* Unemployment hits 27.2 percent in Q1

* Worse than expected figure highlights market decoupling

* Reforms aimed at boosting economy due on Friday

MADRID, April 24 (Reuters) – More than six million Spaniards were out of work in the first quarter of this year, raising the jobless rate in the euro zone’s fourth biggest economy to 27.2 percent, the highest since records began in the 1970s.

The huge sums poured into the global financial system by major central …

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When you see the word “Amazon”, what’s the first thing that springs to mind – the world’s biggest forest, the longest river or the largest internet retailer – and which do you consider most important?

These questions have risen to the fore in an arcane, but hugely important, debate about how to redraw the boundaries of the internet. Brazil and Peru have lodged objections to a bid made by the US e-commerce giant for a prime …

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I was watching TV the other day. Commercial break. Cut to a lush green lawn. A single yellow dandelion springs up through the emerald expanse. The heroic protagonist appears left. He spies the flower, runs, dives, somersaults onto the lawn and pops up sturdily on one knee. Brandishing a bottle of weed killer, he fires. The patented nozzle rains hell on the defenseless sunbather. The flower withers. And …

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A federal appeals court that had blocked the scheduled February execution of a Georgia man whose lawyers say is mentally disabled has lifted its stay, clearing the way for a new execution date.

A three-judge panel of the 11th US circuit court of appeals said in an opinion published Monday that inmate Warren Lee Hill cannot submit his case to a federal court for reconsideration for procedural reasons, including the fact that his claim of mental …

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In cities around the world today, Survival International supporters held protests outside Peruvian embassies and consulates – seeking an end to the deadly expansion of the Camisea gas project in Peru’s Amazon rainforest, which threatens the lives of uncontacted Indians.

Protesters in London and Madrid wore gas masks and helmets depicting gas workers, while carrying placards symbolizing the lethal effects of the Camisea project. Part of the protest demonstration included handing “oil canisters filled with the …

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Major water shortages in Chile are a direct result of the free reign given to mining and logging companies by the Chilean government over the country’s dwindling water supplies, more than 100 environmental, social and indigenous organizations and over 6,000 protesters warned at a rally in Santiago this week.

On Monday the groups demanded that the state regain control of the country’s privatized system of water management, Marianela Jarroud reports for Inter Press Service and the …

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A conflict appears to be brewing between the U.S. Department of Labor and a southern Utah company accused of using hundreds of FLDS children as farm workers.

In documents filed Monday, the Department of Labor argues that Paragon Contractors Corp. has not turned over vital information about a child labor investigation. A news release adds that Brian Jessop and Dale Barlow also have withheld information, while Keith Dutson has failed to appear for subpoenaed testimony. The …

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The school closing debate led to dueling protests this morning outside Chicago Public Schools headquarters.

Students from various area high schools announced they planned to boycott the second day of standardized testing today to protest the role of testing as a factor in schools landing on the school closure list.

Holding signs like “Don’t test me bro” and “Support our schools. Don’t close them,” students circled outside the district headquarters before today’s board meeting.

The student group called …

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LOS ANGELES (AP) — About 20,000 students in California who need to learn English aren’t getting adequate language instruction, according to a lawsuit against the state and education workers filed Wednesday by the American Civil Liberties Union.

Under state and federal law, schools are required to teach non-English speakers the language, but by its own records, the state isn’t offering English instruction to nearly 20,000 students. The suit alleges that lack of instruction has meant some …

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L.A.’s Cultural Heritage Commission met at City Hall Thursday morning to determine whether to designate Tujunga’s Verdugo Hills Golf Course a historic-cultural monument, not because it’s a golf course, but because it was the site of the Tuna Canyon Detention Station, Immigration, and Naturalization Service — a World War II internment camp where 90 percent of the detainees were Japanese.

But the Los Angeles Department of City Planning’s Staff of Historic Resources recommended against the designation, …

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