ROCKY START: President Lee Myung-bak has been struggling to form a new Cabinet, with three of his nominees quitting this week under pressure from liberal opponents
South Korea's parliament yesterday endorsed Han Seung-soo as new prime minister, giving President Lee Myung-bak a much-needed boost after a difficult first week in office.

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Two former presidents joined thousands of protesters yesterday at an interfaith rally pressing for Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's resignation over a raging corruption scandal.

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A Malaysian scientist says she has discovered a cheap way to turn discarded rice husks into a high-tech material that could play a key role in reducing carbon emissions, protect buildings from bomb blasts and make airplanes lighter.

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Chinese police are arresting and harassing organizers of petitions that called on the National People's Congress (NPC) to protect human rights and end corruption ahead of the Olympics, activists said yesterday.

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A Chinese-born fugitive accused of murdering his wife in New Zealand and abandoning his three-year-old daughter in Australia has been captured in the US, officials said yesterday.

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POWER STRUGGLE: On Thursday, Benazir Bhutto's widower met the head of a pro-Taliban political party to discuss power sharing and reached an agreement
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf's allies are rejecting demands for his ouster, but some are calling for clipping his powers to ensure democracy can flourish in a nation that's been ruled more often by generals than civilians.

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Egypt is working on a plan with the Palestinians to supply all the besieged Gaza Strip's electricity needs and wean off its reliance on Israel for power, an Egyptian energy official said on Thursday.

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The use of a home-based anti-retroviral treatment could significantly reduce mortality among adults with HIV in poor nations, especially in Africa, according to a study released yesterday.

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Russia's UN ambassador has called the EU's planned mission in Kosovo "illegal" and said the resolution authorizing the UN to administer the Serb province in 1999 remains in force -- and said the UN mission would remain in Kosovo.

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RESTITUTION: The attorney said that the former Liberian president pillaged US$600 million in diamonds, and that he would seek that amount for victims in Sierra Leone
The prosecutor in the former Liberian president Charles Taylor war crimes trial said on Thursday he was closing in on a US$600 million blood diamond haul amassed by the defendant.

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The Security Council edged closer to adopting a third set of UN sanctions against Iran over its nuclear defiance, with talks set to continue yesterday, despite reservations from some countries.

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`UNREASONABLE': Shieh Jyh-wey engaged in a heated verbal tussle with opposition lawmakers over government policy and the KMT's stolen assets
By Flora Wang
A shouting match erupted on the legislative floor yesterday as Cabinet Spokesman Shieh Jhy-wey (謝志偉) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Sun Ta-chien (孫大千) traded barbs over the issue of whether the government had paid for news reports to promote administrative propaganda.

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DEPLOYMENT: The decision appears to be a show of force as frustration mounts over the long political deadlock in Lebanon, with the presidential election delayed 15 times
The US Navy is sending at least three ships, including at least one amphibious assault ship, to the eastern Mediterranean Sea in a show of strength during a period of tensions with Syria and political uncertainty in Lebanon.

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Former Academia Sinica president Lee Yuan-tseh (李遠哲) is to be honored with the Chemical Heritage Foundation's 11th Othmer Gold Medal, the nation's top research institute said yesterday.

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REFERENDUM: Led by Evo Morales' allies, Congress set May 4 for the vote on a new constitution giving greater autonomy to the nation's 36 indigenous groupings
A bitterly divided Bolivian Congress on Thursday approved a national vote on President Evo Morales' proposed constitution, which would grant greater political power to the nation's long-oppressed indigenous groups.

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The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus on Friday accused the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) of being "two-faced" on the 228 Incident of 1947.

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The chief US negotiator of a nuclear agreement with India said it would be impossible to complete this year unless India quickly makes a "courageous decision" to endorse it.

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By Flora Wang
The legislature yesterday agreed to put a proposed amendment to lower business taxes on four food staples directly to a second reading to help stabilize soaring commodity prices.

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The very design of Abu Ghraib in Iraq turned good soldiers into evil tormentors that humiliated and brutalized prisoners, a social psychologist said on Thursday.

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More than one in 100 adults are now behind bars in the US, home to the world's largest penal population, with a startling one in nine young black men incarcerated, a study showed on Thursday.

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■ UNITED STATES

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