• Cram schools boom widens India's class divide

    Ahmad Masood / Reuters

    Students attend class at the Bansal Classes in Kota in India's desert state of Rajasthan, Aug. 13, 2012.

    Reuters reports — With a sprawling five-acre campus, 10,000 students and state-of-the-art LCD projectors in its lecture rooms, Bansal Classes is bigger and slicker than most schools in India.

    But the institution, now a landmark in Kota, a city in the desert state of Rajasthan, is neither a school nor a college. It is the jewel in the crown of India's private coaching industry, a $6.4 billion business that exacerbates the social divide. Full story…

    Ahmad Masood / Reuters

    A student studies in a classroom at the Bansal Classes in Kota in India's desert state of Rajasthan, Aug. 13.

    Ahmad Masood / Reuters

    A student checks his results on a notice board at the Bansal Classes in Kota, in India's desert state of Rajasthan, Aug. 13.

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  • In Syria's countryside, vital support for rebels

    Manu Brabo / AP

    An FSA soldier shoots his weapon towards Syrian Army positions in the Amariya district in Aleppo, Syria, on Sept. 10.

    Muhammed Muheisen / AP

    Syrian rebel fighters raise their weapons as they head to fight government forces in Aleppo, in Suran, on the outskirts of Aleppo, Syria, on Sept. 10.

    Muhammed Muheisen / AP

    A Syrian rebel fighter, registers the serial number of his AK-47 to a local leader, before heading to fight government forces in Aleppo, at their headquarters in Suran, on the outskirts of Aleppo, Syria, on Sept. 10.

    AP reports -- Support from rebel-controlled towns and villages dotting the rich farmland of this northwestern pocket near the Turkish border is likely one reason that rebel forces have been able to keep going in a now 2-month-old battle for control of Syria's largest city, Aleppo. The region is the rebels' strategic depth. Towns provide fighters. Residents help funnel food, supplies and ammunition to the front lines. And rebels engaged in the fight can find a safe refuge to rest and recuperate.

    Rebels in July launched an audacious assault on Aleppo, Syria's commercial hub that until then had been untouched by the fighting. Eight weeks on, the rebels have held large chunks of the city and show no signs of being driven out as they were in a failed assault on the capital of Damascus over the summer. According to the rebels, the vast majority of those fighting in Aleppo come from the towns and the villages to the north, many of which have been free from government control since May.

    The rebels are proving the wisdom of Che Guevara, who preached the importance of establishing safe havens and local support in the countryside. "The guerrilla fighter needs full help from the people of the area. This is an indispensable condition," he wrote in the introduction to his 1960 manual "Guerrilla Warfare."

    Read the full story.

    Muhammed Muheisen / AP

    Syrian Mohammed Ramadan, 46, whose displaced from his home in Dir el Zour, due to fighting between the rebels and government forces, comforts his daughter Haneen, 5, who suffers from a lung infection, while waiting to be examined by a doctor at a makeshift hospital in Suran, on the outskirts of Aleppo, Syria, on Sept. 10.

    Achilleas Zavallis / AFP - Getty Images

    A Syrian rebel sniper shoots at forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Seif al-Dawla area in the embattled northern Syrian city of Aleppo on Sept. 10.

    Manu Brabo / AP

    An FSA soldier walks through a street in Amariya district in Aleppo, Syria, on Sept. 10.

    After months of protests and violent crackdowns, a look back at the violence that has overtaken the country.

     

  • West Bank cities erupt in violent protests over escalating prices

    Bernat Armangue / AP

    Palestinian demonstrators throw shoes towards a banner with a picture of Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, (not pictured), during a protest against the high cost of living in the West Bank city of Hebron, on Sept. 10. Elsewhere in the West Bank, demonstrators halted traffic with burning tires, schools were closed and store owners shuttered their shops. It was the most serious unrest since the demonstrations erupted last week.

    Darren Whiteside / Reuters

    Palestinian protesters throw shoes at a banner of Prime Minister Salam Fayyad during a demonstration against high living costs and the government in the West Bank city of Hebron on Sept. 10. Palestinian youths attacked a local police station and other government buildings in Hebron on Monday as protests against the rising cost of living in the occupied West Bank turned increasingly violent.

    Abed Hashlamoun / EPA

    Israeli soldiers out on patrol at first light in the divided West Bank city of Hebron, on Sept. 10.

    Mohammed Ballas / AP

    A Palestinian youth covers his face during a protest against the high cost of living in the West Bank town of Jenin, on Sept. 10. Palestinian demonstrators fed up with high prices and unpaid salaries shuttered shops, halted traffic with burning tires and closed schools throughout the West Bank on Monday in the largest show of popular discontent with the governing Palestinian Authority in its 18-year history.

    Reuters -- Palestinian youths attacked a local police station and other government buildings in Hebron on Monday as protests against the rising cost of living in the occupied West Bank turned increasingly violent.

    Several thousand people hurled stones at the Palestinian police station in the city after earlier clashes targeted municipal offices and fire trucks, witnesses said. Riot police fired tear gas to try to chase away the crowds. Several people were wounded, hospital officials said.

    Stone throwing was also reported in Bethlehem and Nablus, while demonstrators set tires alight on main roads into another major West Bank city -- the administrative capital, Ramallah.

    Small-scale protests sprung up last week following a five percent hike in fuel costs, but Monday's violence suggested the spontaneous movement could spiral out of control, posing a major problem for the Western-backed Palestinian Authority (PA).

    Continue reading.

    Darren Whiteside / Reuters

    Palestinians security officers stand in front of protesters during demonstration against high living costs and the government in the West Bank city of Hebron on Sept. 10.

    Bernat Armangue / AP

    Palestinian demonstrators protect themselves from tear gas fired by Palestinian security forces (unseen), during a protest against the high cost of living in the West Bank city of Hebron, on, Sept. 10.

    Abed Hashlamoun / EPA

    Workers inside the municipal building in the West Bank city of Hebron, on Sept. 10, where windows had been broken by Palestinians protesting over the increasing cost of living. Palestinians called a general strike in the West Bank protesting the high cost of living.

    Alaa Badarneh / EPA

    Palestinian protesters throw stones at police attempting to control the streets in the West Bank City of Nablus on Sept. 10. According to reports, some 25 policeman and protesters were wounded in the clashes. Cities across the West Bank ground to a halt as transport unions called a mass general strike in protest over rising petrol prices.

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