WorldNews

[attach=full]20238[/attach] Hours after shaking hands, US President Barack Obama and Cuban leader Raul Castro head into historic talks in Panama on Saturday in their efforts to bury decades of animosity. Taking their bid to restore diplomatic ties to a new level, Obama and Castro will have a discussion on the sidelines of the Summit of the Americas in Panama City, according to US officials. The two leaders already said hello late Friday, greeting each other and shaking hands -- a gesture rich in symbolism -- as UN chief Ban Ki-moon and other leaders looked on, before the 35-nation summit's inauguration. They shook hands only once before, at Nelson Mandela's memorial service in 2013. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20235[/attach] Kevin Anderson survived a five-hour rain delay to clinch a berth in the semi-finals of the US Clay Court Championships with a grueling 7-5, 6-7 (6/8), 7-6 (7/3) win over Jeremy Chardy. "They were incredibly tough conditions," Anderson said. Anderson now seeks to reach the 10th ATP Tour final of his career and his second this season when he faces world number 46 Jack Sock, of the US, in the semis. It is the third time he has reached the semi-finals at an ATP event with each coming on a different surface, comprising the hardcourts in Atlanta, grass in Newport and now clay courts in Houston. Continue reading...

QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) — Gunmen in restive southwestern Pakistan shot and killed at least 20 workers early Saturday at a dam construction site, the deadliest recent attack targeting civilians in a region facing a low-level insurgency, authorities said. Continue reading...

GOLD COAST, Australia (AP) — American Gwen Jorgensen's amazing streak continued Saturday when she won the ITU World Triathlon Series event on the Gold Coast for her eighth consecutive victory in the elite series. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20234[/attach] Across the Middle East, fierce rivalry between Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shiite Iran is heightening sectarian tensions, even in conflicts that analysts say are primarily political. Riyadh and Tehran adhere to different branches of Islam and have often backed members of their own sect in regional conflicts. Saudi officials have cast their intervention in Yemen, against rebels who adhere to a branch of Shiite Islam, as a fight of "good versus evil". Iran meanwhile this week accused Riyadh of committing "genocide" with its military operation. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20233[/attach] Gunmen have killed 20 construction workers in Pakistan's restive southwestern province of Baluchistan, shooting them at point blank range after identifying where they were from, officials said Saturday. "Armed gunmen stormed the camp of labourers in Gokh Don area of Baluchistan late Friday night and killed 20 labourers," senior police official Tariq Khilji told AFP. He said those killed were all from outside the province -- 16 of them from Punjab and four from Sindh province. The incident, which occurred around 1,050 kilometres (650 miles) southwest of Quetta, was confirmed by Akbar Hussain Durrani, a senior administration official in the province. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20227[/attach] Louis van Gaal's increasingly confident Manchester United will look to twist the knife in Manchester City's side when the derby rivals clash in Sunday's Premier League showdown at Old Trafford. A run of five consecutive victories has taken United above City for the first time this season and another success this weekend would blacken yet further the storm clouds gathering over the Etihad Stadium. City's 2-1 loss at Crystal Palace on Monday left them nine points behind leaders Chelsea having played a game more, effectively ending their title defence, and they now face a battle to secure a Champions League place. Fourth in the table, Manuel Pellegrini's team enjoy a seven-point lead over fifth-place Liverpool, but both Arsenal and United have stolen a march on them in the race for automatic Champions League qualification and defeat on Sunday would leave them vulnerable to attack from below. Continue reading...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Secretary of State John Kerry is calling for the immediate and unconditional release of five Chinese activists detained before International Women's Day in March. Continue reading...

AUGUSTA, Ga. (AP) — A brief look at the second round Friday of the Masters at Augusta National Golf Club. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20226[/attach] 2:22 p.m. EDT. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20225[/attach] AUGUSTA, Ga. (AP) — Farewell, Gentle Ben. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20221[/attach] PANAMA CITY (AP) — Nicolas Maduro had barely gotten off his plane at the Summit of the Americas on Friday before he gave a symbolic poke in the eye to Washington, paying a visit to a monument honoring victims of the 1989 U.S. invasion of Panama. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20220[/attach] By Mark Hosenball, Phil Stewart and Warren Strobel WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is expanding its intelligence-sharing with Saudi Arabia to provide more information about potential targets in the kingdom's air campaign against Houthi militias in Yemen, U.S. officials told Reuters. The U.S. officials said the expanded assistance includes sensitive intelligence data that will allow the Saudis to better review the kingdom's targets in fighting that has killed hundreds and displaced tens of thousands since March. "We have opened up the aperture a bit wider with what we are sharing with our Saudi partners," said one U.S. official. U.S. ally Saudi Arabia is concerned that the violence could spill over the border it shares with Yemen, and is also worried about the influence of Shi'ite Iran, which has denied Saudi allegations it has provided direct military support to the Houthis. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20219[/attach] UN chief Ban Ki-moon called Friday for a new push to resolve the conflict over Western Sahara and stressed that cooperation to address human rights could help find a settlement. In a report to the Security Council, Ban said Morocco and the Algerian-backed Polisario Front must "seriously engage" with his envoy and "intensify their efforts" to end the conflict over the north African territory. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20218[/attach] OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — The Golden State Warriors bet on Andrew Bogut staying healthy when they signed him to a three-year, $36 million extension before last season, and Bogut bet on himself by taking an incentive-rich deal. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20217[/attach] CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) — Madison Keys and Lucie Hradecka are finding their games on clay and are both surprise semifinalists at the Family Circle Cup. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20208[/attach] SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) — The daughter-in-law of Michelle Bachelet said on Friday that she's sorry if her involvement in a bank loan scandal has damaged the Chilean president. Continue reading...

BERLIN (AP) — German police say a man has been arrested in the Czech Republic on suspicion of killing an Israeli whose body was found in a ruined Berlin church last weekend. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20207[/attach] Once considered a far-right fringe party, Hungary's Jobbik is seeking to clean up its racist image and move towards the centre in an effort to challenge Prime Minister Viktor Orban's ruling Fidesz. Already the second largest party in Hungary, Jobbik wants to prove at a by-election on Sunday that with a weak and divided left wing, it represents the only viable alternative to Orban's rule. Jobbik's leader Gabor Vona, 36, who once founded a paramilitary group that preyed on the Roma minority, is toning down the party's rhetoric which stigmatised Roma as criminals. "It is a campaign tactic in style aimed at voters who would like to see Jobbik leaning towards the centre with a more conciliatory tone," Attila Juhasz, analyst with Political Capital Institute, told AFP. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20206[/attach] Presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro prepared to hold historic talks Saturday, a US official said, setting up the first substantive meeting between an American and Cuban leader since the 1950s. Obama and Castro were in Panama on Friday for the two-day Summit of the Americas, Cuba's first, marking a landmark follow-up to their historic announcement on December 17 that their countries would restore ties severed since 1961. "We certainly do anticipate that they will have the opportunity to see each other at the summit tomorrow, to have a discussion," senior Obama advisor Ben Rhodes told reporters Friday. The meeting will be the first since Obama and Castro briefly shook hands at Nelson Mandela's funeral in December 2013. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20205[/attach] India's prime minister announced Friday that New Delhi had ordered 36 Rafale fighter jets from France in a multi-billion-euro agreement that has been years in the making. Standing alongside his counterpart Francois Hollande on a visit to France -- the first leg of his maiden trip to Europe -- Narendra Modi finally relieved the frantic speculation over whether tortuous, years-long negotiations on buying the jets would ever bear fruit. "I asked the president (Hollande) to supply us with 36 Rafale jet fighter planes, the ready-to-fly models," Modi said at a joint news conference at the Elysee Palace. Negotiations to buy the planes kicked off in 2012 but had been bogged down over cost and New Delhi's insistence on assembling a portion of the high-tech planes in India. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20200[/attach] Six months ago, France's far-right leader Marine Le Pen stormed out of her father Jean-Marie's house after his Doberman dog savaged her Bengal cat to death. A foretaste perhaps of the recent dogfight that has torn apart the National Front party Jean-Marie founded but also the Le Pen family that has already had more than its fair share of scraps. From the vengeful naked appearance of an ex-wife in Playboy to the treachery and "ex-communication" of an eldest daughter, the patriarch Jean-Marie Le Pen, 86, has a family history almost as colourful as his controversial Holocaust comments. Once upon a time, they were the model of a united French family, the proud father Jean-Marie posing with his wife Pierrette and his three impossibly blonde daughters outside the family estate near Paris. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20199[/attach] QUITO, Ecuador (AP) — Church officials say Pope Francis' trip to Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay is set for July 6-12. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20198[/attach] SANAA, Yemen (AP) — Pakistani lawmakers on Friday unanimously voted to stay out of the Saudi-led air coalition targeting Shiite rebels in Yemen in a blow to the alliance, while planes loaded with badly needed medical aid landed in Yemen's embattled capital, Sanaa, in the first such deliveries since the airstrikes started more than two weeks ago. Continue reading...

[attach=full]20197[/attach] A group of Syrian opposition figures is seeking to form an alternative to the National Coalition body and open negotiations with President Bashar al-Assad to end their country's conflict. The "National Syrian Democratic Conference" is expected to take place in Cairo in early May and bring together some 150 opposition figures living in Syria and abroad, organisers say. They want to adopt a "Syrian National Charter" and a roadmap to a resolution of the conflict, which is now in its fifth year, said organiser and veteran dissident Haytham Manna. "The (National) Coalition has never been able to represent the whole of the Syrian opposition because it declared itself as representing all of the opposition and Syrian society even though it excludes key constituents," Manna told AFP. Continue reading...