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A protest on the Japanese island of Okinawa calling for the closure of a United States military base attracted almost 100,000 people on Sunday, after speculations that the Japanese government may back out of an election promise to force it off the island entirely. The base, Marine Corps Air Station Futenma, has been long criticized by the Japanese people, as it and other bases on the island have served as the location for most of America's 47,000 troops stationed in Japan. The US military presence on the island is seen by some as a legacy of

According to Mohammed Issa Aliou, a spokesman for the Rezeigat tribe in Darfur, Sudan, at least 55 people have been killed in the city after clashes with the Southern Sudanese army. Issa Aliou said yesterday that Rezeigat tribal members were attacked by armed forces near the border with the partially autonomous South Sudan on Friday, as they were looking for water and new pastures. The South Sudanese army, however, responded by saying that the tribal members were the ones who had started the attacks. "A company of 120 SPLA [Sudan People's L

A 6.5 magnitude earthquake has struck off the southeastcoast of Taiwan earlier today, the US Geological Survey reports. The quake's depth was at ten kilometres (6.2 miles), which is considered relatively shallow. The epicentre was 269 kilometres (167 miles) east of T'ai-tung, Taiwan. It struck at 10:59:50 local time, or 02:59:50 UTC. The Taiwanese Central Weather Bureau said no tsunami warning was issued over the temblor; the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center also said there is no threat of a Pacific-wide tsunami. According to the Associated Pre

Singer Bret Michaels has remained in a critical condition after suffering a brain haemorrhage. The Poison singer was rushed to a Los Angeles hospital on Friday with complaints of a severe headache. His publicist released a statement saying that "Bret is a fighter and we are hopeful that once all is complete, the slurred speech, blurred vision and dizziness etc will be eliminated and all functions will return to normal." He added that Michaels is conscious. Michaels reached fame in the 1980s along with the glam rock band Poison. The group r

The Sudanese president, Omar al-Bashir, has been declared the winner of this month's elections, after the first multiparty polls in 24 years. Salva Kiir, a former rebel leader, meanwhile, was also declared president of the semi-autonomous southern Sudan in separate elections. According to the Sudanese election commission, al-Bashir won 68% of the vote, while Salva Kiir obtained 93% of the vote out of slightly more than 2.5 million total votes. "The first [was] Omar Hassan Ahmed al-Bashir. He was the candidate and won," said Abel Alier, the ch

Fidesz, the conservative Hungarian party, has won a two-thirds majority in parliament, according to official results. With about 99% of all votes counted, Fidesz is projected to have won 263 seats in the 386-seat parliament, ending eight years of Socialist government. The incumbent Socialists placed a distant second, obtaining 59 seats, while the far-right Jobbik took 47 seats. A new Green party, called Politics Can Be Different, received sixteen seats, and an independent candidate took the remaining seat. With this power change, Fidesz now

29-year-old William Trubridge from New Zealand set a new freediving record on Sunday, reaching a depth of 116 metres (380 feet) in the Atlantic Ocean, holding his breath for four minutes nine seconds — breaking the world record for the deepest free immersion dive. Wearing a silicon-coated wetsuit, Trubridge plunged into world's deepest blue hole in a bay west of Clarence Town on Long Island, Bahamas. Dean's Blue Hole is 202 metres (663 ft) deep. Using breaststroke and fins to decend, he said “It was hard to get the tag from the bottom as I str

Several NATO oil tankers were set on fire in the Punjab province of Pakistan, and four policemen were killed in a gunfight with unknown gunmen yesterday, reports say. The Deutsche Presse-Agentur (DPA) news service attributes the attack to the Taleban. The incidents occurred in the town of Talagang. Aslam Tareen, the regional police chief, said that "around a dozen" tankers were set on fire after being attacked with rocket-propelled grenades. "Later on, they exchanged intensive fire with the police and killed four of our officers while two more

A convicted killer in the western US state of Utah has chosen to die by firing squad in Utah's first execution in more than 10 years. Ronnie Lee Gardner indicated his preference at a state court in Salt Lake City on Friday, after being informed that an appeal against his death sentence had been rejected. Gardner was convicted in 1985 of fatally shooting an attorney during a failed escape attempt at a courthouse in the same city. Under state law, the 49-year-old had a choice between death by lethal injection or a by five-person team of shooters

Paul Schäfer died at 88 from cardiac-respiratory arrest on early Saturday morning in a Chilean prison hospital. Schäfer was the founder and former leader of Colonia Dignidad, an enclave used for torturing and exterminating political prisoners during Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship. Hr was convicted for sexually abusing 26 children for years, and retained thousands of people under his own tyrannical regime, that worked as an aside territory in the country, where people spoke the German language. Jorge Zepeda, magistrate who investigated the cri

At least ten people are dead after a large, destructive tornado tore through Yazoo City, Mississippi yesterday. The tornado has been rated an EF4 on the Enhanced Fujita Scale, and is estimated to have had at most 170 mph winds. Five of the deaths were in Choctaw County, four in Yazoo County, and one in Holmes County. 21 people have been hospitalized as a result of the storm, and others have been trapped in cars and houses. Multiple injuries resulted from cars being blown off of Interstate 55 during the storm. The tornado moved along a path 97

The British foreign office has apologised, after a leaked memo about a visit by Pope Benedict XVI suggested that he might launch a "Benedict" brand of condoms, bless a gay marriage, and open an abortion clinic during a papal visit to the UK. The memo followed a brainstorming session, where members of the Papal Visit Team came up with ideas for the first papal visit to Britain in 28 years, and was sent to senior civil servants via email on the 5th of March, with the title "Policy planning ahead of the Pope’s visit". Attached files included an "