TEGUCIGALPA: A powerful 7.1 magnitude earthquake shook Honduras on Thursday, killing at least six people, knocking down flimsy homes and causing damage in neighboring Guatemala.The offshore quake destroyed some 60 houses and damaged scores of other buildings across the north of Honduras, a poor country of 7 million people, and briefly triggered a tsunami alert for Central America's Caribbean coast. Emergency services officials said six people died and at least 25 were injured in the earthquake but the toll could rise as reports come in from poor villages in the mountainous area along the coast."It is not alarming, it is not a calamity. For the type ofearthquake it was, the damage is minor," Honduran PresidentManuel Zelaya told local radio.
BEIRUT: Thousands of people converged Saturday on central Beirut to mark the fourth anniversary of the assassination of Lebanese former premier Rafiq Hariri.Waving Lebanese flags and carrying pictures of the slain leader, men, women and children gathered under sunny skies in Martyr's Square where members of the parliamentary majority were to address the crowd. The rally comes as final preparations are underway in The Hague for the launch of the international tribunal set up to bring Hariri's killers to justice. It also comes as the country prepares for legislative elections in June that will pit Western-backed political parties against a Hezbollah-led alliance backed by Syria and Iran.Hariri died in a massive car bombing on February 14, 2005 that also killed 22 others. The assassination was widely blamed on then Lebanese power-broker Syria, which has denied any involvement. The attack on the Beirut seafront was one of the worst acts of political violence to rock Lebanon since t...
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