10 May 2013 Last updated at 08:06 GMT
Suzanne Lynch
North Korea threatens to start a nuclear war, while South Korea dances Gangnam style. Those are the clichés. War has never been this close, but Koreans in Seoul confront their fears by going about a bizarre version of everyday life, complete with truffle pasta and super-smart phones.
A few hours before another ultimatum is set to expire, Seoul is transformed into a sea of fire. Fountains of flames encompass a glass stage in the broadcast studio at the South Korean state television network KBS, where the girls of Girl's Day are performing their new hit. It's the Friday before last, "Music Bank" day. The program is broadcast live every week to 72 countries, and the studio in the southern part of Seoul is filled with excited fan clubs and steams with puberty. Girl's Day sings a song called "Expectation," which isn't a bad way to describe a time when the whole world is wondering whether nuclear war could erupt in Asia tomorrow -- or whether it's all nothing but a show.
As an editor and a reporter are charged, journalists are bracing for more arrests ahead of elections.
Bangladesh factory collapse toll passes 1,000
The death toll from Bangladesh's worst industrial accident has passed 1,000 as recovery teams continue to find more bodies in the wreckage.
The eight-storey Rana Plaza factory building near Dhaka collapsed on 24 April with an unknown number inside.
The authorities say about 2,500 people were injured in the accident and 2,437 people were rescued.
The recovery operation is expected to finish on Friday. The rubble will then be shifted by bulldozers.
On Friday morning, officials said a total of 1,021 bodies had been recovered from the debris of the fallen factory building in Savar. Almost 650 have so far been identified and handed over to families.
European Parliament emerging as a serious political force
Far from being a peripheral entity, it has flexed its muscles on a number of political issues
Suzanne Lynch
Last Monday evening in Brussels, after the daily grind of activity in the European Commission’s Berlaymont building had drawn to a close, one light remained on. Taoiseach Enda Kenny and Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore had gathered with European Commission president José Manuel Barroso and European Parliament president Martin Schulz in a bid to resolve a deepening political impasse on the EU budget, a key file for the Irish presidency of the EU council.
Ten days earlier the European Parliament had cancelled a meeting with Eamon Gilmore which had been expected to kickstart the negotiation process on the EU’s sprawling seven-year budgetary framework. The episode is indicative of a changing power dynamic in Brussels.
HUMAN RIGHTS
Guatemala military dictator testifies at his genocide trial
The judgment is due in a landmark human rights trial in Guatemala. For the first time, a former military dictator in Latin America has been charged with genocide in his own country.
Representatives of indigenous, human rights and student groups, relatives of victims as well as former soldiers were in the court on Thursday to hear former Guatemalan dictator, Efrain Rios Montt, deny the charges against him.
Prosecutors said that while in power, Rios Montt was aware of, and thus responsible for, the killing of at least 1,771 Ixil Mayas in the towns of San Juan Cotzal, San Gaspar Chajul and Santa Maria Nebaj in Guatemala's western highlands.
War Angst and Karaoke: Daily Life as Bizarre As it Gets in South Korea
By Ullrich Fichtner in Seoul
North Korea threatens to start a nuclear war, while South Korea dances Gangnam style. Those are the clichés. War has never been this close, but Koreans in Seoul confront their fears by going about a bizarre version of everyday life, complete with truffle pasta and super-smart phones.
A few hours before another ultimatum is set to expire, Seoul is transformed into a sea of fire. Fountains of flames encompass a glass stage in the broadcast studio at the South Korean state television network KBS, where the girls of Girl's Day are performing their new hit. It's the Friday before last, "Music Bank" day. The program is broadcast live every week to 72 countries, and the studio in the southern part of Seoul is filled with excited fan clubs and steams with puberty. Girl's Day sings a song called "Expectation," which isn't a bad way to describe a time when the whole world is wondering whether nuclear war could erupt in Asia tomorrow -- or whether it's all nothing but a show.
Fears of Zim media crackdown
As an editor and a reporter are charged, journalists are bracing for more arrests ahead of elections.
The arrest of the editor and chief reporter of the Zimbabwe Independent on Tuesday, four days after Zimbabwe marked World Press Freedom Day, has ignited fears of the onset of a wider crackdown against journalists as the country heads towards a high-stakes election.
Dumisani Muleya and Owen Gagare were arrested for a report published in the Zimbabwe Independent last month that claimed that army generals had held secret talks with Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai in a bid to curry favour with him should he defeat President Robert Mugabe in the coming elections.
The ex-cricket star vs. the comeback kid: Who will be nuclear-armed Pakistan's next leader?
By Amna Nawaz and Wajahat S. Khan, NBC News
A former playboy cricketer and an ex-prime minister who was deposed by a military coup and then exiled will square off in a historic general election this weekend as Pakistan elects a new leader.
When Pakistanis head to the polls on Saturday, it will mark the first time in the country's 65-year history that a legislature has completed its term, paving the way for the possibility of a peaceful transition of power from one civilian government to the next.
The nuclear-armed country has been ruled by the military for half its history. Secretary of State John Kerry has met Pakistani army chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani twice in the last five weeks, underlining how crucial Washington views the relationship. However, the 2011 raid to kill Osama bin Laden and U.S. drone strikes targeting militants have damaged ties.
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