Austria wants to seize Hitler's birth house
The Austrian government said it wants to seize Adolf Hitler's birthplace from its private owner in a bid to end a bitter legal battle and stop the house from becoming a neo-Nazi shrine.
"We are currently examining the creation of a law, which would force a change of ownership and pass the property to the Republic of Austria," interior ministry spokesman Karl-Heinz Grundboeck said.
"We have come to the conclusion over the past few years that expropriation is the only way to avoid the building being used for the purposes of Nazi [sympathisers]," he said.
The plan would involve the state making an offer of compensation to the current owner, he added.
SpaceX rocket booster makes breakthrough landing at sea
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket blasted off from Florida, in the US, on a NASA cargo run to the International Space Station yesterday, and its reusable main-stage booster landed on an ocean platform minutes later in a dramatic spaceflight first.
The successful autonomous touchdown of the booster at sea marked another milestone for billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk and his privately owned Space Exploration Technologies in the quest to develop a cheap, reusable rocket.
A couple of minutes after yesterday's launch, the main part of the 23-storey tall, two-stage SpaceX rocket separated, turned around and headed toward a landing platform floating in the Atlantic about 300km northeast of Cape Canaveral.
A live video feed broadcast on NASA television showed the rocket booster descending over the ocean before settling itself upright on the barge-like platform, roughly eight minutes after launch.
Head-on bus crash kills 24 in Zambia
A bus and a minibus crashed head on in Zambia today, killing 24 people, police said.
The accident in the northern area of Kapiri Mposhi, around 210km north of Lusaka, came after the driver of the bus failed to keep to his lane and hit a minibus coming the other way, police spokeswoman Charity Munganga said.
"All the passengers who were in the minibus including the driver died on the spot. There were 24 in total," Ms Munganga said, adding that the number of injured was not yet clear.
Deadly traffic accidents are common in Zambia due to the poor state of the roads and bad driving.
