After enduring wars, earthquakes, fires and poverty-driven neglect, the walled city of Intramuros that makes up the Philippine capital's historic centre may rise again as a tourist attraction.

Government planners see the UNESCO World Heritage listed but famously dilapidated site becoming one of Manila's biggest drawcards, similar to Singapore's Clarke Quay but with the added color of centuries of history.

A notebook containing 85 pages of sketches by Marc Chagall, until now never seen in public, will be auctioned June 17 in New York.

The work is being sold by a European collector and is expected to bring in anywhere from $600,000 to $900,000. It has never been on display before, auction house Sotheby's said.

A Vatican expression of concern over the violence in Syria this week was the latest sign of deep misgivings in Catholic circles about Arab uprisings seen as a threat for Christian minorities.

"The pope has been rather silent on the Arab revolutions," said Marco Politi, a Vatican specialist for Italian daily Il Fatto Quotidiano.

South Korea will Saturday stage a city-center ceremony rich in pageantry to welcome the return of priceless ancient royal books, 145 years after they were looted by French troops.

After years of diplomatic wrangling, France in April and May sent back 296 volumes of "Uigwe", richly illustrated records of major court ceremonies and events during the Chosun Dynasty, which ran from 1392 to 1910.

Diseases that ravage wheat fields are as old as time itself. The ancient Romans even had a legend to explain the terrible plagues.

According to the myth, a mischievous young boy tied a flaming wheat straw to a fox's tail, torturing the animal. This single act angered the Roman god Robigus so much that he unleashed a rust-colored plague on the fields that turned all the crops to black.

A bricklayer in the Czech Republic's picturesque South Moravian wine-making region is drawing legions of tourists curious to see the elaborate cork-decorated facade of his house.

"It has taken 180,000 wine corks in total -- halved, quartered," Miroslav Svoboda from Mutenice, a small town about 230 kilometers (145 miles) southeast of the Czech capital Prague, told Agence France Presse.

Artist M.F. Husain, who died in self-imposed exile on Thursday aged 95, was often referred to as "The Picasso of India" and was the most recognizable figure of the post-independence Indian art scene.

But his vast body of work was overshadowed by controversy over his depiction of nude Hindu goddesses, which enraged ultra-nationalists, saw an $11.5-million bounty put on his head and forced him to flee India.

Lecturers and students at the American University of Beirut (AUB) have launched a petition against honoring former World Bank president James Wolfensohn, accusing him of supporting Israel.

The petition, entitled "Not in our name: AUB faculty, staff and students object to honoring James Wolfensohn," had by Wednesday garnered the signatures of 90 faculty members and was being rapidly disseminated on Facebook.

The authorities in Azerbaijan have removed a monument to deposed Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak which had angered government critics, an Agence France Presse correspondent reported Wednesday.

The statue of the former Egyptian leader sitting in an armchair in front of three pyramids was taken away from a park in the town of Khirdalan near the capital of the ex-Soviet republic on Tuesday.

The Danish Embassy in Beirut will be launching the Danish cultural week 2011, celebrated for the first time ever in Lebanon.

The cultural week will host music events, movies, gastronomy, a puppet show, architecture, modern dance, cultural workshops and competitions, as well as a bike day.