Halle, Germany  - As 12 European cities marked "Handel Special Day" with concerts of the Anglo-German composer's music, orchestras played funeral music Sunday in his hometown, the eastern German city of Halle.

"The concert in our Market Church was a sell-out," said Bianca Berger, spokeswoman for the Handel birthplace trust in Halle.

Handel (1685-1759) was born in Germany and baptized in the church. He later became a British citizen. The concerts were organized to mark the 250th anniversary last Tuesday of his death in London.

Nairobi/Mogadishu  - Two foreign aid workers employed by Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) have been kidnapped by gunmen in Somalia, reports said Sunday.

The African news media network Shabelle. net, quoting witnesses, said the pair were taken on the way to Hudur, the capital of the Bakol region in south-west Somalia.

The BBC's Somali service said the two men, employees of MSF Belgium, were Danish and Belgian.

A bloody insurgency is ongoing in Somalia, where militant Islamist group al-Shabaab is fighting the western-backed government.

Allahabad/ Faizabad, Apr 19 : Congress President Sonia Gandhi on Sunday said that the Prime Minister as well as the Congress party works according to wishes of common man.

"I want to make one thing very clear to you that our party and our

Prime Minister do not work on the order from any organisation. We work on the order of common man. We work on the wishes of people present here," Sonia Gandhi said at an election rally in Allahabad.

Bangkok, Apr. 19 : The general public has approved Thailand''s Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva's government''s quelling of last weekend''s rioting in Bangkok. The latest ABAC public opinion poll says that a majority of the people feels it was done in a transparent manner.

According to the Bangkok Post, the poll showed 74.9 percent of the people questioned thought the riot control measures that were imposed were acceptable. Only 25.1 percent did not think so.

According to the Google Chrome Program Manager, Anthony Laforge, in the Thursday-released Chrome 2.0.174.0 update, the open source browser now includes a new feature that enables the users the "ability to remove thumbnails from the New Tab Page." Earlier, the option was accessible in default mode.

With the 48-hour countdown for the takeoff of the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C-12) having begun at 6.45 a. m. on Saturday, the vehicle carrying two satellites is all geared up to rocket into the sky at 6.45 a. m. on Monday, from Andhra Pradesh's Sriharikota spaceport.

The two satellites that the PSLV will put in orbit include a radar imaging satellite called RISAT-2, and a 38-kg investigational mini communication satellite - Anusat - built by Anna University, Chennai.