BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan - Astronauts from the United States, Russia and Japan are poised for their holiday season space mission Monday, when they are to blast off to the International Space Station from Russia's remote space complex in southern Kazakhstan. Their Soyuz TMA-17 rocket is primed at the Baikonur launch pad — where Yuri Gagarin made the first human trip into orbit in 1961 — fo
World leaders on Sunday insisted that the climate deal clinched in desperation at the UN summit was the best that can be done as they returned home to a lashing from critics. Newspapers widely called the summit accord a failure and experts such as the head of a Nobel Peace prize winning climate panel said urgent action was now needed. US President Barack Obama acknowledged that all of the world
The prime minister of Bangladesh, one of the nations worst-hit by global warming, said she was satisfied with the Copenhagen summit's outcome, and hoped rows over thorny issues would be ironed out soon. I am pleased to say that we have been successful in arriving at a reasonable conclusion, Sheikh Hasina said, while speaking at Lund University in Denmark on Saturday, hours after the world leade
China on Sunday welcomed the outcome of climate change talks in Copenhagen, the day after a deal reached to fight global warming came in for heavy criticism. With the efforts of all parties, the summit yielded significant and positive results, foreign minister Yang Jiechi was quoted as saying in a statement on the foreign ministry website. The Copenhagen Accord, passed Saturday after two weeks
COPENHAGEN - Around the world, countries and capitalism are already working to curb global warming on their own, with or without a global treaty. In Brazil more rainforests are being saved, and in Chicago there's a voluntary carbon pollution trading system. People recycle, buy smaller and newer cars, and change lightbulbs. But the impact of such piecemeal, voluntary efforts is small. Experts say
BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan - Three astronauts from the United States, Japan and Russia received the go-ahead Saturday for a holiday season rocket launch to the International Space Station from Russia's remote space complex in southern Kazakhstan. Their Soyuz TMA-17 spacecraft has been hoisted into place at the Baikonur center for a mission that will boost the number of crew at the orbital laboratory to
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Sushi will soar to new gastronomic heights next week when a Japanese astronaut blasts off for the International Space Station with a load of raw fish. Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi, who will fly into space on Monday from the Baikonur cosmodrome with Russia's Oleg Kotov and NASA's Timothy Creamer, said on Saturday he had introduced his colleagues to raw seafood when they tra
COPENHAGEN - A plan to protect the world's biologically rich tropical forests by paying poor nations to protect them was shelved Saturday after world leaders failed to agree on a binding deal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Burning trees to clear land for plantations or cattle ranches and logging forests for wood is blamed for about 20 percent of the world's emissions. That's as much carbon d
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