Banda Aceh, Indonesia News

The Indonesian annual travel mart, the Tourism Indonesia Mart & Expo or 'Pasar Wisata Indonesia' will this year take place in Padang, the capital city of West Sumatra after being held for two years in Bandar Lampung.

The Jakarta Globe reports that Banda Aceh's deputy mayor, who called homosexuality a "social disease that should be eradicated," is pushing for more draconian measures against sexual behaviour that flouts Shariah law, including a bylaw that would criminalize gay sex.

Aceh Governor Zaini Abdullah says his provincial government has no intention of seceding from Indonesia and that his insistence on flying a controversial Acehnese flag is in accordance with the 2005 peace agreement signed in Helsinki that ended a bitter 29-year conflict.

How did Egypt's creative minds respond to the revolution. We ask six artists, and talk to the founder of In Place of War, a project that champions work born out of conflict James Thompson first had the idea for what would become In Place of War when he was working in Jaffna, Sri Lanka, in 2000, during the civil war.

You can also view a map displaying accumulated data from your report and others.

By Erda Khursyiah Basirs & Nabilah Saleh KUALA LUMPUR -- Tan Sri Dr Jemilah Mahmood, the founder of Mercy Malaysia who became the first recipient of Bahrain's Isa Award for Service to Humanity, hopes the award will inspire young people to be involved in humanitarian efforts.

Dr Jemilah, who was chosen from a list of more than 100 humanitarians from across the world by a special committee, will receive a gold medal and a US$1mil cash award, Bahrain's Gulf Daily news reported Wednesday.

Islamic style headscarves are displayed for sale in a shop in central Banda Aceh December 7, 2012.

As many as 1,231 legislative candidates from across Aceh in Indonesia will take a Koran recital test organised by the Aceh Independent Election Monitoring Committee as part of a requirement for every person contesting the country's 2014 election.

"The children never cease asking for their parents and siblings. Families continue to dig up mass graves in the search for their relatives for years." This description came from Murtala, a resident in Indonesia's North Aceh who set up an organisation for war survivors like himself.