Blacks in New Orleans cry foul over French Quarter curfew
The City Council says stricter rules are meant to protect kids, but critics accuse members of wanting to keep low-income blacks out of sight of tourists.
By Richard Fausset, Los Angeles Times
Reporting from Atlanta– From a distance, it seemed like common sense: an ordinance meant to keep children away from an open-air night-life zone with more than 350 places to buy booze, an abundance of strip joints and a 300-year-old reputation for iniquity.
But last week, as the New Orleans City Council approved a strict curfew for youths 16 and younger in the French Quarter, it sparked an incendiary debate that laid bare some of the tensions over race and police priorities that the Louisiana city – which suffers from the nation’s highest per capita murder rate – is struggling to resolve as it navigates its post-Hurricane Katrina future.
Syria unrest: Arab League to discuss observer mission
Foreign ministers from the Arab League are due to meet to debate the initial findings of their mission in Syria and to discuss whether to ask for UN help.
The BBC 8 January 2012
An observer mission sent by the League to assess a peace plan has been criticised as toothless, as violence continued despite its presence.
At least 27 people died across the country on Saturday, activists said.
The clashes came as thousands joined a state-organised funeral for victims of a bomb blast on Friday in Damascus.
At least 26 people died in that attack, some of them members of the security forces.
Cambodia’s lost temple, reclaimed from the jungle after 800 years
Experts use 3D imaging to undo ravages of time and thieves at the haunting Banteay Chhmar site
DENIS D GRAY BANTEAY CHHMAR, CAMBODIA SUNDAY 08 JANUARY 2012
The haunting monastic complex is so entwined in jungle vines and mystery that it could be the set of an Indiana Jones film. But it is not. It is one of the great historic treasures of south-east Asia, and is slowly awakening after eight centuries of isolated slumber.
The dramatic towers, bas-reliefs and dark chambers of Cambodia’s Banteay Chhmar make it a far more atmospheric place than its famous twin at Angkor Wat. What drove Jayavarman VII, regarded as the greatest king of the Angkorian Empire, to erect this vast Buddhist temple about 105 miles (170km) from his capital in Angkor, and in one of the most desolate and driest places in Cambodia, remains one of its many unsolved riddles.
Burma’s opposition prepares for the unexpected after Aung San Suu Kyi agrees to contest elections
At the cobwebbed headquarters of Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy, party workers are feverishly preparing for an election many thought they would never see – Burma’s first in 22 years.
By Dean Nelson in Rangoon
Party veterans are dusting down old contacts books under the gaze of yellowing propaganda portraits of Suu Kyi’s father, Burma’s independence leader General Aung San, and more recent pictures of the graceful and iconic opposition leader herself.
Farmers, relatives of political prisoners, old ladies with powdered cheeks, and students are serving noodles, collecting pamphlets, and discussing strategy.
There are stalls selling T-shirts, mugs, notebooks bearing the gentle face of one of the world’s most revered political leaders.
Men of steel revive the heart of Gotham
The ironworkers of New York are proud of their rich history and their role in rebuilding an icon, writes Andrew Purcell.
January 8, 2012
On a windy day, One World Trade Centre sways from side to side, as all unfinished skyscrapers do. Standing on the corrugated steel deck that will be the 88th floor, I find the lateral movement disconcerting, the feeling more like seasickness than vertigo, until you look down. The view can stop and unsteady you, this high above Manhattan.
The only two men permitted to work without safety harnesses are Michael O’Reilly and Tommy Hickey, both from Irish-American families that built New York in the glory days of steel.
ANC centenary draws praise from African leaders
African leaders on Saturday hailed the ANC in centenary celebrations for the continent’s oldest liberation movement which inspired regional struggles for freedom.
JUSTINE GERARDY BLOEMFONTEIN, SOUTH AFRICA – Jan 08 2012 06:57
African drums and the ritual slaughter of a bull featured in the second day of celebrations commemorating 100 years of the ANC before a gala dinner attended by more than a dozen African leaders and former leaders.
“When we talk about [the] ANC, it is part of Africa, in particular Southern Africa,” said Mozambican President Armando Guebuza at the dinner which ran into the early hours of Sunday.
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