Activists in northern Germany have been fighting running battles with police, trying to halt a train carrying nuclear waste from France.
Officers used batons, pepper spray, tear gas and water cannon to disperse at least 1,000 protesters who were trying to sabotage railway tracks.
The protesters hurled fireworks and set a police car on fire near Dannenberg.
Earlier, the train was halted after activists lowered themselves on ropes from a bridge over the tracks.
Sunday's clashes took place near Dannenberg - the final destination for the train before the waste is loaded onto lorries and taken to a storage facility.
A police spokesman was quoted by the AFP news agency as saying that "there were arrests and people injured but I am not able to say how many".
The spokesman added that some of the protesters appeared to be "members of the anarchist scene, who threw flares and fired tear gas at police".
About a dozen protesters were injured, demonstrators were quoted as saying by local media reports.
One of the activists was quoted by the AFP as saying that the woods around the train tracks were "completely clouded with tear gas".
Sunday's clashes followed peaceful protests against the train on Saturday by tens of thousands of people.
'Not safe'
The train, made up of 14 wagons containing 123 tonnes of reprocessed nuclear waste in glass and steel containers, is heading to a storage site in Gorleben, northern Germany.
Activists maintain that neither the waste containers nor the site are safe.
The BBC's Berlin correspondent Stephen Evans says that the plan is to transfer the waste to lorries for the final part of the journey but the police and protesters are now trying to outmanoeuvre each other in the countryside along the route.
Chancellor Angela Merkel's decision to extend the lifespan of Germany's 17 nuclear power plants despite strong public opposition has highlighted the issue of the waste trains.
It starts at the airport. A burly guy in a hoodie drapes himself over the barrier that leads out of the parking lot. Watching. Just watching. Most taxi drivers are on the drug cartels' payroll, ordered to spy on visitors and monitor the movements of the military and state investigators. Read more
Nasra Ismail, BBC News Analyst, reported from Jerusalem
for the BBC's Biodun Iginla
The mosque was built without a permit
Police and residents clashed in the southern Israeli city of Rahat as an illegally built mosque was demolished.
Protesting residents said the police used rubber bullets and tear gas against them, while the police accused locals of throwing stones at them.
Thousands of police were reportedly deployed in the operation in the Bedouin city in the Negev desert.
Police said a local court had ordered the mosque's razing as it was built without a permit.
Yusuf Abu Jamer, a spokesman for the local branch of the Islamic Movement, said residents had built the structure illegally because the Israeli authorities would take too long to grant approval.
He described the pre-dawn raid: "They went into the mosque and arrested those who were praying inside, including me, and drove us outside the city until the operation was over."
Barack Obama has kicked off a three-day trip to India with the announcement of billions of dollars in trade deals. Local media and the opposition however have criticised the president for failing to mention Pakistan in a speech about terrorism.
Ivory Coast’s constitutional council validated results of the first round of the presidential election Saturday evening, thereby denying opposition leaders a requested recount. The vote between the two leading candidates will now go ahead on 21 Nov.
Despite having lost their battle in parliament last week, some 375,000 (French interior ministry) pension reform protesters – the lowest number yet – took to the streets of France on Saturday to voice their ongoing discontent.
Tens of thousands of people turned out in the northern German town of Dannenberg on Saturday to protest the arrival of a train carrying radioactive nuclear waste from France. The demonstrators say that storage process of the waste is not safe.
Opposition leaders in Burma accused the ruling military junta of fraud and of restricting the flow of information within the country on Saturday, ahead of elections on Sunday. The elections have been widely criticised for a lack of transparency.
France said Friday that it would receive its first A400M military transport plane in 2013 after European governments struck a new deal to finance the aircraft, which has been plagued by cost overruns and manufacturing delays.
US stocks took a tumble after peaking in volatile trading Wednesday after the Federal Reserve unveiled plans to buy 600 billion dollars of government bonds in an effort to breath life into the floundering US recovery.
Chinese officials have signed a raft of lucrative contracts with aircraft manufacturer Airbus and French energy giants Total and Areva during a visit to France by China's President Hu Jintao.
Britain has charged Internet giant Google's Street View cars of unlawfully collecting private information from wireless networks, but said Wednesday that the company will not be fined for the infraction.
The US economy grew by 2% in the third quarter according to the Commerce Department. Driving the growth was consumer spending, which increased by 2.6%.
The men's world number one Rafael Nadal has pulled out of next week's Paris Masters in order to rest an injured shoulder ahead of the season-ending World Tour finals in London later this month.
Liverpool fought back from a goal down at Anfield Thursday to defeat Napoli 3-1 thanks to a hat-trick by Steven Gerrard. Elsewhere, Manchester City slumped to a 3-1 defeat at Lech Poznan (photo), while Dortmund held PSG to a goalless draw.
In their first ever Champions League campaign, Tottenham thumped title holders Inter Milan 3-1. After a nervous first round match, talisman Gareth Bale set the tempo for the blistering performance.
Belgium's Kim Clijsters came from behind to beat world number one Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark on Sunday and pick up a second WTA Championships title, seven years after winning her first.
British golfer Lee Westwood is to take over as world number one when the new rankings are published on Monday, knocking Tiger Woods from the top spot he has held for the last five years.
The BBC apologised on air on Thursday to the Band Aid humanitarian group and co-founder Bob Geldof (pictured) for a "misleading and unfair" report in March claiming aid money sent to Ethiopia in 1985 was used by rebel forces to buy weapons.
Alexandria Mills, an 18-year-old from the US state of Kentucky, became Miss World 2010 on Saturday, at the end of the beauty competition hosted in the Chinese resort town of Sanya.
Keira Knightley (left) and Eva Mendes (right) will turn out for opening night of the Rome film festival on Thursday. The two appear alongside Sam Worthington and Guillaume Canet in the romantic thriller "Last Night", which opens the festival.
Top art dealer Larry Gagosian opened a gallery in Paris this week, calling it a sign the French capital is "reclaiming" its role on the world art scene. The opening came just ahead of the launch of the FIAC contemporary art fair (photo) on Oct. 21.
At British artist David Hockney’s new exhibit in Paris, iPads and iPhones take the place of canvas. Using the "Brushes" application, which allows users to paint with their fingers, Hockney created a series of colourful landscapes and still lifes.
In today’s French press review, we focus on the five year anniversary of the riots that took place in the Parisian suburb of Clichy. The death of two boys chased by the police near a power transformer sparked extreme violence in the region. Also in the papers: medical assistance on the internet and the worst US campaign adverts, seven days before the mid-terms.
Finland has just become the first country in the world to make a law aiming to eradicate smoking entirely. The government has introduced a bill which aims to make Finland smoke-free by 2040. On October 1st, the first measures of the so-called Tobacco Act were introduced, making it harder for people under 18 to smoke, and restricting smoking outdoors. And tougher measures are to come. But can Europe follow the lead?
While over 200 countries come together in Japan to work out a road map to stop the extinction of species, ENVIRONMENT looks at the bugs and pests that are gaining in strength and taking over towns. Insecticides have gotten less toxic over the years and some species are profiting, but scientists in France may soon be able to trap them using the laws of attraction.
An accident at an Alumina factory in Hungary smothers three villages with a toxic sludge, leaving 9 dead and scores of others burned and badly injured. HEALTH meets those burned by the alkaline mud which ate deep into their skin. At Budapest’s hospitals doctors still rely on results from Greenpeace to see what metals or toxic materials are present in the mud.
A network of suspected Armenian gangsters used means such as setting up fake medical clinics to try and cheat the government's medical insurance programme out of $163 million, the largest fraud by a criminal enterprise in the programme’s history.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy has sought the backing of China's President Hu Jintao for plans to reform the global monetary system during talks in the seaside resort of Nice, a day after the two countries signed a raft of lucrative business deals.
A train carrying radioactive nuclear waste neared the French-German border Saturday, after switching its overnight route to avoid French protesters. Demonstrations are planned for the German town of Dannenberg later Saturday where the train is bound.
Despite having lost their battle in parliament last week, some 375,000 (French interior ministry) pension reform protesters – the lowest number yet – took to the streets of France on Saturday to voice their ongoing discontent.
Around 20 rights activists protested in Paris on Friday against the state visit of Chinese President Hu Jintao, calling for jailed 2010 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo to be freed.
Dozens of activists protesting against homelessness and poor housing conditions have set up camp in the heart of Paris. Temporarily housed in red tents, they say they won’t budge until President Nicolas Sarkozy gives in to their demands.
A reporter for a major Russian newspaper was left in a coma on Saturday after two men brutally assaulted him, smashing his head and legs and removing one of his fingers. Prosecutors believe the attack to be linked to his work.
Tens of thousands of people turned out in the northern German town of Dannenberg on Saturday to protest the arrival of a train carrying radioactive nuclear waste from France. The demonstrators say that storage process of the waste is not safe.
During a two-day visit to Spain on Saturday, Pope Benedict XVI called on the country to reverse the tide of anti-church sentiment and to reinvigorate its Christian roots.
A train carrying radioactive nuclear waste neared the French-German border Saturday, after switching its overnight route to avoid French protesters. Demonstrations are planned for the German town of Dannenberg later Saturday where the train is bound.
France said Friday that it would receive its first A400M military transport plane in 2013 after European governments struck a new deal to finance the aircraft, which has been plagued by cost overruns and manufacturing delays.
Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has claimed responsibility for a parcel bomb plot that was uncovered last week, as well as the crash in September of a UPS plane in Dubai.
Dozens have been killed after a series of fatal blasts struck Iraq's capital Baghdad Tuesday, targeting mainly Shiite neighbourhoods. The attacks come two days after 52 hostages and police were killed in an al Qaeda linked church attack.
Israel suspended relations with UNESCO Wednesday after the cultural branch of the UN classified the tomb of the biblical matriarch Rachel as a mosque. The site is near Bethlehem in the West Bank, and is considered holy by both Jews and Muslims.
An Iranian woman who was sentenced to be stoned for adultery will instead be hanged in connection with her husband's murder on Wednesday, a German human rights group said. The case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has provoked an international outcry.
An al Qaeda group in Iraq has declared in an internet statement that Christians are "legitimate targets". The announcement comes in the wake of a hostage drama at a Baghdad church that ended in the deaths of 46 worshippers during a rescue on Sunday.
Ivory Coast accused Senegal of interfering in its runoff presidential election on Saturday and recalled its foreign ambassador to Dakar, following a private meeting between Senegalese president Abdoulaye Wade and opposition leader Alassane Ouattara.
A French court has given the go ahead on the transfer of exiled Rwandan rebel leader Callixte Mbarushimana (pictured) to the International Criminal Court Wednesday to stand trial for alleged war crimes committed in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
A French court Tuesday has granted Agathe Habyarimana (pictured), the widow of assassinated Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana, more time to fight her extradition from France in connection with the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
As Ivorians vote in Sunday’s much-awaited, much-postponed presidential poll, the UN has increased its troop presence in three areas of Ivory Coast. Its objective: to reassure voters who fear an outbreak of violence following the poll.
Several polling stations set up for Ivorian expats in the Paris region failed to open Sunday, sparking anger among voters. While opposition members say the poll was rigged, electoral officials are adamant all went smoothly.
Six people lost their lives in Haiti as Hurricane Tomas moved across the Caribbean towards the Turks and Caicos Islands early Saturday. Hundreds of thousands of Haitians battled against the storm overnight in temporary flood-hit shelters.
Mexican security forces killed Antonio Ezequiel Cardenas Guillen (pictured), who is allegedly one of the country's most-wanted drug traffickers, in a ferocious gunfight in the northern city of Matamoros on Friday.
US President Barack Obama arrives in India on Saturday for the start of a 10-day Asia tour aimed at forging stronger economic ties, four days after US voters punished his Democratic Party in midterm elections influenced by the morose economy.
Haitian refugee camps crowded with over a million people left homeless by January's devastating earthquake were flooded on Friday as Hurricane Tomas dumped heavy rain on the impoverished Caribbean island.
Cuban authorities say AeroCaribbean Flight 883 went down in a mountainous area on Thursday carrying 61 passengers and a crew of seven from the city of Santiago de Cuba to Havana and killing all aboard, including 28 foreigners.
Barack Obama has kicked off a three-day trip to India with the announcement of billions of dollars in trade deals. Local media and the opposition however have criticised the president for failing to mention Pakistan in a speech about terrorism.
On Saturday, US President Barack Obama kicked off a three-day visit to India, the longest trip of his presidency to any one country. Why is the Asian giant so important to the American superpower?
President Obama has kicked off a three-day trip to India with the announcement of billions of dollars in trade deals, deepening ties between the two countries. He also used the visit to pay tribute to victims of the Mumbai terrorist attack.
Opposition leaders in Burma accused the ruling military junta of fraud and of restricting the flow of information within the country on Saturday, ahead of elections on Sunday. The elections have been widely criticised for a lack of transparency.
On the first day of his visit to India US President Barack Obama signed a book of condolences for the victims of the 26/11 terrorist attacks in Mumbai and vowed to "eradicate the scourge of terrorism" throughout the world.
US President Barack Obama has criticised the pace of Pakistan's fight against militants within its borders.
"Progress is not as quick as we'd like," said Mr Obama.
He was speaking in the Indian city of Mumbai on the second day of a 10-day Asian tour designed to boost US exports and create jobs.
Mr Obama called for dialogue between India and Pakistan, adding that India was the country with the biggest stake in Pakistan's success.
US support for Pakistan is one of the most sensitive issues Mr Obama faces during his visit, says the BBC's Mark Dummett in Delhi.
Many Indians think the US cannot be trusted as long as it continues to supply weapons to Pakistan's army, this country's "enemy number one", adds our correspondent.
No distractions needed
Answering questions from a gathered crowd of students at St Xavier's College, Mr Obama gave an impassioned defence of US policy in the region.
Mr Obama fielded tricky questions on Pakistan, jihad and disappointing mid-term poll results from students at an open forum last event of his Mumbai visit before he headed to New Delhi.
More than 300 students attended the open-air question and answer session at St Xavier's College, in which the US president answered six questions on various subjects.
Twenty-year-old Anam Ansari, a third year science student asked Mr Obama for his opinion on jihad, setting the tone for the rather scorching afternoon.
Afsheen Irani said she had planned to ask a question about education but changed her mind to ask about Pakistan "because I thought he had not spoken about this issue in this visit. It was a diplomatic answer. I had to be satisfied with what I got.
One student asked him why the US did not declare Pakistan a terrorist state.
"We will work with the Pakistani government in order to eradicate this extremism that we consider a cancer within the country that can potentially engulf the country," said Mr Obama.
He said that India would benefit the most from a peaceful and prosperous Pakistan, and that it did not need the distraction of instability in the region.
The US president said he hoped one day to see trust develop and dialogue begin between the nuclear-armed neighbours, which have fought three wars in the past 60 years.
"My hope is that over time, trust develops between the two countries, that dialogue begins, perhaps on less controversial issues, building up to more controversial issues," he said.
As India succeeded economically, he said, it did not want the distraction of insecurity and instability in the region.
Earlier in his visit, Mr Obama visited the scene of the 2008 attacks in Mumbai, saying India and the US were united against terrorism.
Mr Obama's tour follows US mid-term elections that saw heavy losses for Democrats, seen in part as punishment for the US administration's inability to tackle high unemployment.
Before the trip, Mr Obama spoke of the need for greater US access to India markets as part of a drive to double US exports over the next five years and help revive the economy at home.
Trade between India and the US was worth about $40bn in 2008 - still significantly less than US trade with other partners like China and Europe.
Security is tight for Mr Obama's visit. Thousands of Indian and US security personnel are deployed and a US naval warship is on patrol in the waters off the coast of the city.
Later on his trip, Mr Obama will announce a "comprehensive partnership" including economic ties in Indonesia, attend a G20 summit of global economic powers in Seoul and participate in an Asia-Pacific economic forum in Yokohama, Japan.
A police officer has gone on a shooting rampage in Kenya, killing at least 10 people, officials say.
The shootings happened in Siakago, 90 miles (150km) north-east of the capital, Nairobi.
Local media say the officer opened fire in three different bars, killing one person in each of the first two bars and eight people in the third bar.
He then tried to shoot himself but had run out of ammunition so gave himself up, police said.
"He has not talked and the motive is not clear," said district commissioner John Chelimo.
He said the suspect, who is in his 30s and worked as a guard at his residence, had apparently gone out on Saturday evening looking for a female friend but could not find her.
Charles Owino, a deputy spokesman in Kenya's regular police division, told Reuters that two of the officer's colleagues from the provincial police were among the victims.
"He went from one bar to another and was shooting indiscriminately. Apparently he was looking for his girlfriend after he left duty," he said.
"Apparently no-one was injured during the shooting - all those he shot at died," Mr Owino added.
Local radio reporter Antonin Newite said many townspeople did not realise what was happening because they mistook the gunfire for fireworks.
Hindus in Kenya have been celebrating the festival of Diwali.
The shooting spree sparked a large protest outside Siakago police station on Sunday, according to Nyaga Manunga, whose daughter was one of those killed.
"In Siakago there is no security," he was quoted as saying by Associated Press. "Someone can't just shoot 20 to 30 bullets without any reaction from the police."
AP – In this Oct. 30, 2010 photo, Christelyn Karazin holds her 15-month-old daughter, Emma, while her husband, …
By JESSE WASHINGTON
for the BBC's BIODUN IGINLA– Sat Nov 6, 3:25 pm ET
HOUSTON – One recent day at Dr. Natalie Carroll's OB-GYN practice, located inside a low-income apartment complex tucked between a gas station and a freeway, 12 pregnant black women come for consultations. Some bring their children or their mothers. Only one brings a husband.
Things move slowly here. Women sit shoulder-to-shoulder in the narrow waiting room, sometimes for more than an hour. Carroll does not rush her mothers in and out. She wants her babies born as healthy as possible, so Carroll spends time talking to the mothers about how they should care for themselves, what she expects them to do — and why they need to get married.
Seventy-two percent of black babies are born to unmarried mothers today, according to government statistics. This number is inseparable from the work of Carroll, an obstetrician who has dedicated her 40-year career to helping black women.
"The girls don't think they have to get married. I tell them children deserve a mama and a daddy. They really do," Carroll says from behind the desk of her office, which has cushioned pink-and-green armchairs, bars on the windows, and a wooden "LOVE" carving between two African figurines. Diamonds circle Carroll's ring finger.
As the issue of black unwed parenthood inches into public discourse, Carroll is among the few speaking boldly about it. And as a black woman who has brought thousands of babies into the world, who has sacrificed income to serve Houston's poor, Carroll is among the few whom black women will actually listen to.
"A mama can't give it all. And neither can a daddy, not by themselves," Carroll says. "Part of the reason is because you can only give that which you have. A mother cannot give all that a man can give. A truly involved father figure offers more fullness to a child's life."
Statistics show just what that fullness means. Children of unmarried mothers of any race are more likely to perform poorly in school, go to prison, use drugs, be poor as adults, and have their own children out of wedlock.
The black community's 72 percent rate eclipses that of most other groups: 17 percent of Asians, 29 percent of whites, 53 percent of Hispanics and 66 percent of Native Americans were born to unwed mothers in 2008, the most recent year for which government figures are available. The rate for the overall U.S. population was 41 percent.
This issue entered the public consciousness in 1965, when a now famous government report by future senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan described a "tangle of pathology" among blacks that fed a 24 percent black "illegitimacy" rate. The white rate then was 4 percent.
Many accused Moynihan, who was white, of "blaming the victim:" of saying that black behavior, not racism, was the main cause of black problems. That dynamic persists. Most talk about the 72 percent has come from conservative circles; when influential blacks like Bill Cosby have spoken out about it, they have been all but shouted down by liberals saying that a lack of equal education and opportunity are the true root of the problem.
Even in black churches, "nobody talks about it," Carroll says. "It's like some big secret." But there are signs of change, of discussion and debate within and outside the black community on how to address the growing problem.
Research has increased into links between behavior and poverty, scholars say. Historically black Hampton University recently launched a National Center on African American Marriages and Parenting. There is a Marry Your Baby Daddy Day, founded by a black woman who was left at the altar, and a Black Marriage Day, which aims "to make healthy marriages the norm rather than the exception."
In September, Princeton University and the liberal Brookings Institution released a collection of "Fragile Families" reports on unwed parents. And an online movement called "No Wedding No Womb" ignited a fierce debate that included strong opposition from many black women.
"There are a lot of sides to this," Carroll says. "Part of our community has lost its way."
___
There are simple arguments for why so many black women have children without marriage.
The legacy of segregation, the logic goes, means blacks are more likely to attend inferior schools. This creates a high proportion of blacks unprepared to compete for jobs in today's economy, where middle-class industrial work for unskilled laborers has largely disappeared.
The drug epidemic sent disproportionate numbers of black men to prison, and crushed the job opportunities for those who served their time. Women don't want to marry men who can't provide for their families, and welfare laws created a financial incentive for poor mothers to stay single.
If you remove these inequalities, some say, the 72 percent will decrease.
"It's all connected. The question should be, how has the black family survived at all?" says Maria Kefalas, co-author of "Promises I Can Keep: Why Poor Women Put Motherhood Before Marriage."
The book is based on interviews with 162 low-income single mothers. One of its conclusions is that these women see motherhood as one of life's most fulfilling roles — a rare opportunity for love and joy, husband or no husband.
Sitting in Carroll's waiting room, Sherhonda Mouton watches all the babies with the tender expression of a first-time mother, even though she's about to have her fourth child. Inside her purse is a datebook containing a handwritten ode to her children, titled "One and Only." It concludes:
"You make the hardest tasks seem light with everything you do.
"How blessed I am, how thankful for my one and only you."
Mouton, 30, works full time as a fast-food manager on the 3 p.m. to 1 a.m. shift. She's starting classes to become a food inspector.
"My children are what keep me going, every day," she says. "They give me a lot of hope and encouragement." Her plans for them? "College, college, college."
On Mouton's right shoulder, the name of her oldest child, Zanevia, is tattooed around a series of scars. When Zanevia was an infant, Mouton's drug-addled fiance came home one night and started shooting. Mouton was hit with six bullets; Zanevia took three and survived.
"This man was the love of my life," Mouton says. He's serving a 60-year sentence. Another man fathered her second and third children; Mouton doesn't have good things to say about him. The father of her unborn child? "He's around. He helps with all the kids."
She does not see marriage in her future.
"It's another obligation that I don't need," Mouton says. "A good man is hard to find nowadays."
Mouton thinks it's a good idea to encourage black women to wait for marriage to have children. However, "what's good for you might not be good for me." Yes, some women might need the extra help of a husband. "I might do a little better, but I'm doing fine now. I'm very happy because of my children."
"I woke up today at six o'clock," she says. "My son was rubbing my stomach, and my daughter was on the other side. They're my angels."
___
Christelyn Karazin has four angels of her own. She had the first with her boyfriend while she was in college; they never married. Her last three came after she married another man and became a writer and homemaker in an affluent Southern California suburb.
In September, Karazin, who is black, marshaled 100 other writers and activists for the online movement No Wedding No Womb, which she calls "a very simplified reduction of a very complicated issue."
"I just want better for us," Karazin says. "I have four kids to raise in this world. It's about what kind of world do we want."
"We've spent the last 40 years discussing the issues of how we got here. How much more discussion, how many more children have to be sacrificed while we still discuss?"
The reaction was swift and ferocious. She had many supporters, but hundreds of others attacked NWNW online as shallow, anti-feminist, lacking solutions, or a conservative tool. Something else about Karazin touched a nerve: She's married to a white man and has a book about mixed-race relationships coming out.
Blogger Tracy Clayton, who posted a vicious parody of NWNW's theme song, said the movement focuses on the symptom instead of the cause.
"It's trying to kill a tree by pulling leaves off the limbs. And it carries a message of shame," said Clayton, a black woman born to a single mother. "I came out fine. My brother is married with children. (NWNW) makes it seem like there's something immoral about you, like you're contributing to the ultimate downfall of the black race. My mom worked hard to raise me, so I do take it personally."
Demetria Lucas, relationships editor at Essence, the magazine for black women, declined an invitation for her award-winning personal blog to endorse NWNW. Lucas, author of the forthcoming book "A Belle in Brooklyn: Advice for Living Your Single Life & Enjoying Mr. Right Now," says plenty of black women want to be married but have a hard time finding suitable black husbands.
Lucas says 42 percent of all black women and 70 percent of professional black women are unmarried. "If you can't get a husband, who am I to tell you no, you can't be a mom?" she asks. "A lot of women resent the idea that you're telling me my chances of being married are like 1 in 2, it's a crapshoot right now, but whether I can have a family of my own is based on whether a guy asks me to marry him or not."
Much has been made of the lack of marriageable black men, Lucas says, which has created the message that "there's no real chance of me being married, but because some black men can't get their stuff together I got to let my whole world fall apart. That's what the logic is for some women."
That logic rings false to Amy Wax, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania, whose book "Race, Wrongs and Remedies: Group Justice in the 21st Century" argues that even though discrimination caused blacks' present problems, only black action can cure them.
"The black community has fallen into this horribly dysfunctional equilibrium" with unwed mothers, Wax says in an interview. "It just doesn't work."
"Blacks as a group will never be equal while they have this situation going on, where the vast majority of children do not have fathers in the home married to their mother, involved in their lives, investing in them, investing in the next generation."
"The 21st century for the black community is about building human capital," says Wax, who is white. "That is the undone business. That is the unmet need. That is the completion of the civil rights mission."
___
All the patients are gone now from Carroll's office — the prison guard, the young married couple, the 24-year-old with a 10-year-old daughter and the father of her unborn child in jail. The final patient, an 18-year-old who dropped out of college to have her first child, departs by taxi, alone.
"I can't tell you that I feel deep sadness, because I don't," says Carroll, who has two grown children of her own. "And not because I'm not fully aware of what's happening to them. It's because I do all that I can to help them help themselves."
Carroll is on her second generation of patients now, delivering the babies of her babies. She does not intend to stop anytime soon. Her father, a general practitioner in Houston, worked right up until he died.
Each time she brings a child into this world, she thinks about what kind of life it will have.
"I tell the mothers, if you decide to have a baby, you decide to have a different kind of life because you owe them something. You owe them something better than you got."
"I ask them, what are you doing for your children? Do you want them to have a better life than you have? And if so, what are you going to do about it?"
"Every citizen who values democracy and wants democratic rule must cast their votes without fail," said a recent editorial in the state-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper.
"However, some people are inciting the people to refrain from voting in the elections. They are attempting to mislead the people who are walking along the road to multi-party democracy," it said.
Opposition party officials said the pro-junta party had told voters they could lose their jobs if they failed to vote for military-backed candidates.
On the eve of the poll, armed police patrolled the streets of the main city, Rangoon, and shops were closed.
The two junta-linked parties are fielding by far the largest number of candidates.
Harassment
The National League for Democracy - which won the last polls in 1990 but was never allowed to take power - has been forced to disband after it said it was not participating because of laws which banned Ms Suu Kyi from taking part.
by the BBC's Biodun Iginla. Note: I'm not on strike. I belong to the US Writer's Guild (East), and I get paid for my projects, which includes, among others, cross-posting the BBC News Website to my BBC News blogs and my Economist.com articles.
For most viewers it will be the same service they are used to”
End QuoteBBC spokesman
Mr Dear said the second day was 'solidly supported'.
Speaking from an NUJ picket line in Glasgow, he added: "News programmes have virtually been written off in Scotland and we expect huge disruption across the BBC again today."
But the BBC said on Saturday that most viewers would not notice a drop in service.
A spokesman said: "It is not totally back to normal but not far off. It may not be quite as polished as it usually is, but for most viewers it will be the same service they are used to."
Strictly Come Dancing was not affected by the action, with the dancing stars of the show crossing picket lines.
The BBC said viewing figures for Friday's news bulletins had remained "more or less" in line with usual levels, and traffic to the News website was also normal.
NUJ members at the BBC are also set to observe an indefinite work to rule from Sunday, ensuring they take full breaks and only work their minimum prescribed hours.
The dispute stems from the BBC's plans to reduce a £1.5bn pensions deficit by capping increases in pensionable pay at 1% from next April.
Under the BBC's revised offer, the amount employees would have to pay into the pension scheme has been reduced from 7% to 6%.
In return, they would get a career-average benefit pension - based on the average salary over an employee's entire career - that would be revalued by up to 4% each year. The previous offer was 2.5%.
When employees draw their pension, payments will increase automatically each year in line with inflation, by up to 4% - again up from a previous offer of 2.5%.
Bectu, which represents technical and production staff, said after last month's ballot that the amended offer was "the best that can be achieved through negotiation".
But it added their position could be reviewed if the pensions deficit turned out to be less than £1.5bn.
Pope consecrates landmark church
Telecommunications
Nato probes 'rogue Afghan attack'
China artist 'under house arrest'
Somali pirates get record ransom
Spaceman
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