TEHERAN - IRANIAN riot police armed with batons and belts clashed with mourners staging a defiant graveside commemoration on Thursday for protesters killed in post-election violence, witnesses said.
It was the first major violence between security forces and demonstrators in three weeks in Iran, where tensions are still running high over President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's disputed re-election last month.
BANGKOK - THAI Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva on Thursday warned supporters of ousted leader Thaksin Shinawatra against signing a petition for a royal pardon that might allow him to return from exile abroad.
Backers of the former leader, who fled Thailand last August to escape a two-year jail term for corruption, are trying to gather one million signatures to present to the country's revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej.
MANILA - ASIA'S economic growth and social order is being threatened by a lack of equality that has seen hundreds of millions of people left in poverty, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) warned on Thursday.
ADB managing director general Rajat Nag said despite the sharp growth enjoyed by the region in the past 30 years there was a widening gap between rich and poor.
