World News in Pictures

[Mr Lick]

A passenger jet comes into land over houses next to Heathrow airport on August 28, in London, England. Transport Secretary Justine Greening has stated that the Government remains opposed to the building of a third runway at London's Heathrow airport despite calls from some Conservative Members of Parliament for the coalition to reconsider.



A sign is displayed at the village of Sipson, which would be demolished should a third runway be built, near Heathrow Airport on Aug. 28, in London, England.Transport Secretary Justine Greening has stated that the Government remains opposed to the building of a third runway at London's Heathrow airport despite calls from some Conservative Members of Parliament for the coalition to reconsider

[Mr Lick]

A Russian opposition activist was sentenced Tuesday to eight years in prison on drug charges, double the sentence requested by prosecutors, in a ruling that drew immediate opposition outrage.

Taisiya Osipova has maintained that police planted four grams of heroin in her home in 2010 in revenge for her refusal to testify against her husband, Sergei Fomchenkov, also an activist with The Other Russia opposition movement

[Mr Lick]

Jeju Island, South Korea: a Chinese fishing boat navigates through rough waves caused by Typhoon Bolaven



Punto Fijo, Venezuela: a woman walks through the debris of her home, which was shattered by an explosion at the Amuay oil refinery, the country's largest refining facility



Sitra, Bahrain: a masked anti-government protester waves the Bahraini flag in a cloud of teargas during clashes with police



Spain: protesters and members of the Andalusian Union of Workers (SAT) march along the Carranza bridge between Puerto Real and Cadiz to protest against the government's austerity measures



Gauhati, Assam state, India: a shopkeeper looks out from under closed shop shutters during a 12-hour general strike called by the radical Hindu group Bajrang Dal to protest against the ethnic violence in the state



Tongling, China: paramilitary police officers jump up above their colleagues' arms as part of psychological training

[Mr Lick]

Violent protests in Kenya




Civilians carry the body of Aboud Rogo Mohammed along the Mombasa-Malindi highway in Kenya's coastal city of Mombasa August 27, 2012. Hundreds of protesters smashed cars and vandalized at least four churches in the Kenyan city of Mombasa on Monday after unknown gunmen shot dead Aboud Rogo Mohammed, a Muslim cleric accused by the United States of helping Islamist militants in neighboring Somalia



A policeman guards the van in which Aboud Rogo Mohammed was shot and killed in, along Mombasa Malindi highway in Kenya's coastal city of Mombasa August 27, 2012.



A man accused of allegedly instigating street riots is detained by Kenyan policemen in the coastal city of Mombasa, August 28, 2012. Two Kenyan police officers and a civilian were killed when rioters hurled a grenade at officers in the port city of Mombasa on Tuesday after two days of violence over the killing of a radical Muslim cleric. Mobs of youths had fired at police with machineguns just before throwing the grenade into a police truck, Benedict Kigen, a senior police intelligence officer said.


















A Kenyan police officer gets treatment at the Coast General Hospital in Mombasa after a grenade was thrown at them at Bamburi area of the Kenyan Coast, August 28, 2012.

[Mr Lick]

Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, center, talks to his foreign minister Ali-Akbar Salehi, 3rd left, and an official as Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi, right, delivers his speech during the opening ceremony of the summit of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), the group of countries not aligned with any of the traditional power blocs, as United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, left, listens, in Tehran, Iran on August 30, 2012.

[Mr Lick]

Thailand has long been known as the massage capital of the world. Now it has a Guinness World Record to prove it after some 641 massage therapists mass-massaged 641 people simultaneously for 12 minutes to win the honor Thursday at an indoor arena in Bangkok. The event was organized by the Health Ministry to promote the Southeast Asian nation's massage and spa industry

[Mr Lick]

A tombstone sculptor works at his workshop in Damascus, Syria on August 28, 2012. In the Sahnaya district of Old Damascus, even tombstones are not easily available for a conflict which the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says has killed more than 25,000 people over the past 17 months.

[Mr Lick]

A woman is held back by another woman as she reacts to the killing of several people at a crime scene in Monterrey, Mexico on August 29, 2012.

Gunmen shot dead three men and a woman in Monterrey on Wednesday and left graffiti on a wall at the crime scene reading "Commander X20, at your orders, [signed] CDG [Gulf Cartel]", according to local media.

[Mr Lick]

Eight-year-old Charlie Naysmith shows off the piece of ambergris he found on the beach at Hengistbury Head on the coast of southern England.

An 8-year-old boy in England could be up to $63,000 richer, thanks to a piece of solidified whale vomit he picked up on the beach. The chunk may look like a yellow-brownish rock, but it's actually a primo piece of ambergris, an expensive perfume ingredient that is, um, spewed out by whales.

Charlie Naysmith stumbled upon the loaf-sized lump at Hengistbury Head, on the southern coast of England, the Bournemouth Echo reported over the weekend.

As far as Charlie was concerned, it was just a seaside curiosity. But after doing some research, he and his family determined that the curious lump could be worth somewhere between £10,000 and £40,000 ($15,850 to $63,350).
"We have discovered it is quite rare and are waiting for some more information from marine biology experts," the boy's father, Alex, told the Echo.

Charlie is reportedly thinking about using the money to build a house for animals.

But first, he and his parents might want to get that expert opinion. It turns out that the ambergris trade can get pretty sticky.

[Mr Lick]

Saturn's shades of blue and butterscotch are changing along with the planet's seasons, as illustrated by afresh batch of true-color photos from the bus-sized Cassini orbiter.

When Cassini arrived at Saturn, seven years ago, the planet's northern hemisphere had atint of azure blue. Since then, Saturn has gone through an equinox and a significant shift in seasons. Summer is approaching in the north, and winter is coming to the south.

The seasonal change means ultraviolet radiation is intensifying in the north, resulting in an increasing amount of yellowish haze. Meanwhile, there's a reduction in radiation hitting the southern hemisphere, and the haze is clearing as a result. The presence of the ring shadow enhances the effect in Saturn's south.
"The reduction of haze and the consequent clearing of the atmosphere make for a bluish hue: the increased opportunity for direct scattering of sunlight by the molecules in the air makes the sky blue, as on Earth," Cassini's imaging team reports in today's advisory. "The presence of methane, which generally absorbs in the red part of the spectrum, in a now-clearer atmosphere also enhances the blue."

Although Saturn has seasons like Earth's, the fact that a Saturnian year lasts 29.5 times longer than an Earth year means that the southern hemisphere's winter solstice won't occur until May 2017. And if Cassini's mission managers have their way, the orbiter will be around to see it.

[Mr Lick]

A convict consoles his son while being taken to prison after a court verdict in a 2002 religious violence case, in Ahmadabad, India, Aug. 29, 2012. The court in western India found 32 people guilty of charges ranging from murder to rioting for their part in the deadly religious violence. The religious violence began following a train fire on Feb. 27, 2002, that killed 60 Hindu pilgrims. Muslims were blamed for the fire, leading to weeks of rioting in which Hindu mobs rampaged through towns and villages burning Muslim homes and businesses.

[Mr Lick]

ROME (Reuters) - A Sardinian miner slashed his wrist in front of television cameras on Wednesday as some 100 fellow workers stayed barricaded underground in a campaign to keep Italy's only coal pit open

[Mr Lick]

People take part in the Tomatina feast or 'tomato fight' in Bunol, Valencia, Spain. Reports state that about 40,000 people from all over the world took part in the event in which participants throw tomatoes and engage in a 'tomato fight'. About 120 tons of tomatoes were thrown this year.

[OhOh]

BEIJING - Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping said in Beijing on Wednesday that the ongoing visit of Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi "will increase mutual understanding and trust" between China and Egypt.

[Mr Lick]

Artists perform as a choir performs 'Principia' by Errollyn Wallen during the Opening Ceremony of the London 2012 Paralympics at the Olympic Stadium on August 29










"Enlightenment" is the theme for the opening ceremonies of the 2012 London Paralympic Games. Physicist Stephen Hawking was the show's MC and British royalty was in attendence. Some of the photos from today's ceremonies look similar to photos from the Olympic Opening Ceremonies on July 27.The Guardian reports that though there are similarities, it is supposed to be very different.

Over the next 11 days, 4,200 athletes from 164 nations and territories will compete in a variety of sports including wheelchair basketball and wheelchair rugby

[OhOh]

Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei has called on the United Nations to assume a more decisive role in creating a nuclear-free Middle East.
During a meeting with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and his accompanying delegation in Tehran on Wednesday, Ayatollah Khamenei pointed to nuclear disarmament as the common concern for the entire humanity.

He added, “The Islamic Republic of Iran reiterates its stance on a Middle East free of nuclear weapons, and the UN should make serious efforts to allay the concerns with regard to nuclear arms.”

[Mr Lick]

People and a dog who were rescued from their flooded homes are loaded into a Louisiana National Guard truck, after Hurricane Isaac made landfall and flooded homes with 10 feet of water in Braithwaite, La., in Plaquemines Parish on Aug. 29.



People rest in a rescue truck atop a levee next to floodwaters after being rescued in Plaquemines Parish on Aug. 29 in Braithwaite, Louisiana. Dozens were reportedly rescued in the area after levees were overtopped by floodwaters from Hurricane Isaac. Today is the seventh anniversary of Hurricane Katrina

[Mr Lick]

Yawalapiti men play bamboo flutes during the celebration of this year's 'quarup,' a ritual held over several days to honor in death a person of great importance to them, in the Xingu National Park, Mato Grosso State, Brazil, on August 14, 2012.



This year the tribe honored two people — a Yawalapiti Indian who they consider a great leader, and Darcy Ribeiro, a well-known author, anthropologist and politician. Ribeiro, who was known for focusing on the relationship between native peoples and education and founded the nation's Indian Museum in 1953, died in 1997.

[Mr Lick]

A woman cries near the remains of her house after it was burnt by rioters in Kharabari Charak Math, a village in the Barpeta district of Assam, north-eastern India on August 29, 2012.

Unidentified assailants killed one person and burnt down five houses after members of the All Assam Minority Students Union who had been taking part in a rally clashed with local youths, India Today reported.

The Associated Press reported last week that at least 80 people had been killed and 400,000 displaced in several weeks of clashes in Assam between ethnic Bodo people and Muslim settlers, the worst violence seen in the region since the mid-1990s

[Mr Lick]

A car surrounded by water after its owner parked it on the bank to watch waves brought on by Typhoon Bolaven in Qingdao, in northeast China's Shandong province, on August 28, 2012.









Policemen gesture to a driver stranded in a car on a flooded road as waves are whipped up by typhoon Bolaven in Qingdao

[Mr Lick]

A handout picture by the Fire Department of Munich made available on August 29, 2012 shows firefighters walking past a burning protective wall after the controlled blasting of an unexploded WWII-era bomb in Munich, Germany, early on August 29.



Nearly 3,000 residents were evacuated from the heart of Munich on Tuesday before explosives experts detonated the remains of an undetonated, 550-pound World War II bomb, Andy Eckardt of NBC News reports.
Bales of straw which had been placed around the bomb to cushion the shock of the detonation were set ablaze and thrown through the air by the detonation, according to the European Pressphoto Agency. Some of them landed on the roofs of neighboring buildings and ignited fires.



Before the controlled explosion, the bomb was covered with sand bags as nearly 3,000 people left their homes nearby.

[Mr Lick]

A group of prisoners stand on the roof of Socabaya prison during a riot in Peru's southern city of Arequipa, Tuesday, August 28, 2012. About 200 prisoners started a mutiny in the early hours of the day, injuring prison guards and taking four hostages, including the prison director, according to local media. All hostages were later released, and the riot continues as the prisoners demanded improvements of prison conditions and medical attention, said local reports. The banner reads, "Freedom. Benefits."

[Mr Lick]

Hongze Lake, China: a giant waterspout forms



Ahmadabad, India: an artisan gives a finishing touch to a clay idol of the elephant-headed Hindu God Ganesha before the Ganesh festival



Santiago, Chile: students march with giant pencils during a protest to demand improvements in the quality of public education

[Mr Lick]

Tropical storm Isaac heads north from New Orleans

Heavy rain continued to drench Louisiana and Mississippi as Isaac trudged slowly northwards, but fortified levees and an elaborate flood containment plan appeared to have spared New Orleans from disaster



Research students from the University of Alabama measure wind speeds as hurricane Isaac makes landfall in New Orleans

































Storm surge fills the parking lot and Biloxi Small Craft Harbor around McElroy's restaurant

[Mr Lick]

Ciovo, Croatia: People watch the hillsides ablaze on the Adriatic coast



Aleppo, Syria: An opposition fighter throws a Molotov cocktail into a building held by government forces during an attack in the Saif al-Dawla neighbourhood



London, England: Fireworks light up the Olympic Stadium as the cauldron burns during the opening ceremony of the Paralympic Games



Nevada, US: Participants ride an art car during the Burning Man 2012 Fertility 2.0 arts and music festival in the Black Rock desert



Kharabari Charak Math, India: Residents stand by the remains of their house which was burnt by rioters in a village in the north-eastern state of Assam



Cádiz, Spain: Riders compete on the last day of Sanlúcar de Barrameda's 167th annual horse racing event