The appeal hearing in the Russian band Pussy Riot's case is delayed after one member of the group fired their lawyer. (RIA Novosti)
Chinese authorities close down the firm handling dissident artist Ai Weiwei's affairs, possibly saving him from paying the remainder of a 15 million yuan tax fine. (The Guardian)
A U.S. Border Patrol agent is shot dead near the U.S.-Mexico border in the state of Arizona. A second agent was shot and is being treated for non-life threatening injuries. (BBC)
Turkish armed forces bombard targets in Syria in response to a Syrian Army shelling that hit the Turkish border town of Akçakale, killing five people. (Wall Street Journal)
The decision to award the rail franchise for the United Kingdom's West Coast Main Line to FirstGroup is scrapped by the government after what are described as "significant technical flaws" in the bidding process.(BBC)
Turkish forces continue to bombard Syrian territory for a second day in retaliation for a cross-border strike from Syria that killed five people in Akçakale. (The Daily Telegraph)
Syria offers condolences for the shelling deaths in Akçakale; a Turkish official says Syria has offered formal apologies. (CBS)(SANA)
An abortion rights activist ship is blocked from entering the Moroccan port of Smir; the vessel is operated by the Dutch non-profit organization Women on Waves, which provides abortions and related medical services to women living in countries with restrictive abortion laws. (UPI)
Jordan's official news agency announces that King Abdullah dissolves parliament, paving the way for early elections. (BBC)
Science
GCHQ director Iain Lobban gives a rare public speech in which he speaks of the "enduring lessons" to be drawn from the work of Alan Turing, who reportedly committed suicide. (BBC)
Anglo Platinum Limited—the world's biggest platinum producer—fires 12,000 people in South Africa after a strike over working conditions. The corporation has stated that the strikes have cost it 39,000 ounces in output - equivalent to 700 million rand ($82.3 million; £51 million) in revenue. (BBC)
Health and environment
At least 47 people throughout the United States are infected with fungal meningitis from contaminated medicine, with five people dying. (CNN)
Los Angeles Police Department fails to obtain a search warrant when a federal judge in Texas blocks their attempt to obtain 1970's tapes of conversations between a Manson family member and his attorney. LA Police believe this evidence could help solve more than a dozen murders.(FoxNews)
A court in the VaticanfindsPope Benedict XVI's former butler Paolo Gabriele guilty of theft for stealing and leaking confidential documents and sentences Gabriele to 18 months' imprisonment. (BBC)
Mexican Drug War: Initial reports from the Mexican Navy indicate that Heriberto Lazcano Lazcano, the top leader of the most dangerous Mexican criminal organization known as Los Zetas, may have been killed in a shootout. The forensic tests are currently on their way to confirm his identity. (USA Today)
Scientists warn of the dangers of using liquid nitrogen in drinks after a teenage girl from the United Kingdom required emergency surgery upon consuming a cocktail containing the substance. (The Telegraph)
Police in Nigeria arrest 13 people in connection with the lynching of four university students who were accused of stealing laptops and mobile phones in Rivers state. (BBC)
Thirty five people are killed after the Nigerian military opened fire after a bomb struck their convoy in Maiduguri; both civilians and military personnel are believed to be among the dead after the suspected Boko Haram attack. (Reuters)
A suicide bomb attack takes place on an intelligence agency building in Damascus, reportedly killing dozens of people. The rebel al-Nusra Front claims responsibility. (BBC)
After the court's declaration that Sandusky is a violent sexual predator, the presiding judge sentences him to at least 30 years imprisonment. During sentencing, the judge acknowledges Sandusky's "positive work" but further states that it served only to hide his true character. Sandusky's lawyer vows to lodge an appeal against the ruling. (The Patriot News)(CNN)
Oil giant Shell is sued by Niger Delta farmers in a civil court in The Hague, claiming oil spills ruined their livelihoods. Shell says it is difficult to carry out repairs because of local insecurity. (BBC)
Disasters
Heavy rain in the United Kingdom causes flash flooding in the coastal village of Clovelly, Devon, damaging homes and pulling up cobbles in the street. (BBC)
Seven prisoners from Amasya Prison in Turkey say that they began "indefinite and irreversible" hunger strikes on October 5, and their health is at serious risk. (Dicle Haber)
Standard & Poor's downgrades South Africa's long-term foreign currency sovereign credit rating from 'BBB+' to 'BBB' and the long-term local currency rating from 'A' to 'A-'. (RIA Novosti)
International relations
The European Union wins the 2012 [[Nobel Peace Prize]; "for over six decades [having] contributed to the advancement of peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights in Europe". (The Telegraph)
Law and crime
The British government is dragged into the nationwide scandal surrounding former BBC presenter and DJ Jimmy Savile, who faces hundreds of allegations surrounding his conduct in the presence of teenage girls. (The Guardian)
The UK's largest independent investigation into police wrongdoing will be conducted following a damning report into the 1989 Hillsborough disaster. (BBC)
The high court of Botswana overturns a customary law which prevented women from inheriting the family home. (IRIN)
In response to multiple rockets being fired across the border, Israel launched four air strikes. Two militants from a Salafist jihadist group are killed and another wounded in the northern Gaza Strip. (BBC)
Gerhard Richter's Abstraktes Bild, painted in 1994 and formerly owned by rock star Eric Clapton, sells for $34 million - an auction record for a work by a living artist. (BBC)
Residents of Los Angeles watch in awe as U.S. Space Shuttle Endeavour inches through the city on a giant trolley, bound for a museum. Hundreds of trees in its path are chopped down. (BBC)
International relations
Syria announces Turkish civilian flights over Syrian territory are banned, days after Turkey intercepted a Syrian flight that was suspected to be carrying illegal cargo. (BBC)
The UK's Ministry of Defence says that five Royal Marines have been charged with murder over an incident involving the death of an insurgent in Afghanistan in 2011. (BBC)
The UK's Ministry of Defence will hold an investigation after journalists from The Sunday Times posed as lobbyists for a defence manufacturer and approached several senior retired officers to ask if they would help them secure contracts. (BBC)
Internationally celebrated teenage activist Malala Yousafzai is sent to the UK for further treatment after being shot in the head by a Taliban gunman. (Reuters)
The Portuguese government announces details of its draft budget for 2013, as protests continue against austerity. (BBC)
Disasters and accidents
Seven people are treated in hospital for injuries after a bus carrying 56 college students crashes and overturns near the English coastal town of Poole. (BBC)
Virgin Trains is asked to continue running the rail franchise for UK's West Coast Main Line following the cancellation of a deal to award the contract to another company when errors were made in the way in which the process was conducted. (BBC)
Saudi Arabia’s official news agency reports that a hand grenade explosion at the King Abdulaziz military academy in Riyadh kills one cadet and injures nine. (AP via Boston Globe)
Several structures were set ablaze and as many as 24 militants were killed after suspected bombing Boko Haram attacks rocked the Nigerian city of Maiduguri. (BBC)
Two suspected al-Qaeda members and two government-aligned tribesmen are killed during an attack on a border checkpoint in Abyan, Yemen. (Reuters)
The BBC appoints the heads of two separate inquiries into the sexual abuse scandal that has engulfed Jimmy Savile. Former High Court judge Dame Janet Smith will review the culture and practices of the BBC during the time Savile worked there, while Nick Pollard, a former Sky News executive will look at why a Newsnight investigation into Savile's activities was dropped shortly before transmission. (The Daily Telegraph)
A 4.0-magnitude (originally, 4.6) earthquake strikes Hollis Center, Maine, roughly 20 miles west of Portland, Maine, the state's largest city. At 3.1 miles deep, it is a shallow earthquake, felt in Maine, southwestern Connecticut, and eastern New York state. There were reports of very minor damage and cellular phone outages, but no serious property damage, injuries, or deaths. (NBC)
Lance Armstrong resigns as chairman of his anti-cancer charity, LIVESTRONG.
Athletic apparel conglomerate Nike and cycling equipment manufacturer Trek revoke their endorsement contracts with U.S. cyclist Lance Armstrong in the wake of growing allegations of doping. Both will continue to support LIVESTRONG. (Daily Mail)
Anheuser-Busch states it will allow Armstrong's contract with them to expire at the end of the year. It will also continue to support LIVESTRONG. (BBC)(CNN)
American weekly news magazine Newsweek announces it will cease print publication on December 31 and will move to an online-only format. (CNN)
Trading of Google stock on NASDAQ is temporarily suspended after it drops 9% following an inadvertent early release of its quarterly report showing a 20% decline in profits. (BBC)(Bloomberg)
Wissam al-Hassan, head of Saad al-Hariri's security team, is killed in the blast. Al Hassan was known for being the prime investigator in the Michel Samaha case, where Michel Samaha was caught smuggling bombs into Lebanon upon orders from the Syrian government to kill Lebanese officials between 2005 and 2008, starting with the murder of Rafik al-Hariri.(Al Jazeera)
A tour bus went off the highway and crashed in northwest Arizona late Friday at around 8:00 PM PDT, killing the bus driver (who was believed to have suffered a medical incident), and leaving at least four of the passengers with serious injuries. About 45 other passengers were hurt less seriously, and some were not hospitalized. The bus was northbound on Highway 93 near Willow Beach, Arizona and the Nevada state line, southeast of Las Vegas. (NBC)
Taxicab driver Christopher Halliwell is sentenced to life imprisonment for murdering Sian O'Callaghan who went missing after visiting a nightclub in Swindon in March last year. (BBC)
Respect MP George Galloway writes to British home secretary Theresa May and makes a complaint to the police about his secretary Aisha Ali-Khan, claiming that she was working as an "agent" for a Metropolitan police counterterrorism officer who was running a "dirty tricks" campaign against him. (The Guardian)
Authorities in Tripoli announce the capture of Muammar Gaddafi's former spokesman Moussa Ibrahim near the town of Tarhouna, 40 miles south of the capital Tripoli. Ibrahim's whereabouts had been unknown since the end of the civil war in 2011 and there had been several earlier reports of his arrest. Hours later an audio message purported to be by Ibrahim appears online, in which he denies being captured or even being in Libya. (Reuters)(BBC)
Siege of Bani Walid (2012): Reports emerge that Khamis Gaddafi, the youngest son of Muammar Gaddafi, was killed during the fighting in Bani Walid. The 29-year-old has been proclaimed dead several times since the beginning of last year's civil war. (The Guardian)
Suspected members of Boko Haram attack the northern Nigerian city of Potiskum, destroying several buildings and leaving at least 23 locals dead. (Al Jazeera)
Overnight clashes in southeastern Turkey leave 9 people dead, including 6 security officers and 3 suspected Kurdish militants. (Al Jazeera)
The SV Estelle, a schooner attempting to breach the Israeli blockade of Gaza claiming to deliver humanitarian aid, is boarded by Israeli soldiers and diverted to the port of Ashdod by Israeli naval ships; Israel says no aid is found aboard. Passengers offer no resistance. (The Irish Times)(The Times of Israel)
Jewish-American linguist, philosopher and human rights campaigner Noam Chomsky visits Gaza for the first time and attends a seminar alongside Gazan thinkers and intellectuals. (Press TV)
Politics
Tens of thousands of protesters march through London, Glasgow and Belfast in a series of demonstrations against UK government austerity measures. (BBC)(CNN)(RTÉ)
2012 Beirut bombing: Lebanese security forces fire shots into the air and tear gas at crowds, as protesters attempt to breach government offices of prime minister Mikati in response to a car bomb that killed intelligence chief Wissam al-Hassan. (Jerusalem Post)
Police fire tear gas and stun grenades at an anti-government protest in Kuwait; protesters were demonstrating against changes to voting laws. (Al Jazeera)
Syrian civil war: Car bombs explode in predominately Christian neighborhoods in Damascus and Aleppo, killing at least 13, as talks between the Assad and U.N. peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi continue. (Wall Street Journal)
Riot police in Kuwait attack demonstrators with teargas, stun grenades and batons. (Al Jazeera)
Syrian civil war: A Jordanian soldier dies during a gunfight between Jordanian troops and Islamic militants attempting to cross the border into Syria. (CTV News)
A Kindle user from Norway has her account wiped and all her paid-for books deleted by the American multinational electronic commerce company Amazon.com. (The Guardian)
Business and economics
A former Goldman Sachs employee blows the whistle on the investment bank having routinely taken advantage of charities and pension funds to increase its profits. (The Guardian)
The chairman of the U.S. central bank, the Federal Reserve, likely will not stand for re-election to that post. Ben Bernanke has reportedly told friends he will leave when his term ends in January 2014 regardless of who wins the Presidential election campaign. (New York Times)
International relations
The UK doubles its number of RAF armed "drones" operating in Afghanistan and, in a new development, drones are to be controlled from terminals and screens on British soil. (The Guardian)
Six Italian scientists and an ex-government official are convicted of multiple manslaughter and sentenced to six years in prison over the 2009 L'Aquila earthquake after prosecutors accuse them of being "falsely reassuring" before the event. (BBC)(The Guardian)(Al Jazeera)
Pussy Riot members Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova are exiled to remote prison camps located in Perm and Mordovia, home to parts of the Soviet-era gulag system. Their exact locations are unknown, even to their lawyers and family members. They had petitioned to be held in Moscow which would have allowed them to watch their young children grow. (The Guardian)
The body of a female found late Monday in a recycling container in Clayton, New Jersey is preliminarily determined to be that of missing 12-year-old girl Autumn Pasquale according to police (NBC)
Politics and elections
Okinawa's legislative assembly passes a resolution expressing "overwhelming indignation" at the alleged rape of a Japanese woman by two U.S. soldiers, the latest of 5,747 crimes on record allegedly involving U.S. personnel over the past 40 years, and condemns the worsening criminal activity of foreign troops on the island. (Al Jazeera)
A football fan is jailed after an attack on former England international goalkeeper Chris Kirkland during a match last week. Twenty-one-year-old Aaron Cawley was filmed on live television jumping from the stand and striking Kirkland with both arms on the head following a goal during the league match at Hillsborough. Kirkland, who described the assault as like being "hit by a ton of bricks", was thrown off balance, crashed to the ground against his goal area and required treatment for his injuries. (The Guardian)(The Daily Telegraph)
A young Pakistani man, whose father was killed by drones alongside 40 others in March 2011, seeks to block the sharing of British intelligence with the CIA. This represents the first serious legal challenge in the English courts to Britain's involvement in the drones campaign. (The Guardian)
Authorities in Mumbai investigate the sudden death last weekend of the renowned Bollywood film-maker Yash Chopra, who was earlier thought to have died from dengue fever. (BBC)
A fire at a hospital in the southern Taiwanese city of Tainan kills at least 12 people and injures up to 60 others. (BBC)
A "very loud explosion" and a "huge fire" at a military factory in Khartoum are being treated as suspicious. (BBC)
Following yesterday's conviction of scientists for their failure to predict the 2009 L'Aquila earthquake, Luciano Maiani—head of Italy's disaster body—resigns in protest at the harsh treatment of his colleagues. (BBC)(Al Jazeera)
Siege of Bani Walid (2012): Militias loyal to the Libyan government capture the town of Bani Walid after days of battle, with locals claiming that 130 civilians have died under artillery shelling attacks from militia forces. (The Daily Beast)(Reuters)
After years of delays and disputes over cost and design, and amid references in newspapers to Germany's rejection of asylum applications by Roma from Kosovo and comments from the country's interior minister alleging "increasing abuse of asylum from countries in the Balkans", Angela Merkel unveils a memorial near the Reichstag to members of the Roma community killed during the Nazi Holocaust. (BBC)
Former Société Générale trader Jérôme Kerviel loses his appeal against a five-year prison sentence for forgery and breach of trust, handed down in 2010. (BBC)
Police in the Denver suburb of Westminster, Colorado arrest a 17-year-old resident who was allegedly involved in an attempted abduction in the killing of 10-year-old Jessica Ridgeway. (NBC)
Three people are shot dead, two are critically wounded, and a gunman is at large after shootings at two locations in the Los Angeles suburb of Downey, California: a business next to a Coca-Cola plant, and a residence. (NBC)
Syrian civil war: The Syrian government announces via its state media that it will suspend military operations from Friday to Monday, during this year's Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday, as part of a ceasefire proposal by U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi. (CNN)
Business and economics
Official GDP figures indicate the 2012 Summer Olympics helped the UK economy emerge from recession in the three months from July to September, with growth of 1.0%. (BBC)
A rape claim against a major Irish celebrity is investigated. The victim was made pregnant during her ordeal. (Irish Independent)
A jury fails to reach a verdict in the retrial of a policeman thought to have racially abused a suspect in the aftermath of the 2011 England riots. (BBC)
A New York Police Department officer, 6-year employee Gilberto Valle III along with an unnamed co-conspirator, is charged with allegedly conspiring to cross state lines and kidnap, torture, cook, and eat women (at least 100 names and pictures, some with physical descriptions, were found on his computer). He could get up to life in prison. (MSN)[permanent dead link]
France's interior minister Manuel Valls is embroiled in controversy amid reports he ordered police to clear his Paris neighbourhood of homeless so his wife could go about her shopping "in peace". (Ottawa Citizen)[permanent dead link]
Fighting in Syria continues as the ceasefire agreement mediated by U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi to occur during the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha begins. (Christian Science Monitor)
A car bomb explodes in the capital Damascus, killing an unknown number of people and injuring many. (Reuters)
Writer Javier Marías rejects the Spanish government's National Novel Prize, awarded for his novel Los enamoramientos, saying "All my life I have managed to avoid state institutions, regardless of which party was in government, and I have turned down all income from the public purse. I don't want to be seen as an author who is favoured by any particular government." (The Guardian)
Russian leftist protest leader Sergei Udaltsov is charged with plotting "mass disorder" and could face a 10 year prison sentence if convicted. (RIA Novosti)
Iraqi insurgency: A series of attacks across Iraq kill 46 and injured 123 others. (BBC)
Several injuries occur as police use rubber-coated steel bullets and tear gas to disperse people at the Olympia Stadium in Rustenburg, South Africa. (Al Jazeera)
Business and economics
Thousands of people join protests against budget cuts in Madrid and ask that the government quit. Riot police greet the demonstrators. (BBC)(Al Jazeera)
The family of disgraced disc jockey and television presenter Jimmy Savile makes its first public statement since his reputation was destroyed by a sexual abuse scandal. (CNN)(BBC)
A statement from the Vatican claims it is not possible to strip Savile of his papal knighthood over his involvement in the sexual abuse scandal because the honour ceased to exist upon his death. Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi makes it known that the Vatican is "deeply saddened that a person who has been stained by such acts could in his lifetime have been proposed for an honour by the Holy See." (The Irish Times)
Opposition activists report at least 128 deaths around the country, as the UN-brokered ceasefire appears to collapse. The Syrian Army bombards three Damascus districts and the city of Bara near Idlib, killing at least 22 people. (CNN)(Reuters)[permanent dead link]
Two deadly car bombings rock Damascus, according to Syrian state media. (BBC)
Bahraini uprising: Anti-government protests are banned and legal action is threatened against those backing the protests. (Al Jazeera)
Police attack thousands of demonstrators with tear gas and water cannons in Ankara during the celebrations of the anniversary of the foundation of the Republic of Turkey. (Al Jazeera)
Activists descend on the city of Paju to float 50,000 propaganda leaflets on balloons into North Korea, despite protests from local South Korean residents concerned at provoking a military response. (BBC)
The U.S. Supreme Court declines to take on the review of an abortion-related appeal. The case, which is a proposed measure to amend the Oklahoma state constitution that was unanimously struck down by the Oklahoma Supreme Court, dealt with the constitutionality of state "personhood" laws that endorse the viewpoint that human life begins at conception, and would give human embryos rights and privileges given to citizens, which could have made it more difficult to have abortions for non-emergency reasons. (CNN)
Registered child sex offenders in Simi Valley, California, will not have to post a sign outside their home this Halloween reading in part "no candy," but they still are prohibited from decorating their houses and handing out candy, U.S. District Judge Percy Anderson ruled Tuesday, in a partial victory for the suing offenders and their wives before Halloween. (CNN)
Ahead of the first preview of his new play, Alan Bennett reveals it emerged as a result of disquiet at the National Trust and laments a nation turned into a "captive market" where public life exhibits a "diminution of magnanimity." (The Guardian)
Organisers of a proposed free public event on Homo floresiensis are forced to change the event's title after use of the word "hobbit", the creature's nickname, is forbidden by the representatives of the Tolkien Estate. (The Guardian)
A suburban Chicago woman, Elzbieta Plackowska, 40, of Naperville, Illinois, is held without bail after allegedly fatally stabbing her 7-year-old son, Justin, Tuesday night 100 times, and then killing a 5-year-old girl, Olivia Dworakowski, who she had been babysitting and who had witnessed the homicide. She told investigators she did it because she was angry with her husband, a truck driver who was often away, leaving her to do work as a maid and care for the child, work that supposedly was beneath her, according to DuPage County, IllinoisState's AttorneyRobert Berlin. (Peoria Journal Star)
Barclays plc says that it is the subject of two new regulatory probes after a series of scandals. The bank also announces it made a loss in the third quarter of 2012. (BBC)
