A roundup of today's other world news in brief
Palin engagement called off again
WASHINGTON – Sarah Palin’s daughter and her fiance have called off their second engagement after he told her he may have fathered a baby with another girl.
Bristol Palin (19), daughter of former US Republican vice- presidential candidate Sarah Palin, told American People magazine that Johnston told her about the baby on July 14th, the day the couple had announced their engagement.
Bristol Palin and Johnston have a son, Tripp. – (Reuters)
Songwriter of ‘Sunny’ fame dies
NASHVILLE – Bobby Hebb, whose smash pop song Sunnycrossed racial and genre lines to become a huge hit, has died, hospital officials said. He was 72.
Hebb, the son of black musicians, wrote the song after his brother was knifed to death in a street fight in 1963. The song was also recorded by Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, James Brown and others, and was covered by the Beatles on their final US tour. – (Reuters)
New allegations against Woerth
PARIS – A funding scandal dogging French president Nicolas Sarkozy rumbled on, with the government denying a report that Labour minister Eric Woerth lowered taxes due on a famous sculptors legacy as a favour to a major party donor.
Libérationdaily reported yesterday that the minister, at the centre of a scandal over alleged illegal political donations by LOréal heiress Liliane Bettencourt, intervened personally in a tax audit of the estate of sculptor Cesar Baldaccini.
Mr Woerth was at the time both budget minister responsible for tax affairs and treasurer of Mr Sarkozy’s UMP party.
Publishing what it said were extracts of a letter by Mr Woerth, the paper said his intervention followed talks with Alain-Dominique Perrin, executor of the sculptors will, and resulted in the tax bill being cut by €27 million.
– (Reuters)
Judge strikes down California’s ban on same-sex marriage
SAN FRANCISCO – A federal judge yesterday struck down a California ban on same-sex marriages as unconstitutional, handing a key victory to gay rights advocates in a politically charged decision almost certain to reach the US supreme court.
Gay rights advocates and civil libertarians have cast the legal battle as a fight for equal rights, while opponents see same-sex marriage as a threat to the “traditional family”.
Both sides have said an appeal to the 9th US circuit court of appeals was certain regardless of yesterday’s outcome.
The case could then go to the supreme court, provided the high courts justices opted to hear it. – (Reuters)