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.

U.N. Security Council condemns violence in Sudan
The U.N. Security Council on Friday condemned the violence in the disputed Sudanese region of Abyei and called on the government in the north to pull out its troops. “The council demands that the government of Sudan withdraw immediately from the Abyei area,” the statement said. The council called on both parties to adhere to the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement, which ended two decades…

Nintendo says server breached, no data lost
Nintendo was targeted in a recent online data attack, but no personal or company information was lost, the Japanese maker of the Wii game console said Sunday. The server of an affiliate of Nintendo Co.’s U.S. unit was accessed unlawfully a few weeks ago, but there was no damage, company spokesman Ken Toyoda said. “There were no third-party victims,” Toyoda said, while declining to elaborate…

Hamas closes Gaza crossing into Egypt as tensions rise
Hamas closed the Gaza Strip’s border with Egypt yesterday, partially reinstating a four-year blockade that was lifted only the week before. Hamas, the militant Islamist organisation which governs Gaza, took the decision in response to growing tension with Egypt’s new post-Mubarak regime. After announcing the opening of the border last week, officials in Cairo rapidly backtracked, and then announced restricted…

Rare cancer seen in 41 homosexuals
Doctors in New York and California have diagnosed among homosexual men 41 cases of a rare and often rapidly fatal form of cancer. Eight of the victims died less than 24 months after the diagnosis was made. The cause of the outbreak is unknown, and there is as yet no evidence of contagion. But the doctors who have made the diagnoses, mostly in New York City and the San Francisco Bay area, are alerting…

Lady Gaga Backs Backplane, Social Network For Celebrities
Lady Gaga and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt are teaming up to invest in Backplane, a new social network for celebrities spearheaded by a team that includes Lady Gaga’s business manager, Troy Carter. According to the New York Times, Backplane has raised over $1 million in funding from investors that include Lady Gaga, who holds a 20 percent stake in the company, and Tomorrow Ventures, Schmidt’s…

The Revolutionary New Birth Control Method for Men
One Saturday in January 2010, Devendra Deshpande left his home in the Delhi suburbs and drove into the city to get a vasectomy. He was 36 years old, married with two young kids, and he thought it was time. He arrived at the hospital around midday and met Hem Das, then the hospital’s chief vasectomy surgeon. Das had an interesting question for Deshpande. Rather than receive a traditional vasectomy…

Saudi women take to their cars hoping for change
Fed up with having no driver to ferry her to hospital, Shaima Osama decided to take matters into her own hands and drive there herself, an act of defiance in a country where women are banned from sitting behind the wheel. Emboldened by the winds of change sweeping the Arab world, which has toppled leaders in Tunisia and Egypt, women in the conservative kingdom see no better time to seek greater freedoms by…

E. coli death toll rises to 31; sprouts traced to trash in home
Four more deaths have been confirmed by German health officials Friday bringing the total number of European deaths from an E. coli outbreak to 31. All but one were in Germany. According to German health authorities the bacteria has been traced to sprouts found in a North Rhine-Westphalia household in western Germany. This is the first time the actual bacteria has been found in produce. The number of people…

Air bombardment reported in Sudan’s S. Kordofan -UN
Aerial bombardments were reported in Sudan’s Southern Kordofan state on Thursday, and artillery fire could be heard near the state capital as late as Friday morning, the United Nations said. “This took place, according to our information, yesterday in Umm Dorain, Umm Serdiba, Heiban, and Saraf el-Gamos,” U.N. spokesman Kouider Zerrouk said, referring to the aerial bombardments. “Heavy artillery was also heard…