Global News

Richard Branson says his space project will go on – International pressure grows for civilian elections in Burkina Faso – A British bank executive is accused of murdering two sex workers – And more in your CareerSpot World News Briefs:

Private space travel suffers a blow – Nigeria’s purported cease-fire with a feared terrorist group is a joke – There will be no quarantine for a nurse who doesn’t have Ebola – And more in your CareerSpot World News Briefs:

The medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) is warning that some mandatory US state Ebola quarantine measures are having a “chilling effect” on its work of fighting the killer virus in Africa.  This comes as the governors of conservatives states are flustered, having tried to quarantine a nurse who doesn’t have Ebola.

A child bride is accused of murdering his husband, 20 years her senior – US cops captured an alleged cop killer who eluded them in the woods for weeks – A 50-year civil war is getting closer to ending – And more in your CareerSpot World News Briefs:

An advance force of about a dozen Kurdish Peshmerga force arrived in the Kurdish city of Kobanu in Northern Syria, flanked by 50 members of the Free Syrian Army.  It’s hoped the battle-tested Peshmerga from Iraq will help turn the tide of the battle against Islamic State (IS), which is besieging the city from three sides.

Burkina Faso’s long time ruler Blaise Compaore is refusing to step down, even as his country is in chaos.  Protesters stormed the parliament and made off with computers and furniture – all in protest to Compaore’s plan to change the constitution to allow him to extend his 27-year rule.

Israeli Public Security plans to reopen the Temple Mount in Jerusalem on Friday, a site considered sacred to both Jews and Muslims.  It was closed on Thursday to both amid escalating violence in Jerusalem and escalating rhetoric from what passes as “leaders” in the area.

Foreign Jihadists are pouring into the interlocked conflicts in Syria and Iraq at “an unprecedented scale”, according to a United Nations Security Council Report.  And they’re coming from countries that were not previously associated with providing militants for global terrorism.

There’s confusion over how many people might be dead or missing beneath a massive mudslide at a tea plantation in Sri Lanka.  At least ten people are confirmed dead and 250 are missing.  But the government later reduced the number of missing by 100 without explanation.

Egypt is flattening homes and displacing thousands of people to create a 500-meter buffer zone along the border with Gaza.  The massive counterinsurgency measure is intended to stop smuggling of goods and weapons into the territory controlled by Hamas.

A gunman on a motorcycle shot a well-known Israeli-American alternatively described as activist and agitator in an apparent assassination attempt.  Yehuda Glick had just finished a talk on pushing for more Jewish access and prayer rights at the hotly contested Temple Mount.

The UN World Health Organization updated its figures regarding the West African Ebola Outbreak, keeping the death toll at 4,922 – unchanged since last Friday – due mainly to weeding out stray data bits such as suspected cases that turned out to be false positives. 

Because I felt like it, here are some more World News Thingees:

Britain’s conservative government will not support search-and-rescue efforts to help immigrants from northern Africa and the Middle East whose rickety boats often get into trouble in the Mediterranean Sea.  This is because – and I’m not making this up – rescuing immigrants from certain death would only encourage them.

While much of the world’s attention was focused on Pope Francis explaining that the Roman Catholic Church accepted the Big Bang Theory and evolution as scientific fact, another address was his clearest statement yet that the church stands with the rights of the poor – and a preview of an upcoming encyclical on ecology and the environment.

Pope Francis has this habit of making simple statements about church teaching that turn into blazing headlines across the world.  In the latest example, he reiterated the Roman Catholic Church’s view that the Big Bang Theory and evolution are real, but not inconsistent with the belief in God.

The Kremlin announced that Russia it would recognize separatist elections held in two regions of eastern Ukraine held by Moscow-backed rebels.  The United States is warning that any such move would break international agreements to end the fighting in Ukraine.

NASA’s first attempt to privatize space deliveries blows up – A second American nurse is declared Ebola-free – The government’s plan to save the Great Barrier Reef is condemned as too weak – And more in your CareerSpot World News Briefs:

Malaysia’s top court on Wednesday is expected to issue a verdict on the final appeal filed by opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim against a sodomy conviction that critics believe was engineered to end the threat he posed to the nation’s ruling elite who’ve ruled the country since independence in 1957.

South African prosecutors say they will appeal the conviction and sentence handed down to Oscar Pistorius for the shooting death of his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp, believing the judge went too easy on the admitted killer.  Pistorius could be out of prison and in home detention in as little as ten months.