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The winning words in the nail-biter final were 'scherenschnitte' and 'nunatak' In a dramatic, flawless final round, two eighth-graders proved to be joint winners at the 2015 Scripps National Spelling Bee. One a girl and one a boy, one from Kansas and one from Missouri, one a five-time finalist and one a six-timer, 13-year-old Vanya Shivashankar and 14-year-old Gokul Venkatachalam put both their hands on the trophy and thrust it into the air on Thursday evening—after spelling word after word that few people could even hope to pronounce correctly. Shivashankar’s winning word was scherenschnitte, meaning the art of cutting paper...

Full Title: It’s so hot in India right now the roads are literally melting: At least 1,400 dead in month-long heatwaveIt’s so hot in India right now that the streets are literally melting. Soaring summer temperatures in India have left more than 1,400 people dead over the past month, officials said Thursday. Most of the 1,412 heat-related deaths so far have occurred in Andhra Pradesh and neighbouring Telangana, where temperatures have soared up to 47 C, according to government figures. “The rains which have eluded us for the last couple of years have created serious drought conditions,” said state minister...

NDO/VNA - Vietnam and India signed a joint vision statement on bilateral defence relations in the 2015-2020 period following talks between Minister of National Defence Phung Quang Thanh and his Indian counterpart Manohar Parrikar in New Delhi on May 25. The two ministers also witnessed the signing of a memorandum of understanding on coordination between the Vietnamese and Indian coast guards to prevent transnational crime. During their talks, held during Minister Phung Quang Thanh’s visit to India, the two ministers agreed that defence cooperation continues to be one of the key pillars in the strategic partnership between Vietnam and India....

Many of my children are still clinging to the law of Moses(mercy) usurping My Law ~ "The Law of GRACE". Did I not enter the Sheep's Gate and was there not one healed by The Law of Grace hanging from My Veil of Virtue ?! Then why the struggle My children ? Come! Cling to Me(Jesus) and be found at the feet of True Humility for I have already suffered all for you and Grace "IS" yours for The Victory "IS" MINE ! ! ! John 5 5 Later on there was a Jewish festival (feast) for which "Jesus went...

The National Spelling Bee preliminary round is being held today, and its officials are confronting the racism that has accompanied it in recent years. Indian American children have won the spelling bee for seven straight years and 11 of the last 15. Paige Kimble, the Bee’s director, addressed the question last week, partly because of the racially charged tweets that have grown to accompany the spelling bee. “We certainly followed the coverage last year,” Kimble said, “and we are aware of Twitter posts that are not nice, that indicate that we have a long way to go as a country...

When Jadav Payeng was 16 years old, he confronted a problem quite unlike those most teenagers devote their attention to. He lived in remote northeast India on Majuli Island, the largest river island in the world. Abnormal monsoon flooding was bombarding the island’s eastern side. It was rapidly eroding the landmass and stripping all vegetation from the remaining land. Jadav looked at the wasteland where lush forest had once stood, and made up his mind to reverse the trend. So he planted a tree. That was in 1979, and Jadav has continued planting trees, spreading seeds and nurturing the forest...

David Cameron more the doubled the Tories' support among ethnic minorities at the election – securing more than a million ethnic votes for the first time in the party's history. In 2010, when the Tories failed to secure an overall majority, just 16 per cent of black and ethnic minority voters backed the Conservatives. But in this month's election, Tory support among Britain's ethnic minority communities more than doubled to 33 per cent, according to research published today. David Cameron - pictured visiting the Sikh's holy Golden Temple in Amritsar, India, in 2013 - more the doubled the Tories' support...

Russia came in for harsh criticism last week when state-owned jet producer MiG delivered 12 MiG-29 planes to Sudan. Amnesty International suggested that the jets could be used against civilians in Sudan's western region of Darfur, where attacks against indigenous black tribes by the government-backed Arab janjaweed militia over the last 15 months have left at least 30,000 people dead, forced villagers into refugee camps and left some 2 million people without sufficient food and medicine. U.S. Undersecretary of State John Bolton blasted MiG for selling modern weapons to a government the United States considers a sponsor of international terrorism....

They say the Cold War is over, but Russia and the U.S. remain the leading supplier of weapons to countries around the world and are the two biggest military powers. Lately, tensions have been pretty high, too. The U.S. supplies much of NATO and Middle Eastern allies like Turkey, Israel, and Saudi Arabia. Russia supplies many BRIC nations, as well as Iran, much of Southeast Asia, and North Africa.

Submit to the Lord and you will find, Breakthrough of a new kind, For in submission Heaven becomes clear, And you will see into things others fear, For The Father's Heart is Pure Above All, And only The Holy may access and call, For The Eyes of The Cherubim guard what is pure, So only the Holy are able to endure . . . Isaiah 6:5-8 5 Then said I, Woe is me! For I am undone and ruined, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for...

In May 1990, then-U.S. President George H.W. Bush was convinced that Pakistan was poised to use a covert nuclear weapon capability against India. The impending apocalypse—which would have dwarfed Hiroshima and Nagasaki—had to be prevented at all costs. Consequently, the White House dispatched a trusted emissary, Robert Gates (a man who would later become U.S. Defense Secretary in the George W. Bush and Obama administrations) on a top secret mission to South Asia—first to Pakistan and then to India. Eventually on May 21, 1990, it was concluded that the Gates mission had indeed succeeded and, paradoxically, the sense that the...

Four days after Nepal was shaken by its second deadly significant earthquake in less than three weeks, nerves were rattled there by another quake Saturday afternoon. The U.S. Geological Survey indicated the magnitude-5.7 tremor was strong enough to inflict significant damage on poorly constructed buildings. It was felt in northern India. Neither injuries nor deaths have been reported, possibly because so many structures were already toppled by the April 25 magnitude-7.8 earthquake that killed more than 8,000 people and injured more than 19,000. The region was hit Tuesday by a quake that killed over 125 people and injured over 2,500.

Saudi Arabia will join the nuclear club by buying “off the shelf” atomic weapons from Pakistan, US officials told a London newspaper.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Foreign holdings of U.S. debt rose in March as China ramped up its purchases and displaced Japan as the leading owner of U.S. Treasury securities. The Treasury Department says overseas ownership of U.S. debt rose 2.1 percent in March to $6.18 trillion. That is below January's record of $6.22 trillion. China added $37.3 billion ... bringing its stockpile to $1.26 trillion... ahead of Japan, which added just $2.5 billion...to $1.23 trillion. ... The U.S. deficit topped $1 trillion from 2009 through 2012. Foreign governments...account for two-thirds of the foreign holdings...rose 1 percent from the previous month to...

China Retakes Top Spot as the Biggest Foreign Owner of U.S. Debt By IAN TALLEY It was a short-lived domination. After just a month of being the top holder of U.S. Treasury debt, Japan has once again been pushed into the No.2 slot as China bulked up on Uncle Sam’s bonds and notes. As we noted last month – and several times before that – Treasury’s data is a rough guesstimate. That makes it hard for analysts sifting through the obscure sheaves of digital data to glean anything but rough trends. It also makes it difficult to draw precise conclusions....

Russia has deployed hundreds of troops for drills in Central Asia with its ex-Soviet allies in a show of force as anxiety grows over a surge in fighting in neighbouring Afghanistan. Around 2,500 personnel from the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) are taking part in joint exercises due to run to Wednesday in Tajikistan. The move is seen as re-enforcing Moscow's role as the main guarantor of the fragile region's security after US troops leave Afghanistan. The Russian deployment of about 500 troops for the drills started last week, bolstered by soldiers from Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia and Belarus....

In a recent Washington Post op-ed, Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions said the United States needs to curb legal immigration along with illegal immigration, and fast. We need a timeout, don't you know, and the only folks who favor letting more foreigners in are monocle-wearing, cigar-smoking elitists: High immigration rates help the financial elite (and the political elite who receive their contributions) by keeping wages down and profits up. For them, what’s not to like? That is why they have tried to enforce silence in the face of public desire for immigration reductions. They have sought to intimidate good and...

Washington — An alliance of Asian American groups on Friday filed a federal complaint against HarvardUniversity, saying that school and other Ivy League institutions are using racial quotas to admit students other than high-scoring Asians. More than 60 Chinese, Indian, Korean and Pakistani groups came together for the complaint, which was filed with the civil rights offices at the Justice and Education departments. They are calling for an investigation and say these schools should stop using racial quotas or racial balancing in admission. "We are seeking equal treatment regardless of race," said Chunyan Li, a professor and civil rights activist,...

NEW DELHI: India has finally set the ball rolling for the eventual construction of its largest-ever warship, the 65,000-tonne aircraft carrier INS Vishal. The defence acquisitions council (DAC) has sanctioned an initial Rs 30 crore as seed money for the project. Just before PM Narendra Modi left for China on Wednesday night, the Manohar Parrikar-led DAC cleared a flurry of long-pending projects for ultra-light howitzers, medium-transport aircraft, light utility helicopters and the like worth over Rs 25,000 crore, as reported by TOI. But tucked away in the approvals was the relatively minor amount of Rs 30 crore for the indigenous...

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg carelessly waded into a political conflict of words between Pakistanis and Indians when he posted an infographic on the site featuring a map of India, excluding the disputed territory of Kashmir. Inevitably, the post–which was shared to celebrate the “countries connected” by his internet.org project– sparked outrage among the Facebook community and led to Zuckerberg taking down the post. It did not take long for Indians to notice the mistake and angry comments began pouring in from across the world. “Great Job, Please correct the Indian MAP on this Picture, Kashmir is Missing,” said one comment...