AP – Honduras' President Manuel Zelaya,SAN PEDRO SULA, Honduras – The Organization of American States voted by acclamation on Wednesday to revoke the 1962 measure suspending communist Cuba, overturning a landmark of the Cold War in the hemisphere.

"The Cold War has ended this day in San Pedro Sula," said Honduran President Manuel Zelaya immediately following the announcement. "We begin a new era of fraternity and tolerance."

The action doesn't mean Cuba will return to the 34-member body that helps coordinate policies and mediates disputes throughout the Americas.  read more »

(reuters photo/ENRIQUE DE LA OSA)WASHINGTON - With Latin American countries pushing hard for Cuba's re-entry into the Organization of American States, or OAS, U.S. officials said on Wednesday they would be willing to talk about the move if the communist state adopts democratic principles.

The suggestion, included in a resolution submitted to a council meeting of the hemispheric group, reaffirmed a long-standing U.S. position on Cuba but also offered hints of the growing willingness for a dialogue with Havana.  read more »

(photo: AP / Sandro Perozzi)TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras - A powerful earthquake toppled dozens of homes in Honduras and Belize early Thursday, killing at least six people and injuring 40 as terrified residents spilled from their homes across much of Central America.

The magnitude-7.1 quake struck at 2:24 a.m. (4:24 a.m. EDT; 0824 GMT) off the Caribbean coast of Honduras, 80 miles (130 kilometers) northeast of the beach town of La Ceiba, according to the U.S. Geological Survey in Golden, Colorado.  read more »

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration's new drug czar says he wants to banish the idea that the U.S. is fighting "a war on drugs," a move that would underscore a shift favoring treatment over incarceration in trying to reduce illicit drug use.

In his first interview since being confirmed to head the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, Gil Kerlikowske said Wednesday the bellicose analogy was a barrier to dealing with the nation's drug issues.  read more »

Mother's Day History
Origin of Mother's Day goes back to the era of ancient Greek and Romans. But the roots of Mother's Day history can also be traced in UK where a Mothering Sunday was celebrated much before the festival saw the light of the day in US. However, the celebration of the festival as it is seen today is a recent phenomenon and not even a hundred years old. Thanks to the hard work of the pioneering women of their times, Julia Ward Howe and Anna Jarvis that the day came into existence. Today the festival of Mothers day is celebrated across 46 countries (though on different dates) and is a hugely popular affair. Millions of people across the globe take the day as an opportunity to honor their mothers, thank them for their efforts in giving them life, raising them and being their constant support and well wisher.  read more »

US and foreign banks were not unwitting victims of circumstance but deliberately culpable in the financial meltdown that engulfed the United States last year, a campaign group said Wednesday.

The Center for Public Integrity named 25 “subprime” mortgage companies whose risky lending was blamed for the US property market collapse and the subsequent global economic crisis.

Many of the lenders were either controlled by US and European banks, or could not have indulged in their high-risk lending spree without the connivance of banks, the investigative journalism group said in a new study.  read more »

Swine flu—now called Human flu—has rocked Mexico like the 1985 earthquake and the rest of the world is feeling the reverberations. It has Americans donning useless surgical masks and right-wing commentators shaking their fingers at undocumented workers. It has France's president Nicolas Sarkozy calling on the European Union to turn their backs on Mexico, and numerous countries canceling flights. There is panic in the air.

There should be outrage. There should be a call to take to the streets. This is a crisis, but not necessarily a pandemic one. It is a social crisis—human rights crisis número uno. If we all turn off our TVs for a moment, put down the startling headlines, and take a few steps back, we'll see that what's behind the flu is much scarier than the illness itself.  read more »

Health officials see some evidence that the spread of swine flu may be starting to ebb. Mexico's health minister said Monday that the country plans to lower public alerts. Nevertheless, the outbreak has taken a toll on travel destinations in Mexico and even Central America (where very few swine flu cases have been found).  read more »

(Photo)Gregory Bull/Associated PressAs the World Health Organization raised its infectious disease alert level Wednesday and health officials confirmed the first death linked to swine flu inside U.S. borders, scientists studying the virus are coming to the consensus that this hybrid strain of influenza -- at least in its current form -- isn't shaping up to be as fatal as the strains that caused some previous pandemics.

In fact, the current outbreak of the H1N1 virus, which emerged in San Diego and southern Mexico late last month, may not even do as much damage as the run-of-the-mill flu outbreaks that occur each winter without much fanfare.  read more »

For years, people have been waiting for clean, efficient eco-friendly electric cars to arrive. Hybrids like the Toyota Prius don't really cut it. While Hollywood celebrities queue up to display their eco-credentials by buying a Prius rather than a Ferrari, they're kinda missing the point.

The BBC's Top Gear motoring show did a head to head comparison of the Prius with a BMW M3 sports sedan last year. The deal was that the Toyota would blast round the show's test track as fast as its little green wheels could carry it and the BMW gas guzzler would follow along behind.  read more »

OXFORD, UK - Everybody loves a good pandemic. According to media monitor Nielsen Online, Twitter has been abuzz this week, with nearly two per cent of all tweets making some reference to swine flu.

Here in the UK, the perennially-horrified Daily Mail newspaper quotes an expert saying that "hundreds" of Britons can expect to catch it within the next few weeks. If the outbreak lasts until winter, he says, 40 per cent of the population - about 24 million people - could be struck down. The government is even more alarmed, and has ordered 50 million doses of antivirals.  read more »

Photo Reuters29 April 2009 -- The situation continues to evolve rapidly. As of 18:00 GMT, 29 April 2009, nine countries have officially reported 148 cases of swine influenza A/H1N1 infection. The United States Government has reported 91 laboratory confirmed human cases, with one death. Mexico has reported 26 confirmed human cases of infection including seven deaths.  read more »

AP PHOTO/BEN MARGOTThe swine flu epidemic entered a dangerous new phase Monday as the death toll climbed in Mexico and the number of suspected cases there and in the United States nearly doubled. The World Health Organization, or WHO, raised its alert level but stopped short of declaring a global emergency.

The United States advised U.S. citizens against most travel to Mexico and ordered stepped up border checks in neighboring states. The European Union health commissioner advised Europeans to avoid nonessential travel both to Mexico and parts of the United States.  read more »

WASHINGTON - Shock and shame is the only way to react to the latest revelations of the Bush administration's brutal interrogation of suspected terrorists.

As the world now knows, torture techniques - approved by former U.S. President George W. Bush and his vice president, Dick Cheney, and then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld - were exposed in four memos released by the U.S. Justice Department under a court order obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union.

Much as U.S. President Barack Obama wants to move on and to forget the unsavory history of the preceding administration, he has to face up to its ugly reality.

The Bush administration's legal memos revealed that almost anything went when it came to dealing with the captives in U.S. hands, including waterboarding - a mode of simulated drowning, slamming prisoners against walls and placing a prisoner fearful of insects in a box crawling with caterpillars.  read more »

While the collapsing U.S. housing market may be at the root of the global economic recession, the downturn's effects are being felt hardest overseas. Take Iceland, for instance. Its biggest banks failed, its economy may shrink 10 percent this year, its government fell, its central banker was sacked, the country was bailed out with a $2.1 billion IMF loan, and 7,000 people (in a country of 300,000) took to the streets in protest.

Which countries have the greatest chances of being the next stories of failure? U.S.News looked at some countries that are currently facing severe economic disruption that endangers their standards of living, attractiveness to foreign investors, and political stability. First, we examined what Moody's Investors Service and Standard & Poor's had to say about them. These firms rate the risk of sovereign bonds, securities that finance the debt of a country. Many of the countries we identified have poor bond ratings or ratings under review for a downgrade, showing that these governments are perceived as being at greater risk of defaulting on their debt.  read more »

On its 39th anniversary, Earth Day still feels vital to me, but I know that some of you out there think that its time has passed. Everyday should be Earth Day, you say. Choosing just one, single day to say you care about the planet we call home -- what good is that?

The first Earth Day came at the end of a decade in which social activism drove this nation's political agenda. Moved by a desire to create that better world, we got together to fight for change the only way a large group of like-minded people could: we laced up our shoes and walked side-by-side. When you have to get together in person, well, you obviously need a specific day to meet up. And that day turned out to be Wednesday, April 29, 1970.  read more »

Talk has begun to turn to the new economy that will emerge from the present collapse. General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt has suggested that the current crisis is not just a recession but a fundamental "reset" of how business gets done. And Time magazine has taken up this theme with a reset cover story. But there has been little discussion of exactly what changes - in principles and practices -- should be made so that we rebuild our economy on firmer foundations. As we celebrate Earth Day this week, it is a good time to commit to "sustainability" as a centerpiece of a revitalized regulatory system.  read more »

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama left the door open Tuesday to prosecuting Bush administration officials who devised the legal authority for gruesome terror-suspect interrogations, saying the United States lost "our moral bearings" with use of the tactics.

The question of whether to bring charges against those who devised justification for the methods "is going to be more of a decision for the attorney general within the parameters of various laws and I don't want to prejudge that," Obama said. The president discussed the continuing issue of terrorism-era interrogation tactics with reporters as he finished an Oval Office meeting with visiting King Abdullah II of Jordan.  read more »

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is allowing Americans to make unlimited trips and money transfers to family in Cuba and easing other restrictions Monday to usher in a new era of openness toward the island nation ruled by communists for 50 years.

The formal announcement was being made at the White House Monday afternoon, during presidential spokesman Robert Gibbs' daily briefing with reporters, a senior administration official told The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity before the announcement.  read more »

Photo: Getty ImagesThere are high expectations for the upcoming Summit of the Americas, happening April 17-19 in Trinidad and Tobago. It will be President Obama's first opportunity to dialogue with Latin American and Caribbean presidents. Many hold out hope for a new direction for United States policies towards our neighbors in the hemisphere.

We continue to look for signs as to what the administration has in mind. At an event last week in Washington, Jeffrey Davidow, coordinator of the Summit for the Obama administration, offered a few clues. Davidow said that the US would "focus more on dialogue and collaboration, be pragmatic, and look for concrete results, social inclusion and look to reduce extreme poverty." It is not clear yet how these words will translate into actions and if they will mean new policy directions.  read more »