Abroad

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Mark Hurd, CEO of world's largest technology company Hewlett-Packard, was on Thursday named as the "Businessperson of the Year" by a leading US magazine, beating 19 other corporate leaders including three Indians -- Lakshmi Mittal, Mukesh Ambani and Ratan Tata.

An angry husband divorced his wife at a shopping mall in Saudi Arabia after a young man gave her his telephone number.

The husband said he saw his wife receive a piece of paper from a young man.

The husband demanded to see the paper, but the wife refused.

He then grabbed her purse and saw the paper with the man's number written on it, reported Alarabiya.net.

A major fire broke out in a 12-floor building and engulfed an adjacent hotel at downtown of Urumqi in northwest China, but there were no immediate reports of any casualties.

Two female students, including an Indian, were killed when a van carrying seven persons tripped off and overturned along a snow-covered toll road in northeast Indiana State, police has said.

Around 150 Indian-American Information Technology professionals from Kerala came together in New York last November to launch the Kerala Information Technology Alliance (KITA), a platform for IT professionals of Kerala origin worldwide, to help "accelerate the growth of Kerala." Speaking to reporters here today, George Abraham, Chief Technology Officer, United Nations Pension Fund, and one of the

Australian pace spearhead Brett Lee warned it may get worse for Indian batsmen in the remaining matches of the series with pitches being more helpful for fast bowlers.

After struggling on a subcontinental-type slow and low wicket in Melbourne, the visitors might find the Sydney track more difficult to bat on, Lee said.

The Indian team management is hopeful in-form Sourav Ganguly, who is down with fever, will recover in time to play the second Test against Australia starting in Sydney on Wednesday.

Ganguly was one of the few batsmen to make decent contributions in both innings of the first Test, which the Aussies won by the huge margin of 337 runs.

Stocks fell in early trading Thursday after the assassination of Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto and after the U.S. government reported a weak increase in durable goods orders.

Bhutto's assassination raised the possibility of increasing political unrest abroad, always an unsettling prospect for investors. Oil, gold and bond prices rose following the news.