All Blog Posts from World Watch

This story was filed by CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips.

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Johannes Mathaussen could give Indiana Jones whip lessons. When I first saw him he had parked his dogsled off the side of the trail and was containing his restless dog team by snapping 20 feet of stretched seal-gut alternately to the left and right of them.

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This story was filed by CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips.

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(CBS)

To get anywhere in the Maldives — the low-lying Indian Ocean archipelago now at the center of the global warming argument — you either have to get on a traditional slow boat, a Dhoni — long since converted from sail to diesel, or climb into a seaplane originally designed to access the northern Canadian bush. We took the plane.

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At the U.N. today, International Criminal Court chief prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo spoke with CBS News Foreign Affairs Analyst Pamela Falk on war crimes and the Court's work in Darfur, the Sudan, as well as on the preliminary investigation that he is conducting as to whether war crimes have been committed in Afghanistan involving American soldiers. Mr. Moreno Ocampo also discussed the possibility of U.S. membership in the Court. December 4, 2009

A Taliban detainee in Pakistan says he has information on where Osama bin Laden was this past January or February, according to a BBC report Friday.

While the detainee's claims have yet to be verified, he says he met bin Laden several times prior to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.

Basing his information on a contact, the detainee tells the BBC, "In 2009, in January or February I met this friend of mine. He said he had come from meeting Sheikh Osama, and he could arrange for me to meet him."

The detainee added of his contact, whom he said was a Mehsud tribesman, "He helps al Qaeda people coming from other countries to get to the sheikh (bin Laden), so he can advise them on whatever they are planning for Europe or other places.

"The sheikh doesn't stay in any one place. That guy came from Ghazni, so I think that's where the sheikh was."

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A former grocery store worker is facing charges of criminal damage over cell phone video allegedly showed him licking raw chickens before placing them back on shelves in England, according to the BBC.

The brief BBC report says Adeel Ayub, 30, is also accused of slashing co-workers coats and smashing eggs in his bizarre workplace transgressions of 2005.

He is due in court on Dec. 15.

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Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen told CBS News on Thursday that, while President Obama's plan to begin withdrawing U.S. troops from Afghanistan in 2011 is clear, there has been no indication of how long that pullout may take after it's begun.

"It's very clear that the president has given us guidance that in July of 2011, we'll start to transition security responsibility to the Afghan national security forces," Mullen told "Early Show" co-anchor Harry Smith. "There's no determination of how long that will take… There's no specific guidance with respect to how many. It could be very few, it could be a large number."

Mullen also stressed that Mr. Obama has vowed to conduct the withdrawal "responsibly and it will be based on conditions on the ground."

The Chairman acknowledged the huge challenge facing U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan as they race to train and equip the Afghan national forces to take over security duties.

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U.S. soldiers across Afghanistan woke up early to watch President Obama's war strategy speech, which broadcast live at 5:30 a.m. local time Wednesday morning. Most liked what they heard.

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He's been compared to the Tom Hanks character in "The Terminal" by news media the world over, but Feng Zhenghu had never heard of the Hollywood blockbuster until a supporter recently brought him a portable DVD player and a copy of the 2004 Steven Spielberg movie.

"I feel my life is a lot harder than the character's," the 55-year-old Chinese human rights activist tells CBS News. "The movie is a romantic comedy, and my story is more of a tragedy."

Since Nov. 4, Feng has been an unusual fixture at the bustling Narita International Airport outside Tokyo. While the Hanks character became trapped at a JFK terminal when his native country was wiped off the map following a coup, Feng is a Chinese citizen with a valid Japanese visa. He refuses to pass through immigration checkpoints to enter Japan for a simple reason — he wants to go home.

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On Monday, Damascus-based Hamas poured cold water on any imminent deal for the release of an Israeli soldier captured more than three years ago, saying it was still premature to trumpet a happy ending.

Talk of a possible deal has moved to center stage with Israeli media saying that a Hamas delegation was heading to Cairo to discuss the latest list of prisoners Israel is prepared to release in a swap for Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit. Israeli President Shimon Peres heightened speculation after his talks with his Egyptian counterpart Hosni Mubarak in Cairo on Sunday, when he spoke of "real progress" in the negotiations.

"The brouhaha in the media talking about being close to reach an agreement on prisoner exchange deal is purely Israeli leaks designed to influence the feelings of our children, prisoners and their families and to try to pressure and influence on the process of indirect negotiations carried out through the German intermediary," a Hamas statement said. "Hamas will continue its efforts through the competent authority to overcome the obstacles set by the Israeli enemy in the way of completion of exchange … Although we hope to reach an honorable deal for our people as soon as possible, would like to emphasize that it is premature to talk about specific results … or close a deal."

Israeli newspapers said Hamas representatives had already crossed into Egypt from Gaza to meet the German mediator to debate a possible deal for the release of Shalit, captured by Hamas in a 2006 raid near the Israel-Gaza border. The militants tunneled into Israel and attacked an Israeli army outpost, killing two other soldiers.

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Eight years after a U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, the country ranks as the worst place to be born, according to a United Nations report.

The United Nation's Children's Fund, better known as UNICEF, says Afghanistan has the highest infant mortality rate in the world with 257 deaths per 1,000 live births, and 70 percent of Afghans have access to clean water.

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