Recently in International Category

An American aid worker who was kidnapped back in August is now being held hostage by Al Qaeda in Pakistan.

Warren Weinstein is the first private American citizen to be kidnapped in Pakistan since the 2002 execution of Daniel Pearl.

Weinstein was a respected development expert whose work was very uncontroversial, working with dairy farmers and furniture sellers.

ABC News reports that Al Qaeda listed of nine demands in a video which includes the release of Talaban and Al Qaeda prisoners everywhere including Guantanamo Bay.

Officials say that the kidnapping should not come as a surprise. When troops captured Bin Laden in May, they found documents stating how Al Qaeda wanted to get back into the kidnapping business in order to make money.

Weinstein's kidnapping appears to be more about making a political statement officials believe.

The protesters in Cairo and Egypt's military council butt heads again on Saturday, as the troops clears out thousands of demonstrators from Tharir Square, the New York Times reports.

Tear gas and rubber bullets were shot as the battles heated up Saturday evening. With at least three demonstrators reported dead because of the fights.

There were about 5,000 demonstrators in the square Sunday afternoon before the fighting broke out with the military. The number of demonstrators only grew as the day went on.

"I saw the revolution being slain so I had to come," Ahmed Hamza, 41, a lawyer, said watching the fray. Hamza told The Times that like many others, he was set to stay until the ruling military council forcefully carried out an exit plan. "Today there will be violence," he added.

Reports indicated that more than 700 people had been injured. Demonstrators created and maintained a makeshift hospital in a mosque near the square to treat injured protestors. Nearly 400 people were treated there from serious injuries and a couple hundred more were treated from the tear gas.

After Wednesday's 5.6 magnitude earthquake his eastern Turkey, the death toll has risen to 40 people the government reported on Sunday.

There have been twenty-six people rescued thus far in the search efforts.

Wednesday's earthquake was relatively mild compared to the 7.3 magnitude earthquake last month that left 604 people dead in Van.

The quakes have left hundreds of thousands of survivors living outside, or out of poorly constructed huts.

Temperatures below freezing are expected to continue, making the living conditions even worse.

"It's not possible for us to survive winter here" Cezmi Fazla a quake survivor told CNN, "The Van winter is very cold and there's a lot of snow. Living in these shelters is impossible."

Fazla lives in a small hut constructed by Styrofoam and plywood with ten to 15 family members.

"We haven't gotten any aid," he said. "We got a lot of support from the people of Turkey, packages with everything from clothes to toothpaste. But the elected officials, the nongovernmental organizations are not making good use of it and were not good at coordinating those efforts. So people feel very panicked."

http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/13/world/europe/turkey-earthquake/index.html?hpt=wo_c2

The body of Christopher Alder was found in Hull Mortuary 12 years after his burial.

Alder, a former soldier, choked to death while handcuffed and lying on the floor of a police station in Hull in April 1998.

The Huffington Post reported that Friday, Alder's body was discovered where a different woman was believe to have been stored.

City Council chief executive Nicola Yates made a statement to the press, "I am appalled and distraught at what I have learned and in conjunction with Hull and East Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust we will be undertaking a thorough review of the circumstances surrounding the events."

No further events or explanations of the mix up have been reported.

Benghazi, Libya-

Thousands of priceless gold, silver, and bronze coins dated back to the ancient times were the center of one of the biggest robberies in archaeological history.

The coins, known as the Treasure of Benghazi, were stolen from an underground vault after a gang drilled through the concrete ceiling.

"It may have been an inside job," Hafed Walda, a Libyan archaeologist based at King's College London said, "It appears to have been carried out by people who knew what they were looking for."

The Treasure of Benghazi coins were all stolen while items of lesser value were left untouched.

Foxnews reported other items that were stolen included medallions, jewelry, earrings, about 50 small monuments and figurines of bronze, glass, and ivory and some precious stones.

"The collection is not well studied," Serenella Ensoli, an Italian archaeologist at Second University of Naples said, "It is a huge loss for Libya's heritage."