"According to at least two or three sources, a Tibetan layperson set themselves on fire this morning in Ngaba town. As police put out the flames, they beat him severely," said Kate Saunders, of the International Campaign for Tibet, a London-based group.

This prompted local people to try to recover the body, prompting clashes with police, the activists say.

The Chinese authorities say their policies have brought a better standard of living to many Tibetans.

China is reluctant to allow journalists access to sensitive Tibetan areas and information about what is happening on the ground is difficult to verify.

An e-voting machine that is to be used for the presidential election this year has been found to have "anomalies" such as failing to record votes or logging the wrong vote and freezing, according to a government report.

Specifically, the DS200 failed in some cases to record when the touch screen was calibrated or the system was powered on or off, failed to read votes correctly when a ballot was inserted at an angle, and accepted a voted ballot without recording the ballot on its internal counter and without recording the marks, according to the report.

The newly published Law imposes restrictions on visiting and/or using foreign websites by Belarusian citizens and residents. Under this new Law, the violation of these rules is recognized as a misdemeanor and is punished by fines of varied amounts, up to the equivalent of US$125.

It appears that business requests from Belarus cannot be served over the Internet if the service provider is using online services located outside of the country. The tax authorities, together with the police and secret police, are authorized to initiate, investigate, and prosecute such violations.

For example, suppose someone in Belarus buys something from Amazon, which is not a Belarusian company and thus is not registered in Belarus. The transaction is illegal, and so the Belarusian Attorney General would send a note to Amazon informing it that it is violating national law and might be sued.

Iranian naval commander Mahmoud Mousavi was quoted as saying the missile was equipped with the "latest technology" and "intelligent systems".

Tehran reacted angrily last week to reports that Western nations were planning to impose further sanctions targeting Iran's oil and financial sectors.

Iran threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz, which links the Gulf - and its oil-producing states - to the Indian Ocean.

The sentence comes just days after China sentenced another Tiananmen activist, Chen Wei, to 9 years in prison. Wei was one of hundreds of dissidents who were held by Chinese police earlier this year in order to to prevent the "Jasmine Revolution," a series of planned protests inspired by the Arab Spring.

Human rights groups have accused Beijing of cracking down on activists under the cover of the Christmas holidays so that they would not receive as much attention from diplomats or media, BBC News reported.

People wept openly on the streets of the capital, Pyongyang. State media said he had suffered a heart attack on Saturday, aged 69. He had been unwell.

The announcer, wearing black, struggled to keep back the tears as she said he had died of physical and mental over-work.

Images from inside the secretive state showed people in the streets of Pyongyang weeping at the news of his death.

Only the UK has said it will not join. Prime Minister David Cameron said he had to protect key British interests, including its financial markets.

The UK effectively used its veto to block an attempt, led by the French and Germans, to get all 27 EU states to support changes to the union's treaties.

"We were offered a treaty that didn't have proper safeguards for Britain, and I decided it was not right to sign that treaty," he told the BBC.

Less than 12 hours after opening, the Obama administration’s “virtual embassy” in Iran was blocked by Tehran’s digital gatekeepers on Wednesday.

White House spokesman Jay Carney condemned the blockage in a statement Wednesday evening, saying the Iranian government had “again demonstrated its commitment to build an electronic curtain of surveillance and censorship around its people.”

Traditional big media firms have contributed more than $5 million to the sponsors of the Stop Online Piracy Act, with California Democratic Reps. Howard Berman and Adam Schiff as the top recipients.

Earlier this month we noted that Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, the bill's sponsor in the House, has received nearly $400,000 from the TV, music and movies industry during his career, including some recent timely donations from broadcasting and television groups that are lobbying for the bill.

With 68% of the vote counted, the Central Election Commission said United Russia had 49.9% of the vote, down from 64% in 2007.

"We have received thousands of calls from regional offices, confirming massive violations and fraud," said Communist Party deputy head Ivan Melnikov on the party website.

Prime Minister Putin has accused foreign powers of meddling in election preparations, while Duma members have questioned why a foreign-funded organisation is allowed to monitor Russian elections.