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Filmmaker and explorer James Cameron said he was awestruck by the complete isolation of the world’s deepest point, the Mariana Trench, nearly 11 kilometres beneath the surface of the Pacific Ocean.
More about: Exploration, Ocean, Research

There is some scepticism among western diplomats over Syria’s pledge to take steps towards a ceasefire under the plan drawn up by peace envoy Kofi Annan.
He has briefed the UN Security Council behind closed doors on the April 10 deadline, by which time Damascus has supposedly agreed to withdraw its forces from cities to facilitate a ceasefire with rebels.
Syria argues that the rebels must lay down their arms too.
“A plan wouldn’t be successful unless everybody is committed. So far the Syrian government said that it is committed, and we are expecting Mr. Annan to get in touch with the other parties,” said the country’s ambassador to the UN Bashar Ja’afari.
The latest amateur video showed more violence as government forces apparently continued to bombard Homs. Dozens are said to have died on Monday.
Washington’s UN ambassador Susan Rice said some Security Council members were concerned that Syria might use the next few days to intensify its assault on the rebels.
The head of the International Red Cross has arrived in Damascus for two days of talks to press for a ceasefire to evacuate the wounded and deliver supplies to civilians.
UN peacekeepers are already planning for a ceasefire monitoring mission.
More about: Bashar al-Assad, Ceasefire, Friends of Syria, Syria, United Nations

A change of status for Burger King as the private equity group 3G Capital, which bought the fast-food chain a year and a half ago, said it will sell a 29 percent stake in it to a new investor – Justice Holdings.
As a result Burger King’s shares will be relisted on the New York Stock Exchange.
The money raised with the stake sale will be used to revamp the company to better compete with rivals McDonalds and Wendys.
The quick sale highlights a profit improvement at Burger King, which operates more than 12,000 mainly franchise fast-food outlets around the world.
More about: Markets, USA

The largest lottery jackpot in history will be split at least three ways say officials – but there is still no word on who the lucky winners are.
Just three tickets, sold in the states of Kansas, Illinois and Maryland, had the right numbers entitling holders to a share of the $640 million prize.
But they could have been bought by syndicates rather than individuals.
The size of the jackpot prompted Americans from coast to coast to queue for hours for a chance to change their lives forever – even if mathematicians put that chance at 176 million to one!
More about: Gambling, Game, USA

The Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has threatened to nationalise banks and companies that back the opposition ahead of elections later this year.
On return from his latest trip to Cuba for cancer treatment, he was keen to show there were no ill effects, as he danced alongside children on stage in Caracas.
Chavez said he had a list of private banks that were financing what he called the opposition’s ‘destabilising plans’.
“There are big national companies and some international firms that earn a lot of money and support the opposition’s plans. It would not be a bad idea to order the nationalisation of big companies for attempting to act against the constitution and national peace,” he said.
The president, who’s seeking to extend his 13-year rule till 2019, didn’t mention individual banks or companies by name.
He’s already seized billions of dollars in assets from foreign firms. The government faces several arbitration cases after failing to reach compensation agreements.
More about: Banking, Hugo Chavez, Latin America, Opposition, Venezuela

Former Turkish President Kenan Evren is standing trial for leading a 1980 coup that shaped the country for three decades.
The case has begun in a court in Ankara. Aged Evran and surviving coup architect Tahsin Sahinkaya had requested giving testimonies via video links. Judges have ruled this evidence would not be admitted.
Following the military take-over, fifty people were executed, half a million were arrested and hundreds more died in jail.
Demonstrators gathered outside the court to demand justice and the prosecution of more than just the coups leaders.
Meryem G??nes, a relative of coup victims remembers her experiences:“My father and husband were tortured on September 12, 1980. They were detained. We experienced the tragedy along with them.”
Ahmet T??rk a Pro-Kurdish MP talks about why this trial is so important:“It is not a matter of sentencing General Kenan Evren and Tahsin Sahinkaya. It is a matter of showing people and society how the army used people. People should know that.”
The government and at least 350 individuals and groups have become party to the prosecution. This means their personal grievances will be taken into account during the trial.
More about: Coup, Military, Trial, Turkey

In the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, April 6 marks 20 years since the beginning of the siege of Sarajevo in 1992. It was the longest siege in the history of modern warfare. It became one of the tragedies of the break-up of Yugoslavia.
A plaque on a bridge commemorates the first victim killed by a sniper on the day the siege began.
For the next three and a half years, Bosnian Serb forces, with artillery from the army of the ex-Yugoslavia, fired on the city with impunity. Civilians were the snipers’ easy prey. For a long time, the world’s powerful countries did not intervene. This controversial subject still provokes strong emotions.
The Bosnian war ended with the Dayton peace accords at the close of 1995. UN data citing the ICRC speak of a death toll in the hundreds of thousands. More than 11,000 were killed in the capital.
Ethnic and nationalist divisions fester, Bosnia and Herzegovina today divided into two separate entities: the Bosnian Muslim Croat Federation and the Serb Republic of Sprska.
Its president, Milorad Dodik, used to be considered a moderate. And then he refused to acknowledge the genocide of Srebrenica, in which some 8,000 Muslims were killed in the summer of 1995.
But Bosnian Muslim leaders have also been criticised. The top religious figure in now 80 percent Muslim Sarajevo, has to answer charges that he has not done enough to encourage reconciliation, which he denies.
Mustafa Ceric, Grand Mufti of Bosnia and Herzegovina said: “We made progress after the Dayton Agreement in recovery more than any other region in the world. But you know, when we make one step forward, there are forces who come and get us all backwards. And then we have to explain all the questions that we were explaining prior to the genocide in 1992 and ’93. How can you forgive somebody if he doesn’t ask forgiveness for his atrocities?”
Sarajevo researchers said around two thirds of those killed in the war were Bosniak, a quarter Serb and ten percent Croat. Tens of thousands of women and girls were systematically raped.
More about: Anniversary, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bosnian war

The man suspected of killing seven people at a college in Oakland, California had been expelled from the institute following behavioural problems.
Forty-three year old One Goh surrendered at a grocery store several kilometres away from the Oikos University, and is now being held by police, who explained Goh’s motives.
“We know that he came here with the intent of locating an administrator. We do know that he was upset at administrators at the school. We do know that he was upset with several students here because of the way he was treated when he was enrolled here two months ago,” said Oakland Police Chief Howard Jordan at a press conference.
What is the deadliest shooting to take place at a US college campus since 32 people were killed at Virginia Tech in April 2007 may have been because Goh was teased by fellow students.
He opened fire in the reception and two classrooms of the Christian college around 10.30 Monday morning local time.
Victims of Goh’s spree came from Korea, Nigeria, Nepal and the Philippines.
More about: Attack, Shootings, USA