---
title: "India’s Mars rocket blasts off, and other stories – our morning round-up"
date: "2013-11-06T08:11:51+00:00"
modified: "2013-11-06T08:11:51+00:00"
url: "https://newhumanist.org.uk/2013/11/06/indias-mars-rocket-blasts-off-and-other-stories-our-morning-round-up/"
post_id: 6010
categories: ["Uncategorised"]
---

# India’s Mars rocket blasts off, and other stories – our morning round-up

[India’s Mars rocket Mangalyaan blasts off](http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/05/india-mars-rocket-mangalyaan-blasts-off-isro)

India has launched its first Mars-bound spacecraft in a complex mission it hopes will demonstrate and advance space travel technology. Hundreds of people watched Mangalyaan, which means “Mars craft” in Hindi, take off from the east-coast island of Shriharikota and streak across the sky. (Guardian)

[Blasts at China regional Communist Party office kill one](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-24830724)

A series of small blasts have killed at least one person outside a provincial office of the ruling Communist Party in northern China, state media report. The blasts in Taiyuan in Shanxi province appeared to have been caused by home-made bombs. (BBC)

[Greek protesters rally against IMF and EU inspection](http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/05/greek-protesters-rally-against-imf-eu-inspection)

In scenes not witnessed since the beginning of Greece’s economic crisis, auditors from the European Union and International Monetary Fund came face-to-face with the full force of anti-austerity anger as protesters in Athens jeered, heckled and stopped them from leaving the finance ministry. (Guardian)

[Marvel Comics debuts female Muslim superhero](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/10429245/Marvel-Comics-debuts-female-Muslim-superhero.html)

Marvel Comics is bringing Ms. Marvel back as a 16-year-old daughter of Pakistani immigrants living in Jersey City named Kamala Khan.Teenage Ms Marvel will deal with adolescence, religion and superpowers. (Telegraph)

[Parents sue to overturn New Jersey ban on ex-gay therapy](http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/on-faith/parents-sue-to-overturn-new-jersey-ban-on-ex-gay-therapy/2013/11/05/2aad44c4-464e-11e3-95a9-3f15b5618ba8_story.html)

A South Jersey couple has filed a lawsuit against Gov. Chris Christie for signing a law this summer prohibiting licensed therapists from providing gay-to-straight “conversion” therapy to children, saying it infringes on their rights to free speech, religion and to parent their teenage son “free from unconstitutional government interference.” (Washington Post)