Political 2

Rajinikanth launches political party, says it will contest all 234 constituencies in Tamil Nadu assembly polls

In an announcement that could dramatically alter political alignments in Tamil Nadu, superstar Rajinikanth announced his political debut and said he will launch his own party which will contest all 234 constituencies in the next assembly polls in the state

India on top of list of countries that receive the highest number of spam calls

India figures at the top of a list of 20 countries that receive the highest number of spam calls getting 22 spam calls on an average every month.

Twitter is working on finding and banning users that advocate political or religious violence

Twitter Inc said on Tuesday it had stepped up efforts to rid its social network of posts from users advocating political or religious violence, and was increasingly using software to find them rather than relying on reports from users or governments.

No deal in Congo talks on Kabila's future before expected protests | Reuters

By Aaron Ross | KINSHASA KINSHASA Talks in Democratic Republic of Congo on Saturday between the ruling coalition and the opposition failed to reach a compromise on the political future of President Joseph Kabila, who is set to stay in power when his mandate ends on Monday.Delegates said the talks will resume on Wednesday once the Catholic bishops mediating the negotiations have returned from a trip to Rome to meet the pope. The opposition wants elections next year and for Kabila to pledge he will step down after nearly 16 years in power and not stand for a third term, which would breach Congo's constitution. The government says it cannot organise a presidential vote until 2018, however, and the constitutional court ruled in May he can stay on until the election.The capital Kinshasa is on edge ahead of planned protests against what opponents say is a bid by Kabila to cling to power

Legion will release Sansad email dump, taken from National Infomatics Centre servers

Legion did not go into specifics of how they got their hands on the information or the email dumps but they did point out that the group has root access to a lot of servers across the country.

Italy president starts talks to seek way out of political crisis | Reuters

By Steve Scherer and Francesca Piscioneri | ROME ROME Italy's president began talks with political leaders on Thursday to seek a way out of the political crisis caused by the resignation of Prime Minister Matteo Renzi.Sergio Mattarella, a 75-year-old former politician and constitutional court judge, must decide if someone can lead Italy to elections scheduled for 2018, or whether an interim government should serve until a snap vote can be held in spring.Mattarella, a former Christian Democrat with a less interventionist style than his predecessor Giorgio Napolitano, begins talks with institutional leaders at 6 p.m.

After Trump and Brexit shocks, UK finance minister hopes to ease voters' frustrations | Reuters

By William Schomberg | LONDON LONDON Five months to the day after Britain voted for Brexit, its finance minister will outline how the government plans to cope with the economic fallout and voters' frustrations which had echoes in Donald Trump's U.S. election triumph.Philip Hammond, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is due on Nov

ANALYSIS - In Lebanon deal, Iran wins and Saudi retreats | Reuters

By Tom Perry and Laila Bassam | BEIRUT BEIRUT A veteran Christian leader is set to fill Lebanon's long-vacant presidency in a deal that underlines the ascendancy of the Iranian-backed Hezbollah movement and the diminished role of Saudi Arabia in the country.It appears all but certain that Michel Aoun will become president next week under an unlikely proposal tabled by Sunni leader Saad al-Hariri, whose Saudi-backed coalition opposed Hezbollah for years.Parliament will likely elect Aoun on Oct. 31. This will end one element of a paralysing political crisis: the 29-month-long presidential vacuum.

South Africa to quit troubled U.N. war crimes court | Reuters

By Joe Brock | PRETORIA PRETORIA South Africa said on Friday it was quitting the International Criminal Court (ICC) because membership conflicted with diplomatic immunity laws, dealing a new blow to the struggling court and angering the political opposition.Pretoria last year announced its intention to leave after the ICC criticised it for disregarding an ICC order to arrest Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, who is accused of genocide and war crimes, when he visited South Africa. Bashir has denied the accusations.The United Nations on Friday confirmed receipt of South Africa's withdrawal from the ICC, which will take effect one year from Oct. 19, spokesman Stephane Dujarric said, making it the first country to quit the Rome Statute.The instrument of withdrawal document, seen by Reuters on Thursday, has been assessed by the United Nations as bona fide and is being processed, Dujarric said.The announcement puts new pressure on the world's first permanent war crimes court, which has had to fight off allegations of pursuing a neo-colonial agenda in Africa, where all but one of its 10 investigations have been based.

Macron outlines vision of French Islam, drops more ambition hints | Reuters

By Michel Rose | MONTPELLIER MONTPELLIER Former economy minister Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday that France had sometimes made mistakes in unfairly targeting Muslims, suggesting the country could be less stringent in applying its rules on secularism.He made his comments at a rally in the southern city of Monpellier, but he again stopped short of saying he would stand in next year's presidential election."No religion is a problem in France today," he told the crowd. "If the state should be neutral, which is at the heart of secularism, we have a duty to let everybody practice their religion with dignity."The comments followed a string of deadly Islamist militant attacks in Paris and Nice in the past year that have focused attention on France's large Muslim and Arab population and their place in its society.Over the summer, the issue of the full-body "burkini" swimsuit, which some towns tried to ban women from wearing, also fueled tensions.Macron quit President Francois Hollande's government in August, pledging to "transform France".