News headlines in April 2013, page 12

NAIROBI, Apr 16 (IPS) - Kenya's newly sworn-in President Uhuru Muigai Kenyatta may be faced with a number of challenges, including an impending International Criminal Court case and a slow economy. But he must also tackle corruption and ethnic divisions as he embarks on his five-year term as head of state of East Africa's largest economy.

CAIRO, Apr 16 (IPS) - When a young Christian girl goes missing in the Egyptian port city of Alexandria, her family will call on a certain Muslim sheikh in the nearby town of El-Ameriya.

WASHINGTON, Apr 16 (IPS) - The U.S. government's main watchdog on Monday reported that U.S. corporations are paying taxes on less than half of their declared income, largely due to dozens of tax breaks that have come under increased scrutiny in recent months.

CARACAS, Apr 15 (IPS) - The political polarisation in Venezuela became even more marked as the country emerged from Sunday's elections basically divided in half, between two sectors that are antagonistic and reluctant to try to understand each other.

UXBRIDGE, Canada, Apr 15 (IPS) - "Be a climate-protection hero, not a climate victim" is the message energy experts from around the world are bringing to San Francisco Tuesday.

WASHINGTON, Apr 15 (IPS) - Hours after President Macky Sall of Senegal met in Washington with President Barack Obama late last month, he stepped into a brightly lit hotel meeting room to accept the Peter Benchley Award for National Stewardship of the Ocean, the only prize for ocean conservation given to heads of state.

UNITED NATIONS, Apr 15 (IPS) - The spreading economic crisis is taking a bite out of Western military spending - even as the world's developing nations, along with Russia and China, boosted their arms expenditures last year.

GENEVA, Apr 15 (IPS) - Innovation, as the fruit of science and technology, will play a fundamental role in the Sustainable Development Goals that could go into effect in 2015, says Néstor Osorio, president of the United Nations Economic and Social Council.

KYOTO, Apr 15 (IPS) - It has not been this bad since the 1950-53 Korean War.

October 1962, the Cuba-USSR-U.S. crisis, comes to mind. There were horror visions of mushroom clouds. A proud Cuba, with a strong leader-dictatorship, a social revolution in the near past, was denied a normal place in the state system, bullied by the U.S. and some allies with sanctions and boycotts into isolation, which has lasted more than 50 years.

KARACHI, Pakistan, Apr 15 (IPS) - Former parliamentarian Jamshed Dasti, known in his hometown of Muzaffargarh as Rescue 1122, Pakistan's equivalent of an emergency number, is now a dubious hero. On Apr. 4, a district court served him a three-year prison sentence and a fine of 5,000 rupees (50 dollars) for presenting a fake degree to become eligible for a seat in parliament. He filed an appeal in the Lahore High Court which has overturned his conviction and acquitted him.