Andy Murray says he is no longer in pain but the former world number one is unsure whether he will be able to play top-level tennis again following a second hip operation.
The 31-year-old underwent hip resurfacing surgery at the end of January in a final throw of the dice to try to overcome the problem that first became a serious issue in 2017.
"I want to continue playing, I said that in Australia," Murray said at a sponsorship event at London's Queen's Club. "The issue is I don't know whether it's possible." "I'm a lot happier now than I was, certainly the last 12 months, because I have no pain in my hip now and I was in pain for a long time," he added.
"The rehab is slow but it's been going pretty well. I just need to wait and see how things progress. If it's possible, I'd certainly love to compete again."
Murray, who has won three Grand Slams, announced at an emotional press conference ahead of the Australian Open in January that he planned to retire after Wimbledon but was more ...

Andy Murray 'pain-free' but unsure over future after hip surgery

PTI Automatic

British women's marathon world record holder Paul Radcliffe has warned of potential "manipulation" in top-level sport unless tighter rules are applied to transgender women.
International Olympic Committee guidelines state that athletes who transition from male to female should be allowed to compete without undergoing sex reassignment surgery but need to demonstrate their testosterone level has been below a certain level for at least a year.
The debate about whether it is fair for transgender women to compete in women's sport has come into sharp focus since a row developed between transgender cyclist Rachel McKinnon and former tennis player Martina Navratilova.
"Right now, transgender women are not a threat to female sport," Radcliffe told BBC Sport.
"But you would be naive if you thought that, by not putting in any rules, it couldn't come to that at some point in the future.
"People will manipulate this if there is an opening there to make money and win medals and we've seen the ...

Radcliffe calls for tighter transgender rules to avoid 'manipulation'

Santiago Solari said he would not give up as coach of Real Madrid but the decision will probably not be his to make.
Zinedine Zidane earned the right to decide himself and chose to leave last summer.
"It would have been difficult for me to win again next year," Zidane said in May.
"There have been good times but also difficult times. I do not forget that. I want to end with Real Madrid when everything is going well."
Ten months on, Zidane's exit speech feels like a warning.
Madrid's season is up in smoke after seven days in which they were eliminated from the Copa del Rey, deemed irrelevant in La Liga and humiliated in the Champions League.
"I did not come to the club in such a difficult time to give up," said Solari, after a 4-1 defeat to Ajax on Wednesday sent his side out in the last 16.
In the league and cup, they were proven to be clearly worse than Barcelona, their greatest rivals, and in Europe, inferior to Ajax, the club that are supposed to supply the elite not outplay them ..

Madrid failure puts Solari under fire and faith in youth to the test

A military academy that Donald Trump attended as a teenager concealed his academic records in 2011 in response to pressure from Trump allies, The Washington Post reported Tuesday.
The New York Military Academy came under such pressure after Trump challenged then president Barack Obama to release his own academic records, with Trump saying he was surprised such a "terrible student" got into Ivy League Schools.
Evan Jones, the headmaster of the military academy at the time, told the Post that the superintendent of the private school "came to me in a panic because he had been accosted by prominent, wealthy alumni of the school who were Mr Trump's friends" and wanted to keep his academic records secret.
Trump has consistently boasted he was a superb student throughout his youth.
The school's superintendent, or director, at the time, Jeffrey Coverdale, told the paper that he rejected a request from members of the school's board of trustees to hand over Trump's records to them.
"I moved ...

School attended by Trump says it concealed his grades

EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier said Wednesday "no solution" has been found so far to break the deadlock over Brexit, a spokesman reported after the latest negotiations in Brussels.
Barnier informed commissioners with the EU's executive arm that "no solution has been identified at this point that is consistent with the withdrawal agreement," spokesman Margaritis Schinas told a press conference.

EU says 'no solution' for now to break Brexit deadlock

One of Britain's Brexit negotiators said Wednesday he had held a "robust" discussion with European Union counterparts over how to get a withdrawal deal through parliament in London.
Speaking after talks with EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier in Brussels on Tuesday, Attorney General Geoffrey Cox said he had put forward some "very reasonable proposals".
"Both sides have exchanged robust strong views and we're now facing the real discussions. Talks will be resuming soon," Cox told Sky News television from Brussels.
"These are very sensitive discussions, we're in to the meat of the matter now, we've put forward some proposals, very reasonable proposals," he said.  But he said he could not reveal the content of the discussions, saying they were "private and confidential".
The negotiations, which also included British Brexit Secretary Steve Barclay, ended with no official comment from either side.
Prime Minister Theresa May is desperately seeking to salvage her Brexit deal to allow Britain 

UK negotiator reports 'robust' Brexit talks in Brussels

A South African court on Wednesday handed jail terms of 23 and 18 years to two white farmers who murdered a black teenager suspected of stealing sunflowers in a remote farming community.
Pieter Doorewaard, 28, and Philip Schutte, 35, were found to have killed 15-year-old Matlhomola Mosweu on April 20 2017, after claiming they caught him taking a plant from a farm in the area.
Doorewaard was jailed for at least 18 years and Schutte was jailed for at least 23.
The boy died after being thrown out of a moving vehicle driven by the pair and suffering a broken neck, in a case that sparked rioting and looting of white-owned businesses in the town of Coligny.
The men had claimed that the teen jumped off the truck as they drove him to the police but it was Schutte who was found to have thrown the boy to his death.
Judge Ronald Hendricks previously also found the pair guilty of kidnapping and intimidation.
"Murder is undoubtedly the most serious offence that can be committed," said ...

White farmers jailed for murder of black teen in S.Africa

Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino was Wednesday handed a two-match touchline ban and fined USD 13,000 by the Football Association following an angry clash with a referee.
The Argentine, whose side reached the Champions League quarter-finals with a 1-0 win at Borussia Dortmund on Tuesday, was sanctioned over the incident involving referee Mike Dean after last month's 2-1 Premier League loss at Burnley.
It means he will have to sit in the stands when Spurs visit his former club Southampton on Saturday and also for the league game against Liverpool on March 31.
"Mauricio Pochettino has been fined and will serve a two-match touchline ban following an Independent Regulatory Commission hearing," said a statement from the FA.
"The Tottenham manager accepted an improper conduct charge from the FA, which resulted from his language and/or behaviour -- both on the pitch and in or around the tunnel area -- at the end of the game against Burnley on February 23."
Pochettino, whose side have ...

Pochettino given two-match ban after ref outburst

Researchers in Australia have determined that the dingo is not a dog but a native species of its own -- a classification they say requires a conservation rethink of the animal.
Twenty researchers from a number of Australian Universities found the dingo has many characteristics that differentiate it from domestic and feral dogs, and other wild canids -- a family that includes wolves and foxes.
In a paper published in the peer-reviewed scientific journal Zootaxa Tuesday, they argue that due to its geographic isolation and lack of domestication in Australia for over a millennia "little evidence exists" to show the wild animal is a dog.
"There is no historical evidence of domestication once the dingo arrived in Australia, and the degree of domestication prior to arrival is uncertain and likely to be low, certainly compared to modern domestic dogs," Bradley Smith, from Central Queensland University, said in a statement.
The classification of the dingo has provided contentious debate among .

Australian researchers say dingo is not a dog, but own species

Global trade tensions and political uncertainty are weighing on the world's economy, the OECD warned Wednesday, cutting its global growth forecast for this year to 3.3 per cent, down from the 3.5 per cent it predicted in November.
"High policy uncertainty, ongoing trade tensions, and a further erosion of business and consumer confidence are all contributing to the slowdown," the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development said in an interim version of its Economic Outlook.

OECD lowers global growth forecast over trade tensions

China's removal of the export permit of a major Canadian canola company followed the discovery of "hazardous pests" in shipments, the foreign ministry said Wednesday in a move that has stoked diplomatic tensions.
Canada's largest agricultural handler, Winnipeg-based Richardson International, had its licence to ship canola to China revoked on March 1, which risks leaving Canadian farmers with a glut on their hands.
"Chinese customs recently detected dangerous pests in canola seeds imported from Canada," Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lu Kang told a regular briefing.
"Canola seeds exported from one company had particularly serious issues leading to (stocks being) quarantined," he said.
Lu said the decision to suspend imports was taken to minimise the "serious threat to agriculture and ecology" from harmful pests and was "completely reasonable and legal".
"Like any other country, the Chinese government also needs to protect the health and safety of its own citizens," he added.
Canada 

China says 'pests' found in blocked Canadian canola shipments

A French tourist arrested in Myanmar for flying a drone near parliament has avoided a lengthy prison sentence and will be deported after being released from jail Wednesday.
Arthur Desclaux, 27, was detained on February 7 in the capital Naypyidaw and was sentenced to a month in prison under an import-export law forbidding the use of banned goods brought in from abroad without a licence.
The Frenchman denied any knowledge of Myanmar's strict regulations for the use of drones around religious and government sites.
On his release on Wednesday, Desclaux was charged again under the immigration and aircraft laws -- the former holding a possible sentence of up to three years.
But the judge chose to hand out two fines totalling 150,000 kyat (USD 100) instead of sending Desclaux back to prison.
"He is a foreigner, not familiar with the laws in Myanmar and he has also already been sentenced under the import-export law," Judge Sulab Yadanar Oo told the court.
"That's why he will only receive a ...

Drone-flying Frenchman released from Myanmar jail

The sudden death last year of millions of Iraqi carp, used in the country's signature dish, was caused by a strain of herpes harmless to humans, the United Nations said Wednesday.
Iraqi fish farmers south of Baghdad were left reeling in late 2018 after piles of dead carp were found washed up on the banks of the Euphrates River or floating in their cages.
Rumours swirled over whether the fish were sick or the river had been poisoned, and Iraqi politicians put the issue at the top of their agenda.
On Wednesday, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) said a months-long international investigation had pinned down the slippery source: the Koi Herpes Virus.
"KHV is a very serious and lethal disease that is known to cause almost 100 percent mortality rates in carps," said Dr. Thomas Wahli, who heads the  Swiss Reference Laboratory for Notifiable Diseases.
Flame-grilled carp seasoned with sauces made from onions and tomato and known as masgoof, is Iraq's national delicacy.
The mass ..

UN finds herpes killed millions of Iraqi carp

An Irishman has been brutally murdered in Malaysia, with his body found tied up and covered with stab wounds in a high-end condominium, reports said on Wednesday.
Brian Patrick O'Reilly's body was discovered Monday in George Town, on the northern island of Penang, where he had been working as an IT manager for about a month, official news agency Bernama reported, citing police.
Two people, a man in his 40s and a woman in her 30s, have been arrested as part of investigations. Police are also hunting a "fair-skinned foreign man", The Star newspaper reported.
The 50-year-old's hands had reportedly been tied together with shoelaces and his legs were bound with cloth. As well as showing signs of being stabbed, police believe he may have been hit with a pot and frying pan.
Three people were seen entering the condominium with O'Reilly late Friday, and then left shortly afterwards.
"A check of the man's home found a safe in one of the rooms had been ransacked and there were signs of a ...

Irishman brutally murdered in Malaysia: reports

Tesla said Wednesday it was working to resume imports of its new Model 3 sedan in China after the company said a labelling hiccup caused problems with customs.
Elon Musk's electric car firm denied the issue would impact sales of the vehicle in China, a key market for the automaker as it faces a battle to control costs and maintain profitability.
"This error resulted from misprinted labels on certain Model 3 vehicles," a Tesla spokesperson said in a statement.
"We have already reached a resolution with Chinese customs, and we are working closely with them to resume clearance procedures on these vehicles," the spokesperson said.
Local business weekly Caixin reported Tuesday that China's customs administration had suspended imports of its Model 3 cars and was holding more than 1,600 of the vehicles -- briefly sending Tesla's stock tumbling in the US.
Musk is betting on China's growing market for electric cars as regulators push the industry towards an all-electric future.
Musk was in ...

Tesla says working on China import hiccup

The daughter of Uzbekistan's late president Islam Karimov has been sent to prison for allegedly violating the terms of her house arrest, prosecutors said on Wednesday.
Gulnara Karimova -- once a high-profile diplomat and pop singer who had been tipped to succeed her father -- was in 2017 sentenced to 10 years in prison on fraud and money laundering charges.
Last year, a court commuted the sentence to a five-year term under house arrest.
The Uzbek General Prosecutor's Office said early Wednesday that Karimova had lived at her daughter Iman's Tashkent apartment but had "repeatedly violated the conditions imposed by the court".
Despite warnings, Karimova used various "means of communication" including the internet, left the apartment in November and refused to compensate the state for damages.
On Tuesday, a court ruled that Karimova would serve out the remainder of her term in prison, prosecutors said in a statement without providing further details.
Karimova's Swiss lawyer Gregoire ...

Uzbek ex-leader's daughter sent to prison

Hundreds of travellers were stranded at Nairobi's international airport Wednesday as riot police were deployed and teargas fired to disperse striking workers.
With flights grounded since midnight, passengers were advised Wednesday morning not to come to the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport -- East Africa's busiest according to the Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) -- until further notice.
"Kenya Airways regrettably wishes to inform its customers and the general public that due to the illegal strike by Kenya Aviation Workers Union (KUWA), the airline will be experiencing disruptions in normal flight operations," a company statement said.
Inside the terminals, strikers faced off with police who fired teargas as they moved in to arrest union officials they accused of inciting workers.
Passengers waiting for flights, some for hours, were asked to leave the airport, and gathered in parking and waiting areas outside the building.  "I have been here since 3:00 am, and there is no flight, ...

Hundreds of travellers stranded in Nairobi airport strike

China's southern Hainan island will end sales of fossil fuel-only cars in 2030, officials said, becoming the first province to announce a target end date for a transition away from gas guzzlers.
Beijing announced plans in 2017 to phase out petrol vehicles across the nation, but it did not set a date, as the country aims to cut pollution and reduce its dependence on imported oil.
Starting in 2030, sales of fossil fuel cars will be prohibited in Hainan, the provincial government said Tuesday, with officials saying they aim to hit President Xi Jinping's goal for the island to become a "civilised ecology test zone."
Known as China's Hawaii thanks to its resorts and tropical beaches, Hainan is set to become the country's largest free trade zone.
It also hopes to serve as a test area for some of Beijing's ambitious policies like fostering hi-tech industries and attracting international tourist dollars.
China remains at the forefront of the electric car revolution, with hundreds of homegrown 

China's Hainan province to end fossil fuel car sales in 2030

Ferrari will remove all branding by tobacco giant Philip Morris's "Mission Winnow" initiative for the opening Formula One race of the year in Melbourne after concerns about cigarette advertising, officials said Wednesday.
On Tuesday Mission Winnow was removed from Ferrari's official name for the Australian Grand Prix on March 17 after local authorities launched an investigation into whether the team breached laws over tobacco advertising.
A Philip Morris International spokesperson told AFP that Mission Winnow will also not appear on the car or team uniforms in Australia.
"Mission Winnow will remain the title sponsor of Scuderia Ferrari in 2019," the spokesperson said.
"However, our activation will be different in Australia than in other countries. We will announce additional details in the lead-up to the race in Melbourne."
The sport's governing body, the FIA, is opposed to any advertising or sponsoring of cigarettes or tobacco, but Philip Morris re-entered the sport last October ...

Ferrari removes all Mission Winnow branding for Australia

Toyota is teaming up with Japan's space agency on a planned mission to the Moon, with the Japanese auto giant expected to develop a lunar rover, officials and local media said Wednesday.
It will be the car manufacturer's first full-fledged entry into space exploration, after the company jointly developed a small robot sent to the International Space Station.
"We are planning to cooperate with Toyota in an exploration mission to the Moon," said a spokesman with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).
Details will be announced by JAXA and Toyota Tuesday next week when the space agency hosts a symposium in Tokyo, the spokesman told AFP.
Toyota also confirmed plans to announce a joint project with JAXA "on mobility and a space probe" but declined to comment further.
Jiji Press news agency said the car giant is expected to jointly develop a "mobility method" to be used on the lunar surface for the mission.
The mission is part of renewed global interest in the Moon, sometimes called .

Moon shot: Toyota, Japan space agency plan lunar mission

Jorge Lorenzo concedes he could have "thrown in the towel" after a frustrating two-year spell at Ducati, but the three-time MotoGP champion feels rejuvenated and once again ready to challenge the supremacy of title-holder Marc Marquez - his new Honda stablemate.
Marquez has taken the sport by storm since his 2013 debut in the top category, winning the championship in five of the past six seasons, with fellow Spaniard Lorenzo standing between him and perfection having captured the 2015 title.
Yet injury clouds hover over both ahead of this weekend's season-opener in Qatar. Marquez has rated his fitness at "almost 100 percent" following a gruelling rehabilitation from December shoulder surgery, while Lorenzo missed the first pre-season test at Sepang after fracturing his wrist in a dirt bike crash.
Marquez has won just once among the elite at the Losail circuit in Doha, a venue where Lorenzo has triumphed on six occasions across three categories -- including a hat-trick of MotoGP ...

AFP

AFP

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