Arizona Senator John McCain (62), a Republican maverick and former prisoner-of-war in Vietnam, yesterday became the first in his party to take formal steps toward a US presidential attempt in 2000.
McCain filed papers with the Federal Election Commission, according to a statement from the John McCain for President Exploratory Committee.
The former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has $80,000 of his own money and a large amount of his research foundation's funds frozen in an ailing Russian bank, but he is not on the brink of bankruptcy, an adviser said yesterday.
Gorbachev this week published a new history book, which sells for $1 and has an initial print run of 10,000.
Jean-Claude Forest, the creator of sensual comic book heroine Barbarella, has died in Paris. He was aged 68.
Forest, who died after a long illness, started his career as an illustrator of children's comics, but angered by censorship turned to adult publications, producing covers for sci-fi novels and comic-strips for daily newspapers. His big breakthrough came in 1962 when he started the adult comic book series Barbarella.
In June 1968 the series was turned into a movie, starring US actress Jane Fonda, by French director Roger Vadim. Architectural historian Gavin Stamp has branded Prince Charles, who has long waged war on modern design, a laughing stock and a "damn nuisance" for his views on buildings.
Johnny Moore, veteran singer with the American soul group the Drifters, died suddenly on his way to hospital in London yesterday, his agent said. He was 64. Moore was lead vocalist on Drifters hits such as Under The Boardwalk, Saturday Night At The Movies and Kissin' In The Back Row Of The Movies in the 1960s and 1970s.
Robert Guillain, who roamed the Far East for Le Monde over four decades, has died at Clamart, near Paris, the newspaper said yesterday. He was 90.