The Hangover News

Sectarian Strife
BOMBS TARGETING SUNNI MUSLIMS KILLED AT LEAST 76 PEOPLE IN IRAQ
Which has got everyone worried about a potential civil war

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After two days of bombings targeting Shia Muslims in Baghdad, multiple bombs exploded in Sunni areas, killing at least 76 people and sparking fears that the increasing sectarian bloodshed could be building up to a civil war in Iraq.

Nobody has yet claimed responsibility for the bombings, but the fact that they targeted mostly Sunni areas has raised suspicions that the bombs were set by Shia militants.

Tension between the two groups has been on the rise since Sunnis started protesting against what they claim is mistreatment at the hands of the Shia-led government.

The Shia government approach in post-Saddam Iraq has been to try to rebuild the country, restraining their militias when Sunni extremist groups such as al-Qaida have targeted them with large-scale attacks.

Jawad al-Hasnawi, a lawmaker close to the Shia government, said, "It is clear that terrorist groups such as al-Qaida and Baathists are trying hard to reignite the sectarian war in Iraq."

Radical Rallies
SUPPORTERS OF ISLAMIST GROUP ANSAR AL-SHARIA CLASHED WITH POLICE IN TUNISIA
The group openly supports al-Qaida and, weirdly, the government didn't want them shouting about that in public 

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Supporters of the extremist Islamist group Ansar al-Sharia clashed with police in Tunisia after the government banned its annual rally, saying they caused a threat to society.

Ansar al-Sharia openly supports al-Qaida and is considered the most radical Islamist group to have emerged from Tunisia since the country's revolution in 2011, so it sounds like the government have a pretty valid point.

As is now generally the case in these kinds of ad-hoc clashes, protesters resorted to that tired cliche of throwing stones at the police, before the police retaliated with tear gas.

Hardline Islamist groups in Tunisia are seeking to impose more religious guidelines on the country's citizens, which – rightly so, you'd imagine – has the secular elite worried that they're going to try to force their strict views on people and compromise individual freedom, women's rights and democracy.

Erroneous Espionage
RUSSIA DETAINED A US EMBASSY EMPLOYEE FOR TRYING TO "RECRUIT A SPY"
Ryan Fogle may well be the worst spy since Anna Chapman

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In an incredibly embarrassing attempt at espionage, Russia has detained a US citizen accused of trying to recruit a Russian intelligence officer to work for the CIA.

Ryan Fogle, a secretary at the US embassy in Moscow (Russia's Federal Security Service have also claimed he works for the CIA), was caught carrying "special technical equipment", a disguise (that surfer-bro blond wig he's wearing above), a large sum of money and instructions on how to recruit his target.

You'd have thought a general rule of the thumb in the spy game would be to just learn how to recruit people, rather than write it all down ready to be used as concrete evidence, but as the old adage goes: "Never assume anything about spies because sometimes they're idiots."

What with the whole Cold War thing – and the fact that relations between Russia and America have become frostier since former KGB spy Vladimir Putin returned to the presidency last year – Fogle's arrest presumably isn't going to do wonders for any kind of solidarity between the two countries.

Both the US government and the American embassy in Moscow have so far declined to comment.

Fast Food Trafficking 
PEOPLE ARE SMUGGLING KFC CHICKEN FROM EGYPT TO GAZA
Hamas apparently aren't too happy about Western food being brought into the region 

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Buckets of KFC chicken are being smuggled through underground tunnels from Egypt to any residents of Gaza willing to pay around £23 for a family meal of battered battery farm birds.

Tight restrictions on Gazans entering Egypt and the fact that there aren't any international food chains in the blockaded area means that anyone desperate for the Colonel's chicken are turning to the Yamama delivery firm to get their fix.

Hamas is reportedly angry about the importation of food from the Western franchise.

However, a Yamama worker told media that his company was doing the people a favour, claiming that some people who've never been abroad before have, "all their life heard of and seen adverts for KFC and want to taste it… now they can try it with us for a reasonable price".

Social Media Slip-Ups
AN AUSTRALIAN POLITICIAN LIKED A PHOTO OF A TEENAGER'S GENITALS ON FACEBOOK
He's since apologised for being duped by the "sneaky nuts" prank 

(Image via)

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Peter Collier, the Western Australia Minister for Education, has made a public apology after Liking what he thought was an innocent photo of a 16-year-old boy on Facebook.

Unfortunately for Collier, the photo was not innocent – it was, in fact, an example of the "sneaky nuts" photo phenomenon that's apparently swept Australia and "caused a headache for educators" since it was popularised on the Chris Lilley show Angry Boys.

In case you haven't been able to work it out by the two words in its name, "Sneaky Nuts" is where you slyly display your testicles in a photograph – something senior politicians probably shouldn't be approving of on the internet, especially when carried out by a minor.

In a statement, Collier apologised and said that the incident "obviously highlights the pitfalls of social media". Which is weird, because it kind of doesn't at all.