United Nations, June 14: India will surpass China to become world's most populous nation around 2028, with its population crossing the 1.45 billion mark, according to latest report by the United Nations. The report 'World Population Prospects' says the world's population will hit 7.2 billion next month and is projected to reach 10.9 billion by 2100, with the growth mainly occurring in developing countries, with more than half in Africa. But, with the number of future global dwellers linked to fertility, the number at the end of the century could be as high 16.6 billion or even fall to 6.8...
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WASHINGTON/BEIRUT -- The United States has concluded that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces used chemical weapons against rebel fighters and Washington will supply direct military assistance to the opposition, the White House said on Thursday. The new assessment and decision came as Assad's surging forces and their Lebanese Hezbollah allies turned their guns on the north, fighting near the northern city of Aleppo and bombarding the central city of Homs after having seized the initiative by winning the open backing of Hezbollah last month and capturing the strategic town of Qusair last week. With outgunned rebel...
Iranians go to the polls tomorrow to elect a new president knowing that for the first time in eight years the country will be led by someone other than Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a divisive leader who has pushed the country into isolation over its nuclear ambitions and to near economic ruin. Whether Iran’s new leader – voters have the choice between six men – will herald a new era remains unclear. Some argue that a victory for the one remaining reformist candidate, Hassan Rouhani, could lead to real change. Others doubt that any of the candidates can alter the will of Ali Hosseini Khamenei, Iran’s Supreme Leader, and that the election is nothing more than a sham. Hours before the polls opened,...
TEHRAN, Iran — In the end, Iran's presidential election may be defined by who doesn't vote. Connect With Us on Twitter Follow @nytimesworld for international breaking news and headlines. Twitter List: Reporters and Editors As polls opened early Friday, arguments over whether to boycott the ballot still boiled over at coffee shops, kitchen tables and on social media among many liberal-leaning Iranians. The choice — once easy for many who turned their back in anger after years of crackdowns — has been suddenly complicated by an unexpected chance to perhaps wage a bit of payback against Iran's rulers. The rising fortunes of the lone relative moderate left in the race, former nuclear negotiator...
Zimbabwe was plunged into fresh political crisis on Thursday as Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai vowed to fight a unilateral decision by President Robert Mugabe to hold elections on July 31. Mugabe used temporary presidential powers to set the date for a vote that would put an end to their uneasy power-sharing government. “Today, early in the morning, I received a letter from president Mugabe [proclaiming]... July 31 as the election day,” Tsvangirai said. “President Mugabe is acting unlawfully and unconstitutionally,” said his long-time political rival. “As prime minister I cannot and...
A meeting between Turkey's prime minister and representatives of anti-government protesters has ended. There was no clear resolution on how to end the occupation of a central Istanbul park that has become a flashpoint for the biggest political crisis of his 10-year rule. The talks between Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erogan and the protesters were an effort to resolve a sit-in at Taksim Square's Gezi Park without resorting to a police intervention to clear out the demonstrators. Mr Erdogan told the protesters he was giving them a "final warning" to leave the park on Thursday. Although the late-night talks ended on what both sides indicated was a positive note, the possibility remained that...
Washington - FBI Director Robert Mueller said on Thursday that authorities would move aggressively to track down Edward Snowden and hold him accountable for leaking the details of extensive and top-secret US surveillance efforts. Mueller confirmed that a criminal investigation had been launched into the leaks and said public reports about the National Security Agency's efforts to monitor Internet and phone data had hurt US national security. “We are taking all necessary steps to hold the person responsible for these disclosures,” Mueller told the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee, without naming Snowden. “These disclosures have caused significant harm to our...
UNITED NATIONS, June 13 (Xinhua) -- The number of people in the world is hurtling to the 9.6 billion mark by 2050 from the present estimate of 7.2 billion, with most of the increase coming in developing countries, the United Nations projected on Thursday. India will eclipse China as the most populated nation around 2028, while Nigeria could outrank the United States by 2050, UN Department of Economic and...
Former President Carlos Saúl Menem was sentenced to seven years in prison on Thursday for illegally smuggling weapons to Ecuador and Croatia in violation of international embargoes in the 1990s. The court also barred Mr. Menem, now a senator, from holding elective office, and asked the Senate to vote to remove the immunity he enjoys as an elected member of Congress. The sentence is final unless overturned by the Supreme...
WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama has authorized sending weapons to Syrian rebels for the first time, U.S. officials said Thursday, after the White House disclosed that the United States has conclusive evidence President Bashar Assad's government used chemical weapons against opposition forces trying to overthrow him. Obama has repeatedly said the use of chemical weapons would cross a "red line" triggering greater American intervention in the two-year crisis. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., one of the strongest proponents of U.S. military action in Syria, said he was told Thursday that Obama had decided to "provide arms to the rebels," a decision confirmed by three U.S. officials. The...
NEW YORK: News Corp chief Rupert Murdoch filed papers to divorce his third wife Wendi Deng on Thursday, citing an "irretrievably" broken marriage to a woman 38 years his junior. The 82-year-old media tycoon's Chinese-born partner is perhaps best known for a 2011 incident when she leapt to defend her husband by striking a pie-wielding protester, prompting headlines calling her a "tiger wife." "I can confirm for the record that Rupert filed in New York State Supreme Court this morning for divorce," his spokesman Steven Rubenstein told AFP. "The line from the filing says 'the relationship between Mr Murdoch...
Zimbabwean Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has rejected President Robert Mugabe's declaration of a July 31 election, accusing his rival of breaching the constitution and creating a political crisis. The Constitutional Court ordered Mugabe two weeks ago to hold the poll by the end of July, following an application to the court by a Zimbabwean citizen demanding the president set a date before the current parliament expired. Mugabe, who had anyway been pushing for an early vote, announced the election date on Thursday - fast-tracking changes to election laws by using a...
An Argentine court sentenced former President Carlos Menem to seven years in prison for smuggling weapons to Croatia during the Yugoslav civil war of the 1990s, and to Ecuador. A federal court in Buenos Aires will ask the Senate to lift the 82-year-old Peronist’s immunity from imprisonment so he can...
Are Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey “banging their heads against a brick wall” every time they go up on Capitol Hill to explain to lawmakers that they have to accept the proposed deep cuts in the Defense Department budget? That phrase means “to do, say, or ask for something repeatedly but to be unable to change a situation,” according to the Cambridge Dictionaries Online. On Tuesday, Dempsey told the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee: “We simply can’t afford to postpone essential reforms to compensation and health care. Both should be allowed to grow more gradually, [and] we should stop pouring money into excess facilities and unwanted...
Islamabad: Former President Pervez Musharraf was today formally arrested and remanded to judicial custody for a fortnight over the 2006 killing of Baloch nationalist leader Akbar Bugti. Musharraf, 69, was arrested by a team from the Crime Branch of Balochistan Police. The team was sent from Quetta to Islamabad...
Up to 100 homes are thought to have been destroyed by wildfires burning out of control in Colorado, with officials fearing people who stayed behind may have died. Authorities initially estimated that between 40 and 60 houses were destroyed in Black Forest, a heavily wooded residential area northeast of Colorado Springs. El Paso County Sheriff Terry Maketa said late on Wednesday that he believes around 80 have been lost and he would...
William Hague has warned that the international community must be “prepared to do more” to end the Syria crisis following talks in Washington with US secretary of state John Kerry. The Foreign Secretary said the two nations remained committed to securing a diplomatic solution but suggested they must be ready to increase pressure on Bashar Assad's regime. Earlier, Prime Minister David Cameron stressed that no decision had been taken to arm the rebels as he announced he is to hold talks with Russian president Vladimir Putin in an effort to break the international deadlock on Syria. Mr Hague described the...
Greece's two biggest labour unions stage 24-hour walkout against prime minister's 'coup-like move' to close down ERT Greek state television and radio employees and supporters stage a protest outside the ERT offices in Athens. Photograph: Petros Giannakouris/AP Buses and subway trains have stopped running in Athens as Greek workers begin a nationwide strike in protest against the "sudden death" of state broadcaster ERT, switched off in the middle of the night by the government. Greece's two biggest labour unions plan to bring much of the near-bankrupt country to a standstill during the 24-hour strike against Prime Minister Antonis Samaras's decision to close down ERT, which they describe as a...
Google says it has detected and stopped thousands of phishing attacks targeting email accounts of Iranian users ahead of the 14 June presidential election. In an online statement, the firm said it had noticed a "significant jump" in the region's overall volume of phishing activity in the last three weeks....
Deaths exceeded births among non-Hispanic white Americans for the first time in at least a century, according to new census data, a benchmark that heralds profound demographic change. Connect With Us on Twitter Follow @NYTNational for breaking news and headlines. Twitter List: Reporters and Editors The disparity was tiny — only about 12,000 — and was more than made up by a gain of 188,000 as a result of immigration from abroad. But the decrease for the year ending July 1, 2012, coupled with the fact that a majority of births in the United States are now to Hispanic, black and Asian mothers, is further evidence that white Americans will become a minority nationwide within about three decades....
