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...
Sunday, August 09, 2009 BETHLEHEM: Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas received firm endorsement from his Fatah party on Saturday to remain its leader in an impromptu vote in which he was unchallenged.Abbas received the approval in a show of hands from the vast majority of Fatah's 2,300 delegates participating in the movement's first congress for 20 years and the first on Palestinian soil.Abbas succeeded the late Fatah founding father Yasser Arafat who led the movement for 40 years until his death in 2004.Fatah is seeking to throw off a reputation for corruption and cronyism that led in 2006 to an election loss to Islamist rival Hamas which opposes peace talks with Israel.The congress in Bethlehem began on Tuesday and has been marked by reformists' charges of vote-buying and nepotism by an "old guard".
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