UbuneBlog

Muammar Gaddafi has been killed by Libyans he once scorned as “rats”, succumbing to wounds, some seemingly inflicted after his capture, in his hometown of Sirte on the Mediterranean. Two months after Western-backed rebels ended 42 years of eccentric, often bloody, one-man rule by capturing the capital, Tripoli, his death and the fall of the […]

A toddler who was twice run over by vans and then ignored by 18 passers-by as she lay critically injured in the street has died, the hospital treating her said today. Surveillance camera footage of people walking past the two-year-old girl, nicknamed Yue Yue, as she lay bleeding and unconscious, sparked a wave of condemnation […]

A new biography portrays Steve Jobs as a sceptic all his life – giving up religion because he was troubled by starving children, calling executives who took over Apple “corrupt” and delaying cancer surgery in favour of cleansings and herbal medicine. Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson, to be published in the US on Monday, also […]

A YOUNG man captured by militants while protecting a country he loves, and two ordinary, devoted parents who never gave up fighting for his release – for five long years, the Gilad Shalit story has been etched deeply into the Israeli consciousness. As word came through yesterday that Sergeant Shalit had been returned to Israeli […]

“Occupy” protests, inspired by demonstrations on Wall Street, have started in Australia and begun to spread around the world. In Sydney, hundreds of people occupied a site in front of the nation’s central bank headquarters in the heart of the financial district, declaring it as “only the start” of their protest. Elsewhere in Australia, about […]

At the end of the month, the doors of the old gym will be locked and the 50,000 items stored there, including wedding and graduation photos, trophies, satchels, gym vests and other school clothing, taken to a nearby incinerator. For now, however, the belongings remain neatly arranged on tables to allow the handful of visitors […]

“It makes good media. It’s the emotional pulling on the idea that radiation kills you. But you talk to our cancer patients: Radiation cures you.” The nuclear expert sitting in front of me was dismissive about the fears surrounding the public’s perception of radiation. Gerry Thomas runs the Chernobyl Tissue Bank at Imperial College London, […]

The United World Colleges (UWC), whose Bosnian branch has accepted North Korean leader Kim Jong Il’s grandson as a student, is an international network of schools and colleges founded in 1962. The first school in the network, which has establishments in thirteen countries, was opened in south Wales. The main goal of UWC schools is […]

After several failed attempts to convince their 41-year-old son to leave the nest, a Venetian couple have hired a lawyer in a last bid for domestic peace and quiet, Italian media have reported. The parents, whose names were not published, were said to be exhausted by fending for their adult offspring, cooking his meals and […]

It’s not only Western leaders like Julia Gillard and Barack Obama who face fierce resistance from climate sceptics as they try to lay out policies to tackle global warming. In China, where carbon emissions have surged despite tough government constraints and targets, President Hu Jintao is having to stare down claims that human-induced climate change […]