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Three people were killed in a fire set by protesters on Wednesday during a march against government austerity measures in central Athens, officials said. “We have found three dead people in the building that is on fire,” the fire brigade said in a statement. Protesters clashing with police set the commercial building on fire as tens of thousands of Greeks marched to parliament, testing the government’s resolve in enacting deep budget cuts in return for billions of euros in EUIMF aid.

In the worst violence since the Socialist government came to power in October, hundreds of striking demonstrators pelted police with rocks, chunks of marbles and bottles, set garbage cans on fire and tried repeatedly to storm parliament, shorlty before lawmakers began a debate on the belt-tightening measures. The violent protesters were repelled by police in full riot gear hrling repeated rounds of tear gas and flash bombs, and smoke wafted through blocks of central Athens.

Masked youths threw petrol bombs, broke shop windows and shouted “Murderers” and “Burn the parliament”, in a sign of swelling public anger at the governemnt’s plans for painful wage and pensikon cutbacks. A giant plume of dark grey smoke rose over the central Stadiou Avenue where the two-storey commercial building, which houses a branch of the Marfin bank, was burning. Officials said two other buildings in the centre of the capital had been set on fire during the protest. Police estimated the march at about 27,000 people. But eyewitnesses said there were at least 40,000 - easily the biggest protest since Greece was first hit by a debt crisis late last year.

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Apple said the iPad essentially a cross between a laptop and a smartphone that sports a 9.7-inch touchscreen - reached the million sales milestone faster than the iPhone did, which passed one million units sold after 74 days. Apple sold 300,000 iPads on launch day, April 3, and half a million in the first week. Users of the iPad, which is intended as a media consumption device good for video, games, electronic books and magazines, and web browsing have also downloaded 1.5 million digital books, Apple said in a statement.

The company began the second stage of a two-part roll-out of the device on Friday when it started sales on the pricier, high-speed wireless version of the iPad in the United States, following the successful launch of the short-range Wi-Fi tablet. Although the device won’t reach the international markets until late May, some analysts expected Apple to sell five million iPads this year. The company delayed the international launch for a month because of what it said was stronger-than-expected US demand.

“In many respects, we are encouraged that the international roll-out will not begin until May, which will sustain strong sales in the September quarter and throughout 2010,” BMO Capital markets analyst Keith Bachman wrote in a client note. Prices for the cellular 3G iPad start at $629, which secures buyers a fairly modest 16GBs of data storage to compliment the advantages of high-speed connectivity. According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, several Apple Stores located throughout the US had sold their stock allocations by Sunday.

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Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad used a UN conference on Monday to blast the United States for threatening to use atomic weapons, triggering a walkout by US and other delegates. “Regrettably, ther government of the United States has not only used nuclear weapons but also continues to threaten to use such weapons against other countries, including Iran,” Mr Ahmadinejad told the opening session of a meeting reviewing the landmark Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was due to speak later in the day, with the US-Iranian nuclear standoff clearly looming large over the conference, which runs through May 28. Ms Clinton had warned on Sunday that Iran would try to divert attention at thr crucial meeting from its violations of its obligations under the NPT which it has signed along with 188 other states.

Mr Ahmadinejad said having nuclear weapons was “disgusting and shameful, and even more shameful is the threat to use or to use such weapons.” In Washington, the defence department was set to release previously classified statistics on the size of the US nuclear arsenal. This is part of a US drive to prove it is serious about disarmament and transparency about its nuclear weapons. In his 35-minute speech, Ahmadinejad called for the US to be suspended from the UN atomic watchdog’s executive board over its threats to use nuclear weapons.

“How can the US be a member of the board of governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency when its used nuclear weapons against Japan” and also used depleted uiranium weapons in the war against Iraq, he said. Besides the US, fellow nuclear powers Britain and France walked out. Non-nuclear states which also left included Germany, Finland, the Czech Republic and Morocco, according to a Western diplomat.

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More people in India, the world’s second most crowded country, have access to a mobile telephone than to a toilet, according to a new UN study on how to cut the number of people with inadequate sanitation. “It is a tragic irony to think that in India, a country now wealthy enough that roughly half of the people own phones, about half cannot afford the basic necessity and dignity of a toilet,” said Zafar Adeel, Director of United Nations University’s Institute for Water, Environment and Health (IWEH).

India has some 545 million cell phones, enough to serve about 45% of the population, but only about 366 million people or 31% of the population had access to improved sanitation in 2008. The recommendations of United Nations University (UNU) released Wednesday are meant to accelerate the pace towards reaching the Millenium Development Goal (MDG) on halving the proportion of people without access to safe water and basic sanitation. If current global trends continue, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) predict there will be a shortfall of 1 billion people from that sanitation goal by the target date of 2015.

“Anyone who shirks the topic as repugnant, minimises it as undignified, or considers unworthy those in need should let others take over for the sake of 1.5 million children and countries others killed each year by contaminated water and unhealthy sanitation,” said Adeel. Among the nine recommendations are the suggestions to adjust the MDG target from a 50 per cent improvement by 2015 to 100 percent coverage by 2025;  and to reassign official development assistance equal to 0.002 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) to sanitation. The UNU report cites a rough cost of $300 to build a toilet, including labor, materials and advice.

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Tiger Woods, the golfer, stills thrills female fans lining the fairways of Augusta National even though many of them said that they found his off-course behavior abhorrent. An informal survey of more than 20 female spectators out to watch players practice for Masters on a warm Georgia day, found nearly all of them happy to see Woods back despite the sex scandal that led to an absence of five months.

“I try to separate the athlete and the person,” Beda Johnson of Martinez, Georgia, told Reuters as she strolled with two friends along the 13th fairway. “What he did on 16 a few years ago (in 2005, his last Masters win) where he chipped in that incredible butt. How many times in the world are you going to see anybody do that? “If he can do it, no matter what he’s done in his personal life, that is a professional sportsman and that is what is important this week and to this crowd.”

White-haired Judy Coleman from Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, was staying cool under the shady pines along the 15th fairway. “I am very glad to see him back,” she said, dressed formally in a light, lacy dress for her day at Augusta National. “I hope he is discovered the error of his ways and he’ll realize that he has family, and they need him and he needs them.”

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Flooding and mudslides killed at least 102 people in southeastern Brazil, authorities said, as the most intense rains in half a century paralyzed Rio de Janeiro area and brought scenes of fear and chaos. Fire and rescue officials said most of the deaths occurred in hillside slums where heavy rains since Monday triggered devastating mudslides. Officials said that 37 people were killed in Rio but hardest hit was Niteroi, a city on the other side of the bay from Rio, where 53 people died.

Flooding was so intense that authorities urged Rio residents to remain indoors and not venture downtown, where streets were impassable. Some motorists abandoned their partially submerged cars, while others were stranded for hours inside stalled vehicles. “All the major streets of the city are closed because of the floods,” said Rio de Janeiro Mayor Eduardo Paes. “Each and every person who attempts to enter them will be at enormous risk.”

Civil defense officials said most of the casualties were trapped in landslides in the hillside slums that ring Rio, a city of some 16 million people that will host the 2016 Summer Olympics. Paes ordered schools closed on Wednesday for a second day in order to keep people off the streets. Separately, governor Cabral declared three days of mourning. Flooding also wreaked havoc with air traffic, causing serious airport delays. The Santos Dumont airport, which handles cargo flights, closed late Monday but re-opened on Tuesday. However at Rio’s Antonio Carlos Jobim International Airport, most flights on Tuesday were delayed and several domestic flights were canceled.

In a neighborhood close to the mountain where Rio’s iconic Christ the Redeemer statue is located, the local weather service said the rainfall was recorded as twice the amount normally registered for the whole of April. Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva criticized decades of administrative malfeasance which allowed shoddy home construction in high-risk zones of the city’s shantytowns. Officials for too long, Lula said, have closed their eyes to substandard construction, even on Rio’s landslide-prone hills. Lula vowed that his government would work to improve the quality of construction in these areas.

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Hugging saint Mata Amritanandamayi Devi will soon become the first Indian to be conferred an honorary doctorate in humane letters by the State University of New York (SUNY), USA. She will receive the degree at the university’s campus in Buffalo on May 25th 2010. Only two other world leaders, including the Dalai Lama have been bestowed with this highest honor in the university’s 164-year-old history.

“We are awarding her this honorary doctorate in recognition of her wide ranging humanitarian contributions spread all over the world,” Dr Stephen Dunnett, vice chancellor, international affairs, of the university said in a video conference from Buffalo on Saturday, explaining that only those with outstanding contributions to society are chosen for this honor. The university, which has a tie-up with the Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham University in Bengaluru (India), to offer a dual masters degree in management and business, plans to do more research in collaboration with it in future, he revealed.

“It is estimated that the Amma has hugged over 25 million people. On some days, she has hugged up to 50,000 people in a single day, often working for nearly 20 hours,” says Dr Venkat Rangan, vice chancellor, Amrita university. Abhayamitra Chaitanya, pro-chancellor, Amrita University points out that Amma has received international recognition before. She received the Non-Violence Award in 2002 at the United Nations and the recent award for Global Peace Initiative. ‘Her numerous charitable homes, orphanages, hospieces and widow pension scheme have helped the poor all over the country,” he adds.

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Apple’s heavily hyped iPad went on sale on Saturday in the United States with exciting customers crowding to get their hands on what some see as a major new step in the digital evolution. The Apple flagship store in New York greeted hundreds of people who had waited since just after dawn with high fives, whooping, and a New Year’s Eve-style countdown. Many of the shoppers were from outside the United States, which is initially the only country to sell the touch-screen tablet, retailing at between 499 and 829 dollars.

Adi Thomas, who flew in from Australia, said the iPad was “slim, beautiful”. “I really want to get it home and play with it,” Thomas, 38, said. Dutch IT consultant Hans Schoenmakers, 49, proudly declared himself the first person from the Netherlands to own the shiny gadget. “It is better than I thought. I will use it for email while on the couch - and Internet and reading books,” he said.

There were scenes of nearly hysterical enthusiasm as dozens of Apple staff in matching blue T-shirts psyched themselves up before opening hour with rhythmic clapping and cheering. Customers emerged from the glass-roofed store, holding their newly minted toys in front of the television news cameras like trophy winners.

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Speculations of divorce between disgraced golfer Tiger Woods and his wife Elin have renewed after reports that the Swedish model is not willing to give her husband a second chance. Sunday Mirror quoted sources as saying that Elin met lawyers to discuss divorce matters after Woods announced plans to return to golf in April. “She went to her lawyers and told them, ‘I am going through with it’, a friend was quoted as saying. The announcement to play in the Masters was contrary to what Woods said in his apology in February when the golfer spoke of spending time with his family. “I do plan to return to golf one day. I just do not know when that day will be,” he said, ruling out 2010. When I do return I need to make  my behavior more respectful of the game.”

Following Woods apology, reports suggested that the embattled couple were on their way to reconciliation. But now, the Mirror reported that Elin was furious that Woods had, once again, picked golf over the family at this critical time for their marriage. “But now he is spending 16 hours a day at the practice ground, putting his game first, like the selfish, narcissistic husband he is. It’s made Elin realize there would not be any real end to this and she needs to get out,” the friend said. Woods has not played for the past five months following the sex scandal that had received worldwide attention as several golfer’s mistresses came forward with lurid details about his infedility. The cat was out of the bag after his wife Elin found out about his affair with, Rachel Uchitel, a New York party planner, which led to an argument and accident on November 27 last year, when Woods crashed his SUV outside his Florida mansion sustaining minor injuries.

Woods apologized for his behavior in February, asked the media to back off from his personal life, and revealed that he would use Buddhism to get his life back on track. “I want to say each one of you simply and directly I am deeply sorry for the irresponsible and selfish behavior I engaged in,” he had said. “I am embarrassed I have put you in this position. For all that I have done I am so sorry.” Woods has completed six weeks of sex-rehab at two different centres in United States. This week, another porn star, Devon James claimed to have an affair with Woods. If true, that brings the total of Woods’ mistresses to 15, including three porn stars.

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