GAO, Mali (AFP) -- Five people, including two suicide bombers, died Friday in car bombings in northern Mali, a day after fierce urban battles between French-led forces and Islamists left up to 20 extremists dead, officials said.Two vehicles targeting civilians and members of the ethnic Tuareg rebel group, the MNLA, exploded near the town of Tessalit, killing three and wounding several others, a security source said. The suicide bomber drivers also died.A spokesman for the National Movement for t

HOLLYWOOD (AFP) -- This year's Oscars race may be one of the least predictable in recent memory -- but there is one virtual certainty for Sunday night: Daniel Day-Lewis will likely win a record third best actor prize.The British-Irish actor has won the main acting category in almost every show so far in Hollywood's annual awards season, which reaches its height with the 85th Academy Awards this weekend.And, while the other four actors nominated all put in great performances, Day-Lewis looks set

HOLLYWOOD (AFP) -- Multiple Oscar-winning Hollywood legends Jack Nicholson and Dustin Hoffman were added Friday to the presenting line-up at this weekend's 85th Academy Awards.The pair will join a star-studded cast on stage Sunday including Michael Douglas, John Travolta, Ben Affleck, Jessica Chastain, Jennifer Lawrence, Halle Berry, Sandra Bullock, Nicole Kidman and Reese Witherspoon.Nicholson has been nominated 12 times and won three times, as best leading actor in "One Flew over the Cuckoo's

WASHINGTON (AFP) -- President Barack Obama insisted Friday that mandatory government budget cuts set to kick in on March 1 -- known as the sequester -- were not "inevitable."The cuts to defense and domestic spending were mandated in an agreement between Obama and his Republican foes to end a previous budget battle."I never think that anything is inevitable, we always have the opportunity to make the right decisions," Obama told reporters following a White House meeting with visiting Japanese Pri

WASHINGTON (AFP) -- Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe vowed Friday that he would not "tolerate" any challenge to control over contested islands, after China's growing incursions into the area."We simply cannot tolerate any challenge now and in the future. No nation should make any miscalculation or underestimate the firmness of our resolve," Abe said at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington."No one should ever doubt the robustness of the Japan-US alliance."Speaking af

WASHINGTON (AFP) -- The United States and Japan said Friday that talks on a Pacific-wide free trade pact would not make prior exemptions of sectors, despite Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's pledges in the last election.Abe, paying his first visit to Washington since his Liberal Democratic Party swept back to power, did not make any commitment on joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks but heard that Washington would not budge."Should Japan participate in the TPP negotiations, all goods would be s

LOS ANGELES (AFP) -- At least six underground tanks containing nuclear waste in the northwestern US state of Washington are leaking, but there is no imminent threat to public health, a spokeswoman said Friday.The US Energy Department told the state last week that one tank was leaking at the Hanford nuclear site, but Energy Secretary Steven Chu informed its governor Jay Inslee on Friday that more leaks had been discovered."Secretary Chu let him know today that there are actually more tanks they'v

WASHINGTON (AFP) -- Moody's stripped Britain of its triple-A debt rating Friday, saying government debt was still mounting and that growth was too weak to reverse the trend before 2016.In an expected rebuff to the Cameron government's hopes that sharp spending cuts would both reduce its deficit and give growth a boost, the rating agency cut Britain's grade by one notch to Aa1.In parallel, it lowered the rating of the country's central bank, the Bank of England, which also fell from AAA to Aa1.Th

WASHINGTON (AFP) -- America's top diplomat John Kerry  will begin on his first official trip as secretary of state on Sunday, a marathon get-acquainted tour of America's closest allies in Europe and the Middle East.Kerry will visit the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar from Feb. 24 to March 6.The first stop will be London, where Kerry will meet with senior British officials, State Department Spokeswoman Victoria Nuland told r

WASHINGTON (AFP) -- The US military suspended all test flights Friday for the new F-35 fighter jet over potential engine problems, officials said, the latest setback for a program dogged by cost overruns and technical glitches.The move was described as a "precautionary measure" after a crack was discovered on a turbine blade in one F-35 engine at Edwards Air Force Base in California."It is too early to know the fleet-wide impact of this finding, however as a precautionary measure, all F-35 fligh

SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) -- Microsoft joined Facebook and Apple on Friday on the list of US technology titans targeted in recent cyberattacks."As reported by Facebook and Apple, Microsoft can confirm that we also recently experienced a similar security intrusion," Trustworthy Computing team general manager Matt Thomlinson said in a blog post."During our investigation, we found a small number of computers, including some in our Mac business unit, that were infected by malicious software using techniqu

Police said Saturday they have detained a teenager on charges of raping and beating to death a 46-year-old woman he met in a nightclub in southern South Korea.The 18-year-old, identified only by his surname Suh, admitted to the crime, saying he was angry as the woman refused to have sex with him, police said. The victim's identity was withheld.According to police, Suh met and drank with her in a nightclub in the southern city of Jinju, some 285 km southeast of Seoul. He allegedly raped and beat

WASHINGTON (AFP) -- Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Friday he wanted a strong relationship with South Korea, which responded angrily over a rally in Japan against Seoul's control of a set of islands.The conservative Japanese leader sent an official to participate in the annual demonstration in western Shimane prefecture to exert Japan's claims over small islets known as Dokdo in Korean and Takeshima in Japanese.On a visit to Washington, Abe said that ties between the two U.S. allies "can

The minor opposition Unified Progressive Party said Saturday it has elected its former presidential candidate Lee Jung-hee as its new leader.Lee, 44, won 91.06 percent of the vote as the lone candidate in the party election held from Feb. 18-22.Lee was the party's candidate for December's presidential election, but she dropped out of the race at the last minute in an apparent move to consolidate the opposition vote.The party plans to hold a ceremony launching the new leadership next Friday. (Yon

A South Korean man is under investigation for hurling a bottle of human feces into Japan's Embassy in Seoul in anger over Tokyo's claims to South Korea's easternmost islets of Dokdo, police said Saturday.The 49-year-old day worker threw the 750-milliliter plastic bottle containing his own feces over the wall of the embassy in central Seoul around 8:50 p.m. Friday after Japan held an annual event claiming its sovereignty over Dokdo earlier in the day.The man from the southeastern city of Ulsan, i

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un oversaw military aerial and paratrooping exercises, Pyongyang's state media reported Saturday, in what was believed to be a visit to troops for the third straight day.The series of visits to military units is seen as aimed at checking the readiness of the armed forces and boosting their morale after the communist nation carried out its third nuclear test earlier this month in defiance of the international community.Pyongyang's Korean Central News Agency said that

A total of seven people have been arrested or booked in two separate incidents for their alleged involvement in illegal overseas organ transplants, police said Monday.A suspect only identified by his surname Kim, is accused of taking 180 million won ($165,600) as a brokerage fee from a liver transplant patient surnamed Seo and coordinating an illegal transplant in Tianjin, China for him, according to the Gyeonggi Provincial Police Agency. Kim allegedly pocketed a total of 600 million won after o

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Japan's new prime minister says he will make his country a stronger U.S. ally and joined President Barack Obama in warning North Korea that its recent nuclear provocations would not be tolerated.After meeting Obama in the Oval Office on Friday. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe also sent a clear message to China: that while Japan does not want confrontation with Beijing, it won't tolerate challenges to its sovereignty over islands disputed by the two Asian powers.Those regional tensio

　북한의 3차 핵실험에 따른 인공지진의 규모와 폭발력에 대한 추정치가 계산 방식에 따라 크게 다른 가운데 국내 기관들이 세 차례의 핵실험 모두 지진 규모를 외국보다 작게 잡아 논란이 벌어지고 있다.　17일 학계에 따르면 기상청 등 국내 기관이 분석한 규모 4.9를 기준으로 지진의 규모와 계산 공식에 따라 폭발력이 최대 5배 가까이 차이나는 것으로 드러났다. 　이를 인공지진의 실체파 규모(mb)를 TNT의 양으로 환산하는 공식 가운데 이른바 ‘머피 지진원모델’에 대입하면 16.2kt의 폭발력이 산출된다. 이는 일본 히로시마에 떨어진 핵폭탄의 위력(16kt)과 맞먹는 것이다.　규모 4.9는 기상청과 지질자원연구원, 유엔 포괄적핵실험금지조약기구(CTBTO)가 분석한 실체파 규모다. 러시아 국방부와 미국 지질조사국(USGS)은 각각 7 이상, 5.1로 분석했고 독일 연방지질자원연구소(BER)는 5.2로 모두 국내 기관보다 크게 발표했다. 　이들 중 가장 큰 규모인 5.2로 계산하면 폭발력은

South Korea will send a delegation of foreign and defense ministry officials to observe a U.S.-led anti-proliferation drill that is under way in Abu Dhabi, an official said Monday.Code-named "Leading Edge 2013," the two-week drill that started Sunday is aimed at improving international cooperation to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.The South Korean delegation, which will also include maritime police and customs officers, will head for Abu Dhabi later this week, the forei