mohammad Amir, whose 39 not out was the left-arm quick's highest Test score.
     Younis's sixth innings of 200 or more in Test cricket was a dramatic way for the 38-year-old to end a run of low scores.
     He had managed just 122 runs in six previous ...

Younis's double ton puts Pakistan on top against England

Man attacks Swiss train passengers with fire, knife,

Iran-backed rebels convened Yemen's parliament today in defiance of the internationally recognised government, prompting condemnation from President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi.
	The session in rebel-held Sanaa was the first in almost two years, and comes after the Huthis rejected a UN peace plan and appointed a council to run the country.
	Parliamentary sources said 91 lawmakers in the 301-member national assembly attended, and all voted in favour of the council created last week.
	The Huthi rebels overran Sanaa in September 2014 and then fought their way into other parts of Yemen, forcing Hadi and his government into exile in Saudi Arabia.
	A Saudi-led coalition has been fighting the Huthis and their allies -- supporters of ousted president Ali Abdullah Saleh -- since March last year to shore up the Hadi government.
	After Sanaa's capture, many parliamentarians also sought refuge in other towns or overseas.
	Political and security sources in Sanaa told AFP that some lawmakers were forced 

Yemen rebels defy government and convene parliament

Brazil today launched the first public immunisation programme in the Americas against dengue fever, with 500,000 people to be injected with the world's first authorized vaccine against the disease, French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi said.
	The programme will be rolled out in the southern state of Parana, said the maker of the Dengvaxia vaccine, which is the result of 20 years of research and 1.5 billion euros ($1.7 billion) of investment.
	"We will vaccinate all individuals 15-27 years of age in 28 municipalities and 9-44 years of age in the two municipalities with the top dengue burden in our state over the next three weeks," Parana Health Secretary Michele Caputo Neto said in a Sanofi statement.
	He cited a study published in the Brazilian Journal of Health Economics indicating that implementation of the dengue immunisation strategy "could result in 74 percent reduction in disease burden in these highly-impacted municipalities within five years".
	Sanofi said the campaign was the ...

AFP

AFP

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