For 23 miles up on the edge of space, and wearing only a pressurised suit and a parachute, Felix Baumgartner will pause at the hatch of his tiny capsule as it ascends into the heavens beneath one of the biggest balloons ever made. The sponsor Red Bull Stratos announced on Friday that the jump by ... Read more
World
World’s No 1 surrogate mother
The world’s most prolific surrogate mother has told how she is pregnant again and planning to give away baby number 13. British-born Carole Horlock, who moved to a farmhouse near Bordeaux, France, said she will hand over the child to an Italian couple without even giving it a cuddle. The 45-year-old added that she’s delighted to ... Read more
Dubai bans tobacco for 24 hours
All tobacco products are banned from being sold in Dubai for 24 hours on Thursday, May 31 All tobacco products are banned from being sold in Dubai for 24 hours on Thursday, May 31, to observe World No Tobacco Day, a senior official at the Dubai Municipality said. “The move is aimed at spreading awareness ... Read more
Teenager enslaved for 8 years
A teenage German woman has been rescued from a Bosnian couple who are accused of starving and beating her for years and of harnessing her to a horse cart and making her pull it. The 19-year-old, kept in a hamlet near the northeastern town of Kalesija since 2004, had been taken to safety and the ... Read more
Stray dog completes 1700km China race
A stray dog has completed a 1700km journey across China after joining a cycle race from Sichuan province to Tibet. The dog, nicknamed “Xiaosa”, joined the cyclists after one of them gave him food. He ran with them for 24 days, covering up to 60km a day, and climbing 12 mountains. Cyclist Xiao Yong started a blog
Official arrested for raping over 10 girls
Police in central China detained a former Communist Party official on suspicion of raping underage girls. Li Xingong, who was the party’s deputy head in Yongcheng city of Henan province, is accused of sexually assaulting more than ten girls during police interrogations, the official Xinhua news agency reported. City authorities have
Fugitive penguin caught after two months on the run
A young penguin which escaped from a Tokyo aquarium has been caught after more than two months on the run. The Humboldt penguin scaled a 13ft (4m) wall and slipped through a barbed wire fence at the Tokyo Sea Life Park in March. The bird, known only as 337, was later spotted alive in the ... Read more
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg marries girlfriend
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has ended a hectic week which saw his company valued at £106bn after a stock market flotation by getting married. He wed his long-time girlfriend Priscilla Chan, 27, in a ceremony at his home in Palo Alto, California. Chan also had a busy week, graduating from medical school on Monday, as ... Read more
Alumni holds mass wedding at university
A total of 128 couples took part in a mass wedding at Zhejiang University in China. The event was held to mark the 115th anniversary of the institution. The couples, from all over China, gathered at their school once again for the biggest event of their lives, after their graduation ceremony. To participate in the mass ... Read more
Rekha takes oath as Rajya Sabha member
Veteran Bollywood actress Rekha has been sworn in as an MP in India’s upper house of parliament, the Rajya Sabha. Taking her oath, the actress vowed to “faithfully discharge the duty upon which I am about to enter”. India’s prime minister can nominate 12 people with special experience in “literature, science, art and
Hen lays ‘eggless’ chick!
A Sri Lanka hen has given birth to a chick without an egg, in a new twist on the age-old question of whether the chicken or the egg came first. Instead of passing out of the hen’s body and being incubated outside, the egg was incubated in the hen for 21 days and then hatched ... Read more
Sweden: Wedding ring ‘found on carrot’ after 16 years
A Swedish woman has discovered her wedding ring on a carrot growing in her garden, 16 years after she lost it, says a newspaper. Lena Paahlsson had long ago lost hope of finding the ring, which she designed herself, reports Dagens Nyheter. The white-gold band, set with seven small diamonds, went missing in her kitchen ... Read more
Miss Venezuela, 28, dies of breast cancer
Former Miss Venezuela Eva Ekvall, whose struggle with breast cancer was closely followed by Venezuelans, has died at age 28. Her family said Ekvall died on Saturday at a hospital in Houston. Ekvall was crowned Miss Venezuela at age 17 in 2000, and the following year she was third runner-up in the Miss Universe pageant ... Read more
The 30 seconds that could have saved the Titanic
Course should have been altered instantly Experts have revealed that Titanic might have been saved from disaster if it had changed course just 30 seconds sooner. It has been reported that a crewmember on the White Star liner, which set sail from Southampton in April 1912 but sank in the Atlantic after hitting an iceberg, ... Read more
Girls kidnapped to be brides in China
China is witnessing an increasing number of foreign women who have been cheated, kidnapped and smuggled into the country to become brides, a senior official has said. Most of these women are from rural areas in Vietnam, Myanmar and Laos. They eagerly want to find jobs in China or marry rich Chinese men to escape ... Read more
World’s first sex school opens in Austria
While many people may think it’s an activity which should be best learned behind closed doors, an enterprising Swedish schoolmistress thinks otherwise. Ylva-Maria Thompson has opened the world’s first international sex school to teach its students how to be better lovers. The Austrian International Sex School in Vienna offers “hands on” lessons in seduction for ... Read more
First man functionally cured of HIV
Since HIV was discovered 30 years ago, 30 million people have died from the disease, and it continues to spread at the rate of 7,000 people per day globally, according to the UN. Now, after years of progress in holding back the disease, there is finally an apparent case of one successful cure. 45-year-old Timothy ... Read more
Plane crashes into ferris wheel
An ultra-light plane has crashed into a Ferris wheel in a village north of Sydney, trapping four people, Australian officials say. The Cheetah S200 plane with two men aboard did not topple the wheel after hitting it during a festival in the village of Old Bar. The men and two children at the top of ... Read more
Erotic dancer forces flight to turn back
A flight from Moscow to London was turned back when a drunken female passenger started performing erotic dances in front of shocked passengers. The 7am flight from Moscow’s main Domodedovo airport did an about-turn 15 minutes after the take-off on Friday because of the 39-year-old woman’s antics, Ria Novosti news agency reported. ”The woman was ... Read more
China faces bride shortage
Experts have warned that millions of Chinese men of marriageble age may be living as frustrated bachelors by 2020 due to the country’s gender imbalance, a trend that will add pressure to social stability. Boys under 19 outnumber girls in the same age group by 23.77 million, which leads to the inevitable conclusion that more ... Read more