World

HONG KONG, (Reuters) – Thousands of Hong Kong pro-democracy activists clashed with police last night as they tried to encircle government headquarters, defying orders from authorities to retreat after more than two months of demonstrations.

TOKYO, (Reuters) – Gold prices fell the most in more than three weeks and the Swiss franc dipped slightly today after Swiss voters overwhelmingly rejected proposals to boost gold reserves in a referendum.

DAKAR, (Reuters) – Gambia’s foreign minister said the West African country would sever all dialogue with the European Union and rejected what he said were attempts by the bloc to use its aid budget to force Gambia to revoke a tough new law against homosexuality.

LONDON, (Reuters) – The world has finally reached “the beginning of the end” of the AIDS pandemic that has infected and killed millions in the past 30 years, according to a leading campaign group fighting HIV.

FERGUSON, Missouri (Reuters) – Activists in Ferguson, Missouri, yesterday began a 120-mile march to the state capital to protest the killing of an unarmed black teen by a white police officer, a case that has rekindled a national debate over US race relations.

PARIS (Reuters) – Nicolas Sarkozy won the leadership of the conservative UMP yesterday, a potential step towards a bid to be French president for a second time, but his victory was not decisive enough to cow his rivals in the party.

JONESBORO, Ga (Reuters) – A 13-year-old boy who had been reported missing four years ago was discovered alive, hidden behind a fake wall of a home near Atlanta, Georgia, and reunited with his mother early yesterday, police said.

HONG KONG (Reuters) – Thousands of pro-democracy activists clashed with police in running scuffles in Hong Kong’s gritty Mong Kok district early yesterday in a bid to reclaim part of one of the city’s largest and most volatile protest sites.

CAIRO (Reuters) – An Egyptian court has dropped its case against former President Hosni Mubarak over the killing of protesters in the 2011 uprising that ended his 30-year rule and symbolised hopes for a new era of political openness and accountability.

CAIRO, (Reuters) – An Egyptian court on Saturday dropped its case against ousted President Hosni Mubarak, his interior minister and six aides on charges of ordering the killing of protesters during the 2011 revolt that removed him from power.

KANO, Nigeria, (Reuters) – Gunmen set off three bombs and opened fire on worshippers at the main mosque in north Nigeria’s biggest city Kano yesterday, killing at least 81 people, witnesses and officials said, in an attack that bore the hallmarks of Islamist Boko Haram militants.

VIENNA, (Reuters) – Saudi Arabia blocked calls on Thursday from poorer members of the OPEC oil exporter group for production cuts to arrest a slide in global prices, sending benchmark crude plunging to a fresh four-year low.

FERGUSON, Mo., (Reuters) – Demonstrators shut down a shopping mall near Ferguson, Missouri, at the start of the holiday shopping season yesterday as protests over the killing of an unarmed black teen by a white police officer turned against some retailers around the country.

MONROVIA, (Reuters) – Liberia’s Supreme Court suspended campaigning for next month’s senate election yesterday while it considers a petition warning that electioneering risks spreading the Ebola outbreak, the information minister said.

ASUNCION, (Reuters) – More than 40 percent of Paraguay’s indigenous communities are landless and many of those who have with homes are being displaced by a rapid expansion in soybean farming and cattle-ranching, a United Nations official said yesterday.

NEW DELHI, (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Two Indian teenage girls found hanged in May took their own lives and were not raped or murdered, police investigators told media yesterday, fuelling further criticism of their handling of a case that sparked global outrage.

PARIS, (Reuters) – French President Francois Hollande warned African leaders on Thursday against trying to modify constitutions to stay in power and said they should learn from the forced departure of Burkina Faso’s president Blaise Compaore.

ABIDJAN, (Reuters) – Ivory Coast has seized two Chinese trawlers accused of fishing illegally offshore the West African country, a senior Ivorian navy source said yesterday.

FERGUSON, Mo., (Reuters) – National Guard troops and police aimed to head off a third night of violence yesterday in Ferguson, Missouri, as more than 400 people have been arrested in the St.

MADRID, (Reuters) – Spain’s Health Minister Ana Mato resigned yesterday after an investigating judge accused her of benefiting from a kickback scheme that has already damaged Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s People’s Party (PP).