Robert Mugabe faces looming deadline to resign
by Tendai Marima
As a noon deadline for President Robert Mugabe to resign nears, as imposed by Zimbabwe's ruling party, people remain in a state of shock after the 93-year-old leader refused to bow to pressure and quit.
Public expectation was high that Mugabe, under incredible pressure to quit, would tender his resignation in a live address to the nation on Sunday evening. But after 37 years in power, Mugabe held to his throne longer.
In a scenario that last week would have been unthinkable, tens of thousands of citizens and his ruling ZANU-PF party have turned against Mugabe after a military takeover on November 15 - which put the president under house arrest
UN concerned by controversial US plan to revive Afghan militias
Afghan strongmen have already begun vying for influence over militia program that diplomats fear will undermine Afghan government and lead to abuse
Sune Engel Rasmussen in Kabul
As the Afghan government struggles to stem the Taliban insurgency and shore up its dwindling security forces, the US military is turning to a controversial solution long known to stoke unrest and exploitation: local militias.
International donors, including the UN, have warned against such plans and lobbied the Afghan president to reject the US proposal. They say the new militias resemble the Afghan Local Police, a force notorious for grave human rights abuses and destabilising villages by undermining the central government.
The so-called Afghan National Army Territorial Force, essentially self-defence units of locally recruited men serving in their own villages, will be piloted with 1,000 men, once Afghan president Ashraf Ghani approves the proposal, and will eventually number some 20,000, officials say.
Holocaust survivor, 102, meets nephew he never knew he had
Eliahu Pietruszka overcome with emotion as meets brother's son Alexandre, 66, in Israel
Eliahu Pietruszka shuffled his 102-year-old body through the lobby of his retirement home toward a stranger he had never met and collapsed into him in a teary embrace. Then he kissed both cheeks of his visitor and in a frail, squeaky voice began blurting out greetings in Russian, a language he hadn't spoken in decades.
Only days earlier, the Holocaust survivor who fled Poland at the beginning of the Second World War and thought his entire family had perished learned that a younger brother had also survived, and his brother's son, 66-year-old Alexandre, was flying in from a remote part of Russia to see him.
Could Iran’s sand storms be fought with nanotechnology?
In Iran, sand and dust storms are a persistent, worsening problem. Climate change and water mismanagement have transfigured whole regions of the country in the last half-century, notably in the southeast and the southwest, where these storms swallow up entire villages and make the air very difficult to breathe. Since the 1960s, the authorities have used petrol-based mulch to try to stabilise the ground in dry areas. But now, inventors are testing out less harmful organic mulches – including one created using nanotechnology.
In recent years, several startups have come up with new mixtures using clay, vegetable fibers and gelatin to create a sticky mulch that is poured over dirt to keep it from being moved by winds. These are all organic, but they are generally only effective for two to three years, compared with four to five years for petrol-based mulch.
US Marine arrested following fatal Okinawa truck crash
Updated 0813 GMT (1613 HKT) November 20, 2017
A US service member has been arrested following a deadly vehicle crash on the Japanese island of Okinawa early Sunday morning.
Marine Pvt. First Class Nicholas James-McLean was driving a truck when it collided with another vehicle at 5:25 a.m. in Okinawa's capital of Naha, killing the other driver -- a 61-year-old local man identified as Jun Tamanaha, the Naha police department told CNN.
Police said James-McLean's blood alcohol content was three times the legal limit.
Charles Manson dies aged 83 after four decades in prison
Charles Manson, the notorious cult leader who directed his followers to commit a string of brutal murders, and who became a symbol of the dark side of 1960s counterculture, has died aged 83.
Manson was admitted to Bakersfield hospital, California earlier this month and died of natural causes on Sunday.
In 1969, his followers, known as the Manson family, killed seven people.
Among the victims of the killing spree was heavily pregnant Hollywood actress Sharon Tate, wife of Roman Polanski.
One of Manson's young followers, Susan Atkins, stabbed Tate to death and scrawled "PIG" on the home's front door with the actress's blood.
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