Three Al-Shabaab Members Executed By Firing Squad for Presidential Palace Attack

Three al-Qaida members were shot by firing squad for attacking the presidential palace in July.(Reuters)

Three al-Shabaab members accused of being involved in a terrorist attack on the presidential palace in Mogadishu have been executed by firing squad.

The men were found guilty of killing civilians and orchestrating the attack in July, and were sentenced to death by a Somali military court.

Members of the al-Qaida linked Somali terrorist group attacked the presidential palace with guns and bombs while President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud was away.

A spokesman for al-Shabaab said 14 government soldiers were killed. Nine attackers are also believed to have died in the incident.

On Sunday, at least three female city workers were killed and seven others wounded after a remotely detonated bomb exploded in the busy Hodan market district of Somalia's capital Mogadishu.

The women are believed to have been cleaning the streets when the bomb exploded.

Police officer Major Ali Afrah told Reuters: "A remotely controlled roadside bomb killed three female city cleaners and injured seven others in Hodan district. The militants hid the bomb inside a rubbish pit."

Nuria Ahmed, a mother of four who lives in the area, added: "We heard a big blast and then I could see the old mothers who were cleaning the scene lying, some of them dead and others screaming.

"The bomb was wrapped in a big, black plastic bag and then placed inside the rubbish along Taleh Street. I counted three dead and seven others injured. I was the first person who arrived to help. It is very unfortunate if mothers are the target."

African Union forces and the Somali army launched a new campaign against al-Shabaab this year.

Several towns have been taken back from the group, but it still controls large swathes of the countryside and some settlements which it uses as a base from which to wage its guerrilla warfare.

Al-Shabaab is fighting to impose a harsh version of Islamic Sharia law across Somalia. It was responsible for the deadly attack on the Westgate Shopping Mall in Kenya's capital Nairobi last September, which killed at least 67 people and injured 150 others.

150 Killed As Earthquake Strikes Yunnan Province in China [PHOTO GALLERY]

Rubik's Cube Fever Strikes in New Jersey at National Championships

China Factory Blast Kills 64 and Injures 150 [GRAPHIC IMAGES]

Pictures of the Week: Best Photos of Past Seven Days

Gaza Crisis Photos: Israeli Shelling Resumes After Hamas...

Hot Shots Photos of the Day: Lord of the Rings Sword, Tom Cruise...

National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest 2014 Winners

Taiwan Gas Explosion: Dramatic Photos and Video of Huge Blasts in...

Gaza Strip: Who are the 61 Israel Defence Forces Soldiers Killed...

Dead Pigs and Rivers of Blood: Shocking Photos of Water Pollution...

European Cosplay Gathering UK Preliminaries 2014 at Hyper Japan

Pesticides Blames for Soaring Cancer Rates in India

Experts believe the use of pesticides in India's Punjab region is behind increasing cancer rates.(Narinder Nanu, AFP/Getty)

Pesticides used on crops in India are causing spiralling cancer rates, according to health workers.

A doctor at the Acharya Tulsi Regional Cancer Treatment and Research Center in Bikaner hospital, which offer free cancer treatment for the impoverished, said that every day hundreds of people with the disease travelled from miles away seeking treatment.

"Nowadays everything is polluted. People use insecticides and injections to grow more and bigger vegetables," centre director Ajay Sharma told Sky News.

He said that ever day the centre treats 400 patients, and of the 80,000 who sought treatment at the centre last year, many had travelled miles from the Malwa region in Punjab.

In the 1960s, India sought to overcome food shortages by embarking on an agricultural revolution, increasing farming yields through the use of methods including pesticide sprays and fertilisers.

Records at the Health Department of the Government of Punjab show 34,430 people died due to cancer in the last five years: a staggering 20 deaths each day.

Umendra Dutt, of the Kheti Virasat Mission, told Sky News that indiscriminate use of pesticides had caused huge environmental and health damage.

"Punjab is a victim of intensive agriculture based on mechanisation and chemicalisation, and due to this Punjab has a cancer crisis, reproductive health crisis, farmer suicides, debt and water crisis," he said.

JS Thakur, of the Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, who has carried out extensive research into cancer rates in the area, told the Global Post that factory waste was contaminating water supplies used for drinking and irrigation, also contributing to cancer rates.

In the village of Jajjhar, headman Babar Gyan Das told Sky that cancer rates were so high, its inhabitants were now stigmatized by other communities.

"It's been disastrous for us. Pesticides have killed young men, women and the elderly and the government is doing nothing," he said.

Lebanese Army Kills 11 Islamists in Border Skirmish

Seven Lebanese soldiers are reported to have been killed in fighting with Islamist militants.(Reuters)

The Lebanese army killed 11 Islamist militants amid heavy fighting near the Syrian border on Saturday.

Local media reported that seven soldiers were killed as they tried to contain the militants in the border town of Arsal.

However, the army issued a statement warning against reporting "erroneous" information.

"It appears the armed operation was not spontaneous, but planned and studied, and the army will be firm and decisive in its response," the army said.

"What happened today is the most dangerous incident Lebanon and the Lebanese have ever faced, because it's made clear that there is someone planning and preparing to attack Lebanon as well as planning to sabotage the Lebanese Army and the residents of Arsal."

The clashes came after al-Qaida-linked gunmen seized a police station, killing two soldiers and at least three civilians, Reuters reported.

At least 16 members of Lebanon’s security forces were taken hostage after the Nusra Front attacked a police station.(Omar Ibrahim/Reuters)

A security source said 16 members of the security forces were taken hostage after the Nusra Front, al-Qaida's branch in Syria, seized the building. Lebanese security officials said the gunmen also included fighters from the Islamic State, which has seized control of large areas of Syria and Iraq.

A Nusra Front spokesman told Reuters that the group was demanding the release of its leader Emad Jumaa after he was arrested at a checkpoint near Arsal.

Prime Minister Tammam Salam said in a statement on the National News Agency that the attack was carried out by "non-Lebanese armed groups" and that the army would "restore security and stability to Arsal and the surrounding area".

Sectarian conflict across Lebanon has led to the rise of radical Islamist groups such as the Nusra Front and the Islamic State. Violence from Syria's civil war, in which Sunni rebels are fighting to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad, has also spilled over into Lebanon's borders.

Arsal is a Sunni town flanked by Syrian government-controlled territory and a mostly Lebanese Shia region that supports Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed group fighting with Assad's forces in Syria.

Arsal's Sunni population is largely sympathetic to the rebels in Syria and tens of thousands of Syrian refugees have fled to the town to escape fighting in the porous mountainous border.

Gaza Strip: Israel Calls for Politically Uprooting Hamas as IDF On Verge of Wiping out Terror Tunnels

Israeli soldiers stand on an armoured personnel carrier (APC) outside the central Gaza Strip as they fire mortar shell towards Gaza before a ceasefire was due.Reuters

Even as the nearly month-long offensive by Israeli forces in Gaza Strip shows no signs of dying down anytime soon, Israel has called for uprooting Hamas entirely from the region.

Israel's Justice Minister Tzipi Livni urged an international agreement to wipe out the political establishment of Hamas which controls the Gaza Strip. "I don't want to leave a weakened Hamas if we can get rid of it altogether."

Lobbying for Palestine Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to be given control over Gaza, Livni said: "We have an opportunity for political change. It can come through international agreements on the disarmament [of Gaza] and placing Abbas in the Strip," according to local reports.

"With Hamas, one doesn't talk one shoots. You don't make deals with Hamas, you make deals against Hamas, which is what we are doing. The campaign will continue by our decisions, and through our initiative until we achieve Israel's objectives."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also vowed to press ahead with the onslaught in Gaza until the battle is finally over.

Meanwhile, the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) has said they are inching towards total annihilation of the sophisticated terror tunnels used by the Hamas fighters in Gaza.

"We are toward the end of our mission in the tunnels," a senior IDF official told Arutz Sheva.

The IDF has hit nearly 108 targets so far over the weekend alone.

The Israel-Gaza conflict has entered the 27th consecutive day as the death toll of Palestinians crosses 1,600. The IDF has said 64 Israeli soldiers have been killed since 8 July.