Born in 1937 in the village of al-Awja near Tikrit, Saddam Hussein rose through the ranks of Iraq’s Ba’ath Party before becoming the country’s president in 1979. (File photo) Even after losing power and facing trial for crimes against humanity, Saddam Hussein remained defiant. Sitting inside a Baghdad courtroom in 2006, the former Iraqi president…

For most people, asteroids are distant objects that remain hidden behind telescope lenses and scientific instruments. That will briefly change in April 2029, when one of the best-known near-Earth asteroids is expected to become visible without specialist equipment across large parts of the world. The object, called Apophis, has attracted scientific attention for more than…

The United States has now marked its 250th anniversary, but one part of the celebration has only just begun. Beneath the ground in Philadelphia, a specially engineered time capsule has been buried with instructions that it should not be opened for another 250 years. Intended as a message to people living in 2276, it brings…

A five-month-old Los Angeles startup called Orbital has asked American regulators for permission to do something that sounds almost implausible: launch up to 100,000 satellites into space, each one functioning as a data centre powering artificial intelligence. According to SpaceNews’ reporting on the filing, the company submitted its application to the Federal Communications Commission on…

A Ukrainian woman suspected of planting a parcel bomb that targeted a wealthy Ukrainian-born businessman in Monaco last week has been found shot dead near Kyiv, according to Ukrainian news outlet Ukrainska Pravda, with Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office later confirming the discovery of the body.In a statement, Ukraine’s National Police said officers had “detained two…