Election underscores Ghana’s democratic reputation

ACCRA, Ghana (AP) — Voters in Ghana selected their next president Friday in a ballot expected to mark the sixth transparent election in this West African nation, known as a beacon of democracy in a tumultuous region.Proud of their democratic heritage, residents of this balmy, seaside capital trudged to the polls more than four hours before the sun was even up, standing inches apart in queues that...

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Big-data analytics company Cloudera raises $65 million

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Cloudera, a distributor of software that helps companies analyze big data, said it has raised $ 65 million in new funding.The company is part of a growing group of businesses that help dig into the vast trove of data created by digital sources such as sensors, posts to the Internet, pictures and videos.The field caught investor attention when Splunk, another data analytics...

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“Gangnam Style” singer Psy apologizes for past anti-U.S. songs

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The South Korean pop singer behind the viral smash hit “Gangnam Style” apologized on Friday for past concerts featuring anti-American lyrics, ahead of a holiday performance to be attended by U.S. President Barack Obama and his family.Psy issued the apology after reports surfaced in the United States on Friday about his participation in two performances critical of the U.S....

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Roche breast cancer drug extends overall survival

ZURICH (Reuters) – Swiss pharma group Roche‘s drug Perjeta significantly extended the lives of women with an aggressive and incurable form of breast cancer compared to a placebo, according to new data from a late-stage study presented on Saturday.The detailed data presented at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium found that the risk of death was reduced by 34 percent in women treated with a combination...

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Supreme Court: Both sides in gay marriage debate voice optimism

Both sides of the contentious debate over same-sex marriage in America are expressing optimism over the news Friday that the US Supreme Court has agreed to take up two potential landmark gay rights cases.The high court announced it would hear arguments in a case testing the constitutionality of California’s Prop. 8 ban on same-sex marriage.It also said it would hear the case of an elderly New York...

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Ghana election, test of democratic reputation

ACCRA, Ghana (AP) — Voters in Ghana were selecting their next president and a 275-seat parliament in elections Friday, solidifying the West African nation‘s reputation as a beacon of democracy in the region.Some 14 million people are expected to turn out. President John Dramani Mahama, in office for only five months, is running against seven contenders. A former vice president, Mahama became president...

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Strong quake hits off Japan near Fukushima disaster zone

TOKYO (Reuters) – A strong quake centered off northeastern Japan shook buildings as far away as Tokyo on Friday and triggered a one-meter tsunami in an area devastated by last year’s Fukushima disaster, but there were no immediate reports of deaths or serious damage.The quake had a preliminary magnitude of 7.3, the U.S. Geological Survey said, adding that there was no risk of a widespread tsunami.The...

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Strong earthquake hits off NE Japan

TOKYO (Reuters) - A strong quake centered off northeastern Japan shook buildings as far away as Tokyo on Friday and triggered a one-meter tsunami in an area devastated by last year's Fukushima disaster, but there were no reports of deaths or serious damage. The quake had a preliminary magnitude of 7.3, the U.S. Geological Survey said, and thousands of coastal residents were ordered to...

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South Africa military plane crashes in mountains

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — A South African military aircraft on an unknown mission to an area near the village where former President Nelson Mandela lives crashed in a mountain range, officials said Thursday. It was unclear whether there were any survivors.The Douglas DC-3 Dakota, a twin-propeller aircraft, had taken off from Pretoria’s Waterkloof Air Force Base on Wednesday night, said Brig. Gen. Xolani...

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Guatemala detains McAfee, to expel him to Belize

GUATEMALA CITY (Reuters) – Guatemalan police arrested U.S. software guru John McAfee on Wednesday for illegally entering the country and said it would seek to expel him to neighboring Belize, which he fled after being sought for questioning over his neighbor’s murder.McAfee, who had been in hiding for three weeks, crossed into Guatemala with his 20-year-old girlfriend to evade authorities in Belize...

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Male artists lead 2013 Grammy nominations

NASHVILLE, Tennessee (Reuters) – Male artists led the nominations announced on Wednesday for the 2013 Grammys, as fun., Frank Ocean, Mumford & Sons, Jay-Z, Kanye West and Dan Auerbach from The Black Keys landed six nods each for music’s biggest awards.The nominations for New York-based indie-pop band fun. – made up of Nate Ruess, Andrew Dost and Jack Antonoff – included the four main categories...

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Celebrations planned as Wash. legalizes marijuana

SEATTLE (AP) — Legal marijuana possession becomes a reality under Washington state law on Thursday, and some people planned to celebrate the new law by breaking it.Voters in Washington and Colorado last month made those the first states to decriminalize and regulate the recreational use of marijuana. Washington‘s law takes effect Thursday and allows adults to have up to an ounce of pot — but it bans...

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Washington fears 'desperate' Assad could use chemical arms

BEIRUT/BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Washington fears a "desperate" Syrian President Bashar al-Assad could use chemical weapons as rebels bear down on Damascus, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Wednesday, repeating a vow to take swift action if he does. Rebels fighting to overthrow Assad said they had surrounded an air base near Damascus, a fresh sign the battle is closing in on the...

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Sri Lanka see backlash from Aussie ‘wounded soldiers’

(Reuters) – Sri Lanka captain Mahela Jayawardene has warned his team to be wary of a backlash from Australia in their three-test series after the hosts were stung by their series defeat to South Africa earlier this week.Australia’s hopes of snatching the Proteas’ top test ranking ended in a crushing 309-run defeat in the third and final test in Perth on Monday, but Jayawardene took little comfort...

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Facebook just realized it made a horrible mistake

Facebook (FB) announced on Tuesday that it will begin opening Facebook Messenger to consumers who do not have a Facebook account, starting in countries like India and South Africa, and later rolling out the service in the United States and Europe. This is a belated acknowledgement of a staggering strategic mistake Facebook made two years ago. That is when the messaging app competition was still...

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Ex-”Malcolm in the Middle” star Muniz, 26, suffers mini-stroke

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Former “Malcolm in the Middle” child star Frankie Muniz said on Tuesday he had suffered a mini-stroke, at the age of 26.“I was in the hospital last Friday. I suffered a ‘Mini Stroke‘, which was not fun at all. Have to start taking care of my body! Getting old!,” Muniz said on Twitter.Muniz put his acting career on hold six years ago to race cars for a living, and earlier this...

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Trafficked maids to order: The darker side of richer India

NEW DELHI, Dec 4 (TrustLaw) – Inside the crumbling housing estates of Shivaji Enclave, amid the boys playing cricket and housewives chatting from their balconies, winding staircases lead to places where lies a darker side to India‘s economic boom.Three months ago, police rescued Theresa Kerketa from one of these tiny two-roomed flats. For four years, she was kept here by a placement agency for domestic...

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Obama holds firm on 'fiscal cliff' amid Republican disarray

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama held his ground on the "fiscal cliff" on Tuesday, insisting on higher tax rates for the wealthiest Americans, while Republicans showed increasing disarray over how far they should go to compromise with Obama's demands. With less than a month left to confront the budget cuts and tax increases that will begin taking effect in January unless...

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Officials: NATO to decide on missiles for Turkey

BRUSSELS (AP) — NATO foreign ministers are expected to approve Turkey‘s request for Patriot anti-missile systems to bolster its defense against possible strikes from neighboring Syria.NATO foreign ministers are meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday in Brussels. Parliaments in both nations must approve the deployment, which would also involve several hundred soldiers.Ankara, which has been highly supportive...

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Facebook voting begins on Instagram data-sharing, email privacy

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Facebook Inc opened the polls on Monday for its roughly 1 billion users to vote on a variety of changes to the social network‘s policies, including a proposal to scrap the user voting system that Facebook introduced in 2009.Facebook also said it had “clarified” some of the proposed changes, specifying that a new policy allowing it to share user data with recently acquired...

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News Corp to buy Cleveland Indians sports channel: sources

(Reuters) – News Corp is expected to announce as early as this week that it will buy SportsTime Ohio, a TV channel owned by the Cleveland Indians baseball team, for around $ 230 million, sources told Reuters, marking its second acquisition of a regional sports channel since late last month.The deal would give News Corp‘s Fox Sports unit the rights to broadcast the Major League Baseball team‘s games,...

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Brain changes may make older people more prone to scams

CHICAGO (Reuters) – It’s a frequent scenario. Two young con artists walk a retired high school teacher to the bank and fleece him out of $ 17,000. But why did the man, in his 70s, fall for it?It may be that older people are less able to identify shady characters than younger ones, according to a study by Shelley Taylor of the University of California, Los Angeles, published on Monday in the Proceedings...

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