Iran nuclear talks moved up a gear tonight as US Secretary of State John Kerry and Iran's foreign minister stayed on in Vienna to try and break a deadlock days before a deadline.
	Kerry had been set to leave Vienna and sources had said Mohammed Javad Zarif was considering returning to Tehran, but both remained in the Austrian capital.
	"Kerry has delayed his departure (for Paris)... In order to continue consultations" with Zarif, Kerry's spokesperson Jen Psaki said before the two men went into a meeting lasting over two hours.
	"We have not yet determined when we will depart, but will stay in Vienna overnight."
	Zarif, whose possible trip back to Iran for "consultations" had suggested possible progress, said that world powers made "no significant propositions worth returning to Tehran with".
	Iran and the six powers -- the US, China, Russia, Britain, France plus Germany (P5+1) -- have been negotiating intensively since February to turn an interim accord reached with Iran a year ago ...

US-Iran nuclear talks intensify

PTI Automatic

The army strongman in charge of Burkina Faso since the ouster of veteran leader Blaise Compaore three weeks ago, formally handed power to interim President Michel Kafando today.
	Lieutenant Colonel Zida presented a Burkinabe flag to the 72-year-old career diplomat Kafando, who waved it before the crowd gathered in the stadium in Ouagadougou, in a ceremony attended by six African heads of state.
	Zida is to serve as prime minister in the interim government, ensuring the military retains a large say in running the country.

Burkina's army strongman hands power to interim president: AFP

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi will meet Pope Francis on Monday, Holy See spokesman Federico Lombardi said, in the first visit to the Vatican by an Egyptian leader in eight years.
	The afternoon meeting comes six months after Sisi's rise to power. According to religious news agency I.Media he will be accompanied by Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Choukri and three other ministers.
	Sisi will then meet Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi in Rome at 1800 GMT, Renzi's office said.
	Sisi, who led the coup last year that ousted elected Islamist president Mohamed Morsi, hopes to strengthen Egypt's ties with the Holy See, according to diplomatic sources cited by religious news agency I.Media.
	The talks are likely to address the relationship between the Roman Catholic Church and Sunni Islam's main theological centre, the famed Al-Azhar University which fell out with the Vatican in 2011.
	Al-Azhar broke off relations after Francis's predecessor Benedict XVI said not enough was being .

Egyptian president to meet Pope Francis Monday

A 57-year-old US prisoner who was sentenced to death for a murder he didn't commit walked free from court today after spending 39 years behind bars, prosecutors said.
	Ricky Jackson was only 18 in 1975, when he was convicted of murder in Cleveland, Ohio.
	His prosecution was based largely on testimony of a 12-year-old witness who later admitted he had not seen the crime and had given a false statement.
	A beaming Jackson left a court hearing a free man today, even telling reporters he was prepared to forgive the witness whose evidence had put him behind bars.
	"I guess a lot of people will want me to hate that person and carry animosity towards them but I don't," Jackson said, in footage shown on the Cleveland Plain Dealer newspaper website.
	"People see him as a grown man today, but in 1975 he was a 12-year-old kid and he was manipulated and coerced by the police and they used him to get us in prison.
	"As far as that young man is concerned, I wish him the best. I don't hate him, I ..

US prisoner on death row freed after 39 years

China is building a massive island in the South China Sea that could host an airfield in an area where Beijing is locked in bitter territorial disputes with neighbouring states, a US military spokesman said today.
	The vast land reclamation project on the Fiery Cross Reef in the Spratly Islands is one of several pursued by China but the first that could accommodate an airstrip, Lieutenant Colonel Jeffrey Poole said.
	"It appears that's what they're working toward," Poole told AFP.
	There is also a harbour on the east side of the reef that appears large enough for tankers and naval warships, he added.
	In the past three months, China has used dredgers to construct an island about 3,000 yards (meters) long and 200-300 meters wide on the reef, which was previously under water, according to a report today by IHS Jane's Defence.
	The results of the dredging are captured in satellite pictures obtained by IHS Jane's that cover a period between August 8 and November 14.
	"The land reclamation 

China building possible airfield in South China Sea: US

Chinese President Xi Jinping arrived in Fiji today on a whirlwind visit aimed at strengthening economic and strategic ties with Pacific island nations.
	Xi's visit comes after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, head of the world's largest democracy, stopped over in Fiji to also court regional leaders who form one of the largest voting blocs at the United Nations.
	Both leaders have targeted the Pacific as a vital stop on their way home from the recent Group of 20 summit in Australia.
	Xi, who has already established a rapport with Fiji after visiting four years ago as vice president of China, will hold talks Friday evening with Fiji's 2006 coup leader and recently elected prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama.
	Tomorrow, he will then meet a delegation of up to eight Pacific island leaders.
	"An important agenda of my visit is to invite leaders of all Pacific island countries that have diplomatic ties with China to Fiji for discussions on ways to further grow China's relations with these 

China's Xi targets strategic ties in Pacific

Condemnations by Pakistan's top clerics and Islamist parties against the misuse of blasphemy laws could help reverse a rising tide of mob killings, according to one of the country's leading rights activists.
	A Christian couple accused of blasphemy were beaten to death by a mob of 1,500 and their bodies thrown in a furnace this month in the latest in a spate of lynchings in conservative Pakistan.
	A day later, a policeman hacked a man who had been accused of blasphemy to death with an axe while he was in custody.
	Pakistan's tough blasphemy laws can include the death penalty, but critics say they are often used to settle personal disputes.
	While there have been no civilian executions for any crime since 2008, anyone convicted, or even accused, risks a bloody death at the hands of vigilantes.
	Such incidents have been met with general condemnation in the past, but little action has been taken against either the perpetrators or instigators -- a factor, say activists, driving a rise in .

Top Pakistan rights activist hopeful on blasphemy change

Four militants from the Basque separatist group ETA captured in northern France in 2011 were given prison sentences of six to eight years today by a Paris court.
	French authorities had earlier described two of the militants -- Alejandro Zobaran Arriola, 33, and Mikel Oroz Torrea, 35 -- as the heads of ETA's military and logistic wings respectively.
	They were given eight years in prison each but the court found there was no proof they held these posts.
	The prosecution agreed but said they certainly occupied "important" positions in the group, which is blamed for the killing of 829 people in a four-decade campaign of bombings and shootings for an independent Basque homeland in northern Spain and southwest France.
	Evidence was presented showing the two men had frequented locations used by ETA -- including a house in the central French village of Bussy -- where explosives were made.
	They were arrested in March 2011 along with the other two defendants, Urko Labaka Larrea and Ivan Saez 

ETA militants jailed for six to eight years in France

A Tunisian woman called for a free Palestine as she won a pageant exclusively for Muslims in Indonesia today, seen as a riposte to Western beauty contests.
	Eighteen finalists, who include a doctor and a computer scientist, paraded in glittering dresses against the backdrop of world-renowned ancient temples for the contest in the world's most populous Muslim-majority country.
	Computer scientist Fatma Ben Guefrache was announced the winner and received a prize which includes a gold watch, a gold dinar, and mini pilgrimage to Mecca.
	"May almighty Allah help me in this mission, and free Palestine, please, please, free Palestine and the Syrian people," the tearful 25-year-old woman said.
	The 18 finalists were required to wear the Muslim headscarf and judged not only on their appearance, but also on how well they recite verses from the Koran and their views on Islam in the modern world.
	"We want to see that they understand everything about the Islamic way of life -- from what they eat, 

Tunisian wins Muslim beauty pageant, calls for free Palestine

Barack Obama's Republican rivals today heaped scorn on his plans to offer up to five million undocumented migrants protection from deportation, as the US president went on the road to defend the bold measures.
	The controversial overhaul provides three-year relief for millions of undocumented people who have lived in the country for more than five years and have children that are US citizens or legal residents.
	According to the president, it also channels more resources to the US border with Mexico and shifts deportation priorities toward expelling felons.
	But critics blasted the action as "illegal" and "unconstitutional" as soon as Obama unveiled yesterday, bringing tensions with Republicans to a boil.
	Already emboldened by their sweeping midterm election victory, Republicans vowed to thwart Obama's plans.
	"With this action the president has chosen to deliberately sabotage any chance of enacting bipartisan reforms he claims to seek," House Speaker John Boehner declared ...

Obama immigration plan riles Republicans, clashes loom

Ukraine's Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk will keep his post to lead a new coalition government after a deal between the country's pro-Western parties, President Petro Poroshenko said today.
	"Due to the unity of the democratic forces, I expect that the coalition will confirm my decision to nominate Arseniy Yatsenyuk to this post," Poroshenko said in a televised address.
	The parliament would vote on the proposal when it meets next week, he said.
	Poroshenko, however, called for a "total renewal" of the current cabinet, as the new government faces a mammoth challenge to overcome the gravest crisis roiling the country since independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.
	Yatsenyuk, a pro-Western economic liberal, had been widely tipped to retain his post after his party pipped Poroshenko's for first place at parliamentary polls last month.
	Ukraine's pro-Western parties have been locked in weeks of frantic haggling over the make-up of the new coalition, as fighting rumbles on with ...

Yatsenyuk to remain Ukraine PM in coalition: president

World Bank President Jim Yong Kim today warned that despite gains against the deadly Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the new outbreak in Mali is "very worrisome."
	"We must get to zero cases. Ebola is not a disease where you can leave a few cases and say you've done enough," he said at a summit on the epidemic with the leaders of the United Nations, World Health Organisation and the International Monetary Fund.
	WHO head Margaret Chan, who is heading to Mali today, said the target of zero cases is imperative after the disease has killed nearly 5,500 people, nearly all in West Africa.
	"We have to really move with speed and scale and have a no-regret policy," Chan said.
	"We must smother a little fire, a little smoke before it gets out of control."
	In Mali seven people have died in recent weeks, most linked to contact with a single infected 70-year-old Grand Imam from Guinea, who died in a Bamako clinic on 27 October.

World Bank's Kim on Ebola: 'We must get to zero cases'

Weekly Muslim prayers at Jerusalem's flashpoint Al-Aqsa mosque passed peacefully today despite tensions in the Holy City, but Palestinians later wounded two Jews as they walked to worship not far away.
	And in the West bank city of Hebron, stone-throwing Palestinians rioted, responding to a call by the militant Islamist Hamas for a "day of rage."
	After Israel dropped age restrictions for attending Friday prayers for the second week running, tens of thousands of people made their way to the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in occupied Arab east Jerusalem.
	Police were out in force to prevent a repeat of clashes, led by young Palestinians, that have rocked the city for months.
	Men and women of all ages shuffled into the compound, holy to both Jews and Muslims, as police carefully checked the identity cards of younger worshippers.
	But after dark, a few hundred metres (yards) away, Palestinians attacked seven Israelis on their way to Sabbath eve prayers, lightly injuring two of them following ..

Al-Aqsa prayers quiet but Jews attacked later

Ukraine's pro-Western political parties today agreed to make joining NATO a priority in a coalition deal that will give them a parliamentary majority.
	The coalition agreement inked by the five parties stipulates that a law must be passed by the end of the year confirming Ukraine's intention to push for membership of the military alliance.
	Any step by Kiev towards joining the bloc would further rile Russia, with East-West tensions already at boiling point over fighting in east Ukraine between government forces and pro-Moscow rebels.
	NATO has accused Moscow of pouring weapons and troops over the border to fuel a brutal conflict that has cost over 4,300 lives since April.
	Moscow denies that it is involved in the fighting in east Ukraine but it openly supports the rebels politically.
	Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk in August first called on parliament to drop the country's non-alignment policy and endorse a NATO membership bid.
	NATO discussed offering Ukraine membership ..

Ukraine coalition agrees to make NATO membership a priority

Palestinians in Israeli-occupied east Jerusalem attacked a group of Jews on their way to pray there today evening, lightly injuring two of them police said.
	"A group of Jewish worshippers were attacked as they walked...To Beit Horot," a police statement said, referring to a Jewish seminary set up on the Mount of Olives by ultranationalist rabbi Benny Elon in 1999.
	One man was stabbed in the back and the second hit with a blunt instrument, apparently an iron bar.
	On Tuesday, two Palestinians attacked a synagogue in west Jerusalem, killing four worshippers and fatally wounding a policeman who arrived at the scene.
	Police shot the assailants, both from east Jerusalem.
	The killings hiked tensions in Jerusalem, already the site of months of unrest.
	Tensions have been rising in Jerusalem since the bodies of three kidnapped young Israelis were discovered in late June, leading to a revenge attack in which a Palestinian teenager was abducted and burned alive.
	A spate of "lone wolf" ...

Palestinians attack Jews on way to pray in east Jerusalem

The World Health Organisation said today that 5,459 people had so far died of Ebola out of a total 15,351 cases of infection in eight countries since late December 2013.
	The earlier WHO toll on Wednesday gave a death toll of 5,420 and spoke of 15,145 cases.
	The WHO believes that the number of deaths is likely far higher, given that the fatality rate in the current outbreak is known to be around 70 per cent.
	The deadliest Ebola outbreak ever continues to affect Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone the most.
	But it appears to be slowing in Liberia, allowing the hardest-hit country to lift its state of emergency.
	In its latest toll, WHO said that through to November 18, a total 2,963 people had died in Liberia, out of 7,082 cases.
	In Sierra Leone, 1,267 people had died out of 6,190 cases, WHO said.
	Guinea, where the outbreak began late last year, counted 1,214 deaths and 2,047 cases.
	Data from Mali, the latest country to be hit by Ebola, showed six cases of the deadly virus which ...

Ebola death toll rises to 5,459: WHO

US House Republicans filed a lawsuit against President Barack Obama's administration today over his signature health care law and unilateral actions they say amount to an abuse of executive authority.
	The suit, which Republicans have threatened for months, was filed in US District Court in Washington against the secretaries of the Treasury and the Health and Human Services Department and focuses on the administration's "unconstitutional and unlawful" rewriting of segments of the law commonly referred to as Obamacare.
	The legal action addresses president's unilateral move last year to defer the Affordable Care Act's employer mandate, which requires that employers with 50 or more workers offer health coverage to their full-time staff or pay fines, until 2015.
	It also challenges what Republicans described as illegally transferring about USD 175 billion to insurance companies under Obamacare over the next 10 years. Congress has not appropriated funds for the program.
	While the ...

US House Republicans sue over 'Obamacare'

Tens of thousands of mourners packed Seville's Gothic cathedral and lined nearby streets today for the funeral of Spain's flamboyant Duchess of Alba, the world's most-titled aristocrat.
	People from all walks of life applauded as her casket draped with the red and yellow Spanish flag and the coat of arms of the House of Alba made its way through the streets of the southern city to the cathedral.
	"She was a generous person, who helped the needy, noble of heritage and noble of heart," Cardinal Carlos Amigo Vallejo, the Archbishop of Seville, told the congregation.
	Known for her frizzy hair and bohemian dress style, the duchess -- whose full name was Maria del Rosario Cayetana Fitz-James Stuart -- died at her Duenas Palace in Seville on Thursday at the age of 88 after being hospitalised with pneumonia.
	She last came to international attention in 2011 when the twice-widowed noble danced flamenco at her wedding to her third husband Alfonso Diez, a civil servant 25 years her junior, who .

Thousands mourn at funeral of Spain's flamboyant duchess

A magnificent blue diamond has fetched USD 32.6 million in New York, breaking the world auction record for any diamond of its colour, auction house Sotheby's announced.
	The stunning 9.75 carat, pear-shaped diamond was bought by a Hong Kong private collector after 20 minutes of competitive bidding yesterday, Sotheby's said.
	The price also set a new world auction record for price-per-carat for any diamond, the auctioneers said.
	The jewel had been owned by Rachel Lambert otherwise known as Bunny Mellon, the art collector wife of the late philanthropist and racehorse breeder Paul Mellon. She died in March aged 103.
	"Mrs. Mellon's diamond absolutely deserves the place in the record books that it achieved," said Gary Schuler, head of Sotheby's jewelry department in New York.
	It was the highlight of a collection of Mellon's jewels and objects of vertu that Sotheby's sold for more than USD 42 million in New York yesterday, well above the pre-sale estimate of USD 19.2 million.

Blue diamond sells for record USD 32.6 million in NY

Nelson Mandela's widow Graca Machel today said the Ebola epidemic should be a wake-up call for African leaders, saying it had exposed the "extreme weakness" of African institutions.
	In an address on the impact on business of an epidemic which has claimed more than 5,400 lives in west Africa, Machel said the heavy toll was "unacceptable".
	"Ebola has exposed the extreme weaknesses of our institutions as governments, countries which are affected were found totally unprepared," added the South African icon's widow.
	"It's time Africa began to give real value to human life, in other words African human lives," she told health sector and business representatives.
	"Let's take lessons from this outbreak," she said of the epidemic ravaging Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. "Yesterday it was HIV/AIDS, today it's Ebola, tomorrow it can be something else."
	"We can't continue to be unprepared as we are," she said. "We don't seem to have learned from the HIV epidemic."
	She insisted Ebola could 

Mandela's widow says Ebola wake-up call for Africa

Russia is considering cutting its oil production in a bid to revive prices, energy minister Alexander Novak said today as the falling price of crude along with Western sanctions over Ukraine have led to the ruble plunging in value.
	"Is Russia ready to lower production to support prices? This question needs to be looked into carefully since the budget is strongly dependent on the price of oil," Novak was quoted as saying by Interfax news agency.
	"There is no final decision," Novak said. "We are discussing the question. We are working inside the government on the expediency of such methods."
	He said all oil exporting nations are concerned about the slump in oil prices.
	"This calls for careful analysis and possibly the development of some coordinated actions," Novak said.
	Russia gets around half of its revenues from oil profits and its non-diversified economy has been badly hit as global oil prices have fallen by more than 25 per cent since June, coming at the same time as the West .

AFP

AFP

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