Six In The Morning

North Korea's failed missile may foreshadow nuclear test

　Experts say that experience suggests the embarrassment of Friday's missile launch will encourage North Korea's young leader to test a nuclear device soon. Meanwhile, the U.S. cancels food aid.

By Ken Dilanian, Los Angeles Times
The spectacular failure of a North Korean rocket, and the humiliation it presumably caused the nation's young new leader, makes it likely the regime will soon test a nuclear device or take other provocative actions, according to U.S. officials and outside analysts. The United Nations Security Council condemned North Korea for Friday's launch, saying it violated two previous U.N. resolutions. And the White House said it would not honor a promise to provide 240,000 metric tons of food aid to the impoverished nation.

Lost boys: What became of Liberia's child soldiers?
In the 1990s, Liberia was torn apart by a civil war in which child soldiers fought for the guerrilla leader Charles Taylor. As an international court delivers its verdict on Taylor, Finlay Young meets the former fighters back in Africa – now grown up, but not regretful of their past.

Saturday 14 April 2012
On the streets of Liberia's capital Monrovia, the morning is a time of hope apparent. This is when the pavements swarm with children making their way to school. They sashay along, a shifting kaleidoscope of brightly coloured uniforms. Some here remember childhoods of a different stripe. They were generals, corporals and captains. They answered to names like Walking-Fucking, Frisky-Rebel and Domination. Bloody-eyed and dressed garishly for battle, they stared out insolently from magazines on news-stands across the world. They were child soldiers, both victims and perpetrators of Liberia's 14-year civil war, which ended in 2003.

Research Reveals Ancient Struggle over Holy Land Supremacy
The Jews had significant competition in antiquity when it came to worshipping Yahweh. Archeologists have discovered a second great temple not far from Jerusalem that predates its better known cousin. It belonged to the Samaritans, and may have been edited out of the Bible once the rivalry had been decided.

By Matthias Schulz
Clad in gray coat, Aharon ben Ab-Chisda ben Yaacob, 85, is sitting in the dim light of his house. He strikes up a throaty chant, a litany in ancient Hebrew. He has a full beard and is wearing a red kippah on his head. The man is a high priest -- and his family tree goes back 132 generations. He says: "I am a direct descendent of Aaron, the brother of the prophet Moses" -- who lived perhaps over 3,000 years ago.

Suspects in terrorist plot go on trial in Denmark


The Irish Times - Saturday, April 14, 2012
GLOSTRUP – Four men went on trial in Denmark yesterday accused of planning a “Mumbai-style” terror attack on the offices of a Danish newspaper whose publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in 2005 outraged many Muslims. The men, three Swedish citizens and one Tunisian, pleaded not guilty to involvement in the worst terrorist plot in Denmark to date, denying allegations they had planned to kill a large number of people at the offices of the paper, Jyllands-Posten.

As rifts continue, Gazans pay price in innocent lives


Ruth Pollard April 14, 2012
The smell of smoke hangs in the air, and the scorched walls and blackened floor of the empty room speak to the depth of the tragedy that occurred here. Three children, Nadine, 7, Farah, 6 and Sabre, 3, died in this room when a candle they were using for light started a fire that burnt so fiercely that by the time their mother - who fell asleep feeding her baby in a nearby room - was able to raise the alarm, it was too late to save them. It is now five days later and a large group of men gather outside the modest two-storey house in the southern Gaza neighbourhood of Deir Balah, the children's grieving father, Riad Bashir, among them.

Counterattack on China in cyber-space
Greater China

By Peter Lee
The high-profile intrusion into the e-mail server of China Electronics Import & Export Corporation by "Hardcore Charlie" may mark the coming out party for America's own band of patriotic hackers. Documents obtained through the hack were posted on file-sharing sites. For the most part, they are a bewildering grab bag of seemingly inconsequential documents. One folder contains regulations concerning the privatization of public universities in Vietnam; another reveals the monthly salary of an English teacher working for Ivanhoe Copper in Myanmar.