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Ministers defend Rushdie knighthood
LONDON - Cabinet ministers have defended the decision to award a knighthood to author Salman Rushdie after Muslims worldwide complained that honouring the author of The Satanic Verses was offensive to Islam.
Muslims say the novel, published in 1988, blasphemed against the Prophet Mohammad and ridiculed the Koran.
Home Secretary John Reid said the right to free speech was "of over-riding political value", while Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett called the award by the Queen part of a trend of honouring Muslims in the British community.
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Alleged Melbourne killer misses court due to surgery
MELBOURNE - The man accused of Monday's fatal shooting in Melbourne missed a court appearance as he was undergoing surgery at Melbourne's St Vincent Hospital for an injury to his left arm.
Christopher Wayne Hudson, 29, had been due to appear at Melbourne Magistrates Court today to face charges, including murder.
He ws remanded in custody in his absence.
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Abbas assails Hamas 'assassins'
RAMALLAH, West Bank - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, in his first speech since Islamist Hamas took over the Gaza Strip, said there could be no reconciliation with a group he described as "traitors".
Ending a diplomatic embargo imposed after Hamas swept Palestinian elections last year, Israel's foreign minister held talks with the prime minister in the cabinet Abbas formed to replace the Hamas-led government and restore Western donor aid.
Hamas faces deepening isolation in the Gaza Strip and has called for rapprochement with Abbas. But the president, whose break with Hamas was welcomed abroad, rebuffed those overtures in a rare display of public recrimination.
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