Thousands of supporters of Yemen's ousted president Ali Abdullah Saleh and Shiite rebels who have overrun the country's capital rallied in Sanaa today, denouncing the United States over its push for sanctions against Saleh and rebel leaders.
	The US is seeking United Nations sanctions against the former president and two leaders of the Houthi rebels, accusing them for acting as "spoilers" causing Yemen's latest unrest. All 15 Security Council members must approve sanctions for them to take effect.
	Saleh stepped down in 2011 as part of a US-backed, Gulf-brokered deal after months of protests against his rule.
	But backers of his successor, Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, accuse him of undermining Hadi. Many believe Saleh helped Houthi rebels the past months has they swept into the capital, Sanaa.
	Saleh has remained a powerful political player, with his party still holding many positions in government and the security forces.
	The protesters in Sanaa in much smaller numbers than usual today .

Thousands rally against US in Yemeni capital

PTI Automatic

The Supreme Court today agreed to hear a new challenge to President Barack Obama's health care law.
	The justices said they will decide whether the law authorises subsidies that help millions of low- and middle-income people afford their health insurance premiums.
	A federal appeals court upheld Internal Revenue Service regulations that allow health-insurance tax credits under the Affordable Care Act for consumers in all 50 states. Opponents argue that most of the subsidies are illegal.
	The long-running political and legal campaign to overturn or limit the 2010 health overhaul will be making its second appearance at the Supreme Court.
	The justices upheld the heart of the law in a 5-4 decision in 2012 in which Chief Justice John Roberts provided the decisive vote.
	In the appeal accepted today, opponents of the subsidies argued that the court should resolve the issue now because it involves billions of dollars in public money.
	The court rarely steps into a case when there is no ...

US high court to hear challenge to health law

As the doomed flight rocketed past the speed of sound some 13 kilometers high and then shattered seconds later, the odds of survival were slim.
	Remarkably, as sections of the cockpit, fuselage, a wing and motor of the SpaceShipTwo rained down over the Mojave Desert in California and pieces of the lightweight craft tiny enough to travel 56 kilometers were picked up by the winds, a single parachute was seen in the sky.
	Pilot Peter Siebold was alive and drifting to safety.
	"It's no minor miracle that he did survive and survive in relatively good shape," Virgin Galactic chief executive George Whitesides said this week.
	How Siebold, 43, survived the fall from extreme altitude while co-pilot Mike Alsbury, 39, perished a week ago is not yet clear, but Siebold is not the first to live through such a harrowing ordeal.
	Bill Weaver has been telling a similar story for decades. The former Lockheed test pilot was torn from the seat of an SR-71 Blackbird at 78,800 feet above New Mexico on ...

Pilot's survival hailed as miracle, but not unique

US attorney Loretta Lynch has emerged as the leading choice to be the next attorney general, but people with knowledge of his plans say President Barack Obama is not ready to announce a nomination and is abandoning any push for confirmation this year while Democrats still control the Senate.
	White House press secretary Josh Earnest today said that Obama has not made a decision. People with knowledge of his thinking say he does not plan to announce a choice before returning from a trip to Asia next week and will leave it up to the Republican-controlled Senate to vote on the choice in 2015.
	Lynch, the US attorney for Eastern New York, would be the first black female to lead the Justice Department and become the top US law enforcement official if she ends up being the choice.
	The sources who described Obama's plans did so on condition of anonymity without authorisation to speak on the record.
	Lynch, 55, would be Obama's second trail-blazing pick for the post after Eric Holder served .

Lynch emerges as lead attorney general candidate

A Russian man charged with leading a Taliban attack against US forces in Afghanistan pleaded not guilty to terrorism charges today and was ordered held until his April 13 trial.
	Irek Hamidullin was arraigned on 12 counts, including providing material support to terrorists, trying to destroy US military aircraft and conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction.
	Half of the charges are punishable by up to life in prison. Attorney General Eric Holder chose not to seek the death penalty for the weapon of mass destruction charge, Assistant US Attorney James Gillis said at the 15-minute hearing.
	Hamidullin is the first military detainee from Afghanistan to be brought to the US for trial.
	His transfer represents the latest attempt by the Obama administration to show that it can use the criminal court system to deal with terror suspects a move criticized by some Republican lawmakers who believe such cases should be handled by military tribunals.
	US officials say Hamidullin is a Russian 

Detainee from Afghanistan pleads not guilty in US

Syrian activists say al-Qaeda-linked fighters have captured at least three villages from Western-backed rebels in the country's northwest as the militants continue their push to assert control over an area once held by more moderate groups.
	Nusra Front's advances expose the weakness of more moderate factions, which the US hopes to forge into an effective fighting force.
	An activist who uses the name of Alaa al-Deen says al-Qaeda fighters seized three villages Safuhan, Fatira and Hazari in northwestern Idlib province, and were pushing to take others.
	The development comes a day after US airstrikes hit two Nusra Front compounds in Idlib.
	In the past week, the al-Qaeda affiliate has been overrunning strongholds in Idlib once held by two prominent rebel factions armed and trained by the United States.

Al-Qaeda group seizes villages from Syrian rebels

President Barack Obama and the congressional leadership sit down for lunch at the White House today to search for ways to cooperate and try to break Washington's gridlock when Republicans take control of both chambers in the next Congress.
	The midterm election earlier this week produced a stunning rebuke to Obama and his Democrats, with Republicans snatching control of the Senate and widening their dominance in the House of Representatives.
	The new configuration leaves Obama and the Republicans with the choice of finding points of compromise -- on issues such as overhauling the tax code and immigration reform -- or to continue acting on the ideological gulf that has seized the nation's politics.
	In remarks today at the opening at a meeting of his Cabinet, Obama termed the election results "significant" and said he looked forward to meeting with congressional leaders to work on ways to "be more helpful" to the American people. He said he was eager to hear Republican ideas.
	Obama's .

Obama, Republican leaders test will for compromise

Rebel separatists in east Ukraine today said that more human remains have been found at the crash site of a Malaysia Airlines plane that was brought down in July.
	The rebel transportation ministry said that the parts were found while wreckage was being removed from the area.
	A team of Dutch, Ukrainian and Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe workers last week safely reached the area where the Boeing 777's wreckage is scattered and have resumed recovery work.
	An unspecified number of human remains have been retrieved during recovery operations.
	Rebels remain in control of the site where Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down on July 17, killing 298 people -- most of them Dutch citizens.
	Separatist authorities said the search operation has been complicated by the presence of unexploded mines and mortar shells on the site.
	The transportation ministry of self-declared separatist government of the Donetsk People's Republic said work on removal of wreckage has been ..

Ukraine rebels say more remains found at MH17 site

The Kremlin says Russian President Vladimir Putin and President Barack Obama may meet during international summits next week, although no talks have been officially planned.
	The two leaders last met in June, when they exchanged a few words during a ceremony in France marking the D-Day invasion anniversary.
	With Russia-West ties at their lowest point since the Cold War, amid the dispute over Ukraine, the strain in their personal relations was clearly visible.
	Next week, Obama and Putin will attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Beijing, then the G20 summit in Australia.
	Putin's foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, said today that no meeting has been set, but Putin and Obama have "a good chance" to meet on the sidelines.
	Ushakov emphasised that Putin wasn't shunning such a meeting.

Kremlin: Putin and Obama may talk next week

Federal investigators who have been in the Mojave Desert trying to find out why an experimental spaceship crashed are wrapping up their work in Southern California.
	National Transportation Safety Board spokesman Peter Knudson says that today, investigators are leaving the area about 193 kilometres north of Los Angeles where Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo broke apart a week ago.
	The safety board will take months more to finish interviews and analysis of physical evidence before publicly stating what it thinks caused the crash.
	SpaceShipTwo was destroyed after its feathering system that controls descent deployed prematurely and aerodynamic forces ripped it apart. The co-pilot was killed, and the pilot was seriously injured.
	Virgin Galactic is building a replacement spaceship and says test flights could resume as early as next summer.

US investigators wrap site work in spaceship crash

New York City's lower 25 mph (40 kph) speed limit is now the law. It went into effect today.
	It applies to all locations where a maximum speed is not posted.
	The new law cuts the speed limit from 30 mph (48 kph).
	The measure is part of Mayor Bill de Blasio's ambitious traffic safety plan known as "Vision Zero" to reduce pedestrian and driver deaths.
	The city is replacing about 3,000 speed signs.
	The 25 mph (40 kph) speed limit affects about 90 percent of the city's streets.

NYC's lower speed limit law goes into effect

The vice president of Germany's Federal Criminal Police, Juergen Stock, has been elected to take over the operational helm of Interpol, effective immediately.
	The General Assembly of the international police organisation unanimously elected Stock, 55, today at its meeting in Monaco.
	He replaces Ronald K Noble, an American who served as secretary general of Interpol for 14 years.
	The executive committee had picked Stock in June, one of six candidates from six countries.
	Stock said Interpol, which is based in Lyon, France, is a key player in today's world, where challenges range from geopolitical conflicts to health risks, terrorism and cybercrime, and "cannot be overcome by national states alone."
	Stock has been vice president of Germany's criminal police, known as the BKA, since 2004.
	The secretary general oversees police cooperation.

German Juergen Stock elected new Interpol leader

Sri Lanka's Bar Association today asked the Supreme Court to hold an oral hearing on whether President Mahinda Rajapaksa could seek a third term in office.
	Rajapaksa yesterday sought the court's opinion if he could contest an election two years before his second term ends. The constitution has been changed to allow a third term, but there is debate over whether the change applies to Rajapaksa.
	The president wants the court to rule by Monday, and the court gave the Bar Association until today evening to submit its arguments, only in writing.
	Bar Association President Upul Jayasuriya wrote to the Supreme Court today seeking up to two weeks and an oral hearing.
	"The incumbent president of the republic has over two years left of his term of office. There is no urgency in this matter and certainly no urgency such as would require refusal of an extension of time of up to two weeks," Jayasuriya wrote.
	Rajapaksa in 2010 used his party's overwhelming two-thirds majority in Parliament to ..

Bar wants hearing on Sri Lanka presidential terms

A judge has sentenced former News of the World news editor Ian Edmondson to eight months in prison for conspiring to hack the phones of celebrities, politicians and royals.
	Edmondson is the eighth journalist from the now-defunct Rupert Murdoch-owned tabloid to be convicted over illegal activities.
	He initially went on trial last year alongside colleagues including former editors Rebekah Brooks and Andy Coulson, but was dropped as a defendant after a judge declared him unfit to stand trial.
	He pleaded guilty last month to conspiring to intercept voicemails between 2000 and 2006.
	Passing sentence today, Judge John Saunders said Edmondson had suffered from depression and other medical problems and had lost his job and his reputation as a journalist.
	The judge said: "He has only himself to blame for that.

Ex-tabloid news editor jailed for hacking

The number of potential successors for the top spot at PepsiCo is thinning as yet another highly regarded executive announced his departure.
	Zein Abdalla, named president of the company just over two years ago, will retire this year.
	The departure of Abdalla, 56, follows that of Brian Cornell, who oversaw PepsiCo's global foods business and took the top job at Target Corp this summer.
	There has been no hint that PepsiCo Chairman and CEO Indra Nooyi, 59, is stepping down and the company is on solid footing.
	Pepsico Inc, based in Purchase, New York, recently raised its profit outlook for the second time and company shares hit another all-time high Wednesday.
	But a deep bench is reassuring to Wall Street, particularly given recent pressure from activist investors like Nelson Peltz, who wants to break the company into smaller parts.
	Debra Crew, head of Pepsi's North America nutrition division, departed in September for RJ Reynolds.
	Abdalla joined the company in 1995, working mostly 

Another potential Pepsi CEO successor departs

Europol says 17 people have been arrested in an international crackdown on underground websites selling illegal drugs.
	In a statement, the European policing agency said Friday that it coordinated raids a day earlier together with US law enforcement agencies, who yesterday announced the arrest in San Francisco of a man accused of running the "Silk Road 2.0" online drug bazaar.
	Europol said that in addition to the Silk Road site, several other marketplaces were seized, netting USD 1 million (800,000 euros) in digital currency and USD 225,000 worth of cash and drugs.
	Silk Road and similar websites are not visible on the open Internet; they can only be accessed with special browsers that encrypt web traffic. Buyers and sellers trade using digital currencies, usually Bitcoin.

Europol: 17 arrests in drug website bust

FBI Director James Comey says an agent impersonated an Associated Press reporter during a 2007 criminal investigation, a ruse the news organization says could undermine its credibility.
	In a letter Thursday to The New York Times, Comey said the agent "portrayed himself as an employee of The Associated Press" to help catch a 15-year-old suspect accused of making bomb threats at a high school near Olympia, Washington.
	It was publicized last week that the FBI forged an AP story during its investigation, but Comey's letter revealed the agency went further and had an agent actually pretend to be a reporter for the wire service.
	Comey said the agent posing as an AP reporter asked the suspect to review a fake AP article about threats and cyberattacks directed at the school, "to be sure that the anonymous suspect was portrayed fairly."
	The bogus article contained a software tool that could verify Internet addresses. The suspect clicked on a link, revealing his computer's location and ...

FBI says agent impersonated AP reporter

Israel has deployed more than 1,300 police to deal with possible violence as Muslim worshippers flock to a hotly contested holy site in Jerusalem for weekly prayers.
	Police spokeswoman Luba Samri says the officers were deployed today "to maintain law and order in the area."
	The deployment came two days after riot police clashed with Palestinians at the Al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam's third- holiest shrine. Samri said worshippers today would be limited to women and men over 35.
	Israeli-Palestinian confrontations have been escalating in Jerusalem, including near-daily clashes between stone-throwing Palestinians and Israeli riot police. Palestinians have also carried out two deadly vehicle attacks in recent weeks.
	At one access road leading to Al-Aqsa, some 500 young Palestinians knelt in prayer in front of dozens of black-garbed Israeli riot police.

Heavy security as Muslims pray in tense Jerusalem

The human populations now predominant in Eurasia and East Asia probably split between 36,200 and 45,000 years ago, a study has said.
	Researchers used new techniques to analyse genetic samples from the shin bone of a young man who died at least 36,200 years ago near Kostenki-Borshchevo in what is now western Russia. The study, published in the journal Science, concludes that Kostenki man shared genetic sequences with contemporary Europeans, but not East Asians.
	A separate study published last month in the journal Nature determined that a 45,000-year old sample found in Siberia contained sequences ancestral to both modern East Asians and Europeans.
	Taken together, these two studies suggest a time frame of about 9,000 years in which the two genetic populations could have diverged, said Eske Willerslev, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, one of the authors of the Science paper.
	Even on its own the Kostenki sample challenges previous theories that ...

DNA study dates Eurasian split from East Asians

Shakib Al Hasan became the third cricketer in Test history to score a century and haul in 10 wickets as he steered Bangladesh to a 162-run win over Zimbabwe on the last day of the second Test here today.
     Shakib claimed 5-44 in the second innings to help bowl out Zimbabwe for 151, clinch the three-match series 2-0, and send Zimbabwe to the bottom of the test rankings.
     He had figures of 5-59 in the first innings as Bangladesh took a 65-run lead, cutting down Zimbabwe for 368.
     Shakib, who hit 137 in the first innings, joined England's Ian Botham and Pakistan's Imran Khan to take 10 wickets and score a century in a test. Botham and Imran both accomplished the feat in 1980 against India.
     "I had my eye on taking 10 wickets and scoring a hundred. I was lucky," Shakib said.
     "It wasn't easy to score runs but difficult to get out, too, once you settled in. It was turning a lot on the last day. I put the ball in the right areas and it worked. It's a great feeling to lead 

Bangladesh beats Zimbabwe by 162 runs in 2nd Test

South Korea's National Assembly today approved plans to disband the coast guard in the wake of criticism over its failure to rescue hundreds of passengers during the sinking of a ferry in April.
	Authorities say swifter, more aggressive action could have saved more lives. The sinking, one of the country's deadliest disasters in decades, killed more than 300 people, mostly teenagers travelling to a resort island for a school trip.
	The lawmakers voted 146-71 in favour of transferring the coast guard's responsibilities to the National Police Agency and establishing a broader safety agency. Thirty-two lawmakers abstained from the floor vote broadcast by a legislature-run website.
	The safety agency will also take over the National Emergency Management Agency and some responsibilities held by the Ministry of Security and Public Administration, according to officials at the National Assembly and the public administration ministry. The safety agency's creation is aimed at establishing a ...

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