TEHRAN: Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Saturday the Islamic republic is ready to change if US President Barack Obama leads the way by changing American attitude towards his country."If you change your attitude, we will change our attitude," Khamenei said in a groundbreaking address to thousands of Iranians in the holy city of Mashhad which was broadcast on state television.Speaking a day after Obama offered Tehran a "new beginning" to turn back the tide on decades of mutual animosity, Khamenei said however Iran is yet to see any change in Washington's attitude towards Tehran."We have no experience with the new American government and the new American president. We will observe them and we will judge," he said.Khamenei accused Washington of having had a "hostile" attitude towards Tehran since the Islamic revolution toppled the US-backed shah in 1979.Highlighting the three-decades old animosity, Khamenei said Iran would not forget American support to Saddam Hussein during the 1980-88 war between Iran and Iraq or the shooting down of an Iranian passenger plane in 1988 by a US warship that killed all 290 passengers on board.
Friday, August 14, 2009 MUMBAI: A 26-year-old woman died Thursday of H1N1 swine flu in the southern city of Bangalore, raising India's death toll from the virus to 20, authorities said.The death was the first reported in India's information technology capital, the Press Trust of India reported.Meanwhile in Pune, the worst-affected in India, two more victims of the virus died Thursday, raising the death toll in that western city near Mumbai to 12, the report said. The victims were an 11-month-old boy and a 75-year-old old woman.US media reported movie halls, schools and colleges were ordered closed Thursday for three days to a week in Mumbai, the commercial and financial capital of the country, as fear of the pandemic spread.Prajakata Lavangare, a spokeswoman for the government of Maharashtra state of which Mumbai is the capital, said similar orders were issued in Pune, which is also located in the state.The woman who died in Bangalore was identified only as Roopa, a teacher in...
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