Here in this Persian replica of Mecca, built at the cost of millions of dollars, an Iranian film company is attempting to offer the world a literal glimpse of the Prophet Muhammad despite traditional taboos against it.

The movie "Muhammad, Messenger of God" already recalls the grandeur — and expense — of a Cecil B. DeMille film, with the narrow alleyways and a replica Kaaba shrine built here in the remote village of Allahyar. But by even showing the back of the Prophet Muhammad as a child before he was called upon by Allah, the most expensive film in Iranian history already has been criticized before its even widely released, calling into question who ultimately will see the Quranic story come to life on the big screen.

The Burmese slaves sat on the floor and stared through the rusty bars of their locked cage, hidden on a tiny tropical island thousands of miles from home.

Just a few yards away, other workers loaded cargo ships with slave-caught seafood that clouds the supply networks of major supermarkets, restaurants and even pet stores in the United States.

A lawyer representing a Jewish family trying to retrieve a long-lost Matisse painting looted by the Nazis said Tuesday a deal had been signed with the German government for its restitution.

London-based attorney Christopher Marinello, who works for the Rosenberg family, said that the order inked by German Culture Minister Monika Gruetters had now paved the way for the 1921 masterpiece "Seated Woman" to be handed back.

An Egyptian elementary school teacher has been arrested for allegedly beating a girl and cutting off a lock of her hair because she was not wearing a hijab, an official said Tuesday.

The staff member, who teaches religion in the Fayum province west of Cairo, was detained on Monday for a period of four days pending an investigation, the prosecution official added.

The finalists for the prestigious Man Booker International Prize were announced in Cape Town on Tuesday, with 10 authors from around the world, including Lebanese Hoda Barakat, contending for the 60,000 pound (nearly $90,000) prize.

The prize is awarded every two years to an author who has published fiction either originally in English or whose work is generally available in English.

Chinese authorities are gathering evidence that a statue that was displayed at a mummy exhibit in Hungary belongs to a village in southeastern China, ahead of possible diplomatic talks to retrieve the treasure, an official said Tuesday.

The investigation followed a weekend report by the official Xinhua News Agency that the mummy statue featured at the MummyWorld Exhibition in Budapest was stolen from Yangchun village in Fujian province in 1995.

A still-life watercolor painting of flowers by a young Adolf Hitler will be sold at auction in Los Angeles this week, organizers announced Monday.

The 1912 canvas, painted by the Nazi-leader-to-be when he was a struggling artist in his mid-20s, is going under the hammer at the Nate D. Sanders auction house on Thursday.

London office workers are coming face-to-face with the history hidden beneath their feet, as 3,000 skeletons dating back to the 16th century are dug up to make way for a new railway line.

Between the glass and steel towers of the City of London financial district lies the Bedlam burial ground, the final resting place for thousands of people who died between 1569 and 1738.

A controversial sculpture of former king Juan Carlos of Spain being sodomised has finally gone on display in Barcelona.

The decision to show the "very sensitive" papier mache sculpture by Austrian artist Ines Doujak comes after the director of Barcelona's Museum of Contemporary Art reversed an earlier ruling.

A Chinese province is seeking the return of a 1,000-year-old mummified monk that experts say was stolen two decades ago and resurfaced at an exhibition in Hungary.

A Buddha statue containing a monk's remains has been on display at the Mummy World Exhibition at Budapest's Hungarian Natural History Museum, which brings together 28 preserved corpses from different cultures around the world.