It takes courage to defend Bucharest's rich architectural heritage against real estate speculators and corruption. Yet 41-year-old mathematician, Nicusor Dan, took up the challenge and has made some unexpected wins in court.
Once called the "little Paris of the Balkans" because of its exquisite architecture and booming cultural life, the Romanian capital has suffered a long agony.

He is a major general in the Chinese army, a political advisor, an author and a blogger, and now the grandson of China's revolutionary leader Mao Zedong has taken up a university teaching post.
Mao Xinyu is to be a part-time teacher of his grandfather's philosophy, taking on a class of 65 students at Guangzhou University's Songtian Professional College, according to a statement on the school's website.

Twenty-two years after the fall of its communist regime, Bulgaria opened on Monday its first-ever museum of the state-sponsored, propaganda art characteristic of that era.
The Museum of Socialist Art in Sofia exhibits some 77 sculptures, 60 paintings and 25 smaller plastic art works created between 1945 and 1989 by the most renowned sculptors and painters of the time.

An original copy of the Magna Carta dating back to 1297 was on display in London on Sunday, giving people a rare glimpse of one of the most important legal documents in the history of democracy.
The City of London Corporation's 1297 Magna Carta is on show at the Guildhall Art Gallery. It is being displayed in the gallery's Roman Amphitheatre -- chosen for its ambient low light conditions.

Alberto Giacometti's life-changing encounter with the ancient sculpture of the Etruscans is the starting point for a major Paris show that brings his art face to face with the works that inspired him.
More than 150 rare pieces by the Etruscans, a mysterious, seafaring civilization that ruled swathes of the Mediterranean until it was swallowed up by Rome in the first century BC, have made the trip from Italian museums for the show.

An Indian Supreme Court panel on Friday sharply criticized security surrounding a vast underground treasure trove found at a Hindu temple, saying it could be vulnerable to "tunneling attempts."
The staggering hoard of golden Hindu deities, precious stones and other treasures valued at up to $22 billion was unearthed in June in the vaults of the 16th-century temple in the southern coastal state of Kerala.

Archaeologists in Armenia said on Wednesday that they had found parts of a woman's multicolored straw dress that they believe was made around 5,900 years ago.
The find was made during excavations at a cave complex in southern Armenia where previous discoveries have included what are believed to be the world's oldest known leather shoe and most ancient winery, dating back 5,500 and 6,100 years respectively.

It's a side of Jacqueline Kennedy only friends and family knew.
Funny and inquisitive, canny and cutting. In "Jacqueline Kennedy: Historic Conversations on Life with John F. Kennedy," the former first lady was not yet the jet setting celebrity of the late 1960s or the literary editor of the 1970s and '80s. But she was also nothing like the soft-spoken fashion icon of the three previous years. She was in her mid-30s, recently widowed, but dry-eyed and determined to set down her thoughts for history.

Tanks, artillery pieces and other relics of war are still scattered around the valley where Vietnamese forces won a decisive victory over the French at Dien Bien Phu nearly 60 years ago.
But a new battle -- to attract more visitors to the historic site and boost the impoverished region's earnings from tourism -- is tough going for the descendants of the triumphant troops.

A Goodwill worker who spotted a photograph of Confederate General Robert E. Lee has helped the charity make $23,000 in an online auction.
The tintype photograph was in a bin, about to be shipped out, when a worker grabbed it and sent it to the charity's local online department. The item was then put up for auction.
