This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: BBC
March 26, 2010
A Rwandan court has sentenced an opposition politician to 17 years in jail for his part in the 1994 genocide.
Joseph Ntawangundi initially denied participating in the genocide but later pleaded guilty to the charges.
Ntawangundi was convicted for his involvement in the deaths of eight people who were killed at a school he ran in eastern Rwanda.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
March 25, 2010
For three decades Abu Nayef has been digging for treasure from Lebanon's rich archaeological past, but instead of museums his finds end up in the hands of unscrupulous traders around the globe.
In the eastern town of Baalbeck, home to some of the world's most beautiful Roman temples, scavengers like Abu Nayef have made careers of unearthing ancient treasure for sale to the highest bidder.
The artifacts often wind up in the homes and gardens of Lebanese politicians and
Source: Telegraph (UK)
March 26, 2010
Shanghai's Bund, once known as the "Wall Street of Asia", will reopen on Sunday after a painstaking £280 million two-year restoration to bring back a touch of its 1930's glamour.
The stately waterfront, alongside the muddy Huangpu river, was built by the British and was the hub of colonial life in Shanghai until the Japanese invaded the city in 1941.
Now, however, as Shanghai attempts to relaunch itself as one of the world's great financial centres, the Bund
Source: Telegraph (UK)
March 26, 2010
An original lunar flight plan which settles the debate about what astronaut Neil Armstrong meant to say when he first walked on the moon is expected to fetch as much as £55,000 at auction.
The document carries an inscription by Armstrong that he had intended to say "one small step for A man, one giant leap for mankind".
But the indefinate article was accidentally omitted and the erroneous phrase "one small step for man ..." has gone down in history
Source: Fox News
March 25, 2010
Bin Laden threatens to harm Americans if self-confessed Sept. 11 attacker Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is put to death.
Al Qaeda leader Usama bin Laden threatened in a new audio recording released Thursday to kill any captured Americans if the U.S. executes the accused mastermind of the Sept.11 attacks or any other Al Qaeda suspects.
The U.S. is still considering whether to put Khalid Sheik Mohammed and four of his fellow plotters on military tribunal for their role in the Se
Source: CNN
March 25, 2010
Thurgood Marshall, Hattie McDaniel, the Tuskegee Airmen and Walter Morris -- all African-Americans who made history breaking the color barrier. But while America's first black Supreme Court justice, the first African-American Oscar winner and the U.S. military's first African-American pilots are well known, you may never have heard of Walter Morris or his role in American history.
The War Department, as the Defense Department used to be called, wanted it that way. On Thursday, a cer
Source: CNN
March 26, 2010
Loggers in coastal Oregon have found the wreckage of a World War II-era Navy aircraft that investigators believe may have human remains inside.
Investigators reported seeing a wing, tail section, landing gear and other mangled debris spread out over 200 yards in a heavily wooded area in Tillamook County in northwestern Oregon.
Oregon State Police bomb technicians checked the site Wednesday afternoon and found no obvious signs of unexploded ordnance.
Source: WaPo
March 26, 2010
There are 35 statues of very important people in Statuary Hall of the Capitol. Thirty-four of them are of men. Frances Willard, suffragist and orator for Prohibition, is the lone woman. She looks somewhat forbidding, but then again, so does everybody else frozen in granite and marble.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton surely will rank for placement there someday. For now, they are making history, and on Thursday, at a reception in that hall, th
Source: NYT
March 25, 2010
If nationalists in Slovakia have their way, schoolchildren will soon be forced, each Monday at 8 a.m., to listen to the national anthem blaring out from loudspeakers across this small Central European nation.
At a rally to commemorate the Slovak wartime state (1939-1945), people demonstrated in support of the patriotism bill in Bratislava, with portraits of the codificator of the Slovak language, Ludovit Stur, left, and the president of the Nazi-backed wartime Slovak state, Josef T
Source: AP
March 25, 2010
A U.S. replica of the 19th century Cuban slave ship Amistad glided into the millpond-calm waters of Havana Bay and docked Thursday, a reminder of the countries' intertwined past and perhaps a small gesture toward a brighter shared future.
Built in Connecticut, the black-hulled, two-masted re-creation of the schooner, whose name means "Friendship," flew the flags of the United States, Cuba and United Nations. It was one of the few times a ship under Cuba's flag and the Star
Source: Medieval News
March 22, 2010
Experts from The University of Manchester's John Rylands Library are to spend four days at a beautiful seventeenth century mansion to capture its world famous Canterbury Tales manuscript on camera.
From today to March 25th, visitors to the National Trusts' Petworth House, Sussex, will be able to watch the team of four as they work with cutting edge equipment to record the early 15th century Chaucer manuscript in close detail.
It is part of a 18-month project - funded by
Source: Medieval News
March 25, 2010
The severe epidemic of plague known as the "Black Death" caused the death of a third of the European population in the 14th century. It is probable that the climatic conditions of the time were a contributory factor towards the disaster.
"The late Middle Ages were unique from the point of view of climate," explains Dr Ulf Büntgen of the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL) in Birmensdorf, Switzerland. "Significantly, there we
Source: Medieval News
March 25, 2010
Important work to safeguard the boundary wall of the historic Abbey Gardens in Bury St Edmunds, England, is nearing completion thanks to a £100,000 grant from English Heritage.
Repairs to painstakingly rebuild and underpin the precinct north wall have been going on for seven weeks largely behind the popular aviary in the Gardens and away from public gaze.
It has involved carefully dismantling the top section of the flintwork above and adjacent to the aviary as well as s
Source: Ria Novosti
March 25, 2010
The organizing committee for the May 9 celebrations of the 65th anniversary of the victory over the Nazi Germany is not planning to use any images, videos or other promotional material involving Josef Stalin.
"This never happened, not even in the Soviet era," a committee source said. This year, the organizers have also asked the regional authorities to refrain from carrying Stalin's portraits. This primarily concerns Moscow, where his portraits would have been posted along
Source: NYT
March 22, 2010
The U-2 spy plane, the high-flying aircraft that was often at the heart of cold war suspense, is enjoying an encore.
Four years ago, the Pentagon was ready to start retiring the plane, which took its first test flight in 1955. But Congress blocked that, saying the plane was still useful.
And so it is. Because of updates in the use of its powerful sensors, it has become the most sought-after spy craft in a very different war in Afghanistan.
As it shifts fro
Source: Style Weekly
March 16, 2010
Officials in Richmond’s economic development department want to streamline the city’s cacophony of old and new signs — many pointing to historic sites. But one man in the city’s parks and recreation department is quietly — or not so quietly — busting through the red tape.
Ralph R. White, manager of the James River Park System, doesn’t know how many directional, historical, interpretive, public safety and regulatory signs he’s put up around town in the 30 years he’s worked for the de
Source: Reuters
March 24, 2010
The Victorian Gothic novel Dracula is associated with the dense forests of Transylvania rather than the Georgian squares of Dublin, but the great great nephew of its Irish born author thinks that is an oversight.
In time for the centenary of Bram Stoker's death, which will be in 2012, Dacre Stoker has begun work to raise money to erect a memorial to his ancestor to join the statues and plaques commemorating Dublin's many other writers, such as James Joyce and Samuel Beckett.
Source: BBC News
March 24, 2010
Sixty-five years after Burma Star-winner David Norman Davies helped liberate the country now known as Myanmar from Japanese occupation, he's returning to south east Asia to honour his fallen comrades.
"I wouldn't say I think about Burma every day or wake up dreaming about it every night - it was an awfully long time ago now.
"But a smell, a sound or something on telly can take you back there in a flash," said Mr Davies who lives in Cardiff.
&
Source: AINA
March 24, 2010
An Anglican Church pastor and his wife were assaulted by Security agents in Luxor on March 18, 2010, in order to evacuate them by force from their home and demolish Church property. Out of the nearly 3000 sq. meters of buildings attached to the Church, only the 400 sq. meter prayer hall was left standing.
Pastor Mahrous Karam of the Anglican Church in Luxor, 721 km from Cairo, said that the Church was still in negotiations with the Luxor authorities the day before regarding a replac
Source: CNN
March 25, 2010
Thurgood Marshall, Hattie McDaniel, the Tuskegee Airmen and Walter Morris -- all African-Americans who made history breaking the color barrier. But while America's first black Supreme Court justice, the first African-American Oscar winner and the U.S. military's first African-American pilots are well known, you may never have heard of Walter Morris or his role in American history.
The War Department, as the Defense Department used to be called, wanted it that way. On Thursday, a cer
