Jackie Chan awarded honorary Oscar

Action movie star, writer, director and martial artist Jackie Chan is to be given an honorary Oscar for his "extraordinary achievements" in film.

The US film academy also voted to give the awards to editor Anne Coates, casting director Lynn Stalmaster and documentary maker Frederick Wiseman.

Academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs described the four as "true pioneers and legends in their crafts".

Chan, 62, starred in dozens of martial arts films in his native Hong Kong.

He went on to huge international success with hits like Rumble in the Bronx, the Rush Hour franchise, and the animation film Kung Fu Panda.

The other three honorary winners have all had long careers in film. 

Anne Coates spent more than 60 years in movie editing, winning an Oscar for her work on Lawrence of Arabia; Lynn Stalmaster was involved with more than 200 feature films, including The Graduate and Deliverance; and Frederick Wiseman has made almost a film a year since 1967.

Their statuettes will be presented at the Governors Awards ceremony in November.

Melania Trump Sues Daily Mail And Blogger Over 'Escort' Claim

Donald Trump's wife has filed a libel suit against a blogger and the Daily Mail over reports alleging she worked as an "escort" in the 1990s.

Melania Trump's attorney, Charles Harder, said the reports contained several statements "that are 100% false and tremendously damaging to her personal and professional reputation".

The lawsuit was filed against Mail Media, Inc., the publisher of the Daily Mail Online, and against Webster G. Tarpley, which publishes a weblog in Montgomery County.

Powerful quake off north-east New Zealand coast

Residents of a small community on the east coast of New Zealand's North Island have been asked to evacuate after a severe earthquake at sea.

Civil defence authorities asked people in the Tologa Bay area to leave their homes after a 7.1 quake struck 169km (105 miles) north-east of Gisborne.

People in some coastal areas were told to go to higher ground.

The quake caused a tsunami but it has had no noticeable impact, an emergency worker told New Zealand radio. 

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii tweeted that only a 21cm (8in) wave had been measured.

The quake occurred at 04:37 local time (16:37 GMT) at a depth of 19.1 miles, US monitors say. 

Residents across North Island said they felt shaking and rattling as the quake struck but there were no immediate reports of serious damage.

In 2011, the city of Christchurch on South Island was devastated by a magnitude 6.3 earthquake that left 185 people dead.

Each year more than 15,000 earthquakes are recorded in New Zealand, but only about 150 are large enough to be felt.

Facebook Satellite Destroyed In SpaceX Rocket Blast

An unmanned SpaceX rocket has exploded during a routine test at Cape Canaveral in Florida.

The Falcon 9 rocket and its $200m (£150m) satellite payload were destroyed in the blast, which occurred while the rocket was being test-fired just after 1pm.

SpaceX said no-one was injured in the blast, and blamed an "anomaly" on the launchpad for the explosion.

The Israeli AMOS-6 satellite destroyed in the blast was set to be part of a Facebook scheme to provide internet coverage to parts of Sub-Saharan Africa.

Elon Musk's SpaceX had been due to launch the rocket at dawn on Saturday.

The force of the explosion shook buildings several miles away, and a thick cloud of smoke was seen rising from the launch site.

Footage taken after the blast showed the rocket still standing, although the top third appeared to be bent over.

The air is being monitored by authorities for any sign of toxic fumes.

The test-firing was carried out close to NASA's Kennedy Space Centre.

SpaceX is one of two companies shipping supplies to the International Space Station for NASA.

The blast occurred as two astronauts carried out a spacewalk outside the ISS to fix a thermal radiator.

The astronauts were not informed of the explosion, NASA said.

AMOS-6 was the heaviest payload to date for a SpaceX rocket, according to John Logsdon, former director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University.

The accident is expected to significantly disrupt the aerospace firm's plans for six planned launches between now and January 2017.

It comes just over a year after a Falcon 9 rocket failed just after liftoff, destroying a Dragon cargo capsule bound for the ISS.

SpaceX has also lost several rockets while attempting land them upright on ocean platforms.

However it successfully landed a Falcon 9 on a floating drone ship last month, after the rocket sent a Japanese communications satellite into orbit.

Jim Broadbent Joins Game Of Thrones Cast

Jim Broadbent has signed up to play a "significant role" in the seventh season of Game of Thrones.

Details of the character the Oscar-winning British actor will play in the hit HBO series, shown on Sky Atlantic in the UK, are being kept under wraps.

The penultimate series is to be filmed in Northern Ireland, Iceland and Spain and the seven episodes - three short of the usual 10 - will premiere next summer.

News that Broadbent, 67, is joining the cast prompted excitement among Games of Thrones fans, with filming in Northern Ireland expected to start imminently.

Tell-tale GOT signs have been spotted near Titanic Studios in Belfast in recent days and cast member Maisie Williams hinted at her arrival with a tweet about visiting a popular Mexican restaurant in the city.

Williams, 19, teased fans earlier this month - telling them "nothing will prepare" them for the plot twists to come as she read through her scripts.

She tweeted: "Holy BALLS. Just finished reading season 7. I'd start preparing yourselves now.

"Scratch that, nothing will prepare you for this. S*** gets REAL."

Broadbent won his best supporting actor Oscar in 2002 for his role as John Bayley in Iris.

He has also picked up Golden Globes and BAFTAs for Moulin Rouge! and Longford and has past form in a fantasy series - having played Horace Slughorn in the Harry Potter films.

In fact he is the third actor to move from the wizard films to Westeros.

David Bradley played Argus Filch in the Harry Potter films before joining Game of Thrones as villain Walder Frey.

Ciaran Hinds was Albus Dumbledore's brother Aberforth in the Potter series before appearing as Night's Watch member Mance Ryder in Game of Thrones.

Gourmet Burger Kitchen Swallowed By Wimpy Owner Famous Brands

The high-end UK burger chain Gourmet Burger Kitchen (GBK) is to change hands in a £120m deal.

The company is to be bought by the owner of Wimpy, Famous Brands, which said it viewed the purchase as an opportunity to go upmarket.

GBK has grown to 75 restaurants since it was bought from its founders in 2010 by South African private equity vehicle Yellowwoods.

It was confirmed that the chain's current management team and staff would remain in place.

Famous Brands added that it saw plenty of scope to double GBK's footprint through the opening of more outlets over the next five years - with 10-15 new restaurants in the UK alone annually.

"The low interest environment in the UK is supportive of continued consumer spend, while the impact of fears of Brexit on this sector appear negligible - endorsed by a recent survey which confirms that despite the generally subdued economy, household spend in the Eating Out category is up 4% year on year in June 2016."

GBK recently secured an agreement to buy back five franchises in Ireland and Famous Brands said it was considering opening up in South Africa.

Its group strategic adviser, Kevin Hedderwick, said: "We've been looking to expand our presence in the UK market for some time, and the acquisition of GBK was the perfect opportunity for us to do this.

"Not only will this enhance our existing income stream with currency earned outside of Africa, it simultaneously up-weighs Famous Brand to a higher league."

Twin Stars Orbited By Three Giant Planets Discovered

Astronomers have discovered a trio of giant planets orbiting a pair of stellar 'twins' similar to our sun.

The twin stars - known as HD 133121A and HD 133131B - circle each other just 33.5 billion miles apart, a third of the distance of other binary systems.

Because of this, the three giant planets which they host are likely to have been scorched by their immense heat.

Astronomers also believe that one of the stars may have swallowed some smaller planets in the past.

HD 133121A has two planets - one about 1.5 times the size of Jupiter and another half the size of Jupiter.

Its twin hosts a third planet that is 2.5 times the mass of Jupiter. Finding such huge planets is extremely rare.

Dr Johanna Teske, an astronomer at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington DC, said: "We are trying to figure out if giant planets like Jupiter often have long and eccentric orbits.

"If this is the case, it would be an important clue to figuring out the process by which our Solar System formed, and might help us understand where habitable planets are likely to be found."

The stars were first spotted by the Planet Finder Spectrograph on the Magellan Clay Telescope at the Las Campanas Observatory in Chile.

They are relatively old stars, at about 9.5 billion years old, and are mainly composed of hydrogen and helium.

Details of the system are published in The Astronomical Journal, including the theory that one of the stars could have swallowed up some baby planets early in its life.