That's The Way of the World

What's happening in other news? Let's take a spin:

WaPo - UN casts record vote against US embargo on Cuba
Nearly every country in the U.N. General Assembly told the United States on Tuesday to lift its four-decade old economic embargo against Cuba in a record vote of 182 to 4 with 1 abstention.

The vote, held for the 14th consecutive year, was on a resolution calling for Washington to lift the U.S. trade, financial and travel embargo, particularly its provisions on penalizing foreign firms.

Voting "no" were the United States, Israel, Palau and the Marshall Islands. Micronesia abstained and El Salvador, Iraq, Nicaragua and Morocco did not vote. Last year the vote was 179 to 4, with several countries not voting at all.

Sydney Morning Herald - Aussie Terror Ring Broken Up
In the biggest anti-terrorist operation in Australian history, the nation's security forces have seized weapons and a quantity of chemicals similar to those used to make the London Underground bombs, claiming they have foiled an "imminent" attack.

Last night police carried out a fresh raid on at least one more Sydney home after state and federal police and ASIO officers arrested eight men in western Sydney and nine in Melbourne yesterday.

The NSW Police Commissioner, Ken Moroney, predicted more arrests and charges and said authorities had "disrupted what I would regard as the final stages of a large-scale terrorist attack here in Australia".

WaPo - Iran Protests U.S. Aerial Drones
Iran has strongly protested what it said was the United States' use of unmanned aerial drones over its territory and said two of them had crashed this summer within its borders, according to diplomatic letters circulated at the United Nations yesterday.

Iran's charge d'affairs at the United Nations, Mehdi Danesh-Yazdi, asked the Security Council on Oct. 26 to circulate two letters from Tehran, which called for "an end to such unlawful acts" by the United States.

The Pentagon did not deny the incidents but said it could not verify the Iranian claims. "I can't confirm the validity of their statements," said Defense Department spokesman Maj. Todd Vician, after reviewing the letters.

Asked about the Iranian letters, John R. Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said, "That's not in my bailiwick. I'm just a catcher's mitt here as far as Iran is concerned. I really can't comment."

[ed. note - nice use of the word "bailiwick"]

Wall Street Journal - France's Cabinet Invokes State-of-Emergency Law
France's cabinet issued a state-of-emergency decree Tuesday that gives local authorities the power to impose curfews and take other extraordinary measures to halt the country's worst civil unrest in decades after violence around the country raged for a 12th night.

The decree allowing curfews was to become effective at midnight Tuesday, government spokesman Jean-Francois Cope said, adding that there would be an initial 12-day limit to the state-of-emergency measures.

The curfews are authorized under a 50-year-old law that allows the declaration of a state of emergency in all or parts of France. The law was originally passed to curb unrest in Algeria during the war there that led to the North African nation's independence from France.