SANTIAGO, Chile – The earthquake and tsunami that struck Chile last month killed 700 people and caused damages of nearly $30 billion, according to the government.And the ground hasn't stopped shaking.A magnitude-6.7 aftershock rocked south-central Chile Monday night, adding to the raw nerves and mounting damages caused by the Feb.27 quake.Chile's Interior Minister Rodrigo Hinzpeter updated
Amid controversy, the Vatican's instinct is typically to protect the man at the top, particularly when it comes to what is known in both secular and ecclesiastical terms as scandal.That is evident again with a priest pedophile controversy from the 1980s in Germany that is threatening to draw in the German-born Benedict XVI, even as his countrymen demand that he respond directly. The Pope was not
Iran has deployed hundreds of police across Tehran ahead of the beginning of Persian New Year celebrations.Authorities fear the occasion will be used by opposition supporters to protest against last year's disputed presidential election results.Tehran's police chief Gen Hossein Sajedinia told reporters police were out in force to prevent any event happening in the city.The authorities have bran
Beckham was operated on in Finland on Monday by surgeon Sakari Orava after picking up an injury playing for AC Milan at the weekend which will rule him out of the World Cup. I'm feeling positive and now concentrating on getting back to full fitness over the coming months, Beckham told his website. The operation was a success and I'd like to thank Dr Orava and all the medical staff who looked aft
WASHINGTON – Michelle Obama is urging the nation's largest food companies to speed up efforts to make healthier foods and reduce marketing of unhealthy foods to children.Obama asked the companies, gathered at a meeting of the Grocery Manufacturers Association on Tuesday, to step it up and put less fat, salt and sugar in foods. We need you not to just tweak around the edges but entirely re
President Obama's nominee to be the U.S ambassador to Syria, a post deliberately left vacant for years, encountered no resistance Tuesday at a Senate Foreign Relations confirmation hearing. I'm confident the committee will be able to move the nomination before the spring recess that begins March 26, said Chairman John Kerry, D-Mass. Obama picked Robert Ford for the job on Feb.16.The decision
VATICAN CITY – Vatican investigators have completed their probe into the Legionaries of Christ, the conservative order that was once hailed by Rome but fell into scandal after it revealed that its founder had fathered a child and had molested seminarians.The Vatican said Tuesday its five investigators are to report back to Rome this week about their examination of the Legionaries' 120 semin
A record-breaking deal worth more than $200m between Sony and the estate of Michael Jackson has transformed the late singer’s finances, paving the way for a slew of new commercial ventures and a refinancing of the debts that were hanging over him when he died in June.The deal clears up any uncertainty over Sony’s rights to music Jackson had written but not released.When he died, he was out of con
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