"Ours started late, so our lunar exploration cannot follow the beaten track, but must go ahead with a new strategy and long-term designs."

Ooyang Ziyuan, a senior adviser to China's lunar program, on the eve of last Monday's launch of the lunar probe Chang'e-3, which officials hope will bring China closer to putting an astronaut on the moon.

"You can imagine how much I am shaken by the contradictions between the findings of the best experts in Europe in this domain."

Suha Arafat, widow of Yasser Arafat, challenged last week's findings that countered a 2004 Swiss report stating the PLO leader died of poisoning.

(China Daily 12/08/2013 page1)