Thousands of Chileans took to the streets Sunday in a march to remember those abducted and killed in the coup that brought Augusto Pinochet to power, almost 39 years after the turmoil.

Police used water cannons and tear gas to disperse the crowd after some marchers threw rocks at government buildings and destroyed some traffic lights.

In hiding in Damascus since the start of Syria's anti-regime revolt in March 2011, a prominent dissident writer said on Friday he is unable to collect a prestigious award from the Netherlands.

The Prince Claus Fund for Culture and Development award is "actually a tribute to the Syrian people and the Syrian revolution," author Yassin al-Haj Saleh, who was jailed from 1980 to 1996, told Agence France Presse.

Animal rights activists said Friday they would protest a centuries-old festival in central Spain which a bull is chased and then lanced to death.

Hundreds of people, many on horseback, are expected to mark the Toro de la Vega festival in Tordesillas on Tuesday by chasing a bull into a plain near the town and then throwing lances into the animal until it dies.

A potent mix of state censorship, conservative publishing choices and scant translation means international readers are given a narrow view of contemporary China, industry critics say.

There are the occasional books by Chinese authors that hit the international bestseller lists such as the blockbuster "Wild Swans" by Jung Chang, which has sold millions worldwide, and Adeline Yen Mah's "Falling Leaves".

A year ago, China was the sensation of the international art market, but as New York auction houses prepare next week's autumn sales of Asian works, the Chinese dragon has clearly lost some fire.

"It's no longer break-neck," Henry Howard-Sneyd, vice chairman for Asian art at Sotheby's, told Agence France Presse.

For a small but growing number of young Americans, the living room is the classroom when it comes to the "three R's" of reading, 'riting and 'rithmetic.

Homeschooling is growing in the United States, as parents who question the ability of conventional teaching to properly educate their children take matters into their own hands -- with help from the Internet.

A top Democratic official said Thursday that a decision to ditch a party policy naming Jerusalem as Israel's capital, later ordered reversed by President Barack Obama, was not deliberate.

The official weighed in on a row which rattled the first two days of the Democratic National Convention in North Carolina, as delegates passed their platform -- the list of policies to which the party is committed.

The largest flower and ornamental plant show in Latin America is held in a quaint small town founded by Dutch immigrants that is the heart of Brazil's flower industry.

Welcome to Expoflora, complete with an incongruous Dutch windmill greeting visitors at the entrance of the giant flower exhibition center, a two hours' drive from Sao Paulo.

Bullfights returned to Spanish public television on Wednesday after a six-year suspension, sparking warnings of legal action from animal rights activists.

State-financed broadcaster RTVE screened live a bullfight in north-central Valladolid featuring star matadors "El Juli" Julian Lopez Escobar, Jose Maria Manzanares and Alejandro Talavante.

Internationally-acclaimed directors Takeshi Kitano from Japan and Kim Ki-duk from South Korea told Agence France Presse at the Venice film festival that making art house films in Asia is a daunting task.

With his bleak morality tale "Pieta" now one of the favorites to win the Golden Lion prize in Venice on Saturday, Kim said he regretted that audiences at home still did not sufficiently appreciate his foreign award-winning work.