North Asia

The delegation of 4 clerics will be trained for three months. Archbishop Veniamin of Vladivostok talks about problems the orthodox clergy have to tackle in North Korea.

A report warns that life expectancy has dropped in the country to just 58 years for men and 66 for women:this is an alarming statistic for a industrialised country which is a member of the G8.

The oil-rich southern province of Khuzestan will have a new power station. And a station in the Gulf, constructed with Russian help, is nearly operational. Moscow is selling Tehran missiles worth 500 million US dollars.

The president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace highlights progress in ties with the Orthodox Church and expresses hope for "real and concrete" progress; we have drawn nearer to the Moscow Patriarchate as regards European integration and the need to rediscover shared Christian roots and to face current secularization trends. The Cardinal invited Catholics to "embody" Church social doctrine in daily life.

The toxic slick is being purified with tons of charcoal. The authorities are giving conflicting accounts about the extent of danger.

The official inquiry talks of "errors" of the federal security forces, but it is not yet clear who triggered the carnage in the school. The Mothers of Beslan say the report does not answer their questions, but then, they did not expect it to.

According to an official of the Russian Orthodox Patriarchate: no political intent behind the cancelled meeting between Patriarch Aleksij and Cardinal Martino, just an unforeseen "health problem." Catholics in Moscow say: the cancellation is understandable, we respect it, but we had placed a lot of hope on this meeting.

Russian Orthodox Patriarchate opens website for an old monk who spent time in the gulag.

The nation, a former satellite state of Moscow, has made a transition from being a communist regime to full democracy in 15 years. Locked between China and Russia, the country considers the United States as a political "third neighbour".

Finland is the most democratic country in the world according to World Audit. Myanmar and Turkmenistan are dead last. China is 128th.

A winter outbreak is feared. Beijing calls on the World Health Organisation for help. In Geneva experts and politicians discuss ways to intervene.

The second year of AsiaNews.it