White House issued President Obama's birth certificate

The White House has released President Barack Obama's birth certificate, in response to persistent rumours he was not born in the US. Mr Obama had previously released an official "certification of live birth" showing he was born in Hawaii. But fringe "birther" theorists have insisted Mr Obama was actually born in his father's native Kenya, making him ineligible to be president. Recently potential Republican candidate Donald Trump has revived the rumour. On Wednesday, Mr Obama described the unprecedented move as an effort to rid the US political debate of a distraction, saying he had watched, puzzled and bemused, as the birther conspiracy had built and developed over the past years. "We do not have time for this kind of silliness," Mr Obama said. "We have better stuff to do. I have better stuff to do. We have problems we have to solve but we're going to have to focus on them, not on this."