DHAKA: Tehelka founder and editor-in-chief Tarun Tejpal, accused of sexually assaulting a junior colleague in a five-star hotel earlier this month, was Friday booked for rape by Goa Police as the Union home ministry swung into action and sought details of the incident. The famed

DHAKA: 22 people have died in a pipeline explosion in the port of Qingdao in East China, according to local authorities and media.According to reports, the oil pipeline, owned by China`s oil refiner Sinopec ruptured and, while being repaired, caught fire and exploded.Chinese authorities

DHAKA: Andhra Pradesh is bracing for severe cyclonic storm, Helen, which is expected to hit the state`s coast this afternoon.Here are the latest developments:The storm, packing wind speeds of upto 120 kilometres per hour, is likely to cross the Andhra Pradesh coast near Machillipatnam

DHAKA: An extremely rare Leica camera with an estimated value of around $1.2m (£750,000) is set to be auction in Hong Kong on Friday.The gold-plated Leica Luxus II, dating from 1932, is one of only four of its kind ever made.Its Welsh owner, who died last year, showed it on BBC TV`s

DHAKA: Three women have been "rescued" from a south London house as police investigate claims they were held as slaves for about 30 years.Last month officers were contacted by Freedom Charity after it received a call from a woman saying she had been held against her will for decades.A

DHAKA: Firefighters among 26 people killed and dozens more are feared missing after the roof of a supermarket collapsed on shoppers in the Latvian capital, Riga. Two of those killed were emergency workers, officials said. At least 35 people have been injured.A criminal investigation has

DHAKA: Afghan President Hamid Karzai has told his countrymen that a vital security pact with the United States should not come into effect until after next year`s election and conceded there was little trust between the two countries.But the US replied that it was "neither practical nor

DHAKA: President Barack Obama took another step toward cementing an important political alliance with Bill Clinton on Wednesday, giving the 42nd president the nation`s highest civilian honor.Clinton received the Presidential Medal of Freedom along with 15 other luminaries in sports,

DHAKA: Saudi Arabia has asked its citizens to leave Lebanon due to the risk of political violence in the country, where twin suicide bombings near Iran`s embassy in Beirut killed 25 people this week.Riyadh has issued several similar calls in the past two years as the civil war in Syria

DHAKA: Four British men have been killed fighting alongside Al-Qaeda-linked fighters in Syria, it was reported Thursday, as fears rise of the growing threat from jihadists returning from the war.Three of the men, all thought to be from London, were killed in August as their group attacked

DHAKA: An Iraqi Shia militia said on Thursday it had fired six mortar bombs into Saudi Arabia’s desert as a ‘warning message’ to the kingdom to stop ‘interfering’ in Iraqi affairs.‘The goal was to send a warning message to Saudis to tell them that their border stations and

DHAKA: Pope Francis on Thursday said the Catholic Church will not accept a Middle East without Christians, who often find themselves forced to flee areas of conflict and unrest in the region.‘We will not resign ourselves to imagining a Middle East without Christians,’ he said after

DHAKA: A car bombing near a cafe in a packed market killed at least 30 people and wounded 40 others in a town northeast of Baghdad on Thursday.The blast struck in Saadiyah, a town in restive ethnically-mixed Diyala province, according to a police colonel and a doctor, both speaking on

DHAKA: Australian police and central bank websites fell victim to cyber attacks on Thursday with an Indonesian hacker claiming responsibility, reportedly demanding that Canberra apologise in an intensifying row over spying.The row, triggered by reports that Australian spies tried to tap

DHAKA: A US drone strike in northwest Pakistan killed six people including a senior leader of the ruthless Haqqani network, officials said, in only the second such strike outside the country’s lawless tribal districts.The missile attack hit a religious seminary that militants and

DHAKA: The leader of Nepal’s Maoist party, who appears to have lost in this week’s national election, demanded on Thursday that the vote counting be stopped because of what he called massive irregularities.The irregularities occurred during transporting of ballot boxes and also during

DHAKA: Iran would not suspend its uranium enrichment activities says Iran’s deputy foreign minister Abbas Araqchi.Speaking a day after talks with world powers resumed in Geneva, Araqchi told reporters on Thursday Iran would not suspend its uranium enrichment activities, saying it was a

DHAKA: Egyptian army chief Abdel Fattah Sisi, who deposed elected president Mohamed Mursi in July following mass protests, said he did not rule out running for the presidency.Asked if he was a candidate for the job, Sisi replied ‘let’s see what the days bring us’ in an interview

DHAKA: France’s foreign minister said on Thursday the West needed to be firm in its dealings with Iran over the country’s nuclear programme, but he was hopeful an accord could be struck this week.‘I hope so,’ Laurent Fabius told France 2 television when asked if there could be a

DHAKA: A US envoy urged North Korea on Thursday to resolve the issue of American citizens detained by the reclusive country, among them an 85-year-old Korean War veteran from California and Kenneth Bae, a Korean-American Christian missionary.US Special Representative for North Korea