CA-NEWS Summary

Sharif poised to form strong government after Pakistan poll

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Toppled in a 1999 military coup, jailed and exiled, Pakistan's Nawaz Sharif has made a triumphant election comeback and looks set to form a stable government capable of implementing reforms needed to rescue the fragile economy. Sharif may not win enough seats to rule on his own but has built up enough momentum to avoid having to form a coalition with his main rivals, former cricketer Imran Khan's Tehrik-i-Insaf (PTI) and the Pakistan People's Party (PPP).

Turkey says Syrian forces behind border town bombings

REYHANLI, Turkey (Reuters) - Turkey believes fighters loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad were behind two car bombings that killed 46 people in a Turkish border town where thousands of Syrian refugees live, officials said on Sunday. Authorities have arrested nine people, all Turkish citizens and including the alleged mastermind, after the bombings in Reyhanli on Saturday, deputy prime minister Besir Atalay told reporters.

Pope proclaims first saints, says Christians still persecuted

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Francis on Sunday proclaimed as saints some 800 Italians killed in the 15th century for refusing to convert to Islam, and said many Christians were still being persecuted for their faith. The Vatican seemed at pains not to allow the first canonizations of Francis' two-month-old papacy to be interpreted as anti-Islamic, saying the deaths of the 'Otranto Marytrs' must be understood in their historical context.

Greece invokes emergency powers to block teachers' strike

ATHENS (Reuters) - Greece has threatened high school teachers with arrest if they go ahead with a nationwide strike that would disrupt university entrance exams that start this week, the official government gazette said. It is the third time this year that Prime Minister Antonis Samaras's government has invoked emergency law to force strikers back to work to try to show foreign lenders who bailed out Greece that the country is sticking to unpopular reforms.

Egypt court to rule next month on challenge to upper house

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's highest court will rule next month on the legality of the upper house of parliament, judicial sources said on Sunday, in a case that throws more legal doubt over a political transition repeatedly disrupted by lawsuits. A ruling against the Muslim Brotherhood-led upper house by the Supreme Constitutional Court on June 2 could lead to the dissolution of the chamber and result in legislative power being transferred to President Mohamed Mursi.

Four of eight Turks captured in Afghanistan are free: Turkish PM

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Four of the eight Turks captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan last month have been freed and handed to Turkey's intelligence agency, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said on Sunday. Eight Turkish engineers, an Afghan and two pilots from Russia and Kyrgyzstan were onboard a Russian Mi-8 helicopter when it made a "hard landing" in a remote part of Logar province due to bad weather in April. They were taken captive by the Taliban, which controls the area.

End of siege fails to dispel Libyan security fears

TRIPOLI (Reuters) - Gunmen have ended a siege of Libya's foreign and justice ministries but the two-week standoff has left many unresolved questions about the government's ability to impose its authority in the capital, let alone the restive east of the country. The episode heightened security concerns that prompted oil group BP, one of the biggest foreign companies active in Libya, to announce on Sunday it was withdrawing an unspecified number of employees from Tripoli. The U.S. and British governments had already pulled out some diplomats temporarily.

Some 800,000 people to need food aid in Niger: U.N.

NIAMEY (Reuters) - Some 800,000 people will require food aid in Niger in the coming months despite a good harvest last year due to problems supplying cereals to markets, which have pushed up prices, and an influx of Malian refugees, the United Nations said. The U.N. office for humanitarian coordination (OCHA) said they would need food from now until the start of the rainy season, which is usually in July, July and August.

U.S. broadcast TV ratings slide pressures ad rates at 'upfronts'

(Reuters) - U.S. broadcast networks head into their biggest ad-selling season this week, competing with streaming services like Netflix, battling online players for ad dollars, and fending off hits starring zombies and duck hunters on cable. The increased competition will force ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC to settle for their lowest average rate hikes in three years during the "upfront" selling season, Wall Street analysts say.

Union organizer shot dead in South Africa's restive platinum belt

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - A militant South African union said on Sunday that one of its organizers had been shot dead in the platinum belt city of Rustenburg, a potential flashpoint at a time when tensions are running high with job cuts and wage talks looming. The Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU), which poached tens of thousands of disgruntled workers last year from the dominant National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), said the unnamed organizer had been killed on Saturday.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ca-news-summary-040529434.html