Top News Stories –

Prince Ali challenges for FIFA presidency –
Fifa vice-president Prince Ali Bin Al Hussein will challenge incumbent Sepp Blatter for the leadership of world football’s governing body on 29th May 2105. The Jordanian Prince, son of the late King Hussein and the late Queen Alia will stand as a candidate at Fifa’s presidential election where Blatter, 78, will seek a fifth term of office. Prince Ali said: “It is time to shift the focus away from administrative controversy and back to sport. “The headlines should be about football, not about Fifa.” Former diplomat Jerome Champagne, who joined Fifa in 1999, is the only other challenger to run for the presidency.
Prince Ali bin Al Hussein

This is Quite Interesting –
QI presenter Stephen Fry is to marry his partner, Elliott Spencer. The 57 year-old has given formal notice to wed Mr Spencer, 27, at a registry office in Dereham, Norfolk, near where he grew up. He confirmed it to his 8 million plus followers on Twitter (@StephenFry) after The Sun newspaper revealed the marriage plans. Fry said: “Oh. It looks as though a certain cat is out of a certain bag. I’m very very happy of course but had hoped for a private wedding. Fat chance!”

Footballing giant –
His football (soccer) team lost 2-1 to Liverpool in yesterday’s FA Cup but Adebayo Akinfenwa (@daRealAAkinfenwa), Wimbledon FC centre forward not only scored but set Twitter alight with over 39,000 related tweets. The 5’11”, 16 stone (224lb) striker known as the Beast is the world’s strongest player according to the FIFA 15 game. Before the match, the man who can bench press 180kg (392lb) warned team-mates “I want Steven Gerrard’s shirt,” he said before the match. “I’ve told the boys that if anyone gets his shirt before me we are going to have a problem.” He got Gerrard’s shirt.

Lance Percival dies –
Actor Lance Percival, who starred in British hit comedy in Up Pompeii, has died at the age of 81.

Nike shoes accepted as bail –
A man in the US state of Massachusetts has avoided jail for failing to pay court fees by leaving a pair of $85 (£55.94) Nike trainers as a bail bond. Judge Douglas Stoddart offered Jason Duval, who is charged with drug offences, the chance to “be creative”. He can get the shoes back by paying $100 or doing 10 hours of community service.

Video of the Day –

Toronto Skyline Porn from Ryan Emond on Vimeo.

List of the day –

Adebayo Akinfenwa stats.

Top Twitter Trends –

Other News Stories –

Armed conflicts and attacks

• Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
  • Clashes with ISIL in Anbar province kill twenty-three Iraqi Army soldiers and allied Sunni fighters. (AP via The Hindu)
  • The Combined Joint Task Force combating ISIL conducts ten airstrikes in Syria, eight of them targeting the contested city of Kobani, with the airstrikes destroying fourteen ISIL fighting positions and a building. (Reuters)
• A suicide bomber kills herself and a policeman in an attack on a police station in a popular tourist district in the Turkishcity of Istanbul. (New York Times)

Arts and culture

• Officials in the American state of Massachusetts open a time capsule left behind by founding fathers Paul Revere andSamuel Adams. (Reuters via Yahoo! News)

Business and economics

• American luxury fashion company Coach, Inc. agrees to purchase shoe brand Stuart Weitzman for $574 million. (Wall Street Journal)
• The price of crude oil drops to $48 per barrel, the lowest since April of 2009. (KGO)

Disasters and accidents

• A military truck collides with a bus carrying members of the National Guard of Ukraine in Ukraine, killing 12 soldiers and injuring 20 others. (BBC)
• Two commuter trains collide at Mesquita, Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, injuring 158 people. (AFP via News24)

Health

• Scientists at Oxford University begin a new Ebola vaccine trial on 72 healthy volunteers. (BBC)
• 43 US states report an epidemic of influenza, with 21 confirmed deaths. (NBC News)

International relations

• Cuba–United States relations
  • Cuba starts releasing political prisoners as part of an historic agreement with the United States announced last month. (The Guardian)

Law and crime

• Thai police arrest Gurmeet Singh convicted of involvement in a bombing in Chandigarh that killed 18 people in 1996, including Beant Singh who was then chief minister of Punjab. (Reuters)
• Various California state district attorneys fine Safeway a total of $10 million for the illegal dumping of electronics and pharmaceuticals into landfills. (KPIX)
• A man claiming to be the Lord’s Resistance Army top commander Ugandan Dominic Ongwen turns himself in to United States forces in the Central African Republic. (AP)
• A U.S. District Judge sentences former Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell to two years in prison for corruption. (AP via FOX News)
• A gunman shoots a doctor at the William Beaumont Army Medical Center in El Paso, Texas, and then kills himself.(Daily Mail)
• An improvised device explodes outside of the Colorado Springs chapter of the NAACP with no injuries. (ABC News)

Politics and elections

• The 114th United States Congress begins. (ABC News)
• The US Congress re-elects John Boehner to his third term as Speaker. (USA Today)

Science and technology

• NASA‘s Kepler space observatory announces the discovery of three new planets in the Goldilocks zone capable of supporting life. (News Limited)

Sport

• Major League Baseball
  • A proposal to change the demolition of Candlestick Park in San Francisco, California from a gradual process to implosion has been met with opposition from the city’s residents, citing health risks from the dispersal of concrete dust. (KGO)
  • The Baseball Hall of Fame announces the results of balloting by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America(BBWAA) for the Hall’s induction class of 2015. The BBWAA elects Randy Johnson, Pedro Martínez, John Smoltzand Craig Biggio; this marks the first time since 1955 that the group has elected four players. (Boston Herald)

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