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In an ongoing custody battle, the Oregon Supreme Court decided a 12-year-old boy should have a say in whether he should or should not be circumcised as part of a conversion to Judaism. The child of Lia and James Boldt was raised in the Russian Orthodox Church, but his father James, who has primary custody, converted to Judaism in 2004. The couple divorced in 1999. After conversion, James began discussing the religion with his son and informed the ex-wife of his intentions for the son to convert as well. The mother objected to the conversion an

Romano Prodi, the President of the Council of Ministers of Italy (commonly referred to as Prime Minister), is facing votes of confidence in both houses of the Parliament of Italy. The Chamber of Deputies voted on Wednesday. The Senate will vote on Thursday. Prodi called for the votes himself on Tuesday in an effort to keep his weakened coalition in government. The vote in the Chamber of Deputies was won by Prodi. In the lower house, Prodi supporters still command a clear majority, in the form of Prodi's L'Unione, which took power after the 20

The strange lights seen by dozens of Stephenville, Texas residents on the night of January 8 are now believed to have been F-16 fighter jets, according to a statement released by the Air Force Reserve. The press release states that ten F-16s from the Joint Reserve Base Naval Air Station in Fort Worth were on a training mission near Stephenville the night of the sightings. The planes were said to have been in the area from 6:00 to 8:00 pm, which is around the time residents reported seeing the lights. Officials at the Air Force base initially

The 2008 Taipei Game Show, organized by the Taipei Computer Association (TCA), started at Taipei World Trade Center today and ends next Monday (January 28). World-class gaming experts, governmental officials, and companies from the digital content industry gathered there for trade opportunities and to experience exchanging in the gaming industry. Before the opening of the 2008 Taiwan Digital Contents Forum, Minister of Economic Affairs of the Republic of China Steve Ruey-long Chen, looked on a bright side of the gaming industry and said to exe

The Pakistani army says it killed 40 Islamic militants and arrested 30 during two days of fighting along its border with Afghanistan. The United States, meanwhile, has offered to train Pakistani security forces in their fight against the al-Qaeda-linked militants. The fighting took place in South Waziristan province late Wednesday and Thursday. The army says security forces backed by helicopters attacked suspected hideouts of militants led by the country's most wanted man, Baitullah Mehsud. In recent months, bomb attacks blamed on Mehsud's f

The name for the newest James Bond film has been announced today. The 22nd film, previously known only as "Bond 22", will be called "Quantum of Solace". EON Productions who are producing the film made the announcement today at Pinewood Studios, where production for the film has been under way since last year. The name of the film was inspired by a short story (of the same name) from For Your Eyes Only by Bond creator, Ian Fleming. The film will be the second for star Daniel Craig, who first starred in Casino Royale in 2006, taking over from

On January 29, 2008, an asteroid that is between 500 and 2,000 feet in diameter (150 - 600m) will pass within 1.4 lunar distances (334,000 miles or 535,000 km) of Earth according to NASA's Near Earth Object program (NEO). For a brief time the asteroid will be observable in dark and clear skies with amateur telescopes of 3 inch apertures or larger. Asteroid 2007 TU24, discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey on October 11, 2007 is expected to reach a brightness magnitude of 10.3 on Jan. 29-30 before quickly becoming fainter as it moves further fro

Romano Prodi, the Prime Minister of Italy, resigned Thursday evening after losing a vote of confidence in the Senate by a vote of 161-156. The vote comes in the wake of a growing crisis regarding corruption charges against Prodi's former Minister of Justice, Clemente Mastella. Prodi's fate was sealed when the UEDUR Populars, a smaller component of Prodi's ruling Olive Tree coalition, broke ranks and voted against him. Prodi did win the confidence vote in the Chamber of Deputies, but was not expected to win the vote in the Senate. Some belie

A suicide bomber killed a high-ranking police chief and two other police officers in Mosul, Iraq, at the site of an explosion that had killed at least 34 people and wounded at least 217 the day before. Brig. Gen. Salah Mohammed al-Jubouri, the director of police for Ninawa Governorate, was inspecting the scene of Wednesday's blast when gunmen ambushed his convoy. As he was preparing to flee, the bomber, dressed as a police officer, walked up to al-Jubouri and detonated the bomb. al-Jubouri was rushed to a hospital, where he later died. Accord

United States Congressman and 2008 presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich has decided to quit his bid for the presidency and Democratic nomination. Kucinich noted in the Cleveland Plain Dealer on a interview on Thursday, that the Cleveland local and former mayor of the city was "transitioning out of the Democratic Presidential primary race" to focus on a "new direction." This comes a month after his youngest brother, Perry Kucinich, who had paranoid schizophrenia, was found dead. Kucinich told the Plain-Dealer he would make a longer statement

The parliament of Iraq has approved a new flag for the country. The new design no longer has the three green stars of the old flag, as they represented the ideals of the Baath party - "Unity, Freedom, Socialism". Saddam Hussein was a leading member of the Baath party before his rule was ended in 2003. The stars had upset many Kurds, who viewed them as a symbol of the régime that had killed thousands of their people. Massoud Barzani, President of the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government, banned the flag in his region in 2006. "The n

The Internet-based group "Anonymous" has released statements on YouTube and via a press release, outlining what they call a "War on Scientology". Church of Scientology related websites, such as religiousfreedomwatch.org have been removed due to a suspected distributed denial-of-service-attack (DDoS) by a group calling themselves "Anonymous". On Friday, the same group allegedly brought down Scientology's main website, scientology.org, which was available sporadically throughout the weekend. Several websites relating to the Church of Scientolo