Alberta has declared a state of emergency as crews battle to hold back wildfires that have destroyed 1,600 homes and buildings in Canada’s main oil sands city of Fort McMurray, forcing more than 80,000 people to flee.

An Egyptian court has acquitted 26 men arrested in a televised raid last month by police looking for gays at a Cairo public bathhouse.

IRAQI militias are increasingly torturing and executing men suspected of homosexuality, but the authorities in Baghdad are doing nothing to stop the violence, Human Rights Watch said yesterday.

Cheers went up in the corridors of United Nations headquarters after a majority of countries voted to retain Aids conference credentials for the San Franscisco-based International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission.