News Headlines - 19 July 2020
▽Hostilities escalate between Azerbaijan and Armenia | Financial Times
One of the world’s longest-running territorial disputes in the Caucasus Mountains has erupted anew after 20 people died last week in fighting on the border between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
The skirmishes began about 300km north of the contested enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh on July 12 and prompted tens of thousands of protesters to storm Baku’s parliament in anger and demand a return to full-on war. The fighting died down after two days before shelling resumed.
▽US military effectively bans Confederate flag with new policy - BBC News
The Confederate flag can no longer be flown on US military properties after the Pentagon issued a new policy to reject displays of "divisive symbols".
Defence Secretary Mark Esper did not name the flag in a memo announcing the rules, but the policy effectively bans the secessionist banner.
The Confederacy was the group of southern states that fought to keep slavery during the US Civil War.
▽John Lewis, civil rights legend and longtime Georgia congressman, dead at 80 - CNNPolitics
John Robert Lewis, the son of sharecroppers who survived a brutal beating by police during a landmark 1965 march in Selma, Alabama, to become a towering figure of the civil rights movement and a longtime US congressman, has died after a six-month battle with cancer. He was 80.
emorabilia buffs with big wallets scored this weekend at the Hollywood: Legends & Explorers event at Julien’s Auctions in Beverly Hills. Over 900 pieces were sold, the bulk of which were from film and television history, with some space exploration items mixed in, too.
Among the notable items sold were a space suit and helmet from the 1968 production of 2001: A Space Odyssey. It is believed that this is the suit worn by Keir Dullea during the final shut-down sequence of the HAL 9000 computer. The winning bid was $370,000, a substantial amount higher than the estimated listing of $200,000.
▽Nantes: Arson suspected in fire at Saint-Pierre-et-Saint-Paul cathedral - BBC News
A fire at the cathedral in the French city of Nantes is believed to have been started deliberately, prosecutors say.
Three fires were started at the site and an investigation into suspected arson is under way, Prosecutor Pierre Sennes said.
The blaze destroyed stained glass windows and the grand organ at the Saint-Pierre-et-Saint-Paul cathedral, which dates from the 15th Century.
