Reuters - The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas on Thursday banned men in the Gaza Strip from working in women's hair salons, vowing to arrest and try offenders.
Reuters - China must urgently address the physical fitness of the nation's youth or run the risk of raising a generation incapable of fighting the Japanese in a future war, the head of the country's top sports university said Thursday.
Reuters - In search of Mr. or Mrs. Right, dozens of Japanese are attending a newly launched school in Tokyo that aims to turn them into marriage material.
Reuters - Don't mess with a century-old tradition even if it is sexist, Canadians told the Conservative government this week, forcing Ottawa to scrap plans to make the country's national anthem gender-neutral.
Reuters - Performers in London's West End are having to cope with a different kind of stage fright in the form of mice, rat and flea infestations in theatres, according to a new survey by actors' union Equity.
Reuters - An elephant gave birth to a calf at Sydney's main zoo on Wednesday, surprising vets and keepers who two days earlier declared the baby had died in the womb.
Reuters - A New Zealand woman sold two vials that she said contained the ghosts of an old man and a young girl for almost NZ$2,000 ($1,410) after a fiercely contested online auction, local media reported.
Reuters - Canada's largest airline has learned it sometimes has to take a back seat to the country's biggest sporting passion, ice hockey, the head of Air Canada said on Tuesday.
Reuters - Black and Hispanic Americans are more likely than whites and Asians to lose sleep over job and money worries, a sleep survey released on Monday found.
Reuters - A Swedish pilot with a fake commercial license was arrested in his cockpit at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport as he prepared to fly 101 passengers on a Boeing 737 to Turkey, Dutch police said Wednesday.
Reuters - A 16th century dog, the only known female to have served aboard King Henry VIII's ill-fated flagship the Mary Rose, has stolen the show at Britain's Crufts dog show this year.
Reuters - An investigation is underway into why a young child, apparently under an adult's supervision, was allowed to direct air traffic at New York City's John F. Kennedy International Airport, U.S. authorities said on Wednesday.
Reuters - Fueled by leftover chocolate and with components made from carrots, potato starch and flax, the world's first sustainable Formula 3 racing car has a top speed of 135 miles per hour and can go from zero to 60 in 2.5 seconds.
Reuters - A German woman, fearful that a burglar was trying to break into her second storey apartment, called police after she heard someone climbing up to her balcony shortly after midnight, police said Thursday.
Reuters - A union representing Dutch nurses will launch a national campaign Friday against demands for sexual services by patients who claim it should be part of their standard care.
Reuters - Canadian parliamentarians tucked into a meal of seal meat on Wednesday to defy both animal right activists and the European Union, which has banned imports of seal products.
Reuters - Wild elephants rampaged through a southern village in Angola last weekend, destroying farms and dozens of houses and prompting most of its 4,000 residents to flee to neighboring Namibia, a local official said Tuesday.
Reuters - A court in Cyprus remanded two men in custody Wednesday on suspicion of snatching the corpse of former Cyprus President Tassos Papadopoulos, holding it for ransom for three months until its discovery Monday.