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By Michael Holden and Peter Graff LONDON (Reuters) - In the lurid scene of the red-handed knifeman describing his motives for hacking to death a British soldier in broad daylight, perhaps the most chilling aspect for Londoners was the man's unmistakably familiar accent. Michael Adebolajo, 28, who was filmed wielding a bloody meat cleaver and butcher's knife as the soldier lay dead on the road behind him, was not a maladjusted immigrant like Boston bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev, but a true Londoner born and bred. ...

MILAN (Reuters) - Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was involved in a tax fraud scheme while he was head of government, a Milan court said in a document released on Thursday explaining its earlier decision to uphold his four-year conviction. Berlusconi's mounting legal difficulties have created tension in Italy's fragile coalition government, over which he has veto power, and the tax fraud case is nearing its final appeal with a definitive judgment possible within a year. ...

By Hereward Holland JUBA (Reuters) - South Sudan's President Salva Kiir said on Thursday his country would never become a member of the International Criminal Court (ICC), saying it appeared to be preoccupied with prosecuting African leaders. "It seems that this thing has been meant for African leaders, that they have to be humiliated...we never accept it," Kiir told reporters, referring to the Hague-based tribunal. ...

By Fatos Bytyci PRISTINA (Reuters) - European Union police said on Thursday they had arrested five people, including a wartime ally of Kosovo's prime minister, and were investigating the ambassador to Albania on suspicion of war crimes during Kosovo's 1998-99 conflict. The EU police and justice mission in Kosovo, EULEX, did not release the names of the five in detention, but a lawyer for Sami Lushtaku, mayor of the town of Skenderaj, said his client was among them and would appear in court on Friday. ...

It’s like finding out that your parents had a life before you came into the picture, or that your first-grade teacher doesn’t always wear sensible shoes and go by Mrs. Cooper.

An Army sergeant who served as a staff adviser for cadets at the United States Military Academy at West Point has been accused of secretly videotaping female students as they showered, the latest in a string of sexual-assault or harassment cases plaguing the Department of Defense.

DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran denied on Thursday that one of its drones had violated the airspace of Bahrain, home to the U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet, Iranian media reported. Bahrain's Information Minister Samira Rajab told Reuters on Thursday that an unmanned spy drone was found in the Gulf waters between Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. The incident could further inflame tensions between the two countries. In a report carried by Iran's official IRNA news agency, an unnamed official at the Foreign Ministry denied an Iranian drone had violated the Gulf kingdom's airspace, without giving further details. ...

By Marc Frank HAVANA (Reuters) - The trial of a Canadian businessman who has confessed to bribing Cuban officials began on Thursday, almost two years after his arrest in a sweeping government crackdown on corruption. The closed trial of 53-year-old Sarkis Yacoubian, originally from Armenia and the owner of import firm Tri-Star Caribbean, was expected to last two days. An associate of Yacoubian, Lebanese citizen Krikor Bayassalian, is a co-defendant. ...

You may have heard about the case last month of three young men from the United Arab Emirates deported from Saudi Arabia for being “too handsome.”

Russians often grit their teeth at the way their country is portrayed in Hollywood films: a grim, wintry post-Soviet wasteland peopled with mafia thugs, drunks, and Kremlin megalomaniacs.

ANKARA (Reuters) - A prominent figure in the Chechen diaspora in Turkey was shot at his Ankara office late on Wednesday, a North Caucasus refugee association said, the latest in a series of killings of Chechens and their sympathizers in the country in recent years. Many refugees and separatists have settled in Turkey from Russia's North Caucasus, which fought two bloody wars with Moscow in the 1990s, including opponents of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, an ex-rebel turned Kremlin loyalist, and the brother of Moscow's most-wanted militant leader Doku Umarov. ...

By Niklas Pollard and Philip O'Connor STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - The scene of Sweden's worst riots in years, Husby is on the surface at least a typically neat suburb of colorful playgrounds, manicured parks and low rise apartment buildings. Conversations with residents of this immigrant neighborhood soon bring tales of fruitless job hunts, police harassment, racial taunts and a feeling of living at the margins that are at odds with Sweden's reputation for openness and tolerance. ...