This is our new Friday Digest! Every Friday, this weekly news round-up gives us the occasion to share with you news from various topics: politics to arts, entertainment, media, science, sports, fun and less fun news…

This digest is a list of news published this week on the Internet (Friday to Friday), selected by the Sama Team, and it is by no means exhaustive. If you want to suggest a news to be added in the next Friday Digest, contact us.

Bomb kills at least 53 pilgrims in south Iraq
A bomb killed at least 53 Shiite pilgrims near the southern port city of Basra on Saturday, an Iraqi official said. It was the latest in a series of attacks during Shiite religious commemorations that have killed scores of people and threaten to further increase sectarian tensions just weeks after the U.S. withdrawal. The attack happened on the last of the 40 days of Arbaeen, when hundreds of thousands…

Cruise Ship Runs Aground Off Italy
The first course had just been served in the Costa Concordia’s dining room when the wine glasses, forks and plates of cuttlefish and mushrooms smashed to the ground. At the magic show in the theater, the trash cans tipped over and the theater curtains turned on their side. Then the hallways turned upside down, and passengers crawled on bruised knees through the dark. Others jumped alone into the cold Mediterranean…

For King, the right to vote was sacred
Every third Monday in January we gather as Americans to commemorate the values and beliefs — as well as the ultimate sacrifice — of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. His tireless advocacy for civil rights, equal protection under the law, labor rights, and for the ultimate realization of our essential creed that we are “one nation, endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty…

Wikipedia, other websites go dark in anti-piracy bill protest
Wikipedia was one of several websites that shut down at midnight in protest of anti-piracy bills that critics say could amount to censorship. Instead of the usual encyclopedia articles, visitors to Wikipedia were greeted by a message about the decision to black out its English-language Web page for an entire day. “Imagine a World Without Free Knowledge,” a stark message in white letters on a black and gray…

MDC activists tortured in prison
The State has been ordered to investigate the inhumane and degrading conditions that the eight MDC activists who are in remand prison facing false charges murdering a police officer are living under at the Harare Remand and Chikurubi Maximum prisons. The order was made today at the Harare Magistrates’ Courts where the activists were appearing for their routine remand together with 20 other activists…