3 June 2014 Last updated at 07:25
Republican sponsor suddenly withdraws bill HB 328, which would have blanketed supply of lethal injection drugs in secrecy
Before the European Parliament election last month, voters were told the poll would also determine the next Commission president. In a silent putsch against the electorate, Angela Merkel is now impeding the process. She fears a loss of power and Britain's EU exit.
And yet, if that is what she really wanted, it's a goal she could have achieved as early as last Tuesday. Instead, she opted against it. One can, of course, choose to believe the words Merkel delivered last Friday in Regensburg. Or one can focus more on her actions. Thus far, her actions have spoken a different language. It is the language of one for whom the voters are secondary.
Syrians vote in presidential election
Jeremy Bowen reports that the Assad regime seems more confident about winning the war
Syria is holding a presidential election in government-held areas, amid heightened security.
The poll takes place three years into a civil war in which tens of thousands of people have died and millions more have been displaced.
President Bashar al-Assad is widely expected to win a third seven-year term in office.
However, critics of the Syrian government have denounced the election as a sham.
Analysts say Syrian officials have gone to great lengths to present the vote as a way to resolve the crisis.
Louisiana shelves execution secrecy law
Republican sponsor suddenly withdraws bill HB 328, which would have blanketed supply of lethal injection drugs in secrecy
A bill in Louisiana that would have given the state one of the toughest execution secrecy regimes in the US has been pulled by its Republican sponsor at the last minute.
Observers had expected the bill, HB 328, to go through without difficulty. It had already received the approval of both houses of the state legislature and was awaiting final agreement on amendments. Among its provisions HB 328 would have prevented the public from knowing the source of the state's lethal injection drugs.
But with just hours to go before the end of the assembly's legislative session its proposer, Joe Lopinto, killed the bill unilaterally. He told reporters from local papers that he had decided in the wake of the recent uproar over botched executions in other states to play a longer game.
World Cup glare exposes political divide
State football body is repository of a more reactionary and violent Brazil
Tom Hennigan
At next week’s opening ceremony of the World Cup there will be two very different Brazils on show.
President Dilma Rousseff, as leader of the host country, will be there representing one of the world’s largest democracies as it takes on Croatia in the opening game. Almost 30 years after the return of civilian rule she is the country’s first woman president, a former guerrilla who fought the military dictatorship and was jailed and tortured.
Only the second leader from the left, her ruling Workers Party has overseen one of the most aggressive efforts in Brazil’s history to tackle the country’s huge social inequalities.
The Democratic Deficit: Europeans Vote, Merkel Decides
Before the European Parliament election last month, voters were told the poll would also determine the next Commission president. In a silent putsch against the electorate, Angela Merkel is now impeding the process. She fears a loss of power and Britain's EU exit.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel had hardly begun her speech last Friday before she got right to the point. With her hands set on the podium in front of her in the Regensburg University auditorium, she said: "I am engaging in all discussions in the spirit that Jean-Claude Juncker should become president of the European Commission." German news agency DPA immediately sent out a headline reading: "Merkel: Juncker To Be EU Commission President."
Egypt rejects appeal of defeated presidential candidate
The country's elections committee says it has dismissed Hamdeen Sabahi's appeal against voting results that gave Abdel Fattah al-Sisi a win.
Egypt’s elections committee said on Sunday it had rejected a defeated presidential candidate’s appeal against voting results that gave former army chief Abdel Fattah al-Sisi a landslide victory.
Leftist politician Hamdeen Sabahi only got 3% of the votes in last week’s elections, according to initial results that showed Sisi in the lead with 93% of votes.
The elections committee’s statement did not give details on its ruling on the appeal. It said the official results will be announced on Tuesday night.
The vote came 10 months after the army ousted elected Islamist President Mohamed Mursi in July in reaction to protests against his rule.
Have attitudes toward gang rape shifted in India?
The massive outcry after a vicious gang rape on a bus 18 months ago finds a few echoes after the rape and murder of two low-caste sisters.
The vows for change came quickly after the young Indian woman was beaten, gang-raped on a moving bus, and finally died in a faraway hospital. No longer, politicians promised, would rape victims be shamed by police. No longer, the judicial system said, would rapists be able to blame their victims.
Thousands of people swept through the streets of New Delhi in spontaneous protests after the December 2012 bus rape, demanding protection for women. The victim became "the daughter of the entire nation," said Sushma Swaraj, now the country's foreign minister.
Much has changed in the 18 months since then — harsher laws against rape, increased media focus on sexual violence, new police units dedicated to helping women. But a gang rape last week that left two teenage cousins dead, their corpses hanging from a village mango tree, has revealed the immense gulf that remains in India. In a nation that can at times appear convulsed with outrage over a culture of sexual violence, there are plenty of occasions when it seems little has changed at all.
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