Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guards paramilitary units plan to teach drone-hunting to school students, an Iranian newspaper reported Monday.

The report by pro-reform Etemad daily quoted Gen. Ali Fazli, acting commander of the Guard's Basij militia, as saying the new program will be taught as part of a "Defensive Readiness" lesson in high schools from late September.

Bestselling Chinese author Murong Xuecun had nearly 4 million followers on his Twitter-like microblog. One day in May his account disappeared. So did his profiles on several other social media sites. No explanation was given, but one is starting to emerge.

Many famous Chinese — from pop stars to scholars, journalists to business tycoons — have amassed substantial online followings, and these larger-than-life personalities don't always hew to the Communist Party line. Now Beijing is tightening its grip on China's already heavily restricted Internet by making influential microbloggers uncomfortable when they post material the government doesn't like.

A rare round blue diamond will go under the hammer in Hong Kong in October, with auctioneers hoping the sale will fetch a record-breaking $19 million despite fears over the slowing Chinese economy.

Auction house Sotheby's expect the 7.59-carat fancy vivid blue diamond, which is about the size of a shirt button, to set a new record for price-per-carat.

With its rich history, winding white-washed alleyways and enviable Mediterranean setting, the Kasbah of Algiers has been a world heritage site for 20 years but is now threatened by neglect and decay.

The city within a city, crowned by a 16th-century hilltop citadel overlooking the bay and studded with Ottoman palaces, hammams, mosques and souks, has been rocked down the centuries by earthquakes, fires, floods and conflict.

Hundreds of people queued in a remote village in eastern India over the weekend to receive blessings from meters-long and potentially deadly snakes, thought to bring them good luck.

Snake charmers clapped and beat colorful drums to lure their "prized catches" out of wicker baskets and clay pots, as part of an annual festival in the village of Purba Bishnupur in West Bengal state.

More than 30 same-sex couples will say "I do" Monday when New Zealand becomes the first Asia-Pacific country and only the 14th in the world to legalize gay marriage.

The move has sparked a raft of competitions to set wedding firsts, but unease amongst the religious community.

Five Picasso murals that survived Anders Behring Breivik's bombing of an Oslo government block in 2011 are now at the heart of a divisive debate in Norway on the buildings' fate.

The murals drawn by the Spanish master in the late 1950s and 1960s -- "The Beach", "The Seagull", "Satyr and Faun" and two versions of "The Fishermen" -- risk being removed from the location for which they were conceived if the damaged buildings are torn down.

A newly declassified CIA document confirms the existence of famed Area 51 in Nevada, but conspiracy theorists will be disappointed the spy agency offers no proof of alien spaceship landings in the desert.

Area 51 has long been fodder for science fiction films and wild UFO tales claiming the U.S. government imposed secrecy over the site northwest of Las Vegas to cover up evidence of extra-terrestrials touching down on Earth.

Judges on TV talent shows always attract controversy for making or breaking the careers of desperate wannabes -- but for Aryana Sayeed, the job is also a fight for Afghanistan's future.

The glamorous 28-year-old singer is a judge on worldwide hit series "The Voice" that launched in Kabul in May, immediately attracting huge audiences and an array of angry critics.

Six thousand Catholic faithful attended an Assumption mass in the Basilica of Saint Pius X in Lourdes Thursday, two months after the church in southwestern France was damaged by floodwaters.

The crowds were only slightly smaller than last year and a spokesman for the town's religious sites said the recovery had been faster than expected thanks to successful fund-raising campaign.