| Top Stories |
| Karadzic fights war crimes transfer |
AFP - A deadline loomed Friday for Radovan Karadzic to appeal his transfer to the UN war crimes tribunal, as more details emerged about his life on the run and his assets came under threat of confiscation.
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| Obama in Paris to meet with pro-US Sarkozy |
AFP - Barack Obama arrived in Paris Friday to meet the pro-US President Nicolas Sarkozy on a world tour aimed at burnishing the White House hopeful's foreign policy credentials ahead of November elections.
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| Eight small blasts hit Indian IT city of Bangalore |
Reuters - Eight small bombs exploded in
quick succession across the south Indian IT city of Bangalore
on Friday, killing a woman and wounding at least 15 people,
police said.
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| Senate energy speculation bill fails key vote |
Reuters - U.S. legislation to rein in
excessive energy speculation failed a key procedural vote on
Friday to move forward in the Senate, and now lawmakers will
set aside the bill to consider other legislation.
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| Trade talks continue amid "encouraging signs": WTO |
Reuters - Global trade talks which had appeared on
the brink of collapse were advancing amid "encouraging signs of
progress" on Friday afternoon, World Trade Organization
spokesman Keith Rockwell said.
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| Obama says foreign tour will reassure Americans |
Reuters - U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama
hopes his visit to Europe and the Middle East will show U.S.
voters that he is a safe pair of hands, the Democrat said in an
interview on Friday.
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| Consumers, home sales paint less gloomy picture |
Reuters - Consumer sentiment rebounded in July
from a 28-year low and business investment rose unexpectedly
last month, according to data on Friday that showed rare signs
of resilience for the U.S. economy.
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| Politics |
| Clock ticks down on stalled WTO talks |
AFP - Top WTO negotiators headed for make-or-break talks on Friday, with progress needed on key sticking-points to avert another ignominious collapse of attempts to broker a new global free-trade pact.
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| Obama stirs complex feelings in France |
Politico - As Barack Obama’s overseas tour continues to prompt swoons of European delight – over 200,000 came out to see him speak in Berlin Thursday – Friday’s stop in France will provoke more than simple adoration.
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| McCain struggles to be heard in face of Obama trip |
AP - In the face of Barack Obama's overseas tour de force, rival presidential candidate John McCain struggled to be heard. Yet amid the awkward moments, he managed to campaign busily in key battleground states and to raise millions of dollars at fundraisers.
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| Israeli paper publishes Obama Western Wall prayer |
AP - A written prayer that Barack Obama left this week in the cracks of the Western Wall, Judaism's holiest site, asks God to guide him and guard his family, an Israeli newspaper reported Friday.
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| NYPD, Port Authority agree on WTC security plan |
AP - Police and the World Trade Center site's owner sketched out a security agreement Thursday that settles a turf war over who will protect ground zero against terrorism as the Lower Manhattan site is rebuilt.
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| Obama speech draws praise from chancellor's office |
AP - Barack Obama's speech to a huge Berlin crowd sent a "positive signal" to Europe, German Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman said Friday, praising the Democratic presidential candidate's focus on working with U.S. partners.
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| Obama's brief stop in Paris belies his popularity |
AP - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama expected to spend just enough time in Paris on Friday for talks with the French president and a joint news conference, not a rousing speech like the one he delivered in Berlin.
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| Technology |
| Review: Pass on `NCAA Football 09: All-Play' |
AP - If the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions of "NCAA Football 09" are the starting seniors, then Wii owners might feel like redshirt freshmen with EA Sports' first college football game for Nintendo's popular gaming console.
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| 2 activist shareholder nominees to join CSX board |
AP - Railroad CSX says it has asked two nominees of activist hedge fund shareholders TCI and 3G Capital to join its board, but a vote on two others remains too close to call.
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| Report: MySpace could work with Amazon on music service |
CNET - Amazon.com could become the e-commerce engine behind the MySpace Music service expected to launch in September, according to a report on TechCrunch.
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| Bikers, pedestrians seeking better Web maps |
AP - With the old gas-guzzler in the garage, you've got your bicycle ready and your sneakers laced up. Now all you need is a map of the quickest, safest routes for riding around town. Well, not so fast.
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| Netflix 2Q profit up 4 pct, beats analyst views |
AP - Netflix Inc.'s second-quarter profit edged up 4 percent, beating analyst expectations as the online DVD rental leader signed up 168,000 new customers while spending less money to attract them to the service.
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| Thief steals Prince Harry's phone in Lesotho |
AFP - Britain's Prince Harry, briefly dumped by his girlfriend last year over compromising text messages, was breathing a sigh of relief on Friday after being reunited with a cell phone stolen in Lesotho.
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| Yahoo: Burn Your DRMed Tracks to CD Now |
PC World - Yahoo has become the latest company to abandon customers who bought tracks from its music store encoded with DRM, drawing fire...
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| International |
| EU condemns Bulgaria over corruption, freezes funds |
AFP - The European Commission condemned Bulgaria Wednesday for its failure to tackle corruption and bad management of EU funds and said it has frozen hundreds of millions of euros in aid money.
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| Trade powers struggle to save WTO round |
Reuters - The United States, the European Union
and emerging economic heavyweights will try again on Tuesday to
line up the long-elusive trade-offs needed to save a deal to
dismantle export barriers around the world.
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| EU bid to steal show at WTO falls flat |
AFP - A bid by the European Union to kickstart crucial trade talks with a new-sounding offer on agriculture tariffs fell flat on Monday with Brazil denouncing the proposal as "gimmickry".
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| EU, US pressure emerging economies at WTO talks |
AFP - The United States and European Union took aim at emerging economies at crucial WTO trade talks on Monday, warning them to open up their markets if the seven-year Doha Round is to succeed.
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| Teva to buy Barr Pharma for more than $7 billion |
AP - Israeli drugmaker Teva Pharmaceutical says it will buy rival generic drug company Barr Pharmaceuticals for more than $7 billion, in a move to expand its presence in U.S. and Eastern European markets.
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| Slovakia preps isolated Roma for switch to euro |
AFP - Slovakia, which adopts the euro in six months, is putting its money where its mouth is with a drive to help its long-neglected gypsy minority with the switch to the official EU currency.
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| Eurozone industrial output slumps in May |
AFP - Factories and refineries in the 15 nations sharing the euro ratcheted down production in May at the fastest rate in nearly 16 years amid growing economic headwinds, according to official EU data on Monday.
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| Real Estate |
| Breaking Ground: The Vistas of Las Campanas and Querencia |
New houses at a golf community in Santa Fe, N.M., and a residential development in a popular resort area in Mexico.
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| Living Here | Houses With Great Decks: On the Boards |
?The deck makes the world feel tranquil and serene, but close to nature.?
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| Your Second Home | Water Safety: Keeping Splashing Fun |
If you have water at or near your second home, you should take the time to brush up on basic safety precautions before jumping in.
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| Havens | Old Lyme, Conn.: Still the Place for Some Salt Air and a Good Think |
Much of Old Lyme?s low-cost living may have disappeared, but many second-home owners still come for the high thinking.
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| Getting All of It There and Back |
Those who pack up every Friday night for the trip to the weekend home and repeat the process on Sunday for the trip back have their own issues.
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| In a Hong Kong Flat, Customized Design and Storage |
Joanne Ooi spent more than $100,000 renovating her two-bedroom two-bath apartment in Hong Kong.
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| Property Values: What You Get for...$3 Million |
An 1851 brick Federal house with four bedrooms in Savannah, Ga.; a three-bedroom house in Seattle; and a three-bedroom chalet-style home in Edwards, Colo.
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| Science |
| China aims for bigger slice of satellite market |
Reuters - China aims to build a leading aerospace
industry by 2015, when the country would command 10 percent of
the world's commercial satellite market, and 15 percent of the
space launch market, Xinhua said on Friday.
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| Body Language: What McCain and Obama Reveal |
LiveScience.com - Barack Obama spoke in front of 200,000 Germans in Berlin on
Thursday at the start of a European tour, while John McCain talked to small business
leaders at a fourth-generation German restaurant in Columbus, Ohio. But
regardless of the audience, people undoubtedly paid as much attention to the
nonverbal performance as they did to what each presidential candidate said.
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| Dolly dwindles but flood threat still looms in Texas, Mexico |
AFP - One person was killed as tropical depression Dolly dumped rain over Texas and Mexico on Friday after pummeling the coast as a hurricane and stirring up floods.
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| H2O power |
Could water really have a memory?
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| HIV drugs 'add 13 years of life' |
Life expectancy for people with HIV increases by 13 years on average since the late 1990s, survey finds.
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| HP's plan to fix ailing planet |
Hewlett Packard's nanotech lab plans to build a central nervous system for the earth and help businesses at the same time.
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| Rare fossils in India threatened |
Nature protected rare fossils for millions of years, but humans are now destroying them, says the BBC's Salman Ravi in eastern India.
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