* In Baghdad, at "a bend in the Tigris where caliphs summered when Baghdad was the City of Peace," (the New York Times) there is a footbridge called the Greihat Bridge that links Shiites from the Greihat neighborhood to the Kadhimiya neighborhood, so they can visit the gold-leafed shrine in Kadhimiya and pass back and forth between the two areas without having to go through Sunni neighborhoods. The bridge is 15 feet across and 575 feet long, and has become a symbol of the long-term nature of divisions in the city, with blast walls up in surrounding neighborhoods and traffic flowing along sectarian borders. "It's a symbol of war," said Mohammed Kasim, a photographer and filmmaker. Bridges are potent symbols in Baghdad, bearing names of revolutions and referencing martyrs, and having long served as scenes of protest. The bridge was first dreamed up in 1958 as a way of linking the two Shiite neighborhoods, but plans were scrapped when the (Sunni) Baath Party came into power, preferring to keep Shiites more divided and less powerful. Said Winston Churchill: "... we shape our buildings and afterward our buildings shape us."
* In Niger, soldiers attacked the presidential palace in a military coup attempt while a government meeting took place inside. Niger's president, Mamadou Tandja, had not been seen as of Friday. The attack took place on Thursday, and all day long military music played on the radio in the nation's capital, Niamey. Said a high official with the state media agency about the missing Tandja: "I don't know where he is. They told us he has been taken by the soldiers."
* When a plane crashed outside Buffalo, New York, around 10:20 p.m. on a Thursday last year, killing 50 people, aides to the state's governor, David A. Paterson, were unable to reach or find him for more than three hours, and it was five hours before his office released a statement about the deadliest plane disaster in the U.S. since 2001. Paterson had difficulty explaining the delay, saying that an aide had called the wrong number.
* Tenzin Gyatso is the name of the current Dalai Lama. He is the 14th Dalai Lama.
* Saddam Hussein's plans for a Victory Arch built in his honor included use of the skulls of Iranians.