Once-sworn enemies in Bougainville's cruel decade-long civil war are holding a series of reconciliation ceremonies, hoping shared tears and apologies can bury the past ahead of a landmark vote on the region's independence from Papua New Guinea.
Former separatist fighters and PNG military are meeting face-to-face, trying to come to terms with a conflict that left up to 20,000 people dead in the bloodiest fighting the South Pacific witnessed since World War II.
Until a 1997 truce, George Diva was a fighter with the pro-independence Bougainville Revolutionary Army.
Now a 50-year-old, he still carries deep scars on his chest from a battle that left him unable to work. But he is adamant reconciliation is the only way the next generation can enjoy a brighter future.
"We had enough loss, sorrow and pain," he told AFP during a reconciliation ceremony this week on the neighbouring island of New Britain, where he fled.
"We don't want to fight any more."
Tens of thousands like him were displaced 

Tears, hope as foes reconcile before Bougainville independence vote

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The outgoing president of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker said Friday he believes the US will not impose new tariffs on imported European cars in the coming days.
President Donald Trump's administration has been threatening since last year to impose tariffs on auto imports to defend the US automaking sector, a symbol of American manufacturing.
After postponing such measures in May, Trump is due to decide by mid-November whether to impose the supplemental tariffs on cars built in EU countries -- a step particularly feared by the big German automakers.
But in an interview with a German newspaper, Juncker said he was "fully informed" on the issue and that Trump "will not do it".
"Trump will criticise a little, but there will not be tariffs on cars," he told the Suddeutsche Zeitung published Friday.
If adopted, it would mark the latest escalation of the trade conflict between Brussels and Washington, coming only weeks after the US imposed new punitive taxes on European ...

Trump will not impose tariffs on EU cars: Juncker

China's exports suffered their third month of decline in October, and while the drop was less than expected there were warnings Friday of more pain to come as the US trade war rumbles on.
While tensions between the world's top two economies are beginning to ease, Beijing is struggling to get the engines of growth firing on all cylinders as demand for its goods around the world tails off.
In the latest sign of weakness, official data showed overseas shipments fell 0.9 per cent on-year last month, though that is much slower than the 3.2 per cent drop seen in September and much better than forecasts.
Economists surveyed by Bloomberg had tipped a 3.9 per cent plunge.
Imports sank for the sixth straight month in October, dropping 6.4 per cent, though that was also an improvement the previous month and beat estimates.
China's trade surplus with the United States, a key point of anger in the White House, increased to USD 26.42 billion.
The economic powerhouses have been embroiled in a ...

China export drop beats forecasts in October but more pain tipped

Dozens of bushfires raged out of control across eastern Australia on Friday, blocking escape routes for residents and shuttering the main highway linking major cities on the country's Pacific coast.
More than 90 blazes pockmarked the New South Wales countryside, 50 of them uncontained, tearing through tens of thousands of hectares.
"We are in uncharted territory," New South Wales Rural Fire Service Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons told public broadcaster ABC.
"We have never seen this many fires concurrently at emergency warning level."
Authorities said fires had breached containment lines and forced the closure of the Pacific Highway linking Sydney and Brisbane in two places.
Emergency warnings were introduced for 14 flashpoints, bringing warnings to evacuate immediately.
In some areas, residents were told to simply "seek shelter as it is too late to leave".
Local radio stopped normal programming and provided instructions about how to try to survive fires if trapped at home or in a ...

'Uncharted territory' as bushfires rage across Australia's east

A night-time earthquake in northwestern Iran on Friday killed five people and injured 120, according to early reports on state television.
The 5.9-magnitude quake struck about 120 kilometres (75 miles) southeast of the city of Tabriz, in East Azerbaijan Province, in the early hours of the morning, the Iranian Seismological Center said.
Described as "moderate", the shallow quake was eight kilometres (five miles) deep and was followed by five aftershocks.
Provincial governor, Mohammad-Reza Pourmohammadi, told local media that at least 30 houses had been destroyed.
Rescue operations were underway in 41 rural villages, but the damage was largely concentrated in two areas.
The United States Geological Survey (USGS) issued an alert warning that "significant casualties are likely and the disaster is potentially widespread".
Iran sits where two major tectonic plates meet and experiences frequent seismic activity.
The country has suffered a number of major disasters in recent decades, ...

Five killed, 120 injured in Iran earthquake

Captain Alicia Molik Friday gambled with Ajla Tomljanovic instead of Samantha Stosur to play singles for Australia in the Fed Cup final against France, with the debutant opening the tie against Kristina Mladenovic.
World number one Ashleigh Barty plays the second singles rubber on Saturday on the hardcourts of Perth Arena against Caroline Garcia.
Those four players will also be part of the reverse singles on Sunday before a potentially decisive doubles clash, where Stosur will partner Barty against Garcia and Mladenovic.
It was a bold move by Molik as Australia bid for a first Fed Cup title in 45 years, with Stosur a veteran of 16 years of Fed Cup action, but struggling in singles in recent times.
In contrast, Tomljanovic has had a good year and spent most of it inside the world's top 50.
The seven-time champions have not tasted success in the tournament since 1974, while France are aiming for a third crown and first since 2003.
The finale marks the last Fed Cup final played under the 

Tomljanovic to face Mladenovic first in Fed Cup final

Manchester City and Liverpool's ascension to the two top dogs in the Premier League has seen every meeting in recent seasons met with increasing animosity, ahead of Sunday's latest battle for supremacy.
No player bears the brunt of that bad blood more than Raheem Sterling on his return to Anfield.
Sterling shot to fame as a teenager in the 2013/14 season as a rollercoaster ride took Liverpool agonisingly close to ending their long wait to win a league title.
Two years later, he left in acrimonious circumstances with Liverpool going backwards on the field and disputes over his contract off it.
Four-and-a-half years on, there is no doubt who got the better end of the ?50 million deal that took him to City.
Sterling has flourished under Pep Guardiola, becoming a vital part of City's two title-winning campaigns in the last two seasons, while Liverpool's wait for a league crown has now stretched to 30 years.
The England international is one of many tales of what might have been for ...

Familiar foe Sterling the prime threat to Liverpool's title charge

England will round off a transformative year for women's football in front of a sold-out Wembley against Germany on Saturday, with the Football Association hoping the World Cup boom will have a long-lasting legacy.
The record attendance for a women's game in Britain of 80,203 for the 2012 Olympic final between the United States and Japan is expected to be smashed, with 90,000 tickets sold for the clash between World Cup semi-finalists England and the Olympic champions.
The attendance for the friendly will also obliterate the previous record of 45,619 for an England women's home fixture, against Germany in 2014.
On the back of the Lionesses' run to the last four in France this year, attendance records have already been broken in the opening months of the Women's Super League.
Boosted by the hosting of selected matches at larger stadiums normally reserved for men's football, the opening weekend of the WSL attracted 62,000 supporters compared with a reported 92,000 across all 110 games ..

Wembley sell-out proves boom time for women's football in England

If Paris Saint-Germain have been held back in recent years by their lack of a truly top-class goalkeeper, Keylor Navas showed just why they were so keen to bring him to the French capital with his midweek performance in the Champions League.
The Costa Rican joined PSG in September from Real Madrid as Alphonse Areola moved in the other direction, and on Wednesday his late penalty save helped secure a 1-0 win over Club Brugge that clinched his side's place in the last 16.
The last line of defence for Real as they won three successive Champions Leagues between 2016 and 2018, Navas is yet to concede a goal in Europe since arriving in Paris.
Indeed, the 32-year-old has let in only five goals in 12 matches for Thomas Tuchel's side.
"He is an extraordinary goalkeeper. He won three Champions Leagues with Real Madrid in a competition where goalkeeper is such an important position. They can change the outcome of a game," remarked midfielder Marco Verratti after Wednesday's game, in which Mauro .

PSG hail Navas as bitter rivals Marseille and Lyon clash

Borussia Dortmund coach Lucien Favre says his side have "nothing to lose" as they look to inflict more woe on crisis-hit Bundesliga champions Bayern Munich at the Allianz Arena on Saturday.
Niko Kovac was sacked last Sunday as Bayern coach after a 5-1 drubbing at Eintracht Frankfurt, with Hansi Flick taking over as interim boss for two games.
The former Germany assistant coach oversaw a 2-0 midweek win over Olympiakos which sealed a Champions League last-16 place with two matches to spare.
But Bayern sit fourth in the Bundesliga, one point behind second-placed Dortmund and four adrift of leaders Borussia Moenchengladbach.
Dortmund beat Bayern 2-0 at Signal Iduna Park in the German Super Cup in August, but Dortmund have unfinished business in Munich after suffering a 5-0 thrashing in April before their rivals went on to pip them to the title by two points.
"In the last five years, it has been hard to win there," said Favre. "But, we have nothing to lose. We respect Bayern -- we don't ..

In-form Dortmund look to pile misery on embattled Bayern

Inter Milan and Napoli return to the Serie A fray after a disappointing week of European football for the Italian giants as leaders Juventus look to pull clear after punching their ticket to the Champions League last 16.
Juventus have 29 points from 11 games, one point ahead of Inter Milan, with resurgent Roma a further six points adrift in third.
Napoli are seventh after a run of three league games without a victory.
A win over struggling AC Milan would allow Juventus to keep ahead of Inter, who host midtable Verona after their 3-2 Champions League defeat by Borussia Dortmund.
After the frustration of throwing away a two-goal lead against the Germans, Antonio Conte's Inter need a boost against Verona, who were themselves under fire during the week after their fans aimed racist chants at Brescia's Mario Balotelli last weekend.
"This defeat has really got to me and I hope that's the same for my players," said Conte, who blamed a lack of resources despite remodelling the team after his .

Inter, Napoli under pressure as Juventus take on ailing AC Milan

Toni Kroos admits Real Madrid's players feel frustrated they have not used the inconsistency of Barcelona and Atletico Madrid to establish a hefty lead in La Liga.
Barca have already lost three games out of 11 this season while Atletico have managed only five wins from 12, with Real Sociedad sitting third after a surprisingly strong start.
But Madrid have not taken advantage. They missed out on the chance to go top last weekend by drawing at home to Real Betis, just after Barcelona were beaten by Levante and Atletico drew against Sevilla.
Zinedine Zidane's side got back on track with an emphatic 6-0 win over Galatasaray in the Champions League on Wednesday, a morale-boosting win ahead of Saturday's visit to Eibar in La Liga.
"The last few games have been better," Kroos told AFP. "More and more players are coming into form which is good because at the start of the season only a few players were in form which made it difficult.
"To be honest my feeling in the league is that we should be 

Kroos urges improving Madrid to make up for patchy Liga start

Tiger Woods will be a playing captain when he leads the United States against an International team in the Presidents Cup at Royal Melbourne next month.
Woods, who claimed his 15th major title at the Masters in April and won his 82nd US PGA Tour title at the Zozo Championship in Japan in October, named himself among four captain's picks for the 12-man team on Thursday, along with US Open champion Gary Woodland, former Masters champion Patrick Reed and Tony Finau.
Woods will be the first playing captain in the Presidents Cup since American Hale Irwin in the inaugural edition in 1994.
The US superstar admitted in a conference call to announce his captain's selections that piloting the team and playing would be "a lot of work." But the decision had been widely expected since his victory  at the Zozo Championship -- his first outing since arthroscopic knee surgery two months ago.
The Presidents Cup, a match play event modelled on the Ryder Cup that pits a non-European International team ..

US captain Woods will play in Presidents Cup

Novak Djokovic can end his season with a flourish by equalling Roger Federer's record haul of six titles at the ATP Finals and pipping Rafael Nadal to the year-end number one spot.
Germany's Alexander Zverev shocked Djokovic in last year's final at London's O2 Arena but the Serbian will start as the firm favourite after cantering to victory at last week's Paris Masters.
Djokovic and Nadal have shared the spoils at this year's four Grand Slams, refusing to yield to the next generation.
Nadal, who has never won the ATP Finals, dethroned his old rival from the top of the rankings this week and will be hoping to seal the year-end spot despite injury doubts ahead of the tournament, which starts on Sunday.
Federer, Nadal and Djokovic were the top three seeds when they first competed together at the tournament way back in 2007.
Twelve years later little has changed at the top of men's tennis, although they will be wary of the challenge from Russia's Daniil Medvedev, who has won two Masters ..

Djokovic and Nadal vie for year-end supremacy at ATP Finals

England have recalled Jonny Bairstow for their two Tests against New Zealand later this month as cover for the injured Joe Denly, a team official said Friday.
Bairstow, a 69-Test wicketkeeper-batsman who was initially omitted from the squad, is already in New Zealand with the England squad playing in the five-match Twenty20 series ahead of the Tests.
An England spokesman said the 30-year-old will now stay on in New Zealand after the final Twenty20 in Auckland on Sunday.
Denly has not played since he damaged his right ankle ligaments in training two weeks ago, although he did practise in the nets on Thursday and the spokesman said they were "hoping that he will be fit to play" in the pre-Test warm-up match against a New Zealand XI at the end of next week.
England's red-ball specialists arrived in Auckland this week and will join the rest of the squad on Monday.
The first Test starts in Tauranga on November 21.

England recall Bairstow as injury cover for New Zealand Tests

Teenager Mason Greenwood scored as Manchester United cruised into the Europa League last 32 with a 3-0 win over Partizan Belgrade at Old Trafford on Thursday, while Celtic stunned Lazio with a last-gasp goal in Rome to progress.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's United knew that a third victory in four Group L games would be enough to send them through.
The 18-year-old Greenwood broke the deadlock in the 22nd minute with a cool finish to score his third goal of the season and second in this competition.
Anthony Martial doubled the advantage after the half-hour mark with a brilliant individual goal, before Marcus Rashford lashed home the third four minutes after the interval.
The comfortable victory saw United bounce back after a 1-0 loss at Bournemouth last weekend had ended a three-game winning run.
"I think it was a good performance but there are things we can improve on," Rashford told BT Sport.
"We managed to score three goals but it could have been a lot more."
AZ Alkmaar thrashed Astana ...

Man Utd ease into last 32, Celtic down Lazio to progress

China has slammed radical protesters in Hong Kong as "mobsters" using violence to influence upcoming local elections, after a pro-Beijing lawmaker was injured in a stabbing.
The international finance hub has been shaken by five months of huge and increasingly violent protests calling for greater democratic freedoms and police accountability.
With Beijing and Hong Kong's unpopular leader Carrie Lam refusing to offer a political solution to the protesters' grievances, violence has spiralled on both sides of the ideological divide.
In the latest incident, a man holding a bouquet approached pro-Beijing lawmaker Junius Ho on Wednesday morning as the politician was campaigning in his constituency near the border with China.
The attack was "not only a serious criminal act but also pure election violence," Xu Luying, spokeswoman for the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office of China's central government, said Thursday, according to the official Xinhua news agency.
Xu said radical protesters in ..

China calls Hong Kong protesters 'mobsters' after stabbing

A Hong Kong student who fell from a multi-storey car park while police and protesters were clashing last weekend has died, hospital officials said Friday, in a development likely to raise tensions after months of violent rallies in the city.
Alex Chow, a computer science undergraduate of the University of Science and Technology, was certified dead at 8.09am on Friday, Queen Elizabeth Hospital confirmed.
Chow was taken to hospital in an unconscious state in the early hours of Monday morning following late-night clashes between police and protesters in Tseung Kwan O district.
He was found lying unconscious in a pool of blood inside a car park that police had fired tear gas into after protesters hurled objects from the building.
The precise circumstances of how Chow came to be injured are unclear but he has been embraced by the five-month-old protest movement.

Hong Kong student who fell during protest clashes dies

An original score of two minuets composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart when he was just 16 are to be put up for auction in Paris later this month, Sotheby's said on Thursday.
The asking price for the handwritten score dating from 1772 has been set at 150,000-200,000 euros (USD 166,000-220,000), the auction house said.
It goes on sale on November 18.
"It's the only version," said Simon Maguire, a specialist in musical manuscripts at Sotheby's in London.
"Mozart always wrote first versions" without subsequently reworking them, "unlike Beethoven who revised (his scores) endlessly," the expert told AFP.
The minuets -- which are types of dances -- have never been published and the autograph score contains a few corrections and minor modifications, including one or two that might be in the hand of Mozart's father, Leopold.
The manuscript was kept in Salzburg by the composer's sister, Nannerl, and later found its way into the vast collection of Austrian writer Stefan Zweig, who was "a ...

Early Mozart manuscript to go on sale in Paris

Rapper Drake has partnered with Canopy Growth on a new cannabis venture, the company announced Thursday, expanding the Canadian pot giant's list of celebrity backers.
He joins Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg, Martha Stewart and Snoop Dogg in partnering with Canopy Growth.
The new company, More Life Growth Company, will be based in Drake's hometown of Toronto.
Drake will own 60 per cent of the company, while Canopy will retain a 40-percent stake and distribution rights, and run its day-to-day operations.
"Drake's perspective as a culture leader and entrepreneur combined with Canopy Growth's breadth of cannabis knowledge will allow our new company to bring an unmatched cannabis experience to global markets," Canopy chief executive Mark Zekulin said in a statement.
For his part, Drake called the business venture "really exciting." "The idea of being able to build something special in an industry that is ever growing has been inspiring. More Life and More Blessing," he said.
Comedians Rogen and 

Rapper Drake launches cannabis brand

The Dow and S&P 500 finished at fresh records on Thursday following Chinese comments that pointed to a potential removal of tariffs in the long-running trade war with the United States.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended up 0.7 per cent at 27,674.80, about 180 points above the all-time high of two days ago.
The broad-based S&P 500 gained 0.3 per cent to 3,085.18, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index advanced 0.3 per cent to 8,434.52.
Investors welcomed statements from Chinese officials that the two sides have agreed a plan to remove tariffs imposed on goods in stages if a preliminary "phase one" agreement announced last month is finalised.
However, the White House did not publicly comment on the claim and gains moderated following a Reuters report that described opposition to rolling back tariffs within the White House.
The pullback revealed continued doubt about a US-China trade agreement despite more conciliatory signs from both sides, said Karl Haeling of ...

AFP

AFP

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