Main news of January 16

A roundup of what has happened in the past 24 hours

WORLD

* The leaders of Tunisia's political parties could announce the creation of the country's national unity government on Monday, Prime Minister Mohamed Ghannouchi has said

* The Iranian authorities would ban flights of Russian-made Tu-154 aircraft from February 20, the Fars news agency said citing the country's civil aviation chief

* A referendum on South Sudan independence from the north of the country has ended

* Floods and landslides have killed a total of 611 people in the Brazilian state of Rio de Janeiro

* Teresa Scanlan of Nebraska has won the Miss America crown, besting 52 other hopefuls in Las Vegas, U.S. media reported

* North Korea reiterated its call for talks with South Korea, seeking an end to the confrontation on the peninsula, the Yonhap news agency reported

* A week after being shot in the head, U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords has been taken off the ventilator and is breathing on her own through a tracheotomy tube, CNN reported

* An Egyptian state security court handed a death sentence to a man for the killing of six Coptic Christians and a Muslim police officer on Coptic Christmas Eve in January 2010, the Egyptian media reported

* Nine civilians, including a child, were killed after a car hit a roadside bomb in northeastern Afghanistan, local authorities said

* Tunisian soldiers and police exchanged gunfire with several armed groups around the presidential palace in a Tunis suburb, local media reported

* Tunisian interim authorities ordered to shorten the curfew by one hour as the security situation seems to have improved in the North African country following the deadly anti-government riots

* Israeli specialists have tested a Stuxnet computer worm which can be used against Iran's nuclear facilities, the New York Times has reported

 

RUSSIA

 

* Russian special services had no facts to confirm rumors that Chechen militant leader Doku Umarov was killed in a special operation in Chechnya

* A police officer was shot dead in his house in Russia's North Caucasus Republic of Kabardino-Balkaria

* The number of people, infected with the pandemic A/H1N1 strain of flu virus, is on the rise in Russia and Europe

* Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said the search for Chechen militant leader Doku Umarov will continue despite the recently spread rumors on his death

* Russian political opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, arrested after an anti-Kremlin rally in downtown Moscow, was attacked with a butterfly net shortly after leaving jail

* Russia's Krasin and Admiral Makarov icebreakers started an operation to free the ice-trapped Bereg Nadezdy refrigerator ship in the Sea of Okhotsk, the press office of the Russian Transport Ministry said

* A passenger jet of Russian airline Transaero flew to Tunisia to evacuate Russian tourists from the riot-hit North African country

* Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov failed to attend a picket held by opposition parties in downtown Moscow against his arrest on December 31

 

SPORTS

 

* Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev congratulated the Russian Kamaz truck team with the victory in the 2011 Dakar Rally in South America

* Russia's tennis star Maria Sharapova has split up with her long-time coach Michael Joyce, tennis.com has reported