Wafah Dufour

Wafah Dufour

Wafah Dufour

Wafah Dufour

Wafah Dufour

Wafah Dufour

Alicia Keys

Alicia Keys

Alicia Augello Cook (born January 25, 1981), better known by her stage name Alicia Keys, is an American recording artist, musician and actress. She was raised by a single mother in the Hell's Kitchen area of Manhattan in New York City. At age seven, Keys began to play classical music on the piano. She attended Professional Performing Arts School and graduated at 16 as valedictorian. She later attended Columbia University before dropping out to pursue her music career. Keys released her debut album with J Records, having had previous record deals first with Columbia and then Arista Records.

Keys' debut album, Songs in A Minor, was a commercial success, selling over 12 million copies worldwide. She became the best-selling new artist and best-selling R&B artist of 2001. The album earned Keys five Grammy Awards in 2002, including Best New Artist and Song of the Year for "Fallin'". Her second studio album, The Diary of Alicia Keys, was released in 2003 and was also another success worldwide, selling eight million copies. The album garnered her an additional four Grammy Awards in 2005. Later that year, she released her first live album, Unplugged, which debuted at number one in the United States. She became the first female to have an MTV Unplugged album to debut at number one and the highest since Nirvana in 1994.

Keys made guest appearances on several television series in the following years, beginning with Charmed. She made her film debut in Smokin' Aces and went on to appear in The Nanny Diaries in 2007. Her third studio album, As I Am, was released in the same year and sold six million copies worldwide, earning Keys an additional three Grammy Awards. The following year, she appeared in The Secret Life of Bees, which earned her a nomination at the NAACP Image Awards. She released her fourth album, The Element of Freedom, in December 2009, which became Keys' first chart-topping album in the United Kingdom. Throughout her career, Keys has won numerous awards and has sold over 30 million albums worldwide. Billboard magazine named her the top R&B artist of the 2000–2009 decade, establishing herself as one of the best-selling artists of her time. In 2010, VH1 included Keys on its list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time

Alicia Keys

Alicia Keys

Alicia Keys

Alicia Keys

Ali Larter

Ali Larter

Alison Elizabeth "Ali" Larter (born February 28, 1976) is an American actress best known for playing the dual roles of Niki Sanders and Tracy Strauss on the NBC science fiction drama Heroes. She also appeared in guest roles on several television shows in the 1990s.

Her screen debut came in the 1999 film Varsity Blues, followed by the horror films House on Haunted Hill and Final Destination. Major supporting roles in the comedy Legally Blonde and the romantic comedy A Lot Like Love led her to lead roles as the titular character in the Bollywood film Marigold and in the 2009 thriller Obsessed. Larter achieved wider fame after her portrayal of video game heroine Claire Redfield in the successful films, Resident Evil: Extinction and Resident Evil: Afterlife.

Larter frequently appears in "Hot" lists compiled by Maxim, FHM and Stuff as well as People magazine's "Best Dressed List" in 2007. After a three year relationship, Larter married actor Hayes MacArthur in a small ceremony in Maine in August 2009. The couple have a son, born December 2010

Ali Larter

Ali Larter

Ali Larter

Ali Larter

Osama Bin Laden

* 1957 -- Osama bin Muhammad bin Awad bin Laden is born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. He is the 17th of 52 children fathered by Muhammad Awad bin Laden, a Yemeni immigrant who built a billion-dollar construction company in Saudi Arabia. His mother is Hamida al-Attas, who was from Syria.

al-Attas, who was from Syria. 

* 1979 -- Bin Laden graduates from King Abdul Aziz University in Jeddah with a degree in engineering. He goes to Afghanistan to join the "jihad," or "holy war," against the Soviet Union. He remains there for a decade, using construction equipment from his family's business to help the Muslim guerrilla forces build shelters, tunnels and roads through the rugged Afghan mountains, and at times taking part in battle.

 

He made further trips, and joined the fighting. As a wealthy Saudi, he stood out and acquired a following, and other Arabs joined the Afghan Muslims. He organised a guesthouse and camps, naming them al-Qaeda.

The Afghan jihad against the Soviet army was backed with American dollars, and supported by the governments of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. But after the Soviet withdrawal, Bin Laden became disillusioned by the lack of recognition for his achievements. Half a million US soldiers were invited onto Saudi soil, a historic betrayal in Bin Laden's eyes.

Bin Laden began to direct his efforts against the US and its allies in the Middle East. In 1991 he was expelled because of his anti-government activities. His bank accounts were frozen and his movements limited. As he felt himself under increasing pressure Bin Laden became more radical.

By the mid-1990s, he was calling for a global war against all Americans and Jews and, in 1998, he issued his famous fatwa (religious ruling), amounting to a declaration of war against the US.

Experts say Bin Laden is part of an international Islamic front, bringing together Saudi, Egyptian and other groups.

He has been accused of masterminding the bombing of US embassies, the World Trade Centre destruction, and other attacks. He was thought to be in Afghanistan after 11th September 2001.

Al-Qaeda,or groups linked to it, have continued to carry out attacks, even after it lost its bases in Afghanistan with the removal of the Taleban in 2001.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi

Colonel Gaddafi is the longest-serving leader in both Africa and the Arab world, having ruled Libya since he toppled King Idris I in a bloodless coup in 1969 aged 27.

Col Gaddafi presents himself as the spiritual guide of Libya

He may be ridiculed by some for his flamboyant dress-sense and female bodyguards, but Col Gaddafi is also a skilled political operator who moved swiftly to bring his country out of diplomatic isolation.

It was in 2003 - after some two decades of pariah status - that Tripoli took responsibility for the bombing of a Pan Am plane over the Scottish town of Lockerbie, paving the way for the UN to lift sanctions.

Months later, Col Gadaffi's regime abandoned efforts to develop weapons of mass destruction, triggering a fuller rapprochement with the West.

That saw him complete a transition from international outcast to an accepted, if unpredictable, leader.

Muammar Gaddafi was born in the desert near Sirte in 1942, and in his youth he was an admirer of Egyptian leader and Arab nationalist Gamal Abdel Nasser.

He first hatched plans to topple the monarchy at military college. He went to Britain for further army training before returning to the Libyan city of Benghazi and launching his coup there on September 1, 1969.

He laid out his political philosophy in the 1970s in his Green Book, which charted a home-grown alternative to both socialism and capitalism, combined with aspects of Islam.

On foreign trips he sets up camp in a luxury Bedouin tent and is accompanied by armed female bodyguards - he says they are less easily distracted than their male counterparts.

A tent is also used to receive visitors in Libya, where Col Gaddafi sits through meetings or interviews swishing the air with a horsehair or palm leaf fly-swatter.

The international community's rejection of Libya centred on Col Gaddafi's backing for a number of militant groups, including the Irish Republican Army and the Palestine Liberation Organisation.

US president Ronald Reagan labelled him a "mad dog", and the US responded to Libya's alleged involvement in attacks in Europe with airstrikes on Tripoli and Benghazi in 1986.

Col Gaddafi was said to be badly shaken by the bombings, in which his adopted daughter was killed.

Spurned in his efforts to unite the Arab world, from the 1990s Col Gaddafi turned his gaze towards Africa, proposing a "United States" for the continent.

He adopted his dress accordingly, sporting clothes that carried emblems of the African continent or portraits of African leaders.

At the turn of the millennium, with Libya struggling under sanctions, he began to bring his country in from the cold.

It took several years but he achieved his goal and in 2008 reached a final compensation agreement over Lockerbie and other bombings, allowing normal ties with Washington to be restored.

"There will be no more wars, raids, or acts of terrorism," he said at the time.

At home, the Libyan leader presents himself as the spiritual guide of the nation, overseeing what he says is a version of direct democracy.

In practice, critics say, he has retained absolute power. Dissent has been ruthlessly crushed and the media remains under strict government control.

Human Rights Watch says hundreds of people have been imprisoned for opposing him, with some sentenced to death. Torture and disappearances have also been reported.

Although Libya's economy has been opened up to foreign investment, there has been little in the way of reform.

Many Libyans feel they have not benefited from the country's vast oil and gas reserves, with public services poor and corruption rife.