Syria conflict: World powers agree ceasefire plan
World powers have agreed to seek a nationwide "cessation of hostilities" in Syria to begin in a week's time, after talks in Munich, Germany.
The halt will not apply to the battle against jihadist groups Islamic State (IS) and al-Nusra Front.
The 17-member International Syria Support Group (ISSG) also agreed to accelerate and expand aid deliveries.
The announcement comes as the Syrian army, backed by Russian air strikes, advances in Aleppo province.
The move threatens to encircle tens of thousands of civilians in rebel-held parts of the major city of Aleppo.
The Syrian government has not yet responded, though a key rebel coalition welcomed the announcement.
"If we see action and implementation on the ground, we will be soon in Geneva," Salim al-Muslat told reporters, referring to the Swiss city where the UN is trying to get peace talks between the Syrian government and rebels off the ground.
China's young reporters give up on journalism: 'You can't write what you want'
The ever greater constraints placed on news reporting by Xi Jinping mean many Chinese journalists see no point in pursuing a media career
When a 7.9-magnitude earthquake ripped through Sichuan province in May 2008, Lin Tianhong, a 29-year-old reporter at China Youth Daily, was one of the first to volunteer to head into the disaster zone.
“Everyone wanted to go,” he recalled. “Otherwise, why be a journalist?”
Hours later the Beijing-based reporter was flying towards Sichuan’s shattered countryside for what would be one of the most horrifying and defining moments of his short career in journalism.
For the next two weeks Lin trawled the disaster zone writing a series of devastating frontline dispatches. One article, Back Home, told the story of a couple who carried the corpse of their teenage son, Cheng Lei, home for burialafter digging him from the rubble of his six-storey school.
New York police have been secretly spying on cellphones since 2008, documents show
The New York Civil Liberties Union has documents that show the NYPD secretly spied on cell phones more than 1,000 times since 2008.
The New York Police Department has been secretly spying on cell phones since at least 2008, according to documents released by the New York Civil Liberties Union on Thursday.
The NYCLU, through Freedom of Information Law requests, found that the NYPD used Stingray surveillance equipment more than 1,000 times between 2008 and May 2015, and did so without warrants. Instead, the NYPD received low-level court orders to conduct this surveillance.
“If carrying a cell phone means being exposed to military grade surveillance equipment, then the privacy of nearly all New Yorkers is at risk,” Donna Lieberman, executive director of the NYCLU, said in a statement on the organization's website. “Considering the NYPD’s troubling history of surveilling innocent people, it must at the very least establish strict privacy policies and obtain warrants prior to using intrusive equipment like Stingrays that can track people’s cell phones.”
Six things you need to know about gravitational waves
US scientists are expected to say they can show that gravitational waves exist, ending a century-long search to prove one of Einstein's theories. Here are six reasons they're so important for understanding our universe.
What are gravitational waves?
Imagine a tennis ball on the outer edge of a trampoline. It sits there and doesn't move. Then, a small child walks across the trampoline's surface. The tennis ball moves - not drastically, but measurably - as the ripples of energy pass from the child's feet through the mesh fabric and to the ball.
In a similar way, gravitational waves are created by the movement of any mass through space-time, which Physicist Albert Einstein described as a four-dimensional fabric. Violent events like colliding black holes and exploding stars would have the biggest effect on that fabric.
Gravitational waves travel through the cosmos completely unimpeded, similar to how waves ripple across a pool. In theory, that should allow a complete view of the gravitational-wave universe from earth.
Einstein first predicted the existence of gravitational waves a century ago as part of his Theory of Relativity, but even the world's brightest brains have never been able to prove his theory.
How impoverished but nuclear-armed North Korea earns money
AP | Feb 12, 2016, 12.15 PM ISTSEOUL: The closure of a factory park in North Korea jointly run by both Koreas has robbed the impoverished North of a rare source of legitimate hard currency. Seoul says it shut the Kaesong complex in response to the North's recent long-range rocket launch to keep its impoverished neighbor from using the money factories provided to fund its nuclear and missile programs.
With that hit to Pyongyang's already shaky finances gone, at least for now, here's a look at the North's economy and the external sources of income it maintains despite a raft of heavy international sanctions over its nuclear and ballistic missiles program.
10 Most Corrupt Countries, Ranked By Perception
US News & World ReportBy Rachel Dicker | Staff Writer
Corruption lingers at the core of many of the world's underdeveloped nations.
Nigeria, the most populated country in Africa, is perceived to be the most corrupt among 60 countries evaluated, according to data from the 2016 Best Countries rankings. The rankings are a characterization of 60 countries based on a survey of more than 16,000 people from four regions.
In the survey, respondents answered how closely they related each of the 60 countries to the term "corrupt." Respondents were given no further specifications of the term, so interpretation of the word "corrupt" was left to survey respondents.
Elections in Nigeria face scrutiny, even though government accountability is seen as having improved. In 2015, President Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari became the first opposition party candidate to win an election. As part of his presidential campaign, Buhari promised to crack down on corruption.
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