Reuters World News Highlights at 1800 GMT, Nov 29
Nov 29 (Reuters) - CAIRO - The body writing Egypt's new
constitution began a session to vote on a final draft on Thursday, a move President Mohamed Mursi's allies in the Muslim Brotherhood hope will help end a crisis prompted by a decree expanding his powers.
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UNITED NATIONS - The U.N. General Assembly is set to implicitly recognize a sovereign state of Palestine on Thursday despite threats by the United States and Israel to punish the Palestinian Authority by withholding much-needed funds for the West Bank government.
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BEIRUT - Syrian rebels battled forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad just outside Damascus on Thursday, restricting access to its international airport, and the Dubai-based Emirates airline suspended flights to the Syrian capital.
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LONDON - British Prime Minister David Cameron said on Thursday that he had serious concerns about legislation to regulate the media, risking a split in his coalition after a damning inquiry triggered by a phone-hacking scandal proposed a press watchdog backed in law.
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VERSAILLES, France - A French appeals court on Thursday absolved Continental Airlines of blame for a 2000 Concorde crash that killed 113 people and cleared a mechanic at the U.S. airline of the charge of involuntary manslaughter.
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MOSCOW - A Russian court ruled on Thursday that video footage of the Pussy Riot punk group protesting against President Vladimir Putin in a church was "extremist" and should be removed from websites.
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VIENNA - The head of the U.N. nuclear agency said on Thursday a hacking incident involving one of its servers was "deeply regrettable" but suggested that no sensitive information related to Iran's atomic activities had been stolen.
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HILLA, Iraq - Bombs in two majority Shi'ite Muslim cities in southern Iraq killed 28 people on Thursday, police and hospital sources said, in an attack aimed at spreading sectarian strife in the country.
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NEW DELHI - The Indian government bowed to intense opposition pressure and agreed on Thursday to a vote on its decision to let foreign supermarkets set up shop in India, taking a major step towards ending a deadlock that has paralysed parliament for days.
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PARIS - Europe's first gay and lesbian-friendly mosque opens on Friday in an eastern Paris suburb, in a challenge to mainstream Islam's long tradition of condemning same-sex relationships.