An African Union official says African leaders have agreed to send 7,500 troops to fight the Boko Haram insurgency in northeast Nigeria.
	The head of the African Union's Peace and Security Council, Samil Chergui, said today the move came after the council urged heads of state to endorse the deployment of troops from five West African countries to fight the terror group.
	African leaders who are members of the 54-nation African Union are meeting in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa for a two-day summit that ends today.
	UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon earlier said he support the AU's move to send a force to fight Boko Haram.
	Boko Haram is increasing its attacks as Nigeria prepares for February 14 elections. Thousands have been killed in the 5-year insurgency.

Africa agrees to send 7,500 troops to fight Boko Haram

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Former German President Richard von Weizsaecker, who declared Germany's World War II surrender a "day of liberation" for his country as he urged it to confront the Nazi past, and promoted reconciliation during a 10-year tenure that spanned the reunification of west and east, has died aged 94.
	President Joachim Gauck's office announced Weizsaecker's death today.
	Weizsaecker, a patrician and eloquent figure who was president from 1984 to 1994, raised the profile of the largely ceremonial presidency and established himself as a moral conscience for the nation.
	Weizsaecker's May 1985 speech marking the 40th anniversary of Nazi Germany's defeat in World War II cemented his reputation. It won widespread praise as an effort to bring fellow Germans to terms with the Holocaust.
	"All of us, whether guilty or not, whether young or old, must accept the past. We are all affected by its consequences and liable for it," said Weizsaecker, who served as a regular soldier in Adolf Hitler's army. ...

Former German president Richard von Weizsaecker dies at 94

Italian lawmakers elected Sergio Mattarella, a Constitutional Court justice widely considered to be above the political fray, as the nation's new president on the third day of voting today.
	Mattarella's election as head of state was clinched when he amassed 505 votes -- a simple majority.
	As the count continued, the 73-year-old former minister with centre-left political roots went on to garner 665 votes from the 1,009 eligible electors.
	Renzi pushed hard for Mattarella's election, and some of Renzi's rebellious Democrats had protested that the premier had imposed his choice on them.
	So Mattarella's victory is also a win for Renzi in his bid to close fractious ranks, including former Communists, in the governing coalition's main party.
	Supporters of former Premier Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right opposition forces had said they would cast blank ballots in protest.
	While acknowledging Mattarella's credentials to be the guarantor the Constitution and arbiter in political crises ...

Italy's lawmakers elect Sergio Mattarella as president

When Martina Hingis came out retirement for the second time in her career two years ago, she set some ground rules for herself.
     She would only play doubles, no singles. And she only wanted partners who would help her win trophies.
     It took a little time, but the 34-year-old Hingis is becoming a fixture in Grand Slam finals again.
     The Swiss star and her partner Leander Paes of India will play for the mixed doubles title at the Australian Open tomorrow against the team of Kristina Mladenovic of France and Daniel Nestor of Canada.
     It's the second straight Grand Slam final for Hingis -- she played for the women's doubles title at the U.S. Open with Flavia Pennetta, but they lost to the Russian team of Ekaterina Makarova and Elena Vesnina.
     "I think definitely when I go on court I want to win every time," Hingis said this week. "Now I can pick and choose the tournaments that I want to play, I have the partners that I want to play with and I enjoy being out there on ..

Hingis, 34, back in Aussie Open final, 20 years after debut

The Philippine air force said one of its Italian-made light planes crashed at sea on a training mission today, killing the two pilots.
	The single-prop SF-260FH was flying in formation with two other planes on a training flight when it crashed off Nasugbo township in Batangas province south of Manila, said air force spokesman Lt Col Enrico Canaya.
	The planes also were taking part in activities commemorating the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the province from the Japanese toward the end of World War II, he said.
	He said rescuers recovered the bodies of the pilot and the co-pilot about 300 metres from the shore.
	Canaya also said that air force commander Lt Gen Jeffrey Delgado has ordered about 16 remaining SF-260FH planes grounded pending an investigation into the cause of the crash.
	Some of training planes have been modified for combat missions against insurgents.
	The Philippines military, one of the most poorly-equipped armed forces in Asia, is dealing with Muslim ...

Philippine air force plane crashes at sea, killing 2 pilots

Images or mentions of knives, ransom or blood or anything else that can be seen alluding to the hostage crisis involving two Japanese in Syria have been omitted.
	Some anime and other entertainment programmes are altering, canceling or postponing episodes violating those sensitivities typical of the kind of self-restraint shown here to avoid controversy.
	The fates of a Japanese journalist and Jordanian military pilot were still unknown today after the latest purported deadline for a possible prisoner swap lapsed with no further messages from the Islamic State group holding them captive.
	Another Japanese hostage has purportedly been killed.
	The restraint by broadcasters and other media has spilled over into politics as opposition lawmakers, mindful of the crisis, toned down their criticism of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his team. When dozens of lawmakers appeared in their traditional kimonos this week to mark the opening of the annual session, they were attacked on blogs and ...

Japan self-censors images, words linked to hostage crisis

French authorities have laid preliminary charges against five men suspected of involvement in a jihadi recruiting network in a small southern town from where several youths went to fight in Syria and Iraq.
	Spokeswoman Agnes Thibault-Lecuivre of the Paris prosecutor's office today said that the men, aged 26 to 44, face preliminary charges of criminal association involving a plot to carry out terrorist acts. They remain in custody.
	The ruling comes after three days of police questioning of the five after security forces detained them in connection with the network in southern Lunel.
	Authorities say at least six people from the town died in Iraq and Syria in recent months.
	Authorities haven't indicated they believe there is any connection between the suspects and the Paris terror attacks this month.

5 given preliminary charges over jihadi network in France

New York City has agreed to pay USD 3.9 million to the family of a black Bronx teenager shot to death by a white police officer in 2012.
	The deal yesterday settled a federal lawsuit brought by the family of 18-year-old Ramarley Graham.
	"This was a tragic case," said New York Law Department spokesman Nicholas Paolucci.
	"After evaluating all the facts, and consulting with key stakeholders such as the NYPD, it was determined that settling the matter was in the best interest of the city."
	Attorney Royce Russell said the family will comment Monday.
	Graham died after he was shot once in the chest in February 2012 in a tiny bathroom in the three-family home where he lived with his grandmother and other relatives.
	Richard Haste, the officer who shot him, said he fired his weapon because he thought he was going to be shot. No weapons were found in the apartment.
	Haste was indicted on manslaughter charges in the summer of 2012, but charges were dismissed by a judge who said prosecutors ..

City will pay USD3.9M in 2012 NY police shooting of Bronx teen

Canada announced a new anti-terror law that will allow anyone suspected of being involved in a terror plot to be detained without charge for up to seven days.
	The law announced yesterday will also make it a crime for people to call for a terrorist attack, even if they don't make a specific threat, and empower Canada's spy agency to thwart attacks directly in a significant expansion of their powers.
	Work on the law began in October after a gunman killed a soldier at Canada's national war memorial and then stormed Parliament.
	The attack in Ottawa came two days after a man, said to be inspired by the Islamic State group, ran over two soldiers in a parking lot in Quebec, killing one and injuring the other before being shot to death.
	The new law still has to be passed in Parliament but Harper's Conservative government has a majority of the seats so passage is all but ensured.
	Under current law it is a crime to make a specific threat. The new law will make it a crime for a person to ...

Canada to criminalize public terror threats

Australia's largest newspaper was facing sharp criticism over its obituary of the nation's most famous author, whom it described as plain and overweight.
	The Australian newspaper's obituary of Colleen McCullough, whose novel "The Thorn Birds" sold 30 million copies worldwide and who died on Thursday at age 77 after a long illness, opened not with a list of her myriad accomplishments, but with a description of her appearance.
	"Colleen McCullough, Australia's best-selling author, was a charmer," the obituary began. "Plain of feature, and certainly overweight, she was, nevertheless, a woman of wit and warmth. In one interview, she said: "I've never been into clothes or figure and the interesting thing is I never had any trouble attracting men."
	Soon, the hashtag myozobituary was trending on Twitter, as people across the world mocked the publication for what many viewed as a blatantly sexist treatment of a lauded literary figure.
	British author Neil Gaiman, who is married to singer ...

Australian paper mocked for obit of 'The Thorn Birds' author

Five people have appeared before a French judge and could face preliminary charges over a jihadi recruiting network in a small southern town from where several youths went to fight in Syria and Iraq.
	The move comes after three days of police questioning of the five after security forces detained them in connection with the network in southern Lunel. Authorities yesterday said at least six people from the town died in Iraq and Syria in recent months.
	Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve has said Tuesday's raids dismantled a jihadi network.
	France says about 3,000 citizens have links to extremist fighters in Syria and Iraq, with important contingents in both the Islamic State group and al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front.
	Authorities haven't indicated any connection between the suspects and the Paris terror attacks this month.

5 may face preliminary charges over jihadi network in France

Venezuela's military confirmed that it shot down over the Caribbean Sea a small civilian plane believed to be carrying drugs.
	Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino today defended the military's action saying the plane had entered Venezuela's airspace without permission and didn't respond to orders to land immediately. He said the plane was heading from Central America and taken down 25 nautical 15 miles from the coast near the island nation of Aruba.
	He did not provide any information about those who were on board.
	Venezuela has shot down a number of suspected drug-trafficking planes in recent year, mostly over the western portion of the country.
	The country is a major transit zone for cocaine coming over the border from Colombia en route to the US and Europe.

Venezuela confirms it downed plane near Aruba

Israel's settlement watchdog group said today that the government has issued hundreds of tenders for housing units in the West Bank, an area the Palestinians demand for their future state, a move that comes several weeks before Israel's national election.
	Peace Now said today that 450 tenders have been issued.
	Hagit Ofran of Peace Now accused the Israeli government of "trying to create facts on the ground ahead of the election." A senior Israel government official said the current batch of tenders is actually a group of old unpurchased tenders that are being reissued.
	"Contrary to reports there has been no authorization for new construction," the official said anonymously in line with protocol.
	"This is merely the automatic recycling of construction procedure for housing units announced over a year ago during negotiations with Palestinians which were known to all parties, no new housing units have been authorized or added."
	The March 17 elections are widely seen as a vote of ...

Ahead of election, Israel issues West Bank building tenders

E-commerce giant Alibaba pledged Friday to do more to fight online sales of counterfeit goods, quickly settling a public dispute with a Chinese regulator after the value of its US-traded shares plunged.
	Alibaba founder Jack Ma and the director of the Cabinet's State Administration of Industry and Commerce met and pledged to cooperate more closely to combat sales of fakes, the agency said in a statement.
	A report Wednesday by the SAIC accused Alibaba of lax oversight and allowing sales of counterfeit goods on its popular Taobao e-commerce platform.
	Alibaba said it was not to blame and, in a break with the usual deferential tone of Chinese companies toward regulators, took the unusual step of publicly accusing the agency and one of its officials of misconduct and bias.
	But the company faced pressure to end the conflict after the news caused its US-traded shares to fall. They tumbled further Thursday after its latest quarterly revenue disappointed investors.
	The two-day decline ...

Alibaba promises more action against fake goods

The White House says efforts to monitor Taliban detainees released from Guantanamo Bay in exchange for an American soldier have been "updated" because of concerns that they may be seeking to return to the battlefield.
	The five detainees have been in Qatar since being released last year in exchange for Army Sgt Bowe Bergdahl. Yesterday, Republican Sen Lindsey Graham said the men have been in touch with members of the al-Qaida linked Haqqani network.
	White House spokesman Josh Earnest says the detainees remain in Qatar and their activities are limited. But he says the mitigation efforts "have been updated" to reflect concerns about their contacts with terror groups.
	Earnest would not elaborate on the updates, but says the US is confident in the measures that are in place.

White House: Monitoring of released Taliban 'updated'

A Pentagon spokesman says the gunman who killed three American contractors at the Kabul airport was in an Afghan uniform and was subsequently killed.
	The spokesman, Rear Adm John Kirby, said Friday that the attack that killed three civilian aircraft mechanics is under investigation.
	Earlier today, a Taliban spokesman in Afghanistan said the shooter was a Taliban fighter who had infiltrated the ranks of Afghan security forces to stage the attack and was wearing an Afghan police uniform.
	Kirby said the US has no information to confirm or deny a Taliban role in the attack.

US spokesman: Gunman in fatal Afghan attack was in uniform

An aggravated assault case against former volunteer neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman that was opened when his ex-girlfriend said he threw a wine bottle at her has been dropped because she recanted her story and stopped cooperating with investigators, a prosecutor said today.
	State Attorney Phil Archer said he wouldn't file a formal charge against Zimmerman, 31, who was acquitted of killing Trayvon Martin. The killing of the unarmed black teen touched off protests across the US.
	The ex-girlfriend had made it clear she didn't want to cooperate with police, and there were no other eyewitnesses to what happened earlier this month, Archer said.
	Zimmerman was arrested three weeks ago. Three days later, in a sworn statement 28-year-old Brittany Brunelle asked that no charges be filed against Zimmerman.
	She said she was under no pressure and had been offered no money to make the statement. It was released today by the State Attorney's Office. Previously, officials hadn't identified .

George Zimmerman assault case dropped; ex-girlfriend recants

At least eight people died when a boat carrying illegal migrants sank today amid gales off Morocco, near the Spanish enclave of Melilla, the latest victims of the treacherous effort to seek a better life in Europe.
	The boat was carrying 20 people when it sank early Friday, including two migrant traffickers, according to authorities in the Nador province quoted by the state news agency MAP. Rescuers found eight corpses on Boukana beach near the town of Nador, said Adil Akkid, local representative for the Moroccan Association for Human Rights.
	Ten people were rescued, MAP reported. Seven were detained by police, while one is hospitalized in critical condition, Akkid said. All are men from sub-Saharan Africa.
	The whereabouts of the other two on the boat was unclear. The Spanish enclaves of Melilla and Ceuta, surrounded by Moroccan territory on the southern shores of the Mediterranean, attract thousands of African migrants every year trying to enter illegally in hopes of a better life .

Report: 8 dead after illegal migrant boat sinks off Morocco

The chief of Russia's General Staff says the military will receive 50 intercontinental ballistic missiles this year, maintaining a high tempo of modernization despite the nation's economic downturn.
	Gen Valery Gerasimov's statement Friday comes amid spiraling Russia-West tensions over Ukraine, where fighting between pro-Russia rebels and government forces flared up anew this month after a period of relative calm.
	Gerasimov said weapons modernization should prevent the US and NATO from achieving military superiority over Russia.
	He said the development of strategic nuclear forces is the top priority, adding that Russia will counter NATO's U.S.-led missile defense system by deploying weapons capable of penetrating the shield.
	Gerasimov said that Russia is also developing long-range precision conventional weapons in response to the US Prompt Global Strike program.

Russian military to get 50 intercontinental missiles

German automaker BMW says it has fixed a security flaw that made 2.2 million of its vehicles vulnerable to break-ins.
	The company says the problem affected BMW, Mini and Rolls Royce models equipped with its ConnectedDrive technology, which allows drivers to access certain car functions with a smartphone.
	German automobile club ADAC, which discovered the flaw last summer, says hackers could have used a fake cellphone base station to intercept network traffic from the car and lower the windows or open the doors. There are no reports such a break-in ever took place.
	BMW spokeswoman Silke Brigl said today that hackers wouldn't have been able to start or stop the engine. Brigl said the problem has been fixed with an automatic update and customers don't need to take any action.

BMW fixes security flaw that exposed 2.2M cars to break-ins

International investigators say the destruction of Syria's chemical weapons production facilities has begun.
	The latest report by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) says the destruction of the 12 facilities is expected to be complete by the end of June.
	The destruction is a key part of the elimination of Syria's chemical weapons stockpile as ordered by the U.N. Security Council in September 2013.
	The OPCW has already reported that all of Syria's declared chemical weapons have been removed from the country for their destruction, though concerns remain that Syria didn't declare everything it had.
	The OPCW continues to look into allegations of the use of chlorine "for hostile purposes" in Syria.
	The United Nations circulated the watchdog's latest report today.

AP

AP

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