US officials confirm Zika causes severe birth defects
After WHO's comments, CDC experts now say there is no doubt the virus causes microcephaly and other serious defects.
| Zika virus, Health, Brazil, United States, Latin America
US health officials have confirmed that the Zika virus causes babies to be born with abnormally small heads and severe brain defects, confirming the worst fears of many pregnant women in the US and Latin America.
Doctors in Brazil have been linking Zika infections in pregnant women to a rise in newborns with microcephaly - an unusually small skull - since last year.
Most outside experts were cautious about drawing such a connection but the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says it has enough evidence to confirm that.
"There is no longer any doubt that Zika causes microcephaly," Tom Frieden, CDC director, said on Wednesday.
Missing Nigerian girls appear in video shown to Chibok parents
Girls state their names and urge government to help reunite them with families in video released by Boko Haram
A video apparently showing a group of Nigerian girls who were kidnapped byBoko Haram two years ago has been shown to distraught parents in the town of Chibok.
Fifteen girls, who are among more than 200 still missing, appear on the video, which was made almost four months ago. In response to off-camera questions, they calmly say their names and where they are from. The girls, who are Christian, are wearing black hijabs.
Towards the end of the two-minute clip, one of the girls, Naomi Zakaria, urges the Nigerian authorities to help reunite the girls with their families. “I am speaking on 25 December 2015, on behalf of the all the Chibok girls and we are all well,” she says, stressing the word “all”.
What are the largest religious groups around the world, and where are they?
The distribution of religions across the world
The world is going to become more religious, with the number of people who identify as non-religious shrinking as a percentage of the world’s population, according to a report by the Pew Research Centre.
But what are the world's religions, and how they distributed? This map, developed by The Independent and Statistia, shows which religions have the most subscribers in different parts of the world.
The changes in numbers of religious followers are mainly down to fertility rates and the relatively youthful age of many believers. Christianity, currently the dominant religion in the entire western hemisphere, is expected to remain the world’s most popular religion. By 2050, if current trends continue, four out of ten Christians will live in sub-Saharan Africa.
Is North Korea finally close to collapse?
Predictions of an imminent demise of the Kim regime in Pyongyang have so far failed to come true. But are powerful sanctions taking their toll and leading to more defections and unrest in the North? Julian Ryall reports.
For decades, politicians, policy experts and analysts have been predicting the imminent implosion of the North Korean regime, either as a result of economic collapse, external pressures, or a military coup to replace the Kim family as hereditary head of state. Some have even gone so far to suggest that internal pressures were close to the point at which a popular uprising might occur, similar to the one that deposed Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu in 1989.
Yet, successive members of the Kim clan have defied the crises and predictions to cling on to power.
Today, however, North Korea faces arguably the toughest test of "juche," its official political ideology of self-reliance that was dreamed up by Kim Il-sung, the first head of the nation and grandfather of present leader Kim Jong-un.
Can China get away with abducting people overseas?
Updated 0911 GMT (1611 HKT) April 14, 2016
The ongoing crisis over the deportation by Kenyan authorities of 45 Taiwanese nationals to China has sparked consternation in Taipei and accusations of international kidnapping worldwide.
Besides the fact that the individuals were cleared of all crimes by a Kenyan court, their extradition to China, ostensibly due to pressure from Chinese officials, raises essential questions about the future implications of the "one China" policy in a time of greater Chinese assertiveness.
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