World News in Pictures

[Mr Lick]

[Mr Lick]

A Richardson's ground squirrel takes in the action from second tee during the Telus Skins Game golf tournament in Banff, Alberta



A swan census takes places at the Fleet nature reserve in Dorset. A breeding colony has reportedly existed at Abbotsbury since 1993, with cygnets hatching over May-June

[Mr Lick]

A dragonfly on a leaf Shivapuri Nagarjun national park, Kathmandu



A squirrel monkey carries her baby in their enclosure at the zoo in Prague. These monkeys are threatened in their natural habitat of central American by increased deforestation and forest fragmentation

[Mr Lick]

A reed warbler feeds a baby cuckoo. Cuckoos lay their eggs in other birds' nests, fooling them into believing the chick is one of their young. The baby cuckoo, which has a seemingly insatiable appetite, hatches first and then quickly disposes of any competition by kicking any other eggs out of the nest



Turtles released as a penance by Buddhist believers enjoy their liberation beside a pool at the Wenshu monastery in Chengdu, China

[Mr Lick]

A praying mantis is seen on a railing as a light glows in the background during a baseball game in St Louis



A dead fish decays on the dry bed of O.C. Fisher reservoir in San Angelo, Texas. The state is suffering one of its worst droughts, with parts of Texas 15 inches short of their average rainfall for this time of year

[Mr Lick]

Libya fighting puts Misrata's nurses on hospital frontline

[Mr Lick]

[Mr Lick]

[Mr Lick]

Aika ceremony, Payakumbuh, West Sumatra




Lianna, seven, at the end of her 'Aika,' a traditional Minangkabau ceremony. The Minangkabau is a matrilineal society in which surnames and property pass from mother to daughter

[Mr Lick]

Lianna and her brother Muhammed, four, pose with a friend during the ceremony



Lianna and Muhammed's mother comforts her

[Mr Lick]

Minangkabau women bring food to the ceremony

[Mr Lick]

Lianna greets village members



Lianna and her brother Muhammed with their parents - nice to see everyone enjoying themselves

[Mr Lick]

A girl sits on an ice toilet at the Ice Gallery in Seoul July 20, 2011. South Korea's National Meteorological Administration issued a nationwide scorching heat warning recently, local media reported.



Italian free divers Mike Maric (R) and Ilaria Bonin kiss in an attempt to set the world record for the longest underwater kiss, in an oceanic tank at the Gardaland Sea Life Aquarium in Castelnuovo del Garda, northern italy July 15, 2011. Maric and Bonin set the new world record at three minutes and eight seconds.

[Mr Lick]

Selfridges employee Rosanna Harris poses in a Merrimaking hat, expected to be a top-selling Christmas item, at Selfridges department store in London July 28, 2011. Selfridges opened its Christmas shop on Thursday, 149 days before Christmas, as international visitors to the store increase over the summer months, sending a spike in demand for Christmas goods, according a research by the London department store



Sculptures made of lard are on display at a Ukrainian lard restaurant called "Salo Lviv modern art museum" in Lviv in western Ukraine July 15, 2011. The restaurant offers its visitors lard or pig fat, the staple of the Ukrainian cuisine, prepared in different shapes.

[Mr Lick]

Sharon Golan, a graduate design student from the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, poses with her design, a pair of modular shoes, at an exhibition in Jerusalem July 21, 2011. Golan's shoes are made up of four separate plastic pieces which are held together on the foot with silicone rubber bands. The design allows the wearer to change looks by replacing any one component of the shoe offering a total of 256 different footwear combinations.



Competitors in "James and the Giant Yorkshire Pudding" team take part in the Red Bull Flugtag event at Roundhay Park in Leeds, northern England, July 17, 2011. Thirty four teams participated in the event, which saw enthusiasts competing to fly the longest distance in self-made aircrafts in an attempt to win the Flugtag contest, according to organisers.

[Mr Lick]

A contestant drinks a Bloody Mary as she competes in the Not Playing Tennis competition at the Chap Olympiad in London July 16, 2011. The annual Chap Olympiad event is hosted by The Chap magazine, the bible for old-fashioned gentlemen who are against the vulgarity of modern culture and in favour of tweed, smoking a pipe and courtesy to women.



An elephant tries to escape during the filming of a commercial in the centre of Budapest, Hungary, July 26, 2011.

[Mr Lick]

Poland: Russia shares blame for presidential jet crash




A Polish report has found that Russia was partly to blame for the air crash last year which killed then-President Lech Kaczynski.

It said that pilot error was the main reason for the crash, but that air controllers and poor lighting at Smolensk were also at fault.

The crash killed 96 people and has been a source of tension between the two countries.

A Russian report released in January laid full blame on Poland.

But Poland, while accepting some of the findings, said that Moscow's report was "incomplete".

All those on board the TU-154 Tupolev, who included officials spanning the country's military and political elite, were killed when their airliner crashed while trying to land in heavy fog.

They had been on their way to a memorial for the victims of Katyn, where 20,000 Polish officers were massacred by Soviet forces in 1940.

[Mr Lick]

Suzanne McGarry smiles as she is declared winner of the Anthony Ryan best dressed lady during the Galway Festival at Galway Racecourse, Ireland

[Mr Lick]

Palestinian children fly kites in the Gaza Strip in an attempt to break the world record for the number of kites flown simultaneously

[Mr Lick]

Supporters of Peru's new president play Andean instruments outside Peru's Legislative Palace in Lima

[Mr Lick]

Nearly 2000 members and supporters of Israel's gay community take part in the annual gay pride parade in Jerusalem

[Mr Lick]

In Moldova, a monk speaks to tourists at the monastery in Orhei Vechi

[Mr Lick]

Harry Potter ewok actor flashed girl on train




An actor who appeared as a goblin in a Harry Potter film has been given a 20-week suspended sentenced for indecently exposing himself on a train.

Nicholas Read, 40, of Wade Close, Stoke-on-Trent, was found guilty of performing a sex act under cover of a juggler's hat in October 2010.

A 17-year-old girl told Leicester Crown Court how she felt "trapped" sat next to Wade on a London to Leicester train.

Wade must undertake a community sex offender group work programme.

In passing sentence, Recorder Richard Bond, said: "A relatively short sentence of imprisonment will not help you and it will certainly not protect the the public from your fantasies.

"I have to ask myself this question: is this a case where not just you, but more importantly, the public would benefit from you receiving a short custodial sentence? The answer to that is no."

The court heard how Wade, who played a goblin in the 2000 Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone film and an ewok in Return of the Jedi, had previous convictions for making explicit phone calls to "random" women from a hotel room.

Mr Bond ordered Wade to pay £500 towards the cost of his prosecution and be supervised by the Probation Service.

[Mr Lick]

Air France Rio crash: Pilots 'lacked training'




The pilots of an Air France plane that crashed into the Atlantic in 2009 lacked adequate training, French investigators have found.

France's BEA authority said pilots had failed to discuss repeated stall warnings and did not have the training to deal with the hazard.

Air France denied the accusation, saying there was no evidence to suggest the pilots were not competent.

All 228 people on board the flight from Brazil to France died in the disaster.

Investigators said an account of the final minutes of the flight, captured on flight recorders, concluded that the crew had failed to "formally identify the loss of altitude" despite an alarm ringing for nearly a minute.

The pilot then responded by pointing the nose upwards, instead of downwards.

The report also said that the pilots failed to alert passengers to the crisis as they struggled to regain control.

The authority issued 10 new safety recommendations, including mandatory training for all pilots in France to ensure they could handle a high-altitude stall.

The flight recorders were found earlier this year


A statement from Air France rejected the BEA's findings, saying that "nothing at this stage can allow the crew's technical competence to be blamed" for the crash.

"The crew on duty showed professionalism and stayed committed until the end to operating the flight. Air France salutes their courage and determination in these extreme conditions," it said.

"The altitude-loss alarm was activated and deactivated several times, contradicting the real status of the aircraft, which contributed strongly to the crew's difficulty in analysing the situation," Air France said.

Air France and Airbus are being investigated for alleged manslaughter in connection with the crash.

"The BEA establishes the facts and makes recommendations based on those facts," AFP quoted Environment and Transport Minister Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet as saying on RTL radio.

"As to who is responsible, that is up to the courts," she added.

Flight AF 447 went down on 1 June 2009 after running into an intense high-altitude thunderstorm, four hours into a flight from Rio de Janeiro in Brazil to Paris.

The wreckage of the plane was discovered after a long search of 10,000 sq km (3,860 sq miles) of sea floor.

[Mr Lick]

Plane crashes into Salford houses



A plane has crashed into two houses in Greater Manchester, police have said.

Officers were called to Newlands Avenue, Peel Green, Salford, at about 12:20 BST following reports a plane had collided with several properties.

When they arrived at the houses, near Barton Aerodrome in Irlam, they discovered a light aircraft had come down and hit two properties.

It is understood two passengers who were in the aircraft are being treated for serious burns.

A cordon is in place.

The A57 Liverpool Road is closed after junction 11 of the M60.