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Soundbites

“This represents an urgently required step forward for forensic medical research.â€

Richard Shepherd, the forensic pathologist who will lead a team filming the decomposition of a human corpse for television (The Guardian, London, 4 November)

“That was a risk factor for avian flu that we hadn’t considered.â€

Epidemiologist Tim Uyeki of the US Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, after a man became infected by sucking a rooster’s beak and swallowing the spit and mucus – a technique for clearing the bird’s airway apparently common in cockfighting circles (The New York Times Sunday magazine, 7 November)

“They see all these websites as newspapers they haven’t been able to crack down on yet.â€

Hossein Derakhshan, a Canada-based Iranian, following a crackdown by the Iranian government on bloggers, online journalists and computer technicians involved in publishing articles that promote democracy or advocate non-Muslim ideas (The Christian Science Monitor, 28 October)

“I have heard of fake twins who are five or ten years apart.â€

Wang Qiaolin, whose two sons born two years apart are twins according to their birth certificates. She says penalties for having more than one child force some mothers in China to make extraordinary claims (The Times, London, 8 November)

“If the agreement is not approved, then the talks will have failed. But I am not pessimistic.â€

A tangle of negatives from Hussein Mousavian, Iran’s chief negotiator, which obscures news of a preliminary move to halt Iran’s controversial uranium enrichment programme (The Guardian, London, 8 November)