World News in Pictures

[Mr Lick]

Standing Guard
Secret Service agents keep watch atop a Budget rental truck as President Obama, who's been on a bus tour of the Midwest, speaks at a stop in Illinois on Wednesday.



Killing Time in Mogadishu
A Somali soldier with the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) stands in the reception area of the now-closed Lafweyn hotel in Mogadishu on Wednesday.

[Mr Lick]

They Reign in Spain
Lionel Messi, who scored two goals, celebrates his late winner with Cesc Fabregas during Barcelona's 3-2 victory over rival Real Madrid on Wednesday -- a match that marked Barca's 10th Spanish Supercup title.

[Mr Lick]

Cameroon: Call to end 'feminine men' homosexual trial



Human rights groups have called for homosexuality charges to be dropped against two men in Cameroon due to stand trial on Thursday.

The men were arrested last month because they looked feminine, their lawyer Alice Nkom told the BBC.

Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said the men should be freed from prison, rather than put on trial.

Homosexuality is illegal in Cameroon and carries a jail sentence of up to five years.

Ms Nkom said police arrested the men - aged 19 and 20 - outside a nightclub in the capital, Yaounde.

They were accused of homosexuality because their hair was "dressed like women", she said.

"This is a crime of fashion, not homosexuality," Ms Nkom told the BBC's Network Africa programme.

"I don't know how the prosecutor will bring evidence that they are homosexuals."

[Mr Lick]

Vietnam halts anti-China protests




The Vietnamese government has ordered an end to anti-China protests in the capital, Hanoi.

The demonstrations began in June amid an upsurge in tensions over territorial disputes in the South China Sea.

The protesters have been gathering in Hanoi on Sunday mornings.

But the government said the protests had to stop, because people both inside and outside the country were using the rallies to stir up dissent against communist rule.

In a statement, the Hanoi People's Committee said "opposition forces" were using the weekly protests to create "division in national unity".

Police would take measures against those who defied the order, the statement said.

Public demonstrations are rare in Vietnam, a one-party state controlled by the Communist Party.

Tensions between China and Vietnam escalated after an incident on 26 May.

Hanoi accused a Chinese patrol vessel of cutting the cables of a Vietnamese ship conducting seismic research about 120km (80 miles) off Vietnam's south-central coast.

Rival countries have argued over territory in the South China Sea for centuries.

China claims the largest area, putting it at odds with Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Taiwan.

[OhOh]

Chavez Orders $11 Billion of Gold Home - Bloomberg



"Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez ordered the central bank to repatriate $11 billion of gold reserves held in developed nations’ institutions such as the Bank of England as prices for the metal rise to a record.

Venezuela, which holds 211 tons of its 365 tons of gold reserves in U.S., European, Canadian and Swiss banks, will progressively return the bars to its central bank’s vault, Chavez said yesterday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM), Barclays Plc (BARC), and Standard Chartered Plc (STAN) also hold Venezuelan gold, he said. “We’ve held 99 tons of gold at the Bank of England since 1980. I agree with bringing that home,” Chavez said yesterday on state television. “It’s a healthy decision.”

Chavez, whose government depends on oil for 95 percent of its export revenue, is looking to diversify Venezuela’s cash reserves from U.S. and European banks to include investments in emerging markets including Brazil, China, India, Russia and South Africa, central bank President Nelson Merentes said yesterday. The world’s 15th-largest holder of gold is bringing back its gold after a 28 percent rally in the price this year.

Venezuela’s reserves stood at $28.6 billion on Aug. 16. Finance Minister Jorge Giordani said that the weakening U.S. dollar, a near-default by the U.S. government and the European sovereign debt crisis threaten Venezuela’s savings and they will be more secure at home and in “allied” countries."

[OhOh]

Comex gold futures have tacked on more record-setting price gains in late-morning trading Thursday, following a batch of weak U.S. economic data just released.

December gold last traded up $35.20 an ounce at $1,829.00. The weak U.S. economic data Thursday comes following a European financial stock meltdown overnight that spilled over into strong selling pressure in world stock markets. Investor risk appetite has shrunk appreciably Thursday and that is driving strong safe-haven investment demand into the gold market.

[Mr Lick]

Seven-year-old Camryn Dean sits on top of her family's tornado shelter with her brother Blake, 9, and her mother Lacy (right) and grandmother Brenda Blalock, Wednesday, Aug. 17, in Joplin, Mo. The Deans survived the tornado that destroyed their Joplin neighborhood by hunkering down in the shelter. "We walked out without a single scratch on us," she says.



FEMA wouldn't let people occupy their temporary housing units near the Joplin airport until safe rooms, like this one were installed



Aaron Miller, owner of Midwest Storm Shelters, shows off a safe room he installed in a new house.

[Mr Lick]

Zeli Ferreira Rosse, 61, and his wife Cleusa Pereira Rosse, reenact how Rosse sleeps in a coffin in Minas Gerais, Brazil, Wednesday Aug. 17. Rossi says he sleeps in the coffin on Fridays to honor a friend who died in 1988. The two had agreed to buy the coffin of whoever died first. He says that in 1983 he was seriously hurt in a car accident and his friend, who thought he had died, paid for his coffin. Rossi recovered and when his friend died in 1988 of multiple stab wounds he started sleeping in the coffin to honor his memory.

[Mr Lick]

Palestinian youths clamour to see the bodies of six militants at Al Najar hospital who were killed in an Israeli airstrike on August 18 in Rafah, Gaza. The airstrike came hours after attacks by militants killing seven Israelis near Eilat, Southern Israel. The targeted airstrike killed six people, including PRC secretary-general Kamal al-Neyrab.



Palestinians stand in the morgue next to the bodies of six militants on August 18 in Rafah, Gaza.



Palestinians help a wounded woman following an Israeli attack in Gaza City on August 19.

[Mr Lick]

In this undated photo provided by the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago, work takes place on the building of the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal. The Army Corps of Engineers is studying weather to separate the Great Lakes and Mississippi watersheds, which could include returning the Chicago River's original flow in an attempt to stop Asian carp and other invasive species from traveling through the two basins. The flow of the river into the lake was reversed in the late 1800's to prevent pollution from reaching Lake Michigan.




Asian bighead carp swims in an exhibit at Chicago's Shedd Aquarium. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in a report released Friday, March 25, 2011, says it might need to increase the voltage of the electric barrier at the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal to keep Asian carp out of the Great Lakes. The report says small carp won't be completely stopped by the barrier unless the barrier uses more power. Asian carp have long been seen as a severe threat to the Great Lakes



A kayaker paddles along the Chicago River in Chicago. Illinois waterways have undergone dramatic improvement in recent decades, but the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says too much pollution still is overflowing from communities with antiquated sewer systems that route sewage and storm water through the same pipes



A commercial fisherman throws a Common carp back into the southern branch of the Chicago River after a survey netting Monday, May 23 in Chicago. Federal and state officials outlined a series of projects Monday to pinpoint how far Asian carp have advanced toward the Great Lakes and remove as many as possible from a Chicago waterway that offers the nuisance fish a direct path to Lake Michigan.

[Mr Lick]

A few days after a stage collapse at the Indiana State Fair that killed 5 people, this incident happened at the Pukkelpop music festival in Kiewit Hasselt, Belgium.



View of a collapsed tent at the Pukkelpop music festival in Kiewit, Hasselt, Belgium, 18 August 2011. The tent collapsed during a thunderstorm. According to first reports, one person was killed and seven injured in the accident.



Revelers mill around broken lettering after a storm hit the Pukkelpop music festival in Kiewit Hasselt on August 18, 2011 leaving at least two persons dead and 40 others seriously injured, firefighters said. Two stages collapsed, one falling on the concert-goers. Some giant screens also fell down and trees were uprooted by the fierce storm, the Belga news agency reported.

[Mr Lick]

Technicians prepare to remove one of the space shuttle Atlantis' three main engines from the orbiter's aft section on Aug. 18, using a highly modified fork lift in Orbiter Processing Facility Bay 2 at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The engines will be stowed for study or future use.

[Mr Lick]

British Army Lieutenant Daniel John Clack's fiancee Amy Tinley (2nd L), mother Sue Clack (L), and brother James (R) gather just before his coffin is driven through the town of Wootton Bassett, western England, on Thursday, Aug. 18. Clack, 24, of the 1st Battalion The Rifles was killed while serving in Afghanistan last Friday

[Mr Lick]

Players from American Georgetown University men's basketball team and China's Bayi men's basketball team fight during a basketball friendly game at the Beijing Olympic Basketball Arena, on Thursday, Aug. 18.

BEIJING - A bench-clearing brawl at an exhibition game between American and Chinese basketball teams has marred the orchestrated harmony of U.S. Vice President Joe Biden's visit to China.

The fight between the Georgetown University men's basketball team and the Bayi Rockets on Thursday night in Beijing forced the game to end early. On Wednesday, Biden watched the Georgetown Hoyas play another Chinese team. Biden did not attend Thursday's game

[Mr Lick]

A funnel cloud in Wilmington, N.C., on Thursday, Aug. 18. The National Weather Service issued a tornado warning for Southern New Hanover County until 11 a.m. The Weather Service also confirmed that there are numerous water spouts off the coast of Southeastern North Carolina. The Carolina Beach Police Department has reported that two water spouts came in and touched the ground in the Alabama Avenue vicinity.

[Mr Lick]

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, on Thursday, August 18.

[Mr Lick]

Israeli emergency personnel stand near a bus after it was ambushed north of the Red Sea resort of Eilat, Thursday, Aug. 18.






Israeli soldiers secure the area near a road block formed by security forces on roads leading to the sites of several attacks in the Arava desertin southern Israel.

[Mr Lick]

Dozens of endangered animals were seized from illegal traders in the Philippines on Wednesday, according to a police official who spoke to EPA. Manila Police intelligence chief Ernesto Fojas said authorities seized 50 talking myna birds, one serpent eagle and 30 Asian box turtles from the accused traders, who were named as Luz Estacio, James Ferolino and Jake Vargas. All three species are considered critically endangered in the Philippines, facing an extremely high risk of extinction in the wild,



Myna birds seized from illegal traders are seen inside a police station in Manila, the Philippines on August 18. Several endangered animal species were seized from three illegal traders in Manila on Wednesday, a police official said.



Accused trader Luz Estacio sits inside a jail as she looks at a serpent eagle, one of the seized animals, at a police station in Manila on August 18.



An Asian box turtle is tagged by a veterinarian at the Manila zoo on August 18. Police turned over the animals seized from smugglers to the Manila zoo, according to authorities.

[Mr Lick]

Thousands attend funeral for three killed in Birmingham riots



Family photos of (left to right) Haroon Jahan, 21, Shazad Ali, 30, and Abdul Musavir, 31, who died while protecting their community from looters in Birmingham

[Mr Lick]

[Mr Lick]

[Mr Lick]

[Mr Lick]

Tariq Jahan, the father of Haroon Jahan, is embraced by mourners

[Mr Lick]

A-level results

Students from around the country receive their A-level results

[Mr Lick]