Daily News Channel
Lawmakers in the west African country — one of the world’s top producers of oil — are crafting new money-making changes for its state oil corporation, as officials negotiate multibillion-dollar oil deals with China.
When Sudanese-born billionaire Mo Ibrahim announced an annual $5 million prize to reward Africa’s best leaders, he warned that there would be years when “we wouldn’t award the prize.” Just three years on, and despite considering “some credible candidates,” the prize committee said on Monday that no prize would be awarded in 2009. In announcing the decision, committee member and former Botswana President Ketumile Masire said the panel “noted the progress made with governance in some African countries, while noticing with concern recent setbacks in other countries.” The non-award is, of course, a powerful indictment of Africa’s still patchy governance and the continent’s most recently retired leaders
As authorities confirmed the “balloon boy” saga was a hoax, they checked the vessel created by Richard Heene to see whether it could have actually carried his 6-year-old son Falcon. During the incident Thursday, when Heene said his 37-pound son may have been inside the flying-saucer-shaped balloon, the sheriff’s department contacted a specialist at Colorado State University to determine whether it could carry the child.
Twelve people, including two police officers, were killed Saturday in a gun battle between two rival drug gangs in a slum in northern Rio de Janeiro, a state spokesman said.
The State Department has decided to authorize visas for a North Korean nuclear delegation so they can attend conferences in the United States later this month, a department spokesman said Friday.
Turkey’s foreign minister denied any government link to a controversial historical drama being broadcast on Turkey’s state television network.
An impassioned U.S.
The sights and sounds of rocks rolling down mountainsides are common but still captivating phenomena for the residents of the Nile Valley in central Washington state. “Every morning I hear big rocks coming down,” said longtime valley resident Frank Koch
Imagine if the Empire State Building were to be placed smack in the middle of Venice or Jerusalem. Jutting out from the ancient streets, a skyscraper of that size would seem absurdly out of sync with the iconic beauty of the cities.
Rapper and actor Clifford Smith, better known to fans as Method Man, was arrested Monday and faces charges of failing to pay taxes, the district attorney in Richmond County, New York, said. Smith, 38, owes the state nearly $33,000 for New York State income tax returns that he did not file between 2004 and 2007, district attorney Daniel Donovan Jr.