NEWS For more than a century, the Museum of Medical History in Berlin has exhibited assorted limbs, bones, tubercular lungs and fetuses, all in the name of science and enlightenment. Yet lately the curators are re-evaluating the principles that govern their displays as they confront a growing debate over what cultural organizations should be doing to preserve the dignity of the dead. Many of the world's grand museums are hearing increasing demands for the return of human remains from former colonies or conquered peoples. Some are giving back bones and skulls that were once viewed as exotic trinkets and were traded by native peoples for calico or plundered in the late 1800s by scientists exploring racial differences. Doreen Carvajal reports from Berlin.
For more than seven years a lean, chain-smoking officer named Mike at the Central Intelligence Agency's headquarters in Virginia has managed the agency's deadly campaign of armed drone strikes. As the head of the C.I.A.'s Counterterrorism Center, Mike wielded tremendous power in hundreds of decisions over who lived and died in far-off lands. But under a new plan outlined by the Obama administration this week, the Counterterrorism Center over time would cease to be the hub of America's targeted killing operations in Pakistan, Yemen and other places where presidents might choose to wage war in the future. Already, the C.I.A.'s director, John O. Brennan, has passed over Mike, an undercover officer whose full name is being withheld, for a promotion to run the agency's clandestine service. It is a sign that Mr. Brennan is trying to shift the C.I.A.'s focus back toward traditional spying and strategic analysis, but that is not an easy task. Mark Mazzetti reports from Washington.
The attacks have stunned Rio de Janiero. In one, an assailant held a gun to the head of a 30-year-old woman while raping her in front of passengers on a bus as the driver proceeded down a main avenue. In another, a 14-year-old girl from a hillside slum was raped on one of Rio's most famous stretches of beach. In yet another case, men abducted and raped a working-class woman in a transit van as it wended through densely populated areas. The police failed to investigate, and a week later the same men raped a 21-year-old American student in the same van. The recent wave of rapes in Rio - some captured on video cameras - have cast a spotlight on the unresolved contradictions of a nation that is coming of age as a world power. Brazil has a woman as president, a woman as a powerful police commander and a woman as the head of its national oil company - and yet, it was not until an American was raped that the authorities got fully involved and arrested suspects in the case. Simon Romero reports from Rio de Janiero.
Brigham Young University's animation program is not your typical film school. And that's why its graduates actually get jobs, people in the film industry say. Out of nowhere, B.Y.U. - a Mormon university owned and operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - has become a farm team for the country's top animation studios and effects companies. Unlikely as it sounds, young Mormons are being sucked out of the middle of Utah and into the very centers of American pop-culture manufacturing. Jon Mooallem reports.
Google's rivals have again prompted antitrust investigators at the Federal Trade Commission to examine the company's business practices, and staff members have begun a preliminary look at whether Google abuses its market dominance in online display advertising, like the banner ads on Web pages. People who have been contacted in connection with the inquiry said that the F.T.C. had begun asking questions about Google's practices, specifically whether the company was bundling advertising services together in a way that prohibited rivals from competing for the business of advertisers. The F.T.C. said in December 2007 that it would monitor Google's practices in that area. At that time, the commission found that Google's proposed acquisition of DoubleClick, an online advertising company that specialized in display ads, was “unlikely to substantially lessen competition.†Edward Wyatt reports from Washington.
ARTS By Thursday afternoon at the Cannes Film Festival, over glasses of Côtes de Provence, the battle lines had been firmly drawn and the Palme d'Or hypothetically awarded. The winner, amateur prognosticators huddling in the festival headquarters confidently or cautiously predicted, surely would be “Inside Llewyn Davis†or “The Great Beauty†or “Blue Is the Warmest Color†or “Nebraska.†Never mind that it was only Day 9 and that the actual awards don't take place until Sunday evening. For many, the 66th Cannes Film Festival was leveling off toward another grand finale. Manohla Dargis reports from Cannes, France.
SPORTS Germany's strength in soccer is all around us. Whether Bayern Munich or Borussia Dortmund prevails on English soil this Saturday evening, no one can deny that the Bundesliga has outplayed the rest of Europe this season. The pair helped to take down the best of British this season, and each devastated a Spanish giant, Barcelona and Real Madrid, in the semifinals. Munich is the clear favorite after nine months of sustained omnipotence at home and abroad, yet Dortmund's rise from near bankruptcy to this peak in just eight years has its appeal. Seeing the order, the speed, the virility with which both play, it is hard to feel that either would not make a true champion of the Continent. Rob Hughes reports from London.
