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Britain's Duchess of Cambridge, Kate Middleton, will give birth to the future heir to the British throne in the same hospital where the late Princess Diana gave birth to Princes William and Harry, royal sources said on Wednesday. _0"> The new royal baby, who will become third in line to the throne behind grandfather Prince Charles and father Prince William, will be born in the private Lindo wing of St Mary's Hospital in Paddington, West London.   The sources said the royal couple have still not been told the sex of the baby which is due next month as they want it to be a surprise. However speculation about the baby's sex has swirled since March when the duchess accepted a teddy saying: "Thank you, I'll take this for my d.." Bookmaker William Hill said this dropped "d" led to such wide speculation that the baby was a girl that it suspended all bets on gender just weeks later while rival bookmaker Paddy Power paid out on bets that it was

Legendary country singer and songwriter Slim Whitman, known for his smooth falsetto and high-pitched yodeling talent, died in Florida on Wednesday at the age of 90, his son-in-law said. Roy Beagle, who is married to Whitman's daughter Sharon, said the singer-songwriter who was born Ottis Dewey Whitman Jr. was admitted to hospital on Tuesday. "He died last night at the Orange Park hospital at about 12:45 this morning of heart failure," Beagle told Reuters. "We had a 90th birthday party for him in January and he looked good, but he had been in failing health since then."   Whitman, who was self-taught on the guitar and had a string of hits including "Rose Marie," "Indian Love Call" and "Secret Love," recorded dozens of albums and sold millions of records during his career, which began in the late 1940s. Whitman was working in a shipyard in Florida when he was discovered by Colonel Tom Parker, who later became Elvis Presley's

Vince Flynn, the best-selling author of the Mitch Rapp series of political thrillers that includes "American Assassin" and "The Last Man," died on Wednesday at age 47 after a battle with prostate cancer, his representatives said. Flynn, who turned to writing as a way of fighting his dyslexia, died at a hospital in his hometown of St. Paul, Minnesota, said David Brown, spokesman for Atria Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster that publishes the author's novels.   Flynn's most recently published book was "The Last Man" in 2012. Atria will put out "The Survivor" in October. All but one of Flynn's 14 novels center on fictional character Mitch Rapp, an operative for the Central Intelligence Agency who targets Islamic militants and often takes extreme measures to achieve his goals. Flynn regularly made the New York Times best-seller list, and after the publication of his 2007 novel "Protect and Defend" he began topping t

Veteran heavy-metal band Black Sabbath landed its first No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 album chart on Wednesday, more than four decades after the rockers debuted their first album in the United States. "13," the 19th studio album from Black Sabbath, sold 155,000 copies in its first week, according to figures from Nielsen SoundScan, knocking last week's No. 1 album by Queens of the Stone Age off the top spot on the weekly U.S. album chart. Black Sabbath, an English rock band fronted by lead singer Ozzy Osbourne, released their debut self-titled album in North America in 1970, but were never able to notch the top spot on the Billboard 200 album chart in a career spanning 43 years.   "The news is absolutely amazing - we couldn't have imagined this would happen," guitarist and founding member Tony Iommi said in a statement. Osbourne added, "to finally have our first No. 1 album in the U.S. is another incredible milestone for Black Sabbath." Fre

Actor James Gandolfini, best known for his Emmy-winning portrayal of a conflicted New Jersey mob boss in the acclaimed HBO cable television series "The Sopranos," has died while vacationing in Rome, the network said on Wednesday. _0"> Gandolfini, who was 51, died of a possible heart attack, HBO spokeswoman Mara Mikialian told Reuters. (Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy; Writing by Steve Gorman; Editing by Cynthia Johnston)

The artistic director of Russia's Bolshoi Ballet, burned in an acid attack allegedly masterminded by a dancer, is nearly blind despite 18 operations to save his sight, a theatre spokeswoman said on Thursday. The attack on Sergei Filin, which exposed poisonous rivalries over roles, power and pay at the theatre, has cast a long shadow over Russia's premier cultural symbol, from which it is still struggling to escape. At a news conference dedicated to the theatre's 2013-2014 season program, Filin's absence was palpable as he prepared to undergo what Bolshoi spokeswoman Katerina Novikova said would be his 19th operation at a clinic in Germany to save his eyesight. "I spoke with Sergei three days ago, and Sergei said the situation is such that he cannot see out of one eye at all, and he can see 10 percent out of the other eye," Novikova said. She would not comment on the chances his eyesight will be restored. Filin, 42, has vowed to come back to the Bolshoi.

Lebanon's annual Baalbek music festival has been forced to move from its usual venue among Roman ruins in the Bekaa Valley because of rocket fire and a spillover of fighting from Syria , organizers said on Thursday. Baalbek is a stronghold of the Lebanese Shi'ite militant group Hezbollah, which is fighting across the border alongside its ally Syrian President Bashar al-Assad against a two-year-old rebel uprising. Rockets thought to have been fired by supporters of the Syrian revolt over the past few weeks have landed in Baalbek and Hezbollah fighters have fought Syrian rebels on Lebanese soil east of the town. The town is home to some of the best preserved Roman temples, in which world-renowned musicians such as jazz vocalist Ella Fitzgerald and British singer Sting have performed. Nayla de Freij, chairwoman of the Baalbek International Festival Committee, said that security concerns made holding the event among the town's ruins an "impossibility". But she