"A number of analysts here are convinced that not all the photos being released of North Korea's leader, Kim Jong-il, are really photos of Kim Jong-il.

Instead, they say, a look-alike has been standing in for him on some of the 122 trips he's reportedly made this year to the countryside, factories, cultural events, military units, and all sorts of other venues.

Some observers say the North Korean leader is too ill to make all these appearances. One Japanese analyst claims President Clinton didn't meet with Kim Jong-il in August - he met with a Mr. Kim double.

The evidence of Kim stand-ins is far from verified, but several North Korean refugees here say that Kim has not one but several look-alikes playing his role."

The status update from 20 hours ago on former Afghan foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah's Facebook page simply reads "God speed to our beloved Afghanistan." Meanwhile, the wires are buzzing about whether he is going to boycott his Nov. 7 runoff with President Hamid Karzai. A press conference is set for Sunday morning. The AP is reporting that his advisers say he will withdraw from the race.

The reason? Abdullah wanted the corruption that he says aided the ballot-stuffing in the first round to be corrected by the second round. This includes a demand to scrap certain elections officials, something Karzai won't agree to.

Abdullah would still emerge a winner if he goes ahead with the boycott, something he shunned on last Sunday's U.S. news shows but acknowledged that his supporters have been clamoring for him to go in that direction. He will not likely withdraw his allegations of corruption and fraud against the Karzai government, and will likely assume the role of opposition hero in the face of crumbling security and government in his country.

The loser in all of this? The U.S. and the Obama administration, which hoped a tidy runoff would produce a stable government in Kabul and allow it to proceed with its next steps, whatever they may be, on the Afghan war.

(Photo by Majid/Getty Images)

We shouldn't know for a week or so -- at least according to the ousted Honduran president's estimation -- since that country's congress hasn't even scheduled a vote on the deal brokered by the U.S. yet. Basically, Manuel Zelaya could emerge from his hiding place at the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigulpa and resume his role in a power-sharing deal until elections on Nov. 29, when Zelaya will be ineligible to run anyway because of term limits. The deal, however, will come under a non-binding review by Honduras' Supreme Court and is subject to approval by Congress.

Working against Zelaya is the fact that it's the Congress and Supreme Court that voted to toss him out on his ear in the first place. Working for Zelaya is fatigue among many Honduran lawmakers of the world community ganging up on the interim government, as well as optimism that the rest of the world would accept the elections as legitimate if Zelaya was allowed a chance back in. The constitutional referendum over which Zelaya got ousted, though -- working toward an extension of term limits -- is dead in the water.

(Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

"Two weeks before American superstar Beyonce Knowles is scheduled to hold her first ever concert in Egypt, an Islamist MP publically blasted the government for accepting to host the event and accused the government of violating Sharia law.

The bootylicious pop diva is set for a government-approved gig at the Red Sea resort of Port Ghalib, irking Muslim Brotherhood member Hamdi Hassan, who slammed the government for allowing a singer 'who appears naked in her clips' to perform, which he said would spread vice.

'The government is trying to make people indulge in sin and licentiousness to cover up the other crimes it is committing against them,' Hassan said in a parliament session.

Hassan highlighted what he called government double standards for refusing to allow an Islamic band that sings religious songs for children to enter the country.

This is not the first time Western pop diva's have irked Egyptian conservatives.

Last year Egypt cleric Khaled al-Gindi decried a performance by hip-shaking sensation Shakira and likened her profession to prostitution but stressed he was sure she was a 'nice person.'"

At the bottom of the story is a note that indicates the article was translated from Arabic for the English-language website. Wouldn't we all love to know, then, how "bootylicious" translates in Arabic?

(Photo by Koichi Kamoshida/Getty Images)

"Hundreds of food-loving Lebanese came together on Saturday to make the largest hummus serving on the world's biggest plate in a bid to claim ownership of the dish with a new Guinness world record.

...Organizers have hailed the event as 'a patriotic event of national scale.'

'El Hommos Lebnaneh, or Hummus is Lebanese, is an attempt to break the current Guinness world records of hummus and tabbouleh, reaffirming the Lebanese proprietorship of these two dishes,' said a statement issued by the industrialist association and food syndicate, which planned the event.

A battle over hummus and tabbouleh between Lebanon and Israel -- two neighbors still technically at war -- emerged last year and efforts have been underway ever since to clearly identify such dishes as exclusively Lebanese."

"The status of press freedom in Venezuela has always been a source of concern for Reporters without Borders (RSF). In the Worldwide Press Freedom Index 2009 released on Tuesday in Paris, the non-governmental organization warns of a 'major decline' affecting press freedom in Venezuela, 'where President Hugo Chávez's administration kept changing the rules that govern broadcasting with the aim of steadily silencing its critics.'

'The sudden withdrawal of the licenses of 34 regional radio and TV stations in August 2009 was part of the strategy,' RSF said. Referring to the country --ranked 124th in the Worldwide Press Freedom Index 2009-- the Paris-based international organization stresses that 'already badly placed in the 2008 index, Venezuela is now among the region's worst press freedom offenders, close to Colombia (126th) and Mexico (tied 137th)', Efe reported.

According to the report, 'the broadcast landscape was shattered by the years of "media war" that followed the 11 April 2002 coup that briefly removed Hugo Chavez from power. Among the four television channels that backed the coup, the oldest and most popular, Radio Caracas Television (RCTV), had to give up its terrestrial frequency to the public cultural channel Televisora Venezolana Social (Teves), on 27 May 2007, but was able to resume broadcasts on cable. Televen and Venevisión hung on to their frequencies by adjusting their editorial line.'"

"Politicians from the US and France, as well as various officials in Afghanistan, said on Sunday that both Karzai and Abdullah Abdullah, a former foreign minister, must co-operate to resolve the situation.

In first public remarks suggesting that the talks were making at least limited progress, Bernard Kouchner, the French foreign minister, said that the two were ready to 'work together'.

'They talked, both of them, about the necessity of working together,' Kouchner said in Kabul after speaking separately with Karzai and Abdullah.

'Honestly, this is the minimum they could do.'

Election officials in Afghanistan are expected soon to announce whether Karzai is the outright winner of August's disputed election or must face a second vote against rival candidate Abdullah.

The UN-backed Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) may unveil its findings of an investigation into fraud allegations on Monday."

For his part, Abdullah had this to say on his Facebook page Saturday: "Afghans must decide their own future! Karzai's time is over!"

"The army on Saturday launched a three-pronged attack against Taliban stronghold in South Waziristan amid reports of roadside bombings and stiff resistance that left at least two soldiers dead and eight wounded.

Thousands of troops, backed by jet fighters and helicopter gunships, started advancing on the Mehsud tribe's heartland at Makin from three points at first light.

Maj-Gen Athar Abbas, the chief of the Inter-Services Public Relations, told journalists: 'The army has launched an operation after receiving orders from the government. The operation was launched early in the morning. Both air and ground troops are taking part.'"

For everyone that was glued to the TV on Thursday as the news networks followed an odd homemade balloon cruising through the Colorado sky at some 25 mph -- fearing that a 6-year-old boy was trapped inside and hanging on for dear life -- and then saw the nutty circumstances unfold after the child was found hiding in the family's house, this should come as no surprise:

"A Colorado sheriff said he was pursuing criminal charges in the case of a 6-year-old boy who vanished into the rafters of his garage while the world thought he was zooming through the sky in a flying saucer-like helium balloon.

The boy's parents, Richard and Mayumi Heene, met with Larimer County investigators for much of the afternoon, but Sheriff Jim Alderden didn't say who would be charged or what the charges would be.

Alderden didn't call Thursday's hours-long drama a hoax, but he expressed disappointment that he couldn't level more serious charges in the incident, which sent police and the military scrambling to save young Falcon Heene as millions of worried television viewers watched.

'We were looking at Class 3 misdemeanor, which hardly seems serious enough given the circumstances,' Alderden said. 'We are talking to the district attorney, federal officials to see if perhaps there aren't additional federal charges that are appropriate in this circumstance.'

He said deputies were seeking a search warrant for the family's home, and there would be more information at a news conference Sunday."

The kid raised eyebrows when he said to his dad on a live interview CNN "you said we did this for a show." He also puked during two other TV interviews when asked why he hid, sparking a firestorm of debate on news shows about whether the incident was an elaborate hoax.

(Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

Every brave Iranian risked a death sentence just by venturing out into the streets to protest the obviously rigged presidential elections in June -- just ask Neda -- but the brutality continues with the trials and now death sentences for those involved in the pro-democracy efforts. More:

"Three people arrested after Iran's disputed presidential election have been sentenced to death, the Iranian ISNA news agency said.

'Three people who were accused in the post-election incidents have been sentenced to death,' ISNA quoted Zahed Bashiri Rad, media officer at the justice ministry, as saying on Saturday.

Bashiri Rad, giving only the initials of the convicts, said that 'MZ and AP were convicted for ties with the Kingdom Assembly of Iran and NA for ties with the Monafeghin (exiled opposition group commonly known as People's Mujahideen).

Prosecutors said the accused admitted to spying but human rights groups say torture is used to obtain so-called confessions."

Read more on 37-year-old Mohammad-Reza Ali-Zamani, the first person to be sentenced to death in the wake of the protests, at Amnesty International.